Ryland's Reach Read online

He nodded and said, “I know. It was pretty brutal. Did you see anybody else?”

  “Nobody,” she said. Realizing what he meant, she stopped, looked at him, and whispered, “How many more were there?”

  “One,” he said. “My boss and friend. His name is Bullard. I’m Ryland. That’s Garret on the other bed.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s possible that he’s been picked up by somebody else, but honestly I haven’t seen too many people out here.”

  He nodded and sagged back. He would trust that Bullard was still alive because that was one tough-as-leather man. Sure, a blown-up plane could kill anybody, but, with Bullard, if there was any way for him to be alive, he would be.

  Ryland looked himself over and then Garret. His friend was in a bad way, but at least he was alive. So was Ryland, and he’d place odds on Bullard being alive too. He better be. “How long before we can get to a medical facility?”

  “Not exactly a traditional medical facility but we’re sailing toward a US Navy ship,” she said quietly. “They’re coming to meet us.”

  “Good,” he said. “Do they have a full medical center on board?”

  “Fully state-of-the-art, yes,” she said cheerfully. “The hope is to stabilize you both and then get you airlifted out.”

  “That would be nice,” he said, and soon he was out cold again.

  *

  “It would be nice, yes,” Tabi whispered, brushing the hair off his forehead. What he didn’t realize was that he was in worse shape than he probably knew himself. That leg would take some resetting, plus the gash on his head, his multiple breaks and cuts—they all needed attention. His whole body was black and blue. She had managed to strip him down—by cutting off his clothes—to see how much other damage there was, storing everything in a bag beside him. Not much of him escaped without some injury. She couldn’t imagine the soft tissue damage inside. She didn’t have any way to stitch him up, but he needed stitches—a lot of them—on multiple body parts.

  Thankfully any blood had been cauterized by the seawater. Painful but effective in a pinch.

  His friend had what appeared to be internal injuries too. He was the reason she headed as fast as she could toward the US Navy ship out there. It was just a sheer fluke that she’d seen the plane come down in the ocean and just another fluke that she’d found them floating among the debris. She’d been trying to get away from people, trying to get away from work, in fact trying to get away from everything. It had been a real shitty couple months for her, and this was supposed to be her time away.

  But she never turned her back on anybody in need, and she’d never walked away from a natural disaster in her life. As a surgical nurse, she had heavy medical training, but she wasn’t a doctor. Yet she’d seen some things in her time, and she knew critical injuries when she saw them, and this was one of those times.

  Since finding the two men and making contact with the US Navy ship, she’d been looking for any other crash victims but hadn’t seen any. Again what a fluke that she’d even seen these two. The floating pile of rubble had caught her interest, and, when she’d gotten closer, she thought she’d seen movement. Now she was damn grateful she’d done what she could, but, if the one died, she wouldn’t be happy. She checked her radio and sent out one more message. “Ahoy, USS Sand Egret. One patient was awake and is now out cold again. Second one is still out cold.”

  “We’re about forty-two minutes out,” spoke the same man again. “We’ve picked you up on radar.”

  “Good,” she said. “I can’t see any sign of you on the horizon yet.”

  “We’re there and should be visible soon.”

  She kept going in the direction she needed to go, hoping the weather cooperated. She didn’t like being out in the open seas as far as she was likely to be by the time they got the two men transferred. She could only hope that the weather, which had been threatening a squall all day, held off. The last thing those two needed was yet another event. She glanced around behind her to see a few other ships around where the debris field was—everything from scavengers to curiosity seekers. Hopefully somebody would see the third man. She didn’t dare take the time or the energy. She had two critical patients on board.

  It didn’t take forty-two minutes; about thirty-seven minutes later the ship came around an island, and another ten minutes passed before a Zodiac raced out to meet her. As soon as one of the seamen boarded her vessel, she took him below and showed him the two men.

  He was surprised. “Both white,” he said. “Interesting. Did you get an ID from either of them?”

