Out of the Rain
THE PLANE climbed up, up, up and—sort of—leveled out. Birdie came hauling back to the cargo area to grab a parachute and yell at them.
“What are you doing?” the pilot demanded. “Why aren’t you prepping the bikes to bail?”
Marcus and Dean stared at each other.
“Are we hit?” Marcus asked, standing up anyway and slipping on his own chute as the plane sputtered.
“No, but I’m not landing here!” Birdie snapped. “Get your transpo ready, and I’ll be back in two to push you out of the fucking door!” And with that the pilot whirled around to keep the damned plane aloft.
“Well, this feels like karma,” Marcus muttered, but he was on it.
The two cross-country bikes had full fuel tanks and landing platforms, because Dean knew how to requisition things months and months ahead of time so nobody shouted about the expense.
Together the two of them prepped the bikes, and then Dean opened the bay door again and stared down.
“Jesus!” he shouted. “Bird, I don’t even know where we are!”
“About a hundred miles south of where you were gonna be!” Birdie shouted back. “You got supplies, right?”
“I fucking hope so!”
But it didn’t matter. Marcus was shoving the first platform out the bay door, having set the chute to deploy in forty-five seconds, and Dean was putting his shoulder behind the second platform, having done the same.
“Christ,” he muttered. “If we’re lucky they won’t collide in midair. What’s our terrain looking like?”
“Like a rattlesnake’s toilet!” Marcus replied, getting his shoulder in on the action next to Dean’s. One of the platforms held a motorcycle cart with the provisions Birdie hoped they had, and this must be that one because it weighed a fucking ton . “Let’s go swim in coyote shit, shall we?”
They both grunted as the platform dropped out of the plane, and Dean had to pinwheel his arms to stay grounded.
“Don’t worry ’bout the transpo, Bird!” Marcus shouted.
“I’m not!” Birdie shouted back. “I’m worried about the fuel I’m dropping! I think they hit the tank!”
“ Fuck !” Marcus cried, his attention arrested by something right outside the plane. Dean stared where he was staring and realized that flames were roaring down the fuselage, only getting blown out by the change in pressure by the bay door.
“Bird!” Dean shouted, hauling ass for the cockpit, “She’s on fire! Get your ass out here and bail with us!”
Birdie had a wrinkled, weathered face, and could have been anywhere between thirty and sixty years old, but Dean had seen enough people give up something dear to them to know the torture in the old pilot’s eyes.
“But Dean,” the pilot said, the anguish in their voice resonant of countless missions Birdie had helped Dean and Marcus with.
Dean had discovered Birdie on a road trip to the Austin field office the first time he’d been posted there, and he’d liked the tough old bird.
The pilot’s absolute dedication to the craft of flying, the hunger for more and more time in the air—Dean related to it at the time, because that had been how he’d felt about his job.
He’d just been partnered with Marcus, and he’d discovered that brotherhood didn’t have to come with the Royal name, and that Marcus was more excited about participating in his adventures than worried about Dean’s person.
And Birdie had been their companion on so many journeys they’d lost count, and now his friend was in pain.
“Bird,” Dean said softly, “she’s been a good ship. But we’ll get you a new one. You’re too good a pilot—too good an asset —for me and Marcus not to be able to get you a new one.”
The engines were whining, and he could feel the heat from here. From the cockpit he could see the burning fuselage, and as he watched, another engine sputtered and died.
“Dean….”
But Dean had no more time for Bird’s feelings—Birdie could forgive Dean, he hoped, but only if they all lived.
“Bird, get out now or I will throw you over my shoulder and pitch you out of the plane myself,” he said, and something about the flatness of his voice had Birdie giving him a glare of fury.
And of absolute belief.
“Fine, you fucking heartless sadist,” Birdie snarled, but Dean could hear the tears in the pilot’s voice. With a sad little pat of the plane’s console, Birdie set the automatic pilot and followed Dean down the aisle to the cargo bay.
“Go!” Birdie shouted at Dean and Marcus, but Dean and Marcus had dealt with Birdie for too long to fall for that. Birdie had strapped on a parachute when they had, and they’d all made too many jumps to take the time to check gear.
Together they each grabbed an arm and hauled ass out of the plane, ignoring Birdie’s scream as they plummeted toward the earth.
They held on until Birdie’s cry of “ You bastards !” died in the wind, and then all three of them checked their watches as they separated and gauged the time to jump that would give them the most control over their chutes.
“YOU THINK Bird’ll stop bitching before we find the compound?
” Marcus asked after they’d landed. They knew the drill, the same one Bailey had followed: releasing and packing the chute, making sure cooling packs were set with the fuel and water, releasing the latches that held their transpo crates together.
All of it, smooth as silk, with the bleak, angry accompaniment of Birdie’s bitter harangue about arrogant jackasses who knew fucking everything but how to fly a goddamned plane.
Dean rolled his eyes and then raised his head for the horizon. “I predict the bitching will stop in… wait for it….”
