Chapter Thirty-One
Cherry waited for him outside Chimera, standing in the shade just inside the tunnel entrance. It was midday, and until her eyes adjusted the sunlight had been blinding. In spite of her protected position the heat hit her, radiating from the sand and the sun-warmed tunnel wall, and gusting in on the hot breeze.
Aside from the murmur of the wind, the desert was so quiet she heard the heli before she saw it. Then a black dot appeared in the sky. The heli was flying low and its form flickered and shifted in the shimmer of heated air. The aircraft landed in the same place Zapata had set down when Cherry had arrived, next to the road that led to the excavation site. The solid gate in the perimeter fence blocked her view, and as the heli lowered she lost sight of it.
The noi
