by Nick Harrow
Instinct drove Gunnar’s elbow into his attacker, shattering the skinny lunatic’s face and blackening both his eyes. A swift kick to the chest propelled the dazed and bleeding man back into the crowd where he was promptly torn down by more of the bloodthirsty freaks. Gunnar looped his arm around Ray’s shoulders and bulldozed a path toward the garage, praying that the explosion of violence hadn’t attracted attention from Arthur’s hitters. Gunnar tore a path through the crowd and headed for the garage. He liked his odds out there better than here in the crowded confines of the casino with crazies on every side.
Someone had smashed through the garage exit, leaving behind an empty steel frame and a floor littered with square chunks of glossy safety glass. Gunnar bulled through the door, shoulder first, and Ray followed.
The bodyguard swung his gun arm to the right, swiveling his head to track for threats. He heard wailing car alarms and excited hoots and hollers in the distance but didn’t see anything that needed immediate shooting. He scanned the vehicles neatly slotted into the spaces in front of him, cursed, then headed deeper into the garage with Ray clinging to his free hand.
“What are you looking for?” Ray asked.
“Something old,” Gunnar answered. “That won’t attract a lot of attention.”
A bloodcurdling shriek echoed through the low-ceilinged garage. Gunnar ignored the distraction and hurried past the much newer vehicles close to the entrance and toward the rust-pocked carcass he’d spotted. The scabs of peeling paint and spiderweb of cracks across the junker’s back window were a welcome sign for any would-be car thief. “Here we go.”
“This?” Ray asked in disbelief. “It’ll fall apart in five blocks.”
“It’s a Honda with California plates,” Gunnar said. A tickle at the back of his throat made him cough. “This hunk of junk’s gonna get us a lot farther than you think.”
He tried the door and found it locked. Without hesitation, he drove his elbow through the glass, popped the lock, and yanked the door open. It was a tight squeeze into the driver’s seat for his long legs, but that was all right. This wasn’t the time to be choosy. Gunnar reached across to unlock the passenger door, then turned his attention to the ignition. He put his H&K on the dash, fished his Leatherman Surge multi-tool out of the inside breast pocket of his motorcycle jacket, and unfolded the long file blade. He then rammed the makeshift key into the Accord’s starter slot and folded the Leatherman’s body at a ninety-degree angle to the blade to give himself more leverage. When he gave the tool a hard clockwise twist, the engine coughed and sputtered, then grumbled to life as Ray dropped into the passenger seat and slammed the door behind her.
“This thing is disgusting,” Ray groaned. She pulled the grease-stained safety belt across her shoulder and fastened it. Old In-N-Out wrappers, desiccated fries, and deflated ketchup packets covered the floorboards in a greasy snowbank. Ray held her feet off the floor, unwilling to dirty her boots in the fast-food garbage dump.
“Yep,” Gunnar agreed. “But it’s a car that no one will look at twice, and that’s what we need.”
He threw the vehicle into reverse, then slammed on the brakes when something thumped against the Accord’s trunk hard enough to shake the vehicle on its shoddy suspension.
“Help!” a woman screamed and pounded her hands against the trunk. “Please!”
Before Gunnar could react, five men with bloodshot eyes grabbed the woman and dragged her away from the car. She screamed again, her hands straining toward the car. One of the men threw back his head and unleashed a powerful roar, blood foaming on his lips.
Not your problem. Gunnar heard his father’s voice in his ear. Save your girl.
The woman screamed again and clawed at the hands grabbing her. The men laughed in a way that told Gunnar exactly how horrible their victim’s last minutes would be.
“Damnit,” he growled and grabbed the H&K off the dash. “Get behind the wheel. Be ready to get us out of here.”
“Gunnar—” she began, but the bodyguard had already thrown the car into park and bolted out of the driver’s seat.
The pack of five crazed men surrounded the tall woman, their eyes rimmed with red, snot leaking from their nostrils in sticky strings. There was something feral and unnatural in their posture, as if their bodies were ill-fitting costumes worn by animals walking on two legs. They barked and snapped at her, hounds harrying their prey.
