by AJ Sinclair
“Shoot first, ask questions later?”
“Something like that.” More often than not. But he only shot to kill when ordered to do so.
“So, were you working when you snuck up on me?” Her eyebrow arched, and a corner of her mouth quirked up.
Well, shit. “Not exactly.” Could he adjust the ridge in his pants without her noticing? Unlikely.
“Doing a little personal reconnaissance?” A smile stole across her lips.
She’d caught him in the act, but he refused to give up more intel. “Did you get any sleep, Indie?”
A yawn seized her. “Not much.” She reached out to run her fingers along an empty shelf, then pulled back, as if remembering her instructions to them not to touch anything. “You?”
“Enough for now.” He followed her as they turned back toward the sleeping men.
“You guys can function on little sleep.”
He nodded. “It’s a necessity.”
“I can when I’m in my lab.” She yawned and sank down to the cold, hard floor a few feet away from the snoring Eli. “But all this chaotic activity is catching up with me.”
Jack sat beside her, leaning up against the shelves as he stretched his legs out on the floor. His eyes drifted closed. Maybe he could go to sleep again, but then Indie’s voice cut through his daze.
“Why do you believe in aliens? Were you abducted?”
He rubbed his hands over his face, waking himself up for a long conversation. “Extraterrestrial life. And no, I’ve never seen one.”
“So, it’s an intellectual belief?” She pulled her knees up to her chest and crossed her arms over them.
“Yes. It’s arrogant to believe that we’re the only intelligent life in this vast universe.”
“That’s a good point. I’m undecided on the subject. I spent my life looking into a microscope, and so far, I’ve never seen any evidence under my lens that would support life on other planets.”
“Try looking up at the stars.” He followed her gaze toward the front windows but saw only blackness. “Not here. Not in the city. You’ve got to get out where there’s no light, out where it’s only you and the sky. Then you’ll see billions of possibilities.”
“Where do you go when you want to look for possibilities?”
He looked at her. The little bit of light leaking in from the street danced in her deep brown eyes, and her silky black hair spilled over her shoulders. Right here. “The last time I had leave, Cody and I took a drive on his ranch in Texas. The sky out there is…” He closed his eyes and tried to picture a word good enough to describe the sight but fell short. “Cody was speechless too.”
A lazy smile stretched her lips. “You and Cody are…?”
“Too alike.” He knew that wasn’t what she’d been asking, but he brushed it aside for now. “I used to pull the same shit he does. Stealing cars, taking risks. He’s just doing it to impress you.”
“I thought so. But I like it. He’s impulsive, reckless. That’s completely foreign to me.” She bumped her shoulder into his. “What are you doing to impress me?”
“Playing hard to get.” He smothered a smile. “Mysterious and aloof.”
“Is it working?” She appeared unmoved.
“Apparently not.” But he’d caught something playful in her eyes.
She rested her elbow on her knee and propped her head up. “You evaded my question. You and Cody?”
He got the feeling she wouldn’t judge him, so he confessed. “Are, were, have. But not lately though. Right now, I want you.”
“Some researchers believe that bisexuality is a natural sexual orientation.”
Scientists gotta label everything. “I’m not bisexual.” He’d never thought about what to call it. He’d taken opportunities and run with them. “I never felt like my sexual interest had to be limited to women.” Jack paused as his words sank in. “That’s kinda what bisexual means, doesn’t it?”
Indie nodded, and her lips twisted as if holding back a laugh.
“Accurate,” he acknowledged.
“I’m primarily straight. I’ve never been sexually attracted to a woman, but I wouldn’t rule out the possibility.” A lazy smile drifted across her lips. “I’m more intrigued by group dynamics.”
Now, there’s a topic of conversation. “What kind of group?” He wished he had a cup of coffee to hide his smile behind.
“Polyamorous. I believe my heart has room for many loves.”
He believed her heart did too. His, on the other hand… “Yeah, it could work.”
