The sound of her own groaning roused Lily. For a few minutes she drifted in and out of consciousness, but finally awoke and staggered over to the toilet. After taking care of the needs of her bladder, she returned to bed.
That Max had drugged her wasn’t surprising. Her still being alive was what was unexpected.
She remembered how the masked Max, wearing his butcher’s outfit, had come at her with his black stone knife. But instead of cutting her open, he had used his ancient blade to hack away her hair. She ran her hand along her head and felt the stubbled remains. A single tear ran down her cheek.
The afternoon shadows were already giving way to night; Lily had slept away most of the day. Max had probably wanted her to slumber until the full moon showed itself, and he along with it.
Her gaze ran down her naked body. The chalky substance he had rubbed on her skin still covered her flesh. It was for purification, Max had said. He had applied it in preparation for the full moon and what would come with it. She looked like a ghost. And soon, Lily feared, she would be one.
* * *
In the last twenty-four hours, thought Michael, it had felt as if he and Jake had moved heaven and earth. Now there was time enough for him to make one last call. When he’d been a PJ, many of those he had served with had written “just in case” letters, notes to be delivered to loved ones in the event of death. Because of his own circumstances, and having no family, Michael had never felt the need to write a just in case letter. Only now did he wish he’d inked one.
“Husband?” Mona said. He could hear the concern in her voice. Michael had told her not to expect a call from him until the following morning.
“No cause for alarm. I just wanted to hear your voice.”
“Are you sure everything is all right?”
“Can’t your husband call to say he loves you without you getting worried?”
“Hearing those words makes me glad, but I would rather they were said in person.”
“Next time I’ll just text,” he said.
Mona’s playful tone matched his. “If you do so, remember to include one hundred heart emojis, as well as a dozen emojis of roses.”
Although Mona still didn’t sound completely reassured, Michael was glad to hear her playing along with him.
“You drive a hard bargain,” he said.
The door to his hotel room opened. “It’s time,” Jake called. When he saw Michael talking on the phone, he signaled his apology.
“Jake’s telling me we have to go.”
“Husband?” Mona asked.
Her intake of her breath made it sound as if she was about to say something else before reconsidering.
Michael said, “My turn to ask. Are you okay?”
“Of course. I just did not want our conversation to end without my saying, ‘We love you.’”
* * *
Three hours later, Michael thought about his wife’s parting words. Even now they sustained him, providing an irreplaceable warmth. Thinking of her made his mission easier. No, it wasn’t so much a mission, he thought, as a wing and a prayer.
He wasn’t making that leap alone. There were plenty of people who had put their necks on the line for him. If he failed, it could mean the end of their careers. Michael would have understood had they refused his request for help, but no one had even hesitated. His band of brothers had made this mission possible.
The airspace around Las Vegas, like all metropolitan cities, was carefully regulated. Michael was fortunate that air traffic control at McCarran International Airport had a longstanding relationship with Nellis Air Force Base. Because of their proximity to one another, the civilian and military air traffic controllers were used to working closely together. McCarran was also used to accommodating a wide variety of military training missions involving aircraft.
Tonight was supposedly one of those missions. The Cessna 182 that was transporting Michael was flying at a low altitude toward the restricted airspace of Las Vegas. That wasn’t a problem, though; their unusual flight plan had secured approval through McCarran.
From his pilot’s seat, Captain “Corky” Corcoran called out, “Five minutes to DZ.”
DZ was drop zone. The plan was for Michael to leave the plane from five thousand feet, an altitude much lower than he usually jumped from. Still, in hot zones it was often necessary to come in low. Both he and Corky were used to nighttime missions. In the darkness you weren’t as much of a target. Michael suspected the Cessna felt more like a toy to Corky than a real plane. He was used to flying much bigger birds, mostly military transport planes like the HC-130 Hercules. Still, the old Cessna jump plane suited their purposes.
Corky yelled to be heard. “Mid-level winds are light. Under ten miles per hour.”
The wind gods were always fickle, especially in deserts. Michael had been monitoring the wind levels all day. Desert winds are notorious for being blustery and wild. Tonight, there was only a gentle zephyr. Had it been too windy, their mission would have had to be scrubbed.
There was no jumpmaster for this flight. They had taken off with the cabin door open. For Corky, it would be a short flight: fifteen minutes to altitude to destination, and about the same amount of time to land. Corky had departed with one passenger, and would return with none.
Michael checked his rig for the umpteenth time. His harness was snug and secure. He would deploy an MC-6 steerable parachute, a canopy used for accuracy jumps. Its hollow steering toggles would allow for better maneuverability and easier braking. For this mission, that would be absolutely necessary.
