Lady Justice

by Vicki Hinze

  “Elizabeth is here. She’ll keep an eye on Candace. I’ll be right over.”

  “Thanks.” Max hung up the phone, wondering how Conlee was going to react to this development, and sure he already knew.

  Gabby had too much top-secret information running around in her head to ignore her talking crazy. Mentally diminished, she could jeopardize national security, disclose top-secret information, and compromise missions or endanger operatives. She could get innocent people killed. With or without the briefing, Conlee would insist his orders be executed immediately.

  Unless Max could find a way to avoid telling him …

  Keith stepped back from Gabby’s bed, where she lay in a deep sleep, and motioned Max into the hall.

  From his somber expression, Max wasn’t going to like hearing what the doc had to say.

  “She has the infection, Max,” Keith said. “I’ll run the labs, but I’m sure of it.”

  Max felt the weight of the world bear down on his shoulders. Another complication, and one he definitely didn’t need. Worse, one Gabby didn’t deserve. “You’ll give her the vaccine?”

  “I’d rather not.” Keith’s expression went from serious to grim. “Candace isn’t responding to it as definitively as I had hoped. She’s lapsing in and out of consciousness.” His worry put a tremble in his voice. “Gabby is stable for now. No respiratory distress or excessively high fever. There’s no immediate reason to intervene with an extreme measure. The vaccine could kill her.”

  If he only knew how much extreme measures were warranted. “Keith,” Max said softly. “She’s all I’ve got. I can’t lose her—”

  “I know, buddy. I’m rowing the same boat next door.” He clasped Max’s shoulder and gave it a friendly slap. “We’ll do the best we can do and that’s all we can do.”

  “Right.” Max swallowed hard. Even voicing his feelings about her under cover felt strange and alien. “So what exactly can I do?”

  “Push fluids, rest. The usual things you do for flu.” Keith rubbed at his neck, obviously having had a long night, too. “You mentioned some mental confusion.”

  Max nodded.

  “Then we really do want to avoid giving her the vaccine if at all possible.”

  “Why?”

  “Conlee told me I could speak freely with you about the contract. Don’t make me sorry I did, Max.”

  “I won’t. I’d appreciate the same courtesy.” No reporting Gabby’s situation to Conlee.

  Keith summed Max up. “That’s reasonable.” Apparently comfortable with their agreement, he went on. “During the vaccine’s development, my researchers have come to expect long-term memory challenges. Some mild, most significant. I’ve talked with David Erickson on this, and he’s run into the same problem. Unfortunately, even after comparing notes, we haven’t resolved it, and no one else we could approach has the necessary security clearances. We’re hoping after trial studies are done, we’ll have a better grip on it, though only God knows what other side effects will manifest.” He turned down the hall, headed for the door. “I need to get back to Candace. If Gabby’s condition worsens, call and I’ll reevaluate.”

  “Thanks.”

  Max shut the door behind Keith, locked it, and then ran a perimeter security check, mindful of that second Global Warrior running loose in Carnel Cove. Confident everything was okay, he returned to check on Gabby.

  The phone rang. He grabbed the closest remote from the table beside her bed. “Hello.”

  “Good call,” Commander Conlee said. “Leaving Erickson at the lab.”

  “I thought if he was corrupt, he would tip his hand. Intel would pick it up. But I don’t think he is, which leaves the lab protected.” Erickson had homed in on that black-banded canister. Intel would be doing live monitors for the duration of the assignment on that canister. Whatever was in it had to be important; they needed to know any movement of it in real time.

  “He’s not corrupt, but he is motivated to succeed on this project, Max,” Conlee said. “His son died of EEE a few years ago. Erickson has been hell-bent on finding a cure ever since.”

  Which was why Conlee and Dr. Marcus Swift, chief researcher at Logan Industries, had tagged Erickson to develop the Z-4027 vaccine.

  “What’s wrong with Gabby?”

  Decision time. Did Max protect her, or himself? There was no way to protect them both. “She got a couple bites at the lab. Dr. Burke checked her out. She’s doing okay.” When lying, it was best to stick as close to the truth as possible. So he had. With the lie, however, came the commitment. He was in up to his neck now. He and Gabby lived or died together.

