Josh rubbed his chin as he nodded. “Smart thinking.”
“So, either someone makes it out here in the next eight hours, or they’re on their own?” Carducci’s distaste of the situation could clearly be heard in his tone.
“As it stands now, Tony, we don’t know if Delta and Taylor are alive. For all we know, Connie could be trying to dig them out; she could be captured or worse. There are just too many unknowns. Our best bet is to locate the caverns by air and see what needs to be done to excavate. It may take getting the government involved, but tough shit.”
Tony shook his head. The solution was still unsatisfactory. “Maybe I should stay here, then. Just in case.”
“In case what? In case the Colombians decide to storm the beach? Think about it, Tony.”
Sal scooted next to Carducci and put her hand in his. “You’d do her more good in the air, Tony. We’re sitting ducks here.”
Carducci looked at Sal and slowly nodded. “Okay. But we give Connie the full eight hours; not a minute less.”
Sal grinned. “You got it.”
Carducci looked at the black sheet of jungle before him and sighed. Eight hours. If she wasn’t back by then, he wasn’t sure what he was going to do.
If they didn’t get to the shore before dawn, Delta wasn’t sure what she was going to do. Taylor needed medical attention right away, yet to travel through the jungle during the day would become more and more treacherous the closer they got to the beach. Surely, Zahn knew that the coast was where the escape party would head. He would be prepared.
Carrying Taylor made the going slower than Delta would have liked, but she was grateful she didn’t have to do it alone anymore. Looking at Connie, Delta warmed inside.
“Con?”
“Yeah?” Connie answered, not looking at Delta.
“We gonna make it?”
Connie stopped, forcing Delta to stop as well. It was nearly impossible to see Connie’s features. “Seriously?”
Delta nodded. “Well… yeah, seriously.”
“Hell, yeah, we’re going to make it. I didn’t come all the way back here just to lose. It’s third and long, but I have faith in our quarterback.”
“Still?”
Connie chuckled. “Always.”
Delta grinned. “How much further?”
Connie sighed. “A few hours. It’s hard to tell going so slowly.”
“Think the Colombians are waiting for us?”
“Count on it.”
“What will we do?”
Taylor moaned, and Connie readjusted her grip. “I don’t really know. We’ll have to play it by ear, see what the others have up their sleeve.”
“By ear?”
“Got a better suggestion?”
Delta shook her head. “So, we’re third and long and you want me to call an audible?”
Connie chuckled again. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”
Lifting Taylor up, Delta started ahead. “Nope. Let’s just hope it’s not the last.”
Carducci looked at his watch and sighed. In less than an hour, they would have to leave Connie behind, a notion that still didn’t sit well with him. At the very least, he figured, one of them should wait for her, just in case.
“One hour left,” he said quietly. The last seven hours had been calm, and he wondered if the Colombians had retreated, or if they, too, were waiting for the light of dawn to renew their attack. Surely, they cared more about their gold and their freedom than a scrappy bunch of people.
“You think the Colombians are still out there?” he asked Josh.
“Count on it,” Josh replied.
“But why? They’ve got their gold.”
Josh started to sit up, waking a sleeping Sal. “Do they? We cost them a shitload of gold when those caverns blew. We know where the caverns are. We know what’s in them. We’ve seen too much, Tony. The general can’t afford to let us escape.”
Sal stretched and yawned. “No sign of her?”
“Not yet,” Josh answered, patting her head.
“He can’t let us go because of the gold or because he kidnapped people?”
“Neither. This guy’s reputation will be in the dumper if word gets out about this botched scheme. He’ll be a liability to the cartels. Believe it or not, they prefer things to be all neat and tidy. If he fails at this, that’s the end of his life. He’d be better off shooting himself in the head out here.”
Carducci shook his head. He still did not understand. “The cartel’s that powerful?”
“It’s just like your beat, Tony. What happens when a main pusher goes down?”
The light bulb beamed in Tony’s head. “He becomes a liability to the supplier.”
