Chapter Two
A licia wanted to strangle him. She settled for yelling. “I wasn’t the target.”
“Our vehicles were full of targets, including you.” He looked at her like he wanted to strip her naked and inspect her for bruises. “We can’t know if the bomber was supposed to eliminate any one person or just as many as possible.”
“Why didn’t you leave when I told you to?”
“Franz was bleeding out.”
“Saving others at the cost of your own safety is stupid.”
He looked at her like she was crazy. “That’s my job.”
“Throwing your life away isn’t part of your job.” She poked him in the chest again. “I think you were the target. Everything else was collateral damage.”
“We have no proof of that.”
She gritted her teeth. “I’m sure we’ll find it.”
“Why does that matter?”
The man wasn’t stubborn, he was willfully blind to threats to his safety. “Akbar isn’t just looking for any target. He’s fixed his sights on you.”
Max pressed his lips together. “Don’t get ahead of the facts. We don’t know that he’s behind this.”
“Don’t dismiss me, damn it. I know about the body with the message written to you on it.” A gruesome find, discovered at the scene of a bombing, a massacre of civilians in Afghanistan a week ago. It warned that the wrath of God was coming, and had been addressed to Colonel Maximillian, US Army. That kind of death threat could derail even the most pragmatic man.
His gaze softened and he put a hand on her arm to guide her away from the carnage. “While I appreciate your concern, I won’t avoid doing my duty because it’s dangerous, or because someone attempts to kill me. I’ll be careful and I won’t do anything without making sure I’m performing that task as safely as possible.” He stopped and smiled ruefully at her. “I’m a soldier. Danger comes with the job.”
This from a man with few to no combat skills. “Max,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. “Planning for an attack only gets you as far as the first contact with the enemy. After that, no plan can keep up with the changing conditions. I’ve seen your shooting scores and I’ve faced you on the mats. You couldn’t fight your way out of a paper bag. You’re important. General Stone says that you’ve got one of the toughest and most important jobs in the army right now. He can’t afford to lose you.”
He sighed. “Blunt, but true.” He shrugged, but didn’t say anything else for several seconds.
His face was blank as he stared into space, and she could almost hear the cacophony of thoughts racing around in his head. Would he ignore her concerns or take them seriously?
Would he be like too many other officers and shove her expertise and experience aside?
Finally he asked with a short nod, “What do you suggest?”
His question sent a warm wave over her body. She had to focus, making sure her surprise didn't show on her face. “You need more training and a permanent bodyguard.” What he really needed was head-to-toe body armor.
He snorted and stepped away from her. “I don’t have time for more training or a tag-along. I need several clones just to get my current workload done and still sleep once every few days.”
She followed. “I guarantee the person assigned to you would slide into your team without any trouble.”
He gave her a sour look. “You? I thought you swore never to leave your current position? Something about the rest of the army being too pansy ass for you.”
“What can I say?” she said with a toothy grin. “I like a challenge.”
“Lovely.” His tightly pressed lips told her he wasn’t happy with the situation at all. Would he argue against it?
“You need me, Max,” she said, dropping the smile to show she was serious. “Don’t fight me on this.”
“According to you, I can’t fight at all.”
Alicia ran one hand over her face. “We can change that.” If only she could do something about her own problems.
Max watched her with a frown on his face. “What am I missing? According to everyone, you love your job with the Special Forces. Why are you even considering this?”
He deserved the truth.
“I’ve gotten myself into some trouble in the past few months.” She was going to have to explain it. Fuck.
“What kind of trouble?” Max asked slowly.
“Butting heads with a couple of officers.” She sighed. “Complaints have been made.”
“ Official complaints?”
“Yes.”
“And your father is...”
“General Stone does not practice favoritism.”
“Bullshit.”
Alicia turned to stare at Max. He seldom swore. “He’s done as much as he can, but when I screw up, I really screw up. And now, today—”
“Today, you saved my life and Franz’s life.” Max’s voice was filled with righteous indignation.
“And I did it by disobeying an order from the British Army’s chief medical officer. It’s one more nail in my coffin.”
Max stared at her for a moment then muttered something under his breath. She only caught a couple of words, stubborn and idiots , but it was more than anyone else had said. He seemed to think about it for several moments, then looked at her and said, “I’ll make the request for your training skills. Try to stay out of trouble until the transfer comes through.”
“Yes, sir. Though trouble seems to have no problem finding me.”
* * *
A month later, Max hunkered down in the dirt, tucked his rifle into the hollow of his shoulder and waited for his target to show himself. The conditions were good, visibility excellent and no wind. Max had only to wait.
The enemy popped up. Max released a breath, then squeezed out three quick shots.
“You missed,” a woman said from behind him. “All three shots.”
Max’s gut tightened at the sound of her voice. He looked over his shoulder at his personal peanut gallery. Sergeant Alicia Stone.
Finally .
“I expected you three weeks ago,” he said loud enough to be heard despite the hearing protection they were both wearing. “What took you so long?”
