Kitabı oku: «The Hunted», sayfa 3

Chapter 3

“You’re at a church? You’re kidding, right?” The incredulous voice of Second Lieutenant Nick Prescott blared out of the satellite phone.

Chuckling, Sebastian swept his gaze over the single-story brick building a hundred yards away. Two simple wooden crosses were the only hints that it was a church, one adorning the door, the other affixed on the roof. A yellow glow spilled out of the window at the side of the structure, telling Sebastian that the elderly priest who’d shown him hospitality was still awake in his quarters.

“No joke,” he replied. “Though technically I’m in a barn.”

He glanced behind him at the darkened entrance of the little barn he’d be spending the night in. He’d already scouted the area to make sure it was safe, and now he was looking forward to collapsing on the big pile of hay in that empty stall and falling asleep listening to the snorts and neighs of the priest’s two Appaloosa mares.

“So you ran out of gas, and instead of hiking to the nearest gas station, you decided to spend the night in the San Marquez countryside?” Nick’s confusion only seemed to deepen. “And since when do you not carry an extra gas can with you? You’re like the poster boy for always prepared.”

“I had an extra can,” he muttered, swallowing a rush of frustration. “Someone stole it. Most likely one of the patients at the clinic, because I can’t imagine anyone on staff robbing the reporter who’s there to write a story about them.”

And if he hadn’t been so distracted by Julia Davenport’s big hazel eyes, maybe he would have noticed the missing gas container when he was leaving the clinic.

Fortunately, once the Jeep could no longer run on fumes, at least it had the decency to break down near this church.

“Fine. That doesn’t explain why you’re not walking to the gas station as we speak.”

Sebastian stifled a sigh. He couldn’t explain why he needed this respite. It didn’t make much sense—he definitely couldn’t afford to be lazy right now. Unless he wanted to spend the rest of his life on the run, he needed to find out who wanted him dead, and to do that, he had to learn everything he could about Project Aries and the mysterious virus Richard Harrison had been testing on those villagers.

But this was the first time in a long time he’d been alone. Without Tate or Nick lurking around, without that feeling of urgency weighing down on him. Not that the situation was any less urgent. It was as critical as ever. It just didn’t feel so … smothering at the moment.

A part of him wished he had stuck around in Valero, maybe talked Julia Davenport into having a cup of coffee with him.

Oh, fine, who was he kidding? He would have talked her into going to bed with him.

He’d been thinking about the woman all damn night, and he still couldn’t figure out how a skinny, overworked doctor could get his blood going like this. Hell, he’d barely even blinked when he’d met the drop-dead gorgeous Eva Dolce last month, and Eva oozed sex appeal. Julia Davenport was pretty, sure, but she wasn’t sex incarnate or anything.

So why had he been having X-rated thoughts about the woman ever since he’d left the clinic?

A sigh lodged in his throat. It was probably a good thing he hadn’t stuck around. Sex had the power to be distracting as hell, and at the moment, he couldn’t afford any distractions.

“I’ll catch a boat tomorrow morning,” he told Nick. “There’s no reason for me to rush, anyway. This malaria thing was a false alarm.”

“It would help if we knew what symptoms to look for. We don’t know a damn thing about the virus that killed those people in Corazón.” Nick grumbled in aggravation. “Are you sure Cruz didn’t offer any other details about the state of those bodies?”

“You can keep asking that question a hundred more times, Prescott, but it won’t change the damn answer. Cruz said the only visible signs of illness were nosebleeds and some foaming at the mouth. That’s it.”

The irony of the situation didn’t escape him. All the information they had on the virus had come from a source that could hardly be considered trustworthy—Hector Cruz, the former leader of the ULF, who was now very much dead thanks to Tate. But although Cruz had been responsible for killing Tate’s brother during that ill-fated mission in Corazón, the rebel leader had insisted that he hadn’t laid a finger on his countrymen and women, whose dead bodies had been strewn all over the village.

Cruz and his men had apparently burned the bodies in case they were contagious, but Sebastian still wished he’d seen the evidence of a disease with his own eyes rather than having to take a dead man’s word for it.

“Well, it probably isn’t something that’s found in nature,” Nick was saying, still sounding incredibly irritated. “Harrison headed up the biological weapons department at D&M Initiative, so we have to assume the virus he was testing was manufactured.”

