She opened her mouth as if to argue and then closed it with a nod. “Thanks.”
“Wind’s picking up.”
“This is good for us, right?” She eyed him.
“Sure.” He turned to go.
“Wait.” She put a hand on his arm. “Why don’t you take a break?”
Instead of looking her way, he stared at the bright yellow of her glove against his red coat and shook his head. “Too much to do.”
“Okay. Be honest with me. Are we screwed?” When he didn’t answer, didn’t move at all, she went on. “If it’s that bad, how about you take a few minutes, huh? Rest. Tell me how screwed we are.”
He shot her a surprised look. Of everyone in this place, Angel Smith would have been the last one he’d have looked to in a crisis. He’d have asked for a partner with a more scientific mind or maybe someone athletic and strong. Not her, with her effusiveness, her musical laugh, and spice cloud aura.
Wordlessly, he met her molten-magma warm eyes.
She looked tired and anxious and, for the first time since he’d glimpsed her in the galley all those months ago, pale.
“Aren’t we better off staying here and fighting?”
“No power. No fuel. No weapons. Winter’s on its way. We stay here, we die eventually. Whether or not they show up.” It wasn’t a question of if but when. Today, tomorrow, or in a few weeks, when the sun set for the season and temperatures plummeted. Nothing could survive without power out here in the dark of austral winter.
Breath held, he steeled himself for histrionics or maybe, on the opposite end of the spectrum, flippancy.
What he got was something he’d neither expected nor wanted: a hug.
Ford Cooper didn’t do hugs—not as a kid or as a sniper in the U.S. Army, nor as a research scientist in the most unwelcoming field on earth.
But after a few breathless seconds in the soft circle of this woman’s arms, even he had to admit that there was something to be said for comfort in the face of impending doom.
Certain death, he recalled after years without its specter hanging over him, had a way of blowing old hang-ups right out of the water.
She pulled away. “So, where are we headed?”
“Volkov Station.”
“Volkov? Don’t they close down for the winter?”
“Normally. But I understand they brought a construction crew in to renovate this year.” He didn’t let himself imagine what it would be like to winter-over with a handful of Russian workers…and Angel.
“What about the South African station? Aren’t they closer?”
“Eighty miles closer, as the crow flies.”
Her jaw dropped.
“To get there, we’d have to either climb some of the continent’s highest mountains or go around them. Don’t like our chances.” He shook his head, sure of his decision. “I thought about it, and Volkov’s the best choice.” Their sole chance at survival. “Those are the only two options within five hundred miles of here.”
“Five hun—” She looked like she’d be sick. “How far is it?”
“It’s a straight shot. Fairly steady downhill slope, given the elevation here, and without—”
“How far?”
“A little more than…” He cleared his throat. “Three hundred miles.”
“What?” She didn’t sound happy. “How long’s it gonna take us?”
“We’ll drive the big plow for the first fifty or so. The rest could take as little as twenty days.” Unlikely, but possible. They’d have to ski thirteen miles a day at that rate and he had no notion of her skill level or endurance.
Her eyes were massive. “As little? Are you nu—No. No, let’s think about this.” She backed up, put more space between them. “Okay. So, what other options do we have?”
“None.” He shrugged. No point arguing against facts. “Anyway. Backup generator’ll run out of fuel. We need to get our gear together, pack up these sleds, and go. Sooner the better.”
“Right. No fuel, no heat.” Looking shell-shocked, she eyed the sky. “Once we take off, what’s to stop them from coming after us?”
“Nothing.” No point in lying, was there? “It’s why we need to head out, ski all night, if we can. Put some miles between us and this place.”
“We’re heading out into the most dangerous place on earth with killers after us?”
“Yeah.” He couldn’t help a grim smirk. “Better hit the road.”
Chapter 13
Harper Research and Testing Facility, East Antarctic Ice Sheet
“We don’t have the virus.”
“What do you mean you don’t have it?” The director’s voice crackled over the sat phone.
“I’ve been given the wrong ice cores.”
“How on earth could they make an error like that?”
“I’m not certain.” Because you hired monkeys, obviously. “It’s a pretty major issue.”
Without sparing a glance at the man responsible for this colossal error, Dr. Clive Tenny, MD, PhD, waited for the director to respond.
Her breathing was audible through the line, as if she’d been running. Or was in the throes of some kind of fit. Having seen her in person, it was likely the latter, since Katherine Henley Harper, head of Chronos Corporation, was getting on in years and it was perfectly obvious that she did not run.
“Go back and locate the samples. Drill some more if you must.” Of course she’d say that. Of course. It was what he’d said, too. “We need the virus. Now.”
“Well…” Clive hated being the bearer of bad tidings. And, honestly, he shouldn’t be the messenger here, since he wasn’t the one who’d fucked up. He threw Bradley Sampson a poisoned glare. The man was incompetence itself. He’d been given weeks at that research station. In fact, in the time it had taken that paramilitary bozo to do basically nothing at Burke-Ruhe, Tenny had been in charge of outfitting an entire vaccine research and testing facility. In fucking Antarctica, for God’s sake.
