Base (4 page)

She ignored his husky voice. ‘You have chained me to a bed. It's a fear response.'

‘Sure it is.' He grinned and his eyes crinkled at the sides. ‘Some women get off on this. Being restrained.'

She eyed the pistol at his hip, wishing she had the power to retrieve it.

He followed her gaze, looked down and shook his head. ‘Don't even think about it. I'm double your weight and twice as fast. I'm going to release one of your hands and one of your legs so I can inspect your back.'

When he moved into profile she could see his cock tenting his uniform, so damn stiff it must be uncomfortable. He clearly was enjoying himself, the bastard.

‘This virus is passed on through mucus transferal: bites, scratches, even sex,' she added, lying through her teeth as he undid the cuffs on one hand and foot. She managed to push herself to a partial sitting position.

He pulled her shirt from her shoulders, taking it down to her wrists. After he did so, he bundled her shoulder-length hair in his hands and checked the back of her neck. He switched the light off, unclicked the remaining cuffs and washed his hands in the basin in the corner of the room.

Ruth grabbed her shirt and pulled it together to cover herself. She rapidly followed this by yanking up her jeans. Rich, raw hatred for this man consumed her. If she could get at his gun, she'd shove it in his face and blow his brains out.

The captain looked at his watch. ‘It's time for dinner.'

‘I'm not hungry.'

‘You'll come with me just the same. You've been bitten. I think you're past the period of contamination but just to be safe, I'm not letting you out of my sight.'

Chapter 3

Jack accompanied Ruth to the Mess hall with Lieutenant Vassar following behind. As far as physical examinations went he'd never examined anyone so heart-stoppingly stunning, but he'd earned her enmity. The woman was a firecracker waiting to explode. Her red hair, after he'd run his hands through it, had become riotous curls. There were pink spots highlighting her cheeks and her bright, blue-eyed gaze was sharper than the knife he kept strapped to his leg. He'd faced insurgents in Afghanistan who'd wanted him dead, but from the way Ruth looked at him, she'd choke him on his own balls first.

She clearly didn't like to follow rules, but if Ruth planned to live, she'd have to get used to his orders. Better to hit her hard with them early and keep her safe because he'd never seen a situation so intense. Even the military radio systems were down. He couldn't raise anyone in the city. The base on Watson's Bay peninsula wasn't responding. Surely this couldn't be the last of humanity? A hundred guys, a few women and a redhead who wanted him dead?

His men stood and saluted when he entered the Mess. He led Ruth to the officers' table and pulled out a chair on his right for her. She sat, her mouth mutinous. Sue sat at a table full of young recruits. She flashed a smile at him and even Lea seemed animated as Lieutenant Armstrong chatted to her. In a fix, Armstrong was the guy to have by your side. Jack was glad his mate was enjoying a moment's down time. Armstrong, the blond god, the men called him due to his immaculate appearance, was his bravest, most loyal man. He hoped the women would see the ceremony tonight was necessary. Every man had to be kept motivated.

The steward placed fish and tinned vegetables in front of him. Hungry, he picked up his knife and fork and began to eat. There was plenty of fish in Balmoral Beach waters and his navy divers were skilled at spearing them, which meant starvation wouldn't be a problem as they had access to the sea. The braindeads had trouble walking on the uneven, rocky shoreline at the bottom of the base. Even better, they couldn't swim.

‘Eat,' he said, turning to Ruth.

She picked up a knife, clenching it like a weapon and turned to him, her eyes glittering.

‘Don't make a fool of yourself,' he said, his voice low. ‘You want to take out your frustration on me privately? Hit me? Kick me?' He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I don't care. I know this is a big change for you, but you play nice in front of my men.'

‘Or what?'

‘Seriously? You want to find out what's it's like to be disciplined in front of a room full of war-seasoned men? Did you enjoy being restrained that much?' He watched as her cheeks flared.

Ruth picked up her fork, speared a piece of broccoli and put it into her mouth chewing mechanically.

‘Good. Eat up. You're going to have to learn not to waste food. The base has its own generators and fuel to last us a year. Water too. But we have to grow our own crops to survive. I plan to keep everything as sane and routine inside the base as I can.'