Not that their target was going down without a fight. A long shock of pure white hair rose from the crown of her head in a high ponytail that whipped back and forth like a big cat’s tail as she tried to keep an eye on all her attackers at once. She flailed at them with tattooed arms in a futile attempt to drive them back. Her tiki print tank top and cargo shorts were torn and smeared with blood, and Gunnar knew it wouldn’t be long before her attackers took her down.
He knew stopping to help this woman was a bad idea. Every second of delay gave Arthur and his goons a chance to catch up to him and Ray. But Gunnar also knew if he turned his back on this woman and fled for safety, she’d haunt his dreams for the rest of his life. He couldn’t save everyone, but he also couldn’t turn his back on those he could help.
“Get away from her!” Gunnar shouted and fired a warning shot into the garage’s concrete ceiling. He doubted he could reason with these assholes, but he wouldn’t gun a man down without giving him a chance to back off.
“She’s ours,” the nearest lunatic growled, ropes of saliva drooling from the corners of his mouth. “Find your own.”
For the moment, though, the assholes had forgotten all about their victim. They’d turned their eyes to Gunnar, murder glinting in their black pupils. Low, rumbling growls emanated from the pack, and their eyes had gone the flat black of a shark’s. There was something deeply, weirdly wrong with these men.
A switch flipped in the bodyguard’s mind. He wasn’t getting out of here without a fight, and these men would kill him if he didn’t do unto them first.
“Get to the Accord,” Gunnar barked at the white-haired woman. “I’ve got this.”
She took off like a shot, her chunky high heels clattering against the concrete in a rapid staccato rhythm as her heavily inked arms pumped the air with every step. Two of the men tried to chase after her, and Gunnar pumped a round into each of their chests before they could pass him. A third man, his hair greased into a messy pompadour like an Elvis impersonator on his way to the stage, jabbed a knife toward the bodyguard’s ribs. The fourth and fifth attackers, tourists with matching Cubs jerseys, came on with fists windmilling the air like a couple of kids in their first schoolyard brawl.
Gunnar jumped back to avoid the knife, dropping his leather-clad left arm down to defend his midsection in case Stabby Elvis had a longer reach than he’d guessed. The move saved him from being gutted but left Gunnar open to a sloppy rain of blows from the Cubs twins. Their untrained attacks pushed Gunnar back from the casino’s doors, and his boots slipped on the blood-slick concrete underfoot.
Without hesitation, Gunnar caught his balance with a hand on the neck of the nearest Cubs fan. He rammed the man’s face down into his knee and fired two shots over his back into fake Elvis’s chest. With an angry shout, he shoved the dazed tourist into the last man standing, then blasted two more rounds through the pair of them before they could regain their balance and attack him again. The bodyguard turned to run for the stolen car, only to find the Accord idling right behind him, the passenger side door open.
“Nice work,” Ray said. “Now let’s get out of here.”
Chapter 3
RAY HANDLED THE ACCORD like a pro. She kept her head on a swivel and watched for threats as she pushed the rattletrap down the corkscrew garage exit ramp as hard as she dared. The bald back tires screeched around corners, leaving smears of sticky rubber in their wake. The stench of burning oil competed with the greasy French fry reek of the car’s interior, and empty soda cans rattled across the floorboards with every turn.
“What was that
?” the statuesque woman with the blond ponytail asked.
“Bad shit,” Gunnar said, his voice faintly raspy. He coughed into the crook of his elbow and rolled down the window to gulp in fresh air. “You okay?”
“You didn’t have to kill them,” she said, her voice quiet.
“Yes,” Gunnar said, “I certainly did. Their brains were seriously out of alignment, in case you didn’t notice.”
Ray winced at the painful rasp in Gunnar’s voice. Her mind raced through all the details in the files she’d stolen to hand over to DHS. Fever. Sore throat. Violent outbursts. Kyrolina’s Valhalla Virus had sounded bad on paper, but seeing it up close and personal was an entirely different order of nightmare magnitude.
But it didn’t make any sense. The files had said there’d be no tests for at least another month.
