Her Last Defense (7 page)

A face with a neat, round bullet hole in the center of the forehead.

“M
acy? Macy!”

Macy’s silence had Clint crashing heedlessly through the underbrush along the top of the ravine, trying to get a glimpse of her. Her scream froze him in his muddy tracks.

It wasn’t a scream of pain, but one of terror.

What the hell?

The monkey. It had to be. God, she’d stumbled right on the infected monkey. Or it had stumbled on her.

“Macy!”

A new surge of adrenaline lit his blood on fire. He jumped a fallen log, skidded on his heels over a rock covered with lichen, and sailed over the edge of the ravine without pause when he caught a glimpse of her in the water below.

He grabbed an exposed root and used it to slow his slide, then bumped down the rest of the slope on his heels and his butt to find himself standing in hip-deep water next to a dead man.

“Are you all right?” he asked Macy.

She nodded, but her teeth were chattering. A knot of fear hardened in his gut when he realized she’d lost her bio mask.

“It—it’s Michael,” she said.

“Michael who?”

“Mike Cain. Our pilot. He’s been shot.”

And he was a long way from the plane crash. Even the biggest, most desperate coyote wouldn’t have dragged him this far.

Which meant either the pilot had been shot and thrown out of the plane before it went down, or had survived the crash and walked into the woods before being shot.

What the hell was he doing? He didn’t have time for this now. He had to get Macy out of here.

He heaved the pilot to the wide end of the fallen tree, closest to shore, and hooked him over a sturdy limb where he wouldn’t be washed away, and then swept Macy into his arms. She felt small as a child, cradled against his chest, but there was nothing childlike about the plush curves that nestled against his body, or the wave of protectiveness, so fierce it was almost animalistic, that washed up inside him.

“What are you doing?” she asked, squirming against him.

Knowing she had to be freezing, he pulled her closer to his body heat. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

“But Michael—”

“Nothing we can do to help him. We’ll send someone back later.”

She opened her mouth to argue, but he wasn’t listening. He was moving.

Trying to climb the muddy bank here was useless, so he waded downstream to a spot where it wasn’t so steep.

When he got her on dry land—figuratively speaking—he set her on a large, flat rock and ran his hands up and down her arms and legs, feeling for broken bones, signs of blood or other injury.

“Are you sure you’re okay? Do you hurt anywhere?”

“I’m fine. Ow!” She grimaced as he probed her ankle. He immediately gentled his touch, his chest tightening with concern.

“Okay, I’m not fine. But I’ll live. I just twisted it, I think. It caught on something when I was falling.”

“It’s starting to swell already. You’re not going to be able to walk out of here.”

Her gaze roamed the trees on all sides. “To be honest, without my bio mask, I wouldn’t want to try.”

Christ, the monkey. The virus. She had no protection.

She wrapped her arms around herself and squeezed. Her gaze darted left and then right. “Do you think whoever shot him is still out here?”

“I doubt it. From the looks of him, he’d been dead awhile.”

“Do—” A shudder racked her shoulders. “Do you think he could come back?”

Clint’s jaw went hard. He didn’t think so, but
stranger things had happened. “We’re not waiting around to find out. Give me the satellite phone, we’ll call for a chopper to come pick you up.”

She reached into the pouch at her waist. Her hand came back empty. She didn’t have to tell him what had happened to it. It was somewhere at the bottom of the creek.

Terror rose in her in palpable waves. What little color had been left in her cheeks paled. Her eyes rounded to huge, dark, sunken saucers set in an alabaster face.

“It’s all right,” he told her. But it wasn’t. There was an infected monkey and possibly a gunman and God knew what else out here.

With a growl, he ripped his mask off and lifted it toward her head. The monkey, at least, he could protect her from.

“What are you doing?” She shoved his hands away. “Clint, no. Put that back on.”

He clamped one hand around both her wrists. She jerked and wriggled, trying to pull away. “Don’t fight me.”

“If the monkey is in this area, I’ve already been infected.”

“And if he’s not, I plan to make sure he doesn’t get another chance.”

“By giving up your own protection?”

She managed to get one hand free and lurched away from him. He pulled her back by the other hand and braced her back against his chest. Their hearts pounded each other like two rams butting heads.

