Page 40

Piper stepped through the glass door Ian held for her and into the lobby of the regional CDC office in a Las Vegas hospital. She told a receptionist their names and that they had an appointment with the office’s medical director.

She and Ian cooled their jets for about ten minutes before being shown back into a typical doctor’s examining room.

“You did tell this guy we’re working on a possible viral outbreak, right?” Ian muttered.

“Maybe he thought it was us infected,” she muttered back.

The door opened and a bespectacled doctor in a white lab coat stepped into the room. “Hello. I’m Doctor Vargas. How can I help you?”

“You’ve gotten the alerts from the FBI to be on the lookout for unusual viral infections? Particularly of a hemorrhagic nature?” Piper asked.

“Yes, yes. We have a protocol for such things with the local emergency rooms and urgent care clinics. Everyone’s on high alert.”

Jeez. The guy sounded bored out of his mind.

“This is a credible and real threat, Doctor Vargas,” she responded sharply.

“Do you have any idea how often a high visibility city like Las Vegas is the possible target of a terrorist attack? We go through this routine at least three times a year. And those are just the credible threats. We know how to respond, young lady.”

“So there are currently no flu-like symptom outbreaks being reported locally?”

“No. I’d hear about them if there were.” The man shook his head.

“All this fuss about Ebola. Yes, we’ve had a few cases of it brought into the U.S.

But we contained it successfully. While its symptoms can be spectacular, it’s just not that contagious a disease.

I do wish all you conspiracy theorists would get over your fixation on it. ”

Piper opened her mouth to tell the guy that a genetically engineered form of the virus damned well was worth fixating on, but Ian surreptitiously took her hand and squeezed it painfully tight. She got the message. Reluctantly, she snapped her jaw shut.

“Okay, Doctor. Thank you for your help,” Ian said pleasantly. “For the record, the FBI is taking this particular threat seriously. We have direct intelligence that an attack may have already happened and be in an incubation phase.”

The guy’s eyebrows raised skeptically. Vargas didn’t exactly laugh them out of his office, but he wasn’t far from it. She and Ian paused on the sidewalk in front of the hospital to stare at each other.

“We’re not crazy,” she declared.

“We may be. We have no actual proof that Las Vegas is the target except a helicopter sixty miles away. It’s pretty thin evidence.”

She huffed and mopped her brow. It had to be 110 degrees in the shade. The bottoms of her feet were actually getting hot just standing on the concrete pavement. “Now what?”

“Now we wait for further developments. Either the FBI will make Abahdi talk, or Alex will come up with something, or people will start dying.”

“And in the meantime?” she demanded.

He grinned at her. “We’re in Vegas. Do you need to ask?”

“You want to gamble while this attack unfolds? Isn’t that rather like Nero fiddling while Rome burned?”

“The big dogs are on this case. The investigation is out of our hands for the time being.”

They checked into an off-strip hotel and spent the remainder of the afternoon sleeping in the loud hum of an air conditioner that couldn’t quite keep up with the sweltering August heat outside. It was dark when Piper woke up to the sound of the shower running the bathroom.

Had things been better between her and Ian, she would have joined him. But as it was, she pulled on clothes and tuned the television to a news channel to see if the world had come to an end yet or not. So far, no one was reporting any alarming viral outbreaks or bombs anywhere in the country.

Ian emerged from the bathroom looking better than any one man had a right to. He wore a black t-shirt that was just tight enough to outline his seriously hot physique. It stretched tight across his biceps and advertised that he was not a guy to mess with.

“Going out?” she asked in surprise.

“There’s a place in town I usually check out when I’m here.”

“Vegas regular, are you?”

“My unit trains in the area every year or two.”

Probably some sort of desert combat or survival training if she had to guess.

“You wanna come along?” he asked.

“And be your wingman?” she asked wryly.

He grinned reluctantly. “You’re not exactly prime wingman material. You’ll attract too much attention to yourself.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that. She pulled her hair back into a simple ponytail and skipped all make-up, opting only to splash a little cold water on her face and brush her teeth before they headed out. She wore jeans and a plain, white t-shirt considerably looser than his.

The place he took her to—way, way off the Strip—was a dive. It had low-ceilings and cracked linoleum floors, and it was dark and smoky and stunk of sweat and stale beer. The men in the place were mostly the silent, dangerous type, and the women utterly predictable.

Piper groaned. “You did not bring me to a Special Forces groupie bar.”

