Free Protecting Fiona (SEAL of Protection Book 3) by Susan Stoker Page B

she’d had. That ladder was literally the difference between life and death for her. Fiona choked back a sob, now wasn’t the time or the place to break down. She still had to make it up to, and in, the helicopter alive.
     

Chapter Seven
     
     
    Fiona staggered toward the ladder swinging crazily in the air flying around by the blades of the chopper. She couldn’t walk in a straight line because of the pack on her back. She was also still trying to shoot randomly into the trees, but she was almost out of ammo. Fiona figured she looked ridiculous, but all she cared about was getting the hell out of the jungle.
    She looked up. There were men hanging out of the open door still firing their weapons at the drug runners, but Fiona heard it all through a daze.
    Only a little more , Fiona told herself, trying to make herself as small a target as possible, which was really laughable since she had a giant backpack on and was quite tall.
    Finally Fiona grabbed the ladder, reaching it just as she started to fall on her face. She stepped up to the first rung, and hung on tight. There was no way she could get the strap around herself with the pack on, so she simply wrapped her arms around the sides of the ladder, buried her head, and hoped like hell Hunter’s teammates would pull her up fast. They did.
    Fiona heard a bullet hit the pack on her back and she thought she felt something hit her leg, but amazingly it didn’t hurt. She was numb to everything. Her body was shaking from the adrenaline rush like it was twenty degrees outside rather than ninety. Fiona didn’t think she’d feel it if a bullet had hit her in the head at that point.
    Fiona opened her eyes to check on her progress in getting to the chopper and saw they were flying away from the clearing at a high rate of speed. Terrified she inhaled sharply and squeezed her eyes closed and prayed she’d make it to the chopper quickly.
    After what seemed like an eternity, Fiona felt hands on her arms lifting her, practically throwing her into the interior of the helicopter. Her eyes immediately searched for Hunter. He was lying toward the back of the small space with a man dressed all in camouflage giving him first aid.
    Fiona looked around for Julie, she also seemed to be fine. She was sitting off to the side with her head buried in the chest of another camo-wearing man.
    The two men who’d hauled her aboard the chopper, pantomimed for her to crawl over to the side of the aircraft next to the man who was comforting Julie. Fiona gestured at her back, knowing there was no way she could move with Hunter’s pack on her back. One of the men helped her remove the backpack as if she carried feathers instead of what had to be at least a hundred pounds of gear, and she made her way over to where they’d pointed.
    It was too loud to talk, and no one would be able to hear her if she did try to speak anyway. Fiona saw the men all wore ear pieces, so she figured they could communicate with each other, even with the noise. She saw their lips moving, but couldn’t hear anything but the motor of the helicopter. Fiona didn’t care. She was out of the damn jungle and everyone seemed to be okay. At the moment that was all she could muster up inside to care about.
    She watched as Hunter’s shoulder was bandaged up by one of his teammates. He was unconscious, but at least they’d seemed to stop the bleeding. Fiona realized, with a start, that she’d never been so scared in her life as she was when she saw Hunter fall and the blood seep from him. Even when she’d been grabbed and had woken up to…yeah, even then. Watching Hunter fall after being shot, was scarier than even that. Fiona couldn’t say why, it just was.
    The chopper flew on and on and after what seemed like forever, finally landed at a dirt covered airstrip. Fiona saw a small plane and figured that was how they were leaving. Just as Fiona got the nerve up to ask about what was going on, Julie was there to ask the questions so