“Good call, Sir.”
Duncan grimaced but didn’t let Phillip’s verbal slip alter his mood. Because no matter how annoying the younger man could be, today, he’d come through when it mattered. Hell yes, Duncan thought. He’d go to war with Slim any day.
***
With his bladder compressed against the cool ground, Chance figured he could hold the piss another five minutes, tops. Just enough time to let the two gunslingers slink away, thinking their secret entrance hadn’t been compromised. Jokes on you, bastards. When we come rolling in there, he thought, you bunch of dummies aren’t going to know what hit you. Just the thought of a little violence started a dull ache below, and adding the possibility of a female or two as spoils of war really put some lead in his pencil. He grabbed his AK with one hand and, grunting, pushed his considerable weight off the ground.
His plan had been to take a piss in the woods and see if he might rub a quick one out. He never made it to the woods. In fact, he was on all fours when he got the piss part of his plan out of the way. The second he sensed the cool metal pinch his neck, warm urine spread from his crotch, seeped down both pants legs and turned the denim a darker shade of blue. His head slowly ratcheted up, dreads partially covering thin slits for eyes. “Hell are you?” he demanded.
The rifle jabbing him in the neck protruded from a bush. The bush remained silent, unmoving, deadly. His eyes tracked along the barrel. A large scope on top. Fingers inside some sort of gloves. He had been holding his breath. He exhaled sharply and realized his erection was gone. Being on the wrong end of a gun could do that to a guy. First time for everything, he figured.
“Who are you and what the hell do you want?”
“Shut up!” said a disembodied female voice from somewhere nearby just inside the tree line.
Then a burst of static, followed by a soothing female voice, emanated from behind the rifle currently crushing his jugular. “Old Man... come in. This is Jamie.”
Chance recoiled as a second human-shaped bush emerged from the woods and waved one foliage-covered arm at the men he had just been spying on. Ghillie suits, popped into his mind. Those aren’t bushes, he thought to himself. Just a couple of bitches dressed like snipers.
He tried to rise. “You have no right—”
A boot caught him in the ribs, blasting the wind from his lungs. “Lay back down,” the rifle-wielding woman hissed.
Chance complied, then cried out when a bony knee with a hundred pounds driving it speared the soft spot between his ribs and spine. He wheezed and fought to clear his head, but before he could regain his wind and fight back he felt his already fatigued arms being wrenched behind his back, and then heard the unmistakable sound as the zip tie cinched his wrists together. Soft hands brushed his face. A strand of rough burlap covered his eyes, blocking out everything, and then those same supple hands cinched the blindfold tighter than he had anticipated. He grunted, waiting for the gag he knew was the next logical addition to the fucked-up mess he had gotten himself into. It arrived a second later, and then to add insult to injury the cool muzzle returned to his neck.
The walkie-talkie or whatever it was spewed soft static, then a gravelly voice spoke out between short blips of white noise. “This is Duncan. What’s going on up there?”
“Looks like we have ourselves a secret admirer. Twelve’ o clock, past the fence up here on the rise,” one of the female voices replied.
Once again the radio hissed to life. “How long have you two been hiding up there?” Duncan inquired, sweetening his drawl on account of the ladies.
Jamie removed her knee from the jiggling rolls of fat, patted the man’s sticky back, and nodded at bush number two. “We’ve been watching him for about ninety minutes. Took us half that time to sneak up on him,” she replied over the two-way radio. “Not to worry though. We had your back all the way, Sir.”
Duncan winced, shook his head side to side, and with a devilish grin spoke into the radio. “We were up to our asses in alligators down here. Least you coulda done was added a couple of more rotter kills to your name.”
“I was tracking them but you boys kept getting in the way... wouldn’t have wanted to accidently bag one of you two. Besides... looked like you and Phillip had it handled.”
“Roger that,” Duncan replied. “You two coming back to the compound with us?”
“No... we’ll herd this watcher in the woods down to you. Meet you at the fence in two shakes.”
