Damaged (10 page)

Liz watched the FBI agent grip the leather restraints in her gloved fists. She was pretty good at feigning confidence, making it sound like this ride was no big deal, even asking questions about the fishing cooler in sound bites as though she was used to the abrupt shouting conversations of a helicopter. Despite all that, she hadn’t fooled Liz at all. For whatever reason, the woman had panicked back there on the beach the minute she realized she’d need to climb into the copter.

So far O’Dell appeared to be doing okay. But just as Wilson turned the helicopter around after hovering over the spot where they had found the cooler yesterday, a call came in. A boat had capsized. A recreational-fishing cabin cruiser. At least one person was in the water. Initial radio contact reported injuries. Contact since had been lost.

“Sorry, Agent O’Dell,” Wilson shouted over his helmet mike. “We won’t have time to drop you off.”

That’s when Liz first noticed O’Dell’s white-knuckled grip. Now she wondered if the FBI agent would last. Liz couldn’t ask whether she had taken the capsules she’d slipped to her. Though they were definitely not a miracle cure, she hoped O’Dell had trusted her. Otherwise
she’d be feeling sick very soon. In the short time since they left the beach the winds had picked up over the Gulf. Away from shore, the seas were kicking high. And now, so was Liz’s adrenaline.

They found the boat quickly. Liz kept her helmet on, staying connected to their ICS while they figured this one out.

The cabin cruiser had tilted but hadn’t rolled yet. The waves were battering it and had already broken apart some of the cockpit and the rail. One person bobbed in the water, not more than a head in a life jacket with an arm hanging on to a torn piece of the cockpit that dangled, barely attached to the boat. A dog, what looked to Liz like a black Labrador, paced the deck, watching his owner while trying to keep his balance.

“Radio’s completely out?” Kesnick asked.

“Doesn’t matter. He can’t reach it,” Ellis said.

“Looks like only one rescue,” Wilson said.

“We can’t drop the basket in the water,” Kesnick told them. “Current will pull them under the boat.”

“Then where the hell are you dropping it?” Wilson asked.

Liz glanced at O’Dell, who was watching her prepare. Was O’Dell wondering why the men didn’t ask what she thought?

Silently Liz was planning her own strategy. Stay away from that railing. Don’t put any extra weight on the tip-side or it’ll roll. The boat was moving with the current, and as soon as Wilson dropped into hover the rotor wash would set the boat rocking. Initial radio contact reported injuries. If they dropped the basket onto the tilted boat, Liz would have to find a way to roll him out of the water debris, back onto the boat, and into the rescue basket.

“Direct deployment’s gonna be tricky,” Kesnick was saying. “Don’t push it or strain yourself. Let me do the dropping.”

Liz realized he was talking to her. She looked up at him.

“Let me do the heavy lifting, Bailey. We may need to quick strop him just to get him into the basket. Get it under his arms and let me hoist him while you guide him into the basket. Okay? I don’t wanna lose you both under that damned boat. You got that?”

She nodded. Gave him a thumbs-up. Let out a long breath. She started to remove her helmet when she heard Wilson.

“We’ve got one rescue, Bailey. Unless you find someone else in the water, that basket is only coming up once. We’re not sending it down again for that dog. You understand, Bailey? This isn’t New Orleans after Katrina. That dog is not coming up. It’ll have to wait for the cutter.”

She yanked off the helmet without a response. As Liz tucked her hair into her surf hood and strapped on her Seda helmet, she purposely avoided O’Dell’s eyes.

She readjusted her harness and rechecked her restraints. Her adrenaline was pumping and she needed to calm it down a notch, just enough to let it work for her, not against her. They could talk all they wanted, analyze and discuss to the last detail, but once she was out on that cable it was Liz who’d be balancing on the edge of that tilted cruiser. It’d be up to Liz to maneuver the survivor before a lift could even be made. And it’d be Liz’s ass if it didn’t work.

She scooted into position at the door. Kesnick waited for her glance then held her eyes a beat longer than usual. “Let me help you on this.” Maybe he had read her mind.

She nodded and he tapped her chest. She gave him a thumbs-up and crawled out. She slid down just a few feet to stop and wait for the hoist cable to tighten, but instead the wind caught it. The cable looped and bucked then jerked Liz like she was hanging on to the end of a whip. The rotor wash twisted her, pushing her in one direction
then the other. Another jerk wrenched her spine. That’s when she started to spin. It was like getting sucked up into a wind tunnel.

All Liz could see was a blur as she hung tight to the cable. She closed her eyes and dug her heels down around the cable, managing to keep her feet crossed at the ankles. She tucked her chin into her chest so the cable didn’t wind around her neck. She made her body as rigid as possible.

She did everything she was taught to do. But the spin only accelerated.

CHAPTER 18

Maggie watched the rescue swimmer jump out of the helicopter one minute and within seconds she saw the flight mechanic, Kesnick, stumble and slide, diving headfirst toward the open door as if he were being sucked out behind Bailey.

Maggie reacted on instinct. She ripped at her restraints, her gloved fingers taking too long to break herself free. She grabbed for his safety belt that remained hooked into the deck of the cabin. She hadn’t even seen the hoist cable snag Kesnick’s helmet. Instead, she followed the safety belt’s line, using its tautness to pull herself to her feet.

She heard Wilson and Ellis trying to figure out what the hell was going on. She couldn’t see them and didn’t take precious time to wait until she could. Instead, she gripped Kesnick’s belt and pulled with all her weight. It was enough to jerk Kesnick out of his freefall stance. But the hoist cable that had caught his helmet still whipped his head back in the direction of the open door.