“I like the idea of a group bonding together, especially when they’re facing adversity.”
Desperate circumstances had drawn him into more than one tight bond. He cast a glance toward Cody circling the store. “Like a football team after losing its MVP quarterback.”
“Yes.” She agreed like she had no idea what he’d said. “Like strangers who’ve lost everything making a…family. Is that the right word?”
He shrugged. Everything she’d said made sense, even if neither of them could explain it. “I’m not good with words.”
“Neither am I.”
He didn’t need words to enjoy the doctor’s company. Sitting beside her in an abandoned grocery store during a city-wide epidemic felt just as pleasant as a picnic under the stars. His left butt cheek fell asleep, tingling down his thigh to dispute his argument. Jack groaned and shifted. Tomorrow, after the sun rose, he’d scrounge the store for supplies. Not necessities, but little luxuries to make their circumstances more companionable than desperate.
Indie adjusted her position, brushing against him and sending tingles up his other leg. “What about Cody?”
“Oh, he’ll try anything once.” She’d meant sex, right? Of course, that’s where my mind went. “More if he likes it.”
“Like you?”
How had she seen that? The similarities between him and Cody had drawn them together, irritating Jack to no end. “I grew up. I had to. Cody hasn’t.” But maybe she’d seen some lingering recklessness in Jack too.
“What’s it going to take?”
The Scarlet Infection hadn’t done it. “I’m afraid to find out.”
Indie clapped her hand over her mouth in a futile effort to stifle a yawn. Jack’s yawn stretched bigger than hers. Then she shivered.
“I need sleep, and you need to get warm.” He draped an arm around her shoulders and hugged her close. “Here.” He stood and held his hand down to her. “Maybe this will help.”
Jack pulled her up and moved over to where Austin slept on the floor. When Indie lay down beside him, the major rolled on his side, draping an arm around her waist and curling her into his body. Jack lay on her opposite side in the same position, nestling her between them. Eli snored while Cody patrolled.
“Warm enough?” Her hair tickled his nose as he whispered in her ear.
“Oh yes.” She nodded, snuggling into them. “Good night, Jack.”
He slipped his arm under her head to make a pillow, and the barest touch of her lips met his. “Good night, Indie.”
Her body relaxed as she drifted off to sleep, but Jack’s mind raced, filled with the words that had passed between them. Adversity. Group dynamics. Many loves. Good words. He liked them, but he hoped they’d share more than words.
***
INDIE
The sun rose high, sending a spotlight through the store’s front windows and smacking Indie in the eyes. She groaned and rolled over, her hip bone aching where she’d lain on it all night. Austin stirred beside her. Jack stretched at her other side. She’d slept between them. Best night of my life. But the day before had been the worst. They’re all gone. A hot sting ripped through her chest. She’d never argue with her sister again. Never hug her dad. Her brother. Missing. And Mom. Her eyes welled up. “I’ll never know why Mom named me Indiana.”
Jack shifted closer, the heat of his body offering little comfort.
“One time when I asked her, she said that sh
e’d named me Indiana so she’d remember where she’d parked her car. How does that even make sense?” Grief and confusion twisted Indie’s gut.
“Maybe she couldn’t explain it,” Eli said from his spot on the floor.
Indie shrugged. “I’m going with the Harrison Ford infatuation story.”
“I’d buy that.” Jack groaned and sat up, rubbing his back.
Austin’s voice rumbled from his chest. “This floor has to be the hardest thing I’ve ever slept on.”
“And cold.” Indie shivered. “The kind of cold that seeps through your bones and pierces your heart.” She hoped her heart had frozen. She’d need it cold and dead to get through the day.
Cody appeared beside his superior officers to report. “Uneventful watch. We might be able to sneak out the back to stay away from the shooters.”
Austin stood and nodded, acknowledging the information. “We need to search for supplies, anything we can use.” He directed his men. “You three split up. I’ll go with Indie.”
