“I grabbed some supplies before I left Lagos. Didn’t know what you’d have, so I went on the assumption you’d need everything.”
He looked inside. Basic toiletries and survival gear, clothes, boots, ammo, and a weapon. A solid pistol but it wasn’t his Beretta 92, and he gave himself a second to mourn the loss of his favorite gun. That weapon dated back to his CIA days, and had saved his ass more times than he could count. He supposed it was probably somewhere at the militant camp, but he had zero desire to go back there.
He also found a fixed blade combat knife and thigh holster in the bag, as well as a folding karambit, a boot knife, and a machete strapped to the outside. He pulled out a box of condoms and had to laugh. Usually he was the one supplying the condoms to his teammates, not the other way around.
In a side pocket, he found his gris-gris and smiled in relief at the familiar weight of the protection charm. He thought he’d lost it when they were attacked. He kissed the small leather pouch and slipped the cord around his neck, then grinned over his shoulder.
“You do know the way to my heart, mon ami.”
“Yup. Sharp pointy objects, frilly drinks, and pretty women.”
“Could use one of those drinks now.” And he had eyes for only one pretty woman, but he wasn’t going to say that out loud unless he wanted a good ribbing from Marcus. He grabbed a fresh change of clothes and the toiletry kit. “But I guess I’ll settle for a shower.”
“Wasn’t going to say anything, but yeah, you need one.”
“Embrasse moi tchew.”
“Dude, I’m not puckering up anywhere near your ass until you clean it.”
Jean-Luc gave the finger on his way to the door, but was laughing. It was good to see a little spark of the old Marcus again. Maybe the guy would be okay after all. “Meet me in the mess hall in twenty. I have some questions for Claire about the virus.”
Marcus settled back on his cot. “Wouldn’t miss it.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Twenty minutes later, washed and dressed in something other than scrubs, his hair combed for the first time in weeks and pulled back in a tail, Jean-Luc entered the mess hall feeling human again. At least until silence fell over the room at his entry. He glanced behind him but nope, nobody there. Even though it was early for dinner it seemed like everyone in camp was there, and his arrival had made them all go mute. Now they all stared in awe, like he was some kind of god.
And then the applause started.
Now, normally, he thrived at being the center of attention, but this was…awkward. They were applauding solely because he didn’t die. Guess that was better than applauding after death, but… Non, he didn’t like it. All all.
Thankfully, Claire saved him. She waved from a table at the back of the room. “Over here.”
He hustled toward her. Slowly, the applause faded and conversations resumed.
“Merci beaucoup. That was as awkward as a fart in church.” He gave her a quick, sexless peck on the cheek and regretted it instantly. That light brush of his lips on her skin wasn’t enough. He wanted more, wanted to touch his lips to every inch, every secret spot, on her body.
Right. Now.
The many witnesses were the only reason he didn’t lay her down there on the table and find out what she tasted like. While he enjoyed public sex, he figured Claire wouldn’t like that particular kink.
Then again, maybe she would. There was a lot he didn’t yet know about her, and he couldn’t wait to discover it. He’d study her until he was as fluent in the ways of pleasuring her body as he was in fifteen languages.
He couldn’t wait, but he took a step back from her to preserve a shred of decency. There was already no hiding how that tiny bit of contact had affected him.
Marcus sat at the table with a black woman that Jean-Luc recognized—she’d cared for him while he was sick—but he couldn’t remember her name. He sat down across from her and held out at hand over the table. “Don’t think we’ve been officially introduced, cher. Jean-Luc Cavalier.”
She accepted his handshake with a surprisingly strong grip for such a thin, long-fingered hand. “Dr. Sunday Reggie-Fubara. Claire and I have been mates since we were tots.”
“You’re a long way from Old Blighty.”
She sighed. “Oh, tell me about it. I’m dying for a good pub and fish and chips.” She nodded toward the heaping plate in front of him. “Better’n this.”
