Uni and Donna turned. “When are you going to be guinea pigged?” Uni asked.
“Later. They’re running our blood through it first to be sure. But it’s looking really good already.”
“They really might have a vaccine against Kite?” Donna asked.
“Getting Mama in from the cold seems to have been the key piece of the puzzle,” Doc said as he leaned against the doorframe. “She’s the one who engineered the mutations in the first place, her and Waldo. I’m guessing we have a solid vaccine in production by early spring, if not sooner. How fast and widely we can get it distributed remains to be seen.”
Omega appeared in the doorway. “You ready to check out, you goldbricker? Your ride’s waiting.”
“Are the streets cleared?” Victor asked.
Omega grinned. “Doesn’t exactly matter.”
* * * *
They got Victor bundled up and downstairs, out a side entrance. Omega had a large Hummer waiting, knobby tires and four-wheel drive. After everyone was buckled in, he started negotiating the drive back to the safe house outside of Peachtree City.
Donna stared at the landscape, still coated by thick ice in many places. “This wacky weather is crazy. I’ve never seen anything like this before.”
“Count it a good thing,” Uni said. “It means we can get ahead of Kite before it gets more of a foothold in the US. This cold weather is all the way through Texas and down into northern Florida, even. It’s like an Arctic sheet draped over most of the damned country. Courtesy of the Chinese government.”
“You’re welcome,” Victor muttered.
It took Omega the better part of an hour to negotiate the treacherous roads and around abandoned cars before they finally reached the safe house. As they headed up the walk, Chief flung the front door open and swooped out, nearly falling on the slick walkway, to give Victor a hug.
Fortunately, Omega caught her before she plowed into the group like a bowling ball. “Careful there, babe.”
“Sorry. I’m so glad you’re okay!”
“Me, too,” he said as they got him inside.
“Can I get you anything? Make you anything?”
“Soup, if we have it. I’m not picky.”
“I’ll bring it in to you. You three go on in.”
Uni and Donna got him into their bedroom and settled. Then he patted the middle of the bed and crooked a finger at Donna.
Kicking off her shoes, she slipped into bed with him, snuggling in his arms.
She’d been able to put off a lot of her own grieving with her worry about Victor’s survival.
Now that he was going to be okay, she could let go.
He buried his face in her hair. “It’s all right, baby. We’ve got you now. You’re not alone.”
Uni sat on the other side of the bed, an arm draped over her. “No matter what, you’re with us now.”
“What about my parents and my family? Aren’t they in danger?”
“Bubba’s taking care of that,” he said. “They’ll be safe.”
“Knock knock,” Chief said at the open doorway. In her hands she carried a bowl of soup and a glass of water.
“Thank you,” Victor said, sitting up as she set it on the table next to him. “I appreciate it.”
“Least I can do. Now, you finish that.”
He snapped her a salute. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Asshole.” She leaned in for a hug. “You guys are going to be the deaths of us women yet, you know? Scaring us.”
“Tell me about it,” Donna snarked.
“I’ll leave you guys alone. Holler if you want more. I’ll make it for you.” She closed the door behind her.
“So what now?” Donna asked.
Victor had the soup and was starting to eat it. “First I’m going to get this down,” he said. “Then I want to feel a certain woman moaning around my cock while Uni fucks her brains out.”
“But…you just got out of the hospital!”
“Yeah, and all the more reason I want to make up for lost time.”
* * * *
Hell, he’d almost died. Of course Victor wanted to get laid. A massive fuck you to the Universe for almost snatching happiness away from him before he’d even had a chance to enjoy it.
He wasn’t exactly at his best right then, but he was certainly good enough to lay there and enjoy living.
Once he finished his soup, he sat up and stripped, pulling Donna into his arms. “You are wearing too many clothes, babe.”
“You sure you feel okay?”
“I’ll feel better once my cock’s between those sweet lips of yours.”
At least he didn’t feel like an asshole for wanting to get laid now. Obviously, after they’d discovered her friends, none of them had felt like doing more than just holding her.
He wanted to keep her mind here, now, with them, focused on the future and not the past.
He pulled her in for a kiss, one that stiffened his cock instantly. He wrapped her fingers around it, slowly stroking. “See?” he hoarsely said. “Feeling fine.”
She smiled down at him. “Guess you want him to fuck my brains out too, huh?”
“Ooh, yeah. Of course. You know, on second thought, let’s go for a variation of that.”
He turned around on the bed, head at the foot of it, crooking a finger at her once she’d stripped.
“Let me taste that sweet pussy, baby,” he said, pulling her down onto his mouth.
As she moaned around his cock, thickening him even more, he pushed her up just enough so he could talk. “I won’t last long, buddy. So get in there fast.”
Then he held on tight, enjoying her moans and squeals around his cock as he ruthlessly went after her with his mouth. He wasn’t going to toy with her tonight. He wanted to make her come, hard and fast, and drive any other thoughts out of her head. For this moment in time he wanted it to be about the three of them, about an affirmation of survival.
Because next time they might not get so lucky.
