Maybe they’re out of their misery too. Grace said to herself, hoping to ease her conscience.
She looked down at the gun in her hand as the wash from the chopper’s blades blew her hair in all directions and ruffled her white coat.
“That’s four!” She turned to Tilford and held the finger of her left hand outstretched.
“Four? What, I’m not—”
“I’ve shot and killed four people today. I never shot anything but paper targets before, never.”
“You had no choice!” Tilford came closer and grabbed her shoulders. “You had no choice Grace, but we have to go. The chopper’s about to land.”
“Well, let’s get out of here I’m done with this mess!”
Tilford took her hand and led her to the heliport where, along with Sanders, they shielded their eyes from the turbulence as the chopper touched down. All three noticed the camera pointed directly at them. They were destined for prime time TV news.
A helicopter landing on the roof of the hospital heliport wasn’t an unusual sight by any means, but with all the hospital exits sealed off, the chopper from the TV news station raised more than a passing interest from the authorities on the ground.
“Look, there’re more people in the chopper now!” a police officer out in the hospital parking lot called. He and his crew were situated further back on the rise near the access road which afforded him a clear view of the roof.
“Call the station,” he yelled to an officer inside one of the squad cars. “Tell them what happened and the name of that news chopper. We’ll find out where their landing pad is!” The wheels were now in motion. While the chopper spirited the three escapees from the rooftop, the police concentrated their efforts on finding the location of the chopper’s landing. NSA eavesdroppers meanwhile passed on the information to the State Department, the FBI, and the FDA and, of course, to Calgleef.
“Right, thank you so very much.” Calgleef sounded in control as he answered his contact from the NSA. The grim news of three more escaping from the rooftop of the hospital, aided and abetted by a TV station helicopter, had him fuming inside. “We are certain it’s only three?”
“Yes, sir, Director Calgleef. Just three, one male and two females. The Des Moines police have established contact with the chopper as we speak and have confirmed as such.”
“Names?”
“No, sir, not as yet, but as soon as they land the police will take them into custody and—”
“Don’t take them directly into custody,” Calgleef jumped in. He remembered Moya’s admonishment for not taking the first of the escapees into quarantine—and he knew it wasn’t over concern for the public’s safety but more a prevention of the flu from breaking out too soon, before they were ready. These three had been inside the hospital longer, and their exposure was greater, as was the risk. They had to be picked up by one of the CDC special security teams, who were specifically trained for just this purpose and were armed. “Leave that up to my people. We’ll have to take them for routine examinations and hold them until we’re satisfied they aren’t infected.”
“So it is this flu from Europe that’s broken out inside the hospital?” the NSA contact asked Calgleef. He hadn’t been briefed on anything more than a “possible outbreak,” but now with the need to isolate people becoming a reality, he had to find out for his peace of mind.
“We can’t be sure until we test the first group who escaped earlier, but in my opinion, it appears to be.”
“Strictly between the two of us,” the government agent said in a hushed voice, “how was this flu able to take hold so rapidly? I mean, wasn’t this supposed to be a vaccination program aimed at preventing it from getting a foothold in this country?”
Calgleef sensed a need to know from the NSA operative, but the need was more of a personal nature. This was almost a revelation in itself; NSA operatives, like their CIA cousins, practiced their craft of protecting the state by finding out everything there is to know about everyone, and they do it with zeal. They never questioned their role in gathering information, whether it be foreigners or Americans.
Perhaps he lives here in Des Moines, or his family does, and he’s concerned about returning? Calgleef reasoned to himself. But though his NSA contact was most likely cleared with a much higher security level, he wasn’t about to fill him in on any specific details. Besides, he may just be trying to find out how much the director of the CDC knew—or was involved in.
Thinking quickly on his feet, Calgleef placed the blame on the only feasible explanation for the Baltic flu’s arrival in the country—Moya.
In the worldwide game of deception, friends and trusted colleagues are a rare commodity.