“Well what? Tell me.”
He pulled in a long breath. “The drills don’t work.”
“I provided you with engineers as requested. Have they not—”
“They were unable to acquire a sample at the original site. Apparently, they melted straight through the ice. The engine overheated and the entire mechanism died.” He paused, enjoying this just a little. “Seems the design wasn’t as simple as they’d assumed. The engineers didn’t have time to—”
“And it’s too late, I suppose? Were they left at—”
“I had the men retrieve them and load them into the plane, so we’ve got the drills here at the Facility.”
He cringed, ready for another dressing-down, but she surprised him. “Smart.”
“Anyone would have done the same, ma’am.” Which wasn’t strictly true. If Sampson had been in charge, the drills would have stayed at Burke-Ruhe, smashed to smithereens, no doubt. Instead, Tenny had made sure the team worked all night to retrieve them.
“Have that man fix them. The glaciologist. They’re his drills after all.”
“Ah.” His hand tightened on the phone. And he sucked in another breath, wishing he had an actual drink in his other hand instead of cold coffee.
“Please just spit out whatever it is.”
“Cooper. The researcher. The one who retrieved the virus and designed the dril—”
“You’ve explained who Cooper is, for God’s sake, Clive. Now get to the point.”
“He’s still there.”
“There?” The word dropped into the phone like a stone into water. The ripples reached him, even here at the bottom of the earth.
“At Burke-Ruhe.” Clive swallowed audibly. He wasn’t made for this nonsense. He was a virologist, an immunologist, and a physician, not some covert operative. “Apparently Sampson was unable to locate
him. And…”
Sampson shifted at the other side of the room.
“There’s more.” Not a question.
“There has been some unexpected collateral damage.” All thanks to Bradley Sampson. The man was a wild dog, a barely domesticated mutt who, in Clive’s opinion, ought to be put down. He was uncomfortable in the same room with him.
“We’ve lost four, counting Cooper.” He dreaded this part. “One of them was summer crew.” When she didn’t speak, he went on. “The, uh, station’s cook was left behind. The two scientists questioned by Sampson are—were—winter researchers, but they did not…” He dragged in a shaky breath. Not at any point during his long, difficult climb had he foreseen his career winding up this way. An accessory to murder? No. No, he was—
“Yes?”
“They didn’t make it.”
“I’m extremely disappointed.” An understatement, obviously.
“I understand that, Madame Director. We’re not sure how—”
“You were sloppy. That’s how. Inexcusable.”
Clive tightened his lips. A hot flush spread up his neck and face as he fought the urge to hang up on her. There was no point reminding her that he hadn’t been present at Burke-Ruhe. His job had been to oversee the Harper Facility, ensuring that everything was in place for the trials. And it had been perfect. He’d taken her millions and turned what was once a poor excuse for a research station into a state-of-the-art vaccine research facility. That, of course, wasn’t something she’d remark upon.
And it didn’t matter anyway, because he couldn’t run trials on a vaccine if he didn’t have the damned virus.
The director sniffed and he waited, needing this to work—the virus, the vaccine, the bonus.
He wiped a hand down his face and forced a tight, bitter smile.
Whatever happened, he’d continue to do as he was told. Though he hated to admit it, his career would have been long over if Katherine Harper hadn’t allowed him to keep this position. The money certainly sweetened things. It would be a hell of a lot sweeter if those damned mercenaries hadn’t ruined everything.
Tenny hated the feeling of owing this woman something when, really, she was the one who owed him! He’d been the one to identify the virus from Cortez’s email, hadn’t he? He’d followed the trail to Antarctica.
Without him, her mission was dead in the water. Unlike her famous father, she was just a suit after all.
So he’d do what he always did—dig his nails into his hand and wait for the next wave of insults to wash over him.
What came instead chilled him to the core.
“All right then.” He heard a creaking that he could have sworn was the sound of her spine straightening. “Since you’re in charge down there, and you’ve got the most to gain”—Lose! he wanted to say. I’ve got the most to lose, you selfish bitch!—“I want you to go with your security specialist colleagues. To Burke-Ruhe. Get the virus. And the missing scientist, while you’re at it.”
“Director, that is simply impossible. We are on the brink of austral winter. Imprisoned by the ice and the weather until the first fli—”
She must have shifted, bringing the phone closer to her mouth, because when she spoke, her voice cut straight through his—low and quiet but also perfectly clear, as crisp and sour as a New England apple. “You will outfit yourselves. I believe the Facility has every cold-weather supply known to man, and I intend for you to use them. You will take the team, you will find those samples and that troublesome scientist, and you will return to the Harper Research Facility, where you will run your trials as planned. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Director.” He’d made the mistake of calling her Katherine once. That wasn’t something he’d do again.
“Now, with a missing summer crew member, you’ve left me with a lot of smoothing over to do.” As if he was somehow responsible for this clusterfuck! No, this whole insane venture was her brainchild. He was just the poor schmuck freezing his nuts off on the ground. For nine fucking months of austral winter. “An expedition gone wrong, I suppose. I’ll have to get the story out.” She shifted on the other end. “See that their bodies are collected.”