For the first time, he noticed the plate that someone—probably Claire—had prepared for him. Plantains, meat skewers, rice and beans. His appetite suddenly made itself fiercely known. Seemed like he hadn’t had a decent meal in ages. He dug in. “It’s no shrimp étouffée, but I’m not complaining.”
While he ate, they made small talk about Claire’s and Sunday’s early exploits at boarding school in the U.K. The two had been little troublemakers. Who knew Claire had such a mischievous streak?
He then threw in a story about how he and his cousin T-Boe set their other cousin T-Butt’s hair on fire with firecrackers. He had them all laughing by the time he was done.
“Wait, wait.” Sunday held up her hands in a hold up gesture. “Your cousins are T-Boe and T-Butt?”
“Mais, yeah. T- is a nickname in Cajun, kinda like junior in English, and they were both named after their fathers. Beauregard, which was shortened to Beau, then became T-Boe.”
“And T-Butt?” Claire asked, her eyes sparkling with laughter.
“Ah…that’s where it gets confusing. His name is Thibaut. Not to be confused with T-Boe, who is older, so because my relatives have a wicked sense of humor, he became T-Butt.”
“Because that makes sense,” Sunday laughed.
“I’ve met his family,” Marcus said. “Nothing they do makes sense.” He pushed his plate aside and sat forward. “Enough small talk. Tell us about the virus.”
“Party pooper,” Jean-Luc muttered and pushed his own plate away. Okay, so he had been using the stories to stall, but it had felt good to laugh, and he’d enjoyed watching Claire’s eyes light up. He turned to her, watched that light fade, and sighed inwardly. “But he’s right. I want to call in our team, but I can’t until I know more about what we’re up against.”
Claire and Sunday looked at each other. It was interesting watching them both slip into work mode. The women with the open smiles and easy laughter faded away, and in their places appeared two composed, calculated doctors.
Claire quickly rehashed what she’d already told Jean-Luc earlier in the week. It wasn’t a hantavirus like they first suspected, and it was now called Delta Hemorrhagic Fever.
“How fast is it spreading?” Marcus asked.
“Fast,” Claire answered. “So fast it’s starting to fizzle out.”
“Is that normal?”
“No,” Claire said, and Sunday added, “Not at all.”
“Viruses live to spread,” Claire explained. “That’s literally their sole purpose for existing. A virus in its preferred host keeps the patient alive as long as possible to allow for maximum reproduction. These outbreaks usually occur when a virus becomes zoonotic. That is, it jumps from its preferred host to humans.”
“And that’s not what happened here?” Jean-Luc asked.
“No. I really don’t think so. If this was zoonotic, we’d have found the reservoir organism. But it’s killed everything, human and animal. It’s killing so fast it’s burning itself out.”
An ugly idea wormed into his brain. “That sounds like a perfect—”
“Bioweapon.” Everyone at the table said the word at the same time, then lapsed into silence.
Jean-Luc swore softly. “You think this was engineered.”
Another shared glance between Claire and Sunday.
“We do,” Claire said. “The more we research it, the more convinced I am. This is a manmade pandemic.”
Jean-Luc swore again and scrubbed his hands over his face, then looked across the table at Marcus. “If this thing’s manmade, whoever released it will
do it again somewhere else. This was a trial run. We haven’t seen the main event yet.”
Marcus pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re right. Time to call the team.”
“We have a sat phone,” Sunday offered.
Jean-Luc shook his head. “We make that call now, we’ll paint a target on this hospital. Defion will be monitoring all communications from the region. We have to assume they already know you’re here, Claire.”
Sunday’s lips turned down in a concerned frown. “Defion? What’s that?”
Merde. Claire hadn’t told her friend. He couldn’t blame her for that. Trust was a hard thing to come by when you were on the run, and even your oldest friends became suspect. “Defion is mercenary group hired by Bioteric Pharmaceuticals to take Akeso from Claire.”