Her mouth tightened. “I was unexpectedly delayed, sir.”
That was word for word what General Stone said when Max had asked him why his daughter was going to be weeks late in joining Max’s team.
Word for word meant the answer had been carefully chosen. Chosen responses were used in three situations in the army: As a non-answer to a question that shouldn’t have been asked in the first place. As a calculated response regarding a political or public relations messy event. Or as avoidance of a harmful incident. Which one was this?
Stone excelled in her role as a trainer for the Special Forces combatives program, but she had one major failing. She never hesitated to call anyone she was training on their mistakes, regardless of rank.
She was about to stomp all over him thanks to his.
He was a lousy shot.
He secured his weapon, then removed his ear protection.
“I knew you were a terrible shot, but this is beyond my lowest expectations.” She looked at him like he was some kind of insect. “How did you qualify to carry your sidearm with aim like that?”
“A great deal of practice.” He glanced at the rifle he held. “This is not my preferred weapon.”
“You actually have one you like?” Her tone was scathing.
She was pushing it.
He stood and looked at her, altogether enjoying how far back she had to tilt her head to maintain eye contact with him. This woman was a force of nature with a personality to match. To allow her to see weakness was foolhardy at best.
“My tongue,” he said, staring at her mouth. “Weren’t you the one who said I could flay a private alive with it?”
The corners of her lips twitched. “I don’t know many extremists who’ll take the time to sit down and have a conversation with one of us.”
She’d said us . That and the flash of humor soothed something tense inside him. “Well, I’ve got one of them sending me letters. That’s a start.” He’d received six, filled with rhetoric and raving about a holy war. That wasn’t counting the threats addressed to him, written on dead bodies left where they were sure to be found.
“No, someone is attempting to create fear by including flour inside the envelope to make you think they’re sending anthrax,” she said with concern.
He shrugged that away. “We know how to handle anthrax. It’s the dead bodies that have me worried.”
“The point I’m trying to make is that you need to be prepared to defend yourself, which is impossible with aim like that.” She gestured at the target he’d missed a whole lot more than three times. “I knew you had terrible aim, but this is so bad, I have serious doubts about your ability to defend yourself in any situation.” For the first time since she arrived, she didn’t sound like she was accusing him of anything.
She did have a point. “I’m open to suggestions.”
“It’ll have to keep. We’re expected by the general in his office in ten minutes.” She came to attention and stared at his Adam’s apple as any good soldier would do when addressing a senior officer.
“Very good, thank you, Sergeant.”
She saluted and he saluted back.
Max exited the range with Stone behind him, then they went their separate ways.
He returned to his very drab and banal-looking building that contained his office and work space. The inside was anything but drab and banal. He had a fully equipped level-four containment lab, allowing him to work with some of the deadliest bacteria and viruses in the world.
He stowed his weapon in the locker in his office, cleaned up, and stopped to talk with his assistant, Private Eugene Walsh, who was just hanging up the phone. “I’ll be busy for the next couple of hours with General Stone.”
“Sir,” Eugene said. “That was General Stone on the phone. He’s on his way over here for your meeting.”
“Ah. Excellent, thank you.”
Max sat down at his desk and retrieved the latest email from Dr. Sophia Perry, a physician on his Biological Rapid Response Team. She and her partner, Special Forces Weapons Sergeant Connor Button, were currently training medical teams from Afghanistan to respond to disease outbreaks. That was their official mission. Unofficially, they were attempting to track the movements of a very dangerous extremist—a chemist who’d lost his family in an American air strike on known terrorists in Syria.
No one had known Akbar’s family was in the same hotel.
Akbar continued to work as a liaison between the US Army and the government of Afghanistan. He’d bided his time for a couple of years, gaining the trust of army officers and politicians alike. All while designing his own deadly biological weapons.
His first attempt to use a bioweapon had been a weaponized anthrax.
He’d killed an entire village of innocent civilians in the mountains of Afghanistan, laid an anthrax trap that killed an Army colonel at one of their forward bases, and sworn to kill as many Americans as he could.
His known body count now approached two thousand dead. In his last attempt, he’d tried to kidnap Dr. Perry and force her to modify his rabies virus, but she’d blown up her lab to prevent that from happening. Unfortunately Akbar had escaped with relatively minor injuries.
There was a brief knock at the door. Eugene opened it and said, “General Stone and Sergeant Stone to see you, sir.”
“Very good, Private.”
Eugene disappeared and the two Stones came in and closed the door.
General Stone glanced at the two chairs in front of Max’s desk and raised his eyebrows before grunting his appreciation.
Why such surprise?
Observing the two of them as they sat and looked at him made it clear. They were both astonished that an officer of Max’s rank would show a woman of her rank any deference.
“Sir, Sergeant.” Max greeted them both with a nod. “I expected the Sergeant a couple weeks ago.”
