“Tell you what, Doctor”—he said the word like it burned his tongue—“you step out of the vehicle and we’ll talk about what, if any, collaboration we might be able to facilitate.”
Gwendolyn didn’t hesitate. “No. Not happening.”
Her stomach tightened and she instantly wondered if she’d overplayed her hand. Truth was, she had no hand. It was all bluster. But she hoped that if she could stand toe-to-toe with a colonel from the chemical corps, they’d see value in her. They’d see she wasn’t some wallflower with a PhD.
The colonel stared at her before slowly nodding. He clucked his tongue against the roof of his mouth, considering his next move. “This is highly irregular. And you’re insolent. Gutsy. Strong-willed. Stupid. But I like it. Give me a minute.”
Whittenburg stood and marched back to the group of soldiers. The two who’d followed him to the SUV gave chase. The squatty one with the Popeye forearms stole a glance over his shoulder at her as he hurried away.
Two minutes later, Whittenburg returned with two other officers. They stood at the door, all of them tilted forward awkwardly, so as to see her in her seat. Whittenburg indicated the men with his chin. One of them held a computer tablet at his side.
“This is First Lieutenant Lowe and Major Bailey,” he said. “They are the liaisons between my office and your colleagues at the CDC. You are correct. Though I cannot discuss it here, there are machinations involving our handling of the epidemic. We’re filling our team. There’s a possibility we could add you.”
“Possibility?”
“If I were you, I’d listen. You made your point. You proved yourself a no-nonsense woman who I think might be a better teammate than adversary.”
She closed her mouth and nodded her understanding. Butterflies tickled her gut. She exhaled with relief. Her gambit had worked. Almost.
“I say possibility because we still need to run the proper background check on you,” he said. “You’ve been overseas. That’s a complicating factor. But given that you were already on the short list for this program—”
“I was?”
Whittenburg frowned and she waved her hands in apology. She ran her fingers across her lips, as if to indicate she was zipping them shut.
“As I was saying,” said Whittenburg, “we’ve already begun the work. That’s why you’re here. If you weren’t on the short list, you’d be…elsewhere.”
Whittenburg nodded to Bailey. The major handed a small electronic tablet to Gwendolyn.
“Dr. Sharp,” said the major, “I’ll need you to scratch out a signature of consent on the home screen. Then hit the next button on the lower right. Initial each of the bullet points and then sign the bottom.”
She took the tablet. “What is this?”
“Just sign it,” said Whittenburg. “You want in? Ignore the fine print, Doctor.”
Gwendolyn eyed the dense text on the screen. It was full of legal language she didn’t understand and wondered, as she fingered her initials repeatedly on the second page, if this were some Faustian pact. She ignore her misgivings, signed her name across the bottom of the second page, and handed back the tablet.
Bailey looked at the display in his hands. He swiped a finger up and down then nodded to Whittenburg.
“Okay then,” said the colonel. “You’ll ride with the major and me. Lieutenant Lowe will drive.”
Lowe gave the colonel the side-eye. He wanted to protest but didn’t. Gwendolyn saw this. Neither the colonel nor the major did.
“Good,” she said. “Thank you.”
She didn’t offer to move. The colonel smirked at her and then motioned for the first lieutenant to open the rear passenger’s side door. The colonel climbed into the back seat. On the other side, behind Gwendolyn, Lowe helped Bailey into his seat. Lowe rushed around the front of the SUV and slid behind the wheel.
When he put the vehicle into gear and accelerated toward the open hangar door, Gwendolyn rolled down her window. The tinted glass disappeared into the door and she looked out at Morel where he was standing with Thing One and Thing Two. His jaw dropped and his face twisted with confusion. She smiled at him and waved like a beauty queen in a parade. Then she blew him a kiss.
The world might be ending, billions of lives were in danger, but Gwendolyn Sharp was now on the inside. She’d done her time in exile. Things were about to get real. There was much more to the Scourge than what the public knew, and she was about to find out what it was.
