Bewildered, she did as she was told and he pulled off her poncho, rolled it into a ball, and stuffed it under his jacket.
“Scrunch down as much as you can.”
Grass and twigs caught in her hair as she made herself as flat as possible on the sodden earth. He flopped down next to her and heaved some branches over them, caging them as they burrowed like forest animals into the crackling debris.
“Close your eyes,” he whispered. “And don’t move.”
That went without saying. She shut her eyes, the darkness more terrifying than the enemies. The rotors spun debris into a whirlwind that spattered her body. Would the air disturbance blow away their sheltering branches and leave them exposed? Had they been spotted despite the last-second hiding spot?
She clung to Gideon’s jacket front, his arms holding her tight. The soggy ground underneath them quaked with the force of the vibrations. Judging from the deafening roar, the helicopter had to be directly over them. The noise shuddered right through her, threatening to blast away her remaining self-control.
Just hold on. That’s all you can do.
Something moved under her hip. A snake? Her muscles turned steel-taut as she fought hard not to scream. They’d no doubt flung themselves right on top of whatever creepy-crawlies called the decaying tree home. Visions of reptiles and spiders danced in her brain. She tried for calming breaths, telling herself she’d take her chances with vermin and insects any day over the predators in the sky. But the stinging, biting, slithering ...
The helicopter swooped lower, and the whoosh from the rotor thwapping the air vibrated her teeth. Had their location been pinpointed and the craft was about to land, freeing men to execute them?
Again she felt the movement against her body, but this time she identified it.
Not an animal or insect.
Her phone.
The ringer was on silent, but it could be nothing else pulsing in that regular rhythm. A cell signal was possible? Here? Now? Her fingers clenched, her desire to answer overpowering.
But she dared not. It was too risky even to check the screen because now she heard voices from the helicopter shouting to each other through their radios, cutting in and out.
“Negative, I don’t see them ... but they’re close. They’ve ... fire tower ... Soon.”
Move away, she silently demanded as her phone vibrated again.Go search for your prey somewhere else.
The helicopter dipped closer, and she was desperate to look, but she kept her eyes closed and her face hidden in Gideon’s chest. His rapid heartbeat told her he was as stressed as she, but he was motionless, his arms strong and reassuring.
Another pulse from her cell.
The phone went still.
She wanted to scream. Still the men hovered above, scanning for her and Gideon, two rabbits tracked by the falcon.
An eternity later the helicopter roared away. Gideon didnot loosen his grip. “Stay still for a few more minutes, just to be sure,” he whispered in her ear.
At last when he relaxed his hold and eased to a sitting position, she did the same and grabbed her phone.
“I got a call. Someone left a voicemail.” She peered at the screen.
Then everything felt very far away, as if she’d been snipped from the bonds of gravity, floating free.
“What?” Gideon said. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s ... The call ... It’s from Aaron’s cell phone.”
His shock mirrored her own. “How?”
She had no answer. The call had come from her brother’s number. It was inconceivable.
“Was ... Did Aaron have a phone on him when he was killed?”
“He told us the day before the murder he’d lost his phone. I don’t think he had an opportunity to get a new one before the murder.”
