Immune (2 page)

But Janet knew. Lucifer might rule in hell, but here on planet earth, Jack Gregory was the reigning killer angel.

As she looked into Jack's face, a chill ran up Janet's spine all the way to her scalp, leaving in its wake a tingle reminiscent of the aftereffects of a jolt from a Taser. Amazing. There was no thrill on earth quite like what she got from staring into those eyes. God, it made her hungry. It made her want to wrap her legs around him and dig her long fingernails into the skin of his bare back. But that would have to wait.

“So we have confirmation?” Jack's voice disrupted her reverie.

Janet nodded. “Yes. The refrigerated truck will depart the special medical lab at Kirtland Air Force Base at midnight, get up on I-25, and head directly back to Santa Fe before turning off toward Los Alamos. It looks like they are going to turn the body over to Dr. Stephenson at Rho Division sometime before dawn, right back here at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.”

Raymond Bronson leaned forward, placing both elbows on the table. “It sure didn't take long after Riles' death for the powers that be to get Priest's corpse transferred to the control of the Rho Project team.”

Jack shrugged. “They are in full-blown cleanup mode. That's why tonight we are going to dirty things up for them.”

Bronson frowned. “Jack, you know I never question your judgment. But don't you think we are really stepping out on the ragged edge on this one?”

“No more than we already are. We are completely out in the cold now. All our government contacts are cut, and we have to make damn sure to keep it that way. Somehow, Jonathan Riles managed to limit knowledge of our involvement to a group that apparently only included himself and David Kurtz.

“If that knowledge hadn't died with the two of them, you can be very sure we would have already had to deal with people sent to make us just as dead. Whoever betrayed Jonathan has to know that Riles had a special field team deployed, but they will assume the team will be doing its best to disappear.”

Bronson shook his head. “Which sounds like a damn good plan to me.”

“Maybe so, but we aren't going to be that cooperative.”

Bobby Daniels, a tall, lanky man with a head as bald as a cue ball, stepped out of the shadows near the window. “I'm game, as always, Jack. We can't live forever.”

Seeing Jack staring at him, Bronson shrugged. “Of course I'm with you. Just thought I'd offer you one last chance to take the easy way out.”

“I'd rather be the hunter than the hunted,” Jack said. “And I want that body.”

Leaning over the table with the one to fifty-thousand scale military maps of the target area spread across it, Jack stuck a pin in a spot on the highway, sticking two others at locations where the terrain contours indicated that line of sight back to the first point terminated.

“Bobby, you'll wait right here, just at this bend in the highway, about a half mile before the ambush point. Bronson, you’ll take the other spot, blocking the highway approach from the opposite side. Remember, when Bobby gives the signal, it'll take between thirty and forty-five seconds before the truck reaches me and you hear me take it down. There shouldn't be much traffic there that time of night, but if there is, you get it stopped.”

“And if a car is too tight to the truck and makes it through before I can get the police detour set up?” Bobby asked.

“I'll deal with that on my end. Let's hope it doesn't come to that though.”

Turning to Janet, Jack continued. “How's the Abdul Aziz recording coming?”

“I've still got about an hour's work left to do. I have the available recordings of his voice, and I'm using as many of his natural phrasings as possible. But for part of it I have to synthesize the vocal patterns in order to create the extra words we need and to keep a natural sounding sequence. By the time I route it through the disposable cell phone, the best analysts in the business won't be able to say for sure whether or not it was manipulated.”

“That's good because even the local nine-one-one operations record everything. And we damn sure want the call recorded.”

“And the chopper?” Bobby asked.

“I'll be appropriating one of the forest service birds from the site just outside Taos. Janet and I will be in it. You two get your hands on a couple of fast dirt bikes.

“Remember, you are going to keep the road blocked for exactly five minutes while Janet and I deal with the truck and its contents. After that, haul ass along this dirt road to the rendezvous point. Dump the bikes into the canyon. We'll be waiting with the chopper in this clearing right here.”

Jack straightened up, handing a marked copy of the map to each of them. “Any questions?”

“Just the usual.” Bronson's cocky grin had returned. “How'd I get so good-looking?”

“Just don't be late,” said Jack. “We'll give you fifteen minutes to reach us before we leave.”

“Wouldn't think of it,” said Bronson as he and Bobby turned to the door.

As soon as the other two had left the house, Jack walked to the closet and retrieved a large box full of personal effects and other items of interest that they had purloined from Carlton “Priest” Williams' house. Two large files of information on Jack and Janet Johnson were among the contents, but it was not these that attracted Jack's attention.

Finding what he was looking for, Jack held up a skull-shaped key ring.

“I think it's time we paid one more visit to Priest's old haunt.”

Janet nodded, her right hand subconsciously checking the Heckler & Koch 9mm Compact strapped beneath her left armpit. The Los Alamos high country was about to heat up.

Jennifer didn't like lying, especially to Mark and Heather. But there was no way she could tell them that she had not been sleeping at all. Not without revealing the reason for her sleepless nights. And that knowledge would freak them out enough to put them both into low earth orbit.

Jennifer paused, her gaze sweeping out over the near-perfect darkness of the canyon and then up to the night sky above. There was no moon tonight to dull her view of the stars and planets that swarmed above her.

The night skies of the high desert of New Mexico were one of the most awesome sights on the planet. The large stretches of open country with no human habitation and the thin air and low humidity of the high altitudes combined to reveal a view that few on the planet had ever seen: a sky so full of stars and planets that it was hard to find gaps between them.

Jennifer loved looking at that sky. She often lay outside, gazing upward, imagining that the sky was down and that she was glued to the ground, gazing downward at the stars. If she were to come unstuck, then she would fall, down and down, past the planets, to the very stars themselves. She pulled her thoughts back from the heavens to gaze down the steep slope.

