The Ninth Day Read online

“Maybe gardening? Planting flowers? Something like that?”

  Serena shook her head.

  Emma started to pace the length of the RV. Something wasn’t adding up. “Did you smoke any of the leaves from the infected field?”

  Again, Serena shook her head. “I only smoked the healthy leaves. None of us smoked from the diseased fields.” Emma resumed her pacing. La Valle watched her.

  “What is it?” he said.

  Emma paused. “Anthrax isn’t contagious. It has to be present, either in the earth or on a surface, for a person to catch it. It can be inhaled, but unless there was a lot of dust kicking up at the compound, I just don’t see how it could have infected all those migrant workers. Besides, it doesn’t affect plants in the way that the field was affected.” Emma continued pacing. She passed Oz, who had his head in his hands.

  “Then it’s tuberculosis. That’s contagious,” La Valle said.

  “TB sufferers cough, but neither of them show that symptom, and nothing I’ve ever read about tuberculosis cites a massive physical manifestation on the level of what we’re seeing. Besides, TB also wouldn’t kill your fields the way this disease is.”

  La Valle threw open the front door and roared Raoul’s name. Raoul appeared seconds later.

  “Have you been delivering the shipment as I ordered?”

  Raoul nodded. “One fourth in Arizona, some more here.” Emma felt sick herself. The idea that people would be touching the leaves and getting the disease was abhorrent. She needed to find an answer before they managed to infect half of the country.

  “Did you touch it?” Emma said.

  Raoul shook his head. “No. I don’t know how I got infected.”

  La Valle pointed at Emma. “You have one more day to solve this.” He looked at Raoul. “Get her to another lab. Tomorrow.”

  “Mono tells me there’s a warrant out for her arrest. For all of them. I don’t know how we’ll get into another lab.”

  “You question me?” La Valle roared the sentence.

  Raoul put out his hands in a placating gesture. “No, La Valle, no. I’ll get her there.”

  “Where’s the pilot?”

  “He just landed a hundred miles from here. He’s waiting for us.”

  La Valle inhaled. “Good. You tell him there’s been a change of plans. We’ll put the shipment onto his plane and tell him to fly it first to Chicago and then to Washington.” La Valle looked at Oz, who had managed to sit up. “You’re going on the plane with the leaves. I want you to spread them everywhere.” He looked at Emma. “You go with them as far as Chicago. If you don’t have a cure by then, Mono gets to do with you what he likes.” He flipped a hand at Raoul. “Get them out of here.”

  Raoul waved both Emma and Oz out of the RV. He pointed at the smaller trailer.

  “You sleep there,” he said to Oz. “You,” he said to Emma, “go with Mono.”

  Mono leaned on a weathered picnic table placed between the trailers. He pushed off and shuffled toward Emma.

  “Put her in the ambulance,” Raoul said.

  Emma wanted to ask about the hostages, but one look at Carlos induced her to bite her tongue.

  A calculating look entered Mono’s eyes. “She’s done?”

  Raoul shook his head. “Not yet. La Valle wants us to get her to one more lab.”

  Mono groaned. “No way. They’re watching for us. I told you.”

  Raoul stepped toward him. “You want to argue? You tell it to La Valle. He gave her one more day to solve this thing, and I . . .” He shoved his infected hand in Mono’s direction, causing Mono to cringe backward. “I want this thing solved as well.”

  Mono grabbed her by the arm, squeezing it as hard as he could. Emma clenched her teeth together but said nothing. She didn’t want him to know he affected her in any way. He dragged her to the ambulance, opened the door, and shoved her in. After a moment he followed.

  “Move in,” he said.

  Emma scuttled backward, keeping her eyes on Mono the entire time. His face had a demented look, and he was sweating. Emma could smell him. He gave a quick, furtive look behind him before turning back. He took two steps toward her and put the gun under her chin with one hand. With the other he started to grope at her, snatching at her shirt. Emma curled her hand into a fist. His breath smelled like beer and garlic, and she shoved his hand away.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Emma said.

  “Trophy time,” Mono said.