“Exactly. The dealer may get out and still deal, but that supplier won’t be his connection anymore because the risk is too great. If we live through this, and we will, everyone in the world will know of General Zahn and what the Colombian drug lords are capable of. He won’t be able to get a job as a busboy, let alone maintain any sort of leadership role. More than likely, he’ll be fish food.”
This much, Carducci understood. Many mobsters ended up dead or missing after incarceration or bungled drug deals because they posed a threat to a bigger kingpin.
“But his men…”
“Are soldiers, Carducci, and soldiers follow orders. That’s one reason why the cartels rely so heavily on the military. Who better to do as they’re told than military personnel?”
Carducci thought about this before nodding slowly. “And you think the general wants us bad enough to come chasing after us all the way out here?”
“I have no doubt on that score. His life is over if even one of us escapes. They’re out there, Tony, just waiting.”
“Jesus…”
Josh nodded. “After all, how can he explain to his boss that a bunch of female captives escaped and killed so many of his men?”
“He can’t.”
“Exactly.”
“He’s close to desperation, and that’s a dangerous foe to face. He’ll use every man in his outfit to stop us.”
“But if they’re out there waiting, they’re between Connie and us. How in the hell will she get around them?”
Josh patted Carducci’s shoulder. “In the jungle, at night, a person can walk five feet away from you, and you’d never know it. I can’t tell you how many times we crept right up to the Cong in Nam and vice versa. If Connie’s careful enough, it’s possible she can get past the Colombians.”
“She’s running out of time,” Sal whispered. “Don’t you think she should have been here by now?”
As the blackness started to give away to a dark gay, Josh shrugged. “Maybe. Hard to tell. Connie moves well in the jungle. Must be that Native American in her.”
Sal grinned and also patted Carducci’s shoulder. “You’re right about that one. Any minute now, she’s gonna come barreling through those bushes, like the warrior woman she is.”
Regripping his rifle, Carducci slung it over the rock and checked the aim. That was definitely a sight worth waiting for.
The blackness of the night slowly ebbed, As they stopped to rest, Delta stood directly in front of Connie and whispered her concerns.
“It’s almost dawn, Con. What should we do?”
“Keep moving,” Connie whispered back. “Or Taylor won’t make it.”
Delta looked at Taylor, whose head was flopped to the side. She had been dead weight for the past six hours, and every time they stopped to rest, Delta was terrified she wouldn’t be able to find a pulse.
“Yeah. We have to chance it,” Delta acknowledged.
“Del, we have to agree that if one of us goes down, the other has to leave the injured one here.”
“No way.”
Connie grabbed Delta’s face between her hands. The early dusk was upon them, and the darkness was fading. “Listen to me!” she hissed roughly. “There’s no reason for all three of us to die in here.”
“But…”
<
br /> “But nothing! Someone has to get back to Megan and Gina and let them know what happened, or they’ll spend the rest of their lives looking for us. Is that what you want?”
“No.”
“Good. Now swear to me if anything happens to me, you’ll leave me with Taylor.”
“Con.”
“Swear it.”
Delta hesitated before finally responding with a very quiet, “I swear.”
“Good. You ready?”
“No. Wait.”
Connie paused and looked up. A slight grin played on her face. “I know, Storm. All the words you want to say to me, I already know. Right back at you. Now, let go.”
About fifteen minutes from where they had rested, Connie stopped abruptly and motioned silently to Delta. Following Connie’s gaze, Delta saw the barrel of a rifle peeking out from behind a tree. One black army boot toe also protruded from behind the gnarled trunk.
Delta lowered Taylor to the ground and pulled the machete out of the backpack. She held up a finger to Connie, who nodded and motioned that she would go around the opposite side of the tree. Delta nodded once before carefully picking her way to the right side of the tree, which had a diameter of about five feet.
