He recognized that there were problems, like the recent aberrations that had begun to arise at the test station on Lost Eden Cay. But when it came to success in the marketplace, speed often outweighed precaution. Safety first was the motto of the spineless.
Duncan lifted an arm and waved it in a circle. The quiet burble of the boats’ water-jet engines grew sharper as the boats turned away and fled back toward the extraction point.
“Sir?” his second-in-command asked, filling that one word with both respect and meaning.
What’s the plan now? he was asking.
Duncan pocketed his GPS unit. “The surviving specimens are still locked up at that animal research facility by the river.”
In order to safeguard Ironcreek’s interest and limit exposure, the test subjects would have to be either secured or destroyed. He checked his watch and calculated a time line. They were running out of night, but he dared not waste another day.
“We’ll hit it tonight,” he said. “A surgical strike before sunrise.”
In his head, he began formulating an attack strategy, but his second-in-command had one more question.
“Sir?”
Once again, Duncan knew the query behind that one word and answered it. “No survivors.”
ACT TWO
BABYLON RISING
Chapter 23
Lorna stood on her front porch. Sunrise was only a couple of hours away. She should be bone-tired, but the opposite was true. She was wired, still running on adrenaline from all that had happened during the night.
A step below her, Jack waited.
He had driven her from the New Orleans Border Patrol station, where she’d finished giving a statement. The campers were all safe, treated for some minor burns and smoke inhalation. The boy seized by the jaguar had been evacuated by a Life Flight air ambulance, as had Garland Chase. The man had lost a lot of blood, along with most of his left leg to the alligator, but he’d live.
The Coast Guard had wanted to shoot the gator, but Lorna had argued against it, explaining how the gunshots and fire had riled the beast, causing it to lash out with a million years of defensive instinct. The farm owner’s daughter—the one who dove in and rescued Garland—looked ready to throw herself between the Coast Guard sharpshooter and the gator.
In the end, Elvis lived.
Unfortunately the same couldn’t be said about the jaguar and her cub. Their carcasses were airlifted to ACRES. The animals’ deaths were a tragic loss, but Lorna had also watched three men’s bodies hauled out of the forest, their skulls crushed, their throats ripped out. The cat was a man-eater, a remorseless killing machine, too dangerous to be allowed to live.
Still, not all of the aftermath was tragic. The pilot of the crashed helicopter had survived, found in the wreckage with a broken arm and collarbone. Likewise, a lone pirogue had paddled into the park, appearing on the opposite side of the farm. The Thibodeaux brothers— thought lost to the cat—had survived their encounter, along with Jack’s two teammates. T-Bob had had enough swamp savvy to abandon the canoe and retreat his group up a pair of tall cypresses. From the high vantage point and hidden from the cat, he’d taken potshots to drive her off.
Lorna pictured the mother’s limp bulk rising into the air, hauled aloft in a cargo net. She was anxious to get back to ACRES, but Jack had insisted she fly with him back to New Orleans aboard a Coast Guard chopper to give a statement. Afterward, he offered to drive her home, then to the docks to retrieve her Bronco. She wanted to grab a change of clothes and head directly out to ACRES.
“I’ll wait here,” Jack said from the porch step.
He stood in his undershirt. His uniform top had been shredded and bloodied by the cub’s frenzy. His left arm was bandaged from wrist to elbow.
“Don’t be stupid. Come inside.” She nodded to his arm. “You’re already seeping through your gauze. I’ve got a first-aid kit inside. I’ll put on a fresh wrap before we head out. It’ll only take a few minutes.”
He tried to hide his injured arm. “I’ll be fine.”
“Cat bites and scratches shouldn’t be taken lightly,” she warned, and she certainly had the scars on her arms to prove it. “Did they give you any antibiotics?”
“A prescription. I’ll pick it up in the morning.”
She rolled her eyes. Clearly the Coast Guard medical team knew nothing about feline injuries—but then why would they? There weren’t a lot of feral cats on the high seas.
