Chapter Twenty-Four
Jean-Luc kept to the shadows, following in the militants’ footsteps. The whole group of them seemed to be focused on the hospital now, which made his job harder, but at least Claire would be safe. He slipped through the hospital’s front entrance, and paused to let his eyes adjust to the flood of light. He’d forgotten the generators would still be running, and hadn’t properly prepared his eyes for the change.
Two militants stood with their backs to him, peering into the generator room and discussing the possibility of loading the generators onto their boats.
Jean-Luc ducked into the storage unit at the other side of the module. Maudit! That was too close. If either of them had turned while he was standing there, blinded and blinking, that would’ve been the end of the Ragin’ Cajun. He’d lost his touch. He had to be more careful. One near-death experience per month was his limit.
He waited until the two militants had both stepped inside the generator room, then ghosted past them and ran toward the surgical unit. A check behind him showed they hadn’t noticed—another reminder that this was not a well-trained fighting force. They were angry kids with AK-47s. Desperate people doing desperate things to survive.
The surgical unit was dark. He glanced up and down the corridor. Clear. He slipped inside. Back home, surgical instruments were sterilized in an autoclave after a procedure, but he doubted they had anything so sophisticated here. They likely used disinfectants and stored them somewhere easily accessible…
There.
He walked over to the rolling cart next to the operating table and started opening drawers. Score one for Jean-Luc. First drawer contained all kinds of scalpels. Now he was in business. He chose the one with the longest blade. Obviously, it wasn’t going to do much for him in a gunfight, but in close quarters, this would give him the upper hand.
Now to find Ebiere. The girl was probably frightened out of her mind, and it gave him an unpleasant tug in his belly that he’d been so willing to leave her behind. He checked the corridor again. Still empty.
Just as he stepped out, a figured appeared at the end of the hallway. One of the militants from the generator room. The kid opened his mouth to call to his friends and Jean-Luc thought, merde. He lunged, but the militant twisted away to avoid a scalpel in his jugular and drew his own knife. If he was going for a my-knife-is-bigger power play, he succeeded because that combat blade blew Jean-Luc’s little scalpel out of the water in terms of killing ability.
Fuck.
He dodged a swipe at his ribs, blocked a downward blow with his arm. The blade caught on his shirt, tearing a hole, but never made it to his skin. The shorter blade of the scalpel put him at a major disadvantage here.
He dropped to the floor, narrowly avoiding another downward stab, and swept out with the scalpel. The thin, ultra-sharp blade slid through the militant’s leg muscle, cutting so deep and fast, the kid didn’t even realize at first his leg was now useless and kept trying to Psycho Jean-Luc with his blade.
“Cajun!”
Jean-Luc risked a glance toward Marcus’s voice. Marcus stood behind the militant, two rucksacks on his back, a pistol in hand. He slid a karambit across the floor with his foot. Jean-Luc snapped up the claw-like knife, popped to his feet, and hooked the blade on the inside of the militant’s arm while blocking the next downward stab. Flesh ripped as he pulled the knife away and swiped it across the militant’s ribs. The kid screamed and took a step backward, and that’s when his leg collapsed from under him.
Panting harder than he should’ve been from the fight, Jean-Luc stepped closer to the militant and finished the job with a slice across his throat. His eyes flared wide for an instant, then he gagged and crumpled silently to the floor.
Jean-Luc breathed out a sigh of relief as Marcus tossed him his pack. “Oh, mon ami. Am I happy to see you.” He opened the pack to arm himself. He pulled on his chest holster, slid his various knives into their homes. The karambit went into its sheath over his heart, right where it belonged. He loved that fucking knife. “How’d you know I was in here?”
“Well, my first thought was to grab us a boat because I knew you’d want to get the hell out. But I also knew Claire wouldn’t leave her patients.” Marcus relieved the deceased militant of his rifle, and also tossed that to Jean-Luc. Judging by the AK he had slung over his shoulder, he’d already secured one for himself. “Took a solid guess who would win that argument.”
“I get the feeling you’re insulting me, but a comeback will have to wait.” He slid his pack onto his shoulders and picked up the AK. “We’re after one patient. Ebiere.”
Marcus fell into formation behind him. “The little girl. The first survivor.”
“Claire said her blood’s important if this bioweapon ever gets out.”
“She’s not wrong.”
They cleared the next corridor together, Marcus going left, and him going right. “Clear.”
“Clear. Where’d you stash Claire?” Marcus asked.
“She’s safe. At least until they decide to search the staff tents again.”
“Gotta hustle then. Know where you’re going?”
Jean-Luc tapped his temple. “All up here. This way.” He navigated them through the patient areas to the first of the wards. The cold zone. They didn’t see another hostile.
“I don’t like this,” Marcus said after they cleared the corridor outside the cold zone. “Where are the bastards?”
“If I had to guess…” Jean-Luc nodded down the hall to the first of the airlocks. “In there. ‘Rescuing’ their countrymen from the evil white doctors.”
“Jesus Christ. They’re going to get everyone killed. Let’s get outta here. Where’s Ebiere?”
Jean-Luc again tilted his head toward the airlock.
“In there? Are you fucking with me?”
In response, Jean-Luc shouldered his weapon and grabbed a mask and gloves from the storage shelves lining the wall. He tossed them to Marcus before picking up some for himself.
Marcus crossed himself, then pulled on the mask, swearing the whole time. “Dude, if you get me killed just to impress a woman, I’m gonna haunt your sorry ass.”
Jean-Luc stopped in front of the airlock and found the button to operate it. He glanced over before hitting it. “This isn’t about Claire. This is about a little girl who survived the unsurvivable and doesn’t have anyone else in this world. We’re getting her outta here.”
Marcus was silent for a moment, then nodded. “Roger that.”
…
Oh, God, where were they?
Claire tried to stay as still as possible, crouched in the corner of her tent behind her cot, but it was hard when her heart beat a conga rhythm and every nearby sound made her jump. The gunshots had tapered off, but she didn’t think that was a good thing. It meant all of her colleagues were dead and the militants hadn’t found what they were looking for, so they could be coming around to search again.
It was too quiet outside the walls of her tent. Too still.
What if things had gone wrong in the hospital? What if she was alone again? She’d managed on her own for a long time, but the thought of doing it again truly terrified her in a way nothing else had. Only then did she realize how much she’d come to rely on Jean-Luc since he appeared back in her life. She should resent him for it. She hadn’t needed him before. She’d been strong and resilient and…
Tired. So very tired of running.
He’d taken some of the weight of the world off her shoulders. How could she hate him for it?
She squeezed her eyes shut and tightened her hold on the cooler containing Akeso. Please. Please, let him make it back safely. She didn’t know who she was praying to—she’d always been too scientifically minded for religion—but it helped lessen her anxiety, so she repeated to herself. Over and over. Making it her personal mantra until she laid eyes on him again.
Something moved near the front of her tent. She didn’t hear it so much as sense it. For one fleeting moment, she thought Jean-Luc had returned with Ebiere, but the shadow that stepped inside was far too small to be Jean-Luc’s six-foot-four frame.
A woman. And she was holding a gun.
“Dr. Oliver, I know you’re here.”
Claire hesitated, but, really, she didn’t have any options. There was no place to hide. No place to run. Slowly, she stood. “Who are you?” Though she suspected she knew.
“Defion,” the woman said, her tone flat. “You’ve caused us a lot of trouble, Dr. Oliver.”