The SUV cleared the hangar doors and First Lieutenant Lowe gently swung the armored vehicle to the left. Gwendolyn pushed the button to raise her window. As Lowe accelerated, taking her to some unknown destination, she took a deep breath. The air was a mixture of jet exhaust, leather, and the sweat of Army brass. Nothing had ever been more intoxicating.
CHAPTER 24
OCTOBER 3, 2032
SCOURGE + 1 DAY
FLORAL PARK, FLORIDA
The sun was low in the sky by the time the old Ford pulled up to the checkpoint at I-4 and highway 44 in Volusia County. It had taken the better part of the day for Kandy and Phil to get this far. This was their third checkpoint. Kandy hoped that the closer they got to Phil’s home, the easier the passage would be.
“Should I talk first?” she asked as they rolled toward the soldier waving them to concrete barriers that funneled traffic one way or the other. “Show them my media ID? That worked at the last one.”
“I think we’re good using my driver’s license,” said Phil. “We’re not far.”
The soldier waved his hand in a circle, ordering Phil to lower his window. It squeaked as he cranked the manual lever counterclockwise. The F-100 was sturdy but lacked the comforts of more modern transportation.
The soldier approached the truck and put his hands on the doorframe. He eyed Phil, Kandy, then checked the truck’s bed. “Where are you headed, sir?” he asked, returning his attention to Phil.
“My house,” Phil lied. “Ponce Inlet.”
“Why are you traveling?”
“I was at her house,” he said, gesturing to Kandy. “She lives in the city. We’re going to my place.”
The soldier studied them again. “ID, please?”
Phil handed the man his Florida driver’s license.
The soldier glanced at it and handed it back. “And you, ma’am? Do you have some identification?”
Kandy handed him her station identification. The soldier looked at it. His expression didn’t change. He was all business. He looked up without lifting his chin. “Do you have any government issued identification?”
Kandy reached down to the floorboard, fished her wallet from her purse, and slid the ID from a clear protective sleeve on the wallet’s face.
“You realize that we’re in the middle of a grace period?” the soldier said. “We’re allowing residents to relocate. They may bring guests with them. But tomorrow, that changes. No movement. You’re stuck where you are until further notice.”
“For how long?” asked Kandy.
The soldier handed back both of her IDs and shrugged. “Until further notice. Are you sure you want to travel into this sector? Once you do, that’s it for the unforeseeable future. No going back.”
Kandy knew this meant she’d lose her job. She was already on thin ice, having left in the middle of a shift. But the scare at the grocery store, captured on live television, should be enough for her bosses to reluctantly let her get some rest. If she didn’t show up for work the next day, or the day after, her career was toast. It was toast anyway. She’d gone from prized ingénue who traveled for the big stories, got the impossible gets, did reports for the network, and got long contact extensions with sizable raises, to the has-been once-was on a six-month deal worth less than the one before it. She carried her own gear. She worked weekends. All of the handwriting was on the wall long before the Scourge had forced this decision, she just hadn’t wanted to read it. Now some stone faced soldier essentially spelled it out for her.
She smiled a
t Phil. “I’m fine with that. Let’s go.”
“Okay,” the soldier said. “You’re clear to head east on 44. There will be another checkpoint at the intersection with 415 and then another at I-95. Since you’re in Volusia County, I’ll put a sticker on your windshield. That’ll expedite things at those two barricades. Show them IDs and you’ll be good to go.”
“Thank you,” said Phil.
“Thank you,” said Kandy, “and you be careful.”
The soldier almost smiled. “You too. And by the way, I like your reports.”
He patted his hand on the doorframe and backed away from the Ford. Then he affixed a yellow sticker to the windshield above the registration sticker and yelled at other soldiers to let them through the corridor of concrete leading east.
The Ford maneuvered slowly through the maze. Kandy put away her license and station ID, dropped the wallet back into her purse, and sat back in the seat. It was an uncomfortable seat and her back was sore from the long ride.