  “Did he give her the vaccine?”

  “No, he didn’t think it was necessary.”

  “Good. That’s good,” Conlee said. “New orders for you. I’ve inserted you as a public health and safety subject matter expert on the FEMA team. They’re inbound to Carnel Cove to provide disaster relief from Hurricane Darla.”

  “Okay.”

  “At nine A.M., you need to go to Mayor Faulkner’s office to meet with him and Stan Mullin, the FEMA director. Don’t leave that meeting until they agree to spray Carnel Cove for increased mosquito activity.”

  Max stared at a brass finial above the window at the tip of its drapery rod. Spraying would cover the potential migratory area from the lab incident, but it wouldn’t kill the Z-4027-infected mosquitoes. Typical pesticides, as Candace had aptly put it, just pissed them off.

  “Carl Blake,” Conlee said, speaking of the banker he’d briefed Max on before coming to the Cove, “owns a small fleet of pesticide-spraying trucks. He has a contract with Carnel Cove for regular spraying. FEMA is subcontracting him to handle the additional spraying.”

  All well and good as far as it went, but that wasn’t far enough. “What are they going to spray?” There was no known pesticide for Z-4027 superbugs.

  “Logan Industries will provide the chemicals. Dr. Swift’s been working on the pesticide contract for the Defense Department. It’s ready for trial studies.”

  In other words, there was no hard data that it worked or that listed its potential side effects on the humans indirectly affected by the spray. Max stared up at the ceiling and then down at Gabby, dozing lightly in her bed, her hair tumbling across a pillow she had wadded up under her head. “Is Swift giving odds?”

  “No. But it’s the most effective countermeasure we’ve got.”

  “I take it all these assets are being arranged quietly.”

  “Provided Faulkner agrees to the spraying without disclosing the Z-4027 lab incident.”

  They were going to play it so this whole incident and any deaths it caused were tagged as natural occurrences. Increased mosquito activity due to Hurricane Darla. “Is this our wisest course of action, sir?”

  “Would I order it if it weren’t?”

  “No, sir.” Max didn’t hesitate. “Not deliberately.”

  “It breaks down simply, Grayson. If the lab incident remains secret, then the Warriors won’t go underground. To save lives, we’ve got to get to the bottom of why they’re there and after Gabby. No one hires Warriors to hit one operative, even if she’s senior grade in SDU.”

  Max should have informed the commander of the dead Warrior in Gabby’s garage. But he didn’t. He looked at her sprawling, her arm now slung above her head. Shoes reversed, she would do the same for him. She would try to save his life, especially not knowing if his cover had actually been breached. “What about Dr. Erickson? What assures his silence?”

  “Knowing he’ll be killed if he violates it.”

  That was a pretty potent motivation. Gabby sighed, claiming Max’s attention. She turned toward him, opened an eye. Seeing Max standing, staring at her, she smiled and puckered her lips, sending him a silent kiss.

  His reaction came swift and hard. Hot. And he couldn’t deny the truth. He wasn’t covering for Gabby because she was his partner. He was covering for her because she was going to die with regrets. And because just lo
oking at her made him look at himself differently. He didn’t want to waste his life. He didn’t want a headstone that said, “He worked hard.” He wanted a life. And he thought he might just want that life with her.

  A woman he was obligated by oath to kill.

  “Grab a couple hours sleep, Grayson,” Conlee said. “Then meet Mullin at nine.”

  “Yes, sir.” Max cradled the phone. Conlee hadn’t mentioned his initial orders. He had issued “new” ones. It was stretching reason, and no doubt Conlee’s patience, but for now Max could consider his initial orders canceled. Surely if Conlee had intended them to stay in force, he would have amended his existing orders and not issued new orders.

  It was a ridiculously fine line, and Conlee would hit the roof, but to keep Gabby alive Max would walk it.

  “Honey?”

  Surprised by the endearment, he looked over at Gabby just to make sure she really was talking to him. “Yes?”