“Yes” was all he could manage through too-tight lips.
She let out a long, annoyed exhale. “You of all people understand how important it is that the virus not be lost. This entire project—Chronos Corporation’s entire mission, our future—necessitates that it be in your possession.” She paused. “Quickly.”
“I understand, Director. Of course I underst—”
“And, Clive.” He’d never invited her to use his first name, but she’d been doing it for years. Man, did it piss him off. “You will stay on that continent—you and your colleagues—until the virus has been retrieved, the vaccine tested, and the proper results obtained.”
She hung up, leaving him with the phone in his hand and one smug special-forces-type operative—or whatever the hell people like Sampson were called—sitting on Clive’s desk, watching his every move.
“Boss lady’s not happy, huh?”
“No.” Clive rolled his eyes up to glare at Sampson’s wide, movie-star grin. “But I’m not the one who fucked up.”
“You sure about that, Clive?” Sampson chomped on his mint and jumped off the desk. “When do we suit up?”
Clive almost spat out the last of his coffee, “How’d you—”
“Come on, Clive, buddy.” Sampson patted his shoulder, then tightened his hold for a second too long. “What do you say we go get ourselves a virus?”
Chapter 14
Burke-Ruhe Research Station, South Pole
Coop eyed the sleds, which were loaded up with everything they’d need for twenty-one days on the ice. Beside them sat the five metal canisters containing the ice core samples.
They’d have a better chance at survival if they left those behind. Not only would their load be lighter, but Sampson would have no reason to pursue them.
If only he knew what those assholes wanted the virus for.
Did it matter?
Absolutely. But their immediate survival mattered more.
Which made it a no-brainer. Hard to stomach, but a no-brainer.
Decision made, he stomped inside.
“You ski?” Coop asked as he pushed open the ancillary door for what might be the last time.
Without looking up from stuffing baggies with coconut oil and chocolate and trail mix, Angel shook her head. “Downhill. Once, in New Hampshire. Must’ve been about eight years old and the slope was like one hundred feet long.”
So that was a no.
“Practice.”
She gave him a strange look. “Didn’t your mother teach you any manners?”
“No.” He forced the word through tight lips, annoyed and…embarrassed? Was that what this was?
She put down the twenty-pound bag of granola and stood. “I’ll get ready.”
He blinked in surprise. No argument. Huh.
Twenty minutes later, exhausted and cold, they returned to the ancillary building to eat a quick meal before leaving.
She set to preparing it in silence while he hung their outerwear up to dry by the heater. Once they’d settled onto the only two chairs in the place, with the table between them, Coop took a scalding bite of couscous. The taste—spicy and fragrant—shocked him into speech. “’S good.”
“Yeah?” She met his eyes with a small smile. “Did what I could.”
He shoveled back a few more bites. “Good…job.”
“What?” She yawned the word.
“You did well out there.”
Was she choking? No, that was a laugh, apparently. “You kidding me? I was a mess.” Her smile faded when he didn’t reciprocate.
“Even after the day you had, your…” He waved at her nose. “Injuries and so on. You didn’t s
top till you got it right.” Grudgingly, he went on. “Admirable.”
It was what he’d want in a teammate. Grit, not strength, was the decisive factor when it came to making it out alive. That and some elusive survival instinct that couldn’t be taught. After everything she’d gone through, and everything she’d done in the arch, he figured she just might have what it took.
He’d seen it over and over again. It wasn’t the big guys who made it out of tough situations. And it wasn’t the ones who’d planned and prepped and made it their life’s work to be in shape or perfectly trained. It was the ones who wanted it. The ones who acted without thinking, who paid attention to instinct and took cover before they even registered that they’d heard a detonation.
Brows up as if he’d shocked her with his compliment, she compressed her lips and nodded in acknowledgment. She gave him none of that effusiveness she always exhibited to the rest of the crew. Why was that? Why’d everyone else get her laughs, but never him? Why’d she keep her smiles tight and short when he walked into a room, but wrap her arms around Jameson like he was the second coming?
Didn’t matter. None of it mattered at this point. Not the way her hips undulated when she danced. Not the way her face hardened when she caught sight of him or the way her breasts looked in that one soft-looking, bright-red sweater she’d worn at Pam’s birthday celebration.
Coop looked up and, steeling himself, met her eyes. “One more thing before we go.”
“Yeah?” The word was swallowed by another yawn.
“Waste disposal.”
“Okay.” She glanced to the side, then back at him, as if to say, Yeah, what about it?
“You are aware, of course, that according to the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty, we are required to evacuate all waste. Um…” Damn it, his face was scorching hot. “Including human waste.”
“Ooohhh.” She blinked a couple times. “You want to discuss our waste.”
“I don’t want to.” He swallowed hard. “We will bring a bucket for initial disposal, as well as sealable bags for transport.”
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