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VOL. 2
By
Christina Ross
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WEEK ONE
CHAPTER ONE
Somewhere near Manila
May
WHEN I WAS SHAKEN AWAKE, I had no concept of how much time had passed since I’d last slipped into unconsciousness—and had nearly walked fully into the comforting white light that had shined before me. I’d come close to moving into that light, but because of Alex, our child, and my dear friends, I’d pulled away from it before it could fully encompass me.
As I came to, I heard screams and shouting, and smelled the hot, unmistakable scent of smoke.
And then came a man’s voice.
“Jennifer, wake up. The plane is on fire. We need to move you out of here before the other engine explodes, which could happen at any moment.”
My head was still thick and my eyes were still closed when I said, “My baby. I think I’ve lost my baby...”
“I don’t know anything about a child. But if you are pregnant, what we need to do is save both of your lives and get you out of here before it’s too late. Take my hand.”
I opened my eyes, and saw that it was Cutter who was standing in front of me. Beautiful, kind Cutter. Not Alex. Not Tank. And certainly not Max, whom I knew had been ripped away from us—along with the pilots and Amy—when lightning struck our plane and disaster struck. The very thought that five people had died before we crashed was unfathomable to me. I still could see the front of the plane breaking apart and swirling away from me as if it was being tossed aside.
As if it didn’t matter.
“Where is Alex?”
“Outside.”
“Is he alive?”
“There are complications.”
My eyes widened when I heard those words. “What complications?”
“Tank is dealing with them now.”
“What does that mean?”
“Jennifer, you need to listen to me—please. We need you get you off this plane now.”
I looked around me, and saw in the haze, a holocaust of wreckage. I didn’t want to ask just how bad things were because I was afraid to know. I was scared to death to know. Had anyone else died? If they had, I couldn’t bear the thought.
Still, there was a part of me that needed to know. “Where is Lisa?” I asked.
“Tank’s already taken her outside.”
“Is she alive?”
“I’m not sure. We just hit the ground, Jennifer. I know you’re shaken and groggy from the bump on your head—and I know that you’re concerned—but I need you to stop asking questions. I have to get to Blackwell and Alexa before it’s too late. And there are items on this plane that Tank and I need to retrieve before the whole thing blows, which could happen at any moment. I need you to help me. Will you help me? Yes? Good. Take my arm. That’s right. Now I’m going to pick you up. See—that wasn’t so bad, was it? Let me get you outside and safely away from the plane.”
I let him scoop me into his arms and lift me—which hurt so much, I felt my stomach cramp again. “I’m losing my child.”
“If you’re carrying a child, you need to know that I’m a trained medic. So is Tank. To the best of our abilities, we can find out if you’re still pregnant—but later.”
“Where are we?”
“I have no idea. We’re on an island of some sort. Come on. Hold tight. That’s right—good. We’re going through the front of the plane.”
“What’s that sound I’m hearing?”
“The engine. It’s malfunctioning. It’s winding up—and heating up. Soon it will blow. I need to get you outside so I can come back for Blackwell and Alexa before it’s too late.”
“Take them first.”
“Not happening. Protocol is that you come straight after Alex. Tank took Lisa, but we both know why. They’re engaged.”
When we passed Blackwell and Alexa, I saw that each were bloodied and bruised, either unconscious or dead.
“Barbara!” I said as we passed her. “Alexa!”
Neither answered. Neither even moved.
“Good God,” I said. “They’re covered in blood. You have to save them.”
“I plan to. Now listen to me,” he said in my ear as we approached the ruined front part of the plane. “It’s raining hard outside. But there is cover just beyond the beach in the jungle. I’ll place you next to Alex and Lisa, and then Tank and I will handle the rest. I need you to be calm now. I need you to do as I say. We can’t lose the others, and we can’t lose whatever supplies we can salvage before the plane becomes a tinder box.”
My stomach was still cramping, but I fought through the pain as best I could. “Understood,” I said.
“Just hold onto me.”
And I did. We went toward the plane’s ruined open mouth, which greeted me with a set of menacing steel teeth as we passed through it, and then Cutter jumped down onto the ground with me in his arms.
I felt a jolt, and then, through the fog that had overtaken me, I became aware that I was being hurried through rough weather and into a tropical forest just beyond the beach. And that’s where I found Alex and Lisa.
With his shirt off for reasons I couldn’t understand, Tank was beside Alex, administering CPR. He slammed his balled fists against Alex’s chest, and said, “Come on, Alex!”
Daniella was kneeling beside Lisa, talking closely into her ear and rubbing her shoulders, arms, and legs.
“Don’t die on me,” she said. “Please don’t die. Lisa, I need you to hear me. Listen to my voice. Come back to me!”
