CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Miller was somewhat certain she was alive. She’d always been under the impression that there was no pain in death, so she had to be alive.
Frigid water closed over her head, and she took in a mouthful of water as she tried to kick her way to the surface. The force of hitting the turbulent water had broken her hold on Elias, and she had no idea where he was or if he was okay. And if he was okay, she was going to kill him when she was finally able to draw a breath.
Her lungs burned, and panic started to engulf her just as her head broke the surface. She coughed up water and then sucked in a deep breath, only to be pulled under again by the force of the churning waters. A hand grabbed her ankle and then pushed her toward the surface again, and she sputtered and coughed as she tried to swim to the rocks at the edge. Elias lifted her onto the rocks and she rolled to her back, staring at the sky and trying to catch her breath. He was grinning like a fool. The damned lunatic. He actually thought that was fun.
“I’m really mad at you for that,” she said, panting.
“I figured you would be.”
“Did you mean it?” she asked. “When you said you loved me? Or was that your way of getting me to jump?”
His grin faded and he leaned down and kissed her. “I meant it. But we’ve got to move.”
Shots could still be heard from all around, and he knew Deacon would probably stay in place since he was playing the role of sniper for the day, but the others would be surrounding and herding Cordova’s men into a smaller radius like sheep before they were about to be slaughtered.
“I love you too.”
“I know. Let’s go.”
If she hadn’t been so tired she would’ve laughed. Not exactly a romance novel response. But she rolled to the side and got to her feet, the bandages wrapped around them completely worthless. She reached down to take the socks off and unwrap them, but he knelt down in front of her so she could catch her balance on his shoulders, and he did the task for her.
“Be careful where you step,” he said. But she wasn’t paying attention to him. Her eyes were glued to a strand of silver hanging from a tree branch, not ten yards from where they stood.
She stepped down off the boulder and headed toward the chain as if hypnotized as it swayed gently back and forth.
“Miller?” Elias asked, following behind her.
She stared at the necklace with a lump in her throat. She was afraid to touch it. Afraid it would disappear if she did. She hadn’t seen it in more than twenty years, but she remembered it like it was yesterday. The way the long silver chain hung around her mother’s neck, and the way she’d keep the small compass tucked beneath her shirt.
Elias reached up and unhooked it gently from the branch, and then turned it over in his hand.
“There’s an inscription on the back,” he said.
“ ‘So you can always find your way back to me,’ ” she said before he could read it. “It was my mother’s. My father gave it to her when they got married.”
“Your brother’s next clue?” he asked.
“It must be,” she said. “She was wearing it when they left for their last trip.” The sob caught her by surprise. It had been almost two decades since she’d cried for her parents. But all it took was a simple reminder to keep the grief fresh. “He really found their crash site. She’d have been wearing this.”
The enormity of that sunk in and he pulled her into his arms and let her grieve anew. He felt safe and solid, and she realized she’d never had that feeling of security from another person in her whole life.
She wiped her eyes with her hands, though it didn’t do much good because she was soaking wet.
“It’s a locket,” she told him. “There’s a hidden switch on the side and it opens up.” She showed him where it was and used her thumbnail to open it. Inside was a folded piece of paper, and she took it with shaking hands and opened it.
“What does it say?” Elias asked, moving her farther into the trees as another shot rang out from somewhere above.
“It’s a riddle,” she said.
“I hate riddles,” he told her.
“I recognize it. We used to do them when we were kids. Had a whole book of them and spent one summer trying to trip each other up. I was always a lot better at them than Justin was. He hated that. He didn’t like to lose at anything.”
“That didn’t change as he got older,” Elias said.
“ ‘This old one runs forever, but never moves at all. He has not lungs or throat, but still a mighty roar.’ ”
“And that pretty much sums up the reason I hate riddles.”
“It’s a waterfall,” she told him. And then she took a good look at the one they’d just jumped down, and wondered how the hell they were still alive.
She closed the locket and put it around her neck, tucking it beneath her shirt, and then she climbed back up on the rocks to see how close she could get to the falls without tumbling back into the water. Elias didn’t say anything and didn’t ask her what she was doing. He knew. And when the boulders got too big for her to climb, he did it and then pulled her up until they could reach out and touch the falls.
