“Lazzo, give me my bow and hold the arrows up for me,” I whispered down at him. He scrambled to pull the bow out of the bag and handed it to me.
“Don’t make me do this, Chase. They’re not worth it.” Baker motioned for Brock to move a little left.
“You’re wrong, Dad. You’re always wrong.” Chase reached into the back of his pants and pulled out a handgun. “You’re not worth it—”
“Chase, no.” I reached up to grab him, just as he fired a shot at the plane.
I don’t think he was shooting at his dad. I think he was just trying to scare them off—to make them leave. In any case, Baker wasn’t as merciful—he wasn’t merciful at all. I heard him yell, “Shoot him,” when Chase fired, and then three shots rang out as one. I heard Flynn scream a millisecond later as Chase’s chest exploded, and he fell backward onto Flynn and I. As he fell, I pushed Flynn back down into the channel and raised my bow. I got off the first arrow quickly and cleanly. It flew true into Brock’s throat. I saw him clutch the arrow and fall to his knees as I ducked back down into the flooded channel. I heard the captain scream, “Take off,” and bullets clanged off the steel surface above us. I peeked up as the other two men with guns boarded the plane and it rolled away. It rolled to the end of the ship and turned, then passed over us and took off, another plane following a minute behind it.
Everyone knew where we were now, and people were coming toward us, but I knew Baker had to have taken the experienced soldiers with him. He wouldn’t short himself on force. “Flynn.” I grabbed her arm.
She was a sobbing, shaking mess. “She k…k… killed. He… she…” Her shivering he’s were coming out as she’s.
“Flynn.” I shook her. “I know. I know this sucks.” Understatement. I realized then I was covered in Chase’s blood. I tried to at least wash it off my face in the flooded channel water. “But you can get him back—you can get your Dad back for this.”
She looked into my eyes, clearly in shock, but also listening.
“I need you—right now—to stand up and get the people coming to listen to you. You need to get Lazzo and me on one of the other planes.”
She nodded and stood slowly. She crawled out of the hole as a large group of people tentatively approached us. Flynn stared down at her brother’s body. She knelt down beside him and lifted his head into her lap. She eyed the people who had drawn close but since stopped. A few peeks out of the hole told me there were about thirty of them, six or seven with guns—including two of Baker’s men—and a handful of women scattered among them.
I heard Flynn start to speak. “Did you see what he did?” I could only see her face from my crouched position, but that was enough. It was sad but determined. “Did you? Did you hear my dad order them to kill my brother? Did you see him shoot his own son?” There were murmurs but no one spoke. “Is that the kind of man you want to follow? Is that a leader?”
I peeked up, as the water was now almost three feet deep. People were shaking their heads. Baker’s two soldiers still had their guns trained on Flynn. We only had about five or six minutes of air space left. Come on, Flynn.
“Well, here’s how it is. I have two people behind me who need a plane to get to America. They’re not going after my Dad. They’re not here to stop the rescue. No one has to go with them, but they’re going to take a plane.” Flynn pulled two pistols out of the back of her jeans but remained kneeling. “Is there anyone here who wants to die over that?” She specifically eyed her father’s men. They didn’t look like they were going to back down.
“Frankly, I don’t care anymore.” Flynn stood up. “My dad—my dad—killed my brother because Chase didn’t believe in letting innocent people die. If anyone wants to kill these two behind me, you’re going to have to kill me first.” She pointed the guns at the SEALs. “And I. Don’t. Care.”
Flynn was in a standoff with the two SEALs. Ninety-nine out of one hundred times that was a terrible idea. But neither of these men probably wanted to shoot a teenage girl who had just watched her brother die. If they shot her, everyone would turn on them. No one else wanted anything to do with this. The group of onlookers disbanded. Pretty soon it was only Flynn and the two SEALs. I whispered up to her, “Flynn, point both guns at the guy on the left. I’ve got the guy on the right.”
Flynn did as I asked, and I stood up with my loaded bow aimed at the other soldier. “Two on two, y’all.” I stared down my opponent. “You’ve got ten seconds to lower those guns before you both die.”
“How about nine before you both die?” Flynn’s man wasn’t flinching.
“Okay then, we all die.” I wasn’t backing off either.
“Why wouldn’t you just kill us anyway?” My SEAL asked.
“Did either of you shoot her brother?”
They both shook their heads. “No,” the one on the left said.
“Then that’s why. Lower your guns. Take the only way out of this.”
“We can’t let you take a plane,” my guy chimed in.
“Look to your left, will you?” I nodded in the general direction. “You see that guy lying there with an arrow through his throat?” Before they could answer, I went on. “That’s you in three seconds if you say one more word to me. Now lower your damn guns.”
He must have taken me seriously—both of them in fact. They glanced at each other, nodded, and lowered their weapons. “Flynn, go get their guns.”
“Now hang on,” my guy responded, his gun back up. “We don’t give our guns to anyone. Why don’t we just let you go?”
“Tell you what, you can take your guns into the cell with you for all I care. It doesn’t matter. If—and that’s a big if—your captain ever does come back, he’ll understand your dilemma. He’ll know you couldn’t shoot us in front of all these people.” There was no one else outside, but they knew people were watching. They were looking back and forth at each other, but still not lowering the guns. “Look, I get it, we’re girls and you’re SEALs. But Baker was standing next to Brock when I put the arrow through his throat. He knows I could kill you just the same, but I’d rather not. None of us has to die. Just do the right thing. Give us your guns, and we’ll give them back.”
Flynn was standing next to her guy now, and he reluctantly handed her his gun. My guy held his out, and Flynn collected it as well. Lazzo climbed out of the channel behind us. I briefly took Flynn’s hand in my own, as Lazzo lifted Chase up off the ground. “I’m so sorry. I tried to—”
“It’s not your fault.” Bitterness was thick in her voice. “His entire life he’s been told he wasn’t good enough—that he wasn’t man enough.” She put her hand on Chase’s forehead and closed his eyes. “You were man enough tonight, Chase. You were…” Her voice faded into a choked sob.
I wrapped my arm around her, still eying the two SEALs watching us. “Let’s lock them up, Flynn.”
She nodded and we led them down to the cells Lazzo and I had been in the night before. As promised, we left their guns with them. Lazzo stopped down the hall to leave Chase in the infirmary. The doctor in there volunteered to take care of his body—to wrap it for transport back to Hawaii. Flynn gave her consent.
I couldn’t imagine what she was feeling and felt terrible that I had to leave her like this. I turned to her. “Flynn, Lazzo and I have to leave.”
She shook her head. “No.”
No? “Flynn, what—”
“No, you don’t have to leave.”
I objected as she walked past me. “Flynn—”