Mike saw the carbines and thought seriously of making a dash for them, but the risk too great.
“All right, here we go,” Richard said. He came to a stop just before the Humvees, turned in his seat, and started backing into the driveway before going across the lawn to the front door. The three of them in the cabin deliberately avoided looking over to the garage area of the driveway—and the remains of Steve Donalds.
Don’t look, don’t look, you can do this! Grace told herself as the Dodge reversed all the way to the front door. She didn’t want to look at Steve’s body or be reminded of the fact she was the one who shot him dead. There was no choice, she told herself over and over. It was better than allowing him to be torn apart of eaten alive by the infected ghouls as they thirsted for human blood—wasn’t it?
“Miss Delaney, you ready?
“Yeah. And cut the formal shit. It’s Grace, okay?”
PFC Owens nodded, then turned to the other soldiers. “Stay frosty.”
“Okay let’s go, Grace!” Owens said to her as the tailgate of the pickup reached the edge of the pathway at the front door.
“What do you mean let’s—”
“No time to argue, ma’am.”
Owens was right about that, Grace conceded. Though taken by surprise, she was glad for it. The afternoon sun was way down now and the house itself very dark. She didn’t really want to go in alone.
“Anyway, if there’s more than a couple of them things in there, you’ll need more than that 9mm of yours.”
He wasn’t just whistling Dixie there, and the thought of several infected creeps rushing at her in the dark had crossed her mind.
“Okay, let’s go!” Grace said a little too loudly—excitement got the better of her. She went over the tailgate one leg at a time, using the tow ball to stand on while Owens leaped over with just one hand resting on top of the tailgate after Grace had moved aside.
“So far, so good. Let’s get that phone!” Owens remarked, the excitement of action obvious in his voice, too.
Grace jumped to the porch and ran for the door and…
“Fuck, its locked!”
“Good to see you again, Mr. Calgleef,” President Galtieri said. He stood near the chairs in front of the presidential seal on the carpet.
Calgleef stuttered. “Th-thank you for seeing me on such short notice, Mr. President.”
“When a matter concerns the well-being of America, how could I refuse?” The president gestured toward a chair. “Please take a seat, Mr. Calgleef.”
“Thank you, sir,” Calgleef said, after turning to see that it would be just the two of them.
“Now, you have something for me regarding a possible point of entry of this flu into America, is that correct?”
“Yes, sir I have here the results of a test conducted at the CDC. While it’s not thorough in every aspect, it does show the vaccine was deliberately manipulated or tampered with.” Calgleef opened his briefcase, took out the folder, and handed it to President Galtieri.
The president looked over the five-page report, then looked up. “It’s your contention then that the virus was deliberately released into the country?”
“Yes sir, Mr. President.” Could he not see that in the report?
“And you also believe that the CEO of Thorn Bio-Tech is behind the plot?”
Calgleef shifted in his chair. He didn’t know why, but he felt uncomfortable all of a sudden.
“Well, err…yes sir, I—”
“For what end? Surely, there must be some rhyme or reason to it. If you’re going to accuse someone, you must have some evidence to back you. Well, do you?”
As Calgleef considered an answer, he momentarily thought of Delaney and wondered how she was faring.
She couldn’t be under any more pressure than I am now.
Grace Delaney swore as she pushed and pulled on the front door. She hadn’t thought of it—and neither did the others—but when they left the house, it was through the garage access, not the front door.
“Stand aside!” Owens yelled and placed a firm hand on Grace’s shoulder as he moved into her position. The soldier from Fort Des Moines raised his right leg and pushed it forward in a stomp-kick motion. His heavy combat boot loosened the door, but didn’t force it open.
“Again, do it again!” Grace told him.
“What’s going on back there?” Mike called from the cabin of the pickup.
No one answered as Owens kicked at the door once more—this time he was successful. The front door flung backward with the sound of splintering wood.
“All right, let’s go!” he said and raised his carbine to a ready position before entering the house. Grace ran in after him.
“Which way?” he said when he was in the living room. Grace hesitated, so he asked again. “Which way, Grace?”