Sebastian let out a breath. “Yeah, and it’s probably a mutated strain of something or other, which means it’s doubtful there’s an existing vaccine for it.”

Nick’s answering breath was equally glum. “Can’t be government-sanctioned either. President Howard has been firm about his position on the manufacturing of biological weapons.”

Unlike his glass-half-full counterpart, Sebastian was far more cynical. “Oh, this is government. But my guess is Mr. President knows nothing about it. I think we’ve got a bad apple trying to poison the rest of the tree.”

“Maybe.” Nick mumbled an uncharacteristic curse. “Look, just get your ass back here, Seb. Eva and her hacker friend are looking into Project Aries and trying to find out who worked on it. Once we have some names, Tate says you and I should go stateside and do some digging.”

His brows shot up. “The captain actually thinks it’s safe for us to go home?”

“The captain is tired of being on the run, and anxious to marry the love of his life,” Nick replied dryly.

“And perfectly willing to risk our necks to make it happen, I see.” The remark was only half-serious. He knew that Captain Robert Tate would gladly sacrifice his own life for his men, and Sebastian wholly returned the sentiment. Tate and Nick were the only friends he had in this godforsaken world.

“Okay, well, let me get back first and we’ll figure out our next move from there,” he said.

“Sounds good. Be careful, Seb.”

“Always am, Nicky.”

He disconnected the call and shoved the sat phone into his waterproof duffel, then slung the bag over his shoulder and headed for the open doorway of the unlit barn.

He was just crossing the threshold when the whir of helicopter rotors echoed in the air. Narrowing his eyes, Sebastian gazed up at the inky sky, and sure enough, glimpsed bluish lights winking amid the black backdrop. A second later, a military chopper whizzed overhead, followed by a second chopper, and then a third.

Huh. Well, that couldn’t be good.

No sooner had the bleak thought entered his mind than the sound of car engines rumbled in the night air.

He didn’t bother ducking out of sight; he was shrouded by shadows, so nobody would be able to spot him all the way from the road. Chewing on the inside of his cheek, he watched as half a dozen Jeeps sped along the one-lane dirt road. He couldn’t make out individual passengers, but the sea of navy blue-and-gold uniforms said it all. San Marquez military.

“Now where are you hurrying off to, boys?” he murmured, eyeing the scene in interest.

Probably some skirmish with the ULF that needed to be handled, or at least that was what he guessed until he noticed three black medic vans sandwiched between the passing Jeeps. The vans were the equivalent of an American ambulance, yet the sirens weren’t wailing, and the headlights were off.

Sebastian frowned. If the military was responding to an emergency, why go out of its way to make the ambulances less conspicuous? They should be plowing full speed ahead, lights flashing and sirens shrieking.

Unless the military didn’t want anyone to know there was a medical emergency in progress …

As his shoulders stiffened, Sebastian moved away from the barn with purposeful strides. He took two steps in the direction of his Jeep before remembering that the damn thing was out of gas.

“Damn it,” he muttered.

Because he knew for a fact that the priest didn’t own a car, he had no way of following that military convoy. Not unless he did it on foot, which would be pointless. By the time he tracked the soldiers, whatever emergency they were racing toward could be yesterday’s news.

Crap. He needed a vehicle. He scanned his brain, trying to remember if there were any cars at that farm he’d spotted five or six miles east of the church. Or he could always jog back to the Doctors International clinic and steal one of the pickups that had been parked out front, but the clinic was a good two hours away, so—

A loud snort interrupted his thoughts.

Sebastian glanced at the barn, his jaw tensing as he realized the solution to his problem was right beyond that door.

But … Crap. Would he be signing his own ticket to hell if he stole a horse from a priest?

A heavy sigh slipped out. Yeah, probably.

Not to mention that he hadn’t been on horseback since … damn, since an eighth-grade trip to that dude ranch in Wyoming.

But, hey, like riding a bike, right?

Decision made, he strode into the barn and made a beeline for the first horse stall. Twenty minutes later, the healthier-looking of the two mares was saddled up and Sebastian was leading the spotted Appaloosa out of her stall.

He made sure to leave five-hundred American dollars on a bale of hay where the old priest would be sure to find it.

“I’m going with you,” Lissa declared, her green eyes glittering with fortitude.

