by Dale Mayer
“And I’m sure those two men you saved appreciated the rescue too.”
She laughed. “Hopefully, because, man, that was a rough go there for a while.”
“I’m sure it was,” he said. “We heard reports of the plane going down and knew we were the closest in the area, but we were still way too far out to save anybody in the short-term.”
“Well, thankfully we’re here,” she said, “and that’s the least of our issues right now.”
“Exactly. Did you hear any of the details?”
“No, outside of the fact that they said the plane blew up, and, by the time they were hit, they barely had time to get out.”
“When it’s flying that low, it becomes quite a catastrophe just to stay alive.”
“Well, it was, but thankfully they made it,” she said. “Although they’re missing one man.”
“I know. The Coast Guard is out looking,” he said.
“Good.”
He led her to the mess hall. “There’s hot coffee and tea here, if you want something.”
She immediately reached for a cup and the coffeepot. Once that was filled, she snagged a muffin and said, “This will do for a start.”
He just chuckled and said, “Dinner will be here in an hour or so.” He walked her to where two navy men sat, both in uniform. Both men stood and shook her hand. She heard their names, but, at this point, names and faces were a blur, although one was the captain. She smiled when they asked her to seat herself, and she sat down. As soon as she sat, the men sat down too.
She appreciated the respect, although she suspected it was their training. She looked at the two men and said, “Thank you very much for the help.”
“Well, in this case, the rescuer needed rescuing,” he said, “but that was partly on us. We couldn’t get a second trip in fast enough, and we ended up sending you out farther into the rough water, which was not the right answer.”
“It just seemed like you wouldn’t make it back to get the second man, and I didn’t want him to die.”
“Understood. And much appreciated,” he said.
Then the other man offered, “I’m sorry about your boat.”
She winced. “Yeah, me too.”
“Is it yours?”
She nodded slowly. “I’ve had it for quite a few years now,” she said. “So it’ll take me a bit to get over the loss.”
“So where are you currently living?”
She realized they were asking for details about her that went beyond making conversation. “I’m a surgical nurse out of Perth, with odd hours, long hours, so don’t get to sail as much as I would like,” she said. “Plus, my boat is berthed in Sydney because my brother and I had a tradition to come out to these waters for years. Yet I have a friend whose boat is docked in Perth. So we kinda have a boat-share thing going. I’ve kept my boat here in Sydney and come out during my holidays.”
“I’m sorry. This is not what you needed on a holiday getaway.”
“Maybe so,” she said. “But, at the same time, it is what it is.”
They discussed her work, her life, and her holiday a little bit. She wasn’t sure if they were prying or just trying to be friendly.
She asked, “What about the two men? Any chance I could see them?”
“We can arrange that,” the captain said, looking at Petty Officer Joe Smithson. “Get an update for us, will you?”
Immediately he rose and disappeared.
“It’s the first man I’m really worried about,” she said. “He was never conscious all the time I had him.”
“I understood his condition is more severe,” the captain said.
The petty officer returned a few minutes later. “The one is still unconscious. The second is awake, and, yes, I can take you down to see them.”
With that, she stood, leaving her empty coffee cup and the muffin wrapper behind. With a smile, she said, “Thanks for the coffee and the snack.”
“Dinner is in an hour,” the captain said. “Not to worry, we’ll make sure you’re well fed.”
“And then what?” she asked curiously. “Do I get a ride back somewhere?”
“Yes, as soon as the weather calms down,” he said. “We’ll fly you into shore, if we can’t take you, or we’ll send you on by boat.”
“That would be much appreciated,” she said. Then she turned and followed Joe. As they walked, she asked him, “Did they get any details on the first guy? Like what his injuries are?”
“If they did, they didn’t tell me,” he said.
She fell silent after that because, of course, it was all about hierarchy here and the need to know. She had dealt with the same in the hospital. As it was, even with her escort, she got completely lost getting to the sick bay area. They had stairs and hallways and more hallways and more stairs. “How do you not get lost in these ships?” she muttered.
He laughed. “It takes a bit to get used to, but most of them are built in a fairly similar way. So, once you’ve been on one, you’re pretty good at understanding how the others work.”
“Says you, but, at least if I go on a cruise ship, diagrams are on every landing,” she complained good-naturedly. “Here? I haven’t seen anything to tell me where I am, just a series of numbers and letters.”
“The numbers and letters indicate your levels and whether you are forward or aft,” he said. “What’s located on each floor isn’t something that we post.”
“You probably should though,” she said. Just then he turned and went through a set of double doors. She followed behind to a medical center. It was funny how they immediately went from one to the next, and it didn’t seem to matter whether you were on a ship or in a hospital. It looked like a fully functional medical facility, and she instantly felt at home. Several men stood off to one side.
The petty officer cleared his throat, and the men looked up. He said, “This is the woman who came on board with us along with those two men.”
One of the doctors walked over, frowning. “Are you hurt?”
She shook her head. “No, just heartsick that my boat went under,” she said with a laugh. “How are the two men I picked up?”
