Tess Gerritsen - Die Again

The water of the lagoon stirs, as if something has just awakened. I back away, sensing evil here, waiting to trap the unwary. I feel its chill at my back as I retreat, once again, into the grass.

THAT EVENING, I WALK straight into the elephant herd.

In bush this thick, even something as large as an elephant can take you by surprise, and as I stumble out of a stand of acacia trees, suddenly there she is in front of me. She seems just as startled as I am and gives a trumpet of alarm so loud that it seems to blast straight through me. I’m too shocked to run. I stand frozen, the acacias at my back, the elephant facing me, standing just as still. As we stare at each other, I see massive gray shapes moving all around me. A whole herd of them are rattling the branches, snapping off twigs. They know I am here, of course, and they pause in their feeding to warily eye the mud-caked intruder. How little effort it would take for any one of them to kill me. A swat of the trunk, one massive foot on my chest, would rid them of this threat. I feel them all studying me, weighing my fate. Then one elephant calmly reaches up, breaks off a twig, and slides it into her mouth. One by one, they resume feeding. They have judged me, and issued their reprieve.

Quietly I slip back into the brush and move toward the cover of a majestic tree that towers above the acacias. I clamber up the massive trunk until I’m high enough to perch safely above the herd, and I settle into the crook of a branch. Like my primate ancestors, I find safety in the trees. In the distance, hyenas cackle and lions roar, a warning of the coming battle at nightfall. From high in my perch, I watch the sun set. In the shadows below my tree, elephants continue to feed, rustling and shuffling. Reassuring sounds.

The whole night comes alive with screams and roars. The stars wink on, crystalline bright in a black sky. Through arching branches I spy the constellation Scorpio, which Johnny pointed out to me on the first night. It’s just one of the many things he taught me about living in the bush, and I wonder why he bothered. To give me a fighting chance and make me more worthy as prey?

Somehow I have outlasted all the others. I think of Clarence and Elliot, the Matsunagas and the blondes. Most of all I think of Richard and what we once had together. I remember the promises we made, and the nights when we’d fall asleep with our arms around each other. Suddenly I am weeping for Richard, for all that we once had, and my sobs are like one more animal call in this noisy nocturnal chorus. I cry until my chest aches and my throat is raw. Until I am so exhausted that I am limp.

I fall asleep the way my ancestors did a million years ago, in a tree, under the stars.

AT DAWN ON THE fourth day, I unwrap the final PowerBar. I eat it slowly, each bite an act of reverence for the holy power of food. Because it is my last meal, every nut, every flake of oat is a joyous explosion of flavor that I never truly appreciated before. I think of the many holiday feasts I’ve gorged on, but none was as sacred as this meal, eaten in a tree as the sky blooms gold with the rising sun. I lick the last crumbs from the wrapper, then clamber down to the riverbank, where I drop to my knees as though in prayer, and drink from the rushing water.

When I rise to my feet, I feel strangely sated. I can’t remember when the plane is due back at the landing strip, but it hardly matters now. Johnny will tell the pilot that there was a terrible calamity and there is no one left alive to search for. No one will ever come looking for me. To the world, I am dead.

I scoop up mud from the river and anoint my face and arms with a fresh layer. Already I feel the sun’s heat beating down on my neck and swarms of biting insects rise from the reeds. The day has scarcely begun, and I am already exhausted.

I force myself to my feet. Once again, I trudge south.

BY THE AFTERNOON OF the next day, I am so hungry that I double over with stomach cramps. I drink from the river, hoping that water will ease the pangs, but I gulp down too much, too fast, and it all comes up again. I kneel in the mud, retching, weeping. How easy it would be to give up now! To lie down and let the animals take me. My flesh, my bones, will be devoured by the wilderness, forever joined to Africa. From this land we all arose, and to this land I return. It is a fitting place to die.

Something splashes in the water, and I lift my head to see two ears flicking on the surface. A hippo. I’m close enough to alarm it, but I’m beyond fear, beyond caring if I live or die. Though it knows I’m here, it continues to bask unconcerned. The murky water ripples with small fish and insects, and cranes splash down from the sky. In this place where I am dying, there is so much life. I watch an insect flutter toward a thicket of papyrus reeds, and suddenly I’m hungry enough to eat even that dragonfly. But I’m not fast enough, and all I catch is a handful of reeds, thick and fibrous. I don’t know if they’ll poison me; I don’t care. I just want something to fill my stomach and ease the cramps.

With the pocketknife from my knapsack, I slash a handful of reeds and bite down on the stems. The rind is soft, the flesh starchy. I chew and chew until all that’s left in my mouth is a hard wad of fibers, which I spit out. My cramps are easing. I cut another handful of papyrus reeds and gnaw on them, like an animal. Like the hippo, who calmly grazes nearby. Slash and chew, slash and chew. With every mouthful, I take the bush into me, feel it become one with me.

The woman I once was, Millie Jacobson, has reached the end of her journey. On my knees, at the river’s edge, I surrender her soul.

BOSTON

MAURA COULD NOT SEE HIM, BUT SHE KNEW HE WAS WATCHING HER.

“There, up on the ledge,” said Dr. Alan Rhodes, the zoo’s large-cat specialist. “He’s just behind that clump of grass. He’s hard to make out because he blends so perfectly into the rocks.”

Only then did Maura spot the tawny eyes. They were fixed on her and only her, with the cold, laser focus that binds predator to prey. “I would have missed him completely,” she murmured. Already shivering in the cold wind, she felt her chill deepen as she met the cougar’s unrelenting stare.

“He didn’t miss you ,” said Rhodes. “He’s probably been tracking you since we walked around that bend, into his field of view.”

“You say he’s tracking me. But not you?”

“For a predator, it’s all about identifying the most accessible prey, the easiest one to bring down. Before he’d attack a full-grown man, a cougar will choose a child or a woman. Look, do you see that family coming toward us? Watch what the cougar does. Watch his eyes.”

Up on the ledge, the cougar’s head suddenly swiveled and he snapped to full alertness, his muscles rippling as he rose to a crouch. His gaze was no longer on Maura; instead those laser eyes were fixed on a new target, which was now scampering toward his enclosure. A child.

“It’s both movement and size that attract him,” said Rhodes. “When a kid goes running by this enclosure, it’s like flipping a switch inside a cat’s head. Instinct takes over.” Rhodes turned to her. “I’m curious why you’re suddenly interested in cougars. Not that I mind answering questions,” he added quickly. “In fact, I’d be happy to tell you a lot more over lunch sometime, if you’d like.”

“I find big cats fascinating, but I’m actually here because of a case we’re working on.”

“So it’s about work.”

Was that disappointment she heard in his voice? She couldn’t read his face, because he’d turned toward the enclosure, his elbows propped on the guardrail, his gaze back on the cougar. She considered what it might be like to have lunch with Alan Rhodes. Interesting conversation with a man who was clearly passionate about his work. She saw intelligence in his eyes, and although he wasn’t particularly tall, his work outdoors kept him tanned and fit. This was the solid, reliable sort of man she should have fallen in love with, but the spark wasn’t there. Chasing that damn spark had brought her nothing but sorrow; why did it never ignite with a man who could make her happy?