I stare out at the sea below us as we fly way up high. Such a beautiful, tranquil setting and yet we are in the midst of a nightmare. I turn around and look over my shoulder again, half expecting a chopper to be chasing us. I know they don’t have the resources, but my military training leaves me on stand by every time.
“Why wasn’t it him? Why wasn’t he on the damn chopper?” She runs her hands through her hair in frustration.
My angry eyes flick to her. “Something you could have checked before you raised hell.”
She glares at me. “You are a fucking wimp. Do you know that? Drop me off. They saw me point the gun at you. Go running back and beg for forgiveness.” She shakes her head. “Blame me.” She seems to come to a decision before she lets me speak. “You need to get away from me, anyway. You are in more danger with me around.”
I shake my head with fury. Unfucking believable.
“I mean it,” she yells, her eyes continually switching between the sky in front of us and back to me.
My face remains solemn and emotionless.
“I made a promise to your mother,” she snaps.
My eyes fall her way and I screw up my face. “What?”
“I told your mom that I would look out for you.”
“That was just a figure of speech,” I snap. “She didn’t mean for you to literally look out for me.”
“Yes, she did. I know she did.” She pauses for a moment. “What were you going to do? What was your brilliant plan, huh?” she yells over the loud sound of the blades above us.
I shake my head. “When I got him alone, I was going to break his neck or smother him or something less fucking dramatic than your Lethal Weapon strategy. He trusted me, and I could have killed him when I got him alone, but you have fucked up every chance of that happening, haven’t you?” I tap the side of my head angrily. “So stupid.”
She rolls her eyes. “Oh yes, that sounds really safe. Like his guards would have let that happen. You would already be dead if it were up to your plan.”
“At least I would have targeted the right person.” I sneer.
She fakes a sarcastic smile.
We sit in silence for twenty minutes and I continually glance behind us at the ocean.
Nobody is following us, but I know it’s a false sense of security. The storm is brewing.
“What are we going to do?” She sighs.
I shrug and we fly for a while longer as I troll my brain for a logical plan. If I bring us down on the water, we have more chance of not being found, but then I have to get Rosh to dry land safely which would be risky. If I fly directly to the mainland we will continue on the radar of the ship. I know they can still see us now and know exactly where we are. I have to fly up the coast for at least a couple of hundred kilometres and then go inland. There is no other choice. I glance over my shoulder and finally come to a decision. I hit the satellite navigation system and wait for my coordinates. They come up and I make a turn to the right.
“We will land and hide the chopper. There is another small chopper on the ship, but there isn’t another pilot on board and you took out the other one. We have about an hour, I reckon, before someone can get in the air to look for us.”
She watches me intently.
“There is probably a tracking device on this one.”
Her eyes widen in horror and she starts to look around frantically.
“You won’t find it, but they will know where we land.”
“So we land and run?” she asks.
I nod as I remain deep in thought.
“Where are we landing?”
I flick some switches and put the headphones on as we veer even farther to the right. “Columbia.”
* * *
An hour later.
“Brace yourself,” I warn her as she holds onto the straps of her seatbelt.
She closes her eyes.
“Easy… easy,” I woo the chopper.
She grips the belt with white-knuckle force. We have been flying over land for a while now as I looked for somewhere safe to land.
This looks as good a place as any. It’s deserted, nobody for miles, with a relatively flat paddock.
“Woo, girl,” I murmur to the chopper.
The chopper hovers above the ground and I gently place her down. Rosh drops her head into her hands in relief. “Thank God,” she whispers. “How the hell do you do this for a job when it’s scary as Hell?”
I reach over and undo her seatbelt before I take mine off.
We wait for the blades to stop. I open the door and then climb down to go help her out.
“Hang a second, let me grab my backpack.” She bends down and grabs her backpack and handgun.
“You brought a backpack?” I frown.
“Yes.” She shakes her head. “Do you think I’m stupid?” She jumps out onto the ground.
“No comment,” I mutter dryly as I walk off.