“You’re staying here,” Julia corrected. She shoved a spare flashlight into her backpack, along with an extra package of batteries.

“Jules—”

“Don’t argue with me about this, Lis. Everyone else just got off a forty-eight-hour shift, and Kevin isn’t here. With me gone, that leaves only Nadir and Marie-Thérèse to run the entire clinic by themselves tonight. They need you.”

A frustrated breath flew out of Lissa’s mouth. “Fine. But radio me the second you get there.”

“I will,” she promised.

She zipped up her bag and marched out of the supply room, with Lissa hot on her heels.

“Did Kev say what the emergency was?” Lissa asked.

“No. He didn’t say much of anything.” She pretended to adjust the straps of her bag, just so she wouldn’t have to meet the nurse’s eyes.

Don’t come here.

Kevin’s ominous warning continued to buzz in her mind like a persistent fly, and she couldn’t seem to swat it away. She wanted to tell Lissa about what Kev had said, but she didn’t want to raise a panic. Besides, the radio had been so static-riddled that she might have misheard him.

Don’t come here. Ha. Fat chance. Did he honestly think he could say something like that and she’d actually abide by it? If her friend and colleague was in trouble, there was no chance of Julia staying away.

“I’ll take one of the trucks,” she said, swiping a set of keys from the bulletin board near the front door. “It’ll get me there faster than my moped.”

Lissa still looked unhappy as the two women stepped outside. “Drive carefully, love. And contact the clinic the moment you reach Esperanza.”

“I will.”

She slid into the cab of the pickup and stuck the key in the ignition. It took a few tries for the engine of the old truck to chug to life.

Poking her head out the open window, she waved at the redhead and managed a smile loaded with encouragement she certainly didn’t feel. “I’ll call you when I get there.”

It was pitch-black out as Julia made her way to the main road. The weak glow of the pickup’s headlights didn’t offer much help in lighting the way, but fortunately, she knew these roads like the back of her hand. For the past six months, she’d ridden her moped all over this region, but she still forced herself not to speed as she drove north. Hardly any of the locals who lived around here owned cars, but it wasn’t uncommon for a herd of goats, or a stray cat or dog, to dart into the middle of the road.

Esperanza was about seventy miles northwest in the remote woodlands at the base of the mountain. During the day, the drive would take only an hour or so, but with the low visibility and reduced speed, Julia ended up nearing the little settlement almost two hours later.

Because she hadn’t been able to see more than five feet in front of her during the entire drive, the sudden burst of light that came out of nowhere hurt her eyes.

Squinting, she gaped at the unexpected sight before her.

Military vehicles formed a barricade in the middle of the road, and upright floodlights had been set up in various spots to illuminate the area. Soldiers moved around with purpose, their murmured voices wafting into the open window of her truck. The uniforms identified the men as San Marquez military, but amid the blue and gold she also saw … green?

Her eyes widened as she realized precisely what she was looking at. Americans. Those were American soldiers.

And every single person wore a white surgical mask over his face.

“What the …” She trailed off, unable to tear her eyes off the confusing chaos up ahead.

Seeing as she couldn’t exactly go straight, Julia pressed her foot on the brake and jerked the gearshift into Park, just as a shout rang out.

The next thing she knew, four soldiers were swarming her pickup like crazed fans surrounding a celebrity’s limousine. The driver’s door was thrown open, someone grabbed her arm, and her sneakers landed on the gravel with a thud.

“What are you— Let go of me!” she ordered when a strong male hand circled her upper arm and squeezed it hard. She shrugged the hand off and staggered backward.

“Who are you?” one of the soldiers demanded. She couldn’t see his mouth beneath that surgical mask, but his blue eyes were as cold as an Arctic ice cap, and he’d spoken to her in English. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m Dr. Julia Davenport. A colleague of mine was supposed to—”

Her voice died abruptly as she suddenly noticed something up ahead in the distance.

She wrinkled her brow, trying to make sense of that head-scratching visual. Was that a big pile of garbage bags? What the hell were these soldiers doing with—Body bags. Oh, God. Those were body bags.

As horror whipped up her spine, Julia’s gaze flew to the first person she saw. It happened to be a beefy African-American soldier with shuttered brown eyes and a thick black mustache poking out from the top of his mask.

