Bounty flight, p.12
Bounty Flight, page 12
“You know it ain’t gonna matter. They gonna send me back. I violated probation, man, and they ain’t gonna let me off just ‘cause I blow a whistle.”
“You’ll have to do some time, yes, but if you go back now, if you tell the truth—”
“I ain’t going back.” Kirby pressed whatever he held harder into my side, and I looked down to see that it was a jagged piece of glass. He’d taken a piece of fabric from the wreckage and tied it around the glass, binding it to a stick to create a makeshift weapon. I wondered if he’d learned the skill in prison.
“All right,” Brick said. “You don’t want to go back? You don’t have to. I told you when you agreed to come with me that I have no authority to take you in. But I gotta ask, man, what the hell are you doing? How is hurting Lauryn going to help you in any way at all?”
“I gotta do what I gotta do.” Kirby shifted his weight from foot to foot, swaying side to side with nervous energy, and I struggled to maintain balance on my left foot as he pulled me back and forth with him. “It’s survival. Nothing more. It ain’t personal.”
“Oh, that’s where you’re wrong,” Brick said, crossing his thick arms as he squared his shoulders back. “If you hurt her, I’m going to take it very personally. So, I suggest you let her go before you make a mistake you can’t come back from.”
Brick’s stance and his tone had grown noticeably more menacing, and Kirby stopped swaying and took a tiny step back, apparently unnerved by the threat. His arm eased up a teensy bit around my throat, but his other hand still held the weapon firmly to my side.
“This is my chance, man. My shot at starting over. It was a freak of fate that we survived that crash. Ain’t nobody else did, and no one will be thinking we could’ve. This is my chance. If the world thinks I’m dead, then I ain’t gotta go back to jail.”
“Wow,” Brick said, nodding slowly with one eyebrow cocked. “That’s your plan, huh? You’ve really thought this through. What about your mom? What will that do to her? Haven’t you put her through enough already? She isn’t going to take news of your death very well. It will devastate her.”
“She’s gonna be upset, but she’ll get over it. It’ll be better than if I was in prison. At least this way, she gets tore up once and moves on. Last time I got sent up, she told me it broke her heart every time she visited and had to leave me behind those walls. This way, I break it once.”
“You and I both know Susan would much rather you be alive. Sure, it may break her heart to see you in jail, but I guarantee you she’d rather have that than not see you at all. And you’ll get back out eventually.”
“No!” Kirby tightened his arm against my neck. “It’ll be better this way. Everyone needs to think I’m dead.”
“I see a few flaws in your plan, so walk me through it so I understand. How will the authorities think you’re dead if they don’t recover your body?”
“You didn’t see the other half of that plane, man.” Kirby shook his head. “There ain’t nothing left but ashes. No bodies.”
“The part we were in wasn’t burnt as badly,” I said, hoping if I pointed out the obvious he would see reason. “Our seats were intact.”
Brick glared at me with an almost imperceptible shake of his head before his eyes darted back to Kirby.
“I already thought of that,” Kirby said. “I got the fire going again. By the time they find our seats, there ain’t gonna be nothing left but ashes.”
“They can still identify bodies in ashes,” Brick said, coming a step closer. “Some things don’t burn. They’ll know you’re not accounted for. And that fire you stoked? It’s going to make a great smoke signal to lead them straight to the tail section. You’re running out of time to get away, and you’re about to run out of chances if you don’t release her.”
“Why do you need us?” I asked, and Brick glared at me again, his plea for silence obvious, but I was unwilling to remain silent and do nothing while my life was in some desperate man’s hands. “Why don’t you just run, Kirby? Go! Why are you sticking around here anyway? You could have been long gone by now.”
“He can’t leave any witnesses to say he survived the crash,” Brick said, and as I realized he was right, a new level of fear kicked in.
“We won’t say anything,” I said, frantic as I tried to turn my head to look up at Kirby. “I swear to you. I’ll tell them I was unconscious and I have no idea what happened to you.”
