“Woohoo.”
Her smile zinged through Sam’s bloodstream like liquid sunshine. Wanting to make love to her again wasn’t an option, unfortunately. He was looking forward to making love to her for hours on end with no interruption, and without being distracted by listening for the bad guys.
Their time would come to laze in bed all day. This wasn’t that day.
Looked like they were going to get out of here in one piece. If Thadiwe’s men weren’t smarter than the average chimp and had managed to elude him. If they got downriver unscathed. If the hidden chopper hadn’t been discovered and sold for parts. None of those things would have fazed Sam before. Having Beth with him changed everything.
“Here.” He handed her the DEET. “The mosquitoes are having a freaking convention out there.”
He slid toward the tent opening and yanked down the zipper. “I’ll wait outside to give you room.”
“Stay. I love being in tight quarters with you.”
Living in a one-man tent with Beth sounded damn good to him too, but he shook his head. “You’d never get dressed.” He had to kiss her one more time. Supposed to be quick, but she threaded her fingers through his hair, and held him for a kiss that turned him inside out. He’d never been much of a kisser, but Beth made him a convert. Reluctantly he brought the kiss to an end. “Don’t take long,” he told her, loving the way her eyes lost focus when he kissed her. “We have to make tracks.” He crawled out onto the limb to give her room to dress, but left the flap up so he could watch her.
She shot him a sassy smile, and drew the LockOut over her body like a seasoned stripper.
He dragged his attention away from her rosy breasts and scanned the jungle around them. Thadiwe’s men would be getting close. Sam had gone out forty minutes ago to reconnoiter while Beth slept. Just because he hadn’t encountered any more soldiers didn’t mean they weren’t out there. Thadiwe’s minions had plenty of time to realize that five of their men hadn’t returned. Sam had a persistent itch on the back of his neck. He never ignored his intuition. It was gained by experience.
“Can we frame the tent when we get back home?” Beth asked, coming through the opening feet first. She looked sensational in the tight black LockOut, her bright hair disheveled around her shoulders, her pretty eyes alert as she finished pulling the zipper up to her throat. Sam ran his gaze unobtrusively over the cut on her cheek and the two on her throat. No sign of infection. Then he slid his hand under her hair and pulled her to him for a quick, hungry kiss.
“Nah.” He smiled into her eyes. “We’ll pitch it in the backyard and use it for our annual family vacation.” He waited for a reaction, but didn’t get one. His gut clenched before he reminded himself that Elizabeth was good at masking her thoughts. He wasn’t even sure she’d heard him, as a parrot, blue and yellow wings spread, screeched overhead. She flinched, and he wondered what it would take to get her over her fear of birds. One thing for sure, he didn’t have time for it now.
He’d already pulled out the support pegs on the tent, and it was a simple matter to collapse the fabric and stuff it back in the bag. He held up her favorite silk blouse, the pink liberally spattered with dried brown blood. “I needed to bring your clothing so they’d think you’d worn it out of there.” He held the shirt up in a wad. “Want to try and save this?”
Beth shuddered. “No thank you. I might never wear pink silk again.”
“I’ll bury it, and the rest of your clothes, then.
Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.” She scooted on her butt as far as the trunk, then stood to climb down to the ground. It was hotter than hell. Hot and steamy. Her cheeks were a delicate rose, and Sam thought that pink wasn’t so bad.
She smiled. “I’ll be fine not seeing the color green for a while. But I’ll miss the tent.”
EIGHT
“MBOTÉ! MBOTÉ! BOSS-MAN,” DESI called with a shit-eating grin as he paddled a decrepit-looking pirogue up to shore. He looked ridiculously like a young Denzel Washington, and wore ragged cut-off cargo pants, and a royal blue vest with red and yellow house cats printed on it. Around his clean-shaven head he’d jauntily tied a gray and green striped necktie. The entire ensemble would make a damn fine target for anyone on shore. As if he hadn’t a care in the world, Desi jumped out of the boat in thigh-deep water and dragged it closer to shore.
“What happened to the Zodiac?” Sam asked. He suspected he knew. Desi had sold it, and everything in it, to the rebels for a pretty penny. He’d then probably spent the “mbongo” he’d gotten on his new lady friend. “I need …” Desi looked pitiful and mimed eating. “Koliya. Yes?”
