Chapter 3
Three
The force of the water and the intense cold assaulted Gideon like a fist, stripping him of breath as he fought to orient himself in the tumult.
When his head broke the surface, he saw fifty feet to his left that while he was underwater, the van had struck the bridge support, which temporarily held it in place.
A blessing, but the current would have its way soon.
It always did. He struck out, swimming hard against the rush.
This was why he chose to train in the ocean when he had the opportunity.
Even better when he could practice with his Navy cousin, Johnny, who pushed him like no one else.
A placid swimming pool was nothing like a ferocious expanse of living water.
First a deer rescue, now three women and a cop trapped in a police van.
Two dives in one day exceeded his usual conditioning.
Though he kept himself in the best physical shape he could manage, he had to labor hard to fight the violence around him and the painful freeze.
Something bashed his bad shoulder as he propelled himself, a branch or piece of debris.
At least he’d seen no sign of the trucks returning before he dove, but there were other monumental challenges to the rescue.
The glass of the vehicle was reinforced, so he wasn’t going to be breaking any windows to extract survivors. The passengers, who happened to be prisoners, were undoubtedly locked in place, save for the officer, who he wasn’t even sure had survived the crash.
How was he going to free them all before the vehicle sank?
Return with honor, the SERE motto. At the moment, that meant using everything in his power to bring back as many as he could from the wreck. He tried hard not to fixate on the fact that one of those lives was Aaron’s little sister.
Stubborn, mercurial, maddening Mackenzie who shouldn’t even be in a police van in the first place.
He clawed his way over until his palm slapped the prison van’s dented metal.
The frigid water numbed his limbs, and he hardly felt the impact.
He figured he had about three minutes tops before the flow overcame the van.
He used up thirty precious seconds fighting his way to the driver’s side, which was tilted to the sky.
The window was rolled down as the cop struggled to push the door open. He’d survived.
Gideon swam up.
The cop spluttered, eyes wide, one hand disappearing from view as he reflexively reached for his weapon, no doubt wondering if Gideon might be in league with the guys who had just driven him off the road.
Gideon stopped, laboriously treading water, and showed the man his palms. “I’m here to help, sir,” he shouted over the roar. “Staff Sergeant Gideon Landry, US Air Force.”
After a tense moment, the cop nodded. “Sergeant Martin Rodriquez,” he hollered back. They worked together to wrestle the door open, icy water thundering around and in.
“Souls aboard?” Gideon shouted. He wasn’t positive how many prisoners were loaded in addition to Mackenzie. There might have been others he wasn’t aware of.
The cop hesitated, water splashing his face, still not completely trusting, but Gideon didn’t have to say anything further. Rodriquez knew whoever he was transporting would soon be dead.
“Four,” he said.
Cop plus three.
Rodriquez was already moving, stripping off his body armor. “I’ll unlock. You’ll help me get ’em out?”
Gideon nodded. “Yes, sir.”
The cop tucked his weapon into his waistband, unbuckled his heavy utility belt, and dropped it. The van was leveling down as the rear filled with water. Gideon levered himself inside.
With shaking hands, Rodriquez unlocked the security door between the driving compartment and the prisoner area. Together they wrestled it open and swam into the interior. The water had already crept within a foot of the ceiling.
At first he only spotted two women, Mackenzie and another with braids. Their heads were barely above the water as it swirled around their necks. Mackenzie’s eyes flew wide at the sight of him.
“Help her.” She jutted her chin to where he finally noticed the third woman farther to the back, the water just beginning to inundate her nostrils.
Silver hair puffed around her head. Her expression was wild with panic.
Rodriquez immediately swam to the lady, dove under, and suddenly one of the woman’s hands was free.
She screamed and thrashed, striking the officer in the face.
Gideon crossed the distance in one second and pinned her in place with a bear hug. “Stay still,” he thundered. “And you’ll get out alive.”
His tone cut through her panic. She stilled enough that in another second the cop had gotten her completely free and propelled her toward the exit.
“Keys,” Gideon called to him.
He could read the cop’s expression. Allowing a civilian to free the prisoners was against all his training.
“I will get them out,” Gideon said, voice hard with resolve.