“Did they hurt you?” Ray asked with a quick glance in the rearview mirror. “My name’s Ray, and my copilot is Gunnar. Sorry for the rough ride. It’s the best we could do with such short notice.”
The blond woman raked fingers through her hair and nodded to Ray in the mirror. “I’m Bridget. I’m okay, just shaken up. A lot.”
“Good,” Gunnar said, then coughed again. “What a mess. Any idea what the hell caused everyone to go insane?”
“Vegas shit,” Bridget said with a disgusted shake of her head. “Full moon? Bad crab legs at the buffet? Who knows?”
Ray winced at their confusion. Telling them the truth wouldn’t soothe their nerves, and her agreement with DHS was to keep her mouth shut about the virus.
Though she doubted that mattered anymore. Twenty-four hours ago, the information she’d stolen from YmirRe’s database would have been invaluable. Now it was useless. The barn door wasn’t just open—the horse had blasted out and trampled the farmer’s entire family into bloody mud. Ray blinked hard and pushed her worries down deep. She had to hold it together long enough to get them all out of danger. She could break down later, preferably with Gunnar’s arms wrapped around her.
Rayleigh still couldn’t believe how Gunnar had slipped out of her life. She’d tried to keep him on the straight and narrow, but the boy seemed destined to be an outlaw. There’d been far too many sleepless nights trying to find some path back to Gunnar that wouldn’t torpedo her career.
If only he’d come to her instead of running off. Her career was important, sure. But so was her relationship with Gunnar. They could have put their heads together, figured something out. And even if there’d been no other way, she’d deserved to make that choice herself. It was good to have him back, even if the world was going crazy, but she couldn’t help but be irked that he’d taken the decision out of her hands all those years ago.
Knowing what she knew now, she wondered if her job had even been worth saving. Maybe she should have gone on the road with Gunnar. They made an amazing team.
“Hook a right out of the parking garage,” Gunnar said, his gravelly voice pulling Rayleigh back to the present. “Drive north until I give you more directions.”
“Sure,” Ray said. “How are you holding up?”
Gunnar’s face looked washed out under his short-cropped golden hair and five-o’clock shadow. His cheeks were sunken and dotted with red, and his glassy eyes drifted closed of their own accord. Ray was positive he was running a fever, and that scared the hell out of her. It was the virus’s first calling card, a flushed little fuck you before it really got to work.
“I’m all right,” he insisted, blinking at the tiny screen of the burner phone clutched in his left hand. The thing looked comically small in his grip. “Keep driving. I’ve gotta make a call.”
Ray clung to the wheel as the Accord burst out of the garage onto Frank Sinatra Drive. The old car’s crappy shocks squealed, and it bottomed out in a spray of sparks. The stink of burning oil became much more intense, and a gust of black smoke unfurled from beneath the hood. Ray kept her foot on the gas, ignoring the engine’s groans of protest and leaving a greasy slick behind the car. She wanted to get as far away from Caesar’s Palace, and the Strip, as possible before the junker gave up the ghost.
Because what she saw in the rearview mirror was beyond her worst nightmares. As much as she didn’t want to believe it, YmirRe had unleashed the Valhalla Virus on the city. Fifty percent of those exposed to it would go through twelve hours of violent rage before the fever burst their brains like burnt-out lightbulbs. The rampage of the infected would, conservatively, take out another thirty percent of those in the area. Ray hadn’t believed such a ridiculous death toll was even possible.
She believed it now.
Ray glanced at Gunnar and prayed he’d beat the odds. Because if the giant of a man next to her went crazy inside the cramped Accord, she and Bridget were dead. The rage defied reason. The infected couldn’t tell friend from foe. They didn’t care whose blood they spilled, as long as the red stuff kept on gushing.
“Thanks for getting us out of there,” the white-haired woman from the back said. “I don’t live far from here. If you could take me to my place, I’d really appreciate it.”
“We’re going to a safe place,” Gunnar croaked. His voice was so raw it gave Ray sympathy pains. “It’s too dangerous to drive all over the city until we know more about what’s going on. I just need to make a call.”