The guy was a strapping thirty-year-old in no danger of starving. “Hell, no. The Zodiac wasn’t yours to sell.” Desi gave him a blank look. “Never mind.” There was no point arguing. “Let’s go.”
Sam tossed both packs into the middle of the boat.
“Ever paddled a canoe?” he turned to ask Beth. “Desi and I will be rowing, but it wouldn’t hurt for you to know how. Just in case.”
Just in case? Elizabeth resisted turning her head to scan the jungle surrounding them for snipers. “I’ve done the rowing machine at the gym, so I can probably handle it.”
She demonstrated her technique for Sam, practicing in the air while he adjusted her left-handed grip just a fraction.
“Try that again—Keep the oar as vertical as possible. Good. Okay, let’s do it.” She started to cross to the water, but Sam put his hand on her arm. “No point in us both getting our feet wet. Here, I’ll carry you.” She expected a fireman’s lift, but Sam swung her up in his arms.
It was a silly romantic gesture, one she loved. God help her, Elizabeth thought, shocked by the realization. She loved him. He’d proven that he wanted her. But that was lust. Did the concept of love even cross the mind of a man like Sam? She seriously doubted it. He wasn’t hardwired that way. Yet he’d mentioned a shared backyard. She wondered if that was just a throwaway remark or if he actually meant they had a future together. “You Tarzan,” she joked, looping her arms around his neck.
He lowered her into the small canoe while Desi held it steady. “Hang on to me as you put one foot in … now crouch down, grab the gunwale and transfer your weight before putting the other foot in.”
She did as he instructed, without mishap, thank God. The sun, straight up and broiling hot, beat down on her unprotected head. Without a word, Sam leaned over and withdrew a black ball cap from one of his packs and placed it on her head.
The boat barely seemed big enough to hold three adults and Sam’s heavy packs.
Sam flung a leg into the boat and shot her a smile as he carefully lowered himself behind her. “We’re going to get out of here in one piece. I promise.”
First the hat, now he knew how scared she was. “Are you a mind reader?” she asked over her shoulder as she adjusted the cap to better shield her eyes.
“I’m a student of Dr. Elizabeth Bennett Goodall. Okay, Desi. Let’s get the party started.” The two men started paddling in slow easy strokes that took them out to the middle of the river.
Her heart did a little zig-zag at Sam’s response. “What’s my favorite color?”
“Purple.”
“What’s your favorite food?”
“Same as yours. Italian.”
“Favorite ice cream?”
“Vanilla. Yours is Rocky Road. Keep to the middle of the river, Desi. Better chance of being seen, but less chance of encountering most of the wildlife. Watch out for hippos.” Elizabeth presumed he was talking to her and not their guide. “They’re vicious and fast. And don’t put your hands anywhere near the water. Snakes and crocs.”
“I didn’t even want to put my hands in the Thames when Kess and I went on that river cruise last year. Believe me, I’ll keep my hands to myself. This water looks alive with every known parasite and creepy-crawly known to man.” She wasn’t sure which was scarier, the critters she could see or those she couldn’t.
“Can you swim?”
“I’m not getting in the water.”
“Brace your feet on the sides and bring your paddles in and lock them. There’s white water ahead.”
“White water?”
“Rapids.”
“That was rhetori—” Her words cut off with a scream as the small, narrow pirogue slewed sideways in a froth of white water. She grabbed the gunwale with both hands and braced her feet as best she could. Hadn’t she been the one craving adventure? The adrenaline spike was pure fear.
“Dig deep and hold on!” Sam yelled over the scaling thunder of the water. The boat pitched sideways, going down at a steep angle. “Forward paddle—hard!”
The men’s oars weren’t in the water because they were riding on air. It was electrifying. Terrifying, but heart-thumping exhilarating. Elizabeth hung on for dear life, and lifted her face to the diamonds of spray jettisoning around her. If she was going to die, she was going down with a fight.