Kirby shook his head, seeming more agitated. “It’s gotta be this way. I ain’t free as long as the two of you know I’m alive.”
“C’mon, Kirby. You’re not a killer,” I pleaded, not knowing if that was true but praying it was. “You tried to help me before. You invited me to come with you. You don’t want to kill me.”
“She’s right,” Brick said. “You’re not a killer, Kirby. You never have been. You don’t have it in you to kill.”
It was my turn to glare at Brick. Really? Why on earth would you goad the man holding me hostage into killing me just to prove he could and would!
Brick’s eyes never left Kirby’s. “I, on the other hand, would have no qualms killing you if I had to. And if you hurt her, I will kill you. No doubt about it. You need to walk away while you still can.”
“I ain’t going back to prison. I ain’t doing it.”
Brick walked forward a few steps, and Kirby retreated, dragging me back with his forearm so tight against my throat I could barely breathe.
“Kirby, let her go. Now.” Brick’s voice was as hard as cold steel. “I won’t tell you again.”
“I’m sorry, man. I gotta do this. I gotta be free. You need to start walking. We…we’re going back to the plane. To the fire. You walk ahead, and I’ll follow you with her. No funny business, or I’ll jam this glass so far inside her she’ll bleed out before you can do anything to stop me.”
Brick dipped his head and then cocked it to the side slowly. His neck cracked with a loud series of pops, and then he twisted his head in the other direction, cracking it again. When he brought it upright again, his icy blue eyes bored through Kirby’s with a murderous glare, sending a chill down my spine. He spread his fingers wide by his sides, and then he slowly curled them into fists. He looked almost feral, like he might lunge forward at any second, and I knew when Kirby tensed behind me that he had likely sensed the same thing.
“You won’t be free,” Brick said, his voice a low growl. “You won’t ever be free. You shed one drop of her blood, and I will be on you so fast you won’t know what hit you. You won’t have time to kill her and still defend yourself against me, and I will tear you apart limb by limb.”
Kirby wavered. His grip loosened around my neck, and the weapon came away from my skin enough for me to twist and jam my elbow into his gut with every bit of strength I had left in me. He stumbled back, dragging me with me, but I was able to duck out from under his arm.
Brick slammed into him, knocking Kirby off his feet. The two of them landed on the ground in a tumble of fists and wills.
It didn’t last long. With one solid swing from Brick’s fist to Kirby’s jaw, Kirby’s head flew back and his body went slack. Brick rolled him over to pin him facedown with his hands twisted behind him and Brick’s knee in his back.
“You okay?” Brick said to me, his eyes sweeping over me as though he were doing his own inventory.
My power move and subsequent escape had required more weight than my ankle could bear, and I’d collapsed to the ground soon after hurling myself into Kirby. I sat stunned and trembling in an undignified heap with silent tears streaming down my face.
“Yeah. I’m fine.” My voice shook, betraying my lie, so I added, “I will be.”
Brick pulled the handcuffs from his back pocket and secured Kirby’s hands, and then he rose to come to me. He weaved as he walked, shaking his head slightly as though trying to unscramble it, and I knew his dizziness had returned. I hoped he hadn’t further injured his head fighting with Kirby.
“Are you all right?” I asked as he knelt beside me.
He didn’t answer my question. He just wrapped me in his arms and pressed his lips to the top of my head.
“I’m so sorry, Lauryn.”
“For what? Saving my life, yet again?” I pulled away from his embrace, uncomfortable with being confined when my emotions were so raw. Swiping at my tears, I let out a maniacal-sounding laugh at the absurdity of the last twelve hours. “I swear I’m not usually this prone to life-threatening situations. I live a mundane life. Truly, I do. I go to work. I come home. I go to my parents’ house for Sunday dinner, and I go for the occasional Saturday morning horseback ride at my cousin’s. That’s the extent of my exciting life. Oh, and I belong to a trivia league that meets once a week. Other than that, I literally sit home and read or attend online book club chats. This conference I just went to? First time I’ve flown in years.” I motioned to the woods around me. “This is not my life. This craziness. This can’t be happening to me. I just want to wake up from whatever hellish dream this is.”