Ray met Bridget’s eyes in the rearview mirror. She offered her a warm smile and hoped the platinum blonde would understand she was in good hands.
Even though Ray was still miffed about the choice Gunnar had made for them both, she knew he wouldn’t let anyone hurt her.
Gunnar reached over and squeezed Rayleigh’s thigh. The firm grip of his calloused fingers against her smooth skin comforted her. With this guy on her side, Ray knew she’d be all right. She shivered just thinking about their time together. The memory of his arms around her, holding her tight, his big hands clutching her, a drowning man hanging onto a life preserver. The way he’d filled her, his long, thick—
“Mimi?” Gunnar’s hoarse voice dragged Rayleigh’s attention back to the here and now. He was getting worse by the minute. She had to get off the road, tell him what was coming before it was too late. “I need a place to crash. I know. No. Listen—”
Angry squawks drove Gunnar’s ear away from the phone. He held the handset at a distance and let whoever he’d called rant into the Accord’s stinking interior. When the angry shouts subsided, he returned the phone to the side of his face and continued. “I won’t be there long. Shit’s gone off the rails out here. Do me a favor here.”
After a few moments of silence, Gunnar nodded. “I understand,” he said, his voice a choked rasp. “Thanks, Mimi.”
“Everybody hang tight,” Gunnar said, his hand still on Ray’s thigh. “Take a right on Sammy Davis, and another down Sands.”
“Okay,” Ray said. “And then?”
But the bodyguard was out cold, chin resting on his chest, hands loose and limp in his lap.
Shit, Ray thought. Here we go.
GUNNAR’S EYES KEPT closing without his permission. He alternated between burning up and freezing, and his heart banged around like a malfunctioning jackhammer. It was getting harder to catch his breath, and the call with Mimi had used up the last of his energy. He heard Ray ask for the rest of the directions, but there wasn’t enough gas left in his tank. He was so tired he couldn’t hold his head up.
Shit.
He was sick.
Was he dying?
No, that was impossible. He had a job left to do. Gunnar wouldn’t let himself wash out until Rayleigh Ashe was safe and sound.
He’d promised.
“Come to Valhalla,” the fireman howled in Gunnar’s dream. But his axes were different now, their heads heavier, their hafts shorter and more curved. He wore a coarse shirt and trousers topped with a fur mantle instead of a uniform. The full moon rose behind the hill he stood atop, its silver light painting the bodies scattered around the berserker in harsh shades of white and black. More enemies surged
up the slope to fight the warrior, and he laughed in their faces before hacking their heads off their shoulders and splitting their skulls.
What bothered Gunnar wasn’t the man’s ferociousness or his weapons. It was the dark urge to join the warrior’s homicidal slaughter that bubbled up inside him. Gunnar wasn’t built for the modern world with its rules and hidden traps of etiquette and politics. He sometimes thought he’d have been more at home among his Viking ancestors. He felt a burning urge to tear off his clothes, pick up an axe, and hack a bloody path through anyone who got in his way. It would be so much simpler, so much easier—
The scream of a horn tearing past his window roused Gunnar from darkness. His hand tightened around the pistol in his lap, and he jerked his head up. The world was a chaotic smear through his bleary eyes, forcing the bodyguard to blink again and again to clear his vision. The Accord weaved around burning cars left in the street, and the thick plumes of black smoke billowing from the shattered metal corpses made it hard for him to make out landmarks. Gunnar was relieved when he finally caught sight of the north side of Treasure Island because it meant he hadn’t been out of it for more than a few minutes.
“Sorry,” he said to Ray. “Not feeling great. Had to rest my eyes.”
“It’s okay,” Ray said. She sniffled, then stifled a cough against the inside of her elbow. “I’m not at the top of my game, either.”
Bridget coughed, too, and wiped at her face with the back of her hand. She snorted, and another cough exploded out of her.
The white-haired woman slumped back in her seat. Hectic spots of red danced in her cheeks, and beads of sweat oozed from her forehead. “I’m sorry. God, I feel like hammered shit.”