Elias sat down on the rock instead of trying to slide behind the falls and risking slipping. He was already wet, so it didn’t matter that he got soaked again as he searched for a ledge. One moment, he was right in front of her eyes. And in the next moment, he was gone.
She scooted close, and then his arm reached out and grabbed her, and she stifled a yelp of surprise. Then he pulled her behind the falls and her feet touched solid ground.
She heard him swear as he tried to unbutton the thigh pocket of his pants, but because it was damp it made it difficult. He finally managed it and the high-powered beam of the flashlight came on, illuminating the cave behind the falls.
“This should keep them busy looking for us for a little while,” he said.
“I thought the goal was to find an extraction point.”
“It is, but we’ll let them do a little cleanup first. You’d be surprised how often sheer dumb luck plays a role.”
“That’s not a comforting thought,” she said.
“Not for us, most of the time,” he said. “We’re skilled enough to adapt to any situation. But for a good majority of ops, there’s a lot of improvisation and a whole lot of praying. For instance, even as advanced as our technology is, a cell phone isn’t going to survive a dive from a waterfall.”
He held up the device that had been their lifesaver during this mess, and she felt her heart sink at the sight of the shattered screen.
“We can’t communicate with Elaine,” he said, “but they’ll still be able to pinpoint our location with the tracking device in me. And there’s another backup on my watch.” He shone the flashlight onto the floor, noting the sharp rocks. “Hop up on my back,” he told her.
“You can’t keep carrying me everywhere,” she said. “What happens if you get a hernia or blow out a disc? What the hell am I supposed to do then?”
“Put me out of my misery like an old dog,” he said dryly. “Do you have to argue about every damned thing? I’ve pulled in fish heavier than you.”
“Fine, but I’m going to be really angry with you if I have to take you out to pasture and shoot you.”
He turned around and squatted down some so she could hop on his back, and then he hoisted her up like she was nothing and started walking.
“Just so you know,” he said, “if I need to reach for my weapon I’m going to drop you.”
“I’ll understand completely,” she told him, and they made their way through the narrowing cave, her holding the flashlight so he could hold on to her legs.
“I’ve got to put you down,” he said. “It’s getting too narrow for us to go through like this.”
The walls had been steadily shrinking, and the sound of the waterfall was a good distance behind them, though she could still hear it. The walls were black rock and slightly wet, and the air was damp and cool. There were places where the walls came close to touching, and she didn’t think Elias would be able to get his broad shoulders through, but he somehow managed.
“This is not my favorite thing,” she said. “It feels like the walls are moving. I’m having visions of Luke, Leia, and Han Solo being stuck in the compactor in Star Wars.”
“I was wondering when you’d find a movie reference for this,” he said.
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Uh-huh.” He got down on his knees and then his belly and Miller followed suit.
The stone was cold and wet beneath her and her body trembled uncontrollably, out of either fear or the cold, she wasn’t sure. Her lungs seized and her breath came in shallow pants as the walls pressed in on her, scraping at her shoulders, rocks digging into her knees as she crawled.
She couldn’t focus on Elias. She could only focus on one small movement at a time, and not think about the fact that they could get wedged inside and might not be found until it was too late. She could hear Elias’s labored breathing in front of her, and she didn’t know how he was doing it. He’d shifted onto his side to make it easier for his shoulders to get through, but it seemed like an impossible fit.
And then when she reached the point where she wasn’t sure she could keep going, the cave opened back up again, and she sprawled onto her stomach with relief. There wasn’t a waterfall at this end of the cavern, but instead it was covered with thick vines that hung down like snaky ropes.
“Thank you, Jesus,” she muttered, crawling on hands and knees toward the opening.
The exit was only as high as her waist, but she could see the little peeks of sunlight through the vines, and she’d never wanted to see daylight so bad in her life. Elias crawled through first and stood up and then reached back to help her through.
A shot rang out and Elias crumpled in front of her, and all she saw was the blood on his face.