Total pages in book: 102
Estimated words: 98176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 327(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98176 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 491(@200wpm)___ 393(@250wpm)___ 327(@300wpm)
“So sorry,” she murmurs when she’s done, and I hand her a water bottle from the case on the floor.
“Nothing to be sorry about,” I say as Anton gets back on the road. “This is perfectly natural.”
I keep my voice calm, as if I’m not the least bit bothered by seeing my wife puke her guts out on the side of the road while we’re running for our lives. As if rage isn’t like acid in my veins, tinting my vision a bloody shade of red.
“Are you sick, Sara?” Anton asks, and I realize he doesn’t know about the baby yet. And why would he? We’ve just found out ourselves.
“We’re expecting,” I say, and despite my best efforts, I don’t sound anything but tense.
If something happens to Sara or the baby because of this, I’ll never forgive myself.
“Oh.” Anton seems at a loss for words. “That’s… Congratulations.”
“Thanks,” I mutter, and then I hear it.
A wail of sirens in the distance.
Fuck.
“Step on it,” I tell Anton, but he’s already flooring the gas, his face tense.
I turn to Sara. “Put on your seatbelt.”
She scrambles to obey, her hazel eyes dark in her colorless face as I check my weapons.
The sirens are coming from behind us—from the direction of the clinic—which means my intuition was right.
They came for us.
The roar of a helicopter soon joins the sirens, and Anton speeds up further, taking a steep curve in the road at a hair-raising speed.
“Slow the fuck down,” I bark as Sara convulsively grabs my hand. “We can’t crash, you understand?”
If it were just me and Anton, I’d risk it, but not with Sara here.
Not when she’d nearly died in a crash on a road much like this one.
Anton lets up on the accelerator a bit, and I bring Sara’s hand up to my lips. “It’s going to be okay, ptichka,” I murmur, kissing her knuckles. “We just need to get to the plane.”
“They might already be waiting for us there,” Anton says. “Since they knew about the clinic, they might know about the airstrip too.”
“The clinic is on the map, but the airstrip is not,” I say, squeezing Sara’s hand reassuringly when I feel it tense in my grip. “They’d need to get its location from the staff.”
Or so I’m hoping.
Because we could be heading into an ambush.
Anton doesn’t respond, just floors the gas again as we reach a straighter stretch of road. We’re just a few minutes from the airstrip now, but the chopper’s roar is growing louder by the second, drowning out the adrenaline-fueled hammering of my heartbeat.
Finally, I see its headlights pop up behind us as we take another sharp turn.
“Get down,” I bark at Sara, pushing her flat on the seat, and then I open the window and lean out, ignoring the sharp pulling pain in my side as I aim my M16 at the chopper.
It swerves behind the trees before I can open fire.
I wait, not wanting to waste my bullets.
A second later, the chopper pops up again, and I fire off a round.
It fires back, then swerves away again.
Fuck. We’re almost at the airstrip now.
I wait until the chopper appears again, and then I open fire, squeezing the trigger until my gun clicks empty and the chopper falls back in an effort to avoid my bullets.
Ducking back into the car, I swiftly reload, then lean out the window again.
This time, though, the chopper hangs back.
That’s not good.
We can’t take off with these fuckers shooting at us.
The car turns sharply, and when I glance at the front, I see we’re already on the airstrip, heading full speed for the plane.
“RPG’s inside,” Anton yells, slamming on the brakes. “I’m making a run for it.”
We screech to a halt a dozen yards from the plane, and I grit my teeth as my side slams into the sharp metal edge of the car window.
If we survive this, Sara will be upset that I fucked up my stitches.
Anton jumps out of the car, sprinting for the plane, and I provide cover fire as the chopper approaches. The sirens are getting louder too; they must be right on our heels.
“Get on the plane, now!” I shout at Sara, and out of the corner of my eye, I see her scramble to obey.
My M16 clicks empty, but there’s no time to reload, so I grab the Glock from my waistband as the chopper swerves away, then comes back, spraying the car with bullets. The glass around me explodes, the shards biting into my face and neck. Gripping the Glock, I push my door open and tumble out, rolling away from the car as I shoot back.
I need them to focus on me, not the plane or Sara.
Bullets hit the ground all around me, sending bits of asphalt flying at my eyes. I can smell the gunpowder, feel the burn of lead as it whooshes by.