Phil had restored the bench seating to its original vinyl glory. Everything in the truck was restored. He’d even managed to change out the lap belts for ones with shoulder straps. It was still a rough ride.
Clear of the checkpoint, he pushed the gas pedal. The truck hesitated before beginning its acceleration. There was nobody on the road. Kandy counted two vehicles headed west. Nobody was going east. The sun was behind them and cast long shadows onto the highway. Kandy closed her eyes, meditating to the vibration of the truck on the road. She was almost asleep when she felt the truck slowing and opened her eyes.
“What is it?” she asked, looking at the road ahead of them.
“There’s somebody in the road,” he said. “I don’t like this.”
The truck’s headlights were on in the dying sunlight. They shone on a woman standing in the center of the road, holding her hands up for them to stop.
The barefoot woman was in a tank top and cutoff jean shorts, frayed at the tops of her thighs, and the shirt hung low on her chest, revealing a teal bra or bikini top. Her stringy blond hair hung in matted ringlets around her round, moonlike face. The shape of her face was at odds with her rail-thin physique. What struck Kandy more than her clothing or her apparent malnourishment was the expression on her face. It was sunken and desperate. Even from this distance the blemishes on her cheeks and chin were obvious. They were shades of red and pink in various stages of healing.
“I don’t like it either,” Kandy said.
There was no car, no truck, no bicycle, or motorcycle visible. It was as if the woman had dropped from the sky. From where had she come? It was too suspicious. Both sides of the highway were crowded by a narrow shoulder and a thick undergrowth of palmetto beneath towering pines.
Phil had his foot on the brake, but the truck was in drive. He took a hand from the wheel and pointed to the glove box. “Can you open that?”
There was a key in the box’s lock. Kandy turned it and pulled. The cover opened toward her. She stared at the contents and back at Phil.
“Is that necessary?”
“It might be,” he said. “Better safe than sorry.”
A rush of nerves flooded Kandy’s body, starting in her chest and traveling toward her limbs. She had her hands in her lap.
It wasn’t that she was afraid of guns. She’d fired it at the range and liked the kick of it when she pulled the trigger. But handing Phil the gun would instantly escalate what she imagined would already be a tense situation. She’d covered too many stories in her career where a gun introduced more problems than it prevented.
The woman started toward the truck, her strides deliberate. She moved toward Phil, motioning for him to roll down his window. He didn’t comply.
“Now, Kandy,” he said. “Please.”
He started to lean over her, but she stopped him, took the gun from the glove box, and handed it to him, keeping it low. He set it between them and put his hand around it.
“Is it loaded?” she asked without moving her lips.
“Always.”
“And the safety?”
“It’s in the trigger.”
The woman was at the front edge of the truck, standing in front of the driver’s side headlamp. She was standing there to stop them from moving. The light traveled up her body, casting an eerie glow on her face from underneath. She knocked on the hood.
Phil cracked his window. “Could you move out of the way, please? If you need help, I can tell the authorities at the next checkpoint.”
The woman checked over her shoulder, turned back, and shook her head. Her hair hung over one of her eyes. “That’s gonna take too long. I need help immediately. Could you roll down your window or come out here?”
Kandy’s heart was racing. She put her hand on Phil’s and squeezed.
“Ain’t nobody come by here in twenty minutes,” she said. “I been trying to get help. Nobody helps. Everybody speeds by me. So I decided to stand in the middle of the road. I can’t stay here. Got to get out.”
Phil raised his voice so the woman could hear him. He tightened his hand around the gun’s grip. “What kind of help do you need?”
“I need your truck,” she said. “And whatever else you got.”
Kandy saw movement at the edge of the road. Before she could react, a tall, muscular man was at her window. She screamed and jerked her body away from the door. The man was trying to open it.
She put her hands on the door handle, tugging on it. The door was locked, but her instincts took hold as a tsunami of adrenaline flooded her body. Phil raised the gun toward the passenger’s side window. The man backed away at the same moment the driver’s side window exploded.