PFC Owens could see she was having trouble remembering, or it may have been the dark. He reached for the light switch.
“There, that way.” She pointed when the lights came on and started for the main bedroom.
“Easy, let me check first.”
Grace held back, letting Owens pass, and took her pistol out.
“Clear. Let’s go!”
She raced into the bedroom and picked up the cellphone on the bedside table with a single swipe of her hand.
“Got it, let’s…oh shit!”
Three infected beings burst into the bedroom from the connected bathroom. Their faces smeared with blood and their eyes totally filled with the red substance.
“Move, Grace, move!” Owens yelled. He wanted to get out too, but he wasn’t about to leave a woman to face these things.
As she ran for the door, one of the infected lunged at her. Owens fired twice, both bullets catching the diseased ghoul in the temple region of the head.
“Go, go!” Owens yelled. “Fucking go!” He opened fire on the other two with the same accurate precision—the peripheral light from the living room just enough to aid him.
Owens turned to follow, then he heard the distinctive sound of the 9mm pistol. Rushing back into the living room, he saw Grace firing at another sufferer that entered from a door opposite. Three shots from a 9mm into the chest would have put most down, but not this blood-eyed scourge. Owens took aim with his M4 and slammed a single round into the head of the deranged creature. “Get moving before any more come.”
Owens covered her exit. He walked backwards as his eyes darted across the room and the muzzle of his weapon followed.
“I’ve got it, I’ve got it!” Grace screamed when she got outside.
“Get in.” Mike stood by the open door of the pickup. “Owens, jump in the back and keep us covered.”
Owens grabbed the hand of the other soldier who pulled him into the back. He felt some redemption after running before. It wouldn’t bring back his dead buddies, but by running, he stayed alive and was then able to save Grace Delaney. Perhaps he was meant to do that all along?
The moment Owens was in the back, Richard got the Dodge underway. Everyone inside and outside was breathing hard. But they had made it.
The president looked at the Director of the CDC long and hard, as if sizing him up.
Perhaps he was, Calgleef thought.
“How do we know this vaccine wasn’t just a mix-up or a wrong batch delivered? After all, it was done in some haste. Which I must admit, I’m partly responsible for.”
Just a “mix-up?” Is he kidding me?
“Sir, I have been in direct contact with Thorncroft and he has admitted as much.”
“Yes, you’ve already stated Thorncroft is responsible. But again, Mr. Calgleef, proof?”
The president cast an eye over at the Resolute Desk as if he was checking on something. Though Calgleef noticed, he didn’t see anything untoward. There was a satellite phone in an upright stand facing them, but he was sure the president had several of those.
“And making accusations based on your own contact with Thorncroft…you’re aware that you’re incr
iminating yourself, right?”
“Yes, Mr. President, I am. But it’s not about me, it’s about saving America.”
Calgleef saw the cheek muscles of Galtieri rise, as a huge smile crept over his face. The country’s political leader then burst into raucous laughter.
“Sir, I—”
“You, you should be running for my job!” Galtieri said between cackles.
The grilling he’d received from the President had unnerved him, but he’d thought Galtieri was being thorough. Yet now, the lack of any real concern, the mockery, Calgleef had a low sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach as he realized Galtieri wasn’t interested in his report on the vaccine at all.
“Wouldn’t you agree?” Galtieri turned his head toward his desk when he asked the question.
“Why, yes. Indeed,” a voice called out from the sat phone—it had been on the entire time. “With such virtues, he’d be a certainty to get the popular vote!”
Calgleef stared in slack-jawed shock at President Galtieri, then to the phone on the desk. The voice that emanated from that phone belonged to Thorncroft.
Calgleef stood, slowly letting the report slide from his lap. “You-you were listening the—”
“Yes, my good boy. Of course I was,” Thorncroft replied. “I knew what you had something up your sleeve. Long ago, in fact. I let you continue just in case you’d told the truth and you were trying to protect my interests. Ooh, sorry, Mr. President—our interests.”