It was a cloudless night. The full moon would provide more than ample illumination. As he had been doing for much of the day, Michael visualized his jump. To prepare for the mission, he had pored over the DZ map, familiarizing himself with all the cardinal headings of north, south, east, and west, and the landmarks associated with them. He had prepared as if his life depended on knowing that information cold. It wasn’t an overstatement to say that it did.
Worldwide skydiving accuracy competitions—landing at a dead center target—were often determined by as little as a centimeter. The best skydivers were able to land on a dime. Michael wouldn’t have to be quite that precise, but close to it.
PJs constantly worked on accuracy in their landings, but setting down atop a building’s roof wasn’t something he had ever trained for. Michael wasn’t even sure if that was something you could train for. The jump, and especially the landing, posed significant dangers.
Looking out the open cabin door, he could see the skyline of Las Vegas and its kaleidoscope of colors below him. Among all the flashing, in the midst of the city’s sparkler show, he identified his target. It wouldn’t be as easy to do so while spinning around in the air.
“One minute,” Corky said.
Those who skydived were wont to use the expression “Blue skies.” It was a phrase often heard before jumping, or after landing. Michael said those words now: “Blue skies.”
Then he stood up and made his way toward the opening. The wind grabbed at him with its unseen fingers. In his head, Michael recited Psalm 56, verse 3. It was short and to the point: When I am afraid, I put my trust in you.
No question about it, he thought. I am afraid. But that didn’t stop him from positioning first one foot atop the small ledge above the right wheel, then the other. It was time for his leap of faith.
He jumped.
* * *
Freefall. PJs liked to call low-altitude jumps “hop and pop,” as there is little time to do anything but deploy your canopy.
Still, there was time enough to spread his wings to the wind around him and take in the earth below. All of Michael’s senses were instantly engaged, supercharged with the hyperawareness that comes with free-falling from the heavens.
He could hear Tom Petty singing the chorus to “Free Fallin’” in his head. Michael felt as if he was part of the song.
The bliss that came with his fall was its own drug. Beneath him was the biggest amusement park in the world, with all of its vying light shows. The wind was singing in his ears, and another song came with it, “Purple Haze” by Jimi Hendrix. The universe opened up to him; Michael was kissing the sky.
Two selves on the same skydive. Altimeter check, mental countdown to terminal velocity of 120 miles per hour. Ten seconds of freefall to one mind, eternity to the other. His rapture told him to follow the wind, his mission mind noted the speed and direction of that same wind.
Too soon, time for the big brake. Too soon the release and the canopy above him.
Michael took in the window in the sky. He descended on the experience of more than a thousand prior jumps, but asked for the wings of angels on this one. His eyes took in the Yin-Yang, a visual more reliable than GPS, and he traveled along the glide path he had been studying and visualizing for. Like a pilot preparing to land, Michael worked his own controls, using brakes, wind-checks, and crabbing to slow his descent, but not stall his canopy. He employed S-turns to get the best approach to the roof, aiming for dead center.
The Yin-Yang’s low-slope rooftop drew closer. Michael knew it through aerial photographs; now he would see it up close. He needed to avoid the ductwork and piping. The building rose up at him.
Stick the landing, he thought.
There was no alternative, or none he wanted to imagine.
* * *
Lily’s heart was pounding as she awoke from her drugged sleep. She had heard loud knocking and feared Max was coming for her. Lily looked around, alert to the sounds of more banging. She turned her head from side to side, trying to identify where the noise was coming from, but then it stopped.
Max, she thought. Bile rose up in her throat. Max had to be behind the sounds, even though he was nowhere to be seen.
Seconds passed. She was on the alert for anything. But what she didn’t expect was someone calling her name.
“Lily!”
Or at least she hadn’t expected a voice calling from outside her bedroom window.
“Are you there, Lily?”
The voice was faint, not much more than a whisper. But the best thing about it was that it didn’t sound like Max. Another man was calling her name. But that was impossible. She looked toward the window. Even though it was dark, Lily could just make out a figure.
No. It couldn’t be. Max had to be playing a final trick on her. He was getting back at her, pretending the moon was talking to her.
“Nataliya? Lily?”
The voice sounded more desperate now. Lily wondered if she was going mad. Perhaps, on this night of the full moon, it would be a mercy to not be in her right mind.
She rose from the bed, driven to go see. Once at the window, she put her face up against the darkened glass. Something was out there. That wasn’t possible. The figure was awash in the moonlight. He looked to be hovering in the air.
She stepped back, afraid. That was madness, she thought, unless . . .
“Are you an angel?” she said, shouting the words so that they might be heard.
“No,” the voice said. “My name is Michael Carey. I’m your lawyer.”