World War Moo (16 page)

Lesley sunk down in the seat. Even while being held captive in a moving vehicle, her malign aura was so powerful it could suck creatures in to their deaths.

Finally they pulled off the main road and rattled along at a slower speed before coming to a halt. Once the engine died, the only noises were the night whisperings of nature. Her captor pulled off the bag and helped her out of the car. A small log cabin sat in a forest clearing, hemmed in by soaring pine trees. The only way in or out was the narrow dirt track they'd driven down. Although her minder was barely pointing the gun at her any longer, Lesley didn't try anything. She smoked far less now thanks to the restrictions in New York, but that didn't mean she'd partaken in anything as vulgar as physical exercise—although she did purchase trainers and a gym membership, which in her book should have conferred some honorary fitness upon her. Her guard looked as though he could overpower her using his pinkie, and if she somehow did manage to knock the gun from his hand and make a break for the trees she would get only a few hundred meters before collapsing in a sweaty heap. And so she'd let him lead her inside as the cab crunched off through pebbles and strips of bark.

Now she'd been cooped up for over a week, stewing in her own juices. Her guards rotated every twelve hours, standing outside the door while she showered, sitting across from her as she stared at the television, and watching her as she slept—which at first ensured she lay awake for hours staring at the ceiling until she got used to it. They brought her clothes to change into: ill-fitting dresses, blouses, and jerseys snatched randomly from the racks of Walmart by the look of it. All the while they refused to talk to her, get a message to Terry that she was alive, or buy cigarettes and booze.

Despite the isolation and mindless wait, it was a relief to have the responsibility for all those lives taken out of her hands. Whatever consequences arose from the military onslaught, or lack thereof, she could console herself with the knowledge that none of it was her fault. Her jinx was as safely locked up as she was. All the same, she thought obsessively of the preparations that would be taking place—bombs being loaded into crates and planes, soldiers mobilizing, drones being fueled up—and the face of the blue-eyed boy haunted her uneasy sleep. Escape, however, was not an option.

That night, as she was about to climb into bed, her kidnapper returned and held out the bag.

“No questions,” he said. “Just put it on.”

She complied and allowed him to tie her hands. It was possible that the attack was in full swing and she was about to be freed. Although it was earlier than Jack had anticipated, they could have accelerated the timeline for fear of further leaks. While she was happy at the thought of getting the hell out of there, her freedom would mean the bombs were falling. She no longer knew how she felt about that.

This time the journey was much shorter. When she got out of the car, they left the bag on and led her stumbling through a series of gates and doors. From the exchanges between her companion and those manning the entry points, it seemed they were in an air base. She walked across a wide, open area, cold wind whipping around her, and up what felt like a metal gantry. Somebody shoved her into a seat and clicked a belt around her waist. She was definitely on a plane.

“Where are you taking me?” she asked.

“You're going on a little holiday. All expenses paid by the U.S. government.”

“Can you at least take the hood off? If it gets bumpy I might puke in it.”

“At least you won't have to reach for the sick bag. I'd sleep if I were you. You're going to need your strength.”

Lesley was beginning to get the strong feeling that her assumption she would be released had been misplaced. The air-conditioning came on as the plane's engine fired up, and footsteps receded as her guard walked away. She began to fumble at the seatbelt with her bound hands, sucking the cloth into her mouth with each panicked breath. Somebody delivered a stinging slap to the backs of her hands.

A male voice, low and hard, sounded close to her ear. “The fasten seatbelt sign has now been lit, so I'll have to ask you to remain in your seat.”

*   *   *

The following hours were nightmarish in both wakefulness and fitful sleep. Her dreams were full of images of buildings crumbling and bodies disintegrating in the heat of blasts. When she woke amidst a rattling bout of turbulence, she was convinced she was trapped beneath the rubble with bombs still raining above her. Only a helpful slap to the side of the head brought her back to reality, which was almost as bad. The bag came up once, just as high as her nose, to let her gulp from a bottle of water and be spoon-fed greasy spaghetti.