“Are you allergic to penicillin?” she asked and turned to the front door with her keys.
“No.”
“Cats carry a form of Pasteurella in their mouths, a toxic and septic bacterium. I’ve seen animal health technicians lose fingers and parts of hands from neglected bite wounds. Antibiotics must be started immediately. I have some Augmentin inside. I always keep a supply in case I need to self-medicate.“ She glanced back to Jack. ”But you didn’t hear that from me.”
He finally relented and climbed the last step to the porch. She tugged open the door, flicked on the light inside, and led him into the foyer.
“The kitchen’s in back.” She pointed. “I’ll grab my kit and meet you there.”
She climbed the stairs to the upper landing, taking the steps two at a time. Her abraded back protested, but she didn’t slow. Definitely wired. She retreated to the hall bathroom and opened the medicine chest. Rows of prescription pill bottles lined the shelves, along with various toiletries and sundries. She grabbed the bottle of Augmentin and shook it. Plenty still left. She also snatched a fresh roll of gauze, hydrogen peroxide, and iodine.
As she closed the medicine chest she caught her reflection in the mirror. Her hair was a scraggly mess, half plastered to her skull. Her clothes had fared even worse. She wasn’t a vain woman, but there were limits even for her. She abandoned the medical kit into the sink and turned to the tub. She twisted on the shower, waited for the steam to rise, then climbed in fully clothed. She let the water run over her for a full half minute. With her eyes still closed, she stripped to the skin, let the blistering-hot water scald over her, then finally climbed back out and toweled off.
In another few minutes, her hair was brushed loose to her shoulders and she’d hurried to her room naked and changed into a fresh pair of jeans and white tank top. Retrieving the medical kit, she headed downstairs.
She found Jack sitting at the kitchen table, his back to her. His head was hanging, half drowsing from his posture. She hated to disturb him and paused in the doorway.
For just a moment she flashed back on Tom. As she caught Jack in half silhouette, the family resemblance was uncanny. Relaxed with his guard down, Jack looked ten years younger. She could see the boy hidden behind the hardness of the man, almost a ghost of his younger brother.
He must have heard or sensed her presence. His head jerked up and toward her, his face going stony again. Still, his Cajun accent drawled softly, huskily.
“Lorna . . .”
The one word flushed goose bumps along her arms. His gaze traveled sleepily up and down her body, taking in her new clothes. If not so exhausted, he might not have been so brazen about it. Under his raw gaze, a warmth traveled deep into her belly and settled there.
Discomfited, she hurried to the table and dumped the medical supplies down, then crossed to the sink to get a glass of water for him to take with the antibiotics. She was glad to have her back to him as she turned on the tap.
Get ahold of yourself already . . .
Glass in hand, she turned back around. “Better take two pills. Then let me check that arm.”
As he shook out the pills into his palm, she pulled up a chair and laid out the fresh gauze and a bottle of Betadine. He craned back to swallow the antibiotics. She noted the pinpricks of blood that stained his undershirt.
“Did anyone treat the wounds on your chest?” she asked.
“They’re just scratches.”
Annoyance burned away the residual discomfort of his close presence.
&nb
sp; “Take off your shirt,” she said.
“They’re nothing.”
She waved at him. “Don’t argue.”
He gave her a tired sheepish look, then, in one pull, shed his shirt. His bare chest and belly were crisscrossed with shallow scratches. The movement and pull of cloth set a few to bleeding again. No one had bothered to clean them.
She sighed. “There’s a full bath with a shower off the sleeping porch in back. I want you to take hot water and soap to any and every wound from that cub.”
“We don’t have time—”
“Doctor’s orders.” She stood up. “There are clean towels in there. I’ll get you a fresh shirt. My brother’s about your size.”
He looked ready to argue, but she pointed her arm.
“Go. I’ll make a fresh batch of coffee and warm some leftover beignets.”
That seemed to satisfy him, and he headed off toward the bathroom.
She pulled out a teakettle and a French press to make coffee. As the water heated she picked up the phone and punched in the number for ACRES. She called the genetics lab, figuring someone was still there.
