Monkey Wrench

  With the tingles of her last orgasm still fluttering through her, she let out a gasp of pleasure. Quack shoved his cock into her open mouth, deep, filling her and almost making her gag.

  “Okay, baby. You wanted us, you got us,” Quack rumbled, his tone deep and charged with passion. “We’re going to give you what you want, as much as you want. Fight it out or fuck it out, either way. There’s nothing you can throw at us that we can’t handle. So settle in and let him fuck everything out of your brain except how much you want our cocks inside you.”

  His words and tone made her moan again, from deep within her, relief filling her. Lima dug his fingers in, nudging her knees even farther apart to get her hips exactly at the height he wanted them. “Fuck yourself against me, baby,” he ordered. “Show me how bad you want it.”

  She did, her body on autopilot as his hard, deep thrusts started her up the mountain again. It took longer, and she felt Lima having to slow down a few times to hold back, but eventually he coaxed a third, smaller orgasm out of her like that.

  The fact he’d done it only with his cock made her moan that much louder around Quack’s cock.

  He’d let go of her hair in lieu of cradling her face in his hands, strong fingers curled around the back of her skull and his cock fucking her mouth in time with Lima’s strokes. She used her tongue on him, trying to get him off, teased by the salty tang of pre-cum on her tongue, but he chuckled.

  “Oh, no, baby. I’m holding back. This load’s going in that sweet pussy of yours, too, after he’s done.”

  Lima sped up his pace once he knew she’d finished coming, until he finally plowed her cunt deep and hard, his cock throbbing inside her as his balls emptied their load.

  Lima braced himself against the mattress. “There’s one, baby.” He grabbed her hair and pulled her off Quack’s cock, then switched places with the other man.

  “Open, baby. Nothing you haven’t tasted before. I love the taste of your pussy.”

  She engulfed his spent cock with her mouth, tasting his juices and hers mixed together as she sucked on it.

  He let out a hiss. “That’s it, baby. Maybe you can have seconds if I can get it up again.”

  Quack didn’t waste any time. He buried his cock inside her, no preamble, and started fucking her hard and fast.

  “We fuck that fight out of you yet, baby?” Quack asked. “Or you want to go another round with us? We can do this as long as you need to.”

  She couldn’t think—which was not only a good thing, it was the whole point. She let out a soft whimper around Lima’s cock.

  He eased his grip on her hair, tenderly gathering it all into one hand and stroking her cheek with his other. “I think she got what she needed.”

  Quack stopped moving. “Oh, good. Then I can do this for her.” He reached around her hips and found her swollen clit and started playing with it.

  With his cock embedded in her pussy, it felt damn good.

  “Oh, yeah,” Quack said. “She wants one more. Don’t you?”

  She hoped they understood her whine was an affirmative.

  Lima’s cock only reached about half-mast before he said, “No offense to you, baby, but I think I only have one in me right now. But you keep that mouth of yours busy. It still feels good.”

  She rested her head against his thigh as she sucked and licked his member, glad she could make all the noise she wanted with it to muffle the sounds.

  Quack shifted position a little as he thrust forward, working his cock deeper inside her. “There, that’s even better, isn’t it?” he asked as he continued frigging her with his hand.

  All she could do was moan in reply.

  “The first ones were for you,” Quack said. “This one you’re going to give us, it’s ours, because we want to hear you moan. You aren’t alone, baby. You’re ours, and we plan on taking care of you, however you need us to take care of you. You need to fight, you fight us. You need to cuddle, that’s us, too. You need to scream and cry and fuck like a horny madwoman, you have us. Nothing you can show us will run us off unless you tell us you want us gone. Got it?”

  Then he leaned forward and bit the back of her shoulder.

  It triggered her release, the sweet pain and the sharp pleasure, everything mixing together and stirring her mind until all she could focus on was them.

  “There’s our girl,” Lima cooed. “Enjoy that bliss. Soak it up.”

  She started fucking herself back onto Quack’s cock, wanting it hard, fast, deep, but he wouldn’t start moving until he was sure she’d completely crested and finished with her orgasm.

  Only then did he sit up and grab her by the waist. “Okay, my turn.” It only took him a few strokes until he finished, adding his load to her pussy.

  Lima made her let go of his cock while Quack, keeping his cock inside her, hooked an arm around her and rolled them to their sides, facing Lima. Lima stretched out in front of her, their bodies pinning her in place between them.

  It was the best feeling in the world. Anchors amongst the insanity.

  Lima kissed her. “Okay, go back to sleep. You need another round when we get up in the morning, we’ll give it to you. We’ll give you everything that’s in our power to give you, whatever it is you need to make it better.”

  That sounded good to her, and she let blissful darkness take her away again.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Jerald didn’t look happy when he entered Silo’s office.

  Silo automatically assumed he shouldn’t look happy, either. “What happened?”

  “Well, a slight hitch, sir, but only a minor one.”

  Silo waved at him to continue.

  “One of the volunteers…escaped before he was sent out.”

  “What?”

  “It’s all right. He’s dead. He was shot.”