Duncan said nothing, just watched the spectacle as the two five-footers—fully clad in camouflage suits made up of burlap, twigs and grass—marched the much larger man-boy towards the road. His kinked and matted locks flopped atop his head, keeping tight cadence with each labored step. A poor man’s dreadlock job, Duncan mused. If that’s what you call ‘em on a white guy. He hoped to see Daymon again. Posing that question would make for one hell of an ice breaker. Maybe it’d even allow the old man the opportunity to apologize for referring to the ex-firefighter’s fine mane of dreadlocks as a spider. At least he hadn’t named it Charlotte, he thought. That would have really gotten things started on the wrong foot.
As it was, if Duncan’s memory served, Daymon had been like a little clam when they’d first met—quiet and wound tighter than the Blue Angels flying in formation. He warmed up slow, but once you got to know the kid he was all right. The kind of guy you could call solid.
Pushing the thoughts to the back of his mind, he stepped to the barbed wire, placed a boot on the bottom strand and pulled the middle up, creating an opening half the size of their sunburned prisoner.
Getting the blindfolded biggun through the fence was easier said than done. With Phillip pulling far less than his weight, and the girls pushing on far more than theirs, they finally got it done. The whole endeavor made certain Duncan would be taking a handful of Tylenol later— quite a few more than “the doctor’s recommended dose.”
“So, darlin’,” Duncan drawled. “What was this sack of shit doin up there?”
Jamie removed her boonie hat; the overlapping foliage peeled away with it. Then she handed over the small yellow notepad. “He’s been keeping tabs on us.”
“Phil, why dontcha double check him for weapons, then help Jordan jam him into the back of the Hummer.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Fuck Phil—“
“Sorry Duncan.”
As Phillip gave the white Rasta a thorough searching, a few muffled grunts, most likely an argument of some sort, escaped the kid’s mouth through the oily scrap of burlap clogging his mouth.
Duncan regarded the notepad. Turned it over in his hand. “And what am I to do with this?” he drawled. “Go on an Audubon Society outing?”
“Just look inside,” Jamie said. She donned her hat minus the ghillie overlay, helped Jordan over the fence, then effortlessly scaled it herself, joining the younger woman on the other side.
Duncan read the last two pages, made a face, then stuffed the journal in a cargo pocket. “I’ll take this to Logan and the others see what they make of it.”
“We’ll hang out here a little while and see if anyone comes looking for this turd,” replied Jamie as she arranged the foliage-covered net over her head until just her eyes were visible. “Let’s go, Jordan. Good job up there.”
Duncan watched the two women walk uphill and crest the rise, noting that they had taken a slight deviation so their tracks wouldn’t be as obvious in the tall grass.
Moving gingerly, he slid behind the wheel, then keyed the two-way radio. “Ladies... be sure you shoot first and ask questions later.”
“Copy that Sir,” said Jamie, who by now had melted back into the forest.
Duncan’s brow knitted. Somewhere in the background, overlapped by the woman’s voice, he thought he could hear someone breathing, low and steady. “Logan, that you?” he queried.
Silence.
Duncan keyed the radio. Repeated himself. “Baby bro... that you?”
“Yes,” a voice replied.<
br />
“Gotta let her go. She’s a big girl.”
More silence.
“And she’s probably listening in right now you moron,” Duncan added. Just a little brotherly jab. Then he gazed to the west. Clear. To the east, clear. At Phillip, who by now was in the Toyota, head scanning the road, waiting patiently.
“She knows how I feel,” Logan conceded.
“Well Romeo... harden your heart. We’re on our way with a present.”
“I know,” Logan admitted. “I overheard your entire conversation.”
“You were eavesdropping?” Duncan joked.
Changing the subject, Logan said, “So what do you mean by harden my heart? Are we going to torture him?”
“We’ll see,” Duncan said darkly. “If he doesn’t cooperate... what was it that Malcolm X said? By any means necessary—” He made it a point to speak loudly so the kid in the back seat had something to think about on their long drive to the compound.
