As Motzi followed Piner out onto the deck, Mason pulled Lauren aside. “That was Bear. His team concluded their business with Blackman last night, and they are in their plane on the way to disappearing forever.”
She raised her eyebrows. “So? What’re you guys now… best buds? He call you to say bye-bye?”
Mason put his hand on her shoulder. “Right before we split up yesterday, I asked him to tell me about Janus since he was leaving Blackman’s employ anyway.”
“And?”
“He said he didn’t know Janus’s real name, but that his best guess was that Janus was a female on the Wildfire Team and that she must’ve had some feelings for me ’cause she tried to get Blackman to guarantee that I wouldn’t be killed by Bear and his men when they stole the specimens.”
“Then it’s got to be either Shirley Cole or Suzanne Elliot, right?”
He nodded. “Yeah, and what’s more, Bear said that he told Blackman that they’d killed all three of us while stealing the specimens so if Blackman tells Janus that, then the one of the two women who is most surprised to see us alive will probably be Janus.”
As they walked toward the waiting helicopter, Mason hung back and motioned for Piner to join him.
“What’s up, Doc?” Piner said with a grin. “I’ve always wanted to say that,” he added.
Mason smiled, having heard the old joke a million times. “Here, Commander,” he said, handing the man a small duffle bag.
“What’s this?”
“These are most of the specimens we retrieved from the natives in Mexico. I need you to get these to the CDC in Atlanta as soon as possible so they can start working on a cure for the plague.”
“But, I thought that’s what you’re gonna be doing down at your lab in the jungle.”
Mason nodded. “We are, but the CDC has much better equipment and lots of really, really smart doctors who can probably do a better job there than we can in the jungle. I am taking a few of the plants and blood samples with us, but the world is counting on you getting the rest of these to Atlanta as fast as humanly possible, Commander.”
Piner nodded, a serious look on his face. “I’ll get this duffle over to the Makin Island and have one of their helicopters rendezvous with the nearest ship with a jet onboard, and I’ll tell them to have the pilot use the afterburner the entire way, Doctor.”
Mason clapped Piner on the shoulder. “Good man!” He glanced over to where several Marines were jostling to see who would be the one to “help” Lauren up onto the deck of the hovering helicopter.
“Do you think they’ll fight like that over me?” Mason asked, smiling.
Piner shook his head. “Doubtful, Doc, doubtful.”
And he was right. Mason had to fight his own way up onto the chopper with no help from the Marines, who just stood there smiling, all their eyes on Lauren.
As they settled into their jump seats, Mason cast a suspicious eye on Lauren. “By the way,” he said, “Motzi and I had to shower in the ship’s crew showers last night.”
She cut her eyes toward him and with an impish grin, said, “Uh-huh?”
“You’re looking very clean this morning… just where did you shower?”
“In the crew’s shower,” she said.
“What?”
“Yes, but two very nice young Marines volunteered to stand watch to guard my modesty.” She smiled, “They said the entire crew had drawn lots to see who got to stand guard and that they’d won.”
In spite of himself, Mason laughed as he took her hand in his and squeezed it as they lifted off from the ship.
Janus spat into the sat-phone, “You bastard! I told you not to let your dogs hurt him!”
Blackman replied. “I already told you, Janus. Those were my instructions, but when dealing with the kind of men we use to do this kind of job, accidents will happen.”
“You’ll pay for this, Blackie.”
“Oh, don’t be so melodramatic. This is as much your fault as it is mine, Janus. After all, it was you who came to me asking to work with me against your masters at the CDC.”
“Don’t remind me.”
“Anyhow, now that the samples are on their way here, you can be of more use up here in Maryland than you can down there in Mexico. When Bear and his men arrive to… uh… take care of the rest of the Wildfire Team, why don’t you return with them and come to work for me full time? I can always use someone with your… special skill set.”
“How would we explain my survival when the rest of the team ends up dead?”
“Oh, we can say you were out gathering samples of plant life when the lab must have been attacked by a band of narco-traffickers looking for drugs. I can have Bear drop you off a few miles from the perimeter guards and you can approach them with a horrible story about the deaths of your friends and the destruction of the lab.”
“I’ll think about it,” Janus said hanging up the phone and thinking “in a pig’s eye.” She knew Blackman was just offering her the job with him to put her at ease until he could have his hit men take her out with the rest of the Wildfire Team. She shook her head, thinking if Blackman ever came within her reach he was a dead man. Janus owed him for what he’d done to Mason Williams, a man Janus had loved for many years.
Janus put the phone away and stared off into the jungle, wondering if Mason had felt any pain when the mercenaries had killed him. Finally, wiping tears from her eyes, she entered the Bio-Lab to continue pretending to work on a cure for the plague while she figured out a way to disappear into the jungle just before Bear and his men arrived to execute the team.
Jinx looked over at Bear in the copilot’s seat as their small airplane lifted into the air and banked over the jungle on a northward course. “Okay, where to, boss?”
Bear stared out the window for a moment before answering. “You can drop me off in Baltimore. After that, you and the men can go anywhere in the world you’d like.”
Jinx’s eyebrows rose. “Baltimore? Why there?”
Bear shrugged. “I’ve got some unfinished business with Blackie.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Now that I’ve got enough money to retire and sit on a beach somewhere drinking umbrella drinks, I don’t want to have to spend my time looking over my shoulder.”
He looked over at Jinx. “Blackie is a fool, but he’s a hard man with a lot of resources at his command, and he’s not going to take it lightly that we double-crossed him. Remember, he’s still expecting us to take out the Wildfire Team in the jungle, and I expect he’ll be a mite pissed when he discovers the samples we gave him are bogus and that we ignored his orders to kill the scientists at the lab.”
“You think he’ll send some hard-dicks to come looking for us?”
“I think we can count on it. After all, that’s what we’d do… right?”
Jinx nodded thoughtfully. “I think you’re right.” He looked over his shoulder at the other men in the rear of the airplane. “But boss, the man lives on a fuckin’ army base. You might just need some help to get to him.”
Bear shrugged. “I’ll admit the thought had crossed my mind.”
Jinx grinned. “Good. Then that’s settled. We’ll all come with you and we’ll take that bastard down as our last official job together.”
Bear showed his teeth. “I can’t think of a better way to end our association.”
Chapter 41
Suzanne Elliot entered the Bio-Lab and almost ran into Eduardo Matos. She stepped back and gave a low whistle. “Boy, Eduardo, lookin’ good, my man,” she said with a lascivious leer, trying to cover her grief with the casual banter she was known for.