“Just between the two of us then, Mr. Jones,” Calgleef doubted his contact’s name was Jones, but whatever, “the European doctor who came here to assist with the program, and acted as a spokesperson for the manufacturer, worked closely with the Baltic flu from its inception. He’s renowned for his work with infectious diseases. His name is Dr. Moya.”
The silence that greeted Calgleef at the other end of the phone filled him with dread. Did I say too much… is he already passing this information on to his superiors?
“Dr. Moya? But he was cleared to enter the country and didn’t show any signs of infection.”
“It appears he may have been a host. As you know, hosts don’t always exhibit any symptoms.” Calgleef looked at his watch impatiently as he was greeted by further silence.
“Where is Dr. Moya now?”
Calgleef was sure he was being pumped for information now. The tone of his contact’s voice changed, more authoritative. The NSA had every available area of communication into and out of the hospital covered, as well as all departments and individuals concerned, thoroughly monitored.
Just whose side are these people on? Calgleef asked himself. The NSA, or this operative, know full well where Moya is.
Is he checking to see if I’ll give him up or not?
“He told me on the phone a short time ago that he was in Kansas City. I, of course, have no way to verify that and—”
“But we do, Director Calgleef. Leave it with us and thank you.”
Calgleef put his cell phone down on his desk and tapped a nervous finger over the buttons. Moya was Thorncroft’s man here in the United States, but the whole stratagem to fleece the US for billions of dollars was in jeopardy unless he came up with a credible reason for why the Baltic flu broke out so suddenly.
“‘Strictly between the two of us,’ yeah sure and my ass too,” Calgleef mocked. The heat was being applied, and he wondered how much the NSA knew and what they planned to do about it.
He snatched at his cell and was about to call Moya when he thought better of it. “They’re monitoring everything, they’ll know straight away.” He put the phone back down. “Best leave it alone, break off all contact, and let the cards fall where they may.” Calgleef wasn’t concerned that Moya might talk and mention their involvement in a hundred-billion-dollar worldwide fraud. If he did, he would have to include Thorncroft too. And Thorncroft and his colleagues were part of the very cartel that the NSA really protected. Calgleef knew that, though he would never dare say so publicly.
“But it would make for a convenient way to clean up all the loose ends, would it not?” Calgleef loosened his neck tie and undid the top button. He looked outside to the overcast day in Atlanta. It had become quite warm in his office, quite warm.
“Who are you people? Doctors?” Steve squatted on the floor, his back to the pilot seat so he could fire questions at Grace, Tilford, and Sanders and give Richard enough room to film.
“I’m a doctor,” Tilford said, while his eyes darted from his colleagues to the reporter, the camera and the back of the pilot. They made it out—alive—but the expression on their faces wasn’t one of relief. “This is Dr. Delaney, and she’s from the CDC and Beth Sanders, a Riverside nurse.”
“You’re with the Center for Disease Control?” Steve h
ad to shout to be heard over the noise of the rotors. He addressed Grace directly, instantly having lost interest in a plain old doctor from a local hospital. It wasn’t just her position at the CDC that made her more interesting either. Fancying himself quite the ladies’ man and allowed his eyes to follow the curves of her body, before settling on her chest.
“Yes… I came in with the team to conduct the first of the vaccinations,” Grace told the reporter before adding. “A routine job—or so I thought.”
The reporter noted the exchange of looks between the CDC officer and the doctor.
“What, what is it?” Steve showed his aptitude to pick up on certain triggers; a must-have ability for a TV reporter.
Tilford reached over and grabbed Grace’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “Go ahead, we have to.”
Steve looked at them inquisitively. He couldn’t hear over the noise, but it appeared to him as if the doctor was giving her some encouragement. He didn’t know about what but was about to find out. Grace looked directly into the camera, then yelled out to Steve to turn it off if he wanted to know what was happening at the hospital.
“I’ll grant you an exclusive, when we land, but not now.”
Steve complied with a nod then leaned over and told Richard to turn the camera off. He didn’t want to; his instinct said no, but she promised him an exclusive, so he would honor his word.
“Okay, the camera’s off now what’s going on at the hospital that you can’t say on camera?”
