67
EAGLE'S NEST
FRIDAY, MIDNIGHT
Griffin prayed the road wouldn’t crumble beneath them with the landslide of heavy boulders slamming onto it and bouncing over the cliff. He had no control of the Range Rover now tilting toward the edge.
The rocks continued to crash down, luckily, none hitting closer than about six yards in front of them. The Range Rover continued to slide toward the cliff edge, nothing he could do to stop it.
“We’re going to jump, Carson!”
He grabbed her arms and pulled her across the driver’s side after him. They stumbled back toward the gate and landed on their knees in the center of the narrow road. They watched from well back, frozen, as the earth beneath Griffin’s Range Rover split and crumbled.
Griffin watched his car plow down the bushes and slide over the edge. They heard the SUV bouncing against the cliff wall, heard it land with a loud boom at the base of the mountain. Griffin ran as close to the edge as he dared and looked down. He saw his beloved Range Rover crushed against rocks, one wheel slowly spinning. Suddenly, the earth beneath his feet ripped apart and he slid into an ever-widening crevasse. There was nothing to hold on to, nothing to save him. He knew he was going to die, and how to make peace with that?
“Griffin! Grab my hand!”
He flailed his arm upward and he felt her grab him, and she was pulling him up? But how? No, he would pull her over with him. He yelled, “Let me go, Carson!”
“Griffin, I’ve got this bush between my legs. Pray it holds our weight. Come on, pull yourself up. No way are you going to fall.” She managed to grab his other hand as he climbed upward, his feet scrabbling to find purchase. He managed to fit his boot against a rock that hadn’t yet pulled loose and heaved himself up, so slowly it felt like eternity. “Come on, Griffin, pull, pull,” she said over and over, her litany, until finally he reached solid ground. He fell next to her, breathing hard, his heart galloping. But only for a moment. They crawled backward until they hugged the mountain. Carson grabbed him around his chest, squeezed him hard, then pulled away, stared at him a moment, then began laughing like a loon. He pulled her back against him, his heart still kettledrumming, but he was alive, she was alive, and he was so grateful it nearly swamped him. She hiccupped and eased away from him to lean back against the mountain wall. She wasn’t laughing any longer. “I was so scared, I thought you were going to— No, forget that—we’re both all right, we both survived. I didn’t think, just acted.” She looked toward the lone bush still upright at the edge of the cliff. “May all of heaven rejoice at the strength of that precious bush. I want to take it home, take care of it, maybe add a dollop of vodka in its water.”
Griffin’s heart was slowing enough so he could catch his breath. He leaned in close, said against her tangled hair, “Thank you for my life, Carson.”
She hiccupped again, swallowed. “You’re welcome, but please, don’t ever do anything like that again. I don’t want my heart to stop. It might not reboot next time.”
If she hadn’t been with him, if she hadn’t been such a quick thinker— No, he wouldn’t go there. He was alive, they were both alive. He hugged her once more, and turned to watch a huge boulder hurtle down the mountain, hit the road like a bomb, then bounce high like a basketball to hurl itself over the cliff.
“It’s probably going to land on top of my Range Rover.” He popped his ears. “There, that’s better. I wondered why I was having a hard time hearing you.”
Carson popped her ears. “Yes, good.”
“Are you okay, Carson? Really?”
“I—I, that is, yes, other than not having any spit in my mouth and my heart wanting to leap out of my chest, but, hey, who cares? We’re alive, Griffin, we’re alive.”
Griffin drew in a steadying breath. He finally said, “I bet Quint’s had the explosive in place for a while now.”
“That’s how he was going to handle us? Even though we were really careful, it’s gotta mean he saw us on a camera. But why did he have it already in place?”
“To take care of unwanted guests and claim it was an act of God? Still, it was sloppy, hard to time a landslide at exactly the right time, has to take some luck, which he didn’t have with us. He should have gotten out his shotgun and drilled us clean, over and done. Thank the powers that be he wanted to be cute about it, turn it into an accident, no dead bodies on his property. Still, it was close.”
He took her dirty hand and they sat quietly. The night was silent again.
“Griffin.”
He felt her hand on his forearm. He pulled her in. She was shaking, no surprise, she was overloaded with adrenaline from the shock and fear, the fight for his life, and the aftermath, finally knowing they weren’t going to die. All of it made a wicked brew. She said against his ear, “I’m sure glad you’re a crappy driver. If you’d made that first K turn, we’d be dead. Smashed really dead. Do you think Quint will come down and check?”
“I would,” he said, gave her another hug, and pulled out his cell. “I am now officially pissed.”
Savich whispered, “Griffin? What’s up? Sorry, but you’ve got to make it fast.”
And Griffin told him what had happened.
“Good, you’re both all right. I can’t talk, I’m up to my eyeballs in trouble here. Get off the mountain, Griffin, now, before Quint Bodine gets down there to see if you’re both dead. When you can, call Bettina Kraus. She’ll bring the troops.”
Griffin was shaking his head as he said, “I was going to wait until morning to call Bettina, Savich, but not now, not since Quint knows we were looking around. You know as well as I do the girls’ lives are on the line. He might kill them, bury the evidence. I can’t let him do that. I’ll call Bettina, tell her the situation. We’ll wait here for her and her troops.”
“Be careful, all right?” Before Griffin had a chance to say anything more, Savich had punched off.