A Question of Intent Page 11

  "I need to hit the computers," Cody said, bringing his mouth down to hers once more. "I'll see you at the hangar for the pretest briefing."

  He intended a quick farewell, a last taste to take with him to his tiny office at the clinic. He should have anticipated the swift punch to the gut that hit him every time he kissed this woman.

  His timing really sucked, he thought as they headed in different directions. Both he and Jill were involved in a mission essential to national defense. The last thing either of them should have on their minds was sex. Yet all he had to do was feel her mouth under his and his entire body went on red alert. Hell, who was he kidding? He didn't need a taste. A mere glimpse of her honey-colored hair or trim, tight behind got him hard.

  He'd told her the flat-out truth a few moments ago. Like the virus that had hit Ed Santos, Jill Bradshaw had worked her way into Cody's system. She was in his head, in his blood.

  Grimacing at his less-than-poetic phrasing, he unlocked the door to the clinic and flicked on the lights. With Santos back on the job and no other patients to tend, the small dispensary had reverted to standby mode. The hospital corpsman assigned to the site would report to the hangar to provide medical coverage during the test, as would Cody.

  First, though, he wanted into the Center for Disease Control database. He'd already searched it for recently reported cases of illnesses with unidentified causes and symptoms similar to Ed's. Now that Decker Labs had reported the specific serological characteristics of this new strain, though, the CDC computers might have matched it with other cases across the country.

  Luckily, every workstation in the clinic was equipped with high-speed, encrypted laptops that would access just about every reputable medical database. The Pegasus site was too remote and the clinic staff too limited to rely solely on their collective knowledge. These sleek little computers put the entire medical universe at their fingertips.

  A universe, Cody discovered after a half hour of determined searching, that apparently didn't include any outbreaks of high fever, dizziness, and nausea caused by the same bug that had hit Ed Santos. Blowing out a long breath, he shut down the computer and left the clinic.

  The warm, dry night was fast giving way to a hot, dry dawn. Cody angled a glance at the mountains to the east. The slopes were still black as pitch, but the jagged peaks were backlit by spears of red and gold. In a few hours Pegasus would race toward those steep slopes and attempt to conquer them.

  His pulse quickening, Cody joined the stream of personnel hurrying into the dining hall for a quick breakfast before assembling for the test.

  Captain Westfall had informed his senior staff he wanted them at Test Control for the prebrief by 0730.

  Jill came right from guard mount and arrived first. She'd reviewed the test plan with her personnel, deployed the necessary teams to the higher elevations and had Sergeant Barnes and another chase team standing by with their newly modified Humvees.

  Excitement thrumming through her veins, she greeted the technicians manning the various monitoring stations. "Mornin' team. Everyone ready for a good run?"

  "We're ready."

  It sure looked like it from where Jill stood. Their racks of black boxes were lit up like Christmas trees, blinking red, glowing green, blipping gold dashes. The screens at each station displayed a similar rainbow of colors. If Pegasus so much as burped during his dash up the slopes, his handlers would know it instantly.

  Kate showed up at Test Control a few minutes later. Unlike Jill, who wore her standard uniform of black beret, boots, BDUs, and her heavily laden bat belt with its assortment of police equipment, Kate was in khakis. Her flaming hair was neatly braided and tucked under a black ballcap that sported the red, white and blue Pegasus shield on its crown. She greeted Jill with a smile, excitement evident by the glint in her green eyes.

  "Big day today."

  "Sure is."

  "If Pegasus jumps this hurdle, he'll only have one more land-based test before he gets to try his wings."

  Jill knew the schedule. The next—and final—land test included sending Pegasus galloping through clouds of simulated nuclear, chemical and biological hazards. Cody would switch from physician to nuclear-biological-chemical expert mode for that particular test.

  And if Pegasus passed the final land test, Ditech would have lost out on any chance to get in on the multimillion-dollar project.