My tears came faster and harder as I ranted, and by the end of my meltdown summary, I sounded near hysterical. My chest jerked as I drew in ragged breaths and struggled not to outright sob.
Through it all, Brick stared at me, his mouth tight and his brows joined together. He looked like he was in pain, and I was even more certain he must have been injured tussling with Kirby or perhaps he’d made his head injury worse.
When he spoke, his calm and soothing voice was in complete contradiction with the agony on his face. “It’s gonna be okay. I’m gonna get you out of here and back to your life. You’re gonna have dinner with your parents this Sunday. It might be a while before you climb on a horse by yourself again, but you’re going to be fine, Lauryn. You’re going back to that life of yours, and you’re gonna be fine.”
“I know,” I mumbled, and then I made a horribly unladylike snorting sound as I tried to manage the barrage of snot my hysteria had produced. Sitting up straighter to square my shoulders, I wiped my nose on my sleeve in equally unladylike fashion, and then I exhaled with a loud huff. “I know I’ll be fine. It just all became a little much to process for a moment, and I had to get it out. I’m good now.” I nodded to reassure both of us. “I’m all right, I swear. But I’m worried about you. About your head. Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” he said, much less convincing than I had been, which wasn’t much. “I want to get you back to the tail section.”
“What about him?” I asked, glancing toward Kirby, who had begun to rouse.
“He’s not going anywhere until I get ready to take him somewhere.”
“But is he gonna be okay? What’s gonna happen to him?”
“Let me worry about Kirby. He never should have been your problem.”
“You won’t, um, like, uh,— ”
“No, Lauryn, I won’t hurt him, if that’s what you’re asking. I would have, if he’d harmed you, but he’s restrained now, and I don’t go around beating up defenseless men. My first priority is to get you to safety, and once I do that, I’ll make sure Kirby is taken into custody and flown back to Florida with the proper authorities. I’ll do all I can to help Susan get a chance to speak to him, but his actions tonight prove that he can’t be trusted to do the right thing on his own.”
Brick’s demeanor was eerily subdued. He felt distant, like a wall had been built between us.
I wished I’d let him hold me before when he’d tried. I’d been too antsy then to be comforted. I’d felt like I was coming out of my skin and needed space. But now, I wanted nothing more than to be back in his arms.
“You sure you’re all right?” I asked, wondering how he would react if I reached for him, but scared of how much it would hurt if he rejected the offer as I suspected he would.
“I’m fine.” He stood upright and laid his hand on a tree trunk to steady himself, and then he looked back at me but didn’t make eye contact. “I’m gonna carry you back to the plane.”
I opened my mouth to protest, but then shut it as reality set in. My feet were bare, and I was unable to walk on my own. Even if the wreckage had been close—and it wasn’t—I’d be hard-pressed to hobble through the woods without injuring myself further. There was a time for independence and determination, and there was a time to admit defeat and accept help. This was the latter.
But I was also uncertain he’d be able to carry me such a distance in his present condition. He was injured too, and obviously struggling.
“You don’t have to carry me. Maybe I could just lean on you like a crutch. Maybe we could lean on each other.”
He cocked one eyebrow and looked down at my foot, which had swollen to a grotesque size and had begun to turn what appeared to be blue in the dawn’s increasing light.
“Add stubborn to that list of adjectives,” he said. “It would be so much easier for us both if you’d just let me carry you.”
“How is that easier for you? You lifted me up a mountainside already; you know that even though I’m short, I’m solid! With the way you’re wobbling, I know you’re still dizzy and nauseous. It isn’t going to help either of us if you fall while you’re carrying me. Then, we’re both screwed.”
“I won’t fall. I’m fine.” He moved closer and then turned his back to me and did a half-squat. “Lean forward against me, and I’ll reach back and lift you up. Can you do that without it hurting you too much?”