“You picked them up, huh?” She nodded. “I’d love to know more about what you saw when you found them,” he said.
“Why?” she asked.
“Just to see the kind of injuries they may have. We’re taking x-rays and doing a full workup on the unconscious man right now.”
“That’s Garret,” she said. “How is Ryland?”
“Ryland is awake and will probably be happy to see you. We’ve popped his leg back into place. He’s got a couple hairline fractures and a lot of soft tissue damage that he’ll notice for the next month and a half,” he said with a smile, “but we don’t have to do any surgical intervention for him.”
“Well, that’s good, except for what? Two hundred stitches?”
He laughed. “Yes, it was about two hundred, now that you mention it. Good guess.”
“I’m a surgical nurse,” she said.
He looked at her with interest. “Good to know. I may need your services while you’re here.”
She looked at him in surprise. “Why is that?”
“We’re not happy with Garret’s condition, and I may need to go in and take a look. Normally I’d send him out on a helicopter, but, with the weather right now, we’re not flying.”
Garret, although he was safe, was not out of danger by any means.
*
Ryland heard the voices in the other room. He was hoping he heard the voice of the woman who had plucked them out of the ocean. It was a woman for sure and sounded like it could be her. He tried to look through the glass pane to his doors, but some film was over it, giving him an unclear visual.
Just then the double doors opened, and the doctor walked in. “You have a visitor,” he said.
Sure enough, it was her.
She walked up to him, a big smile breaking across his face. “Hey, I’m so glad to see you loo
king better.”
“Well, yeah, considering most of the breaks aren’t major,” he said. “Also they got my leg put back in place, so I’m feeling a whole lot better than I deserve to be.”
“Isn’t that the truth,” she said, nodding. “But you have a lot of soft tissue damage.”
“Always,” he said. “Just like any explosion, you take a blow like that in the sky, and then you fall into the water, which is another hard-impact injury. It’s not easy.”
“You did have a chute on your back, didn’t you?”
“We did, and it slowed the plummet but didn’t stop it because we were too close to the ground.”
“Understood, but, outside of a few breaks, dislocations, and over two hundred stitches,” she said with a laugh, “how are you feeling?”
He gave her a big grin. “I’m alive,” he said, “and I’m pretty thankful for that, all things considered.”
She nodded. “Your friend is still unconscious and in serious shape,” she said quietly. “They’re running him through a bunch of tests, but they’re afraid that they may have to open him up to see what’s going on.”
“Well, at least we’re here in a safe place with specialists on hand.”
“They’ll try to get us off here,” she said, “but a hell of a storm is brewing.”
“Exactly. That’s how these things go,” he said. “Well, you and I are safe and sound, so it comes down to whether or not they can handle whatever Garret needs.”
“We won’t know just yet.”
Ryland nodded and smiled. “How did you happen to be out there in the middle of the ocean?”
He listened while she told him about taking time away from her job at the hospital in Perth. “It’s always been a favorite holiday destination,” she said, “so I kept my boat docked in Sydney.”
“I’m sorry to ruin your holiday,” he said, and he really was sorry. That was shitty for anybody, and he hoped like hell she had insurance on her boat, but he didn’t have a clue how that worked.
“It is what it is,” she said.
Something in her tone suggested a lot more was going on in her world than she’d shared, but then why would she tell him? “We were heading toward Australia to pick up the rest of our team,” he said. “I need to contact them.” He sat up and looked around. “I guess there’s no phone or anything that I could use to call them.”
Now that he had a good chance to study her, he saw the high cheekbones and the clear blue eyes, her wet hair now braided down the side. She was tall, trim, and dressed in a shirt obviously a little too small across the chest, but provided a delightful strain on the buttons, and pants that somewhat fit. “I gather your clothes were soaking wet?”
“Everything I have is soaking wet,” she said. “I don’t know if my phone survived or not. I left it in my room.”
“I need to get a message out to the guys. They were expecting the plane.”
“Well, if you give me a number to call …” she said, looking around for something to write it down on. Not finding anything, she disappeared out into the main room.
He collapsed back, taking several deep breaths because, damn, he was really sore.
When she returned with a small notepad and a pen, he wrote down the number and said to contact Cain.
“Okay, what am I to tell him?”
“Just tell him what you know—that the plane exploded midair, that you rescued the two of us, but we … we’re missing Bullard.” At that, his voice cracked. She looked up at him, but he just sighed. “He’s a good friend … and my boss.”
“Will do,” she said and then hesitated. “Anything you need?”
“They’re bringing me soft food,” he said. “I’m getting IVs for liquids and vitamin shots, so I’ll be fine. What about you?”
“I’m supposed to get dinner in an hour, and there was talk of flying to land,” she said, “but I think, with the storm, if they can’t get you guys out, chances are they can’t get me out either.”
“No,” he said. “It’s all about safety for the crew and the passengers.”
“Understood,” she said, as she smiled and patted his hand. “I know that you’re pretty banged up, but you’re lucky to be alive.”