‘You call what you did to me sane?'

‘You could have cooperated like your friends.' He ate faster than he should, wishing the helping were bigger, because he'd barely had time to eat all day.

‘I hated you touching me.'

There was something stark in her voice that made him wince. ‘You should have done as I asked, then I wouldn't have had to.'

She cut off a tiny piece of fish and raised it to her lips, stopping before she ate it. ‘Promise me, you won't touch me again.'

A single, hot redhead living on a navy base with a hundred adrenaline-charged men in the prime of their lives, and she didn't want to be touched? The men would line up to lick her anywhere she wanted just to get a taste of her. He grinned at the thought. Some people took a while to get a grip on how things had changed. ‘Binding a woman is usually not my thing but you were very sexy restrained like that.' Shit he was getting a hard-on just thinking about it. He couldn't get the image of her out of his mind. Her pussy had been glistening, ready for his cock to plunge into her. ‘I'd rather you invited me for a replay.'

She didn't smile back. Her eyes flashed fire. ‘Let me get this into your thick, navy man head. You will never be invited. You are a disgusting person. You need to promise me, you'll keep the hell away.'

‘I can't promise that. You don't take orders well. I don't know what damn fool thing you're going to do. For an educated woman you're taking a long time to grasp the urgency of what is going on here and the rules you need to adhere to.' Jack noticed the silence around them. He guessed his conversation was a whole lot more interesting.

Ruth slammed down her fork. ‘Don't make me the crazy one in this. You're the one gunning down everyone.'

Jack slid his utensils together to signal to the steward he'd finished, then he took a long sip of beer. He noticed the whole of his table was looking in their direction. ‘Let me make something clear to you. I'm not the bad guy here. You and your friends are alive because of me. You inefficiently knocked down one braindead. What would you have done when she got up? Mosman has thousands of them.'

‘I didn't need your help.'

‘You think so? When braindeads get together they tear a person apart like a pack of starving dogs. More were headed your way. Ever see them feast on a live person's intestines? Think you could cope with a situation like that?'

Her face blanched and for a while she went quiet. Just sat and picked at her food. ‘In the hospital we restrained them. Then things started to get crazy and the military ordered the staff to leave. I heard them shooting the patients.'

‘The military saved your lives. Our orders were to close the hospital, shoot the braindeads, even our own men who were bitten.' He watched as her hand scrunched up her napkin.

‘Look I'm not asking for a thank you. I'd be happy if you wiped that 'I want to kill you' look off your face and think about what skill you have to offer this base. My men risked their lives for you.' He drank his beer, before he wiped his lips with his napkin noticing a spot of congealed blood where she'd hit him.

‘I'm a doctor,' she said with reluctance. ‘I can do all your bite checks. I can treat your sick and injured but I'll work for you on one condition. You don't ever lay a finger on me again.'

She hated him. It oozed from every pore of her body. His life yawned long and lonely in front of him. Each day the same. Fighting a multiplying enemy. Some of the men had eaten a bullet after they'd come home and found their wife and kids dead, or worse, turned. Touching her had made his cock ache but it had gone far deeper than that. She made him want her when he'd thought himself incapable of ever giving a damn about a woman again. It was the way she stood up to him. Engaged him. Sparred with him. He admired her, even if her views were misguided. Maybe her hostility would bring him back to his senses because he didn't want to care. He took a deep breath. ‘You behave yourself. I'll keep my hands off you.'

‘Deal.'

When the meal finished he stood to speak. With the exception of the men guarding the perimeter and the outlying posts, all sailors were in the Mess. ‘Thank you for your hard work today. Thank you to Lieutenants Armstrong and Vassar for guiding the team and clearing Middle Head Road. Today we celebrate not losing one single man.'

The men punched their chests and chanted. ‘Hoo-Yah.'

‘Tomorrow we plan to place roadblocks on all side-streets opening onto Bradley's Head Road right down to the zoo in order to run the surviving animals up to the grazing grounds you fenced earlier. It'll be dangerous work because we don't know what state we're going to find the animals in. Even if we clear the streets, there'll be plenty more braindeads in the mansions so we'll need to secure all entries and exits all the way down the road.'

‘Hoo-Yah.'