Grace was under no illusions as to her fate. She knew there would cops, the National Guard and the CDC security waiting for them when they landed. As a high-level CDC officer, she expected they would be taken to a place of isolation, probably a temporary one for now, before being transferred to a military base hospital where the security was tight, and (considering all she knew) probably never heard of again.
Tilford was right, she knew. Others had to be told. The more who were informed, the more chances of the public becoming aware that the vaccine wasn’t going to save them from the flu. It was only going to make a few men richer than they already were—much richer. She told the reporter as much as she could in the short time they had before landing.
When she’d finished the reporter could only stare at her, his mouth wide open. If he had been in Australia, he would have swallowed a thousand flies by now. She watched as his eyes darted over to Tilford, who responded with a single nod. She didn’t tell him everything; there wasn’t time. The important part was that the Baltic flu was most likely loose in the hospital, and that was the reason for the lockdown, not Legionnaires' disease, and the patients in the hospital, already weak from illness, didn’t survive. Grace didn’t tell him about the ones she shot, including a nurse she had just recently got to know and work with and above liked. She didn’t say how she leveled the revolver and squeezed the trigger and ended the life of a colleague. She was trying not to think about—trying being the key word.
“They didn’t all die,” Nurse Sanders spoke for the first time, “they… some of them, are still alive and their-their eyes are filled red with blood and-and…” She struggled with the words.
Grace squeezed passed Tilford, took a quick look out the window of the chopper. She hated helicopters. They rattled, were noisy, and were easily buffeted by the wind. They were far from a perfect way to fly, far from it.
“It’s okay, it’s okay. We’re safe now.” Grace put an arm around Sanders’s shoulder and comforted her and also checked her pupils. She was afraid Sanders might slip into a catatonic state.
“What does she mean, ‘still alive’ and ‘eyes filled with blood’ Are these patients?” Steve paid enough attention to hear that much.
Tilford leaned forward; he was closer to the reporter now with Grace comforting Sanders. Even with the doors closed, the rotors and the engine of the Bell 407 GXP made quite a racket, and Tilford could feel an irritation begin in his throat from the yelling.
He hoped it was the yelling.
“Let me tell you this much,” he said to the reporter as they leaned toward each other, “within an hour of receiving the shots, the patients—”
“Steve, Steve!” The pilot reached around and grabbed Steve by the shoulder. Mike pointed to his headphones indicating for Steve to put his on.
“We have a welcoming committee,” Mike told the reporter the instant he put his headphones on.
“What do you mean?” Steve, still shouting, got up and turned to look out the large angled front screen of the chopper.
At least a dozen police vehicles waited at the heliport, their blue and red lights flashing. They were accompanied by several Humvee’s of the National Guard and two white vans belonging to the CDC.
“How did they know we’d be coming?”
“Simple, just contact air traffic control. They probably already have FAA approval. This is a state emergency, remember?” Steve nodded and patted the pilot on the shoulder—lightly—Mike knew the machinations of the various services involved better than he did.
“What should we do?”
“We’re gonna land. That’s what we’ll do!” The pilot answered sharply.
As the chopper touched down, the edge of the heliport wasn’t a comforting picture, ringed as it was by police and the National Guard all wearing white surgical masks over their faces; the cops also wore rubber gloves. The Guard were behind them, but it was the CDC team in yellow hazmat suits that stood out.
The phrase, “They're coming to take me away,” popped into Tilford’s head.
And they were.
The heliport was in a sectioned-off area of the TV station’s parking lot. The two white CDC vans parked in a spot in front of the Bell 470, which always landed facing the same direction.
“Step out from the helicopter and head toward the two white vans ahead of you,” an officer ordered over a loudspeaker.
As the sound of the rotor abated in volume, the doors on the side of the chopper were eased open. Tilford, Steve, and Richard (without camera) stepped exited on the side in full view of the cops, while Grace, shielding Sanders’s face stepped out on the other side. Mike opened the cockpit door last and joined them on the pad. Once they’d passed the outer edge of the slowing rotors, they received further instructions.