A rustle of clothing and some grunting emanated from the back of the Humvee.
Duncan smiled and fired up the engine. Then he got Logan back on the two-way. “One more thing— I know you were a good little packrat before the shit hit the fan— but what I’d really like to hear is that you went and stocked up on a good amount of ammunition for that big Barrett sniper rifle of yours.”
“I’ve got some,” Logan said.
Duncan smiled. He knew Logan’s favorite store had always been Costco. Therefore, Logan’s idea of some had always been a little different than most everyone else’s.
“How many is some,” Duncan asked.
“Five... maybe six hundred rounds. Why?”
“If this new toy of ours makes it down the road without getting wedged between a couple of trees, you’ll see.” Duncan stuck his arm out the window and waved Phillip ahead. He kept track of the Land Cruiser in the rearview, watched as it passed on the right, then stopped short. Phillip moved quickly; he opened the hidden gate and hopped back inside. He drove the rig through and waited for Duncan, who tucked his ride close to the Toyota’s bumper, entrusting Phillip to batten down the hatches behind them.
Again Logan’s voice crackled through the radio. “What is this new toy you’re bringing back?” Then he cleared his throat dramatically. “I’m afraid to hear an answer though. If a Department of Homeland Security Black Hawk is not enough toy for you, old man... what is?”
“You’ll see,” Duncan intoned. He smiled as he pictured Logan sitting in the communications area back at the compound, wondering what in the hell his older brother was up to this time. And even though the story of a cranky Air Force first sergeant freely giving away a helicopter so he could ferry himself to Utah was one hundred percent above board, he was certain Logan hadn’t bought it. Furthermore, Duncan knew without a doubt that in Logan’s mind, his retelling of his flight from Portland, Oregon to Schriever AFB in Colorado also required a tall pair of hip waders.
Duncan’s smile turned to laughter as he visualized his much younger brother madly twisting his handlebar mustache, which, while they spoke, was probably slowly turning gray from worry. After their mom—who had perfected the art—Logan was the next biggest worrier in the family. Always had been. And at times Duncan wondered how crazy the Winters’s household would have been if him and Logan had been closer in age. The one thing he was certain of, his dad would have gone crazy with two worrywarts in the house while he was tear-assing all over southeast Asia with a Huey Gunship strapped to his ass. Because Lord knows their mom’s constant worrying had been more than enough to age their father prematurely, and then the new baby coming along when the two were in their mid-forties had vastly accelerated the aging process.
A pall fell over Duncan as he reflected on their passing. Both were in their mid-sixties when they’d passed, much too young considering all of the Hollywood pukes who lived to be in their nineties while still banging girls in their twenties. He shook his head. Hell, the world was an unfair motherfucker.
Yep, his parents lost out. They had barely inched into their golden years when the Reaper took them, six months apart—inexplicably, both in their sleep. Hadn’t even made a dent in their retirement savings. In the end, the nest egg had been split between him and his brother. Logan built the compound with his half of the inheritance. He believed the Y2K bug was coming and was destined to knock the world on its collective butt; consequently, this worry nurtured within him an overwhelming urge to spend it on something tangible. And a handful of Conex shipping containers and the land to plant them seemed reasonable at the time. Especially since Logan feared that money would soon become worthless—nothing but unreadable data contained on dead hard drives within dead computers.
Duncan, on the other hand, burned through his cash in a blur. Two hundred and fifty grand. Vegas, Reno, Lake Tahoe—pretty much anywhere he could drown his sorrows and gamble away the money, which had become a constant nagging reminder of yet another cruel cosmic joke played on the Winters’s family. If only I was as emotionally mature as Logan, he thought. Then maybe I’d have something to show for all of Mom and Dad’s hard work. He wasn’t proud of many of the things he had done in the past but he was proud of Logan, and when they had been reacquainted a handful of days ago, he had never been happier. The kid had his unconditional love and that wasn’t a one-way street. In fact, their parents’ deaths had brought them closer together for a spell, until life had once again separated them. Duncan was not only grateful for how Logan had spent his inheritance and the relative safety the compound afforded, he also considered himself lucky that he’d found his last remaining kin. Now that they were reunited, he’d do anything to ensure baby bro’s safety—even if it meant making the ultimate sacrifice.