“What’s going on here?” she asked, her voice sounding far calmer than she felt.

The man didn’t answer. Rather, he grabbed her arm and forcibly moved her away from her truck. “Please come with us, ma’am,” he said in a monotone voice.

Outrage slammed into her. “What? No. I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what’s going on here.”

Her protest was ignored. The grip on her arm tightened.

“I’m an American citizen!” she blurted out. “You can’t just detain me for no reason! I haven’t done anything wrong, damn it!”

She was still shouting out protests as the soldiers dragged her away.

Chapter 4

“What is your business here?”

Julia was grinding her teeth so hard that she was surprised the enamel hadn’t yet filed away to dust. If they asked her that question one more time, she was absolutely going to scream.

For the past hour and a half, she’d been detained in a canvas tent, sitting on an uncomfortable metal chair in the middle of the dirt floor. The chair was the only piece of furniture in the tent, which lent the space a seriously ominous feel. She wasn’t bound, she wasn’t gagged, but the two guards at the entrance and the two soldiers looming over her made it clear that she was a prisoner here.

She had no frickin’ clue what was going on, but it sure as hell wasn’t good. Those body bags out there … Oh, God, and where was Kevin? Where were the people? As she’d been dragged through the village toward the tents set up near the tree line, all she’d seen were soldiers.

Esperanza was deserted. No signs of life. None.

“Answer the question, please.”

Tightening her lips, she met the masked face of one of the soldiers, a tall man who carried himself with so much authority that she knew he must be the one in charge. The surgical masks everyone wore definitely indicated there was some sort of medical emergency in progress, but because nobody was wearing full hazmat suits, she deduced that the mysterious disease that had triggered these precautions probably wasn’t airborne.

“I already answered your question,” she said tersely. “My name is Julia Davenport. I’m a doctor and I run the clinic in Valero. I came here to check on my colleague, Dr. Kevin Carlisle.”

“At this hour of the night?” Suspicion lined the man’s tone. When he crossed his arms over his broad chest, her gaze was drawn to the four stars on the shoulders of his uniform.

She scanned her brain, trying to remember what that signified. Holy crap, he was a general.

Which spoke volumes about the importance of this interrogation.

Angrier than she’d ever been, Julia met her captor’s eyes. “How many more times do I have to answer these same questions? I told you, Dr. Carlisle radioed me. It sounded like an emergency. I was worried. I drove up here to check on him. The end.”

“Watch your tone,” the second soldier ordered.

She shifted her gaze to him, noting that he looked younger than his counterpart and wore a uniform without any insignia. “Oh, gee, was I being rude? Are your other prisoners more polite and agreeable than I am?”

“You’re not a prisoner,” the general replied, sounding annoyed.

“Oh, no?” Arching a brow, she rose from her chair.

The two soldiers guarding the door instantly snapped the barrels of their assault rifles in her direction, their body language becoming menacing.

“That’s what I thought,” she said coolly, then sank back down.

The general’s lips tightened. “Let’s not play games, Dr. Davenport. I need to—”

“Games?” she interrupted. “Are you kidding me? This isn’t a game, for Pete’s sake! Where is my colleague? Why is the village overflowing with body bags?”

As expected, she didn’t receive an answer. Just another question.

“Did you inform any of the staff at the Valero clinic that you were coming up here?”

“No.”

The lie came out smoothly, and there’d been no hesitation on her part. Somehow, she’d known that answering yes to that would be the worst possible thing she could do. As it was, she’d only officially told Lissa about her plans, but the nurse had undoubtedly filled the others in after Julia had left. Maybe it was her paranoia talking, but she had the sinking feeling that these men would send a team of soldiers to the clinic if they thought she’d said anything to her coworkers.

“You left Valero without telling anyone?” The younger soldier looked unconvinced.

“I was alone in my tent when Dr. Carlisle’s distress call came in,” she answered. “My colleagues had their hands full in the clinic with some potential malaria patients, so I just left. I planned on radioing them when I reached Esperanza.”

The men exchanged a look, and then the general gave an imperceptible nod that made Julia’s heart drop to the pit of her stomach. They knew she was lying. Crap.

She decided to distract them. “Why are you wearing masks?” she demanded.

“That is none of your concern,” the general said stiffly.