Marcus joined him in staring, and together, they watched as the plane got lower and lower and—
Boom !
The concussion of the plane as it hit more coyote shit and exploded knocked Birdie to the ground and forced Dean and Marcus to brace, reaching out to grab each other’s bicep as a stabilizer.
The orange flame that hurled from the wreck was enough to make Dean shudder.
“Hey, Birdie,” Marcus snapped as Bir gaped at the destruction. “You see that bigass fireball?”
Bird nodded dumbly.
“That means your fuel tanks were well and truly breached, because that only happens in the movies when your plane’s about to explode .”
They both saw Birdie swallow. “Yes,” came the stunned croak.
“So now that we know the damned thing was going to kill you, do you think you can give Dean a fucking rest for saving your life !”
Dean regarded Marcus with surprise. One of the things he’d always liked about his partnership with the man was that they were equals, in this together. But that had sounded almost protective.
“That plane meant a lot to Bird,” Dean said softly, and Marcus scowled and shook his head.
“So should Bird’s life,” he said. “It bothers me when people yell at you.”
“People yell at me?” Dean asked. He didn’t often register that. He assumed part of it was his lack of social awareness that he’d never noticed.
“Sometimes,” Marcus said, shaking his head. “Let’s say I’ve grown a sudden tenderness for your feelings and leave it at that.”
Dean stared at him. “What? Why?” Then, with horror, “You’re not… not in love with me, are you?” The absurdity of even asking that question left him gasping.
“No,” Marcus said, with such absolute finality that Dean gave a sigh of relief. “But I do love you. You may have brothers coming out your ears, but I only have one, and I don’t like him disrespected. Is that okay with you?”
Dean gave him a smile. “That’s fine,” he said happily. “I do have brothers coming out my ears, but that doesn’t mean people get to be mean to you either.” He paused. “Except me. I get to give you shit at any time.”
“Oh, of course,” Marcus said, nodding. “Goes without saying.”
They didn’t need any other words as they went back to gathering and organizing, and after another grumpy, pissed-off moment of mourning the plane, Birdie stood to help them.
Twenty minutes later, as Birdie prepared to mount behind Dean on the motorbike, Dean heard a rusty voice proclaiming, “Thanks for not letting me die, you arrogant fuckhead.”
“Anytime, Bird,” Dean said, meaning it. “Keep an eye on the compass. Seriously, Marcus and I knew where we were going , but we have no idea where we are now.”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it. Sangrino del Corazón isn’t really found on maps.”
Dean grunted. “We were hoping to find the town before we found the compound. I’d leave you in the town, Bird. You could place a call for exfil, and Marcus and I could go do our thing.”
“Wait a minute,” Birdie said, forestalling Dean from hitting the kick start. “What’s your thing? I don’t know your game plan here. What aren’t you telling me?”
Dean shot an unhappy glance at Marcus, who against what they both knew about being all alone in the middle of fucking nowhere, glanced around them as though scorpions sporting recording equipment were a common occurrence.
“I’m not gonna say it,” Marcus told him. “I mean, I know what we’re doing, but the less we actually say what we’re doing, the more we can pretend we weren’t planning to do it.”
Birdie stared from Marcus to Dean and back. “Wait. Did I just crash my plane in an unsanctioned action? C’mon, guys. The FBI is going to replace my plane, right?”
Dean nodded, no doubt in the world. “Of course they are, Bird. We’ve got recon near the US-Mexico border totally cleared. You were in perfectly legal airspace when Corazones de Sangre opened fire on you. You’re good.”
Birdie blinked. “What are you two chuckleheads not telling me?” the pilot asked flatly.
Dean regarded his old partner in adventuring with a level gaze. “Right now, Birdie, you can call our supervisor from town, and they will send a copter to pick you up in exfil. And when they ask you what we’re doing, you can say that was never part of our deal.”
Birdie’s mouth opened a little, lean and lined and a tad vulnerable, and then closed again. “And what if I want payback?” Birdie asked suspiciously. “Those fuckers shot down my baby.”
Dean and Marcus met eyes again.
“Either way,” Marcus said to Dean alone, “we’ve got to get going before somebody starts checking to see where our chutes went.”
Dean grunted. “My boyfriend’s a witness to a Bratva murder,” he said.
“The same hit men who’ve been cozying up to Corazones de Sangre.
We’re gonna head toward town to drop you off, and I want you to think about the one thing that would keep my boy and his family and now my family safe, and when you come to a conclusion, then you can let us know if you want to come with us.
Until then hold tight, Bird, and keep your helmet and your goggles on. ”
The diminutive pilot nodded firmly, and Dean and Marcus kickstarted their bikes. The two-stroke engines roared to life, and they hauled ass in the general direction of the town.
“What happens,” Birdie yelled at him as they hit their stride, “if we get to the compound before we get to the town?”
“I guess you won’t have much of a choice to make then after all!” Dean shouted back, and then kept his mouth shut because he didn’t like eating bugs.