  Silo closed his eyes and took off his glasses so he could pinch the bridge of his nose. “Start over.”

  Jerald told the story of the man leaving the facility a few hours before he was supposed to be sent out on his mission. He’d gone to talk with someone they suspected was his sister. But then they’d been attacked by someone who apparently had intended to shoot the sister.

  “So he died from the gunshot?”

  “Yes, sir. He didn’t have any ID on him, of course. I followed up with contacts who said no witnesses identified him, so he was immediately cremated once it was determined he had Kite. The police know who killed him, because that man was also killed, by someone else.”

  “So who the hel—heck shot the other guy?”

  “That we don’t know. The woman left with them. Our people think it might have been gang-related.”

  “But we don’t know?”

  “No, sir.”

  Silo chewed on the inside of his lip. “Has anyone come to the facility asking questions about this incident?” He didn’t want to scuttle the whole operation just because of coincidental gang activity.

  “No, sir. Nobody.”

  “What about the incident at the facility the other day? The shooting?”

  “The police say it likely was a gang incident as well. They’ve had increased activity in the area. Since no one was injured, and it was only property damage, they haven’t pursued any other inquiries with the facility. They’re overworked with the ongoing riots.”

  “That’s about the only damn piece of luck we’ve got. Has anyone else shown up infected with Kite as a result of this incident?”

  “No, sir.”

  “I’m sure you have an opinion on what to do next.”

  “I say we do nothing. We don’t confiscate the payment, obviously. That might lead to more questions if someone in the family objects. It’s too soon to get feedback yet on the people we sent out. We won’t start seeing results for a week or so, at least. I say we release the extra staff who have been promised stronghold positions. Allow them to advance to their next posts. Wait a few days until we’re sure everything has calmed down, finish…disposing of the remaini
ng…materials, and then close down the facility and burn the building. Claim it must have been related to the gang activity, or the riots even. Then restart operations in another facility.”

  “Do we have another facility?”

  “There is the lab we are constructing in St. Louis. It’s not quite complete yet, not fully operational, but I’m sure we can move the samples and personnel there and have them pick up where they left off in their research in a matter of weeks. We wouldn’t want to run another Preachsearch operation from there, of course, but we can easily set that up somewhere else, anywhere, and bring the…supplies in as needed from off-site.”

  “In other words, you’re saying you think if we do anything else right now, it’ll draw unwanted attention to the LA facility?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Silo leaned back and considered it. Jerald had a valid point. “You don’t feel it’s worth following up with the sister?”

  “I don’t even know for sure she’s still alive, sir. I did a little checking and, if it was his sister, apparently she didn’t show up for work for two of her shifts without contacting them, so they fired her. If she is alive, she might just take the money and…well, run. I did not have anyone try to contact her at her home for fear of this all being connected back to the facility.”

  “And you’ve thought about every possibility here?”

  “Well, in this case, apparently I hadn’t. I will definitely improve program security in the future. We didn’t want the volunteers or our staff to be suspicious if we locked people in and refused to let them come and go. We certainly didn’t want to risk drawing unwanted questions by using armed security. We thought for sure a combination of being in a strange location, economic factors, and the Kite drug would keep them from leaving for long. Perhaps if the man hadn’t been local, it wouldn’t have been an issue. In the future, we’ll come up with a reason why they can’t leave. Perhaps tell them the surrounding area is crime-ridden, and that they’re locked in for their protection. Or that the medications we’re testing on them means we need to limit their exposure to outside germs so it doesn’t skew the research results. I don’t know. If we up the Kite dosage a little, or mix in other drugs, it’ll make them even more pliable and they’ll likely believe it without question.”

  Time for a little bit of the stick. “I’m highly disturbed by this development. You realize that, don’t you? And I’m very disappointed in the lack of foresight used in this instance.”

  “Yes, sir. I’m disturbed myself. I thought the location we’d picked would be secure enough for the duration of the project, but apparently I was wrong. I take full responsibility for what happened.”

  Another thing he liked about Jerald, he admitted when he screwed up. He owned it.

  And now time for the carrot. “Jerald, you do an amazing job as it is. I cannot expect perfection from you when I cannot deliver it myself. Let’s do better with the next phase, right?”

  The man looked relieved. Good. He never wanted to come down so hard on Jerald that the man rebelled and broke free. Silo kept a lot of velvet glove padding the iron fist when it came to handling Jerald.

  “Yes, sir. Thank you.”

  “Carry on then, son. Let’s get out there and do God’s work.”

  “Amen, sir.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Stacia felt like she’d had her body and soul run through a woodchipper the next morning. She slipped out of bed without waking the two men and carried the clothes she’d been given out to the bathroom, where she cleaned herself up and got dressed. The slightly baggy women’s panties and oversized men’s jeans would have to do. She’d worn worse in her life. She had to roll the cuffs up on the jeans, but that was okay. The belt would at least keep them up around her hips. The sneakers Clara had given her fit perfectly and felt comfortable. And they’d included a new surgical mask.

  When she reached the lookout at the main downstairs door, he gave her a nod. She thought his name was Niner.

  “Leaving alone?” he asked.

