by Andy Lucas
Nobody needed any persuading to head back down the path and over to the helicopter. As soon as they reached the aircraft, Hammond took the gun from Sarah and bundled her into the co-pilot’s seat. He waved the pilot and co-pilot into the back seats with the gun before climbing in after them.
With the engine already hot from the last hour of strenuous use, the machine fired up instantly and was soon clawing for altitude in the flanks of the angry storm. Circling the container once, feeling the need to take a final look, Pace brought the aircraft around on a bearing back to Manaus and gunned the engine hard.
Climbing to three thousand feet, they had enough fuel to take them nearly two hundred miles. He got straight on the radio and managed to raise McEntire. Pace did not divulge any details over the airwaves, other than to tell him who was onboard, their direction and airspeed.
A small airfield within Pace’s fuel range was agreed and Pace altered course, pleased to see the rain ease outside as they passed out from beneath the storm and broke into clear, star-sprinkled skies. The moon shone so brightly that visibility stretched for miles and he would have marvelled at the breathtaking beauty if his heart had not been so heavy.
‘You did a good job, James,’ ventured Sarah gently. ‘Amanda would have been proud of you.’
‘If I’ve done anything good, it’s been inspired by others.’
‘Of course,’ she smiled, feigning arrogance and planting a soft kiss on his defenceless cheek. ‘That’s because we’re all a team now. We bring out the best in each other.’
Pace nodded and settled back in his seat to concentrate on getting them to the airfield in one piece.
‘That is very true.’
Behind him, Baker closed his eyes and drifted off into a light sleep. This adventure was over but the McEntire Corporation would doubtless need his services again soon, as it would those of the man now flying them all to safety.
James Pace’s life was never going to be quite the same again.
Epilogue
The pain was palpable, going around and around angrily inside her skull like a dog chasing its tail. Her eyes were closed and it was a real effort to force the sticky lids to open. When they finally pulled apart, the gloom outside did little to brighten her mood. Sitting, alone in the darkness, looking out over the sombre river, Ruby knew she was in serious trouble.
Her left arm hung limply down by her side after being badly smashed. She should have been dead, she knew that. She still couldn’t decide how all the other bullets that had wrecked the hovercraft and sent its shattered remains to the riverbed could have missed her. Only two of them had found her; one at the shoulder and another that had gouged a deep furrow of flesh out of the top of her hairline.
The pain in her arm was intense but she was so weak from loss of blood and dehydration that her head hurt more. Her arm needed to be strapped up but she had no belt to bind it with and no knife to cut vines loose from the trees. The deep gash running across the top of her skull no longer bled but the crusted wound now offered a home for buzzing black flies that she didn’t have the strength to swat away.
Cosmos had not been so lucky. As they had nosed the hovercraft out into the river, preparing to make a dash for the city, two speed boats carrying heavy calibre machine guns had swept into the main channel from their hiding places, set back in small tributaries downstream, and opened up on them.
One of the very first bullets had found the Kenyan; the larger ammunition easily breaching the Kevlar impregnated hull. One minute she had been talking with him, the next he had slumped in his chair, as his head exploded against the inside of the cockpit in a welter of blood and brain matter. Then the hovercraft had literally been shot to pieces around her. Fully expecting to die, she’d remained in her seat.
Just as the two bullets had hit her, the floor had fallen away beneath her and she’d been tipped into the river, sinking deeply and being swept along by a surprisingly swift current; agonisingly flapping her useless arm against her body.
It seemed like hours before she surfaced and was finally able to gasp a deep breath of warm air. The sound of gunfire had died away and she couldn’t see the boats, but she couldn’t swim for the shore, which was by then some thirty feet away. Helplessly she had drifted within the iron grip of the current, waiting to succumb to her injuries, eventually washing up onto a small sand bar nearly two hours later.
Shivering and exhausted, Ruby had waded the few feet across to the main river bank, staggered up the gentle bank, and promptly passed out.
Dishevelled in her tattered, stained running suit, she wondered for a moment if there were any mercenaries nearby, who might end her suffering quickly. Then she thought about Sasha and a faint smile found its way onto her lips, dispelling any thoughts of suicide from her mind.
And what about Pace? What about all the trials they had faced together to get this far? Was he dead too? He’d never returned from his trip to find the source of the radio message, so it had obviously been a trap. She and Cosmos had decided to follow his final instructions and try to make it back together. But Cosmos was now dead and she was sure that James was also as dead as the Kenyan athlete. Good lives wasted, and for what?
It was a good question but it didn’t alter the fact that they were gone, and she was the only one left alive. It was all up to her now; to get back to civilisation and tell their story. She knew she had to survive, if for no other reason than to make sure they had not perished in vain.
‘And that means doing something about your arm, patching the hole in your head, and getting moving,’ she chided herself, glad to hear her own voice in the loneliness of a jungle night.
Searching around at the edges of the bank, she managed to find a strand of fallen creeper, which she lashed like a high belt around her chest. Lifting her damaged arm up with her good hand, she jammed it inside the tight band, relieved that the weight of the useless limb was instantly supported. Kneeling down by the water’s edge, warily eyeing the dark, softly rippled surface for signs of hungry predators, Ruby carefully washed most of the matted blood from the wound in her scalp. She winced with each careful sweep of her fingers but persevered until she was satisfied that it was as clean as she could get it by bathing it in a muddy river.
Ruby wished fervently that she had some of the antibiotic tablets to ward off possible infection but their supplies had gone down with the hovercraft. Instead, she selected a large, flat leaf from a nearby bush and pressed it against the wound with her hand.
Drawing in a fortifying breath, she knew she had only one hope. Follow the river downstream, keeping to the bank. In the end, if she was lucky, she might get back to the city in one piece. It was a long way to go on foot, especially hampered by serious injuries, and she refused to fool herself about her chances of making it. Within a few hours, she was likely to be as much a ghost as her fallen companions. But there was no choice. The dead deserved better than for her to just lie down and give up.
‘Come on then,’ she resolved, somewhat dubiously. ‘At the end of this damned riverbank, the world awaits you.’
Walking gingerly, forcing the pain from her mind as best she could, Ruby kept the river to her left and noted the ominous growls of thunder in the disgruntled skies above.
‘At least it will keep the insects away,’ she sniffed, swallowing down the growing sense of wretchedness that was gnawing at her insides. Indecision was her biggest enemy now and she was determined not to let fear get the best of her.
Hugging the edge of the jungle closely, she began the walk of her life, whistling softly to keep her spirits up.
‘Here we go then.’
As if the forest knew she needed company, the rain decided to fall again, this time in soothing, quiet curtains. Unseen, however, and shrouded by the thick vegetation, a dozen malevolent eyes were watching.
Silently, purposefully, they followed her.
If you enjoyed RACE AMAZON, get the new James Pace thriller duology and continue the adventure!
> SKELETON GOLD: Scorpion, available now.
For more information about the author, including impending new releases, please visit www.andylucasbooks.