Lost Contact (The Bridge Sequence Book One), Nathan Hystad [primary phonics books .TXT] 📗

pursed, and he crossed his arms defiantly. “I’ll take your word on it.”

“Wait, how did you know we were here?” I asked her. Hunter’s warning about the Believers rang in my mind.

She lost her smile, and her cocky stance shifted into something different. “I’ll be honest. I was here with my plane, running a few tours in the area. You see, I have a bit of a niche business. Hauling snotty trust-fund kids around to remote regions so they can show off to their friends. The latest brought me to Sydney, and I advertised on social, picking up a couple more jobs. But I saw you…” She flipped her phone around. It was Hunter Madison in the same suit he wore now, walking behind some vapid-looking duck-lipped woman taking a selfie in the hotel lobby.

“I was checking out hashtags for this place, trying to see if anyone wealthy enough to take a private charter might be in the area. And as luck had it, I saw you, Mr. Madison.”

“What do you want?” he asked.

“I heard you say you need a pilot. That’s me. I’m the woman for the job.” She placed her hands on her hips and smiled widely.

I had to admit her energy was electric, and we did need someone. “You said you had a plane? How big?” Marcus asked her.

“Six-seater.”

“Then you’re wasting our time. We can’t take a bush plane across the Indian Ocean. It’s thousands of miles.”

Veronica only smiled wider. “Then it’s a good thing I have another one on the coast of Mozambique. Assuming you can charter a flight out of Sydney.”

“Why should we trust you?” Tripp asked.

“You shouldn’t, but I’ll tell you what. You don’t have to pay me until we get to the stone forest. We’ll discuss the payment—”

Hunter rubbed his forehead and cut her off. “Fifty thousand if we find what we’re after in Madagascar. I’ll pay you the same for each of our stops.” I was confident he’d do some digging on the woman when he returned to his room, but for this moment, he was desperate. Hunter was dying, and the Tokens were within his grasp.

My jaw dropped, but to Veronica’s credit, she didn’t flinch at the sum. “When do we leave?”

3

To my surprise, there were something like fifteen airports spread out on the African island country. Unfortunately, I didn’t see any of them from our current vantage point.

The engines sputtered as we neared land, and Veronica grinned as she lowered toward the bare ground. Seated beside the pilot, I listened as the dash alarms chimed out repeatedly. The gauge dials were pushed to their limits, but none of it seemed to discourage Veronica.

“What the hell were we thinking?” Hunter shouted, and I peered at him. He was whiter than a ghost and clutched the seatbelt tightly. The plane was a stark contrast to the ones he was used to traveling in. The seats were cracked, the paint chipped, but so far, they’d managed to cross the gulf between Mozambique and Madagascar, if only by a hair.

“You worry too much,” Veronica said into her headset. Tripp had remained quiet, and Marcus seemed pensive, his eyes pressed closed as his lips moved silently. I suspected he’d just found religion.

A voice carried through her radio, speaking in crackling French. She responded and gave me a thumbs-up as she steered the plane south. “We’re cleared for landing. What, you didn’t think I was going to touch down on the rocks, did you? They do have laws, Rex.”

The plane jerked to the side, sending me into Veronica.

“Hands to yourself.” She smirked, and I found myself liking the woman more and more with each quip. She was easy to look at, not to mention carefree in a way I’d never managed in my life.

The airport looked like a few others I’d stopped in over the years: a single ratty tower, a lone runway with a few rusted-out planes parked outside a chain-link fence. There was a narrow road between the water and the tarmac, and she headed for it, descending faster than any of us liked.

We each sat in a kind of petrified state as the wheels touched the pavement, bouncing up, then screeching on the strip as she leveled it out. We jerked sideways several times and finally slowed, the engines cutting out as she directed the plane toward a man in an orange vest, waving his batons.

“Told you. Smooth sailing,” Veronica said as she powered off the plane.

“I’ve never—” Hunter started, but I cut him off.

“You got us here. Thank you.” I unstrapped, and she gave me an appreciative grin.

Tripp opened the exit, and Marcus was the first out, landing on wobbly feet. “I’m never getting in there again.”

“Maybe not, but I bet it won’t be your last hectic ride,” I told him.

The air was humid, but a far cry from being as hot as the harsh terrain in the outback, and I took the offered bags from Tripp. I hadn’t asked him what was inside his, but judging by the heaviness of it, there were a few guns and God knows what else.

“Bonjour, bienvenue à Madagascar,” a man said in fluent French.

“Thank you,” I replied.

“This way,” he said in English. A few men watched us from the main building, leaning in the shade and staring with curiosity at our strange group.

Hunter Madison was the last to disembark, and he looked like he was on death’s doorstep. “You sure you can do this?” I asked quietly. Tripp and Veronica were ahead, with Marcus a few feet behind, lugging another pack.

Hunter’s eyes were lively, and he managed a smile. “Rex, I’ve been waiting to see a Token for thirty years. If it’s where those coordinates say it is, I’d make that flight fifty times over.” He took off, moving spryly, and I jogged after him.

We followed the local airport attendant to the fence, and I watched as a white truck drove by, exhaust billowing from the tailpipe. The town was across the street.