“I apologize for the length of time it took to get Sergeant Stone to you,” the general said. “I hadn’t anticipated the difficulty in arranging for replacements for her in the Special Operations training program. There was also some unanticipated red tape to getting her properly transferred.”
“No apology necessary, sir.” Max nodded at her. “I’d been warned by Demolitions Sergeant Smoke that it might be longer than initially thought. Sergeant Stone is highly respected.”
General Stone blinked in surprise.
“It’s good to know that boy can do more than grunt,” the general said.
“Have you had time to read Dr. Perry’s latest report?” Max asked, examining Ali’s expression. Something about her reactions was bothering him.
“Slippery bastard,” General Stone muttered. “No clue as to what disease he’s planning to use as his next weapon?”
“Not so far, no. I’m afraid that there are too many possibilities. He’s proven to be adept at manipulating very complex organisms, though he’s had no formal training in how to handle them. He’s taking a lot of risks, not the least of which is accidently releasing a biological weapon in a highly populated area.”
“How probable is that threat?” Sergeant Stone asked.
“If you’re looking for a number, I can’t give you one, but if it happens I won’t be surprised.”
“He’s insane,” she said almost to herself.
“Yes.” Max thought the same. “A very dangerous sort of insanity. He’s highly intelligent and without a conscience. It’s not a matter of if he’ll attack again, it’s where and when .” He paused, then added, “I think it will be soon.”
“We’re starting to see small outbreaks of cholera in some of the refugee camps in various places in the Middle East. The CIA has intel saying these camps are prime targets for the same extremists we think are supporting Akbar,” General Stone said. “The problem is, we can’t send in troops. These are countries who haven’t asked for military assistance.”
“Unless they start dying by the hundreds.” Max was unable to hide the rough edge that eventuality put into his voice. “Then they’ll call us, but it will be too late.”
The general turned to his daughter. “Are you clear on your assignment?” There was a note of reprimand in the general’s voice.
What the hell was going on?
“Bodyguard and liaison for Colonel Maximillian with Special Forces,” she replied, her back as flexible as a steel rod.
“Yes, and see if you can get him to shoot straight. I’d hate to lose him because he can’t hit what he’s aiming at.”
“Why don’t you just shoot me?” Max suggested sarcastically.
“No,” General Stone said with an oddly flat expression. “I like you just the way you are. Alive.”
“Has there been a specific threat against me made?”
“Dead bodies with your name on them not enough?” The general stood. “The sergeant will fill you in on the latest. Keep in touch.” General Stone exited the office, closing the door behind him.
Max turned to her. “The latest?”
Sergeant Stone nodded. “The general has friends in the CIA. Your name keeps coming up in connection with several dangerous people.”
“I suspected, but had hoped I was just being paranoid.”
“Be all the paranoid you want. It might help keep you alive.”
“You’re full of happy thoughts today,” Max said, examining her expression. “What happened?”
“Nothing good.” She closed her mouth after those two words and pressed her lips together.
Fine. She didn’t want to talk.
He wasn’t the only stubborn one.
“Come on, I’ll introduce you to my aide.” He gestured at the door and she got to her feet. “We’re a tight group, on a first name basis unless we’re out in the general base population. How would you prefer to be addressed?”
She relaxed. It was subtle, mostly in her shoulders, but still noticeable. “Not Super Bitch.”
Max couldn’t keep his eyebrows from rising. “Some moron called you that to your face?”
She laughed. It lasted only a moment, but the change in her demeanor was astonishing, as if she’d removed a layer of plain brown paper to reveal a hidden work of art beneath. “Not anymore.” Before his eyes, she pulled the wrappings back around her, hiding the warm woman behind the uniform again. “Stick with Stone.”
Max took in a breath, filed the incident away into a special section of his mind labeled Alicia Stone , and said with a nod, “Good, Stone.” He stood then led the way out of his office and stopped at Eugene’s desk. “Private Walsh is my personal assistant.”
Stone shook his hand.
“Call me Eugene or Gene,” he said.
“Stone,” she told him.
“Eugene always knows where to find me,” Max explained. “Not sure how he does it, but...” He shrugged.
“Good to know there’s a GPS for you, sir,” Stone said.
“Max.” He permitted a grin before he said, “Eugene, I’m taking Stone on a tour of the lab. I have my phone if you need me.”
“Very good, sir,” Eugene said, reclaiming his seat.
She leaned slightly toward him and said, “He called you ‘sir.’”
Max leaned toward her and replied in the same quiet voice, “He’s only got one or two bad habits. Calling me sir every once in a while is one of them.”
“I was raised to be polite to my elders.” Eugene said it without a trace of humor.
Stone laughed, while Max gave him a sour look.
Max set off toward the lab at a stroll with Stone at his side. “So,” he said casually, “what didn’t the general tell me?”
A rueful smile came and went across her face. “Remember that suicide bomber I shot in Germany? It turns out there’s a bounty on you. A big one. You’re on the hit list of every mercenary and warlord in this part of the world.”