Shards of glass stabbed Kandy’s left arm, the side of her face and her legs.
Phil groaned and slumped in his seat. Kandy, wide-eyed and trembling, tried to make sense of what happened. Phil was hunched over toward the wheel. He was gasping for air, grunting between breaths. The truck lurched forward and jerked to a stop.
Past him, standing next to the door, stood a man with a golf club. He was large and shirtless. His long hair was wet or greasy and his face was snarled with crazed fury. He held the club like a baseball bat and had it primed for another swing.
“Phil,” she said. “Drive. Drive!”
Phil groaned. His breaths rasped, ragged and uneven.
Kandy groped for the gun and found it where Phil had dropped it. She picked it up with both hands. In one fluid motion she lifted the weapon, leveled it at the man as he swung the club, and applied quick pressure to the trigger. Once. Twice. Three times.
A trio of explosions that left her ears ringing kicked the semiautomatic nine millimeter in her hands. The muzzle flashed. The man’s body jerked awkwardly. His swing hit the side of the door with a weak clang. Then his head snapped back and he dropped from sight.
The woman ran toward the dead man and Kandy tracked her, pressing the trigger twice more. The first shot spun the woman to the side. The second hit her center mass and staggered her. She fell into the truck, bounced off, and hit the ground.
The world was moving in slow motion. Every millisecond stretched into an infinite string of time, and Kandy spun back to the right. The man at her window was gone. The gun shaking in her hands, she swept it from left to right to left. The loud crack of the shots rang in her ears. The medicinal odor of smokeless powder was heavy in the air.
“Phil,” she said. “Phil, are you okay?”
She put her hand on his back. He was still conscious. She could feel his lungs filling with air, the hitch in his breath, and the groan on the exhale.
“We’ve got to go,” she said. “We’ve got to go. C’mon. Can you drive?”
Phil grimaced. “He. Got. Me. I think. My. Ribs. Are. Broken.”
Kandy noticed that the truck was in drive. “Switch with me. Can you switch?”
Kandy checked the passenger’s side again and unlocked her door. She pushed open her door and carefully stepped onto the asphalt. Wit
h the gun in her hands and her arms extended as Phil had taught her, she moved around the back of the truck. The sun was all but gone now. A symphony of cicadas chirped loudly from both sides of the road. The sound pressed down on her as she moved toward the driver’s side. She spun in a circle, looking for the man who’d disappeared. There was no sign of him.
In the middle of the road next to the truck were the bodies of the two people she’d killed. She kicked the man’s meaty side when she reached him. His fat jiggled in the aftershock of her kick, but he didn’t otherwise move. The woman was on her back, her arms and legs splayed like a child making a snow angel.
Kandy bent her knees, keeping the gun aimed at the dead man, and picked up the golf club. She backed up a couple of steps and tossed the club into the truck’s bed.
She opened the driver’s side door and put a hand on Phil’s shoulder. He looked over at her, pain etched in his face. She looked down at the floorboard and saw his foot pressing the emergency brake. That was why the truck was stopped despite being in drive.
“Scoot over,” she said. “I’m driving.”
“You don’t know where you’re going.”
“You can’t drive. You can barely breathe. I need to get to the next checkpoint. They can help you. Then we’ll figure it out.”
Phil groaned again and, using an elbow, pulled himself to the passenger’s side of the bench. She climbed in behind him, put the gun on the dash, and helped him into his seat. He was sweaty, clammy, and every movement was stiff. He was clearly in pain. With the cabin light on, she saw blood on his face and his arms. There was a spray of glass cuts across his left side. The shards were everywhere, and she tried swiping them from the seats and dash. Kandy knew she was bleeding. As her adrenaline waned, the sting of her injuries began to throb.
She yanked the door shut and sat on the edge of the bench, freed the emergency brake, and accelerated. The truck kicked into gear and she sped away from the carnage she’d left in the middle of the two-lane highway.
The Scourge (Book 1): Unprepared Page 25