After the last few crater-sized potholes sent spasms through Duncan’s lower back and elicited pain-filled moans from the trussed and blindfolded prisoner in the back seat, the gravel feeder road finally spit the Humvee into the clearing-cum-makeshift-airstrip.
Chief, Gus, and Lev stood in the sun looking like kids on Christmas morning, eagerly awaiting their parents’ blessing to tear into their presents.
But Duncan didn’t stop. Instead, to confuse his prisoner, he drove the length of the airstrip, then spun a U-turn when the packed dirt stripes ran out. He sped back towards the mystified trio, zig-zagging to and fro across the runway. For good measure he made two more similar passes and finally parked near the waiting men and killed the engine. When he emerged from the military Humvee he pressed a vertical finger against his lips and gestured for the men to approach.
Chapter 24
Outbreak - Day 15
Schriever AFB
Colorado Springs, Colorado
Bang! Bang! Bang! The three sharp raps, loud enough to wake the dead, rattled the screen door.
Brook padded across the room and snatched up her M4. Since she wasn’t expecting anyone to drop by, her mind rapidly flicked through every scenario she could think of. Annie didn’t like to venture out with the baby, especially with the Elvis guy still not accounted for. Cade had said he wouldn’t be back until around dinner time. She flicked her gaze to Raven, who was staring wide eyed from a top bunk five feet away. She checked the safety. On. Flicked the lever over to fire. The rifle is now hot, she thought. Only it wasn’t her inner voice that she heard, it sounded more like Cade was speaking in her head. She kept the barrel trained on the floor, eyes riveted to the door.
“Who is it?” she said, lowering her voice a few octaves so as to sound intimidating. She stole a sidelong glance at the stray Australian Shepherd that she had somehow been convinced they had to adopt. Max was on his belly, white teeth bared, hackles raised. So far he hadn’t growled or barked and seemed to be focusing on the door handle. Good dog, Brook thought to herself.
Following the urgent knocks, a muted male voice called out, “I’m looking for Brooklyn Grayson.”
Bang! Bang! Bang!
“Who is looking for Brooklyn Grayson?” she said, this time without a
ltering her voice. She brought the rifle to her shoulder and trained it at the door, midway between the handle and the middle set of hinges. Exactly where she assumed center mass would be on her gentleman caller.
Again the voice called out, much louder this time. “It’s Wilson. I ran into you in the mess at breakfast time.”
Amazing, Brook thought. Now the kid’s stalking me. “What do you want?” she bellowed.
“Open the door. This is effin important!” he hollered back.
She lowered her rifle, flicked it safe and motioned for Raven to unlock the door, all the while her face conveying a look urging the twelve-year-old to be careful.
Raven flashed her usual ‘I got this, Mom’ smile. Meanwhile, Max let out a lone growl that Brook interpreted to mean that he also had their back.
Bright light cut into the room followed by the gangly redhead. He removed his hat, and nodded at Raven first. “Thanks,” he said to her. Then he skipped the formalities and addressed Brook. “I have something very important to show you.” He kept his eyes locked with Brook’s, reached a hand into the hip pocket on his cargo shorts, and came out with the thumb drive, its metal case reflecting the sunlight streaming in the open door.
Brook stared at him, then at the metal object that he was holding in her line of sight. “Come inside,” she said. Raven closed the door, maneuvered around the visitor and plopped down on her mom’s lower bunk.
Wilson handed the device over. “If this is what I think it is... everyone on this base is going to shit a brick.” He smiled, a big toothy grin made whiter by his sunburned face.
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