Tucker checked his watch. They had made good time and were twenty minutes early.
“Very shallow here,” Elena announced as she swung the plane’s nose and headed toward the island’s shore.
“Again, just get as close as you can.” Tucker unbuckled and stood up. “Thanks for the ride. I—”
Over Elena’s shoulder, out the side window, a dark shape appeared out of nowhere. Disoriented, Tucker’s first thought was rock. They were passing some storm-beaten shoal sticking out of the water.
Then a strobe of navigation lights bloomed, hovering there, revealing its true nature.
Helicopter.
Tucker shouted, “Elena . . . get down!”
“What—?”
As she turned toward him, her forehead disappeared in a cloud of red mist.
26
March 17, 8:47 P.M.
The Caspian Sea
Tucker dropped to his knees, then his belly. He felt wet warmth dripping down his face and swiped his hand across it.
Blood.
He turned his head and yelled through the cockpit door. “Everyone flat on the deck!”
Kane came slinking toward him, but Tucker held up his hand, and the shepherd stopped.
“What’s happening?” Anya called out, sounding terrified.
“The pilot’s dead. We’ve got company.”
He rolled and rose to his knees behind the pilot’s seat. He craned his neck over Elena’s slumped body and peeked out the side window.
The helicopter was gone.
Smart, Felice . . . kill the pilot and the plane’s grounded.
Now she and her team could take their sweet time at capturing or killing them.
Tucker peered through the windscreen. A hundred yards ahead, the black silhouette of the island blotted out the stars. At its base, a gentle crescent of white sand beckoned.
Only then did he note that the Beriev was still moving toward their goal. He scanned the control panel, looking for—there. The pictogram of a spinning propeller glowed, bracketed by a plus and minus sign.
Easy enough to interpret.
Reaching around the seat, he shoved the twin throttles forward. The engines roared, and the nose lifted slightly, then settled as the Beriev’s speed climbed. The plane raced for the island, skimming the water, rapidly closing the distance. He knew they would never be able to escape the more agile chopper by air.
That wasn’t his plan.
He goosed the wheel, keeping them angled toward the beach.
“Brace for impact!” he shouted. “KANE, COME!”
The shepherd sprinted forward. Tucker curled his left arm around Kane’s chest and turned them both so they were tucked against the bulkhead. He propped his legs against the pilot’s chair and squeezed his eyes shut.
Beneath his rear end, the Beriev’s fuselage shuddered as it passed the shallows. Next came a shriek, followed by a grinding of metal on sand.
The plane violently lurched left, catching a pontoon on something—a rock, a sandbar—then flipped up on its nose and cartwheeled across the beach.
Glass shattered.
From the cabin, screams and shouts.
The copilot’s seat tore free and seemed to float in midair before crashing into the side window above Tucker’s head.
Then the plane hit the trees, shearing off one wing. They slammed to a teetering stop, the plane stuck up on its side, the remaining wing pointed to the sky.
Tucker looked around. A pair of emergency lights in the overhead bathed the cockpit in a dull glow. Tree branches jutted through the side window. Above him, over his left shoulder, he saw a sliver of dark sky through the windscreen.
He took personal inventory of his condition and ran his hands over Kane’s flanks and limbs, getting a reassuring lick in return.
Think, he commanded himself.
Felice was still out there, but her helicopter lacked pontoons, so it could not land in the water. He pictured the tree-lined beach. He didn’t believe it was wide enough to accommodate the chopper’s rotor span.
We have time—but not much.
They just had to survive until the plane Harper sent got here.
He called, “Everyone okay back there?”
Silence.
“Answer me!”
Bukolov called weakly, “I am . . . we are hanging in the air. Anya and myself. She hurt her hand.”
“Utkin!”
“I am here, pinned under my seat.”
“No one move. Let me come to you.”
Tucker ordered Kane to stay put and pulled himself to the cockpit door. He swung his legs until he was sitting on the door coaming. With the plane on its side, the left bulkhead was now the floor. He found an emergency flashlight strapped to the wall. He snagged it free, turned it on, and took a moment to orient himself.
Utkin was still buckled into his seat, but it had broken loose and rolled atop him. Above him, Bukolov and Anya were strapped in place and suspended in midair.
No one seemed to be direly injured, except Anya clutched her hand to her chest, her eyes raw with pain. For now, there was nothing he could do to help her.
“Utkin, unbuckle yourself and crawl to me.”
As he did so, Tucker hopped down next to him and stoop-walked aft until he was beneath Bukolov and Anya. He shined his flashlight up.
“Anya, you first. Press the buckle release with your good hand, and I’ll catch you. It’s not as high as it seems.”
After a moment’s hesitation, she hit the release and fell. Tucker caught her and lowered her to her feet.
He repeated the procedure with Bukolov.
Once down, the doctor leveled a finger at Utkin’s face. “You! You almost got us killed. Again.”
“Abram, I did not—”
“Quiet!” Tucker barked. “We have only a few minutes before Felice finds a way to reach us. We need to get out of here without being seen.”
“How?” Anya asked, wincing. It appeared she had either sprained or broken her wrist.
“A window in the cockpit is smashed. That’s our way out.”
He turned and clambered back through the door that led to the cockpit. He swung his legs until he was straddling the coaming.
“Grab our packs!” he ordered. “Then Anya up first.”
Moving quickly, Tucker shuttled everyone out of the cabin, past the cockpit, and through the broken window. It was a tight squeeze amid the broken branches, but it allowed them to exit directly into dense forest, keeping off the open beach.
Utkin was the last of the three to leave. He looked at Tucker. “You’re wrong about me. I wish you would believe that.”
“I wish I could.”
As the man shimmied out, Tucker turned to Kane. “Ready to go, pal?”