The cop blinked, gave one sharp nod, and slapped the keys into Gideon’s hand. “I’ll move her to safety and come back and assist.” He continued urging his terrified prisoner to the door. “We’ll swim to the bridge support and you’re gonna hold on there. Help is coming.”
Whoever was en route would not arrive fast enough. Gideon turned back to the two remaining women. The water level had risen and they both had to strain, heads craned toward the precious pocket of air. Mackenzie thrust out her chin again, this time indicating he should release the braided woman.
Still giving orders. He didn’t need her direction.
In any case, he did as she suggested because the freckled lady was clearly starting to panic, breathing fast, inhaling snorts of water that made her cough.
He swam over, dove down, found the wrist cuffs, and unlocked them. She immediately bobbed up into the narrowing pocket of air where he joined her.
“Can you swim?”
She nodded, sucking in huge breaths.
“Okay. Swim the direction you saw the cop go. It’ll be hard work, but you can do it. Kick clear of the van when you get out.” He didn’t want her getting sucked in as the water completely claimed the vehicle.
Her face was dead white, lips bluish. “I can’t. I’m scared.”
“You can,” he snapped, “or you’ll die.”
She pressed her lips together and started to cry.
She wasn’t going to move unless he figured out how to convince her. Patience, Gideon. She’s a civilian, remember? He said more gently, “What’s your name?”
“L-Lorraine.” Her voice was barely a whisper, wet lashes spiky around her terrified eyes.
He took her hands. “Listen, Lorraine. This is scary, for sure, but you have someone who needs you, right? Someone who’s going to be mourning you forever if you don’t get out of here?”
She nodded, and a gleam of determination infused her eyes.
“You can do this. I’ll be right behind you in a minute, and I’ll help you if you need it. I’m a stranger, I know, but you can trust me. You’ve got to.”
She gave him a tiny nod.
He squeezed her shoulder, assisted with a push that propelled her toward the driver’s compartment.
He couldn’t spare any more attention on her because the water was now lapping at Mackenzie’s upper lip. She was not yet in panic mode, but her nostrils were flared, muscles straining.
He dove, following the feel of her arm to the restraints.
It required more seconds than it had for Lorraine because he was almost completely numb and his movements clumsy.
Praying he wouldn’t lose his grip, he inserted the tiny key and unlocked the cuffs.
With one swift kick, she bobbed up to the air pocket.
He joined her there just as the van lurched and began to fill in earnest. They had seconds, no more.
“Big breath,” he called over the rush.
They inhaled as deeply they could, dove, and kicked their way toward the driver’s compartment.
When she began to fall back, he took her arm, tugging her next to him.
The force of the water shooting in required their combined strength to fight, and she had been in the water longer.
By the time they made it, the driver’s area was fully engulfed, so they bobbed to the roof where there were a few precious inches of air. They gulped it in.
He pointed, directing her to shove off the seat to get momentum enough to clear the open window. There wasn’t a spare moment to tell her to swim as far from the vehicle as possible, but her cop training should help unless she completely freaked out.
He didn’t think she would. Mackenzie had grit, no matter what she lacked in judgment.
Without hesitation, she disappeared into the void.
The moment he kicked off in her wake he felt powerful suction as the van sank behind him.
He powered hard, fighting cold and fatigue, straining with each stroke until he broke the surface.
As he blinked away the blur, he caught sight of the cop and the two prisoners clinging together atop the cement platform of the bridge support pier twenty feet from his position.
The women’s arms were linked together as they stood, shivering, Rodriquez with them, watching the surface of the water.
Two women.
Where was Mackenzie? He pivoted in a circle without spotting her.
Gideon caught the cop’s attention.
Rodriquez gave him an “I don’t know” gesture.
He swam in another tight circle, once, twice. Water foamed around him, weighing him down. He stared every which way, trying to calculate where the water might have dragged her. It was not possible that she hadn’t made it out.
His memory churned and brought him back to that moment from the past, Mackenzie’s voice blazing with anger, disbelief, anguish, all of the above.
“He’s dead, Gideon.”
He heard again the glass-sharp words when she’d told him her brother had been murdered. The bullet shattered five lives that day. Aaron’s and his sister’s, their parents’, and Gideon’s. Maybe Aaron’s girlfriend’s too.
And if Mackenzie drowned now, how would he tell her parents?