The boat came down with a bone-jarring thump. Trees and bushes went by in a blur of greens and browns as they shot downstream, slewing sideways, bumping and jostling as the unruly water tossed them from level to level in untidy increments. Down the rapids almost on their nose, then jolting them backwards until she was practically in Sam’s lap.
“Hang on. There’s more,” he shouted.
Elizabeth noticed. There was more white water, all right. Lots more. The water frothed high over the sides of the pirogue, drenching them all. Maybe instead of being exhilarated she should be praying. She tried it, but her breath caught as they glanced off a submerged rock and literally went flying. Down, down, down, over the rocks and debris that swirled and tumbled down a series of cataracts.
“Hold on! Hold on!”
Thump, slam. Into a flume where the water raced around a sharp bend, then dropped seven or eight feet over a ledge. Elizabeth’s breath caught, and her heart stayed in her throat as the boat tipped and swayed with the force of the thrashing, churning water tossing them around like a child’s toy.
She was too scared to close her eyes, and too terrified not to. This made the roller-coaster rides she’d taken as a kid pale into insignificance.
They landed with a bone-jarring skid, then slid backwards over a short drop.
“Catch your breath,” Sam told her when they seemed to have dropped into a pool of calm below the rapids. The little boat bobbed a bit, then glided through the water. “You’ve got about ten minutes before we hit the next set.” He placed his hand on her shoulder. “Enough adventure for you, sweetheart?”
Elizabeth turned her head to smile at him through the water dripping from her hat brim and off her lashes. “It’s freaking terrifying. But I’ll remember this for the rest of my life. How did you make it upstream?”
“Pottage—Ah, shit. Desi, haul ass. Now! Go. Go. Go!”
Elisabeth’s heart leapt into her throat again. Now what? She spun around to face front. “What—Oh, my God.”
Thadiwe’s soldiers, guns pointing right at them, lined the banks. The three of them in the boat were sitting ducks.
NINE
KNEELING, SAM PADDLED AS fast as he could. In the front of the pirogue, Desi’s hands and arms glistened, a chocolate-colored blur as he dug his oars into the water, pulling the boat with him. Thadiwe’s men were firing round after round. Thousands of birds, in hundreds of species, were catapulted out of the trees by the noise. Squawking and crying out, they flew in a tidal wave of multicolored beating wings up into the sun-baked air.
Sam felt a burn zing across his upper arm. It didn’t slice through the LockOut, but he felt the sting. Ignore it. Pull. Pull. Pull. “Beth. Get down. Lower, damn it.” Bullets crisscrossed overhead, cutting through the water, or ricocheting off nearby rocks. Beth’s cap went spinning over the side, and Sam’s heart fucking stopped in his chest. “Beth?”
She was bent over, her head on her knees. “I’m okay. I’m okay,” she shouted, her voice muffled.
Thadiwe’s men had chosen well. The river not only curved blindly right after the rapids, it also narrowed to just a few hundred feet wide. It would then be impossible to miss the boat or its occupants. To return fire, Sam would have to stop rowing. Right now he wasn’t stopping for anything, or anyone. Speed was going to save their asses. Speed. And luck.
The soldiers were running downstream, trying to keep parallel. Fortunately the bank was littered with thick vegetation and it wasn’t a smooth run. But it was damn well impossible to dodge that many bullets.
The pirogue swept under a low-hanging branch where a leopard was sunning itself, its amber-spotted body sleek and lethally beautiful. The cat raised its magnificent head, and its muscles flexed beneath its glossy fur as the boat flew beneath the branch. “Stay where you are, Spot,” Sam warned. That’s all they needed: a pissed-off cat in the boat with them.
“Take it, Desi,” Sam yelled, waiting for Desi to adjust his strokes to make allowances for Sam taking his hands off the oars. The second Desi was rowing on his own, Sam pulled out the MP5 and returned a blast of fire. Two men went down, splashing into the water. Eight hundred rounds a minute had a lot of stopping power.
He chambered another 9 × 19 mm Parabellum ammunition cartridge. Thirty rounds left a lot of holes. He was counting on it. The roller-delayed blowback mechanism of the weapon fired from a closed-bolt position. When the trigger was pulled, the bolt was already locked forward against the cartridge, which reduced the amount of mechanical movement, improving accuracy. And Sam needed every advantage he could get.