“Raise your hands, raise your hands and drop to your knees… now, do it now!” The tone had changed from that of a traffic cop giving directions to a more authoritative and anxious one.
Tilford, Steve, Richard and Mike complied straight away. However, when Grace struggled with Sanders the nervous sounding voice behind the loudspeaker came back: “Remove yourself from each other and get on your knees.”
The sound of the chopper, the loudspeaker, the flashing lights and all the uniformed personnel had an effect on Sanders, and not a good one. “What’s going on, what is this, what… oh my God! There’re more of them, more, there’s more” she screamed, and threw her arms frantically and tore herself away from Grace.
“Nurse Sanders, Nurse Sanders, get a hold of you—” Grace attempted.
“No, no, they’re trying to kill us, kill us all.” She pushed away from Grace and ran in the opposite direction of the authorities. Grace tried to go after her.
“No. Stay down, now!” Mike reached up and grabbed Grace’s wrist and pulled her down. He knew more than he liked to admit what the result of so many police, guards, and guns all in one spot would be when presented with a target of opportunity.
A salvo of gunfire erupted from the drawn pistols of the police and semi-auto from the rifles of the National Guard.
“Beth, Beth, oh my God, Beth!” Grace as she witnessed the fleeing nurse cut down by a fusillade of lead. Sanders jumped in the air, twitched, stumbled, and then fell forward before coming to a bloody rest.
“You bastards! You fucking bastards!” Grace pulled her arm free from Mike’s grasp.
“Back on the ground, get back on the ground!” the voice behind the loudspeaker squawked.
“Do it, Gr
ace, do it. You have no choice.” Mike called. Steve and Richard were the only two that remained motionless during the whole episode.
Only when Delaney returned to the ground, did the two hazmat-suited agents from the CDC, come forward—pistols drawn.
“Bastards, all for money. Just money… Bastards!” Grace screamed as she heard the footsteps of the agents behind her.
13
Thirteen
Noel Thorncroft wasn’t well-liked by many. With his you had his wealth and influence, though, it hardly mattered. He was far from an attractive man by any stretch of the imagination. Overweight by a hundred pounds, bald on top, with a chin that was the size of most people’s mid—section and a large protruding bottom lip, but he cared little about his looks. With his money, he could have anyone he wanted, and he wanted men. Specifically, young men in their late teens. Tall, thin and without body hair; that’s how he liked them. The complete opposite of himself. And he did pay well for their services that was one positive that could be said of him. As the tumultuous events worsened in Des Moines, he sat back in his Jacuzzi. On this hectic day, a relaxing tub soak was what he needed to take his mind off the situation. The possibility this could all blow up with his business and reputation ruined was very real. His private life, which he guarded carefully, could become common news and if he lost his wealth, he’d certainly lose his appeal to his “boys.” He didn’t know which he feared more: losing billions of dollars or being found out as a fat old man who liked to fuck young men all night. He pushed the thoughts from his mind as he watched his young lover for the evening pour a glass of wine and bring it over to the tub. Thorncroft had a typical English complexion, and even though he spent quite a few months each year in one of his villas on the Mediterranean, he didn’t look as if he’d seen any sun for years. He was referred to as “Moby Dick” by the small but growing ring of young male prostitutes who entertained him. It wasn’t because his male member was so renowned, but for his overweight condition and almost sickly white skin color. He took the glass from the young man as he stepped into the Jacuzzi and stood before Thorncroft. The young man was tall and of a slim athletic build, unlike the obese billionaire who had more rolls on him than a bread shop. With his free hand, Thorncroft loosened the towel around the hips of the young man, who barely looked old enough to shave—which was what Thorncroft preferred. He allowed the towel to drop into the bathwater. The edges of his mouth curled up in lustful delight at the sight before him. As Thorncroft took a sip of his wine while he slipped his free hand around his lover’s naked buttocks and drew him closer, closer and…
Pestilence Boxed Set [Books 1 & 2] Page 11