“Are you kidding me?” she said again, as amazed as she was outraged. “I’m a doctor, and you’re clearly worried that there’s been an outbreak of something. Is it a bacterium? How is it transmitted?”

“Dr. Davenport, we are the ones asking the questions here. Now please tell us, who in Valero knows you came here?”

Disbelief spiraled through her. She shook her head a couple of times, wondering how any of this could possibly be happening, but the more she tried to make sense of the situation, the more afraid she became. Her palms dampened, her body growing cold. Something really, really bad was going on here.

God, Kevin, where are you?

“Dr. Davenport,” the general snapped.

“No,” she snapped back.

He faltered. “No, what?”

“I’m not answering any more questions until I speak to a lawyer.” She scowled at him. “Or to someone who’s willing to give me some answers of my own.”

Then she shut her mouth, crossed her arms over her chest and glared at the two men hovering over her.

After a moment, the general spun on his heel and stalked toward the tent’s entrance. The younger soldier quickly trailed after him.

Both men exited the tent, as did the two guards, but she didn’t fool herself into believing that the latter had gone far. She suspected the guards were right outside those canvas flaps, ready to shoot her down if she tried to escape.

Escape.

What on earth was going on?

And why was she starting to suspect that the only way she was getting out of here would be in one of those body bags lying on the dirt?

Sebastian watched in growing alarm as more body bags were tossed into the back of the wide-load trucks parked at the entrance of the village. He’d counted thirty-five bags in the first truck, and another forty-one in the second. Had to be the villagers. Christ. More dead villagers.

The soldiers in charge of disposal efficiently carried out their task without comment or expression. Sebastian swallowed a rush of disgust, wondering how they justified it to themselves. Probably assured themselves they were good little soldiers simply following orders, and who were they to question orders?

His jaw tightened. Brought to mind all those soldiers in Nazi Germany—they hadn’t questioned much either, had they?

Battling his rising fury, Sebastian crept deeper into the forest, moving through the shadows like a nocturnal predator. Being a black ops soldier meant he possessed the power of invisibility, the ability to sneak right underneath these men’s noses, even slit their throats without anyone knowing he was ever there.

Through the trees, he espied a cluster of khaki-colored tents. The men in charge had set up a headquarters of some sort, and that was the place to be if he wanted answers. The strap of his M4 was slung over his shoulder, but he didn’t reach for the rifle. Rather, he slipped a lethal hunting knife from the sheath on his hip and gripped the ox-bone handle with ease. If he had to eliminate a guard, he preferred to do it quietly.

He neared an opening in the brush and pressed himself up against the rotting bark of a rosewood tree. His position offered a line of sight to the entrance of a tent that two uniformed men had just emerged from. They were tailed by two heavily armed soldiers, and the uniforms marked all four as American. The entire village was crawling with both U.S. and San Marquez military, indisputable evidence that some sort of joint task force was in effect.

His stomach went rigid as he thought of those body bags. Task force? No, make that joint cleanup crew.

“She’s lying.”

The muffled voice drifted toward him, uttered by—holy hell, a United States Army general. Christ, they’d sent someone that high on the totem pole to handle this cleanup? This was bigger than he’d thought.

He inched closer, struggling to make out the conversation occurring twenty yards away.

“… to Valero. Question the staff, see what Carlisle told them.”

“… necessary? And to contain that many people?”

“Easier if …”

Sebastian’s gut swam with uneasiness. He needed to get closer.

Adjusting his grip on the knife, he moved without making a solitary sound, finding cover behind another tree, this one with low-hanging branches that allowed him to blend into the darkness.

“… the clinic will be handled.”

The clinic? Waves of foreboding crawled up his spine, moving faster and gathering in intensity when the general uttered a very familiar name.

“Davenport needs to be handled, too.”

Sebastian’s shoulders became stiffer than a block of marble. Davenport? As in Julia Davenport? As in the woman he’d spoken to only hours ago?

“… won’t be hard. Her death could be blamed on the virus.”

The general seemed to mull it over. “Carlisle was checking on patients when he died.”

“We’ll say she was here, too. Making the rounds with Carlisle.”

“The powers that be won’t like this. Two dead American doctors? This won’t look good.” There was a savage curse. “But that’s what they get for releasing Meridian this close to a damn international medical facility. Who was the genius who made that call?”

Meridian? Sebastian filed away the word as he watched the duo move away from the tent.