In a daze, I looked over at Lisa, whose left hand seemed to lift before falling again. She was coming in and out of consciousness, but she was alive. I wanted to go to her, but I had no strength to do so. I felt weighted down and heavy. Useless. And so I just lay there on the sand, unable to move as I turned to watch Tank try to bring my husband back to life.
“Breathe!” he commanded.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Cutter run away from me toward the plane.
“Breathe!” Tank said again.
But Alex just lay there, nearly as pale as Tank’s white button-front shirt, which was soaked from the rain and wrapped loosely around Alex’s neck. Why was it there? Why was it covered in blood? And then I remembered. In the crash, something had slashed Alex’s throat. He’d been bleeding heavily before I blacked out. At some point, his heart must have stopped. Had he lost that much blood? He must have.
The fear of losing him gave me the shot of adrenaline I needed.
With an effort, I crawled toward them. The pain I felt was excruciating, but I pressed through it, determined to be at my husband’s side and to help bring him back to us. I watched as Tank held Alex’s nose, pressed his mouth over Alex’s mouth, exhaled a sharp breath of air, and then went back to pressing on Alex’s chest. As I grew closer, Tank’s voice was almost a bark.
“Jennifer, stay back.”
“Let me talk to him,” I said. “Let him hear my voice. He needs to hear me now. He needs to know that I’m alive, and that there’s something to fight for.”
While he pumped his fists against my husband’s chest, Tank looked fleetingly at me. “You need to stay out of my way if you want him to live.”
“Is he breathing?”
“Not yet.”
“Alex!” I shouted next to his ear. “It’s Jennifer! It’s your wife! Please fight for us! Please fight for yourself and our child!”
At the mention of a child, Tank’s eyes flicked up in surprise toward mine before he continued with his work.
Watching Alex lie there as Tank struggled to bring him back to life was too much for me to absorb—I wanted to be strong, but instead I started to sob. “I can’t do this without you,” I said to him. “I love you so much. You can’t go now. Now isn’t the time. Let go of whatever’s holding you back. Step away from the light like I did. It’s possible. I’m here to tell you that it’s possible. And that I love you. I am fighting for you and our child. Now do the same for us, Alex! Please! Breathe for us for Christ’s sake!”
Behind me, there was a sudden rushing of footsteps. I turned and saw that Cutter had just laid Blackwell and Alexa down on the ground. He did so with such ease, that it was as if they were as weightless as rag dolls. He must have carried each of them on either one of his shoulders. I looked over at the destroyed plane, and saw that it was billowing massive clouds of black smoke into the rain-slaughtered air. Worse, the engine was starting to make a screaming noise that was loud enough to frighten me.
“Mommy!” Daniella screamed when she spotted them both. “Alexa!”
“I’m going back for supplies,” Cutter said to Tank.
“Don’t—it’s too late. Listen to the engine. It’s going to blow.”
“I’ve got time,” he said.
“No, you don’t! Everything we need to survive is on this island—you know that! Our training has taught us that.”
But Cutter ignored his boss and was gone again, slicing away from us toward the plane through the thrashing rain.
I looked over at Blackwell and Alexa—either they were dead, or they were alive and unconscious. I didn’t know for sure, but unlike Lisa, neither seemed to be breathing. They were unmoving, and unlike Lisa’s chest, which was rising and falling, I couldn’t tell if theirs were. They seemed completely still to me.
Dead to me.
At that moment, Tank struck Alex’s chest so hard that it caused him to take a sharp breath and lurch upright into a sitting position. His eyes shot open as if he’d been shocked back to life. He sucked in another lungful of air, looked at Tank and me as if he didn’t know who we were, and then slumped back onto the sand.
“Alex!” I said.
He squinted up at Tank, who was looking down quizzically at him, and then he launched into a coughing fit before he finally turned to me. When he saw me, the color rushed back into his face. I reached out for his hand and grasped it in my own.
“Watch him,” Tank said. “He has a gash in his throat. It’s not deep—it didn’t slice through his trachea, which is a blessing. But it did knick an artery, so he needs to try not to cough or the bleeding will only get worse. Keep him calm. If we’re lucky, Cutter will find supplies on the plane that will fight an infection should he get one. Cutter knows where everything is, so let’s hope for all of our sakes that he returns before the plane blows.” He stood up. “Let me tend to Blackwell and Alexa. Let me see if they’re all right.”
“Tank,” I said. “Listen to the engine.”
“I told Cutter not to go, but he made his choice. For all of us, let’s hope it was a wise one.”
And with that, he hurried to help Blackwell and Alexa, neither of whom had yet to move.
