EMERALD HEAT

Excerpt

...He felt a jolt. The chopper dipped. Jim realized someone or maybe two people had grabbed the landing skids. He hovered over the river and rocked the chopper to dislodge the unwelcome passengers. Two jolts upward told him they had dropped into the river. He pulled back farther on the collective and they were climbing to meet the clouds.

Bullets followed them into the night sky.

Lily noted, vaguely, that she could hear wind shriek through holes in the cabin.

The cloud cover had condensed into nightly rain with its rushing wind. The powerful helicopter bucked and shuddered under the double impact of wind and water.

Lily knew if anyone could keep them safe, it was Jim.

Her head was, surprisingly, still on her shoulders, but the unceasing, fevered pain was overshadowed by a massive thirst. Bemused, she stared at the rain water falling sideways across windscreen and window. A few drops spattered through the bullet holes. Placing her fingertip to one hole she was gratified to feel water. She brought the wet fingertip to her parched lips, soothing them with the liquid.

Jim wanted to check her condition. That was impossible. Still climbing into the night at more than 100 MPH, he ignored everything but the instruments. In the dusky shroud of storm clouds they were his only guides and means of control.

He sorted through his memory for a safe place to take Lily for medical help. Brazil and Peru were out. Don Phillips had too much influence.

Almost lost in the heavy clouds and rain, he barely glanced at the black hole spread out below. Daylight would disclose a vast green ocean of treetops. For now that was hidden in the rain-washed dark.

Blossoms of light in the clouds ahead showed lightning activity far enough away not to destroy his night vision.

He had another worry. The helicopter had developed an unhealthy sound. It shuddered and moved sluggishly. He kept it going with numerous tricks learned under enemy fire. To make it more interesting, he was losing fuel at a rate that said at least one bullet had found a vital part of the fuel system.

Forty-five minutes after they'd left the survey camp, Jim knew he'd have to set down in unexplored rain forest. The helicopter had developed a nasty hiccup. They were on a shorter trip with every rotation of the titanium blades.

All his attention was focused on keeping the helicopter in one piece in the air. He played a dangerous game of tag with the taller trees. He most definitely didn't want to be, It.

Over the engines' roar, he shouted, “Brace yourself,” to Lily. Then they were dropping, angling down to a silver line that marked another river or long lake.

Trees rushed up on all sides. Branches reached out like hungry hands to clutch and scrape the helicopter sides. The silver line developed into a long oxbow lake.

Sometime, in the distant past, a long loop of unnamed river had been closed off from the main rush of water. It was this slender curve of water that kept an opening in the midnight ocean of trees.

Night birds, disturbed by the falling metal bird, shrieked and changed their flight path. Broken branches and leaves tumbled through the high, rain-drenched canopy.

Misshapen shadows rushed up to meet the chopper as wind and rain threatened to propel it into the lake. Jim spied a narrow clear area at the lake's edge. He'd run out of choices. This was it.

With one last choking spurt, the helicopter turned and settled on the muddy ground in the narrow clearing. Part of the bank gave way under the right skid. The helicopter tipped, like a bird dying of its wounds, and settled with the right side in water up to the middle of the cabin door. Everything not tied down in the cabin slipped and slid toward that door.

Water seeped in through bullet holes. Damaged parts popped and sizzled. The once powerful blades were limp and silent in the now gentle rainfall. A moan broke the silence of the cabin, then it was quiet except for the slow gurgle of water...