‘Before I brief you, I want to welcome Sue, Lea and Ruth to our compound. Sue is a nurse. Lea, an immunologist and lastly, Ruth's a doctor who has agreed to treat our men. I cannot tell you how relieved I am to find people with these important skills. Please make them welcome.'

The sound of the men punching their chests thundered around the room.

Lea gave a shy smile and Sue waved, turning this way and that. Ruth focused on him, narrowed her eyes and glared at him. Nice.

‘This brings the total women we have on the base to eight. I haven't given up hope that we'll find more survivors, who will bring additional skills so that we can have a future that includes a safe place to live, enough food and water and most of all female companionship.'

***

Pussy. That's what the captain was talking about. Ruth's senses went on high alert. Sure, he wasn't tacky enough to use the word instead of companionship, but he might as well have because every man in the room was looking lustfully from Sue to Lea to her. Where were the other five women on this base? Locked in some sex dungeon on some of Jack's weird restraint beds? Her fingernails drummed the table as the captain spoke. She didn't miss that his men wore the same dress code of a navy jacket, white shirt and black pants like the captain, others were in combat uniform. What she'd thought were a ragtag gang of men appeared to be a more cohesive unit.

‘Now we come to the most popular part of the evening. The reward ceremony for the bravest and hardest working men,' Jack said.

Ruth watched as a couple of slabs of beer were carried out and placed on a nearby table. She was surprised to see these were still available, given how Australian men liked to drink. There were also cartons of cigarettes and a terrifying looking machine gun. No doubt the ultimate boy toy accessory.

‘We're well aware that the men who volunteer for extra braindead clearing patrols receive the best rewards. Armstrong. Stand. Vassar.' The captain continued to call out names of the men Ruth had seen on patrol.

The men stood and saluted their captain.

‘We have a choice of rewards tonight. The alcohol cannot be consumed on duty but will be rewarded to you on your rest day. Lieutenant Armstrong. You haven't had a day off in a month. We don't know how many people fled the area when the virus took hold, but we do know that Mosman had a population of 26,000 people. Fortunately, we are well stocked with ammunition. The braindeads are gonna be eating bullets until every single one of them is gone and it is safe to walk the streets. You've shot more of them on patrol than any other man. Choose your reward.'

Ruth recognised Armstrong as the man who had joked about her well-dressed cancer patient, the woman who had tried so hard to preserve her dignity. He'd also locked her and her friends up like animals with no more explanation other than, ‘captain's orders'. He hadn't even offered them water to wet their fear-parched throats. Though not as tall as the captain, he looked like he could have stepped out of The Sound of Music casting call as he stood there in his uniform with perfectly cropped, blond hair and ice-cool, blue eyes. She hoped he suffered one hell of a hangover if he selected the beer. Armstrong looked longingly at the alcohol before turning back to the captain. ‘I'll take Lea, sir.'

‘What!' Ruth gasped.

Lea stood, put her hand to her mouth but said nothing.

‘As you wish, Armstrong. Your duty is to protect her with your life, honour her wishes and serve her to the best of your ability. Lea is the treasure of our base. Most importantly, she was working on a cure for this virus until her lab closed. Our lives, our hopes, our very futures lie in her hands.'

The room erupted with loud cheers and applause.

When the noise calmed down Armstrong saluted his captain, turned and walked towards Lea and took both of her hands. ‘Lea, I will give my life to protect and serve you.'

Lea stood dumb-stuck staring up at Lieutenant Armstrong as if she couldn't believe her ears. It dawned on Ruth that naturally shy Lea was getting more male attention than she'd probably had in her whole life. No wonder she was shell-shocked. At twenty-five, she'd quietly confessed to Ruth she was still a virgin.

Someone had to stop this madness. This crazy male-dominated system that put women on a par with beer or a fancy gun. It made a mockery of everything Ruth had strived to achieve in her own life, all the long hours at medical school and later in the hospital treating bashed women in the trauma section, working with the social work team to organise counselling and a shelter place for them, so they could learn not to accept ill-treatment as their lot. All the years she'd spent in her holidays volunteering on aboriginal missions where her mother had been a doctor, teaching women about contraceptives and control over their own bodies.