Cody, Jack, and Eli fanned out down different aisles while Austin followed Indie.
She wandered down a row of paper products, plates, cups, utensils and such. Apparently not a prize for looters since the stock hadn’t been touched. They could use all those things, but did they really need them? They’d made do so far. She turned into the next aisle. Feminine hygiene products. Ah, this I should stock up on.
“Find anything?” Austin spoke from behind her.
“Yes.” She whirled around, heat flashing over her face. “Uh…girl stuff. Would you mind…?” She pointed a finger down and spun it.
“Turning around?” Amusement lit his eyes. “I had two sisters. I’ve seen this stuff before.”
“I’m sure you have, but you haven’t seen me with it.”
He groaned and rolled his eyes as he turned.
Indie worked quickly, grabbing boxes of tampons without looking and tossing them in her backpack. She didn’t need them now, but she would if this quarantine went on much longer. “Oops, condoms. Don’t need those.” She pulled the out of place box from her bag and slapped it back on the shelf next to dozens more boxes of the same brand and other brands, colors, and sizes.
But wait. Why didn’t she need them? She’d kissed both Eli and Cody, bonded with Jack, and Austin was currently drooling over her like the last croissant on a breakfast buffet. It would be foolish not to have any protection. She grabbed the box again, a package of three. I’ll need another.
But wait. She couldn’t sleep with all the men. She put the condoms back on the shelf and turned to catch Austin grinning at her. God, those blue eyes just melted her. And she knew the hard object jabbing her in the back last night wasn’t his gun.
Why couldn’t she have sex with all of them? Not at the same time. That would be…challenging. Her mind began calculating positions and angles and whose hand would go where… Stop that!
“Turn around,” she snapped at Austin.
He rolled his eyes and obeyed.
Indie grabbed the box. Then another and another. This is crazy! She put them back on the shelf.
“What the fuck are you doing?” He was staring at her again.
Indie glared straight at him and swept her arm across the shelf, knocking boxes of condoms into her bag. “Gathering supplies.” One box remained, so she snatched it up and tossed it to him.
Austin caught it and laughed. “I thought you’d never make up your mind.”
She hefted her bursting backpack to her shoulder, staggering a bit under the weight of it. Austin reached for it, but she adjusted the straps and the burden settled nicely.
“Come on.” He cradled her elbow and headed back toward their camp. “I think we have enough,” he fake coughed, “supplies.”
While keeping her gaze on him, Indie reached for a tube of her favorite lipstick and slipped it into her coat pocket. “Is it wrong to be thinking about sex when there’s so much death around us? My entire family…” A sob cut her off.
He smiled, most likely at catching her shoplifting maneuver. “The mind processes grief in strange ways. When my brother died, all I could think about was completing my mission.”
He’d had a brother? He’d lost family? “When did your brother die?”
“Two weeks ago.” His voice hardened, but his shoulders slumped.
“My God, the virus?” Anything could’ve happened. Plane crash, cancer, hit by a bus, but the timing and the vitriol on Austin’s face answered her.
“Yes.” He stopped in the middle of an aisle that used to display soup and pasta and kicked aside a stray can. The anger and pain disappeared, and the major straightened, gripping his rifle. “He was part of my company.”
“You appear to be handling it well.”
“Good.”
Eli came back with some toothpaste and several toothbrushes. “Not much left. Moldy bread, rotten produce.”
Jack had found whole coffee beans. “We’ll need something to grind them with, not to mention water and a pot.”
“I hit the jackpot.” Cody gloated and presented several cans of cat food.
Jack snarled at him. “What the fuck are you even thinking?”
“I’m not that hungry.” Indie sniffed.
“What?” Cody seemed wounded. “It’s duck breast with orange sauce. Damn cats eat better than I do.”
“Keep it.” Austin took a can and stuffed it in his pocket, then shrugged when the others gaped at him. “You never know.”
Eli shuddered but didn’t complain as Cody passed the short, wide cans to each of them.
