Restless Soul - Alex Archer [43]
“Hell of a storm, yes?” Luartaro said. They’d reached the bottom of the mountain, and an expanse of water stretched before them. “That little river? It’s not as little as before. There—”
On the other side, Zakkarat sat on a flat piece of rock, the umbrella-like leaves of a weeping tree sheltering him from the brunt of the storm.
“It’s just wide,” Luartaro continued, pointing to the water. “And fast, but not terribly deep. I got Zak across without too much trouble. Let’s go. Let’s hurry.”
She passed by him, taking the lead and edging out into the water. It tugged her and for an instant she thought about letting herself go with its current. It would be easier than dealing with the gunmen and the storm and whatever else God and Thailand wanted to throw at her. Let the river take her where it wanted. But it was against her nature to simply give up, and so she forged across, leg muscles burning from the day’s ordeal.
The water swirled around her hips, and she reached a hand to her waistband, pulling out the mud-caked gun and holding it up with one hand, taking the camera out of her breast pocket and holding it high with the other. She didn’t want to risk the river ruining either. She especially didn’t want to lose the camera, with all of its pictures of the coffins and the treasure. Annja heard Luartaro sloshing behind her. He was talking softly, but his words were lost in the water and the rain.
The water was up to her shoulders in the middle of the river, the current more insistent there. But Annja was determined and reached the other side, climbing out and plodding to Zakkarat and then looking over her shoulder to spot Luartaro doing the same.
“The treasure would not have mattered, Annjacreed,” Zakkarat said, his sad eyes locking on to hers. “The pack I filled would not have made it down the mountain with me.”
“But at least you made it down,” she returned, kneeling by him and looking out across the river for signs of the gunmen. She glanced at his foot. He’d taken his left boot off, and the ankle was terribly swollen and discolored. She suspected it was broken, rather than sprained, and she knew he would not be able to get the boot back on. “I know you should rest. We all could do with a little rest. But we have to keep going, Zakkarat. Those men—”
“Will be after us because of what we saw,” he finished. “I know.”
“Can you—”
“Walk, Annjacreed?” He made a tsk-tsking sound. “I will have to, won’t I?”
“And I will help you,” Luartaro said. “Come on. Let’s get away from the river. They might be able to see us here.” He helped Zakkarat up, pulling the Thai man’s arm across his shoulders and taking the weight off his left leg. “Any idea who they are, Zak? Did you recognize any of them?”
Zakkarat shook his head. “Some very bad men, I know that. Very rich and very bad men. And they are not Thai.”
Luartaro raised an eyebrow.
“They are Vietnamese,” Zakkarat explained. “Or maybe Laotian. They are not Burmese. I have Burmese friends.”
Annja struck out perpendicular to the river, eyes downcast, and choosing a path across springy ground cover that might not reveal their boot prints. She tried to avoid stretches of mud where it could be easier to spot their tracks.
Maybe the gunmen had given up and were concentrating on their treasure, she hoped. Maybe because of the storm and the swollen river and the treacherous terrain they had decided to let her and her companions go and spend their time loading up the Jeeps with gold.
A shot rang out, followed by a burst of machine-gun fire, ending her wishful thinking.
11
Annja preferred to avoid physical confrontations. She didn’t worry that she would get hurt. Rather, she worried that she would hurt someone else. Violence against another person rankled her. Years past or maybe even long months past, she would have preferred to run rather than fight for that reason alone. That hadn’t been her attitude recently, though. Lately she’d tended