The Espionage Effect(91)
Why couldn’t that unquestionable support have come from my parents?
At least Anna’s belief that I would find my way had been absolute, even if her identity and motives had been a lie.
After another ninety seconds and endless climbing, we reached a bulkhead door at the uppermost landing. Alec grasped the escape wheel handle, spun it to the left as metal dogs scraped free from the hidden framework inside, then pushed the door open.
Cool, salty air burst over my face as I stepped over the bulkhead lip and onto the outer deck. A clear night sky stretched over us, black velvet speckled with bright pinpricks of light.
Dead ahead, Escobar’s sleek black helicopter glinted in the darkness. I glanced up to where a light source emanated from. The backside of the captain’s bridge towered over us.
Earlier when we’d first arrived, when Escobar held a punishing grip on my elbow and Alec had been surrounded by a half dozen guards, I hadn’t taken note of the deck where we’d landed; I’d been focused on where we’d been headed, and we’d gone below deck in the other direction, toward the stern.
Now I realized that the helicopter landing pad was actually in the center of a converted promenade deck with half its lounge chairs shoved aside. When we rushed forward, the echo of our footfalls muted, revealing that the deck’s substrate had been reinforced from its inception, likely to accommodate such dual-duty flexibility.
A large nautilus-shaped pool shimmered some distance beyond the helicopter with its adult play area sunken into the open deck a half-flight of steps below our position. As soon as we stepped under the helicopter’s stilled rotary blade, a whizzing sound then a high-pitched ping jerked my attention toward the aircraft’s fuselage. A round metal hole marred the surface.
Alec grabbed my arm and yanked me toward the skid. “Down!”
“Where’s it coming from?” I shouted, scanning behind us.
He grabbed my hips from behind and shoved me upward. “Bridge tower. Guess Escobar left someone to keep an eye on his toys.”
“Toys?” The plural threw me.
My question was lost as Alec climbed aboard, rushed past me, then took the pilot’s seat as he put a headset over his ears. He gave a jerky nod to the other set dangling from the bottom edge of the instrument panel.
I slipped the leather-cushioned cups over my ears and watched as his fingers flew across the instrument panel, flicking switches. A vibration trembled up through the seat as the turbine engine began to warm up. After another switch was flipped, the overhead rotor began to spin.
“Please tell me you know how to fly this monstrosity.” Flipping switches and piloting with skill were two totally different things.
The helicopter had to be the biggest I’d ever seen in person. Uncertain about his flying ability, I pulled the harness belt over my shoulders and clicked the fastener securely into place.
He shot me a smug grin as the rotor whumped faster and faster overhead. “We built this monstrosity. And yes. I should be able to keep it airborne.”
We? EtherSphere One. It seemed arms dealer also encompassed the facilitation of aircraft acquisition.
A bullet ricocheted off the windshield. Then a dark figure appeared, running toward us.
“How long?” I shouted, panic taking hold. We’d been sitting ducks for almost a minute.
“Another ten seconds,” his calm voice murmured through the headset. “No need to shout.”
Ten one-thousand. My attention remained riveted on the armed guard raising the muzzle of his assault rifle as he ran. “Got a gun?” We’d never make it otherwise.
“Toys in the back.”
Eight one-thousand.
Aha. Toys. Before my next heartbeat, I released my harness belt. As I rushed back into the cabin, I vaguely remembered seeing weapons cases between the soldiers’ feet on our flight over. They still sat there. I clicked a smaller case open. The uppermost layer of dark gray foam held three weapons, but a semiautomatic threaded barrel SIG SAUER P226 caught my attention.
I grabbed it, ejected the magazine to verify it was loaded, then reseated it with a firm shove of the heel of my palm before I racked a round into the chamber. Then I ran toward the open portside door. The helicopter suddenly jerked as it caught air, and I slid but then recovered on my next footfall.
Three one-thousand. At the bulkhead, I pressed my body flush just inside the opening, then darted a quick glance outside while slipping my fingers through cargo netting that hung beside me for a secure handhold. The pursuing guard closed the distance, sprinting inside our launch zone, the wind from our rotors beating his long hair back. His body compacted down, muscles coiling tightly for release as if he planned to leap into the side opening.
On a smooth exhale through tightened lips, I raised my weapon, finger sliding over the cold metal trigger. His eyes widened, then narrowed as my gun fired with an orange flash. The weapon kicked, but I tensed, fighting to hold it steady as I depressed the trigger again, and again.
His upper body jerked, throwing him off-balance in his crouched position until he tipped over while the helicopter began to take flight in a steady vertical rise. His lifeless body grew smaller with every passing second. A pool of dark blood bloomed across the deck beneath his upper body.
A low voice rumbled in my ear. “You good?”
“All good.” For us, anyway.
Gripping the cargo netting as we gained altitude, I inhaled a deep breath. Then with no time to freak out, I compartmentalized what I’d just done: killed a man. Thirty feet, forty feet, fifty…we rose into the night as I scanned across the visible portions of the deck and along the railings of the captain’s bridge, ensuring no snipers or shoulder-mounted weapons had sights on us.