  Emma put up a hand to stop him. “Just let me take my own clothes off. I don’t want to tear them. They’re all I have.”

  Mono gave an evil smile and nodded. He stood up in front of her. She shifted onto her knees and adjusted the angle of her body.

  She slammed her fist up and directly into his groin.

  He collapsed into a heap in front of her, his shoulder hitting her on the temple as he fell.

  Fool, she thought. She braced her back against the wall and used her feet to slide his body along the bottom of the ambulance. She had his body almost to the end when Raoul stepped into view. He took in the scene.

  “He passed out. Too much to drink, I guess,” Emma said.

  Raoul shrugged. Emma pushed one more time, and Mono rolled out and dropped the three feet to the ground. Raoul nudged him with his toe, looking unconcerned. He reached to each side of the doors and slammed the panels shut. Emma heard him snap the padlock into place. She settled onto the floor, determined to get some rest. God only knew what she’d be facing when Mono woke up.

  Chapter 28

  Banner was eating a room-service breakfast when his cell phone rattled on the desk. He recognized Sheriff Wiley’s number.

  “Mr. Banner? I suggest you turn to the headline news.”

  Banner picked up the remote control and flipped on the channel. A news reporter stood in front of a ramshackle house that featured a car on cinder blocks to the left of the front door, and a second, this one on tires, to the right. Yellow police tape stretched from the front door handle to a nearby tree. Police in hazardous materials suits were moving in and out of the house and Banner could see a cluster of reporters huddled on the opposite side of the barrier.

  “What am I seeing here?” Banner said. He stabbed at the remainder of his breakfast. The television screen changed and Banner saw a picture of Caldridge on a split screen along with the grainy image of Kroger from the lab footage. The image changed to one of the Mexican guy, also from the lab video.

  “The Phoenix police just walked into the house of a drug dealer to arrest him on a warrant. They found him, his girlfriend, and two of his buddies dead on the floor. The officer said, and this is a quote, that they ‘were covered in sores and looked like they had bled to death from every pore.’ ” Banner stopped eating. He shoved his tabasco-sauce-covered omelette to the side. He’d just lost his appetite.

  “Why are they showing the footage of Caldridge from the lab break-in?”

  “Turns out Conway might have been right. The autopsy on one of the Black Eagles that died in the blast showed that he bled from inside before the explosion hit him. The theory is that he contracted some sort of hemorrhagic fever. The second body was too ripped up to make a definitive statement about cause of death. The authorities think Caldridge might know something about it and since she was one of the last people to see the Eagles alive, they’re considering her as a person of interest. And there’s more. Two of the Phoenix dealer’s clients are dead. Same scenario. One was a well-known real-estate broker. He had been tortured to death. His wife was tortured as well, but she’s clinging to life. She’s also covered in sores that she denies were from the torture. She described her attackers and claims that she saw Emma Caldridge with them.”

  “The band guy and the Mexican?”

  “No, just a Mexican man.”

  “The woman say that Caldridge was present when she was tortured?”

  “They didn’t get that far. The woman lapsed into a coma. She’s in the ICU.”

  “Is the Cent
er for Disease Control investigating?”

  “Yeah. They’re considering anthrax based on what Raynor told us. Or an Ebola-type virus. They’re working with the locals. Right now we’ve put out an arrest warrant for Caldridge, Kroger, and the Mexican guy. We’ve asked the media to help. CNN should be running the story.”

  “Can you keep me posted?”

  “Sure,” Wiley said.

  Banner rang off and was packed and ready to go when Sumner knocked on his door at the prearranged time.

  “You see the news?” Sumner said the minute Banner was face-to-face with him.

  Banner nodded. “Think she arranged it? Tried to kill them and get away?”

  Sumner looked grim. Rather than answer, he turned and started down the hall toward the far exit. He shoved the bar handle against the panel and they stepped into the morning sun. Banner let it bathe his face a moment.

  “If it’s a strange and unusual virus, then Caldridge would be the one to have access to such a thing. We have no idea how the band guy got his sores, but these Eagles appear to have what he did, only times ten.”