The line picked up. The voice spoke in an impatient rush. “Dr. Trent here.”
“Zoë, it’s Lorna.”
In the background, she heard the neurobiologist’s husband, Paul, talking animatedly about RNA transcription errors. She also recognized Dr. Metoyer’s muffled voice but couldn’t make out his words. None of them had left. They were pulling an all-nighter, too.
“I was just checking in,” Lorna said.
“Then you’d better stop checking, chica, and get that butt of yours over here! You’re missing all the fun. And I can use a little estrogen here.”
She smiled at her colleague’s excitement. “Had to pick up a few things from home. I should be there in the next hour. Is the DNA analysis finished?”
Zoë’s voice grew more serious. “Not yet. Should be done by the time you get here. But the MRI data finished compiling. The results showed some strange neurological anomalies.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s too much to go over on the phone. Oh, and just so you’re prepared, about an hour ago we performed a series of EEGs on your animals.”
Electroencephalograms?
“What? Why?” Irritation dulled her initial excitement. Lorna felt protective of the recovered animals. They had been traumatized enough. “Any live testing should have waited until I was on the premises. You all know that.”
“I know, I know. But the procedure was noninvasive. We’ll explain it all when you get here.”
“I’ll be right over.” She hung up the phone, knowing her last words sounded as much a threat as a promise.
The teakettle whistled for her attention. She packed the French press with a chicory blend from Cafe du Monde and allowed the simple routine to resettle her thoughts.
Down the hall, she heard the bathroom door pop open. Jack returned with his hair wet and his skin almost steaming. He came in barefoot, wearing only his work trousers and a towel over one shoulder.
“I heard talking as I was drying off. Everything okay?”
“Will be once I get over to ACRES. Something’s got them all worked up.”
Jack nodded to the table. “Then this can wait. I can take care of all of this after I drop you off—”
“Sit.” She pointed a cup of hot coffee toward the table. “Sugar? Cream?”
“Black will do.” He sank reluctantly back into his seat.
Lorna checked the scratches and bite wounds, satisfied that he’d scrubbed them clean. “This’ll sting.”
She painted the marks with Betadine, noting his skin flinch with each touch, but the deeper underlying muscle never moved and his breathing never changed its steady rhythm. She felt an impulse to press her ear to his chest, to listen to his heart, to monitor that rhythm, too, but she restrained herself.
The only other reaction from his body was a flush along his neckline and a hardening of his abdominals, as if he were preparing to take a blow to the stomach. She suspected it wasn’t all from the pain. Confirming this, he shifted self-consciously.
As she worked in silence, she noted several old ropy scars across his left shoulder, neck, and down his back. Without meaning to, she allowed one finger to lightly trace one of the scars.
“Shrapnel from an IED,” he explained matter-of-factly. “A roadside bomb.”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean . . .” Her hand dropped away, and her face heated with embarrassment.
She finished her ministrations and replaced the bandage on his arm.
When she glanced up, she found him staring her full in the face. His eyes were like a wolf, raw and unreadable. He leaned closer. For a moment she thought he was going to kiss her, but instead he reached to the cup of coffee on the table.
“Thanks.” He stood up. “You said something about a new shirt.”
“That’s right,” she stammered out, feeling stupid for forgetting— and for stammering. “I’ll get one from my brother’s room.”
She was happy to flee the room. She wiped her damp hands on her jeans. She blamed the fine sheen of perspiration over her body on the night’s humidity. Or maybe it was just the exhaustion, weakening her guard. Or maybe it was the boy she’d noted in the slumbering man. An echo of Tom, of long nights in each other’s arms.
She might have forgotten, but her body had not.
She dragged a clean T-shirt from her brother’s dresser and hurried back to the hallway where Jack waited. He tugged into the shirt. She was wrong about Jack being the same size as her brother. The shirt was a tight fit and clung to his shoulders and chest.
“Ready?” he asked as he shoved into his socks and boots.
