Linda Andrews - Extinction Level Event

“Even if it is more virulent, those of us who got sick should be immune.” Her stomach clenched. The burger she’d consumed earlier felt like a rock. Unless it had changed enough. Sweet Jesus! She’d taken Sunnie out, exposed her. They’d both gotten the influenza; both recovered.

The disease couldn’t strike them again.

“Impossible.”

But it wasn’t. Viruses were simple things. And they could mutate fast. Very fast. Yet, to change so much that a healthy immune system couldn’t recognize an antigen… She locked her gaze on the Colonel’s.

He reshaped the metal hasp of his mask across the bridge of his nose.

Mavis’s nails bit into her palm. The deaths in Asia would have been occurring for a while. Might never have stopped. “Why did the government lift the public gathering ban if they even suspected it could come back?”

The porch light blinked on then off. A question from Sunnie disguised as a normal power fluctuation.

Mavis scratched the back of her head, before flashing the peace sign. She was all right. Sort of. Maybe. Probably not. Lowering her hand to her side, she replayed their excursion to the fast food restaurant. Had anyone coughed or sneezed? No. She would have remembered. Heck, everyone would have stampeded from the building. But people had talked.

And bugs hitchhiked on the spoken word.

The colonel thumped the silver briefcase in his hand against his leg, before looking around the cul-de-sac and adjusting his facemask. Again. “Perhaps we should have this conversation inside.”

“Of course.” Mavis spun on her heel and crossed the cement porch. She didn’t particularly want the man in her house. Something about the Colonel set off her gag reflex. But the last thing she needed was Mr. Quartermain’s grandson finding out about the return of the Rattling Death and skewering her with an arrow.

Soles thudded softly behind her. One set, the colonel’s no doubt. The career NCO wouldn’t have survived by making so much noise. Mavis’s irritation meter spiked. And why hadn’t the officer introduced himself? Just another petty mind game, power-hungry thugs liked to play? Like not turning over the case to her and leaving?

“Did you observe any sick civilians while you were out?” The colonel’s nasally twang disturbed the night.

“No.” And she would have noticed. Everyone would have. She jabbed her key in the deadbolt and twisted. “Everyone seemed shocked, guarded, but otherwise healthy.”

Turning the knob, she pushed the door open and keyed in the pin for the alarm. The faint chemical smell from the pellet stove surrounded her.

“Of course, you can’t be sure.” The colonel brushed her back as he darted inside. “You weren’t looking for the signs of the illness.”

Butt head! Mavis jerked on her key but it refused to come free. “Everyone was looking for signs of the illness. The high fever, the raspy breathing, the unquenchable thirst, and the broken blood vessels in the eyes.” Bracing her foot against the base of the door, she tugged on the key. Why wouldn’t it come free? “No one will ever forget watching a loved one drown slowly in their bed.”

A calloused hand slipped around hers. “Ma’am?”

Tingles raced up her arm. The sergeant major. Not that she’d forgotten him. Who could? There was something about him, more than his buzz cut or his clean ACUs. More than the scent of honest sweat and determination. Her husband had smelled like that.

“Have at it, Sergeant Major.” Mavis scuttled away.

The colonel’s lips quirked.

She stopped on the threshold. The pompous prick probably assumed she’d been glad to hand over the difficult task of opening doors to a man. Raising her chin, she looked the CO in the eye. “The lock always sticks.”

Metal jingled behind her. The sergeant major’s voice was soft as velvet. “It’s the Arizona dust. Gets into everything.”

Stepping into the foyer, she smoothed her jacket. Like they were here to talk about deadbolts and dirt. Still she appreciated his effort to put her at ease.

“Exactly.” She shrugged off her purse strap while walking past the closed doors of the den, heading for the great room.

The colonel stepped backward, bumping the abstract hanging on the wall. The four-by-six foot collage wobbled. “Now about the Redaction…”

Mavis reached out to steady the work of art but it had stopped moving. A quick glance and she spied the sergeant major taking his hand from the painting. The CO could learn a few manners from his non-commissioned officer. “What information have you brought me to look at?”

Turning to flip on the light switch, she eyed the sergeant major.

The recessed CFLs in the great room buzzed before slowly brightening.

A grin flirted with his full lips and dimples flashed in his clean-shaven cheeks. He glanced down at her loafers before lazily making his way up her legs, over her stomach, lingered on her breasts, then paused on her mouth before meeting her gaze. Heat flared in his brown eyes.

Mavis’s cheeks tingled and her skin prickled with awareness. Oh my. He looked like he was willing to teach her a few things as well. Good Lord, no man had looked at her like that since Jack.

He held out his hand. “Your keys, Ma’am.”

She shook off the soldier’s spell. Careful not to touch him, she plucked the keys from his fingers. “Thank you.”

The colonel cleared his throat. “Sergeant Major, please make sure the house is secure.”

The sergeant major’s jaw clenched. “Yes, Sir.”

Mavis fisted the keys. “My niece should be in the back bedroom.”

The soldier’s dimples flashed. “I’ll be sure to make plenty of noise so I don’t scare her, Ma’am.”

“I’d appreciate it.” She smiled. The warning was for her niece to stop listening in the hall and get to her bedroom. Dropping her keys in the Royal Dolton bowl on the hall table, she placed her purse next to it then faced the colonel.

The light wasn’t kind to him and she almost asked him to put the mask back on. His close-set eyes, pursed lips and swallow complexion reminded her of a sick pig. His gut strained the Velcro of his stained uniform. Sloppy and disrespectful. The Army must have been harder hit by the Rattling Death for anyone in their right mind to make this man a full bird colonel.

“Now, Mrs. Spanner…”

“Dr. Spanner, Colonel.” Best to use proper titles when dealing with worms. Especially when he didn’t seem inclined to hurry and hand over her case. Not that she’d begrudge his curiosity. Something told her he wouldn’t use the information for the public welfare.

Mavis crossed to the round teak dining room table. Moonlight filtered in the open vertical blinds in the niche. She grabbed the dirty glass off the bar of the open kitchen and set it inside the soapstone country sink.

“Of course, Doctor.” He strode across the beige ceramic tile into the sitting area of the great room. He scanned the contents.

She could almost feel him calculating the value of the painted aboriginal masks and original artwork on the beige walls. Her skin crawled when he focused on the gilded canopic jars from Egypt, the Samurai sword and sheath, and the red and black Minoan bowl on the built-in bookcases. The uncouth moron probably didn’t recognize them as reproductions.

“I think we’ll use the table, Colonel.” Mavis pulled out one of the cane back, oak chairs then took the seat opposite it. “That way we have room to spread out.”

And you don’t get too comfortable.

The officer trailed his fingers along the blue and green Persian rug hanging by the arcadia doors before stopping next to the circular table with her replica Ming vase.

Mavis crossed her arms over her chest. If he touched her honeymoon souvenir from the Great Wall of China, she’d break off his fingers and feed them to him.