  Banner nodded. “I have to agree. Whatever the band guy has might be contagious.”

  Sumner beeped open the SUV and tossed his duffel bag in the back. Banner followed with his own. Sumner slipped on some shades and put the car in drive.

  “The only thing I can’t figure out is, why didn’t she just run away? Sounds like whatever this disease is it would have incapacitated everyone in the house in no time. Why does she stay with the band guy?”

  Sumner maneuvered the car into traffic. “Who knows? And you’re assuming she was at the drug dealer’s house when they died. Maybe she wasn’t. Maybe they got the disease earlier and died later. I’m headed to the airport. Do you want to fly intercept with me?”

  “No. I better get back to D.C. This thing is mushrooming out of control. Good luck with the pilot. How will you force him to land?”

  “We ask nicely three times. Then we blow them out of the sky.”

  Chapter 29

  Oz pulled the Escalade into a rest area off the interstate in the late afternoon. Diagonal parking spaces lined the front of a small brick building. A flagpole in the front flew an American flag. Several semi-trailer trucks idled to the left in an area designated for heavy vehicles and RVs. Only two cars were parked in addition to the Escalade, La Valle’s BMW, and Raoul’s ambulance. La Valle walked to the building, while Serena stayed in the back of the car.

  Raoul walked up and tapped on the passenger-side window. When Mono lowered it he said, “Here’s where we separate. You take the woman to the airfield in the ambulance. Load fifty bricks from the BMW into it along with her. The pilot’s going to fly them first to whatever lab she picks, then to Chicago.”

  “You want me to stay with her?”

  Raoul shook his head. “The pilot will watch her. The second batch from the Escalade and La Valle’s is going to D.C. Where you”—he pointed to Oz—“are going to deliver it right to the DOD’s doorstep.”

  Emma noticed that the sores on Raoul’s hand had traveled up his arm. They disappeared under his rolled-up sleeve. He caught her staring at them.

  “You find a cure in Chicago,” he said. He transferred his attention to Oz. “How bad are yours?”

  Oz said nothing. Emma wasn’t surprised. When they’d stopped at a restaurant off the interstate to eat, he had ordered a sandwich and eaten half of it. He avoided looking at anyone, including Emma.

  “He’s not talking,” Mono said. “Watch them, I need to take a piss.” Raoul snorted and leaned back onto a parking support in full view of the Escalade. When the door slammed, the interior of the car fell silent. Emma inhaled a deep breath, happy to be out of Mono’s toxic presence.

  “I’ll solve this puzzle. I won’t let you die,” Emma said. “But we need to also keep focused on escape. Once we do, we go straight to a hospital.”

  Oz turned to her, looking her full in the face for the first time that day. His eyes were bleak, and the exhaustion and despair that showed in them made her want to cry. He moved his arm, and she saw that the sores had crept above the bandage up his arm and under the tee shirt sleeve.

  “Are they on your torso?” she said.

  He nodded. “Front and back.”

  “Do they hurt?”

  He shook his head. “Still numb, but the skin is sheeting off where they exist.”

  Emma swallowed. “No bleeding?”

  “You mean like the guys at the house?”

  Emma nodded.

  “No, but I’m not able to straighten my fingers anymore. It’s as if the tendons are shortening. My hands are beginning to form claws. Like Serena’s were last night.”

  Emma swallowed again. The tears were welling, and she was damned if she would cry in front of Oz. He would take it as defeat on her part, and she was not defeated. Frightened, but not defeated.

  “I will solve this thing,” Emma said again.

  He gave her a look, and for the first time in hours his face softened into a smile. “I’m glad I met you. I hope to God that you get away from these guys.”

  Emma reached out to him, and he shrank back against the door. “Don’t touch me. You could get it.”

  “Listen to me. It’s not my day to die, and it’s not yours either. I will find the answer in time.”

  He shook his head. “No, you won’t. But I told you I won’t do what they say in D.C., and they’ll kill me there. Assuming, of course, that the disease doesn’t get me first.”

