Duke just stared at me like I was stupid for trying.
“Do you hear that?” I said. “It’s a plane. They saw the flare. We can escape. You can come with us.”
I could see his mind churning. “You would let me come?”
“Yes!” I lied. “This is our chance to be free! Please, unchain me!”
He pulled the key from his pocket and pondered it in his palm.
A gunshot cut through the wind and the dwindling rain.
I started to sob. I yelled Nash’s name over and over until my voice was hoarse. Oh my God, if he was dead I might as well die too.
And then a plane flew overhead.
I started jumping, waving my arm, screaming anew. “Help us! Get their attention!” I cried at Duke. “Please!”
He shot into action, running below the plane and waving his arms, jumping up and down. It drew closer and I realized it wasn’t a plane, but a helicopter. It was red.
The Coast Guard.
Dear God, the Coast Guard had found us.
Movement at the edge of the sand drew my attention. Nash burst forward, running like the wind. His chest was splattered with red and I screamed his name.
His head snapped to me and he changed course, rushing toward the rocks as several scurvy pirates followed.
“Help!” I screamed again into the sky.
The helicopter was lowering, the wind battering the little aircraft, and yet it still came closer. “Please don’t leave,” I pleaded.
Duke ran back over, making a beeline for me. But Nash intercepted him, tackling him to the ground and hitting him in the head with the butt of the gun. He sprawled out beneath him and Nash pushed up, rushing over to me.
“He has the key!” I cried, pointing at Duke.
Nash cursed and rushed away. Pirates were closing in as Nash dug through Duke’s pocket and came up with the single key.
Just before he reached me, the pirates caught up to him. He threw the key at me. It landed in the sand at my feet. My hands were shaking so badly that I had a hard time getting the key in the tiny hole.
I gave a frustrated cry and the key slid in.
The gun went off again.
I fell forward when the chain released me. I scrambled up and ran toward Nash, who was wielding the gun as a bleeding pirate lay at his feet. The others were circling him warily as I rushed to his side.
He put his arm around me, draping me in security, as the helicopter hovered above.
“We cannot land,” echoed a loud voice from overhead. “Put down your weapons.”
Surely they could see that people were trying to kill us! “Help!” I screamed.
A very long, very unsteady ladder fell from the helicopter and landed in the sand. “Drop your weapons,” they instructed again.
Nash looked between the gun and the pirates. Between us and the rope ladder offering us safety.
“Get ready to run,” he said to me.
I nodded.
He dropped the gun.
We took off.
Nash took my hand and dragged me behind him, my feet barely touching the sand. Just when the ladder was within reach, a hand closed around my ankle.
I shrieked and fell, rolling over and looking behind me.
One of the dirty pirates had launched at me, managing to take me down. I kicked at him with my free leg. That only seemed to make him try harder.
Nash grabbed me beneath the armpits and pulled, trying to get me away. A strange game of tug-of-war ensued… I was the rope. I was the prize.
Safety or death? Live or Die?
I glanced at Nash. “Just let me go. Save yourself.”
He yelled a cuss word. A very bad one.
And then a gunshot cut through the commotion. The man tugging my leg fell into the sand as a pool of red spread out beneath him. Nash pulled me away, lifting me up and carrying me the rest of the way to the ladder. He stepped on and wrapped it around us.
“Don’t let go of me,” he said.
I looked back. Duke was standing there, blood dripping down the side of his face, wielding a gun.
He helped me.
He helped us.
“Duke!” I screamed. “Hurry!”
He stepped forward, toward us. Pirates clustered around him. He went down. I saw the struggle of the men, a rumble of bodies all moving frantically in the sand. I couldn’t see Duke. I didn’t know what was happening.
Then I saw the suitcase sitting a few feet away, near the table where they played poker. I ripped myself free and ignored Nash’s outraged cry. I grabbed up the suitcase and sprinted back to the ladder where Nash told me I was stupid and then held me tight.
The helicopter began to move. It began to lift us up away from the ground, into the sky.
“Duke!” I screamed one last time.
A final gunshot rang out.
Nash and I stared down as the tangle of pirates separated, leaving a lone body in the sand.
It was Duke.
His chest was saturated in red. He was unmoving.
He was dead.
I turned my face into Nash’s chest. His arm tightened around me as the helicopter swung up into the sky and we dangled between safety and the ocean.
The ladder began to tow upward, and long minutes later, we were both sprawled across the floor of the helicopter.
“Are you Ava and Nash?” one of the rescuers asked.
“Yes!” Nash yelled over the engine. “Our plane crashed on the island.”
“We saw your smoke flare,” the man yelled, passing us thick, heavy blankets. “We had to turn back because of the storm last night.”
I wrapped the blanket around me with trembling fingers. I couldn’t get the image of Duke out of my head. He hadn’t deserved that.
“We flew out this morning before it started to rain again. We were about to head back when we saw the second flare.”
“Thank God you came,” Nash said. I heard him tell the guy about the pirates. I heard the pilot radio to someone that we were found and that assistance was needed on the unnamed island. He gave coordinates that I didn’t understand.
Nash came close, wrapping his blanket around me and then tucking me against his chest. He propped us both up against the wall of the helicopter as we flew away to a nearby island, to a hospital where they apparently were waiting for us.
I tipped my head back, angling it against his chest and looking up at his face.
He kissed me, right on the lips, in front of everyone. “We made it,” he whispered, his lips brushing mine.
“I was so afraid you died.”
“I wasn’t about to die. I have too much to live for.”
I rode the rest of the way wrapped in his arms. The relief I felt was insurmountable.
Finally. We were safe.