of the bomb’s cell phone before resetting its menu and plugging the detonator back into the explosive.
Rachel watched him from the corner of her eye. For a moment he thought that she was looking at him, but then realized that she was looking past him. Ethan turned to see the Humvee drawing alongside, three grim-faced soldiers glaring at them. The rifleman in the rear slowly brought his weapon to bear.
Ethan swallowed thickly as a prayer that he hadn’t heard since his school days passed unbidden through his mind. He pressed dial on his cell phone.
“Turn right!”
Rachel yanked the jeep’s wheel over and the vehicle surged sideways across the plain, sending up a billowing cloud of dust between them and the Humvee. Ethan hurled the explosive device across the void between the two vehicles, watching it land in the rear of the Humvee as it struggled to match their turn. The rifleman in the rear tumbled backward and out of the vehicle, his shot flying wild and high above their heads. The two soldiers in the front took one look at the tiny device rattling around in the back and instantly leaped from their seats, hitting the desert floor hard amid roiling clouds of dust.
“Straighten out and get down!” Ethan shouted, pointing back toward the sunset.
Rachel jerked the jeep back onto its original course, as Ethan heard the dial tone suddenly beep in his ear. He grabbed Rachel’s head and forced it down with his hand.
A crackling blast ripped the sky behind them as the Humvee was torn apart from within. Ethan turned to see the vehicle lurch out of control across the desert floor, hitting an angular chunk of rock and spiraling into the air to crash onto its back amid a cloud of twisted metal and spinning tires.
“Keep going!” Ethan shouted.
Rachel fixed her gaze ahead as Ethan strained again to look behind them.
The second Humvee was pulling up alongside the wreckage of the first, and he could see three specklike figures hauling themselves out of the dust and staggering toward it. He judged the distance to the airfield and allowed himself a brief sigh of relief.
“We’ll make it, but only just.”
Ahead against the brilliant canvas of the setting sun he could make out the shape of the low stone buildings scattered on the edge of the airfield. He pointed to the left of the runway.
“Head for that part,” he shouted to Rachel. “Aaron landed into the wind from that direction, so he’ll have to take off into the wind too.”
Rachel guided the jeep toward the end of the runway, seeing the familiar silhouette of the de Havilland Beaver sitting on the tarmac with its engine running. Rachel pulled the jeep up alongside the airplane as Ethan vaulted from the passenger seat and grabbed his rucksack, looking out across the desert to see the remaining Humvee trailing a spiraling vortex of sun-gilded dust as it raced toward them.
He grabbed Rachel’s unsteady hand as she staggered on legs weak with fatigue and fear.
“Come on!”
Together, they ran around to the port side of the de Havilland, jumping aboard as Aaron shot Ethan a questioning look over his shoulder from the cockpit.
“What the hell happened out there? We heard a blast! Where’s Ayeem?”
“I’ll explain on the way,” Ethan shot back as he slammed the airplane’s door shut. “Get us out of here!”
Aaron turned without another word as Safiya pushed the throttles to the firewall. The airplane responded instantly, surging forward and gathering speed along the runway. Ethan held on to his seat, peering through the opposite fuselage windows for a glimpse of their pursuers.
The Humvee had turned to attempt to intercept the aircraft, but Ethan could see that they wouldn’t make it. The Beaver swayed and gyrated and then soared into the air, leaving the runway behind them as they climbed out into the brilliant evening sky.
Ethan strained across to peer out of a window, and saw the Humvee slowing down and drawing away from the airstrip, a tiny dot of black against a glowing golden desert tiger striped with long shadows.
Safiya raised the aircraft’s flaps and turned around in her seat to look at Rachel, who sat in stony silence, tearstains coursing through the dusty grime coating her face. Safiya shot Ethan a harsh look.
“What the hell happened?”
Ethan wiped the grit from his eyes, squinting against the glare of the sunset blazing through the windshield.
“We got into the camp but the MACE guards caught Ayeem. I think he was covering for us.