Chapter 14 #3
Her location wasn’t brain surgery, not when he knew she’d been on the way to the compound.
There was only one satellite that could have been taken out, at the northwest entrance.
But where they’d landed in the truck was another story.
The mountain range carried for miles—hollows, valleys, and depressions of varying degrees all around.
Depending on the topography, however, he knew Amanda wouldn’t have had a view of certain constellations.
And armed with that knowledge, he at least had a firm impression of their location—just not how far down they would be.
Or what they would find when they got there.
Maybe Amanda was right—they had to keep replaying this nightmare until they got it right.
They started securing their harnesses, as Evan…Jesus, Evan was getting his tools ready.
“We’re nearly there,” Alexander called behind him to his crew, clocking a familiar copse of trees.
“I can hear you, Alexander,” Amanda said breathlessly.
“I’ve got a visual!” Michael cried at the same time.
“I climbed in front next to Stephen,” Amanda repeated.
“The window’s gone, but I think there’s enough room to get him out first.” He could see them now.
Not Amanda. But the truck on its side, driver’s-side up, dangling precariously on the edge of an outcropping, supported from below by two ancient evergreens.
Alexander shook his head at accessing the crash site—no, he told himself, landing site.
There wasn’t room, or time. He looked at Gregor.
They’d both drawn the same conclusion and said “Grab and go” simultaneously.
They reconnoitered with the crew, and the two SAR members who had to come along as protocol.
Plan in place, Alexander and Gregor told the SARs to stand down, this was their job, but then Michael pushed between them and said, “I’ll go with you, Alex. ”
Jesus, he’d amassed a loyal retinue. He was about to tell Michael how this was going to go down, but Gregor stepped in and said it for him. “I love you, kid, but this is my job.”
“Let’s do this,” Alexander said to Gregor, giving an acknowledging nod to Michael. And then they cast off, rappelling down. As they got closer, Alexander could see Stephen was cut and bleeding, a huge gash on the side of his face. Amanda had her arms wrapped around him.
“Amanda,” he called over the noise. “You have to let him go so Gregor can lift him.”
She started crying. “I don’t want to do this again.”
“It’s okay, sweetheart, we’ll get it right this time,” he promised, not sure if he believed his own words. “On the count of three, okay? Once Gregor takes him, you and I are going right after. Understand?”
“Affirmative.”
“On three—not before, not after, Amanda.”
“Got it,” she said through gritted teeth. By the sound of it, her tears had all but dried. Her voice was calm and even. She was tough, his wife.
“One…two…three.”
Amanda let go as Gregor slowly lifted Stephen.
Slow was the name of the game. One, they didn’t want to disturb the truck’s balance, and two, they had to clear his legs.
Once his feet left the vehicle, Amanda’s hands reached out the window and Alexander grabbed them both, lifting her up to him easily.
She wrapped her legs around his waist and buried her face in his neck.
He couldn’t see through his tears as he looked up to signal that they were good to go. The guys above got the message, though, and lifted them to the hovering aircraft.
The guys hoisted them up together and they landed beside each other on the floor of the chopper. Evan sat next to them, already working on Stephen.
Though they’d made it, Amanda was still wrapped around him, clinging tightly.
“I need to look at you, Amanda. Check you for injuries,” Alexander said, his voice thick with emotion.
She pulled back then, and at the sight of her face covered with blood, he felt his entire body suddenly seize from a sharp pain.
His vision blurred, and all of a sudden it was like he was watching the scene in the helicopter from afar and in slow motion. Then he was falling.
Amanda screamed as he went down, and Evan started barking orders as he pivoted from working on Stephen to ripping Alexander’s shirt open. The last thing he remembered was Stephen taking his hand and whispering his name. He only hoped they were both on the side of the living.
Alexander woke up to a full hospital room. The circus was definitely in town, and the ringmaster’s wife lay beside him in his bed. Stephen lay in a separate bed next to him, looking over and giving him a thumbs-up.
He felt his chest to see if they’d cut him open, and Amanda’s hand covered his as she snuggled closer, if that was at all possible. While he felt a bit woozy, nothing he could sense in his body told of surgery or a procedure.
When Amanda straddled him, grinning from ear to ear, he saw that she was a bit scratched up, but besides the tape covering a small half-inch spot on her right temple, she looked sound and whole. The blood must have been Stephen’s.
“You didn’t have a coronary,” she told him cheerily. You’d think they’d won the lottery based on her declaration.
“Bloody hell, Amanda.” His eyes teared just looking at her.
She leaned down and kissed him, whispering, “I love you too.” He all but crushed her, pulling her in.
Evan was standing at his bedside. “Anxiety attack, Alex.”
“Excuse me?” he asked, looking away from his wife for a millisecond.
“You had an anxiety attack.”
“Are you for real?” He sounded like Amanda.
“Considering what you’ve been through this past year, it’s honestly no wonder.
If you had told me the symptoms you’d been having, we could have bypassed—no pun—this entire fiasco,” Evan said, clucking his tongue.
“I did, however, give you something to help you relax. You obviously caved under pressure.”
Alexander could tell Evan was enjoying himself immensely, and the crew, too, as chuckles sounded throughout the room. And all the while, Amanda sat there beaming, practically on his chest.
Then she threw her head back, punching the air, shouting, “Yes, yes, yes!” She looked down at him again, her blue eyes sparkling, and said, “Are you ever going to say you love me, Montgomery?”
She screeched as he flipped her beneath him. “I jumped off of a cliff two hundred and forty-five years ago for you, Amanda Abigail Montgomery. So, do I love you? Hell yeah, I love you. I’d jump again tomorrow if I had to.”
“Wow, good answer.” Then he kissed her, forgetting the circus was still in his room until they all cheered. Loudly. He told them to get the hell out.