From the position of the rifle, he was clearly standing, and Delta could only hope that Connie would get his attention so he’d never see it coming. Delta regripped the machete in her left hand. She’d have one chance. She’d have to go for his throat and take his head off. Thinking about what these men had done to her lover made the task that much easier.
Three feet from the tree, Delta nodded once to Connie, who tossed a rock into a group of bushes. As the rock lifted into the air, Delta stepped around the tree and started the swing of her machete. Halfway to its intended target, she pulled up and embedded the machete into the tree above the Colombian’s head. Of all the mental pictures Delta had processed prior to taking her fatal swing, what stood before her wasn’t one of them.
Standing rigid, still holding a rifle, was a Colombian soldier impaled to the tree by three long arrows, one through his neck, one through his chest, and one through his abdomen. The force from the arrows was so powerful that they held him to the trunk like a butterfly in a collector’s case. By the looks of it, the kill had been recent.
Stepping out from behind the tree, Delta waved Connie over. Connie stopped short when she saw the body.
“The Bri,” Delta whispered as Connie examined the arrow’s feathers.
“Uh huh.” Turning from the corpse, Connie grinned. “What a pleasant surprise.”
Delta did not know what to say. The people who had honored and accepted her warrior spirit into their tribe were among them now, helping Delta and Connie to escape the Colombians.
“Come on, Del, we have to hurry. Dawn’s broken, and if the Bri are out there…”
“No ifs, Con. The Bri are here. Somewhere.”
“Then let’s amscray.”
Delta dislodged the rifle from the corpse’s stiff fingers, and hung it over her shoulder. “They knew,” she said quietly as they returned to Taylor. “And they came.”
Connie hoisted Taylor’s right arm over her shoulder. “Come on, Taylor. Time to go home.”
Josh studied Carducci’s profile as dawn broke. “That’s it, Tony. Time to go.”
Carducci hadn’t taken his eyes off the forest for an hour, and still didn’t. “I can’t go. I’m sorry.”
Josh started to say something, but Sal’s soft touch on his leg and the gentle look in her eyes quieted his words. “Tony, Delta would want you to be smart here. It isn’t disloyal to save yourself first. We’ll be back. I swear.”
Still staring at the wall of jungle before him, Carducci shook his head. “I’m not doing it for her, Sal. I’m doing it for me. I’d never be able to look in the mirror if I left when she needed me most. You two go. If you get a chopper, pick me up, but I can’t stand the thought of leaving Connie out here by herself. She wouldn’t do that to me.”
“No can do, pal,” Josh replied softly. “Stay here, Tony, and you’re a dead guy.”
“Tony, we can still help her, but not here. We have to go get help,” Sal offered.
For the first time, Carducci looked at them both. “You’re sure we can get a bird in the air?” His voice was coldly metallic.
Josh and Sal both nodded. “It’s the only option we have now. But if we stay much longer, they’ll pick us off in the raft. We have to go.”
Pulling his rifle to him, Carducci bowed his head.
“It’s what she’d want,” Sal said gently. “And you know it.”
Holding back his frustration and tears, Carducci looked at Sal and nodded. “I know.”
“Let’s go,” Josh said, grabbing the raft and tossing it in the water. “As it is, we still may be sittin’ ducks in this thing.”
When Sal and Carducci hopped in, Josh started pushing the raft farther out, until the water was up to his armpits. After hopping in, he turned for one last look at the jungle.
“Don’t worry, Tony. We’ll be alright…” Stopping in midsentence, Josh squinted once before putting his rifle’s scope up to his eyes.
“What?” Sal asked, trying to follow his gaze.
“Nothing. I… wait a second… I think I saw… nah.”
“What?”
Josh lowered the scope and turned to Sal. “could’ve sworn I saw a native.”
Sal grabbed the rifle. She couldn’t see what years of jungle warfare had taught Josh to see. “I don’t see them.”
Josh took the rifle back and peered through the scope. “They’re out there. I’m sure of it.”
“They’re out there, Con. I’m sure of it.”
