by Dirk Patton
After a few seconds, she fumbled about until feeling the infected’s face. It was slicked with blood and her fingers momentarily slipped inside a gaping wound beneath the female’s nose. Martinez took a deep breath and let it out slowly, realizing her first strike had been incredibly lucky. The eight-inch blade had pierced the infected’s sinuses and continued on directly into its brain.
Pulling the knife free, she did her best to wipe it and her hand clean on the stinking rags that had once been the female’s clothes. Standing quickly, she remained still and checked the canyon rim. Though in numbers less than earlier, the infected were still streaming toward the east. Facing west, Martinez closed her eyes despite the darkness and listened intently for more footsteps approaching. Thirty seconds later, she breathed a silent sigh of relief and carefully resumed her trek toward the coast.
14
Nicole squatted on a small hill. A strong breeze was blowing, tossing her hair about her face. Normally this would have driven her to utter distraction, rendering her unable to focus on anything until the offending locks were brought under control. Now, she didn’t even notice.
Two hundred yards away, Gonzales moved across the barren landscape. He was tracking her, unaware that his prey was actually the hunter. With the wind came the scent of the man she’d loved. She could detect that he was injured, though not where or to what extent. And there was something else. A musk that she’d never noticed before.
A primal urge within her responded so strongly that the rational part of her mind was surprised. She wanted a child. Not just any child, but a child with Gonzales. The civilized human part of her recoiled in horror at the thought of ever allowing him to touch her again, but the infected side burned with desire.
Nicole’s breathing grew deep as a wave of heat flushed through her belly and into her genitals. She could smell her own reaction to the thought of mating with him. Inside, a voice of reason screamed in revulsion. Gonzales had used her. Lied to her from the beginning. Betrayed her!
Anger boiled inside as she remembered how completely and totally she had given herself to him, only to mean less than nothing in the end. But memories of their time together fueled her desire and the heat continued to spread.
Nicole had never wanted a child. On several occasions she had seriously considered asking her gynecologist to sterilize her. After all, it was a simple procedure that would ensure there were no surprises. But she’d never felt it was important enough to bother with. Her work occupied the majority of her life, to the exclusion of any sort of romantic relationship.
On a few occasions, usually when she’d had a few too many drinks, she’d felt the need for a man and had easily found a suitable partner to satisfy her urges. But she’d never wanted to be in the type of committed relationship she’d seen her colleagues pursue, sometimes to the detriment of their careers. She wasn’t one to allow that to happen. Men, to her, were a necessary evil when she got an itch that just couldn’t be scratched any other way. Until Gonzales.
From the moment she’d laid eyes on him when he and Lieutenant Sam rescued her from the physics lab in Seattle, something had been different. She’d wanted to be with him. To care for him. Support him. And to love him. In less time than seemed possible, she found herself picturing them spending the rest of their lives together. Imagined a world where they no longer had to fight to survive, then they arrived in Hawaii and seemed to find that at Pearl Harbor.
Then she learned of the coming blight and that they would soon have to leave their home in paradise and return to the mainland. To a harsh existence that didn’t fit with her dreams. But she hadn’t despaired because she’d believed that whatever happened, Gonzales would be there at the end of the day to wrap her in his powerful arms. To make her feel loved and safe. Until he betrayed her trust.
Emotions boiled over and Nicole was unable to stop herself from screaming her rage at the night sky. Was unaware as she bellowed her pain and loss. And the burning need for a mate continued to spread through her body.
When she regained a degree of control, she was startled to find that she’d stood and approached Gonzales. He stood staring at her through the scope of a rifle, the muzzle steady on her. She could smell his fear, now mixing with the musk that had caused her to lose control.
Forty yards separated them and they stood still, watching each other. Confusion coursed through Nicole as the urge to rush forward and kill the man who’d betrayed her continued to war with the sexual desire that threatened to consume her.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he called.
The rifle never wavered as he spoke.
“Too late for that,” she answered, her voice husky with emotion.
Slowly he lowered his weapon, but not so far that he couldn’t snap it back up and fire in an instant if she charged.
“I had no choice. I’m sorry it worked out like this, but...”
She stared at him, waiting for him to finish, but he seemed unable to find the words. Once again, anger surged inside her.
“You could have asked me,” she screamed as tears began to run down her face.
He watched her silently for a moment, eyes narrowed.
“Would you have said yes?”
“I don’t fucking know what I would have done! But I would never have betrayed you like you did me!”
Nicole was breathing hard as her pain and anger momentarily overrode her carnal desires. Her eyes were locked on Gonzales as he processed her words.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I should have talked to you. Told you everything. But I never intended for you to be harmed. I just needed to control you long enough for them to take some of your blood.”
“You could have fucking asked!” Nicole screamed again, this time taking a couple of steps forward.
Gonzales snapped the rifle back to his shoulder and she scented a fresh wave of fear roll off him. The fact that he was afraid gave her a degree of satisfaction, momentarily calming her rage. After a few moments, he lowered the weapon again, though not as far off target as before.