“Oh my God, Claire!” Sunday whirled on her. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Tears filled Claire’s eyes. “I didn’t want you hurt. They already killed Tiffany. I figured the less you knew, the safer you’d be.”
“Oh my God,” Sunday said again.
Claire wiped at her eyes and turned to face him. “We can’t do anything to compromise the hospital. The infected can’t be moved without killing them. Their vascular systems are too weak. Hit a pothole, they could bleed out.”
It was so like her to think of everyone else before herself. The woman didn’t have a selfish bone in her body, which made him feel like a heel. He rarely did anything without some kind of self-serving ulterior motive. Even now, his need to protect her was purely selfish.
She was too good for him. By a long shot.
“Claire.” He waited until she looked at him. “We have to leave. It’s only a matter of time until Defion makes themselves known, and knowing what we do about Akeso, we can’t let them get their hands on it. Or you.”
“But—”
Sunday stopped her protest with a gentle hand squeeze. “The world needs your brilliant mind more than we do, love. We both know the people here are beyond saving, but there are others you can help. As long as you stay alive.” She stood and pulled Claire into a hug. “I wish you had told me all of this sooner. I’d have told you to leave, as I am now. You can’t do anything more here.”
Claire held on to her friend for a moment, then backed up a step and wiped at her eyes. When she glanced over, Jean-Luc clearly saw the war waging inside her. It was so against her nature to put herself before others that she struggled to make the right—hell, the only—decision. Luckily, he was selfish enough for the both of them. He’d already decided he was getting her out of here tomorrow, whether she wanted to go or not. He’d throw her over his shoulder, kicking and screaming and cursing his name, if it meant she stayed safe.
She drew a breath that moved her shoulders, and her next words shocked the hell out of him. “You’re right. We need to leave. There’s a boat leaving on a supply run to Port Harcourt tomorrow. We can catch a ride with them. I’ll go pack.”
Her words carried a deep sorrow that stabbed and twisted at the center of his chest. He stood as she passed and reached for her hand, but she shook him off. He stared after her as she left, unsure of what to do.
“Claire is all logic,” Sunday said behind him, “but she also has a lot of heart hidden underneath. She knows this is the best option, but it’ll hurt her to leave.”
Although she was long gone, he continued staring after her. Every fiber in his being screamed to chase her down, pull her into his arms, and hold her until that sorrow faded away, but he couldn’t seem to make his feet move. “What are you saying?”
“Just…she’ll need a shoulder to cry on.”
And that did it. He didn’t even realize he’d given chase until the rain splattered across his face. It was dusk, that odd gray time when it wasn’t fully dark, but not light either. He strained to make out landmarks and orient himself on the hospital grounds. Until that day, he’d only ever seen the inside of the hospital tents, and hadn’t had enough time to learn his way around. The staff quarters were a jumble of tents stitched together from pieces like voodoo dolls.
Yellow door.
She’d said hers had a yellow door. He jogged through the camp until he found the yellow door, and damned if he was waiting to be invited inside. He pushed open the flap and found Claire standing in the middle of the tent with a suitcase open at her feet, sobbing.
“Aw, cher.” He stepped up behind her, pulled her into his arms. She turned toward him and buried her sobs against his chest.
He never liked seeing women cry, much preferred to see them smile. Growing up, he’d seen his mom cry far more than she smiled, and he could sometimes even still hear her wailing sobs as Social Services whisked her children away from her. That day he’d made it his life’s mission to make the women in his life smile as often as he was able.
But now? He was at a loss. A joke wasn’t going to help, and would only seem crude. And seducing a smile out of her now would be just plain wrong. All he could do was hold her, rub soothing circles on her back, and let her cry it out.
He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, then lingered there, just breathing in her scent. Warm vanilla and spice. It brought to mind images of a cozy home on a cool, foggy morning, and the two of them snuggled together in front of a cracking fireplace.
No, not just any cozy home, but his home. Not the townhouse just off Bourbon street that he shared with his siblings, or the old fishing shack deep in the bayou, where he sometimes took his tourist lays for a real Cajun thrill. No, he was picturing her at his cabin on the Northshore of Lake Pontchartain.
