Beverly Long - Trapped

“I’m going to sit with the Hardys,” Elle said.

“Tell them I’ll be there in just a minute.”

“Sir,” Angus said, “there’s a first-aid kit under the captain’s seat.”

Brody fished around and pulled out the rectangular aluminum box. Holding the flashlight in one hand, he used his other to flip open the lid. He made a quick assessment. Basic stuff. Bandages. Gauze. Alcohol sponges. Ibuprofen. Antiseptic wipes. Antibiotic ointment. Adhesive tape. Scissors. Several pairs of gloves.

He turned toward the pilot. The man was still strapped in and he was regaining consciousness. He pushed himself back from the controls, almost to the point where he was sitting up. He looked stunned. There was blood running down the side of his face from a hell of a gash on the side of his head where something had obviously hit him.

“I’m a doctor,” Brody said, his voice gentle. “I can help you.”

He lifted the man’s wrist and took his pulse. Steady. Maybe a little slow but not alarmingly. He needed to get the bleeding stopped. “You’ve got a head injury. Are you in pain anywhere else?” he asked.

The man shook his head, very slowly. Brody didn’t believe him. He wasn’t confident the man even realized that he was a pilot and that his plane had just crashed in the Amazon jungle.

“What the hell happened?” Brody asked, turning towards the copilot.

“I’m not sure. There was some kind of malfunction with the electrical system. We lost power. Captain Ramano did a hell of a job keeping us out of a spin.”

Captain Ramano didn’t add anything to the conversation, confirming for Brody that he was definitely injured.

“The lightning?”

“I don’t think so. I’ve flown through storms before with Captain Ramano and we’ve never had any trouble.”

First time for everything. “Did you get a distress call through?”

“We did. Although I’m not sure how much good it will do. Even using satellite imaging, it’s hard to find a plane in the rain forest.”

He was probably right. Rain forests were known for their dense canopy of trees, and that would complicate an air search. But he couldn’t focus on that right now.

“I’ll be back,” Brody said.

Pamela was sitting in the first row, staring at the door, looking as if she intended to make a break for it. He did not relish the idea of chasing after someone in the dark jungle. “Pamela, I need your help,” he said.

She didn’t answer but she did stand up. He led her back to the cockpit, where he opened the first-aid kit again, removed a wrapped gauze pad and opened it.

He motioned for her to get as close to the pilot as she could. “I need you to press this hard against that cut. Can you do that, Pamela?”

“I’m not touching blood.”

He’d been just about to get to that. He pulled a pair of gloves out of the first-aid kit and handed them to Pamela. She hesitated and then put them on.

“Okay,” he said. “Put pressure on and don’t stop until I come back.”

He shone his flashlight ahead of him. At the back of the small plane, Elle was kneeling next to the elderly couple. Her hair was still dark, cut shorter than it had been in college when she’d worn it past her shoulders. He could see her slender neck, her collarbone.

Elle had always been slim and in good shape. She’d been a good athlete, too. The bar where she’d worked had fielded a volleyball team that played on Sunday afternoons, and he’d loved watching her. So graceful yet she could jam the ball down an opponent’s throat.

Now she had one arm out, patting the shoulder of Mrs. Hardy, who was talking a mile a minute. She had her other arm tucked into her side.

When she heard him moving down the aisle, she stepped aside.

The elderly woman stared at him. “My husband says it doesn’t hurt, but he can’t move. Please help him. You have to help him. We’re on our fiftieth anniversary trip. He’s—”

“I’m going to do everything I can,” Brody said. He looked at the woman’s cheek. She had a cut that was bleeding, but it didn’t look deep. “But here’s what I need from you. I want you to stand up and move to the other side of the plane. I’m going to need your spot.”

The woman shut up now that she had some direction. She got out of her seat and stood next to Elle. That’s when he realized that Elle also had blood on her face. And her eyes held the look of someone in pain.

He reached for her.

She jerked back.

“You’re bleeding,” he said.

“It’s nothing. Help the others first.”

He gave the cut on her forehead another look. Head wounds always bled a lot, and this one was no exception. But it appeared to have stopped bleeding. Still, there could be glass in it. He took a quick glance at her very brown eyes. Pupils were the same size.

“Him first,” she said.

“Okay. But I’m going to look at that arm, too.”

She nodded.

He stepped into the seat that Mrs. Hardy had vacated. It was awkward, but he got a good hold of the debris and shoved it away from her husband. He put a hand on the man’s back, assuring him. “Don’t move just yet,” Brody said. He ran his hand down the man’s spine. “Are you in pain?”

“No. Damn thing didn’t hit me hard, thank goodness.”

“Okay. Then try to sit back.” The man had been very lucky. He was at an age when it became difficult to recover from severe injuries. When the man was upright, Brody took his pulse and used the flashlight to check his pupils. Both okay.

Brody stepped back. It was quite frankly amazing that everyone on board had survived the crash. He’d seen enough aircraft-crash-scene victims over the years to know that there were common injuries caused by the pressure of rapid descent. Vertebrae compression. Or a ring fracture at the base of the skull caused by force traveling through the spinal column. Sometimes even internal injuries caused by the jerk of the lap belt. Lower-limb injuries were common as legs flailed around and struck things, so Angus’s fractured tibia didn’t surprise him.

He’d set the leg as best he could. Unfortunately, however, what might be a relatively minor injury in a fully equipped operating room became potentially life threatening when there were nonsterile conditions and delayed treatment. And the humidity in this part of the world was a virtual breeding ground of bacteria.

He turned, only to realize that Elle had returned to the cockpit. She was talking to Angus, obviously trying to comfort him.

It was difficult to tell how badly the captain was hurt. Angus definitely needed the most immediate treatment, and there wasn’t any room in the cockpit area to do that.

Elle saw him start back down the aisle and met him halfway. “What do you think?” she asked.

“On the plus side, I think Mr. and Mrs. Hardy are fine. They’re probably going to be stiff and sore as the night wears on. The biggest risk for Pamela is to keep her from running off into the rain forest. You, I’d like to see that shoulder.”

“I’m fine,” she said.

He shook his head. When she’d moved out of the way earlier so that he could get to Mr. Hardy, he’d seen enough to realize that it wasn’t her arm that was injured, but rather her shoulder. “Elle, please don’t be stubborn about this. It’s just wasting time. I’m going to need help with Angus and you’re the only logical person to do it. I need you to have two arms and hands that are working.”

It was the right approach. She clearly didn’t want to impede the others receiving medical care.

She put her flashlight down and moved so that she stood in front of him. They were just inches apart and he was reminded of how nicely her head used to fit under his chin. He took a deep breath, put his hand on her shoulder joint and probed gently. “You dislocated your shoulder,” he said.