“Nah. It’s not that exclusive a place.”

She looked around in disgust. “I know Special Forces guys when I see them, and these women are all but lying down on the pool table and spreading their legs.”

“It’s not that bad,” Ian replied, grinning.

“I hear panting. And that, right there,” she pointed at a wet spot on the floor, “is a puddle of drool.”

Ian bellied up to the beer and ordered a pair of beers on tap. He shoved a foamy glass at her and turned to survey the room. “Some decent action, tonight,” he commented over his brewsky.

Eyes narrowed, she scanned the room. She knew the female types. Bleached blondes. Busty. Tight jeans over juicy, wagging asses. High-heels to make them look that last ten pounds thinner. “There’s not an IQ in the lot that breaks triple digits,” she reported sourly.

“Guys don’t come here for the intellectual stimulation.” He was laughing outright at her, now.

She turned back to face the bar. “You’re an asshole,” she muttered.

“Jealous?” he inquired.

“Hardly.”

“Hey, look. Piper. Someone’s coming over to talk to you, in spite of your man clothes, general scrawniness, and obvious brainiac tendencies.”

She glanced up at a giant slab of a man. He was at the top end of the age range in the place, but she would bet he could take out half the male talent in this joint. His graying hair was buzzed short.

“This guy bothering you?” the slab rumbled, lifting his chin at Ian.

“Nah. He’s okay,” she mumbled.

“Sure you don’t want me to take his sorry ass out back and teach him some manners?”

Alarmed, she looked up at the man. “No, really. He’s fine.”

“I dunno…”

Ian reached over and slugged the guy’s shoulder. “Hey, T-Bone. Long time no see. How’s the other side of the fence?”

“Lucrative, man. You need to hop ship and come to the private security side of the house. Where’ve you been M&M?”

Piper looked back and forth between the two men. Of course. The Special Forces community was tiny. She would bet Ian knew half the yahoos in here. Scowling, she listened to the ritual trading of war stories between Ian and the mountain of a former Marine.

Once they’d traded evasive pleasantries about their most recent assignments, she was startled to hear T-Bone murmur, “Who’s the arm candy, Ian?”

“My partner. Piper, meet Cooper Bosworth.”

“Can I buy you a drink, darlin’?” Bosworth rumbled.

She smiled regretfully. “I’m designated wingman, tonight. And at the rate Ian’s going, he’s going to need some serious help finding a willing female and figuring out what to do with her. I’d better stay sober enough to help him find his dick?—“

“Hey now!” Ian interrupted as T-Bone roared with laughter.

She shrugged, eyes glinting with irritation. “I dare you. Find a bimbo in here and have sex on the premises before we leave.”

Ian stared at her in open shock. Something akin to disappointment passed through his gaze.

“You wanted a wingman, right?” she pressed. “Isn’t it my job to help you achieve cheap sex with the hottest groupie you can manage to snare with your line of bullshit?”

“Bit of an attitude your partner’s got on her,” T-Bone commented just before slugging about half a beer in a single pull.

Ian glared at her. “You noticed that, huh?” He picked up his glass as she glared back at him and moved off toward the dim recesses of the bar near a jukebox spewing country music and a tiny dance floor full of slutty bubbettes strutting their stuff. He was welcome to them.

“Bunch of half-drunk groupie chicks,” she muttered in disgust, staring down at the bar and the beer sitting between her braced elbows. “Hardly seems fair to turn Ian loose on them.”

T-Bone chuckled from beside her, his elbows planted next to hers. “Only kind of chicks he knows what to do with.”

She glanced over at the big man, startled. “Excuse me?”

“Ian ain’t exactly a ladies’ man. Oh, the girls swoon all over him, and the way I hear it he’s hell on wheels in the sack. But he’s a man’s man.”

“What the heck does that mean?” she demanded.

“He’s most comfortable with men. In the field. Blowing stuff up and hanging with a SEAL team. Women—they make him hinky.”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

“How’s it going between you two? Never thought I’d see him work with a broad.” T-Bone added hastily, “No offense.”

“None taken.” As for the whole, how’s it going between you question, she dodged it entirely.

“Where’d you two meet?” T-Bone inquired.

“Overseas. I spotted him through a scope on my sniper rig.”

The big man laughed heartily. “My greatest fear. A woman on the business end of a high-powered rifle.” He drained yet another beer and ordered a pitcher for himself this time around.