The Crockett Chronicles- The Complete Collection
Page 88
Mat shook his head. “I can’t take you there. Not without some kind of security team. Your new husband would kill me deader than dead.”
“If you will not take me, I will go on my own.” New husband or not, she almost added. Michael was on call for a flight today, anyway. He would not learn of this before she returned tonight.
Mat paused. His eyes gave him away before he spoke. “This is against my better judgment, but there’s a guy who owes me. Let’s go.”
Hien returned the film canisters she had planned to develop to her purse for another time and grabbed her camera before Mat changed his mind.
“C’mon Hien, the sooner we leave, the sooner we can get back to Saigon.”
* * *
The cargo hold of the C-130 Hercules allowed no room for conversation. The plane’s four engines roared loud enough to silence the most talkative. That left Hien running scenarios in her mind and asking herself questions she had no information with which to answer. Mat appeared calm, from the waist up. The rhythm of his right knee bouncing the entire flight belied him.
The second they rolled to a stop, he was out of his seat, heading for the cockpit.
“When do you need to take off?”
The pilot, Juan Andrade, shrugged. “This is a turnaround flight. Just long enough to unload.”
“Can you give us an hour?”
“An hour, yeah, I’ll stretch it that far. But, if you’re not back, I’m not waiting.”
Hien grabbed Mat’s arm, speaking in his ear. “Tell him not to leave us!”
“She says don’t leave us.”
Juan shrugged again. “Then be back in an hour.” He returned his attention to the controls.
“We’d better move. I’ll get a vehicle.” Mat climbed out and ran for the operations shack, leaving Hien to dismount the plane on her own.
She followed, only to have him return, running with keys in hand.
“Let’s go.” He grabbed her elbow, steering her toward a jeep on the edge of the runway. They both jumped in, he started it up, and they were on their way into the city. Hien gave him directions to her parents’ apartment building. That was the easiest place to start.
Fifteen minutes later, they pulled up in front. Everything looked the same, though different. The tree outside her old bedroom window appeared taller. The flowers in the pot beside the door bore a different color. A neighbor she did not recognize swept the stoop of the adjacent building. Her heart did a little twist. This must be the definition of bittersweet.
Clambering out, she motioned for Mat to follow, and ran to her parents’ door, what used to be her door. She tried her old key, but it did not work. She reinserted it, trying again. It would not turn. Hien left the key in the lock and knocked. “Mẹ, chính là con.” She called to her mother. Now she could hear her brother’s dog, Bao, barking from the back of the apartment. Surely someone was there. Bao grew quiet. She knocked again. “I do not understand, Mat. Mother should be here.”
Mat tapped her shoulder, put his finger to his lips, and pointed down.
A small piece of paper stuck out from the threshold. The folded sheet moved, sliding further out. She stooped to retrieve and open it. Only three scrawled words.
Rời khỏi, Nguy!
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