“What’s our next move?” Jack asked Austin.
Indie didn’t give the men time to think. “We’re going back to the hospital.”
“The hell we are,” Eli complained without a second’s hesitation.
Austin held up his hand to cut off any other protests. “Why?”
“One, I didn’t find my brother. He could be in another part of the building. Now that we know what to expect, we’ll have an easier time searching.” She had no idea where to search for him, so starting with the hospital appeared to be the best approach.
“Walking through the halls of the Scarlet Infection is easy?” Jack cringed.
“Easier. A comparison.” Sticking to logic helped her face that hell.
“And two?” Austin prodded. “There’d better be a two.”
Eli stated the obvious before she could respond. “It would be smarter to go back to your lab.”
A wisp of hair stuck to her cheek as she shook her head. “No. That would be going backward. The lab is safe.” Another comparison. “I left to help people. Going back there would be selfish. The hospital is still the best place to find the resources and facilities I need to make more of the cure.”
“Do you think that’s accurate,” Austin turned to Jack, “based on what you observed yesterday?”
Jack focused on Indie. “No.”
“But–”
He talked over her protests. “The hospital is a biohazard. Anything we find there would be contaminated.”
“We already might be.” Eli’s face turned ashen.
“Right.” Austin nodded. “The hospital is out. Options?”
“There are no other options!” Indie clenched her fists, barely resisting the urge to pound some sense into the arrogant, obstinate ass. “I have to find Monte. I have to get the cure to more people!” She suddenly remembered he’d put her in charge. “I’m the ranking officer here. You can’t stop me.”
“Yes, I can. I’m revoking your authority. You’ll obey me.”
Jack caught her as she lunged at Austin. Hot tears streamed down her face and she swung her fists, missing him by several inches.
Austin grabbed her flailing hands and wrapped his fingers around her wrists. “We will do all of that. But there’s only one way.”
Indie stilled, panting as she looked around the circle of men. They all seemed to be thinking the same thought.
Eli voiced
it. “We need to get out of the quarantine.”
Chapter 9
AUSTIN
Planning an escape in broad daylight was a sure-fire way to get caught, but Austin refused to waste time waiting for the cover of darkness. The word ‘planning’ was a stretch. Pulling a hair-brained scheme out of his ass, more accurately.
Austin gathered Indie and his men around him. They’d slipped out the back of the grocery store without incident and walked a good mile before they risked stopping at a deserted warehouse. “Before communication was shut off, we got our briefings from a base here.” He used a stick to draw a crude map in the dirt of the chain link fence the National Guard had set at the northern end of the quarantine. “If we break through the fence, we can get the doctor to someone who can help her distribute the cure.”
“How are we going to break through?” Indie eyed him with serious skepticism and a hint of fear.
“Somehow.” Here’s where the crazy antics come in. “With something big and heavy.” They explored the warehouse, which turned out to be a garage for Department of Transportation vehicles. City buses, fire trucks, and ambulances, they could take their pick of big and heavy.
Austin stopped in his tracks as Cody practically drooled beside him. He followed the sergeant’s gaze and got a little giddy himself. “That’s what I’m talking about.”
“I’m hard already.” Cody sucked in a breath as he spotted his prize. “Come to daddy.”
“Oh my.” Indie sighed, fluttering her fingers to her heart. “Size doesn’t matter, but that’s huge.” Her eyes widened, and Austin hoped for a chance to get her that excited.
“The bigger, the better.” Jack winked at Indie.
Even Eli salivated. “I’d love to take that thing apart.”
“I’m driving!” Cody leaped ahead of them, sprinting toward a massive snow plow with two smooth blades as tall as the vehicle itself coming to a point in front of it.
Austin had seen this kind of plow once on the news, during a major blizzard. The city had used it to crash through six-foot-tall drifts whipped by the wind, dwarfing them with its giant blades. The damn door nearly smacked him in the head as Cody jerked it open.