Flirting with Disaster Read Online Free PDF

anything.
    Lisa closed her eyes, exhaustion overtaking her. The cover of darkness offered her the best opportunity to return to town, where she could try to find some means of transportation to get her back across the border. But the longer she sat by this tree, the worse she felt. Every time she tried to stand, pain shot through her head. With every hour that passed, her mind grew fuzzier, her body weaker. She’d run out of what little food and water she had hours ago, so her disorientation was only going to get worse, eventually edging into delirium. And just how delirious would she have to be before she lost her sense of self-preservation, before she just lay down and didn’t get back up again?
    You have to get out of here. Get up. Now.
    Sluggish with fatigue, she forced herself to rise to her knees, but when she tried to stand, her legs wobbled dangerously. She fell to her knees again with a steadying hand against the tree trunk, telling herself that maybe she just needed to rest a little more, but in the back of her mind she had the most ominous feeling that if she didn’t stand up now, she was never going to. A terrible vulnerability crept in, the same feeling she’d had when she’d seen those men coming at her, heard the shots, knowing that somebody meant to kill her.
    Then she heard something.
    She turned toward the road, and what she saw sent a surge of adrenaline racing through her, followed by a rush of cold, clammy fear.
    Headlights.

chapter three

    Lisa crawled sideways away from the tree where she’d been sitting, her palms and knees crunching against dead leaves, taking cover behind a large, prickly shrub. When she looked back at the road, it was so dark that she couldn’t make out anything about the car. All she saw was the bright glare of headlights slicing through the night.
    The car came to a halt. A man stepped out. He was nothing but a tall, dark silhouette, and she had a sudden flashback to the men who had stood at the top of that ravine and that moment of silence right before her plane had been blasted with machine-gun fire.
    He stood behind the open car door for a moment, flipping on a flashlight. He directed the bright beam at the bunkhouse, then swept it toward the woods. Lisa ducked back behind the shrub just as the beam of light passed by her.
    The car door slammed shut, the sound reverberating through the stillness of the night and searing her already raw nerves. She couldn’t look around the bush again, just in case he was glancing her way. She just sat there, holding her breath, her whole body slick with sweat, praying she’d hear the bunkhouse door open and close behind him. If she did, she was going to run as far and as fast into the trees as her weary body would carry her.
    Then the flashlight beam came back around, stopping a few feet to her right. Glancing over, she saw it had landed dead center on the backpack and shovel she’d left beside the tree.
    Lisa put her hand over her mouth to stifle a gasp. She heard footsteps. Feet shuffling through dead leaves.
    He was coming.
    In a moment he would be right on top of her. He was undoubtedly armed, which meant she was a dead woman. Out here in the middle of nowhere, would anyone even hear the shot?
    As the footsteps drew closer, she couldn’t stand the tension any longer. She leapt to her feet. Fueled by adrenaline and driven by sheer terror, she started to run.
    “Stop!”
    His voice was deep and commanding, but still she ran. Behind her she heard the loud swish of his footsteps through the leaves as he ran to catch her, and he was closing in fast. A tree branch raked across her face. She slapped it aside, only to have her foot catch the edge of a sapling. She tripped, almost fell, then righted herself again and kept running.
    “Stop!”
    She braced herself for the bullet she knew was coming. She’d be dead before she hit the ground, but by God, she was going to die running.
    But no shot came. Instead, he caught her arm. She