was higher over on her side, and when at last she opened the window fully, she revealed only the cold night air.
Then suddenly another giant caiman came surging in through the driver's side window of the Humvee and splashed down into the pool of water in the front half of the vehicle.
“Go!” Race yelled. 'Get onto the roof!'
Lauren moved fast. In a second she was out of the Humvee, climbing up onto its roof. The dazed Gaby went next—she shuffled quickly across the back seat and reached out through the window. Lauren immediately began to pull her out from up on the roof, while Race pushed her from below.
The caiman in the driver's seat bucked and snorted, searching for its prey.
Water was now rushing over the front seat in a thick steady stream. It was almost waist-deep in the back.
Just then another caiman rammed into the rear-left win dow of the Humvee, causing the entire vehicle to jolt. Race spun at the impact and saw that the whole left-hand side of the Humvee was now completely underwater!
Gaby Lopez was halfway out the right-side window.
Race was the last one left.
It was then, however, as he pushed on Gaby's feet, that he heard a sickening metallic groan from somewhere within the Humvee.
Abruptly the whole car lurched dramatically to the right.
At first he thought it was another ramming from one of the caimans. But it wasn't. No, this time the whole car had shifted laterally. It was moving. Moving…
Downstream.
Oh, God, Race thought.
They were being carried downstream by the current of the river!
'This is not happening,' he said.
At that moment there came another, more familiar jolt as one of the caimans rammed the left-hand window again.
“Come on, Gaby!' he yelled at Lopez's feet as they dan gled inside the right-hand window in front of him.
By this time, the caiman in the front seat seemed to have realized where Race and the others were and it began to shuffle clumsily backwards so that it could leap over into the back seat.
Race saw it move.
'GabyV
'Almost there…' Lopez called back.
“Hurry up!”
Then suddenly, Gaby's feet disappeared out the window and Lauren yelled, 'She's clear, Will!' and Race leapt for the window, poked his head out through it and saw Lauren and Gaby standing on the roof above him.
The two women quickly reached down and grabbed his hands and hauled him out of the car not a second before the caiman in the front seat clambered over into the back and snapped angrily at his outward-moving feet, missing them by millimetres.
Back in the village, Nash, Copeland and the six American soldiers were all sitting—handcuffed—in the safety of the all- terrain vehicle, watching the nightmare outside unfold, when suddenly the sliding side door of their armoured vehicle was wrenched open from the outside and a blast of rain and wind swirled into the interior of the ATV.
Two soaking Germans hurried in through the door, their mudsoaked feet clanging on the floor of the vehicle. They shut the great steel door behind them and abruptly there was silence inside the ATV once again.
Nash and the others just stared at their new companions.
A man and a woman.
Both were sopping wet, and both were completely covered in mud. They wore civilian clothes—blue jeans and vhite T-shirts—but with a twist: both wore black Gore-Tex holsters and compact Glock-18 pistols on their hips. They both also wore navy blue bulletproof vests. Their appearance screamed: undercover cops.
The man was burly, strong-looking and barrel-chested. The woman small but athletic, with short peroxide- blonde hair.
The man didn't waste any time. He walked straight over to the Americans and began unlocking their handcuffs.
'You're not prisoners anymore,' he said in English. 'We are all in this together now. Come, we must save as many of the others as we can.'
Race, Lauren and Lopez were standing—stranded-on the roof of the Humvee, as the whole Humvee-Huey combination drifted awkwardly downriver, caught in the current.
Just then Race saw the rickety wooden jetty about ten yards away from them, downstream. It looked like they would float right by it.
That was their chance.
The Humvee-Huey lurched again, sank lower in the water. At the moment, the Humvee's roof was about a
