Darkness(55)

“You know, someday I’d love to engage in that philosophical debate with you. Right now, I’d just like a straight answer.”

“I’m a private contractor. Okay? End of discussion.” His tone was short, and she made another of those hmmph noises in response. But they’d come upon a patch of ice, and she let the conversation lapse as they picked their way over it.

In the ensuing silence, he had an epiphany: if they knew someone had survived the plane crash, they probably knew it was him. He, Ezra, and Hendricks might all prompt the degree of firepower that had been summoned to deal with the threat a survivor posed—Rudy’s survival would have merited the response equivalent of a flyswatter—but Ezra and Hendricks had presumably been on the other side. Unless they’d been tricked, which he considered possible. Surface-to-air missiles had a range of only fifteen thousand feet, and there was a chance that the thirty-million deal for Rudy had been offered as a way of getting the plane to descend under that ceiling so that it could be shot down.

For safety’s sake, however, he had to presume that his sole survival was known, and all this was in his honor. The intensity with which they were going about ensuring his demise made him think, too, that this wasn’t just about Rudy’s information, or the crash of Flight 155. The way they were going full scorched-earth here, in attempting to wipe out not only him and the others on his plane but a dozen civilians as well, set off all kinds of alarm bells in his mind.

Rudy had said that there was chatter that what had befallen Flight 155 was being set to happen again to another plane. For his survival to merit this kind of response, that almost had to be true. Whoever was behind this was prepared to do whatever was necessary to protect whatever was getting ready to go down.

Cal was willing to bet all his money that another civilian airliner was getting ready to fall out of the sky.

If he was right, it wasn’t just his and Gina’s lives at stake. Hundreds of others could die.

Cal blew out a frustrated puff of air. “I’ve got to get off this damned island.”



HAVING REACHED the edge of the patch of ice she’d been negotiating with such care, Gina responded to the first words Cal had said in several minutes with a skeptical “By stealing a plane.”

“Yep.”

“You don’t think hiding out for five days would be a better option?” Her pulse was picking up the pace big-time. Fear fluttered inside her like a trapped bird. She really, truly thought attempting to steal a plane from the midst of a camp bristling with killers (probably a whole lot more once the plane landed) was a terrible idea. That opinion was only influenced a tiny bit by the bitter truth that she was mortally afraid to fly.

She had not been on a plane since the crash that she had barely survived.

“What about you? Won’t anyone be coming to look for you? You said your transponder was off, but—”

He cut in before she could finish. “It’s possible, but it’s nothing I’d be willing to bet our lives on. The plane was off course, for one thing. There might be some confusion about where we went down. Or even if we went down.”

That made Gina frown. But before she could follow up with more questions, they reached the pass and started across what was basically a natural rock suspension bridge between two mountains. Sheer cliffs dropped down into nothingness on both sides, and the lowering gray sky suddenly felt so close that she could have reached up and touched it if she’d wanted to. A bucking, writhing mass of dark gray clouds churned below. Looking down at them, Gina thought that the clouds appeared solid enough that you’d almost think you could jump down on them and hitch a ride.

Without the mountain to act as a barrier, wind gusts buffeted them from all directions, some strong enough to part the clouds and the underlying fog, allowing glimpses of the silvery river that, far below, ran beneath the bridge.

“Whoa. Slow down.” Cal caught the back of her parka as she strode out on the bridge with the confidence of someone who’d crossed it before, which she had: a pair of gyrfalcons that she’d been documenting had a nest on the other side.

Gina glanced back at Cal in surprise. “You’re not afraid of heights, are you?”

“I’m not a fan of falling off heights, that’s for sure. How about you pay attention to what you’re doing?”

“I’m very sure-footed,” she said. She did slow down, though, partly because it was so windy and partly because he’d kept his hand fisted in her parka. The rock underfoot was frosted over and slick, and the natural buttresses on each side were only a few feet high: it would be easy to go over. She started paying more attention to where she put her feet. As they approached the middle of the bridge she could no longer see the mountains that anchored it. All she could see was a swirling mass of gray clouds above and below. It was like being suspended in midair. The wind blew strongly, smelling of the sea, and had an icy bite to it. She had the sudden fanciful notion that if she spread out her arms the wind would catch her up and she could fly away on it.

If only.

A few moments later they were off the bridge and trudging across the face of the adjoining mountain. It was another narrow, rocky path, only this time they were going down. She was in the lead, and was acutely conscious of the vast bleakness of the jagged, treeless mountains rising all around, as well as the potential treacherousness of the path beneath her feet. The thin patches of snow weren’t a problem: they were easy to avoid. The ice was harder to see. Snow-frosted boulders lay everywhere, blocking the path at times so that they had to skirt around them. This mountain and the next were like conjoined twins that became separate entities about two hundred feet above sea level, and that juncture was where they were heading. As they descended they plunged into thickening fog, and every outside sound—wind, sea, more honking geese—grew increasingly muffled. In contrast, Gina could hear her and Cal’s breathing and footsteps in perfect tandem. Cal stayed so close behind her that she could have stretched a hand back and touched him, and again she was glad to have him there. He made her feel far safer than she had any business feeling under the circumstances, she knew.