  “Aren’t you coming to bed?”

  More crazy talk. “I’ll bunk down on the sofa.”

  “Whatever for?” She looked perplexed and maybe a little hurt.

  “You have a fever.”

  “In sickness and in health,” she reminded him of a wedding vow. “I’m sick and I want you beside me.” She threw back the covers, exposing her naked skin. “Come to bed, Max.”

  She wanted to feel special. Max stripped off his shoes and shirt and emptied his pockets on the nightstand. He set the .38 on the table edge, then lay down beside her.

  Gabby scooted close, snuggled to his side, and resting her head on his chest, she let out a contented sigh.

  Max stared at the ceiling and prayed for mercy. She was sick and not right in the head.

  “Honey?”

  God help him, she felt good, smelled good. “Mmm?”

  “Why do you have a gun beside the bed?”

  She was definitely not right. The woman had one herself on her side of the bed. “The lights are still out. You know hurricanes bring out looters.”

  “Right.” She draped a leg across his, splayed her fingers on his chest. “I forgot.”

  Boy, did he need to get out of that bed. He started to rise, jostling Gabby.

  “Where are you going now?”

  “I forgot to set the alarm.”

  “It’s set,” she said, shoving him back down against the mattress. When he settled back, she settled in. “Night.”

  Not sure what else to do, Max curled an arm around her and closed his eyes, certain sleep would never come.

  “Night.”

  It was a good dream.

  Andrew and Liz were standing before the assembly. He, with his right hand on the Bible, swearing the oath and becoming a judge. Liz, smiling adoringly up at him, fairly bursting with pride. She had always had a way of looking at him that made him want to live up to the admiration he saw in her eyes. And Douglas, their pride and joy and only son, who was all of seven, already thoughtful and diplomatic and sharing his father’s love of the law, stood with them dressed in a navy suit with a bright tie covered with red and blue balloons. How proud they’d been of Andrew that day.

  How proud Andrew had been of them every day.

  Again in his dreams, Andrew relived that last breakfast with them. Their final moments together before they had died.

  “I have to practice for the debate after school in the auditorium, Mom.”

  At the stove, Liz had flipped a skillet full of pancakes. The smell of sizzling bacon had hung in the air, making Andrew’s stomach growl in anticipation. “That’s Monday,” she said. “Today, Dad works, but we’re going fishing in Destin.”

  “Charter boat! Yeah!” Licking syrup from his fingers, he saw he’d caught Andrew’s eye and quickly reached for his napkin. “Sorry, Dad,” Douglas said with that wry grin that had always prevented Andrew from issuing stern discipline.

  “As well you should be,” he said.

  If only he had known those would be his last words to his son. Forever branded in his mind and heart. No “I love you.” No “I’m proud of you.” No “Your compassion and insights awe me.” All Andrew had to soothe his broken heart and shattered soul was, “As well you should be.”

  He awakened to find his face and pillow wet, his mood as dark as his bedroom. He glanced over to the bedside clock. Nearly five A.M. At least, thank God, it would soon be light. He hated the dark these days. Hated the emptiness stretching and yawning endlessly before him. Hated the isolation and being damned with himself for company. Himself, and his guilt.

  He stared blankly out the window until the sun came up. Just as he’d decided to haul himself out of bed for the day, the phone rang.

  Tossing back the covers, he swung his legs over the side and jammed his feet into his worn slippers. “What?” he said into the phone.

  “Good morning, Andrew. Have a rough night?”

  The director. How Andrew had come to hate his voice. He frowned out the window, dead certain it was going to be a rotten day. “No more so than usual.”

  “I just received a report I thought would interest you.”

  A hitch lifted Andrew’s thin chest. Gabby. “She’s dead?”

  “No,” the director said, sounding decidedly less than happy about that. “One Warrior is dead, I’m told. The remaining one on that leg of the mission was unable to retrieve the body.”

  “Where is it?”

  “I wasn’t told. Better to not know that to have to lie. But my guess is, at or near Gabby’s house. Though that is speculation.”