He got another man in midair, as the guy tried to vault over a log. Two more who’d chosen wading in the thigh-deep water lapping the shore rather than the obstacle race that was the bank. Sam got them both in one sweep.
He saw the alternate view of the leopard’s tail or head or streamlined body as it ran behind the soldiers, stealthy and well hidden in the brush. It was keeping well back, but hauling ass, ready to pounce should a man fall behind.
Sam knew they had maybe a minute or three before the next set of rapids. Not as steep as the first, but navigation would require both his strength and concentration. The river narrowed substantially right there, and the drop was perhaps twelve feet in a hundred-yard stretch. There wasn’t a chance in hell the soldiers would miss them at that range. Sam’s heart raced with anticipation as bullets strafed the water beside the boat. Several hit above water, striking the pirogue but missing them by fractions of an inch.
“What can I do?” Beth shouted, still doubled over.
“Nothing!” Jesus. She was enough of a target as it was. He didn’t want her sitting up to take stock of the situation. “Stay down!” He returned fire. Got another raze on his shoulder, hurt like hell, but again, didn’t cut through the LockOut. The bullet hit the inside of the boat, inches from Beth’s back, making Sam’s heart leap into his throat and lodge there.
A small chunk of wood flew off, hitting him just above his eye. Blood trickled down his face, blinding him to the left. Shit. He wiped his face on his shoulder, then fired into a group of four men clustered on a jut of land just ahead. The soldiers went down like bowling pins.
A four-course meal for the giant croc that had slipped into the water a few feet away on their arrival and now turned back in a lash of tail and jaws to collect.
Sam saw Thadiwe immediately. The tango towered over his soldiers by a good eight inches and stood, legs spread, arms akimbo, as his men aimed their weapons at the approaching boat.
Sam shifted the submachine gun, centering the sight between Thadiwe’s close-set eyes. “Here’s that facial reconstruction you wanted so badly, asshole.”
Thadiwe’s head exploded like a watermelon.
Excellent. Saved Sam a return trip.
The soldiers leaped into action as another croc whipped its head around as the man’s body crashed into the tall reeds, half in, half out of the muddy water. The white spume flung up by the croc’s frenzy turned crimson as he dragged the tango deeper int
o the water.
The soldiers tried to make up for their inattention by firing off a barrage of bullets willy-nilly. Their enthusiasm was admirable, but their aim sucked, even at this close range. Most of the bullets missed their target by several feet. Sam happened to glance in Desi’s direction as a bullet sliced through the man’s upper thigh. The injury was deep, and bled. A lot. The other man faltered for a moment, then attacked the water with his oars like a man possessed as the soldiers gauged the target better and started narrowing the gap between hits and misses.
ELIZABETH SMELLED THE FAMILIAR metallic scent of blood over the fruity/muddy smell of the river. Sam. She lifted her head just enough to see that it was Desi who’d taken a hit. He was rowing like a madman. The oars sliced through the water, sending up sprays and droplets that sparkled in the sunlight. On either side of the river, men in uniform were running as they fired their weapons. The noise was horrendous. The soldiers shouting, animals screaming, the thrash of the narrow boat moving rapidly through the choppy water. And birds. Flying about wildly, their cries adding to the cacophony.
None of that mattered to Beth right then. Desi’s wound was life-threatening. He was losing too much blood, way too fast. She grabbed the smallest of Sam’s packs, which rested between her feet.
“Stay down, for God’s sake.”
“Desi’s been hit. What do you have in here that I can use—Ah. Thank God.” Sam’s kit contained a new device she’d only read about. A “Wound Bullet.” An ingenious closure device.
Hauling the pack with her, Elizabeth scooted on her butt toward Desi. The boat rocked, and all of them yelled out at the same time. She felt for the distal pulse at Desi’s ankle. Weak. But he reacted at her touch, which was good. His skin was warm. Also good.
While she knew it must hurt like blue blazes, it was an uncomplicated wound. No major arterial or bone damage. But his leg looked like minced meat. She’d never used a Wound Bullet, but she’d read the articles in JAMA.