Flashback (Kendra Michaels #11)

“Lynch, you crazy son of a bitch…”

“What? What’s he doing?”

Kendra shook her head. “He thinks he’s Tarzan.”

The realization suddenly hit Metcalf. “You don’t think he’d really…?”

“Just watch him.”

Lynch moved down the length of braided vines, gripping them in his gloved hands. He held tight as he braced his feet against the ravine wall, then pushed away. He swung back and forth, making an ever-larger arc as he moved toward another cluster of vines and shrubs that would take him lower.

Lynch swung his hips to push himself even closer, but as he did so, the force of his movements caused several of the vines to break off in his hands. He plummeted several feet, eliciting gasps and a few shrieks from the crowd above.

“He can still make it back up here,” Metcalf said.

Kendra shook her head. “No way he’s giving up.”

“Maybe he should.”

“This is Lynch, remember?”

He swung farther and higher as even more of the vines broke in his hands. A big clump finally pulled loose entirely. Lynch let go and leaped through the air, grasping at any vine and piece of shrubbery that could conceivably keep him from plummeting the hundred-plus feet to the ravine’s rocky floor.

“He made it!” Metcalf shouted.

Lynch had grabbed another vine cluster, slipping only a few feet before securing his new place on the ravine wall.

Several police officers whistled and applauded, but the firefighters were held back by stern glances from their chief.

Kendra pointed to the binoculars hanging around Metcalf’s neck. “Lend me those, will you?”

Metcalf handed her the binoculars, and she trained them downward. “Shit.”

“What do you see?”

She turned the focus knob. “There’s smoke coming from that car. I think I just saw a flame in the engine compartment. But why now, after it’s been down there for hours?”

“The car may have been running all this time and leaking fluids.” Metcalf took back the binoculars and aimed them toward the car. “There’s a fire, all right.” Metcalf turned toward the firefighters to tell them, but they’d already seen it. “I wonder if Lynch knows yet.”

Was that… smoke?

Still gripping the vines, Lynch twisted his body toward the car below him. Flames shot out from the undercarriage, and black smoke coiled upward. Great. Just great.

A moment later, he was engulfed by the smoke. His eyes watered and his nose burned.

Fight through it. Only about seventy-five feet to go.

He moved down the vines, traveling hand under hand as another plume of acrid smoke swirled over him.

Dammit. He closed his eyes and held his breath, hoping against hope that the plume would soon break. It didn’t. Shit.

He continued his downward journey, trying to feel his way past a thorny outgrowth of branches.

More smoke, and this plume was even more intense than the last.

It was getting harder, not easier. Gotta pick up the pace.

He forced open his watery eyes and half climbed, half slid down the next thirty feet, still holding his breath. Finally, the smoke thinned and moved in a different direction. He looked down. The car was still burning and the fire had spread to some nearby brush. Damn. If Williams was alive in there, his chances were fading fast.