“We need to get out of here,” Luis interrupted impatiently, before pushing Andrea forward. They both slid down the inflatable slide.
Before she was ready, Alberto jumped onto the slide himself, dragging Gillian with him. The second their feet hit the tarmac, he was yanking her upright and pulling her toward the small plane waiting for them.
People were running around everywhere. Confusion was rampant. The freed hostages didn’t know which way to go. Some were heading for the small plane, but others had turned and were running off to the right, toward a man wearing all black. Gunshots rang out, but there was nowhere to find cover.
Alberto wrapped an arm around her neck and pulled her against his chest. Gillian’s hands went to his arm and she tried to pull it away from her throat. He was cutting off her air, and the only thing she could concentrate on was getting oxygen into her lungs. As they walked backward, Alberto raised his rifle and shot at the men and women running in the opposite direction, then laughed when screams sounded around them.
“Stop fucking around!” Luis yelled from behind them. “Get to the plane!”
Gillian fought then. She was not going to get on another plane with these heartless assholes. She knew if they got her onboard, no one would ever see her again. Not her parents, not her best friends, no one. They’d abuse her, hurt her, then discard her body deep in a jungle somewhere.
She wasn’t just going to let that happen.
Alberto was obviously surprised by her struggles, because he stopped shooting and dropped his rifle. It was slung around his back with a strap, but he needed to use both hands to try to subdue her.
No matter how hard she struggled, though, Gillian couldn’t escape Alberto’s hold. It wasn’t until she heard Luis swearing in Spanish that she realized they’d reached the smaller plane.
Before she could process what was happening, Andrea screamed. Poor little Renee was also crying from somewhere nearby.
Gillian distractedly noticed that Leyton must have followed them off the plane. He was standing nearby. He wasn’t helping her, or Andrea, or even Renee. He was just standing there watching, almost as if he was in shock.
She wanted to yell at him to run, to get away from the plane and the hijackers, to save himself, but she didn’t get the chance.
One second Gillian was standing, and the next, she and Alberto were on the ground. They’d smacked into Andrea and Luis, hard, and all four of them went down. The other couple was now under them. They were lying at the bottom of the three steps leading into the twin-engine aircraft, Luis yelling in Spanish and trying to get to his feet.
Renee was curled in a ball nearby, crying for her mom.
Everything was chaotic and confusing and happening too quickly for Gillian to process.
A loud gunshot rang out—and everyone seemed to freeze. The sound of glass breaking came immediately on the heels of the gunshot, and shards rained down on the foursome at the bottom of the steps.
“Dammit!” Luis shouted before he finally extracted himself from Andrea and stood. He turned to scramble up the stairs, but another gunshot filled the air, and the leader of the hijackers slumped against the very stairs he was attempting to climb.
Andrea screamed again.
Alberto wrenched Gillian to her knees, but before she could gain her feet, one more shot rang out…
And Alberto slumped against her.
She felt wetness splash against her face before she went down again, Alberto’s weight pinning her to the ground.
Andrea continued to scream, Renee continued to cry, and Gillian had the uncharitable thought that she wished they’d just shut up. She could hear more screaming and crying all around her.
Struggling to get out from under Alberto, Gillian heard more gunshots, this time much closer. Flinching with every one, she decided to stay where she was. It was irrational, but somehow she felt safer hiding under Alberto’s dead body than standing up and exposing herself to flying bullets.
It might’ve been two minutes or two seconds, she wasn’t sure, but the sound of silence finally registered in her ears.
Then, “Gillian!”
She’d recognize that voice anywhere.
Walker.
Renewing her attempt to get out from under Alberto, Gillian tried her best to wiggle free. She struggled for only seconds before shoving the man’s body off herself. Turning her head, Gillian looked into the concerned gray eyes of Walker as he ran toward her.
He looked very different than the last time she’d seen him. Gone were the gray airline coveralls. Now he was dressed in black, even had black makeup smeared on his face. He was holding some sort of rifle and he had something wrapped around his throat.
Reaching down, he hauled her up with one hand, keeping his rifle at the ready, and pulled her toward him.
Gillian went willingly.
He was hard all over, mostly because of the bulletproof vest he was obviously wearing, but even his biceps were as hard as rocks.
She’d never felt so safe in all her life.
She allowed herself a second to close her eyes and relax into him before the sound of Andrea’s sobs forced her to open them once more. Looking to her right, she saw a man dressed much like Walker, helping Andrea to her feet. She looked terrified out of her mind. So much so, she couldn’t even walk; the man had to pick her up to get her to safety.
Luis’s body had been pushed off the stairs and he lie dead on the tarmac, next to the small plane. Another man, obviously with Walker, stood in the doorway of the plane. He was frowning, and he scared Gillian a little bit with his dour expression.
Turning, she saw that Renee was no longer lying on the ground. One of Walker’s teammates was pointing her toward the terminal and telling her to run.
Gillian’s ears rang. “Is it over?” she whispered, feeling stupid.
“It’s over,” Walker confirmed.
“Three dead inside, not including the pilot,” the man standing in the plane said.
“There’s three more out here. Good job, everyone,” someone standing behind them said, scaring the hell out of Gillian.
“Easy, Di,” Walker murmured, not loosening his hold on her.
It was a good thing, as Gillian knew she would’ve fallen to the ground without his support.
Looking around, she pointed to Luis. “That’s Luis.” Then she nodded to Alberto. “And the one who had me was Alberto.” Turning, she looked at the dead man behind her. “And that’s Jesus.”
“We need her to ID the others,” the man in the plane said.
“No,” Walker replied.
At the same time, Gillian said, “Okay.”
“You don’t have to do this,” Walker told her sternly. “Someone else can figure this goat screw out.”
She shook her head. “I need to know they’re dead.”
Walker pressed his lips together. She could tell he wasn’t happy, but he didn’t try to talk her out of it. “Oz, drag them to the door. She can ID them from here.”
The big man on the plane nodded and ducked out of sight for a moment. Then he was back, dragging Carlos’s body by the upper arm.
“Carlos,” Gillian said softly.
Oz nodded and repeated the action twice more as she identified Isaac and Henry.
Gillian knew she was in shock. This couldn’t be her life. Was she really standing in the middle of a runway in Venezuela identifying dead men? Men bleeding from holes in their heads?