“I’m sorry, Nicole. I really am. But they aren’t going to stop.” He let the rifle drop to the end of its sling and stood straight with a wince of pain from his broken ribs. “I won’t hurt you. If you kill me, they’ll send someone else to find you. Someone who won’t care what condition you’re in, as long as you’re alive and still have blood in your body that can be drained.”
“They can’t touch me,” Nicole said.
She took several slow steps until she was only a few feet in front of Gonzales. On the outside, she appeared calm, but inside the battle between desire and anger raged on. She wasn’t sure which emotion would win, or for that matter, which one she wanted to win.
“Why not?” he asked.
Nicole looked around and he followed her gaze. A soft curse escaped his mouth when he saw they now stood at the center of a solid ring of infected females.
15
I sat across from Viktoriya in a sumptuously upholstered leather seat. With a supremely arrogant and satisfied expression, she was sipping champagne from a crystal flute. Her eyes had transitioned to a vivid red and were locked on me over the rim of the glass.
We were on our way to Arizona, aboard a Gulfstream jet that the Russians had liberated from somewhere in Southern California. It was the most luxurious aircraft I’d ever been in. Somehow, I derived a small degree of pleasure from scraping mud off my boots onto the plush carpeting.
“Are you making an effort to be disrespectful, or does it come naturally?”
“How am I being disrespectful?” I asked, not stopping.
“You are dirtying up my beautiful aircraft.” She took a long drink to empty the flute, then carefully refilled it from a bottle resting in a silver ice bucket. “I hope this is not a preview of how you will behave in your new role.”
Sighing, I leaned back in the seat and looked into her eyes. Started to respond with a challenge to her claim that the jet was hers but thought better
before I opened my mouth. There was no advantage in needlessly antagonizing her.
“Have you reviewed the files I provided?”
I nodded, even though I hadn’t.
“And?” she asked with an arched brow.
“And I’ll get it done.”
I was lying, hoping she wasn’t able to pick up on my deception. Well, I didn’t know if I was lying or not. It was likely I would kill the two Russian officers, but not until I knew why they’d visited Irina. When I took into account their interest in her and factored in Viktoriya’s desire to have them assassinated, I wasn’t in any hurry to remove them from the equation.
But I needed to keep Viktoriya convinced that I was on board until Rachel, Mavis and Dog were safe. The problem was how would I know when Lucas had eliminated the threat of the snipers targeting them.
“I want to see my wife,” I said, looking pointedly at the tablet lying on the small table next to Viktoriya’s seat.
“And you will. As soon as I am firmly in control, you can have her brought to Arizona to join you.”
“How do I know she’s still alive?” I asked, deciding to press the issue.
Viktoriya pulled a face as if I’d offended her, but she was only mocking me.
“Do you really think I would harm her at this point? She is my insurance. My leverage over you.”
“I thought we were partners.”
“In time. Trust must be earned before I allow you off your leash.”
I did a commendable job of not reacting to her comment, managing to keep my face neutral and my tone calm.
“Trust is a two-way street. Let me see her.”
Viktoriya stared at me, a smile slowly spreading across her face.
“What is in it for me?”
“What?”
“Why should I give you what you want? There is nothing I gain if I let you see her.”
“Goodwill. That’s what you gain.”
“Goodwill is highly overrated,” she said, flapping a hand in the air to dismiss the concept. “I was thinking of something more substantial.”
Eyes locked on my face, she slowly trailed a hand across her breasts, then down her stomach. It came to rest on her inner thigh.
“Not interested,” I said.
“You are a liar,” she said with a laugh. “Do not forget my senses are heightened. You are aroused. Your pupils are dilated and I can smell the desire coming off you. You want me!”
I shook my head, but she was partially correct. My body was responding to her presence and the scent coming from her. I felt the pull from the beast within that wanted to take her on the spot. But at the same time, I was repulsed by the idea of being with her. In fact, it was difficult to control the urge to tear out her throat.
“There is no need for your wife to ever know, if that is your concern,” she said.
“Let me see her.”
“Let me see you!”
Viktoriya slid forward out of her seat onto her knees, reaching for my belt buckle. I grabbed her wrists, none too gently, and levered her hands away from me.
“I like a strong man,” she purred.
She smiled at me for a moment then tried to pull away. I held tight and she started to twist in an attempt to break my grip. Instead of fighting, I allowed her to spin, then clamped down and pulled her arms across her front as if she were restrained by a straitjacket. Standing, I shoved hard and she tumbled away to trip over her seat and fall to the carpeted deck.
Through asking, I reached for the tablet, but Viktoriya launched herself at me before I could pick it up. Foolishly, I hadn’t been prepared for her attack and with her virus enhanced speed she slammed into me and sent both of us sprawling across the aircraft cabin. In a flash, she was on top of me, lips peeled back in a silent snarl. Her eyes flashed and it was obvious the infection had control. She wanted to kill me.
