Allison Brennan - If I Should Die

“He’ll try.”

“Sir, I don’t think that’s good enough.”

Lucy said, “Who was the civilian who made the original report?”

“Joseph Hendrickson.”

She glanced at Noah. “I think we-” She stopped as something flashed in the thermal camera. “Noah! Look!”

Noah glanced at the screen. “Bingo. Mr. Stockton, sir, we found our warehouse full of weed.”

“I’ll wait for your report.”

Lucy shut off the cell phone and adjusted the camera. The red, orange, and yellow glowing colors over the external structure of the warehouse told them that it was well heated with high-wattage lights. “Wow. I didn’t realize it would be so noticeable!”

Noah made a note on a pad attached to the console. “I got the location. We’ll swing around and take another pass, then-”

“No-go north. Look at this.” She pointed at the ground where there were clearings ahead.

As Noah headed north, one warehouse gave way to another about one hundred yards apart.

“Two warehouses?” Lucy asked.

“I think you’re right.” Noah looked at his map and the terrain below. “We’re approximately four miles northeast of the town center. The population center is in town, and most of the larger-acreage properties are south and west.”

“Could there be more?”

“Anything’s possible, but look at the size of those buildings.”

Trees dotted the area, which was relatively flat, but didn’t provide a complete canopy. The warehouses may have once been barns-they were the same relative size and shape-but they’d been completely renovated. Likely insulated to keep down the cost of the electricity and heat. It would still cost a small fortune to run the facilities.

“I’m going east to follow that road down there,” Noah said. “It appears that both those warehouses are accessible from it.”

The road dipped into a valley and ended before the mountain began to rise again on the far edge of the Spruce Lake area, opposite from the Hendricksons’ and Callahans’ properties. Four new buildings were nestled in the valley, each half the size of the large barns they’d passed a mile away. A rambling ranch house spread out on the far side of the property, at the base of the mountain.

“Two of the buildings are possibles,” Lucy said, showing Noah the screen. “The other two are dark. The house-very small thermal signatures.”

Noah glanced. “People. We need to get out of here.” He started his ascent and turned away from the property at the same time that three men ran from the house, and a fourth came from one of the buildings.

“They have semiautomatic rifles,” Lucy said, sliding the camera back into its case.

She heard the rapid fire of the guns even over the plane’s engine, sounding more like comic pops than weapons fire.

Noah increased speed and continued to climb. The window behind Lucy cracked. “Those are fully automatic,” he said grimly.

A sharp metallic bang was followed by alarms in the cockpit and the small Cessna dipped dangerously to the left. Noah’s hands gripped the yoke, fighting to control their descent.

“It’s the rudder,” he said. “We have to land. Look for a road, an open field. No trees.”

They were heading northwest and a small lake was directly beneath them. The sun was gone, they were flying in the twilight, and Lucy had a hard time distinguishing the terrain without any outside lights to point her to a road.

“Lucy, anything! I need to get her down while I still have some control.” The propeller sputtered and Noah flipped a switch rapidly until it came back on.

Lucy saw a dirt road just the other side of the lake heading back toward the town. “On the left.”

Noah glanced. “Twenty degrees left. I don’t know if I can turn the plane.”

As he moved the stick to go left the plane dipped precariously.

“Bad idea,” he said.

“I don’t see another road.”

“I’m aiming for the field.”

He couldn’t regain the control he’d had before he attempted the turn, and they were dropping fast.

Lucy sat in the co-pilot seat, buckled in, gripping the strap hanging from the ceiling. Though Noah was tense, he had an aura of calm command even as the plane continued to fall. He worked the panel of switches and buttons like a master musician. There was a waxing crescent moon, hardly reflecting any light, but because the sky was cloudless and there was still a hint of light on the western horizon, she could make out the edges of the trees. The field was shorter than a football field with trees lined on the far end.

If Sean were landing under these conditions, he’d be talking to make both himself and her less nervous. Even when he was fully alert and in crisis, Sean always appeared relaxed and casual. Yet he had the same confidence that Noah had.

She missed Sean’s manner. She could almost hear him saying, “ It’ll get a little bumpy, Princess, but it’s no problem for a Rogan .”

Noah said, “Get ready.”

He had to turn the plane slightly to make it to the field and not hit the lake. The plane protested, sputtered, and fell three stories. Lucy’s stomach rose and she tightened her grip. Noah leveled off for a few seconds, the tops of trees scraping the bottom of the plane, a thick branch hitting the front window. Lucy bit back a scream.

They touched the ground faster and sooner than she expected, and she bit her tongue. Blood filled her mouth and her eyes watered. She swallowed, her stomach queasy.

The plane bumped up, then came down hard. Noah held the controls firmly, trying to give no yield to the plane’s natural momentum to turn or spin, but it was a battle between machine and nature and man, and they were losing, two against one.

The field was rocky and rutted, and they didn’t roll, they bounced, coming down hard again. Lucy’s head hit the side window. The window behind her that had been shot earlier shattered, the sound startling her, and this time she did scream. She couldn’t hear herself over the noise of the plane.

Lucy had faced death before. While fear had been there, so had resolve and the will to live. Each time she’d had choices to make, and while her decision could have had a tragic ending, she was still in control. Having control kept her from panicking.

She had no illusion of control tonight. She could die, and it wouldn’t be because she’d made the wrong decision, but fate. She could die, and Sean would never know she loved him.

He knows. He tells you often enough that you love him .

But he needed to hear it from her. Deep down, she knew he was waiting for it, insecure because she couldn’t admit the depth of her feelings. Her nightmares now weren’t just about her past. They were about losing Sean. Her fears held more power because they weren’t just about her anymore, they were about them .

The plane lurched up again and Lucy saw her real fears, the ones she kept buried, in their full light: loss, loneliness, helplessness.

She had been so alone, even with her family surrounding her, until Sean walked into her life and taught her how to live and laugh. She was no longer lonely, in the deep, weary existence she’d had for years.

Love was a risk. Sean made it look so easy when he told her I love you . Yet when she looked at him, he was waiting. He was scared she didn’t love him back, no matter how confident he was that she did. He needed her to admit it, because he knew she wouldn’t lie.

She had to tell him.

She had to first survive.

The plane hit a boulder and forced them to an immediate stop, but the momentum kept the tail end going and she was looking at the ground through the front window. Then the plane continued to turn, and it hit the ground hard, upside down, and stopped.