Page 103 of Deadly Strain

“How long are we running dark?”

“About thirty minutes.”

Grace reached out and squeezed March’s uninjured shoulder. When he leaned closer to her, she said to him, “You let me know if the bleeding doesn’t stop or gets worse. I’ll try to bandage you up blind.”

“I’m putting pressure on it, Doc,” he said. “It should be fine.”

When she didn’t let go, he added, “I promise to tell you if it doesn’t stop bleeding.”

“Good.”

Somewhat mollified, she settled back in her seat.

Huh. For once, she didn’t feel airsick.

The men around her stirred a long time later. The lights all came on and when Grace looked out the side of the helicopter, FOB Bostick was below them.

The engine slowed and they dropped onto the same pad as the one they’d departed only two days ago. This time no one was shooting at them, but there was a strong force of soldiers surrounding the area. For their protection or other reasons?

Smoke shut down the engine and Sharp got up first. “Stay here,” he said to her on his way past her and onto the tarmac.

Grace resisted the urge to shake her head and spoke to March first. “Let me see your shoulder.”

He held still while she got some of the gear off of him, tore open his uniform, and slapped a nonstick pad on the wound, then used a self-adhering bandage to keep it in place.

She kept glancing out to check on Sharp, but he hadn’t gone alone. Hernandez stood just behind him and to his left. She picked Marshall out of the crowd as well, but he wasn’t the man Sharp was talking to.

General Stone?

Sharp nodded and gestured at the helicopter. Marshall turned his gaze on the aircraft and even though March was blocking the colonel’s view, she felt as if his gaze was a laser, targeting her for his next shot.

Finally, after what felt like an hour, Hernandez jogged back to them.

“We’re good,” he said as he gave the all-clear signal to everyone in the cargo section of the bird. He moved to tell Smoke and Clark, and within moments they were disembarking and walking toward the knot of officers waiting with Sharp.

Her feet weighed twenty pounds each and she had to force herself to keep walking. She couldn’t believe Marshall would give up his anger just because a superior officer ordered him to. No, he’d suffered a loss that had wounded him in ways most people couldn’t even see, let alone understand.

She was responsible for that loss.

Sharp turned and stepped out of the way, revealing a man in his fifties, his salt-and-pepper hair buzz-cut short, with a face set in stone.

She saluted along with the rest of the team.

He returned the salute and never looked away from her face. “Major Samuels.”

“Sir.”

“You look like shit.”

“Yes, sir.” Why argue with the truth?

He regarded her coldly for several seconds, then asked, “Did you order, request, or beg Commander Cutter to release you from Colonel Marshall’s custody?”

“No, sir. I called him and his team a bunch of idiots.”

Stone grunted.

“To be fair, sir,” she continued, “once I realized they weren’t going to revise their plan to leave the base, I agreed to go. Reaching Colonel Maximillian with samples could not wait.”