Once they could see the shore, Delta and Connie picked up their pace. They’d already stepped over three more dead Colombians, all with the same, long arrows embedded in them.
“Why aren’t the Colombians shooting back?” Delta asked Connie as they pushed through the foliage.
“They don’t even see it coming,” Connie answered, out of breath. She was having to take two steps to every one of Delta’s four-foot strides.
“You think they got them all?” Delta asked.
“Sure looks like they might have.”
Nodding, Delta took a few steps before her path was blocked by a grinning Colombian soldier with a rifle pointed at her chest.
“Say adios, amig—” His final sound was abruptly stifled by an arrow through the side of his throat. Like a dropped barbell, he thudded heavily to the ground, his hand clawing in vain at the arrow protruding from his neck.
“Let me have her,” Delta ordered, pulling Taylor from Connie.
“But…”
“But nothing. Get your ass out of here. We’ll move faster now if I sling her over my shoulder.”
Hesitating just a moment, Connie nodded as she watched Delta toss Taylor over her shoulders like a sack of dog food. “Go, Connie, and don’t stop until you’re out to sea.”
Connie took one step and turned back. “I love you, Storm.”
Delta nodded. “I love you too, Chief.”
With that, Connie took off running, with Delta not far behind.
Her legs struggling beneath the weight, Delta watched Connie’s back as she opened the distance between them. As Connie’s feet finally hit the sand, Delta prayed that the absence of gunfire would continue until Connie was safely out to sea. Her prayers, however, went unheard. Connie wasn’t ten yards onto the sand when the first rifle shot of the morning cracked through the air. Connie managed one more step before landing face-first on the beach.
“No!” Delta’s anguished cry erupted as she pushed herself through the final bushes. “Connie!” Trying to balance Taylor’s weight, Delta stumbled and faltered. When she regained her footing, she was surprised to see Connie up and running again, feverishly trying to get to the water, where bullet impact would be greatly minimized. Movement in the distance caught her eye, and Delta saw two men get out of a raft and make th
eir way toward Connie.
Several more shots were fired, but that was about all, and Delta knew why. Every rifle sound alerted the Bri to the location of the shooter, who would soon look like a human pincushion.
The thought put a smile on Delta’s face, and when her feet finally hit sand, she ran as if she were free of any burden. Ahead of her by nearly seventy yards, Connie was suddenly embraced by Carducci. Delta had hoped that they’d actually waited all night for Connie’s return, and there they were, standing neck deep in water, pulling Connie into the surf before pushing her over the side and into the raft, where Sal pulled her in. Carducci and Connie remained in the raft while Josh crawled on his belly back to the rocks that had protected them through the night. With rifle in hand, Josh fired two rounds into the forest just to the right of where Delta emerged, carrying Taylor across her shoulders like a yoke.
Her legs slogged through the unforgiving sand, and Delta reached the shore just as a burst of bullets sprayed water across them.
“Take her!” Delta commanded Carducci and Sal, flopping Taylor’s limp body into their arms. “Go! We’ll cover you.” Delta grabbed one of the rifles lying on the floor of the raft and swam back to the beach.
As more bullets peppered the sand, Delta dove behind the rocks next to Josh. Delta squeezed the trigger of her rifle, sending bullets high into the trees. She could not afford to shoot head level for fear of hitting any Bri. The best she could do was to appear to shoot back, allowing the small raft to get beyond harm’s reach.
“The Bri are in there, Josh. Don’t take any head shots. We’ll have to take them low.”
“Got it.” Josh fired a round into the kneecap of a soldier who went down screaming and cursing. “Like that?”
Delta looked at him and saw him grinning. If she didn’t know him better, she would have thought he was enjoying this. “Just like that.”
“We have to give them enough time to get out of here,” Josh said, firing and killing another Colombian, whose body fell from a fifteen-foot tree. “And I’m just about out of ammo.”
Storm Surge (Delta Stevens Crime Logs Book 6) Page 23