“You’re a doctor,” he said, struggling for some semblance of calm.

“And that makes my life more important than yours? You’re a Texas Ranger, for God’s sake. You don’t think that’s worth something?”

The sickness that had been festering in his gut for weeks spread to his mind, his heart. This was his fault. He couldn’t hold her. Hadn’t been able to pull a hundred-and-ten-pound woman to safety when her life depended on it.

So what was his life worth now?

“Not as much as it used to be.”

Barely holding back a growl of guilty frustration, he yanked his biohazard mask over her head and checked to make sure each strap was tight as she watched him through wounded eyes.

She didn’t understand. How could she? And he wasn’t about to explain.

Not as much as it goddamn used to be.

“It’s miles back to camp. You can’t carry me the whole way.” Macy’s face shield bumped the back of Clint’s head as he slipped in the mud, righted himself. She’d been riding him piggyback-style for a good twenty minutes. He was breathing hard, but showed no signs of slowing.

“We’re not going back to camp,” he said.

Her arms tightened around his shoulders. The woods on all sides seemed deeper and darker, more dangerous than ever. “Then where are we going?”

They needed to get back to camp, where it was safe. Where he wouldn’t risk sucking in death with each labored breath he drew.

She hadn’t been able to convince him to take back his mask, the jerk, and it wasn’t like she could throw him to the ground and force it on him.

“Back to the last trap we checked,” he huffed. “I think there’s a place there we can hole up until we can get some help.”

It was a fire tower, he explained when they were close enough to see the metal stilts rising through the tops of the trees. The Forestry Service used to use them as observation posts during fire season, but they were mostly abandoned now. Clint had seen this one a couple-dozen yards away from the last trap they’d checked.

He set her down at the base.

She peered up, but couldn’t see what sat atop the stilts for the trees in the way. “How do we get up there?”

Clint walked around, his head also turned upward. “There should be a ladder. There it is.” He pointed.

It was a retractable type, like the ones on fire escapes. Probably to keep unauthorized people, like them, from climbing the tower. A metal box housed the pulley system that would lower the steps. Clint used the butt of his gun to whack off the rusted lock.

“Here we go,” he said as the ladder creaked down. “Can you climb?”

“I’ll dance the rumba if it means getting somewhere dry.” Somewhere far above sick monkeys and floating corpses. She shivered, wrapped her arms around herself. “Please tell me this thing has a roof.”

“This thing has a roof.”

“Thank the Lord.”

He put her on the ladder before him and followed her
up, his feet just one rung lower than hers, his body behind her, shielding her and bracing her. Ready to catch her if she fell.

The seventy-five-foot climb was slow and painful. The steps of the ladder were slippery and her ankle ached. By the time she reached the four-by-four square shack perched far above the treetops, it was all Macy could do to drag herself inside and flop onto her back, spread-eagled. Or as close to spread-eagled as a girl could get in a four-foot-square room.

The Ranger pulled himself in after her and shook his head like a dog, splattering water across all four walls, then leaned into the small, square hole cut in the wall that looked out over the forest to the west. “I think we’ll be pretty safe up here. Come see.”

Macy couldn’t summon the energy to move, much less get up and look out the window. She did manage to pull off her face mask. It felt good to breathe unfiltered air again. She inhaled deeply, smelling the forest and the rain. “The virus shouldn’t drift this high.”

He pulled the rope and retracted the ladder. “I hope José won’t be able to pay us an unexpected visit, either.”

“He could probably shinny up the stilts, but I doubt he’d climb a metal structure when he’s got all those trees to play in down there.”

“All right, then.” The Ranger rubbed his hands together. She watched him through heavy eyelids. “That takes care of shelter.”

Of course, now that they had a roof over their heads, the rain had stopped. Only the occasional stray drop pinged on the tin overhead.

“Let’s see what we can do about the other necessities.” He dug through his pack, pulling out and inspecting items. “Water. Bananas.”

“Those are for the traps.”

“Not anymore. First-aid kit. Disinfectant.” He opened the lid on the bottle of antibacterial gel, squeezed some out in his palm and then tossed the bottle to her before slathering his hands together. “Scrub down,” he said and then kept digging in the pack.