  He looked out the window of the car. “There’s something you should know. I put a good-bye letter to my family in the lockbox on the back of the Triumph. Sounds like you’ll be traveling in the ambulance to the airstrip. Maybe you could get it out and take it with you. Here are the keys.” He fished the keys out of his pants pocket and placed them on the seat between them. “Either mail it or deliver it personally when this thing is all over. The bike is yours to keep.” He gave her a wan smile.

  Emma pocketed the keys without a word. There was nothing to say.

  Mono emerged from the building, heading back. Raoul waved her out of the car. Oz looked at her, and she could see unshed tears in his eyes.

  “Next time I see you I’ll bring a cure.”

  “Good-bye,” he said.

  She refused to say good-bye. She got out of the car without a word.

  Emma let Mono march her to the ambulance. He shoved her in, but this time he didn’t tie her up. She sat on the side with her back to the wall. The Triumph was opposite her, in the same place it had been.

  Mono slammed the doors shut, and the back of the ambulance darkened. The ambulance rumbled into movement. Emma scrambled across and applied a key Oz had given her to the lockbox. When she opened it, she felt for the white envelope. She couldn’t read the address in the dark. Folding it into thirds, she put it in her pocket along with the keys and settled back to wait.

  About an hour later she felt the ambulance slow, and then stop. After another ten minutes she heard the lock on the doors disengage and they swung open. Mono stood in the entrance.

  “Move to that side, we need to load the shipment onto the plane.”

  Emma transferred to the opposite side and sat next to the Triumph. Several men, all Hispanic-looking, began to take apart the ambulance’s false walls. She watched them remove the bricks. They were done within twenty minutes.

  “You’re next. Into the plane.” Mono gestured with his pistol.

  Emma scooted across the ambulance floor and stepped onto the tarmac. The back of the vehicle faced the end of the runway. She walked around to see where the airplane was parked. It was an ancient Fokker. Next to it stood a tall, lean man with brown shoulder-length hair tied in a ponytail and a cigarette in his mouth. His face lit up when he saw her.

  “Well I’ll be damned,” he said. “It’s Emma Caldridge.”

  Chapter 30

  Emma stayed still and stared at Wilson Vanderlock, struggling to keep the ru
sh of hope that she felt at seeing him from showing on her face. The last time they’d met had been in Somalia. He looked the same as he did then; about thirty-five, with a rugged, masculine appearance and in perpetual need of a shave. He was dressed in army green cotton chino pants and a loose-fitting black tee shirt, and on his feet were python cowboy boots in a dark green color.

  “How do you know her?” Mono’s voice was full of suspicion. He kept his gun pointed at Emma’s midsection.

  Vanderlock removed the ever-present cigarette from his lips and blew out a stream of smoke. He stared a challenge at Mono.

  “Who the hell are you?”

  “I work for La Valle. How do you know her?”

  Don’t tell him you know me. Emma thought the words, but wished she could say them out loud. Vanderlock flicked a glance at Emma. She stared back and twitched her head no with a tiny movement. Vanderlock watched her a moment before returning his gaze to Mono.

  “Her face is splashed all over the news,” he said. Emma let her breath out slowly, quietly. Vanderlock was quick on his feet; she remembered that about him now. He pointed at Mono with the fingers holding the cigarette. “Yours, too, and some white guy. Real good work, getting caught on camera like that.” Vanderlock’s voice was filled with sarcasm. Mono’s face flushed red.

  “We needed to get to the lab. She needs another one. It’s your job to fly her, and this time you get to break in with her. We’ll see how well you do.”

  Vanderlock raised his eyebrows in surprise. “I was only told to deliver the shipment to Chicago. Then I’m out. That was my deal with La Valle.”

  Mono snickered. “Looks like La Valle changed his mind. Now you have to get her into a lab within the next few hours.”

  “And if I don’t?” Vanderlock said.

  “Then he kills you and I get her,” Mono said.

  “And if I do, do I get her?”

  Mono shook his head. “She stays with La Valle. For ransom.”

  “How much?”

  “You can’t afford me,” Emma said.