“You mean you were—”
“Yes Calgleef,” Galtieri said, “and here’s someone else who I’m sure you won’t be all that happy to see.”
A side entrance to the Oval Office opened and Mr. Brown stepped through. “Good to see you again, Calgleef, though I doubt you feel the same.”
Right there, Calgleef saw the enormity of the conspiracy and how Thorncroft was always one step ahead of him. The NSA—through Brown—monitored every communication at his office and home. But as he had suspected, there were even bigger fish in Thorncroft’s pond. The president—the biggest fish of all—was firmly involved in the scheme and probably had been from the start.
It was a losing battle.
“You could have been with us, Calgleef,” Thorncroft said. “Such a waste.”
The president nodded to Brown, who took the results in one hand, then took Calgleef’s forearm with the other.
“This way, Mr. Calgleef.”
As he was led out of the Oval Office to a service elevator and a quiet disappearance, Calgleef had but one thought: Delaney, Grace Delaney.
What would she do now?
23
Twenty-Three
The Dodge had driven a good five miles from the street where the attack occurred, where the soldiers lost their lives and Steve Donalds lost his. But thanks to Grace Delaney, he didn’t die horribly. Though that didn’t make it any easier for her.
“It’s been over four hours and he hasn’t called. Something’s wrong, I can feel it.”
“He’s meeting with the president, Grace. I’m sure there are delays in getting in to see him. It’s not—” Richard told her.
“Bullshit! Not on such an important matter as this. I’m going to call him.”
“Do you think that’s wise? If he’s in the meeting now, we could be alerting others to where we are,” Mike added.
“Does it matter, Mike? We’re just sitting here scratching our asses. We have to know, one way or the other.”
Tilford gave his support. “I’m with Grace. We need to know.”
When no other dissenting words were spoken, Grace took the cell phone and punched in the number for Calgleef’s sat phone. She waited for a moment as a series of beeps and then a musical tone sounded before the ring tone began. She hadn’t heard that the last time she called.
A refined voice in a distinctive English accent answered. “Miss Delaney, how pleasant it is we finally get to speak.”
“Who—who is this?” Grace had a fair idea—there was only one Englishmen involved in a major way. “Where is Director Calgleef?”
“Why, this is Mr. Thorncroft. You met my representative, Dr. Moya. Anyway, you don’t need to concern yourself with Calgleef anymore, Miss Delaney. Or the vaccine. Unfortunately, your city Des Moines—which I believe you’re still in—is too far gone to help. Should anyone try to leave that area, they’ll be stopped. Permanently, you follow?”
She did. Thorncroft was sending her a warning. She and her friends were on their own. Calgleef was dead—or soon would be—and Des Moines was a no-go zone. It would be left for the infected to kill each other or die out on their own. Any attempted escapes from the area would be met with a swift show of deadly force.
“Fuck you, Thorncroft. Fuck you!” Grace threw the call phone out the window of the Dodge pickup and watched as it shattered on the asphalt road.
It wasn’t over, despite what had happened. The loss of Calgleef, the loss of the lab results—which went without saying—she also had to assume President Galtieri had to be in on the conspiracy. He was the last person Calgleef was to meet, and…
No, as long as she had a breath left in her, this was not over. Not by a long shot.
“Drive, Richard, drive!” she said as she thought about what to do next. She couldn’t do it alone and looked at the others: the three soldiers, Richard, Mike, and of course, Isaac Tilford. She was thankful they were here.
“We can do this!” she said through gritted teeth.
The sun was almost down and darkness was about to envelope Des Moines once again. This time, the dark would remain for a long time to come.
The End 2/12/2017
———————————————————————
Also by Craig A. McDonough
Toward the Brink Series
Toward the Brink One
Toward the Brink Two
Toward the Brink Three
Beyond the Brink (Toward the Brink IV)
The Forgotten Battles (A Toward the Brink Companion)
Pestilence Series
Pestilence: The Infection Begins
Pestilence 2: The Infection Spreads
Short Stories
She Said
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Pestilence Boxed Set [Books 1 & 2] Page 29