The general glanced at the soldiers manning the entrance. “If she tries to run, shoot her,” he ordered.

Sebastian’s body was strung tighter than a drum as the two men stalked off. If what he’d heard was accurate, then Julia Davenport was inside that tent. How the hell had that happened?

The colleague. Crap. She must have driven up here to check on her colleague, that Kevin guy she’d been worried about earlier.

Her death could be blamed on the virus.

His next breath came out ragged as a jolt of anger slammed into his gut. These bastards were planning to kill Julia and blame it on the virus.

No way.

No freaking way would he allow that to happen.

She’s not your objective.

The nagging little voice only further pissed him off. He knew that rescuing the doctor wasn’t his responsibility. Hell, all the mayhem and confusion of the past ten months was a direct result of his unit’s attempt to rescue a doctor. But Harrison’s death was no sweat off his back, not after they’d discovered the man was treating humans like lab rats.

But Julia Davenport? He’d be damned if he was going to let her become another casualty of that goddamn virus. So yes, he ought to be gathering more intel, listening in on more conversations, attempting to get a peek inside one of those body bags, but Sebastian was more than willing to give up any insight he’d find if it meant saving the smart, sassy woman who’d made his body burn today.

The soft hissing sound brought a frown to Julia’s lips. She twisted around in the chair, trying to pinpoint where the noise had come from. She strained her ears, but the sound had stopped.

Tssssss.

Her forehead creased. Okay, what was that?

For a second she wondered if her captors had let loose a poisonous snake in the tent or something. As her heartbeat quickened, she shot to her feet and examined the ground, but she didn’t see a rattler crawling on the dirt.

Tssssss.

She spun around, gaping when she noticed a line slowly appearing in the tent wall.

Someone was cutting the canvas!

Fear and astonishment warred inside her, but the latter quickly overtook the former when a large hand poked through the slit in the tent and a familiar pair of silver eyes suddenly locked with hers.

Julia gasped. “Seba—” Her jaw snapped closed when he swiftly held his index finger to his lips.

A million questions ambushed her brain, but even if he hadn’t ordered her to remain quiet, she suspected she wouldn’t have been able to make her vocal cords work anymore. She was too dumbfounded.

The man who slipped into the tent like a ghost was not the same one she remembered from Valero. Gone were the casual pants and T-shirt. Now he wore a skintight black shirt that clung to the rippled muscles of his broad chest, and black cargo pants encased his long legs. He had black boots on his feet, and a nasty-looking rifle slung over one shoulder, though not as nasty as that blade he skillfully wielded in his hand.

Julia gulped as the sharp steel of the knife winked in the light from the electric lanterns illuminating the tent.

She was looking into the eyes of a warrior. The playful, sensual twinkle from before had vanished. Sebastian Stone was all business now, those gray eyes grim with fierce determination. Waves of strength and danger rolled off his powerful body, making her mouth go dry.

Without a word, he walked toward her and cupped her chin with one hand.

She jumped, then relaxed when she saw the unspoken question in his gaze.

Are you okay?

Julia managed a shaky nod. God, what was he doing here?

And why did she get the feeling that this man was the furthest thing from a freelance journalist?

Sebastian took her arm and led her to the slit he’d created in the tent. “Stay close,” he murmured, his voice so low it was barely audible. “If I say move, move. If I say stop, stop. Do exactly what I tell you, do you understand?”

She stared at him, wide-eyed. And then her pulse took off.

Wait a minute—he was helping her escape?

“This entire village is crawling with soldiers,” she whispered with a violent shake of her head. “They’ll shoot us if we try to run.”

“They’ll kill you if you stay.”

You. Not us. She didn’t miss the distinction, and she suddenly grew queasy. There wasn’t an ounce of confusion on Sebastian’s rugged face, only focused intensity, which told her he must know a hell of a lot more about what was going on here than she did.

So maybe it would be prudent to listen to the man instead of arguing about his plans.

He reached behind him and pulled a black handgun from his waistband. “Do you know how to use one of these?”

She nodded.

He promptly shoved the weapon in her hands. “Good.”

Her heart pounded a frantic beat in her chest as she watched Sebastian carefully part the canvas to peer out. He seemed satisfied by what he saw, because he ducked back in and shot her a firm look.