  She pointed. “His clothes are in the bag, and that’s his ID there.”

  He pulled it out and looked at it. “Ryland Roscoe. Africa. That’s interesting,” he said. “What are they doing here?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Neither has been in any shape to really talk.”

  “We’ll get them transferred up and out,” he said.

  She got out of the way, as the men carefully unrolled a portable stretcher and transferred Garret into it, still out cold. They moved him up and out onto her deck and then onto their Zodiac.

  “Can you take both of them together?”

  “We’ll take this one first,” he said. “Keep going in the same direction as the ship, and we’ll meet you again.”

  She nodded and watched as they raced away. When she heard Ryland call out, she raced belowdeck to see him sitting up again, looking for a drink of water. She got the water, as he looked at the other bed.

  “What happened to Garret?” he asked, his voice harsh. He tried to swing his leg over and cried out.

  “Wait,” she said. “The US Navy just came and took him to their ship. They could only take one of you at a time on the shuttle. You’re next.”

  He looked at her, his gaze questioning. Then, after he finished drinking, he sank back and said, “Is Garret okay?”

  “No, he’s not okay,” she said, “but he’s alive.”

  “Good enough,” he said, settling and wincing. “Damn leg.”

  “Yes, damn leg. It’s broken.”

  “Dislocated for sure,” he said, staring at it. “Maybe ankle and knee.”

  “You’ll have to wait for the doctor on board to see,” she said. She felt her boat starting to heave.

  “What’s the weather like out there?” he asked.

  “Rough,” she said, “but not too bad yet. A storm’s been threatening for the last hour. I was hoping we’d make it to the ship, and I could get away before it got any worse.” With that, she said, “I need to go back topside.”

  She headed up to the deck. They’d veered off course, and the wind had picked up. She shifted the mast, trimmed the sails, and corrected her course. The naval ship was off to the side but still a good distance away, and she saw no sign of the Zodiac. She could only hope that they would come back quickly. This was not the weather she wanted to be in out here, and she needed to head back to shore just as soon as she could.

  The waves continued to pick up, and they tossed her small sailboat higher and higher. She knew she couldn’t be out here much longer before she should turn around and cut for the coast. It didn’t matter what the navy guy had said because, if they didn’t get back here soon, she couldn’t stay afloat and transfer the second patient.

  Just when she thought it was time to cut for the coast, she looked out and saw the Zodiac. Suddenly a heavy gale came up, hitting her hard. Her little boat was tossed in the wind. When she heard a snap, she knew her mast was going. She cried out as it came crashing down. The Zodiac reached her within minutes. Four men hopped out, leaving the driver inside, and two of them went down to her visitor.

  Two of the men came over to her; one assessed the damage to her boat and shook his head. “You can’t stay on board,” he said. “You can’t get back to shore like this.”

  She glared at him. “I was trying to get back to shore with the second man, but you guys ordered me out here.”

  “And the weather c
hanged,” he said. “Go grab whatever you’ve got. She’ll start taking on water soon.”

  “No,” she said. “She’s seaworthy.”

  “She was,” he said. “But now she’s taking a battering out here.” He pointed out where the water sloshed over the sides, the lower cabin already filling up. “How is the bilge?”

  “Not keeping up with that,” she said.

  She swore and looked at the mast, as another heavy wave came over and basically filled up the cabin beneath them. Shouts came from the men down below. They came up slowly, hanging onto the sides, carrying Ryland on a stretcher. As soon as they got him on the deck, they were hit with yet another wave. The Zodiac snapped free of her sailboat.

  She realized that this rescue was no longer for one person but for two. She ran down below and grabbed her purse and a few things, including a few pieces of clothing, before one of the men grabbed her and pulled her up through the waist-high water onto the deck. She realized that her boat, valiant as it always was, had given up the ghost and was sinking.

  The seaman grabbed her bag. “What kind of swimmer are you?”