His haven, a place he never took any woman.
Ever.
Putain.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Claire felt his arms tense, felt him shift away ever so slightly, and realized with horror she was clinging. Hard. She abruptly let go and turned away to find something to wipe her face. She was probably all blotchy with red eyes and nose, and while she wasn’t usually concerned with how she looked, she didn’t want him to see her like that. She found a clean T-shirt and pressed her hot face into it.
She expected him to leave. Why wouldn’t he? He’d come in at her invitation, expecting to get laid, and instead she’d sobbed all over him.
But she didn’t hear the tent flap open. He didn’t move.
She risked a peek in his direction. He still stood right where she’d left him, his hair and shoulders wet from the rain, the front of his shirt wet from her tears. He looked a little lost, like he had no idea what to say or do next, so she took pity on him and gave him an out.
She pushed back her shoulders and bent over for her suitcase. “I need to finish packing.”
“Hey.” He caught her hand, and drew her toward him again. With his thumbs, he swept away the wet streaks still on her face. “Why the tears, ma belle?”
The unexpectedly compassionate gesture broke down the fragile wall she’d spent the last few minutes building around her emotions. More tears leaked out and she grasped his wrists. “I feel like I’m abandoning them.”
“You’re not. There are so many good doctors here. They’ll all get the best care available to them.” He gave a crooked half smile. “Believe me, cher. I know from experience.”
She liked that she didn’t have to specify who she was talking about. He knew her concern wasn’t for the doctors, her friends, but the patients. This was why she did better in a lab. With patients, she got too involved. Every time. “I guess it’s egotistical of me to think I can do something the other doctors can’t.”
“But you can. You did. You saved me. Nobody else could have done that, which is why you need to stay safe.”
“Yes, I know.” She stared over at the cooler containing what was left of Akeso. “I know I can’t ethically use Akeso here again. For you, I had Marcus’s permission. Even if I could get a patient’s family to approve treatment, I couldn’t know if they understood what they were agreeing to. These are uneducated people who still believe in witches and magic. And t
hen who would I choose? I only have one dose left. How could I play God like that?” She shook her head hard to ward off another rush of tears. “Logically, I know all of the reasons, but…” She patted her chest over her heart and the tears started flowing again despite her efforts. Her voice caught in her throat. “My heart’s breaking.”
He hugged her again, and again, she clung, clutching big handfuls of his shirt at his back. She couldn’t help it. She hadn’t had anything solid in her life for months, and right now, Jean-Luc felt very solid.
They stood together like that for a long time, until the tension eased out of her shoulders, and the ache around her heart lessened.
Finally, she felt his lips move against her hair, curving into one of his mischievous smiles. “For the record, I believe in witches and magic.”
A laugh bubbled up and surprised her. She backed away and lightly smacked his chest. “You do not.”
“Of course I do. I’m Cajun.” He pulled on the cord around his neck and a small leather pouch popped out from under his T-shirt. “You can’t grow up in New Orleans and not believe in magic.”
She touched the pouch. The leather was faded and worn soft. “What is it?”
“Gris-gris.”
“Voodoo? Like black magic.”
“Non, not black. It’s for good luck and protection against those who wish you harm.” At her arched eyebrow, he took the cord from around his neck and placed it over her head. “You keep it. You need it more than I do right now.”
She studied the talisman for a moment. “You can’t honestly believe this little bag”—she held the cord up, letting the pouch dangle between her fingers—“will protect me?”
“It won’t magically stop a bullet, but it has a way of steering its wearer away from harm.”
She scoffed and dropped the cord. The gris-gris felt heavy around her neck. “Worked great for you, didn’t it?”
“I didn’t have it until Marcus returned it a few hours ago. But, yeah, it was still working for me. You found me in that camp. You found Marcus, the only person who could give you permission to treat me, in Lagos.”
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