She nodded and pulled open the front door, glad for the cool night breeze on her heated face.
Out of the shadows in the front yard, a hard shout called to her.
“Where the hell do you think you’re all going?”
Chapter 24
At the shout, Jack pulled Lorna behind him, an instinctual reaction. He crouched, feeling exposed under the porch lamp, blinded by its glare. Towering oaks and bushy magnolias shadowed the dark walkway. Movement drew his eye below. A figure stalked up from the front gate.
Lorna stepped back into view. “Kyle? What are you doing back? I thought you were stuck on that oil rig for another four days.” Lorna turned to Jack and explained under her breath. “My brother.”
“I told you on the phone I was coming back early.”
“And I told you that wasn’t necessary.”
“Well, I wasn’t about to let you go hunting in the swamps by yourself. And it looks like I got here just in time.”
The figure climbed the steps and into the porch light. Jack sized him up. Lorna’s brother had the same sandy blond hair as his sister— in his case cropped short on the sides and longer on the top. From the looks of it, he hadn’t shaved in days and had worn the same cargo shorts and loose polo shirt for just as long. He had a wiry physique, like a coiled spring—though at the moment wound a bit too tightly. As the kid gripped the porch rail, Jack noted that his fingernail beds and the wrinkles of his knuckles were black with ground-in oil. The only thing darker was the kid’s demeanor as he eyed Jack with a hard suspicion.
“I told you not to come,” Lorna said. “The hunt’s already over. You came all the way back here for nothing.”
“Then where are you two going?” Kyle stood a step below, blocking the way.
“Over to ACRES.”
“Both of you?”
Lorna glanced to Jack. “No. He was just taking me over to fetch the Bronco. It’s over by the dock near the zoo.”
Jack cleared his throat. “Or I could take you directly to your lab. Be faster, and I wouldn’t mind hearing firsthand what your colleagues have figured out about those animals. Might be important to the investigation.”
Lorna nodded. “I’d like . . . I mean, that would be fine.”
K
yle narrowed one eye and studied him. “You’re Jack Menard, aren’t you?”
He nodded.
Kyle turned back to his sister. “Then I’m going with you.”
“Don’t be stupid. Get some sleep.”
“If he’s going”—Kyle stabbed a finger at Jack—“then I’m going. Someone needs to chaperone this date.”
“It’s not a date.” Lorna’s face flushed, more angry than embarrassed. “I can damn well take care of myself.”
“What? Like the last time you took off with one of the Menard brothers?”
Lorna’s eyes widened, shocked by his words, struck dumb. Jack had to restrain an urge to slam a fist in the kid’s face.
Kyle seemed to recognize he’d overstepped himself and back-pedaled. “Sorry. That was a stupid thing to say.”
He hurriedly climbed the last step and joined his sister, as if shortening the distance could temper his words. He touched her arm, but she turned away. He followed, matching her step for step.
“After what those Menards put you through,” Kyle said more softly as his anger bled away to raw concern. “I don’t want you hurt again. That’s all I was saying. I’d cut off my right arm to protect you. You know that.”
She sagged under his assault. “Of course I know that, Kyle. But in this case, you don’t know what you’re talking about.” She glanced over at Jack. “I trust him.”
Something in her face more than her words steeled through Jack. He found himself standing a bit straighter. At the same time he remembered her fingers on his skin, warm and soft.
Kyle looked between the two of them, then shook his head. “I’d still like to go with you. I won’t get any sleep till you’re home anyway.” His tone was more conciliatory and plainly worked better on Lorna. “And I promise I won’t cause any trouble.”
“Fine. But we’re leaving right now.”
“That’s okay by me.”
He stepped aside, and Lorna led the way back to the street. Kyle kept pace next to Jack. Though the kid had taken a more mollifying tone with his older sister, Jack read the continuing suspicion in his glance as they headed out. Kyle was clearly keeping his guard up—and Jack respected that. Lorna’s brother only wanted to protect her and didn’t care whose feathers he ruffled.
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