  “In a swimming pool, great,” she said. “In this shit, not so much.”

  Nodding, he handed her a life jacket and hung it on her, then cinched her tightly into it. They were thrown a buoy from the Zodiac. They both jumped into the ocean, grabbed on to the buoy, and slowly the two of them were pulled toward the Zodiac. The injured man was already on board. She had gulped more water than air. Soaked and her teeth chattering, she was dragged in over the side of the Zodiac, and, as soon as she was in, the motor roared, and the vessel spun around and took off toward the naval ship.

  She stared at her little boat, as it slowly went under. “Oh, my God,” she said. “I can’t believe that just happened.”

  “I’m sorry,” said someone beside her.

  She looked up; it was the injured man. She smiled at Ryland and said, “Two lives for a boat? Not exactly a contest.”

  “No, but if you hadn’t been trying to save us,” he said, “you wouldn’t have been caught in this storm.”

  “Well, I couldn’t get to the coast because of the debris field, not without getting too far out anyway,” she said. “I had to check the movement I thought I saw among the debris because you were out in a more open current. So I managed to rescue both of you, but …” She lost her words, as she stared at her boat.

  “Maybe we can get you another one,” he said.

  She tossed him a half smile. “Wouldn’t that be nice?” she said. “But I gave up dreaming a long time ago.”

  His gaze was steady as he studied her. “That doesn’t mean that everything has to be a nightmare though,” he said quietly. “Sometimes good things happen. And I do thank you, for my life and Garret’s. I’m not sure how much longer we could have hung on out there.”

  “You were pretty well supported on that raft you managed to make,” she said. “The problem would have been lack of water.”

  “Yeah, water, the heat, and the injuries,” he said. “We might have survived a day, but I’m not sure Garret would have.”

  Thinking of the injuries she suspected both men had, she nodded, smiled at him, and said, “No, that’s quite true.”

  They took another pounding as the Zodiac bounced from wave to wave, fighting the storm as it headed back toward the naval ship. It had been tough going even for this experienced crew. Now that seven were on board, the vessel was weighed down, and it would be a fight to get to where it needed to be.

  She hung on tight, as one of the seamen signaled to her to check that her life jacket was on correctly. Gratefully she tightened the straps, noting that the injured man had been put into one as well. That wasn’t a good sign, considering how difficult and painful that must have been. After losing her sailboat and now stuck in the middle of the ocean in a storm, hoping they could reach the naval ship in time, all helped to put the situation in perspective.

  The seaman beside her smiled and said, “It’s okay. We’ll make it.”

  She gave him a disbelieving look. “We’re taking on water too,” she said, as the waves broke overhead.

  “Yep,” he said, “but we’re used to it, and the ship is expecting us. So, if we have any problems, they’ll come and get us too.”

  She let out a slow breath and said, “Well, that’s good to know because this isn’t exactly the way I pictured my life ending.”

  “No,” he said. “One good deed deserves another. You saved the lives of two men, so don’t worry. We’ll make sure we get you out of here.”

  She gave him a bright smile and nodded. “They’re missing another friend of theirs too,” she said, motioning toward the plane’s debris floating in the ocean.

  He looked at her curiously. “Did you see anyone?”

  She shook her head. “I wasn’t even coming out to check because they were so far out,” she said. “But I thought I saw movement, so I went to look. I’m sure glad I did.”

  “So am I,” Ryland said from the other side of her.

  After that, the wind picked up, and it was too damn hard to hear. The wind caught their voices and carried them off in the opposite direction, making it almost impossible to communicate. The loud whistle of the winds and the deafening roar of the waves were all they heard, as Mother Nature broke overhead, obviously in a tempest of some kind.

  Tucking her head in against the edges of her life jacket, she curled up in the smallest ball that she could and closed her eyes against the wind and the water, wishing she were anywhere else but here.