  Gabby had killed a Warrior? A trained assassin? “Well, I hope you’re wrong.” The possibility alone was enough to scare the Apostles right out of their sandals. Andrew grabbed his skull, pressed hard with his bony fingertips. “Has she called Sheriff Coulter?”

  “No, not yet.”

  That was the worst news of all. “She’s going to bury us. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again,” Andrew said. News of the Warrior’s murder was probably all over the Cove by now. If Jackson Coulter caught wind of it at the Silver Spoon before hearing it through official channels, he’d be livid.

  Coulter being livid was a very dangerous thing.

  “The murder hasn’t been reported.”

  “Then how do you know it happened?”

  “How do you think? The surviving Warrior told me,” the director grumbled. “You need to calm down and get a grip, Andrew. You’re worthless, maybe even a liability now.”

  Icy fingers squeezed his heart. He knew exactly what that meant. Straighten up and fly right or you’ll be eliminated. “I’m calm.”

  “No one has called the sheriff. He would have reported it to the mayor immediately. He hasn’t. You would have thought of that yourself if you weren’t scared shitless of this woman.”

  “But if she killed him and she didn’t report it—”

  “I didn’t say she killed him,” the director countered. “The surviving Warrior never saw her. He thinks someone intercepted his partner before she got there. Makes sense. If the body were in her house, she would have reported it. She can’t know the Warriors are after her.”

  Andrew didn’t believe it. Not for a second. “Maybe she did kill him and she doesn’t want you to know that she knows about the Warriors. Have you considered that? Maybe her not calling Coulter proves she’s undercover on the Warrior cases, and playing us all for fools.”

  “Why are you obsessed with fearing this woman?”

  “I have a bad feeling about her and I just can’t shake it.” Sounded lame, but it was the truth. “This is a mistake.”

  “It’s no mistake.”

  It was, and as if to prove it, a cold chill rippled up Andrew’s spine. He started sweating bullets. She was going to bury them and he was going to spend the rest of his life in jail.

  He couldn’t go to jail. No matter what, he couldn’t do it. He knew what the inmates did to judges in jail—and so did the director. Andrew didn’t have a freaking island to escape to like the director
did. He’d be stuck facing the music, even if that music was the funeral march.

  “Stop overreacting, Andrew. She doesn’t know anything. Even if she were under cover, she’d have to report the murder to maintain the cover. Besides, her husband has come home.”

  “She really has a husband?”

  “Apparently, she does. He risked life and limb to get to her during the hurricane.”

  A husband, too. This was not a welcome development. Andrew chugged water straight from his bedside carafe. “What happens now? Do the Warriors go after her or both of them?”

  “For the moment, neither of them.”

  Had he lost his mind? “But—”

  “No buts. At the moment, we have limited resources on site, and I need them in other areas. Besides, there’s no reason to believe she’s an immediate threat. And if she were, after the failed attempt, she’d be ready for us.”

  “You’re making a mistake.”

  “Maybe,” he said, taking on a haughty tone. “But as long as I’m the director, the mistakes are mine to make.”

  The harsh reprimand made his position clear. He was tired of the dire warnings about Gabby Kincaid. Andrew knew it, and yet the sense that she was the most dangerous of all threats to the Consortium had left a bitter iron taste in his mouth and a warning gurgling in his throat that threatened to choke him.

  “Right now, Gabby Kincaid is too busy in bed with her old man to be worrying about much of anything else. By the time they’re reacquainted, everything will be ready to go.”

  “Ready to go?” Andrew asked. What did he mean by that?

  “Don’t ask, and don’t worry. I’ve got a plan.”

  A plan. He’d had a plan before, too, and that one had failed. It had cost Andrew his seat on the bench and, he suspected, William Powell his life. “What kind of plan?” Andrew plucked at a loose button on his pajama top and pushed anyway.

  “A legal one.” The director answered, surprising Andrew. “The groundwork is already in place. A meeting at nine A.M. will seal it up.” He let out a relaxed sigh. “We’re fine, Andrew. I’m sure of it, and I’ve gotten us this far, haven’t I?”