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“No, use this.” Winter hands me the miniature telescope again.
I take it and bring the lens to my eye and adjust the focus to scan the circle of tents. In the gap between two of them, I’m able to make out Dr. Boonjan sitting in the dirt on the left side of the camp with a miserable air about himself. Somchai is slouched next to him. Their hands and ankles are tied.
My heart sinks. Smith has wasted no time.
“What’s going on?” Winter asks.
“Smith must have control of the camp,” I say. “Somchai and Dr. Boonjan are tied up; they’re sitting on the ground with their backs against a tree.” I observe more closely and notice the length of rope sneaking around their chests. “Bound to the trunk.”
“What about Tucker and Archie?”
“I can’t see. They must be on the other side of the tree. Let’s shift.”
Careful not to make any noise, we shuffle sideways, crawling on our elbows and knees. Once we reach our new vantage point, I look through the mini telescope again, clocking in on Archie’s ashen features.
Before I can stop myself, an involuntary roar of rage escapes my lips.
Winter pushes my head down toward the ground, and we both lie flat on our bellies.
“Are you crazy?” she hisses. “You want to get us caught? What did you see?”
“It’s Archie,” I say. “I have to go.”
I try to push up again, but she pulls me back to the ground, saying, “Calm down.”
“Check for yourself”—I hand her the telescope—“and then tell me again to calm down.”
Winter takes the black tube from me and spies the camp through the high grass covering the terrain. I know when she has Archie in her focus, because she gasps loudly.
“Those bastards,” Winter whispers angrily, without removing her eye from the lens. “They’ve made him sit on his wounds.” She pauses, takes another look, and gasps even louder. “There’s blood on the ground; the stitches must have burst open. He has to be in a lot of pain.”
I take the telescope back from her and examine my best friend’s face. “It’s not just the pain. He’s not well. An infection, most likely. Smith must’ve gotten here last night. If Archie has been sitting in the dirt with open wounds for twenty-four hours, he must already be feverish. We have to do something.”
“Agreed,” Winter says, and preventively grabs my arm to ground me. “But rushing in there won’t solve a thing.”
“It’s Archie.” I struggle to get free. “I have to go.”
“Logan.” The tenderness in her voice makes me pause. “Say you attack now, and even manage to cut them free. Then what?” She pauses. “Archie will need to be carried at this point. Tucker looks more like a teddy bear than someone who’d be helpful in a fight.” No matter how fit he is, I add in my head. To go against Smith, one needs to be mean, and Tucker doesn’t have an ounce of mean in him. “And the only thing Dr. Boonjan has fought in his life,” she continues, “is probably an unruly book page. So unless Somchai has some hidden martial arts skills, you’d be in there alone fighting three highly trained ex-Special Forces armed to the teeth with no weapons of your own. You’d only get yourself caught and tied to the tree with the others. Then Archie would really stand no chance.”
Winter’s right. I hate that she’s right. And not because she has outsmarted me once again; because it means I’m powerless to help my best friend when he needs me the most.
“So what do you propose?” I ask.
“We wait.”
“For what?”
“It’s almost dark. If the soldiers haven’t left by now, they must be planning to leave at first light tomorrow.”
“I’m not sure Archie has that much time.”
“Listen to me, Logan, we’re his only hope and we only get one shot at this, so we have to get it right on the first try.”
“You have a plan?”
Winter winks at me. “I do.”
I shake my head. I swear, this woman never ceases to amaze me.