  “I didn’t want to wake them. I have to get home and check on my aunt. Do you have any change on you for the bus?”

  “Someone can drive you.”

  “No, I need to be alone for a little bit. It’s okay. And my bus pass…” She didn’t want to think about that. “I’ll pay you back.”

  He carefully eyed her, maybe gauging if she was really as okay as she said she was, but he dug into his pocket and came up with not only change, but a couple of bills, too. He made her take all of it, pressing it into her palm and closing her fingers around it.

  “Thanks.”

  He wouldn’t let go of her hands. It didn’t feel sexual at all, it felt…brotherly. “And no, you won’t pay me back, because you’re one of us. You’d do the same for me.”

  If she didn’t get moving, she was going to start thinking, remembering.

  And that would lead to crying. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  “Come back soon, Ak. And be safe.” He gently squeezed her hands before releasing her.

  She wanted to burst out in maniacal, hysterical laughter at the code name.

  She didn’t feel like someone who could kick ass and help save the world.

  Hell, she couldn’t even save her own damn brother, who ironically, had died because of someone holding a grudge against her.

  He’d died protecting her. Being a big brother for her. Finally, his last act on the face of this earth had been to step up and take care of her.

  And he’d paid the ultimate price.

  Well, he would have died anyway since he was infected with Kite. Or been better off dead on the long-shot chance he had not died from the disease.

  And he nearly took her and Quack with him in the process, but he hadn’t known that.

  She wouldn’t hold that against him, and she damn sure wouldn’t let that taint her memory of the intention of his final act.

  He’d died as her big brother. The big brother she’d always wanted him to be.

  Acting like a man. Stepping up.

  How am I going to tell Aunt Darla?

  Worse, what if she and Quack had not escaped infection? What if she’d caught it and died, and then Aunt Darla would have been left alone and never known what happened to her or Marvin? Well, Lima would have told her, but who would have cared for her?

  She pulled her surgical mask up over her nose and mouth and walked to the closest bus stop. She was physically and emotionally too gutted to walk the entire way, even though she knew she could make it in probably forty minutes if she beat feet. Even the argument of saving herself the cost of the bus fare wasn’t enough for her to overcome her exhaustion.

  She supposed her job was moot at that point. After missing two days of work without notice, Billy had probably given her position away to someone else.

  Now I’ll have to go find another fucking job.

  She drew in a deep, ragged sigh that almost turned into a sob. She didn’t want to start crying. Not then. Not on the street. If she did, she’d be thinking about Marvin, about his dying words to her.

  And about how she felt she’d failed him as a sister in the end.

  She’d have to grieve Marvin, yes. But right now, she had to go home, get to Aunt Darla. It was six o’clock in the morning and the busses were already running in this part of the city. It was a Saturday, so her aunt should be home when she got there.

  Fortunately, the bus stop was on the other side of the apartment building, so she didn’t even have to look at the park.

  By the time Stacia made it upstairs to the apartment, it was a quarter ’til seven. She quietly let herself in so as not to wake up her aunt. She would be awake and moving around by eight, usually.

  No use ruining her sleep over bad news she can’t change.

  Besides, it’d give her time to compose herself and figure out how to break it to the woman.

  Stacia took a shower and grabbed some clean clothes out of the dryer to put on. She’d wash the loa
ned clothes and return them later.

  The shoes would be a shame to give up, but she’d pick up some thrift store ones to get her by. She still had an old pair of sneakers in her room that she could make do with until then. A few turns of duct tape around the right one would keep the sole from flapping off at the toe.

  It would get her by.

  But by eight thirty, her aunt hadn’t emerged from their bedroom, and Stacia had heard no sounds from the room. Slowly, she cracked open the door and realized both beds were empty and neatly made.

  Huh.

  There wasn’t a note from her on the table, or on the counter, that she was working. She always left a note if she worked a weekend shift.

  The notepad and pen lay in their usual place.

  An uneasy tingling crept into her gut, eventually coalescing at the base of her spine, much in the same way it had that first day she’d followed Marvin—

  She clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle the sob.

  She didn’t want to lose it. She was the strong one, the dependable one.

  She had to be.

  Especially now.

  She washed her face in the kitchen sink and patted her skin dry with a dish towel.

  Still, the nasty tingle wouldn’t go away. She turned to face Marvin’s bedroom door, and that was when she realized it stood slightly ajar.

  It hadn’t been that way the last time she’d been home.

  Stacia’s feet moved forward before she realized her brain had issued the command. She didn’t want to do this, she knew it, but couldn’t stop herself from reaching for the door and pushing it open with her fingertips.

  In Marvin’s bed lay Aunt Darla. Despite the peaceful look on her face, Stacia knew she wasn’t sleeping.

  Maybe because of the peaceful look on her face. Even in sleep, their aunt had suffered from the agony of her arthritis, her face pinched and lines deeply etched there.

  On the bedside table sat an empty medicine bottle, a nearly empty glass of water, a large, sealed manila envelope, and a note written in her aunt’s spidery hand. She’d added the time and date at the top. She’d written the note Friday evening, around eight o’clock.