  One more blow for Cody's former father-in-law. Jill had followed up on the tip passed to her by the research assistant at Decker Labs and checked out Jack Conway. If she'd read the financial reports right, Ditech had started a steep downward slide in recent years. Conway's attempt to profit from the recent an-tianthrax hysteria had only added to the slide, draining both funds and talent until Cody marshaled the board votes necessary to terminate the research. Jill had a feeling the doc wasn't on Conway's Christmas list anymore.

  The door to the Control Center opened with a wrench.

  "No, Major, I'm not prepared to alter the parameters for the first over-water test."

  Her eyes stormy, Cari entered the center. Russ McIver followed hard on her heels. The marine's face was set in tight lines under the brim of his BDU field cap. He gave Kate and Jill a curt nod and sent his gaze back to the woman who was fast becoming his nemesis.

  "If we maximize the load, we'll get a better read of how Pegasus handles with a full insertion team aboard."

  "First we have to know how he handles without sixteen heavily armed Marines riding in his belly."

  Jill wouldn't have thought Mac's jaw could torque any tighter. She was wrong.

  "All I'm suggesting is that you increase the ballast by another five hundred pounds."

  Cari drew herself up to her full height, which left her a good twelve inches short of the stiff-backed marine. "I'll discuss the matter with Captain West-fall."

  "Do that, Lieutenant."

  The two combatants retired to opposites sides of the Control Center, leaving Kate to arch a brow at Jill. Neither commented on the frosty relations between the Coast Guard and the Marine Corps, however, since the door opened once again to admit more of the senior staff. Cody arrived, as did Ed Santos, now fully recovered. The contractor's senior test pilot came next, followed by Captain Westfall and the Army officer who served as his exec.

  The captain's glance skimmed the center, noting the staff members present. Everyone but the AF rep, Bill Thompson, had now assembled. Westfall's gaze cut to the large-display digital clock in the center bank of black boxes.

  "We'll kick off the prebrief as soon as Colonel Thompson arrives. I suggest you fill your coffee mugs while we wait. Once we commence, there will be no breaks."

  He made the suggestion in his normal voice, which had all the resonance of a rusty bucket dropped down a deep well, but Jill could see he wasn't particularly pleased that his second-in-command was late.

  She snagged a ceramic mug emblazoned with the cadre's shield and hit the coffeepot. Mug in hand, she moved to a niche between stands of black boxes. When Cody followed, Jill gave herself permission to imagine the play of his muscles under his crisply pressed khakis. For a moment. Only a moment.

  "How did your computer search go?" she asked, sternly banishing the image of his naked chest and strong, corded thighs.

  "It didn't. If our particular variation of the virus has struck anyone else, the Center for Disease Control has no record of it."

  "That sounds like a plus to me. Maybe this little sucker is so rare and isolated it won't manifest itself again."

  "Maybe."

  Jill didn't want to stand in the way of medical research, but she sincerely hoped Ed Santos's bug had made its one and only appearance in this corner of the desert.

  Her hopes took a nosedive not twenty minutes later, after a noticeably irritated Captain Westfall tried to contact Colonel Thompson via his eBook communicator. When Thompson didn't respond, Westfall turned to his staff.

  "Anyone seen Colonel Thompson this morning?" "I saw him when I came back
from my run," Kate volunteered. "He was up and ready for the test but..."

  "But what?"

  "His face was flushed. I asked him if he was feeling okay. He said he was fine, just still a little heated from his morning workout."

  Frowning, the captain sent his exec to Thompson's quarters. The young Army officer reported back within minutes.

  "He's not in quarters. The door was unlocked, so I went inside and conducted a search."

  Westfall whipped around to Jill. She already had her communicator off her belt.

  "I'm on it, sir." Keying the transmit button, she raised Rattler Control. "I need a location for Colonel Bill Thompson. ASAP."

  An uneasy silence gripped the senior staff members until the MP desk responded.

  "We've got him, Rattler One. He's here on-site, lust twenty or so meters from where you're standing. Looks like he's stationary. Want us to send someone lo make contact?"

  "I'll do it."

  She found the colonel behind one of the modular units, lying facedown in the dirt.