Uni stripped and Victor felt him kneel on the end of the bed. “Okay, one fucking coming up.”
Uni’s strokes inside her made her moan even more, only increasing the pleasure vibrating through Victor’s cock.
Oooh, yeah. He felt his balls drawing up tight, getting ready, but he hadn’t got her over yet. He damn sure wanted to do that first, so he wrapped his lips around her clit and rapidly flicked it with his tongue. That quickly rewarded him with Donna sliding into an orgasm, deep-throating him as she came.
Fuck, yeah.
* * * *
Uni didn’t need any other encouragement to start fucking Donna harder, faster. The way her pussy clamped down on his cock as Victor made her come had him close to coming already.
“That’s it, baby,” he encouraged. “Suck his cock good. He just made you come, so you return the favor.”
He felt a second wave of orgasms flow through her body, her back arching as his cock pumped into her. Nothing had ever felt as perfect and right as this, with her. He never imagined he’d find the love of his life with his best friend, but he wouldn’t question it.
Especially not now. He’d never take a day of it for granted again.
Not a single minute.
And fuck anyone who wanted to tease him about telling Victor he loved him. He didn’t want to fuck the guy—even though his balls were now dangerously close to bashing the guy in the forehead—but yeah, he loved him. More than a brother or a friend, but a partner. What they had, what they’d been through, he knew it was for life.
His own release drew close and he managed to hold back until he felt and heard Victor moaning under him, triggering one last cycle of orgasms in Donna.
“That’s it.” He fucked her, hard, enjoying her pleasured squeals as his balls emptied deep inside her.
One day, maybe, she wouldn’t need the five-year. One day, maybe, it’d be the two of them fucking her silly as much as they could get it up until they got her pregnant.
For no
w, he’d try to focus on the now and enjoy what they had.
He didn’t want to crush Victor under them so he hooked an arm around her waist and rolled to the side so Victor could sit up.
He was a little slow to move. “You all right?” Uni asked.
He grinned and leaned in to kiss Donna, then fist-bumped him. “I’m great, buddy. Absolutely fucking great. And I love the hell out of both of you.”
“Love you both, too,” Donna said.
Uni’s gaze locked with Victor’s. “Love you both, too, man. Don’t you ever fucking scare us like that again.”
His grin widened. “Believe me, I don’t want to.”
Chapter Forty-Four
After two weeks spent at the Atlanta safe house, Donna, Victor, and Uni flew back to Florida with Panda late one evening just a few days before Halloween. In the plane was a good portion of her worldly possessions—two suitcases of clothes. The last two suitcases would be brought back via truck with one of the teams when they returned. The men had gone back to the apartment for her and packed all her clothes.
She didn’t want to see the apartment. She knew she wouldn’t be able to handle the sight of it, even though the men said there were no traces left of what had happened.
It would be different, and she’d know the differences.
Seeing Lisa and Ginny’s things would be too heartbreaking.
They also brought her a couple of pictures they’d had framed and sitting on the TV stand out in the living room, of the three of them. One taken on their graduation from college, all three of them in caps and gowns, and one taken just a couple of years ago at a friend’s wedding, all smiles and happy.
That’s how she wanted to remember her friends.
That one of the last things she’d ever told them was that she loved them.
She held Scooter during the entire flight, her gaze fixed out the window on the ground and lights thousands of feet below them.
She wished her first time flying was under more pleasant circumstances.
On the seat next to her, securely wrapped and padded to protect them, were Ginny and Lisa’s urns. Donna wasn’t sure what she was going to do yet, if she was going to keep them or scatter them in the Gulf of Mexico. Neither of her friends had ever seen an ocean, but she wasn’t sure she could just turn them loose yet.
A dizzying number of introductions awaited her at the dock, including Papa, the unit’s commander.
He greeted her with a warm handshake. “Nice to finally meet you, Scooter. Wish it was under better circumstances.”
She looked back at Uni and Victor. “Guess I don’t get to petition to change that, huh?”
The men grinned. “Not on your life. We like it.”
Papa smiled. “What fun would it be if you actually liked your code name?”
The next morning, her first morning there, Donna stood on the balcony and stared out over the Gulf of Mexico. The purplish early morning light cast everything in soft, romantic shadows that seemed out of place with her new view of the world. She’d seen the Atlantic, once, when she was a kid. Her parents had taken her to Savannah for a weekend.
A rare treat indeed.
To now be “living” here, on an island, was like a tropical dream come true in some ways. Especially when she added Uni and Victor to the mix.
Except a functional numbness had set in that they all warned her was normal. Trying to come to terms with her grief and everything she’d been through, on top of the stress of Victor’s near-miss, meant she’d need time to decompress.
She wasn’t taking the medicine anymore, better able to deal with everything now. And she’d been throwing herself into her work again, going through the computer data, looking for patterns and finding even more.
A side note, she’d discovered while trying to correlate news stories to things they’d found in the computer system that a doctor of Mary Silo’s was found dead of an apparent suicide in Albuquerque.
Too coincidental for any of their tastes.