She hurries to keep up with me. “I have your two passports and mine and our wallets and your phone.”
I narrow my eyes at her. How does she know I have two passports? I turn and begin to run. “Keep up,” I snap.
“I am,” she bites back.
She’s a ballsy little bitch, I will give her that. I turn and take the backpack from her and put it onto my back. “What’s in here?” I ask as I flick the long grass out of my way.
“Just what I told you,” she calls. “Oh, and I bought you a sweater,” she adds from behind me.
I stop still and turn to her. “You brought me a sweater?” I frown.
She nods quickly.
I smirk.
She smirks back. “It does seem kind of ridiculous now, come to think of it.”
I burst into laughter-deep, bellyaching laughter. This fucking woman will be the death of me.
“You don’t think twice about shooting your uncle who you thought was your father, but you remember to pack me a sweater.”
“It could get cold,” she cries out in embarrassment.
“That will do me.” With a shake of my head, I turn and start to power walk. The terrain is too rough to run. We will end up breaking a leg. We walk quickly at the edge of a forest under the canopy of trees for protection from the skies above.
We have walked for over an hour and it’s hot.
“I stink,” she calls from behind me. “I need deodorant.” She swats the bugs as she walks. “I don’t suppose you have any in your pockets?”
Fuck’s sake. I keep walking and ignore her. Nothing new. I’ve been ignoring her the whole way.
I’m so pissed off. All of my plans were ruined in three minutes of crazy.
“Do you think it’s much farther?” she asks.
I don’t answer.
We keep walking for another half an hour. “Are you going to keep ignoring me?”
“Yes,” I snap.
“Why?”
I turn and raise an eyebrow and glare at her for a moment before I return back to my power hiking. She has got to be kidding?
Another hour we walk.
“How much farther, the town looked closer than this. Are we even going the right way?” she calls.
“Stop fucking jabbering and walk faster,” I yell.
We finally get to a farmhouse and I duck down low to do a risk assessment of the area. A large stone house and three cars sit idly. I wonder if anyone is home. I’m squatting down behind the building as I look around, and then, without hesitation, Rosh walks straight up to the car parked in the drive way and gets in.
I look around nervously. Shit. What is she doing now? I glare at her and shake my head angrily.
This chick has a fucking death wish… and I may be the one to kill her.
She pulls the cover off the front of the car and hotwires it. It starts on the first go.
“Get in,” she mouths.
I glance around. This is just great. When they find the chopper, they are going to doorknock the closest houses. She has just effectively told them where we are. With one last look around, I run to the car and get in and she speeds off just as a man and a woman come running out from the house.
I can’t control my anger any longer. “What the fuck are you doing?” I scream.
“Right now?” She glances at me. “I’m stealing a car.”
“Do you discuss anything before you do it or are you just in this alone?” I yell.
He eyes flash to me and she frowns. “What’s that supposed to mean?” The car veers around the corner at speed and she nearly loses control. The car swerves as she straightens it back up.
“Stop the fucking car!” I yell. “Can you even drive?”
“Yes, I can drive.”
“Get out! I’m driving. Stop the damn car now.”
Her eyes flicker between the road and me.
“How do you know how to hotwire a car?” I yell.
“I had a boyfriend once who didn’t have keys to his car, so we hotwired it to use it.” She shrugs. “I never knew it would come in handy.”
She pulls over and I run around to the driver side as she jumps across the seats. I take off fast.
We sit in silence as I concentrate. The roads are filled with dirt and rough terrain, hilly with lots of corners.
Her hair is flying around from the air blasting through the open windows. “Don’t give me a lecture on discussing things with you. We both know you discuss nothing with me! In fact, you straight up lie.”
I glare at her. I don’t think I’ve ever been this pissed off with a woman in my life. She is absolutely fucking infuriating. “When did I lie?” I yell. “When?”
“Was Stucco there in the maintenance room?” She sneers sarcastically. “No, stucco wasn’t there, nothing happened,” she imitates me in a fake, deep voice.