  Chapter 11

  Jill dropped to her knees beside the Air Force officer. She didn't touch him, unsure at this point what had brought him down.

  "Bill?"

  When he made no response, she took his arm and gently rolled him over. The blue tinge to his lips stopped the breath in her lungs.

  "Oh, no!"

  She pressed two fingers to the side of his throat. No pulse. Her chest tight, she keyed her communicator.

  "Control, this is Rattler One. We have what looks like a S-77. Advise Doc Richardson I'm starting CPR and get him here, fast!"

  Waiting only for Rattler Control to acknowledge the coded signal indicating possible cardiac arrest, Jill threw the communications device aside. Her hands shook as she turned Bill's head to one side to clean his mouth of any obstructing matter. Repositioning him with his head back and his chin up, she pinched his nose, drew in a deep breath and closed her mouth over his. She blew in once, twice.

  Again she felt for a pulse.

  Still none.

  Her heart pounding, she rose up on her knees and found the notch at the base of his breastbone. She stacked her hands above the notch, one on top of the other, locked her fingers, and pressed down.

  "Fifteen-one, fifteen-two, fifteen-three..."

  She was sweating by the time she counted out the fifteen compressions. Panting, she pinched Bill's nose again and stooped to breathe into him.

  Once. Twice.

  "Come on," she pleaded, stacking her hands once more. "You've got a wife and two kids. Come on, dammit!"

  She was on her third set of compressions when she heard the thud of running footsteps. Cody rounded the back of the building, one of his hospital corpsman hard on his heels.

  "We'll take him, Major. Move aside."

  Sagging with relief, Jill yielded her place. Cody dropped down beside the colonel and swiftly took his vitals.

  "No blood pressure, no pulse, no respirations. We'll need the AED."

  "Yes, sir."

  Jill stood clear while the medic flipped open the lid on the AED—the Automated Emergency Defib-rillator. Small, portable kits like this one were now carried on most commercial aircraft as well as being readily available in airports, schools, gambling casinos, and major sports facilities. Jill had purchased several of the inexpensive units for her detachment on the off chance one of the patrols working a remote section of the site might run into trouble. She'd also made sure her people had been trained in its operation.

  This was the first time, though, she'd seen one put to use in anything other than a classroom situation. Her fists clenched at her sides, she watched Cody yank down the zipper on the colonel's flight suit and drag up his undershirt. A quick peel pulled the backing from the adhesive electrodes. Once they were affixed to Bill's chest, the AED's computer interpreted his heart rhythm and returned an almost instantaneous, metallic-sounding response.

  "Press shock button."

  Cody pushed the blinking red button. The jolt arched Bill's back and brought him off the ground. Thankfully, it also jump-started his heart.

  "We've got a pulse. Let's intubate."

  Jill murmured a silent prayer of thanks. Slumping against the wall of the modular unit, she watched while Cody worked a plastic tube down the colonel's throat. As soon as it was in place, the corpsman attached a tube with a dangling bag. The other end of the tube was connected to a small, portable oxygen bottle.

  Relief sliced into Jill like a blade when the bag began to slowly inflate, then deflate.

  Almost as soon as Cody had the colonel stabilized, he ordered an air evacuation to the Cardiac Care Unit at Kirtland. While his corpsmen loaded the patient aboard the helo, he instructed Jill to rinse her mouth thoroughly with antiseptic, then briefed Captain Westfall. The naval officer stood beside Cody at the helo pad, his face carved in granite as the doc pitched his voice to be heard over the whine of the chopper's engines warming up.

  "Bill had an irregular heartbeat. Nothing major, and nothing that required medication. Under normal circumstances, it wouldn't have caused him any trouble. But preliminary indications are his temperature spiked so high it caused a severe arrhythmia, which in turn led to the heart attack. We won't know how much damage was done to the heart muscle until we get him into CCU."

  "Do you think this sudden high fever was caused by the same bug that hit Ed Santos?"

  "That's my guess."