Her theory had proven correct. The only thing that limited the effects of the neural enhancements each of the three of them had received on their first visit to the Second Ship was their self-image, but that limitation could be overcome by need. Her need had finally driven Jennifer to overcome at least some of her self-imposed limitations.

Only that need had driven her to believe that she could run like she now could. Not as fast or as powerfully as Mark, but fast enough and without tiring. Only that need had let her cast off her glasses and develop her eyesight so that she could now see in the dark almost as well as a cat. Only that need had driven her to lie to her friends and family so that she could sneak out on these nightly runs.

She knew she was risking discovery, should anyone check closely enough to discover the pillows stuffed under the covers on her bed. But her need drove her beyond the timidity that, only weeks before, would have left her a nervous wreck had she even contemplated doing what she now did. She was through playing the meek geek, through playing second fiddle to Mark and Heather.

Jennifer moved down the steep wall of the canyon, passing silently through the brush before turning left along an invisible but thoroughly familiar path. The soft magenta light of the ship cavern enfolded her, the warm glow gentle enough that it did not blind her, despite the darkness from which she had just come.

Ducking under the smooth curves of the ship where it touched the wall, Jennifer moved directly to the spot where the alien weapon had punched a hole cleanly through all the decks of the Second Ship, the edges of the hole so smooth that it looked as if the deck and hull had been made that way. Without pause, Jennifer leaped up to catch the edge of the first deck, swinging her body smoothly up and in.

Continuing onward, she rapidly ascended to the room where the four headsets lay along the curving desktop, each positioned directly in front of one of the chairs that rode the narrow track in front of that table. Jennifer glanced down at the delicate, flexible bands with the small bubble at each end. It was odd, really, the way she, Mark, and Heather always left those headsets in almost the exact position in which they had originally found them. Anything else just didn't feel right.

Jennifer picked up the first of the translucent bands, sliding it over her temples, pausing only momentarily as the feeling of relaxation swept through her body, like a shiver from a cool breeze. Then, once again, she began climbing up through the hole to the decks above.

Even before she had settled into one of the three swivel couches, the imagery that dissolved the smoothly flowing ceiling, walls, and floor of the command deck left her wrapped in the vastness of space itself. It was only a recorded section of this ship's vast travels, but Jennifer loved it.

However, tonight she only allowed herself a brief glance at the wondrous view, shifting her attention to the databanks provided by the ship's onboard library. It was the discovery she had kept secret from the others, telling herself that once she understood how to better access and understand the information it contained, she would reveal the treasure trove to her brother and best friend. And she still intended to do that. Just not yet.

After all, she had only just begun to scratch the surface. With each visit to the ship, Jennifer managed to solve more of the puzzle, each attempt uncovering some little clue that allowed her to delve a little deeper into the ship’s databanks. Not deep enough to uncover anything of great importance, but the progress kept her going, feeding her thirst for knowledge. Not enough to quench it. It merely stoked the fire of her need.

And as Jennifer lay back, engulfed by the alien couch, swimming in a sea of data, that fire burned white hot.

Chital, Pakistan. It had been in the rugged mountains due north of Chital, across the Kunar River, high up along that narrow strip of Afghan land that separated Pakistan from Tajikistan, where Jack had last worn full Arabic garb and carried an AK-47 rifle. Now, as Jack crouched in the darkness overlooking New Mexico Highway 502, just west of the intersection where Highway 30 curled away toward the sleepy town of Espanola, a whisper of déjà vu caressed the nape of his neck.

The Arabic clothing, the AK-47, and the weapons selected for this raid had all come from the special locker Jack had uncovered at the remote hideaway, which had formerly been used by one Carlton “Priest” Williams. That weapons locker had been one of many unusual discoveries Jack had made upon tracking down the site the day after he had killed Priest.

Priest had always been overconfident. It was one of many unprofessional aspects of the ex-Delta Force commando that Jack had despised upon first meeting the man. That overconfidence produced sloppiness, which had resulted in the insurance form Jack had found in the glove box of Priest’s truck. That form had revealed the truck was stolen from a man named Delbert Graves. A quick check of public records revealed that Graves was a hermit survivalist who owned a small ranch deep in the high country northeast of Los Alamos along the boundary of the Santa Clara Indian Reservation.

How many months it had been since Priest Williams had killed Delbert Graves and appropriated the man’s property as his hideout, Jack could not determine exactly. By the state of decay of the corpses Jack had found in the dry well near the main house, Priest must have been using it off and on for almost a year. There was little doubt that Priest had kept the place secret from everyone, including his unknown employer.

In addition to a collection of women’s bodies, there were two male corpses. One of these was probably that of the unfortunate Delbert Graves. Jack had recognized the other male corpse, despite the rot. Now he knew what had become of the assassin Abdul Aziz, for whom numerous agencies of the US government were still searching.

Here tonight, Jack’s earlier decision to avoid relaying the information of Priest’s hideaway to the people at the NSA was about to pay dividends.

Jack glanced down at the dimly illuminated display of his watch. 01:03. The drive from Kirtland Air Force Base to Los Alamos took an hour and a half under normal circumstances. The refrigerated truck carrying Priest’s corpse would be traveling the speed limit on roads that had little traffic at this hour. That meant that it would be turning off New Mexico Highway 84 onto Highway 502 right about now.

Pulling a small infrared flashlight from his belt, Jack flashed it twice, signaling Janet to begin the cell phone transmission. Then slipping his goggles into place and adjusting the infrared laser sniper-sight, Jack settled deeper into his hide position to wait.