“I can do it, but I’m—I—there’s got to be another solution. Why don’t we stay here, and then when we hear the helicopter come back, we can signal them?”
Straightening with a sigh, he shook his head. “Our best chances of being seen are if we’re in that small clearing with the fuselage. And if Kirby lit that fire like he said he did, then the smoke will be a beacon to lead them to us. Is there any way you could just not fight me on this? I’d been up for thirty-six hours straight when I got on that plane, and granted, I’ve gotten more sleep than you have since I was knocked out cold for a few hours, but I’m exhausted, and I’m sure you are, too. I don’t want to argue with you, Lauryn. I just want you to be safe and well, and this is the best way I know to try and achieve that.”
Sixteen
I’d been fueled by adrenaline for so long that I hadn’t thought about being tired, and Brick had been such a machine since regaining consciousness that I hadn’t considered his own level of exhaustion. Now that he’d mentioned it, I could see it in the way his eyes had begun to droop and in the deep lines of his forehead and the downward pull of his mouth.
“If you’re exhausted, that’s all the more reason you shouldn’t try to carry me.”
“I’m accustomed to functioning when exhausted. Will you please just let me do this for you?”
Something in his plea tugged at me. There was an air of defeat I hadn’t sensed in him before, and a sadness in his eyes that made me want to grant whatever wish I could in hopes of taking it away.
“All right. Fine. We’ll do it your way,” I said, and for a moment, it worked.
The tension in his face softened, and his eyebrows raised in surprise.
“I get the feeling those aren’t words you say very often,” he said with a grin so damned enticing it made submitting to him worth whatever the cost may be.
I rolled my eyes but couldn’t help grinning back at him. “Yeah, well, enjoy them while you can. But if you feel dizzy at all, or if I get too heavy and you need a break, we’re stopping. Got it?”
“Yes, ma’am. I got it. Let me check on Kirby and let him know what’s going on.”
He knelt by the young man, speaking quietly with him. Then the two of them rose, and Brick pulled his belt from his jeans and threaded it through the handcuffs and then around a tree trunk to secure Kirby until he returned.
“Is he all right?” I asked, staring past Brick toward Kirby.
“He’s fine.”
“You’re not going to just leave him there, are you?”
Brick glanced over his shoulder to Kirby and then back to me. “Until I can get you safe and get back here, yes. Are you ready?”
“No, but I don’t think I’m ever going to be, so it doesn’t matter. How do I do this?”
“First, you need to move your bag to your back,” he said, motioning to the small backpack purse on my chest. “Here, hand it to me and I’ll put a couple of waters in here in case you have another coughing fit.”
Once he’d filled the small bag and I’d pulled it on, he bent and motioned for me to lean across his back. Then, he reached his hand behind him and around my hips to swoop me up and over. I wrapped my arms around his neck as he put his hand beneath my rump to push me higher until I was situated squarely on his back.
Standing upright, he threaded his arms beneath my knees and tugged me closer. “You good?”
“Aye, aye, captain.”
We set out through the woods, and I was thankful for the ever-increasing light as day broke. For the first few yards, I worried Brick might stumble and take us down, but he trudged along like a machine once more, as if he didn’t even notice the extra weight on his back.
At first, we were both silent. I assumed Brick was focused on the trek, and conscious of the effort he was making both physically and mentally, I remained quiet so as not to tax him further.
But then the maddening silence began to wear on me, and I had to speak.
“How are you feeling? Still dizzy?”
“It’s manageable,” he said. “And you? You comfortable?”
“I wouldn’t say comfortable, but I’m good.”
In truth, my back ached from trying to hold myself upright so I didn’t slump like dead weight against him. The various cuts, bruises, and scrapes all over my body stung and ached, and even though Brick held my right leg a little farther from his body to ensure my foot didn’t bump against his thigh, each step he took jarred my ankle and sent pain shooting up my leg.
“You’d be more comfortable if you relaxed, you know. You don’t have to be so rigid.”