When the plane landed, she stumbled on numb legs, aided by prods to the back, onto what seemed like another airfield. There, after an interminable wait, she was tossed up like a sack of potatoes into another cabin, which she realized belonged to a helicopter when the blades began to whine. This was worse than being held by Brown, who'd at least got to the point quickly. What they were doing felt like mindless cruelty with no apparent end—unless it was an attempt to break her so she wouldn't talk about her capture upon her eventual release. She fervently hoped that was the case; the alternative was that she'd become a victim of rendition and was en route to a country where human rights treaties were used only to stabilize the wobbly leg of the table upon which they kept the pliers, scalpel, and blowtorch.

After another unquantifiable period in the air, her stomach registered that the helicopter was dropping. A door clunked and air whistled into the cabin. Somebody cut through her bonds and the bag was yanked off her head. Outside of the helicopter was blank darkness. Between two men in U.S. Air Force uniforms sat Jack, his hair dishevelled and skin pale beneath the cabin light.

One of the soldiers yanked her to her feet and jockeyed her to the brink of the helicopter. With no further ado, he gave her a hard shove in the back. She didn't even have time to scream before her hands and knees smacked onto wet grass. Almost immediately, Jack landed face-first beside her with a thud. The wind from the blades buffeted her, and she looked up to see the helicopter silhouetted against a sky full of fragmented clouds backlit by the moon. It banked off to the right, gaining altitude until it was lost in the darkness. She grabbed Jack by the shoulder and helped him to his feet. His face was caked in mud, and he seemed unsteady on his feet.

“Where are we?” he said.

Lesley looked around, trying to get her bearings. With the helicopter gone, she could hear the wash of waves on rocks nearby, although she could still see little other than a field fading off into the murk. She didn't need to see anything to have a good guess at where they were. “The bastards dropped us back in Britain.”

Jack wiped mud from his lips and flicked it to the ground. “Jesus,” he said shakily. “I'd like to say it's good to be home, but I'm afraid that would be a lie.”

Lesley took in a whooping breath. The oxygen fed the spark of anger smoldering in the pit of her stomach, boosting it to a roaring conflagration. She turned to Jack and began beating her fists against his chest.

“This is your fault, you fucking arsehole,” she shouted. “Why didn't you pick some other idiot for your stupid bloody story?” Jack didn't even try to fend her off; he just stood there and let her beat her rage out against his breastbone. When the coals of the fire had gone cold, Lesley sat down heavily, uncaring that the muddy grass chilled her buttocks. She dropped her head to her knees. “We're dead.”

“Not yet, we're not.”

“Yes, we are. You just don't know it yet. Were you here during the outbreak?”

“No,” Jack admitted. “I was stationed in New York.”

“I almost died, several times, and that was before people got infected. Now every living thing on this island is going to want to kill us, and there's no way off.”

Jack sat down and put a tentative arm around her shoulder. She could tell from his heavy breathing that he was just as scared as her. However, he put a brave face on it. “Look, I know this isn't ideal.”

“That's the fucking understatement of the century.”

“At least we're free. And while we're alive, we've got a chance.”

“Really? If the bloody zombies don't get us, they're going to bomb the shit out of this country any day now. You can choose which one of those ways to die suits your personality. I'm just going to sit here and starve quietly. In fact, I might suffocate myself.”

Lesley plunged her head into the mud.

Jack pulled her up. “Stop fucking about. They've left us here to die, no doubt about it, but they've made a big mistake.”

“You're right. They should've pushed us out from much higher up.”

“We've still got time. Somewhere on this island there must be a way to get a phone call or an e-mail out. I mean to find it and let everybody know exactly what they've done and are going to do. They're not going to get away with it.”

“That's very action hero of you. Shame we don't even know where we are.”

“I'll have you know I used to be a scout. Troop leader, no less. And I have my orienteering badge.”