Mary Silo—or Kali Enyo, as she’d finally allowed Ax to tell them her new name—hadn’t come in yet. Ax was still talking to her, trying to convince her that they needed her to come in where they could protect her. He thought she’d moved, but she wouldn’t confirm that and he didn’t want to give her any indication he thought that, either.
The men themselves soon joined her, flanking her on either side and not breaking the quiet of the waves lapping at the shoreline and the soft, gentle breeze.
“So what do we do when this is all over?” Donna asked. “Where do we go?”
Not like she had a home anymore.
It surprised her to realize that, other than the grief over losing her friends, she wasn’t sad to be “homeless.” She had Uni and Victor.
That was enough.
Throughout all of this, they were enough.
“What do you mean?” Uni asked.
“What’s after this?”
“Whatever you want,” Victor said. “This is the best news we’ve had, the progress they’ve made. They’re going to kick Kite’s ass and stop it in its tracks. Once that’s done, our job is complete and we’re free to do what we want.”
“With me?” She knew she shouldn’t keep asking it, but it just…didn’t feel real yet in some ways. Like this was a dream or nightmare she couldn’t get out of. Great in many ways, yet horrific in others.
She’d lost her friends—adopted family—and gained nearly thirty more in the process.
The men slipped their arms around her. “Of course, with you,” Uni said. “Why wouldn’t we be with you?”
“What about your enlistment time? You’re not up yet, right?”
“We’re not done yet, no,” Victor said. “Still a ways to go. But you’re staying here with us. And when we’re given the all-clear…” He shrugged. “Wherever you want to go. You’re a part of the team. Look at how you found those money trails no one else had.”
“That was just luck,” she said.
“No,” Uni insisted, “that was skill. You have banking knowledge. That’s fantastic. And you have a knack for spotting patterns. We can really use that now. We can start sucking Silo dry from the inside out before he even has a chance to know what’s going on.”
“And because of you,” Victor said, “we found Ax. He’s going to help lead us to Mary Silo.”
“That was just sheer dumb luck.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Uni said. “We found you, and now they’ve got a target on the vaccine. It’s a win.”
“If it’s not a cure yet, then it’s not a win,” she said, leaning her head against Victor’s shoulder. “Only a win is worth losing them, and even then not so much.”
He kissed the top of her head. “We’re right here, babe. I swear.”
“I couldn’t protect them.” She felt the prickle of tears and didn’t bother trying to staunch the flow. “I thought they were safe.”
“We all did,” Uni said, slipping his arms around her waist from behind. “I’m so sorry.”
They stood there for a moment. “Omega said we’re throwing Junior a birthday party before he goes to join Q’s family.”
“He’ll be safe there,” Victor said. “And he knows Q’s family already. He won’t be alone.”
“But…we don’t know where he’ll be.”
“We can’t,” Uni said. “You know that, and you know why.”
“Yeah. I do.” She stared out at the water. “I sure as hell do.”
* * * *
Kali Enyo sipped her morning latte at a busy coffee shop in Atlanta. She knew from what Ax had told her that Silo’s team was dead and no longer a threat.
She wished she could have seen the look on Hannibal’s face when he finally figured that out.
It was a couple of days before Halloween. She had rented herself a tiny apartment just south of the city upon her arrival there nearly two weeks earlier, and was enjoying exploring the city. She’d nearly talked herself into contacting Ax and asking
for a meeting with him, but she wasn’t quite ready yet.
They were close to a vaccine, the research team was. She was hoping to time any meet-up with them having a vaccine ready to test. She’d volunteer to test it.
An even better fuck-you to Hannibal and his plans.
Ax had released another round of video clips, which were the second largest headline, next to the medical advances in Kite. The team was reporting all its findings to the publicly accessible website, and others around the globe were trying to replicate their results with varying degrees of success. It depended on what strains of Kite had mutated in their particular region, what they could get their hands on.
Hannibal’s live broadcasts had decreased to just a couple a week, unheard of before all of this. It looked like Jerald was trying to portray him as a heartbroken old man.
But she saw through it. She saw the gleam in Hannibal’s eye, the way he surveyed the crowd during pauses in his sermon, how he was assessing everything.
He hadn’t changed, and he damn sure wasn’t in ill health.
He was simply waiting.
As was she.
Waiting for her chance.
Waiting for the perfect chance to stab the monster right in the heart.
* * * *
Jerald had made sure their church staff had planned plenty of alternate activities for the kids for tonight’s Halloween festivities. He’d been settling in there and actually enjoying it. St. Louis was productive in a number of ways. Jerald silently gave thanks to the foresight to wire Hannibal’s quarters for sound. He’d discovered three other contacts the man had that Jerald hadn’t known about, and he quickly converted them to his side.
He was stalling the Houston project, the staff there instructed to tell Hannibal, if he called, that things were progressing.
Jerald didn’t want to flood more Kite virus into the country. If the government’s website was to be believed, a vaccine was only months away.
He damn sure didn’t want to fuck that up.
Spread the drug, sure, he’d do that. But he wanted to be smart about it.