Chapter 13 #2
Alan turned Britta around. Pulled her back against his chest. His arms locked around her waist. A harness clipped around her body.
“No, no—”
“I hope this works.”
What?
His hand found the door handle.
“West!” Britta’s scream was raw. “West, help me!”
West was on his knees. Trying to stand, still wheezing. His face twisted and he lunged again.
Alan pulled the emergency release.
The door blew outward.
The world exploded.
Wind screamed into the cabin. Papers flew. Seats rattled. The decompression sucked the air from the cabin. Britta’s ears popped. The pressure change spun her head.
The pilot’s limp body slid out of the cabin, still unconscious, into the blue.
The wind blew West against the wall, and he fought to find purchase before it sucked him through the door.
The opening showed sky. Clouds. The impossible distance to the ocean below.
“Please—” Britta couldn’t hear her own voice over the wind. “Please don’t—”
“Please,” Alan said, and jumped.
Britta’s scream was ripped away.
They tumbled out of the plane into open air.
The world spun. Sky. Ocean. Sky. Ocean.
The air tore at her clothes. At her hair. At her skin. It was freezing at this altitude. The air so thin she couldn’t catch her breath.
They were falling.
Falling.
Falling.
Britta’s body wouldn’t respond. She tried to grab onto Alan. Tried to do something. But her arms flailed uselessly.
Alan’s chest was pressed against her back. His arms and legs locked around her. His arm moved and she clawed at it—
The parachute deployed.
The harness jerked, gravity nearly yanking her to the earth. But Alan’s legs held, his arms again clamped around her. Her body snapped upward, her ribs burning, the pull instant and brutal.
Their fall slowed.
Not to a stop. Just slower.
They swung in the air. The parachute a white canopy above them. Alan’s breathing ragged in her ear.
“Look up,” he said.
Britta couldn’t. Couldn’t make her neck work. Couldn’t make anything work.
“Britta. Look up.”
She forced her head back.
The Westwind II was above them. Still flying. The emergency door a black hole in its side.
As she watched, something appeared in the doorway.
West.
Standing there. Looking down at them.
Too far away to see his expression. But she knew.
She knew.
He had no chute.
“West!” Wind and distance swallowed her scream.
And he didn’t jump.
Why wasn’t he jumping?
He disappeared into the plane.
The fighter jets flanked him, one on each side of the Westwind. Close enough that she could see the pilot’s helmet turning. Looking at the parachute.
The Westwind flew on. Straight and steady on its autopilot course.
They were going to shoot it down.
“No.” Britta’s voice broke. “No, no, no—”
Alan’s voice in her ear. “Britta. Britta, listen to me. We’re going to hit the water. You need to take a deep breath before we go under. Do you understand?”
She didn’t answer. Couldn’t.
The ocean was rushing up. Blue and endless and far too solid.
“Britta!”
“I can’t—”
“You can. When I say breathe, you breathe. Deep as you can. Hold it. Don’t let go until we surface. Okay?”
She nodded. Or thought she did. Her head wasn’t working right.
The water was so close now. A hundred feet. Fifty.
“Breathe!” Alan shouted.
Britta sucked in air. Her lungs filled.
They hit.
The impact drove the air from her lungs anyway. Every bone in her body shook. The parachute dragged them under immediately. White silk in the blue water. Tangling. Pulling them down.
Britta’s eyes opened underwater. Salt burned. The parachute clouded the water, tangled around her legs. Alan was still attached to her back. His arms moving. Doing something.
She needed air. Alan’s hands found hers. Pressed something into them. Something hard. Cylindrical.
Then he was gone.
The weight on her back disappeared. The harness went slack.
He’d unclipped her.
Britta kicked. The parachute silk wrapped tighter around her calves. She couldn’t get free. Couldn’t reach the surface. The blue darkened as she sank.
Her lungs gave up. Don’t breathe—
Something grabbed her arm. Yanked.
Strong. Insistent. And pulled her up.
Britta’s head broke the surface.
She coughed. Vomited salt water. Gasped. Coughed again.
Air. Beautiful, painful air.
Alan was beside her. Treading water, his face gray. The gunshot wound in his gut spread blood in the water around them.
“Kick,” he said. His voice was weak. “Parachute. Kick free.”
Britta kicked. The silk was still tangled but looser now. She kicked harder. Felt it slip away.
Free.
And that’s when, on the horizon, she saw it.
The plane exploded over the water, an orange fireball, the Westwind disintegrating. Shrapnel flew outward in all directions. The sound reached them seconds later—a boom that rattled through Britta’s chest.
West was in there.
West had been standing in the doorway.
“West!”
The fireball bloomed, then collapsed toward the sea. Debris spun through the air. Burning pieces of metal and plastic and glass.
