Detective Danny Cavanaugh 01 - The Brink

you,” she said, holding her head with both hands. “Is that water I hear?”
    Danny felt the easy tug of the river’s current. Then he listened to the waves slapping up against the raft. He looked up and saw the Potomac’s black water shimmer under the light of a new moon. “It is.”
    “We landed in the river?”
    He nodded. “Did you ever doubt me?”
    “Of course not. It just felt like we hit a concrete wall is all.” Sydney looked off in the distance. “Where exactly are we?”
    Danny stared out in the same direction. The first thing he saw was the District’s lights in the distance. He could make out the familiar shapes: the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument, the Capitol’s dome. Then he scanned the rest of their surroundings to see if they had been spotted. He saw no witnesses.
    “We’re right by the monuments, exactly where we need to be.”
    “Très bon,” Sydney said. She attempted to clap and winced as pain stung her traumatized body.
    “Can you paddle?” Danny asked her.
    She lifted her arms over her head, gritting her teeth as she tried to rotate her arms in circles. “I can.”
    “No you can’t.”
    She looked at him like he just slapped her in the face. It was obvious she didn’t like being told she couldn’t do something. “I’ll be fine.” She knelt over the side of the raft and began paddling toward the monuments. A perfect stare of determination, something she no doubt honed over the years in her swim meets, forced any sign of weakness to abandon her face.
    I’d hate to see that staring at me from the next starting block , Danny thought. He checked his watch and then began paddling next to her. It was nearing eight o’clock. He wondered how long it would take them to reach dry land.
    Three nervous minutes passed. Danny kept one eye on the skies above them and the other on the District. It was hard to tell at night, but he figured they had made some headway. He heard the sound of an approaching plane and watched it on its final descent. Although they were a good distance away from it, the plane’s ferocious jet engines throbbed inside every inch of his body. He stopped paddling and motioned to Sydney.
    “Let’s take a break.”
    “What?” she asked.
    Danny edged closer to her, figuring she couldn’t hear over the plane’s noise. He prepared to yell the same four words when a familiar sound reached his ears over the jet noise.
    Danny had heard that same noise before during training exercises. The whine of a shoulder-fired missile screamed through the air above their heads. Danny instantly realized its intended target. He grabbed Sydney’s arm and yelled in her ear.
    “Get in the water! Now!”
    The missile struck the plane just as Danny and Sydney hit the water. Sound blasted through the water, as the river erupted in an orange glow around them. Danny let go of Sydney’s arm to claw his way down further and further underneath the water. The backpack was making it difficult for him to make any headway, but he dare not shed it and lose their evidence.
    Soon though, he felt Sydney’s hand around his wrist. Danny swam down through the water as fast as he could, but Sydney was still pulling him along. He felt the strong turbulence as her powerful legs kicked beside his body. She was dragging him further and further. Down, down. Pressure intensified inside his head with every passing second. He couldn’t go down any more; his ears were about to explode. He pulled against Sydney’s grip. She stopped and came over to him. Danny opened his eyes, and although he could feel Sydney right next to him, he couldn’t see a thing.
    Suddenly, Danny had a new problem. His lungs were out of air. He grabbed Sydney’s hand and hit his chest, then his mouth, hoping she knew what he meant.
    I need to go up!
    Danny kicked his feet and started to gain altitude under the water. But then he felt Sydney’s hand tugging him back down.
    What is she doing? Is she trying to kill me?
    Danny felt Sydney’s body wrap around him. Then he felt her lips lock onto his as she pushed air into his mouth. He finally realized what she was dong. She was giving him her air so he could stay under the safety of the water a little while longer.
    Sydney pulled on him again, but this time instead of going down, she cut across the water in what Danny hoped was away from falling airplane debris.
    Nearly a minute passed, and Danny was out of air again. He turned loose of Sydney’s grip and shot toward