“Here we go. Survival blankets.” He tore open the plastic pack, unfolded the crinkly silver sheet and handed it to her. “Not exactly a down comforter, but it’ll conserve at least a little body heat. Take those wet coveralls off.”

That woke her up. “In your dreams.”

His hands went still. He turned his head toward her. Shadows and whisker stubs darkened his face, but his eyes were fever-bright. “If this were my dream, honey, you wouldn’t have to take them off. I’d do it for you.”

Macy clamped her teeth together to keep her jaw from dropping.

“Come on. Rain poncho first.” He waggled his fingers at her. “Give it to me.”

The poncho was uncomfortable. It kept tangling up her arms. She pulled herself into a sitting position, her back propped against the wall, and dragged it over her head.

“Good girl,” he said when she handed the tattered yellow vinyl to him.

He yanked his poncho off and tied the two together, then put his butt on the windowsill and levered his
shoulders through the hole. A moment later, he disappeared through the opening altogether.

“Are you crazy? You’re going to fall!”

“I hope not. It’s a long way down.”

She scooted to the window, looked up and saw the toes of his rubber boots perched on a strip of metal about as wide as an elementary school ruler. “What are you doing up there?”

“Making a distress flag, I hope. When we don’t show up at camp by nightfall, they’re bound to send choppers out looking for us first thing in the morning. This bright yellow ought to be visible from a good distance.”

“Oh.” Pretty clever, her Ranger.

Not too smart, giving up his bio mask with a lethal virus floating around, but definitely clever.

And when had he become
her
Ranger?

“Are you naked yet?” he called out as casually as if he’d been ordering a burger and fries at the drive-through, and she realized he was trying to make a joke of it, to relieve a little of the anxiety in the situation, even if his humor did sound a little forced.

She appreciated the effort, but she really wasn’t in a laughing mood. She was tired and cold. She was sad for the lives that had been lost, worried for those that might yet be lost, including his, and she was scared.

Scared that the searchers wouldn’t find them in the morning. Scared that when she closed her eyes tonight, she’d see monkeys swinging through the trees, just out of reach, and corpses floating in the creeks and rivers.

Scared that she was going to be spending the night
on the cramped floor of a tiny room with a very large man, and only a scrap of silver blanket to separate them.

Scared that maybe she wished there were nothing to separate them at all.

Clint hooked his feet back into the window, grabbed on to the edge of the roof and swung himself into the room, nearly landing on top of Macy. She was huddled in the corner, the silver blanket tucked up to her chin. She’d unbraided her hair, and the wet, heavy waves fell around her shoulders like an auburn shawl.

Their gazes met, then his slid down. Past the edge of the blanket to the floor. To the puddle of blue coveralls against the far wall.

The hairs on the back of his neck stood up as if there were another storm moving in. Tension crackled and popped in the room. Heat suffused his body from the toes up.

At least he wasn’t shivering any longer.

“Your turn,” she said, and the sound of her voice pulled his gaze back to hers. Her eyes were still wide. Shocked.

He looked away, studied the floor. “You know, I didn’t much care for this jumpsuit when your people issued it to me after decon.”

“And your point is?”

He risked a quick glance at her, tried to communicate with a look what he couldn’t with words: regret. “It’s starting to grow on me.”

“Chicken.”

“Damn straight.” He jammed his fingers into his
pockets, leaned his hips against the wall across from her. As far away as he could get. “Look, Macy. You’ve had a hell of a day. We both have.”

“Your point, again?”

“Stress and naked bodies don’t mix well.”

“Afraid I’m going to seduce you, Clint?” she asked softly. Dark was falling outside. Only the thin light of the sun setting behind the clouds gave the tower room a soft, shadowed glow.

“I’m afraid you won’t have to,” he answered honestly.

His life was coming apart at the seams. How easy it would be to forget his troubles in her. The sight of her. The scent. The warm, wet heat.

She deserved better.

He turned to stare out the window. Mist clung to the dark treetops, pooling in spots like filmy lakes. The sun’s last rays set the lakes aglow. The moon had already risen in a clear sky above it all.