Before she could wrap me up, I got a hand around her throat and tried to hit her in the face, but she saw the punch coming and was able to deflect most of the force with her shoulder. Slashing at my eyes, she savagely whipped her head from side to side but was unable to break my grip on her neck.
Batting her hands aside, I grasped the back of her head with my free hand, intending to snap her neck. At the last instant, I restrained myself. Without her resetting the sniper’s countdown on a regular basis, they would kill Rachel when time expired.
Ignoring the damage her nails were doing to my flesh, I settled for slamming her head into a table. The heavy champagne bottle was knocked off and started to roll away from us, but she snatched it up by the neck and swung it like a club. I managed to get a forearm up in time to block it, then landed a punch on the side of her head that sent her tumbling away.
Both of us snapped to our feet in a heartbeat, facing each other. Blood poured from a gash on her scalp where I’d crashed her against the table, and I could feel the warm wetness running down my face from my own injuries. We stood there for a beat, glaring at each other and it was damn difficult to control the berserker inside that was frothing at the mouth with bloodlust.
“Rachel is dead,” Viktoriya hissed, lisping because of a swollen lip from one of my punches. “I am going to make you watch the cunt die!”
I stared at her for a moment, then the beast inside took control and I was beyond rational thought. With a guttural snarl, I leapt. She tried to slither away, but I locked onto a fistful of her thick hair, pulling her backwards off her feet. Tearing at my arm, she screamed and tried to kick me in the balls, but I was unstoppable.
Holding tight, I twisted and threw her by her hair across the cabin. She crashed into a bulkhead that screened a cramped galley, shattering it and crumpling to the deck unconscious. Lunging across the open space between us, I dropped to a knee, fist coming back.
Before I could deliver a blow that would crush her skull, gunfire sounded and my head snapped around. One of the pilots stood in the cockpit door, eyes wide with fear as he pointed a pistol at me. We looked at each other for a beat and I could see his courage waver under my gaze.
“Move from her,” he said in passable English.
He may have been frightened, but the weapon was steady. In an instant, I calculated how best to kill him. The berserker urged me to attack, but a glimmer of reason reminded me that I wasn’t bullet proof.
“Move!” he said, sounding more confident that I hadn’t attacked.
“You kill me and Barinov will have your balls cut off,” I growled.
“Do not care.”
I stared at him, considering calling his bluff and killing Viktoriya. Once she was dead, I could use her corpse as a shield and bull him back into the cockpit where the close quarters would be to my advantage. I only needed to get a grip on the man and he was done. But I held back.
Not because I’d abandoned the idea of taking him out, but I could hear something he couldn’t. A faint, high-pitched whistle that had begun immediately after he’d fired the pistol to stop me. Somewhere towards the back of the plane, the bullet had pierced the outer skin and we were losing pressure. And the sound of escaping air was quickly growing in volume.
Another beat passed, then there was a loud bang from the rear of the aircraft and the whistle became a roar as the cabin depressurized. A shout in Russian from the cockpit drew his attention and with a powerful push off, I struck.
Slamming into him, I clamped one hand around the weapon, my other going to his neck. With a savage pull, I tore his throat open, getting bathed in hot blood, then crushed his gun hand before taking the pistol. Shoving the dying man behind me, I pushed into the cockpit and rammed the muzzle into the back of the pilot’s neck.
“Get us on the ground” I said, my voice little more than an animal growl.
He didn’t respond. I glanced through the windscreen but could see nothing other than darkness.
“Now!” I roared.
He still didn’t speak but nodded his head and pushed the controls forward until we were in a rapid descent.
>
16
Lucas adjusted the Navy uniform, settling a pair of pistols and a knife out of sight. Bending, he double checked the readiness of his suppressed, short barrel rifle in a canvas kit with a large red cross on each side. Satisfied, he lifted the bag and slung it over his shoulder so his hand hovered above the open top. He’d be able to reach in and grab the weapon if it was needed.
He looked around, spying Jessica, Admiral Packard and Captain West standing near a military ambulance, speaking with Colonel Chapman. Bouncing the medic’s bag one final time to check its security, he walked over to them.
“Any change?” he asked.
Jessica held up a tablet and he could see a shadowy image of Rachel’s sleeping face, the cross hairs of a rifle scope steady on her forehead. He nodded and looked at the Admiral.
“Good to go, sir.”
“The uniform suits you, Staff Sergeant,” Packard said. “If you’re interested in a second career, I’m sure we could find a way to use your talents.”
“And have to deal with officers like John Chase, sir? He’s bloody insane.”
Packard smiled and nodded his head before turning to Captain West.
“We ready?”
“Yes, sir. The Marines will move in as soon as the Colonel’s family is secured. No one’s leaving the area until we’re satisfied they’re not one of the Russian snipers.”
“Good luck, Staff Sergeant,” Packard said, turning back to Lucas.
“Good to go, sir.”
Lucas turned and nodded at the Marine who was going with him. He was also dressed like a Navy corpsman and the two of them swung up into the cab of the ambulance. Starting the engine, he eased the vehicle out of the large garage, coming to a gentle stop.