  The captain's jaw tightened. "Bill hasn't left the compound since he arrived. That means he picked up the virus here on-site."

  Cody had reached the same conclusion within seconds of arriving at the scene. "I've told my folks to check the water containers again and do a thorough sweep of the dining hall. We've got to identify the source of the contamination. In the meantime, we'd better be prepared for the virus to infect more of our folks."

  Westfall nodded, his expression grim.

  Cody glanced at the chopper, saw the pilot give a thumbs-up, ready-to-go signal. "I'll get back to base as soon as I can."

  He stayed with Bill Thompson until the Air Force officer was coherent enough to understood his condition. Not only would he be unfit to return to duty anytime soon, it was doubtful he'd ever climb back into a cockpit. Glum but thankful to be alive, Thompson didn't recall being bitten by any ticks or mosquitoes, nor did Cody find any evidence of insect bites on his body. He did, however, admit to feeling dizzy during his workout at the gym that morning.

  "Why didn't you report to the dispensary?" Cody wanted to know.

  "I was going to, but the dizziness let up," the macho pilot admitted sheepishly. "When it hit again, it came on so hard and fast, I just folded."

  Cody was in the air and en route back to the Pegasus site a little past 3:00 p.m. Midway through the flight, he received word that another member of the test cadre was at the clinic, complaining of a headache and dizziness.

  "It's one of my troops," Jill informed him when she met him at the helo pad. "Private First Class Harris."

  Clamping her hand over her beret to keep it from being blown away by the still-rotating blades, she lengthened her stride to match Cody's.

  "He was up in the mountains with one of the chase teams. I deployed two, well before the scheduled test run. Harris started feeling whoozy about an hour after he got in place but tried to tough it out."

  Like Bill Thompson.

  "We'll have to advise the rest of the test cadre not to play chicken with this virus," Cody said tersely. "It's too potent and too fast acting."

  "Captain Westfall scrubbed today's test run," Jill informed him.

  "I heard." Frowning, Cody started up the steps to the clinic. "A wise decision under the circumstances."

  "Doc!"

  He paused on the top step. "Yes?"

  Concern darkened Jill's eyes to a deep coffee ; brown. "Harris is a good man. I'd hate to lose him."

  "You won't," he stated with more confidence than he felt at the moment. He forced himself to r
elax his taut muscles and gave her a belated pat on the j back. "You did great this morning, by the way. Really great."

  "Thanks."

  "Bill said to tell you he'll deliver a dozen roses and a big, fat kiss as soon as he's back on his feet."

  "Well, that gives me something to look forward to."

  "With any luck, I'll deliver before Bill does."

  The drawled promise stayed with Jill long after she returned to Rattler Control. At guard mount later that evening, she briefed her people on the status of both Colonel Thompson and Private Harris.

  "Don't try to macho this thing out," she added, mindful of Cody's advice. "If you start feeling dizzy or nauseous or achy, let someone know and report to the clinic immediately if you're able. If not, we'll come get you."

  As she did most evenings, Jill drove her souped-up four-wheeler out into the desert to do a perimeter run and spot-check her patrols. The night was still and calm and so decked with stars it was hard to believe she'd fought desperately for a man's life only this morning.

  "That was a close one, Goof."

  The plastic toy Velcro'ed to the dash of her vehicle bobbed its head in acknowledgment.

  "Too close," she murmured, only now allowing herself to feel the aftershocks. She slowed the ATV and waited for the tremors to subside.

  It was close to midnight when she stopped by the clinic. The latest word from Albuquerque was that Bill Thompson was holding his own against the virus that had aggravated his heart murmur and sent him into cardiac arrest. So, thankfully, was Private Harris. Jill found the MP asleep in a cocoon of strategically placed cooling packs. An IV dripped a glucose solution into his veins to replace the liquids he'd lost to uncontrollable sweats.

  Cody joined her a few moments later.

  "Isn't there anything else we can do for Harris?" she asked.

  "Our primary objective is to break the fever. Once he gets past that, recovery should be quick."