“And I’m alive, thanks to you,” he said softly.
She looked down to see where she patted him. “I’m sorry,” she said. “OMG the skin has been flayed right off you.”
“Wouldn’t be so bad,” he said, with a note of humor in his voice, “but after they flayed the skin off me, they dropped me in saltwater.”
“Ouch,” she said with a laugh. “Mother Nature was a bitch today.”
“Maybe she had good reason,” he said. “I wish I knew what made the plane go down.”
“Did you have any warning?”
He shook his head. “No, we were just coming in and maneuvering a better position. We weren’t even very far out anymore. We were at the end of a very long flight, coming from Texas in the US. We had stopped in Hawaii to refuel.”
“And it just happened, at the very end?”
He nodded.
“Bizarre,” she said. “Anything suspicious about it?”
His gaze narrowed, as he studied her. “I don’t know,” he said. “Outside of the fact that the plane went down from an explosion, which is always suspicious.”
“Right,” she said. “Not that I know anything about it, I just wondered.”
“And with good reason,” he said quietly. “The thing is, I don’t know. Until I can get back on my feet, I don’t have any idea what happened, but I will find out.”
“Well, you’re not getting on your feet for a little while,” she said. “So give up that idea.”
“Oh, I’ll be up pretty damn fast.” She frowned at him, but he just gave her a crooked grin. “It’s hard to keep me down.”
“I know guys like you,” she said. “Big and tough until something bigger and tougher knocks you sideways, and then it’s even harder to get you back on your feet.” She shook her head. “Even the big guys drop. And sometimes harder than they expect.”
“I know,” he said, “but the longer I sit here and think about it, I’m worried about the rest of my team. Because, if we were targeted, maybe they are in danger too.”
She stopped and stared at him. “Targeted? Your team?”
He shrugged. “We run an international security company, and Bullard’s the head of it. We’re stationed out of Africa, but we work with other companies around the world. One of them is in Texas, and, in our line of work, we’ve made some pretty big enemies.”
“Oh,” she said, studying him with alarm. “Like enemies who would blow you out of the air? That kind of enemies?”
“Enemies who would blow us out of the air and leave us to die in the ocean. Absolutely,” he said. “You can bet that I’m already plenty pissed that there’s no sign of Bullard around. Because if they took him out …” With that, his voice trailed off, as he thought of what would be the repercussions of something like that.
“Well, don’t even start thinking along those lines,” she said, reaching out to softly grab his fingers. He looped his fingers with hers. “You first have to heal.”
“I do,” he said, “but then? All bets are off.”
“Well, there’s nothing you can do while you’re here, so relax,” she said. “You need your strength.”
“Go make that phone call for me, will you?”
“I’ll see what I can do,” she said. “I can’t guarantee you that my phone works at all. But the navy should be sending out messages from here to whoever you need, to let them know that they’ve picked us up.”
“Well, I know that the alerts have likely already gone out,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean anybody in my group knows.”
She frowned at him.
“Please,” he said, his voice steady and low. “It’s important.”
Chapter 3
Just something in the tone of Ryland’s voice worried Tabi, as she wa
lked down the hallway, hoping she would find her room soon. As a sailing enthusiast, she had a very good sense of internal navigation, but this ship was giving her fits, and she’d already had to backtrack several times. But she was determined to see if her phone would work. His words had already been enough to send her hustling out of there. But the doctor had again asked her on the sly if she was available, in case he needed a hand.
“Absolutely,” she said, “but don’t you have a half-dozen people here ready and able to do this?”
“Maybe,” he said, “but we’ve also got two down in sick bay. And this isn’t something I want to start with somebody green.”
“Got it,” she said. “If you need me, I’m there.” She just hoped that it didn’t happen. It was one thing to be a surgical nurse in her nice perfect hospital, with a system that she understood, versus being here, dealing with something that was much more an off-the-cuff emergency surgery. But, because it was an emergency, she would help in any way she could. That didn’t mean it would be easy though.
Finally she stopped and stared at the room in front of her. She thought it was the right one. She quickly unlocked it and stepped inside, relieved when she saw her personal belongings on the bed and only hers. She hadn’t even considered that she could be rooming with a second person here. This was not a world that she wanted to live in. And, therefore, it wasn’t something that she touched on very often.
She walked to her phone, where she’d taken it apart and pulled out the battery, so it could all dry. Checking it, she realized it was pretty dry to the touch and popped it back together. She turned it on and actually had power. She quickly dialed the number Ryland had given her and waited for someone to answer.
“Identify yourself.”
Surprised for a moment, she replied, “I’m Tabi Sutherland, calling on behalf of Ryland Roscoe.”
There was a short silence on the other end, then he asked, “Where is he?”
“We’re both aboard a US naval ship,” she said. “Their plane was blown out of the air, and he and Garret managed to survive long enough for me to pick them up on my boat. We were heading toward the navy ship, when the weather came up. I have since lost my boat and am on board the naval ship as well.”