  Chapter 2

  A hard poke had Tabi Sutherland lifting her head. The seaman beside her pointed, and she saw the side of the big naval ship ahead of her. She was stunned. It was just so massive as it rose above her. She was also numb from the cold rainwater. If she was expected to climb, they were out of luck; her limbs had stiffened in the cold. “Jesus,” she said. “I didn’t realize how big it was.”

  “It’s pretty scary,” he said. “Especially if you’ve never been close to one before.”

  When the Zodiac moved into the shadow of the big ship, she thought in her mind that the waves had increased just that much more. As they pulled up to the side, lines were tossed. They were snugged up close, but it was a challenge to get everybody up and off. This weather just added to it. By the time she stood on the deck, shivering from the cold and the wind, she was grateful to see Ryland being carried indoors. As she stood here, with the one lonely bag, purse inside, in her hand, she looked around at the wide-open space and the metal decking. “What do I do now?”

  Just then a navy man in a white uniform approached. He smiled and said, “Petty Officer Joe Smithson. We have a room for you, but we’ll get the doctor to check you over first.”

  She smiled. “I’m not injured,” she said. “That was my boat that went under though, so I could really use a hot shower and a chance to dry off.”

  “That can be arranged. Follow me, please.” She followed him down the stairs and through a long hallway until she was shown a small room. “This is yours,” he said. “When you’re done, we’ll see you two floors up.”

  “Sure,” she said, looking around the tiny-ass room. And just like that he was gone.

  But then, what did she expect? It was a huge ship, and hundreds of people were probably on board. However, she was pleased to see she had a small bathroom all to herself. She stripped down out of her wet clothing and stepped into the hot spray, ever mindful of the water issue on a ship like this. As soon as she was clean and warmed up, she shut it off and grabbed the towel, dried off, and stepped out in the bedroom to get dressed.

  The trouble was, the clothes in her bag—even though it was waterproof—weren’t much drier than what she’d had on. She pulled them out and frowned. What she needed was something drier than what she had. When a hard knock came on the door, she grabbed a T-shirt, threw it on, and wrapped the towel around her. She opened the door a crack to see the same petty officer.

 
He said, “Here’s some fresh clothes. Don’t know that they’ll fit, but they’re dry.”

  At that, her face lit in delight. “Thanks, I was trying to figure out what I would do. The only change of clothes I had in my bag were soaked too.”

  “I’m not sure about your shoes,” he said doubtfully, looking at her bare feet.

  “I’m okay with wet shoes,” she said.

  “If you give me all your wet clothes,” he said, “we’ll get them dried for you.”

  “Perfect, just give me a minute.” She closed the door and emptied the bag of clean dry clothes on her bunk. She tried on the clothing he’d given her. The pants were a reasonable fit. The shirt was tight across the chest, but it would do. She packed up all her wet clothing in the bag the seaman had brought her. Anything that was fabric she bundled up with her wet clothes. Dressed again, she opened the door. “My shoes are just soft canvas runners,” she said.

  He nodded, as she handed the bag off to him. “May I come with you now?” she asked. “I don’t really know where I’m supposed to go.” As she spoke, she quickly braided her long blond hair and brought it down around her shoulder.

  He nodded and said, “I’ll take you upstairs, where there’s hot food and coffee waiting. Plus our captain wants to hear what happened.”

  “Of course,” she said in a formal tone. Something was very odd about being in such a regimented area, where everybody else followed orders. But she didn’t know which orders were hers to follow. So once again, she felt like a fish out of water. In this case, literally. As she followed him down the hallway and back up the stairs, she asked, “How are the two men?”

  “They’re in sick bay,” he said. “I don’t have an update yet.”

  “Right,” she said. “Is it possible to see them?”

  “It will be in a little bit,” he said with a bright smile.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I really appreciate the navy’s assistance. It was getting a little close for comfort out there in that storm.”

  “And I’m sure those two men you saved appreciated the rescue too.”