Britta couldn’t look away. Couldn’t close her eyes. Just watched the pieces tumble toward the ocean below.
Her throat was raw. When had she started screaming?
“Did he get out?” Britta whispered.
She treaded water, sobbing. This time West wasn’t in the water to show up, curl his arm around her, pull her to his warmth, keep her alive.
Alan lay on his back, floating, bleeding.
She finally did the same, trying to stay alive. West would want her to stay alive.
An engine hummed over the waves and she spotted it. A Coast Guard boat. Cutting through the water toward them.
Someone shouted. Threw a line.
It hit the water ten feet from Britta.
“Swim,” Alan said, his voice weak.
She tried. Her arms barely worked. The salt water made everything heavy. Her clothes dragged. But she tried.
For West, she tried.
Hands grabbed her. Pulled her toward the boat. Lifted her out of the water.
She collapsed on the deck. Retching. Shaking.
Someone wrapped a blanket around her. Checked her pupils. Asked questions she couldn’t hear over the ringing in her ears.
Through the crowd of Coast Guard personnel, Britta saw them pull Alan from the water. He didn’t fight. Didn’t speak. Just lay on the deck bleeding while someone tore open his shirt and called for first aid.
She sat on the deck as the cutter picked up speed, heading south. They came to a debris field, and she scanned the surface. Looking for any sign of him.
“There was someone on that plane,” she heard herself say. Her voice sounded distant. “Do you see a survivor?”
The Coast Guard officer kneeling beside her followed her gaze. “Ma’am, we’re searching. But at that altitude—” He stopped. “I’m sorry.”
The words didn’t make sense.
West was former military, trained for exactly this. He could survive anything. He’d survived the yacht attack. He’d survived getting on that plane somehow. He’d—
A piece of debris floated past the boat. Charred and twisted beyond recognition.
Britta watched it drift away.
And then the cutter carried her clear away from where the plane had gone down.
Away from West.
“No.” She tried to stand. The blanket fell. “No, we have to—we have to find him—”
“Miss White.” The officer’s voice was gentle. Firm. “We’re taking you to your father. He’s on his yacht. We’ll keep searching. I promise. But we have to follow the president’s order.”
Her father. Who’d just watched—what? The plane explode? His daughter fall from the sky?
Britta looked over at Alan. They had started an IV. He looked pale, strapped into a stretcher. Two armed Coast Guard personnel stood over him.
He met her eyes.
There was something in his expression. Something she couldn’t place. Grief, maybe. Or relief.
Or both.
“Who are you?” Britta whispered.
He didn’t answer. Just looked away. Stared at the water, where pieces of the plane still floated.
The boat picked up speed. The debris field fell behind.
Britta pulled the blanket around her. Her whole body shook. From cold or shock or something else she couldn’t name.
West was gone.
The plane was gone.
And the man who’d put a bomb on board had also thrown her out to save her life.
Nothing made sense.
The Coast Guard officer was talking to her. Asking if she was hurt. If she could move her fingers and toes. Standard trauma assessment.
Britta answered automatically. Yes. No. I don’t know.
All she could see was West standing in that doorway. Looking down at her as she fell away.
Why hadn’t he jumped?
The question wouldn’t stop. Played on repeat. Why hadn’t he jumped?
He’d had no parachute.
Maybe he hadn’t been able to get clear in time.
Maybe he’d known that jumping wouldn’t work and had stayed to try something else.
Maybe he’d been buying them time.
Maybe.
Maybe.
Maybe.
The Coast Guard boat cut through the water. Ahead, a yacht. Large. Presidential. Secret Service agents lining the deck.
Her father would be there.
Waiting.
Britta closed her eyes.
When she opened them, they were pulling alongside the yacht. Hands reached down. Voices called.
Someone lifted her. Passed her up. More hands caught her. Set her on the deck.
And then her father was there.
President Isaac White. Gray hair. Lined face. Red eyes.
He pulled her into his arms. Held her. She felt him shaking.
“You’re alive.” His voice cracked. “They said—the plane—I thought—”
“I’m okay.” The words came out automatically. “I’m okay, Dad.”
But she wasn’t okay. Not even a little.
Over her father’s shoulder, Britta watched the Coast Guard boat that carried Alan. Watched them bring him aboard the yacht.
Secret Service agents surrounded him.
One of them—a tall man with gray hair and hard eyes—stepped forward.
“Alan Martin,” he said, “you’re under arrest.”
Alan didn’t resist. Didn’t speak. Just nodded.
The man looked at the personnel now coming out to take Alan below, where someone said something about a medic. “Keep him alive.”
As they led Alan past Britta, he looked at her.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “For all of it.”
Then he was gone.
Britta stood on the deck of her father’s yacht. Wrapped in her father’s arms. Surrounded by Secret Service agents and military personnel.
Safe.
Alive.