“Okay then, Baden-Powell. Where exactly are we?”

“If you get up out of the mud, we can start walking and figure it out.”

“Why bother?”

“Because getting this story out and maybe stopping the attack is the only chance you've got of surviving this. Nobody's going to stop and ask if you're a zombie before dropping a big bomb on your head or shooting you.”

“Are you just going to keep nagging me if I don't get up?”

“Yes.”

“Great. Do me a favor and nag me to death.”

“For fuck's sake, Lesley,” Jack said, “try to find some positives.”

Lesley ran through a mental list: fresh air, the great outdoors, a chance to pee without a guard listening to her tinkle. None of them were particularly heartening. Her life seemed to have become a cycle of repetitive events. For the second time, she found herself kidnapped and trapped in a zombie-infested nation as she tried to disseminate a story that would have wide-ranging repercussions. Once had been quite enough, thank you very much. The only thing missing to make the awful sense of d
é
j
à
vu complete was a very large bull. Once more wrapped in the comfortable blanket of self-pity she'd worn so many times down the years, she said nothing.

“If you want to sit here and be pathetic, that's fine,” Jack said. “I'm off to do something about it.”

He stomped off into the darkness. Lesley, stung by being called pathetic, got to her feet. Just as she'd fallen back into a similar situation, she'd fallen back into being the old Lesley: a useless woman who spent her life bemoaning her fate rather than doing something to change it. Well, she'd shown in New York that she wasn't that woman any longer, even if that was what had ultimately brought her back here. She wasn't about to give up those hard-won gains so easily. Yes, they were in a whole lot of trouble, but Jack was right: they still had a chance, no matter how slim.

“Hold on,” she shouted. “I'm coming.”

Jack reappeared, suggesting his plunge into the unknown had only been a performance to snap her out of her funk. “Fantastic. Let's try and find a bit of cover until the sun comes up so we don't freeze to death. Then we can make a plan.”

As she opened her mouth to acquiesce, provided the plan involved getting food into their stomachs as soon as possible, a deep bellow sounded from the darkness. Lesley, completely unsurprised, almost smiled at the ridiculousness of the last element of her Groundhog Day falling into place.

“I don't suppose you used to be a matador as well,” she said.

Jack shook his head, peering into the field to figure out which direction the sound had come from.

“Then I suggest we leg it,” Lesley said, and demonstrated what she meant.

 

14

Geldof, his gaze darting left and right, tried not to run as he approached the Paris tower block where he was due to meet Scholzy and his team. It was just after midnight, and all around him shuffled loose packs of youths in hoodies, who turned the shadows where their faces should be toward him. He put on a fake pimp walk as he mounted the narrow stairs, hoping he looked mean rather than just lame in every sense of the word. He still hadn't told his grandfather he was going in and had booked the ticket to Paris under the pretext of carrying out a last-minute check that everything was in order. With luck, he would be out with his mum and starting a new life before his grandfather realized what was really going on. Provided, of course, he even made it out of the tower block alive.

Scholzy didn't waste any time when he answered the door, ushering Geldof inside to stand in front of three men lounging on a beat-up old sofa.

“Introductions,” Scholzy said.

First he pointed to a short man who appeared to be entirely hairless, although it was hard to be sure since he was wearing a chunky, hard-plastic mask that covered the lower half of his face. Geldof could only presume it was an air filter, which was odd since his grandfather's comprehensive briefing packet said the risk of air-borne infections had passed. They just needed to make sure they didn't have sex with anybody, get bitten, or both. Considering Geldof's record to date, he wasn't too worried about the first one. Plus they weren't even in the country yet. Even so, the mercenary was also already wearing what looked like body armor. Although they were clearly in a dodgy area of the French capital, such precautions seemed a touch excessive.

“This is Peter Abraham, our logistics and techy guy,” Scholzy said. “Bostonian, with tours in Iraq and Afghanistan before he saw the light and decided to make real money.”