“Sir! Listen.”
Oxley strained his ears for the sound of anyone approaching. He stood still for several seconds. Then he heard it too. It wasn’t someone’s footsteps; it was the distinctive thump of spinning rotor blades clattering into the dark sky. It was coming from the ocean. Oxley scanned the horizon, searching for the chopper’s position lights, but he couldn’t spot them.
“Get on your ATVs and take position fifty meters on the north and west side of the helipad,” Oxley ordered the two men squatting next to him. “Questions?”
There were none. “Make sure you don’t turn on your lights,” he reminded his men. “You don’t want to lose your night vision.”
“Understood,” one man replied.
“I’ll wait for Ricardo and the NVGs right here,” Oxley said. “Then we’ll regroup around the helipad.”
Both men nodded. Oxley rested his M4 on top of an oak barrel and scanned for threats. “Go!” he ordered.
He heard his men’s boots pounding against the dirt path behind him as they raced toward the front of the building, where they had left their four-wheelers. Oxley once again cursed his lack of readiness. If he’d had a pair of NVGs with him, it would have given him the technical advantage he needed to swiftly end this little escapade. At least Adaliya and the kids were off the property. That had been a good call.
The helicopter was getting closer. Oxley had no difficulty hearing the whine of the chopper’s turbine engine. The fact that Oxley couldn’t see its navigation lights told him everything he needed to know. This was indeed a rescue operation. But for whom? Pierre or White?
The sound of the helicopter approaching was soon drowned out by revving engines of the two ATVs that sped past Oxley. Oxley watched as his men navigated the dirt path with one hand on the ATV handlebars and the other holding their rifles. The ATVs’ brake lights came on as his men slowed down to take a sharp bend in the path.
And that’s when Oxley saw the muzzle flashes followed by the silhouette of one of his men being thrown off his four-wheeler.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Kommetjie, South Africa
White shook Pierre gently by the collar. “C’mon, snap out of it, Pierre. We need to move.”
Though he’d gotten most of his hearing back, White’s ears were still ringing, and he wasn’t sure how loud he was speaking.
Pierre didn’t respond. He was in a fetal position, rocking back and forth. It wasn’t a pretty sight. White slapped him across the face. Pierre looked at him, confused.
“Hey,” White said. “I need your help, buddy. Can you help me?”
Gradually, Pierre stopped shuddering, and his short legs unfolded. He got up to one knee and gazed at his surroundings, his eyes blank and unseeing.
The roar of incoming ATVs gave White an idea. It was risky, but it was an opportunity he couldn’t afford to miss. Not if they wanted to make it to the helipad in time for their pickup.
“I’ll be back,” White said to Pierre. Grabbing his M4, White started running parallel to the dirt path, staying close to the grapevines in an effort to stay concealed for as long as he could. In case a shooter was waiting for him on the other side of the vines, White didn’t want to show up too close to where he had last been seen.
In front of him, the vines took a sharp turn to the right, signaling a similar bend in the dirt path. White anticipated the ATVs would slow down right before the curve, unless the drivers wanted to flip their machines onto their sides.
They were getting closer. Almost on his heels. It was now or never.
White hopped on top of the small stone wall and raised his M4. The ATVs were a bit farther away than he had expected, but it wasn’t all bad. It gave him an extra second to adjust his aim. The ATVs were running without their front lights, but the moon provided enough illumination for White to align the front sight of his rifle with the torso of the man driving the lead ATV, now only a hundred feet away.
White exhaled and pressed the trigger five times in quick succession, his rounds slamming into the man’s chest, knocking him off his ATV. The ATV, having lost its driver, hit a bump on the dirt path and changed direction, heading straight toward White at thirty miles an hour.
White dove to his left and onto the dirt path just as the ATV struck the wall with an ear-splitting crash, sending bits of metal and stones into the air. The ATV caught fire but didn’t explode. White, who had landed on his stomach, raised his head just in time to see the second ATV coming straight at him.
He rolled hard to his left, leaving his rifle where it lay. The right front wheel of the SUV missed him by less than an inch but rolled over his M4. White watched in disbelief as the driver locked the wheel and tried to turn the ATV away from the upcoming wall.