Kesnick let out a scream from the pain. For a brief, sick moment, Maggie worried it may have broken his neck. Her eyes followed the cable from its snag on his helmet to a hook on the top of the open door. She couldn’t reach the hoist cable but she could reach
his helmet. She clawed at it, fumbling with the chinstrap, trying to remember what clicked into what.

Wilson and Ellis were yelling at each other, at Kesnick, at Maggie. Then the helicopter shifted and rocked, slinging Kesnick backward, his head in her gut. His helmet-less head. Thank God. She saw the cable snap and fling Kesnick’s helmet out the door.

Maggie grabbed on to a leather strap attached to the wall just as the helicopter rocked again and her feet started to slide toward the door. Wilson grunted a string of curses before he rocked it back and held steady.

Amazingly Kesnick was already on his knees crawling back to his feet.

Ellis yelled, “Are you okay, man?”

But without his helmet, Kesnick didn’t hear and couldn’t respond. He hurried back to the open doorway, clutching his safety belt still tethered by the line to the floor. He leaned out to look down for Bailey. Maggie had forgotten about the rescue swimmer. Was she still even there? Kesnick reached for the hoist cable, wrestling and jerking it until the loop that had knotted on the hook broke loose. Somehow he managed to tug it free.

“What about the rescue swimmer?” Ellis yelled at Kesnick’s back.

Maggie heard the howling wind roar through the helicopter. The thump-thump of the rotors and thump-thump of her heartbeat made it difficult to hear the words and she knew it was impossible for Kesnick to hear anything without the communication system inside the helmet.

She held tight to the leather strap, readjusted her weight, and shoved herself up onto her feet. Still holding on to the strap, she swiped up Bailey’s flight helmet from where she had left it and
tapped Kesnick on the shoulder with it. His eyes shot her a look of surprise then he nodded, yanked on the helmet, and adjusted the mike.

“Liz’s caught in a crosswind,” Kesnick yelled. “She’s spinning.”

“Son of a bitch,” Wilson answered.

“I’m pulling her back,” Kesnick said, planting his feet.

In seconds Kesnick had Bailey back inside the helicopter.

Maggie handed Liz her own helmet. Then Maggie sat against the wall, gripping the leather strap with gloved fingers, noticing now how badly her hands were shaking. She could no longer hear the conversation taking place. Both Kesnick and Bailey looked remarkably calm.

It seemed like less than a couple of minutes and Bailey handed the helmet back to Maggie, replacing it with her lighter-weight swim helmet. Maggie checked her eyes in that brief exchange. There was no hesitation. No fear.

Bailey scooted back to the open doorway, waited for Kesnick’s tap on the chest, gave him a thumbs-up, and to Maggie’s disbelief, the young rescue swimmer rolled out of the helicopter again.

CHAPTER 19

Platt stared at the dead boy’s face. He looked so much younger than the nineteen years recorded on his chart. Stripped of everything, including his life, his gray body appeared small, his prosthetic leg emphasizing his vulnerabilities. It gnawed at Platt to think that this brave kid survived Afghanistan and his battle wounds only to come home and die from some mysterious disease.

Gowned up again, Platt stood beside the stainless-steel autopsy table going over the chart when he realized the pathologist, Dr. Anslo, was waiting for him. The man’s almost nonexistent eyebrows were raised, their presence distinct only because Anslo’s shaved head and smooth face left nothing else to forecast his emotions. His latex-gloved hands were held up in front of him, signaling that he was ready—ready and waiting for this guest who had been imposed on him.

Platt quickly found what he was searching for: the boy’s name, Ronald (Ronnie) William Towers. It was a small thing, but he wanted to know how to address this young man, if nowhere else but in his own mind. It was the least he could do. Ronnie Towers deserved that small, last respect.

“I’m ready,” said Platt.

This part of his job always challenged his sensibilities. It didn’t help matters that he had just returned from Afghanistan and had witnessed the carnage that young men like Ronnie had to deal with every day of their tours. It battered his psyche as much as the exhaustion did. Each trip to Afghanistan or Iraq reminded Platt why, as an army doctor, he had chosen laboratories filled with vials, test tubes, and glass slides rather than the OR.

“I’ll need a vial of his blood.”

Anslo gave a terse nod as though Platt was wasting time telling him something he already knew. “And a tissue sample.”

“Fine,” Anslo said, shifting his weight in an exaggerated show of impatience as he continued to hold up his hands, waiting for instructions.

“Would you mind starting at the surgical site?” Platt asked.

The man’s long, drawn-out sigh told Platt exactly what Anslo thought of his request. He didn’t, however, refuse.

“If you tell me what you’re looking for, perhaps I could help.”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“No,” Platt admitted and avoided Anslo’s eyes.

Since he arrived, Platt had tried to sift through as many of the files as possible looking for some common thread. All of the injuries had begun as compound bone fractures with deep tissue and bone exposed to open air for an extended period.

Dr. Anslo disconnected Ronnie’s prosthetic, set it aside, and began on the surgical site just below his knee.

“Everything looks quite normal,” he told Platt without glancing up at him. “If you’re searching for an infection, I don’t believe you’ll find it here.”

Initially Platt had thought it might be an airborne bacterium. In Iraq he had seen a bone infection called osteomyelitis (OM), prevalent in the Middle East. It often occurred in severe fractures where the bone was left exposed. But OM wasn’t fatal or life-threatening. Sometimes, though rarely, it cost a soldier his limb. And sometimes it led to or acted as a primer for
methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus
, MRSA.