“Yes.” He looked down at the floor. “I was on the last chopper to get out.”
She knew the operations at the airport had been his responsibility — he’d been in command. She felt incredible pain from the loss of her team, but she could only imagine the torment he felt from losing his soldiers. There’d been so many of them.
And he’d been the last one out.
The doctor spoke. “Ms. Ridenour, you’re a very lucky lady. Colonel Hoffman here found your crash site and got you out of there just in time.”
“Just in time?” She didn’t like the sound of that.
“We found your chopper right before it was overrun.” Garrett was looking up again. “I tripped over you trying to get out of there, as a matter of fact.”
“You were thrown from the crash site, Ms. Ridenour,” Doctor Tanner said. “Luckily, you’ve only suffered some minor cuts and bruises. It could’ve been much worse.”
Carolyn looked Garrett in the eyes. “You saved me?”
“I tripped over you.”
Now I remember, she thought. You’re an asshole. “Well, I guess I owe you a debt of gratitude for not being too swift on your feet then.”
“Yes, I guess you do.” He was frowning.
Carolyn immediately felt guilty for poking at him. He had, after all, risked his life to save her and had apparently barely made it out alive.
“Look, I’m sorry for that. I really do owe you a debt of gratitude. I owe you my life, Colonel. Thank you for saving me.”
“You’re welcome, Ms. Ridenour.” At the airport, he’d seen her as a nuisance, an officious civilian getting in his way. But after he’d pulled her from the field and held her in his arms in the chopper, he’d felt an attachment to her. He hadn’t been able to save many of his soldiers, but he had been able to save this one woman. That, to him, was a small victory. A single victory in the face of what had been a black night of unimaginable horror.
He turned to the doctor. “Doc, is she good to travel?”
“Travel? To where?”
“I have orders to accompany Ms. Ridenour to Utah. Today.”
“Ms. Ridenour is in no condition to travel, Colonel. She’s survived a traumatic helicopter crash. She needs to rest. I need to keep her under observation for—”
“Doc, I don’t think you understand,” Hoffman said. “If the trip won’t kill her, she’s going to travel. Right now.”
“By whose orders?”
“Somebody who has enough stars on his shoulders to make both of our lives a living hell if we don’t move quickly enough.”
Carolyn sat up in bed. Her temples throbbed in protest. “They want me back at Van — to go to Utah?”
“Yes, Ms. Ridenour,” Garrett said.
“Carolyn. Call me Carolyn.” She found herself looking past the Army colonel and seeing Garrett for the first time. He was tall with angular features. Quite handsome. His eyes were slate-gray, communicating purpose, determination, and warmth.
“Okay, Carolyn it is, then. Yes, they want you back at Dugway as soon as you can move. If the doc says the trip won’t kill you, we’ll head for the flight line as soon as we can get out of here. Now, I need my answer, Doc. Is she good to go?”
“She needs to stay here for observation. Her injuries from the crash weren’t serious, but sometimes things can come up unexpectedly that we didn’t catch in our initial—”
“If you haven’t noticed, Doctor, thousands of people were slaughtered last night. There’s a very good chance that thousands more will be slaughtered before we can figure out how to stop these things. Ms. Ridenour may be able to help us do just that. If she can move, she’ll move! Now give me a fucking yes or no, or I’ll find another doc who can give me an answer!”
The doctor was obviously not accustomed to having a good portion of his ass bitten off, and his face showed it. He stammered as he said, “I don’t believe the trip will kill her. But if it does, it’s your responsibility, Colonel, not mine.” He turned on his heel and left.
Carolyn had already swung her legs over the side of the bed. “I feel fine, for Christ’s sake. Where the heck are my clothes?”
“Now that’s more like it!” Garrett grabbed Carolyn’s folded clothes from a chair in the corner of the room and tossed them to her. “Get dressed. I’ll inform Dugway that we’re on our way.”
Much to his surprise, Carolyn stood, dropped her hospital gown to the floor, and started to get dressed. He couldn’t help but stare, for a second. A long second. He turned away when Carolyn paused and looked at him.
“What’s the matter? Never seen a naked woman before?”
Catching himself before he said, “Well, yes,” Hoffman felt his face flush and quickly said, “I’ll go call Dugway.”
“Good. I’ll be ready in a min—” She fell to the floor in a half-dressed heap.
Garrett knelt beside her and helped her sit up. “Are you okay?”
Her temples were throbbing terribly. “I’m a little light-headed. And I’ve got one hell of a headache. You must’ve stepped on my head when you tripped over me.”
“Yeah, I’m a hopeless klutz. You’re really okay to travel, right? If you croak, it’ll be my ass.”
“Thanks for the genuine concern for my well-being, Colonel Hoffman.”
“It’s Garrett.” He helped her sit on the side of the bed.
“Okay, Garrett, then. Yeah, I’m okay to travel.” She pulled her skirt up to her waist and buttoned her blouse. “Did they happen to tell you why they needed me back so fast?”
“They have some of the things. Dead ones. The bodies are on the way there right now, and they want you to take a look at them.” He paused. “And since I have nothing else holding me here, I’m escorting you.”
Carolyn looked into his eyes and saw the pain. She reached out and took his hand. “Are you okay?”
He pulled his hand away and stood. “I’m as good as I can be. Hurry up. I’ll be waiting outside the door.” He pulled a cell phone from the leg pocket of his ACUs as he stepped into the hall.
Carolyn knew that talking to someone about what he was feeling was not on the top of his priority list at the moment. He was, after all, a soldier with a mission to accomplish.
As Carolyn hurriedly finished putting her clothes on, she couldn’t help but wonder what they’d discovered that so desperately required her analysis. Why Dugway? Why are they taking the bodies there?
She remembered what the sergeant major had told her about the creatures staying out of the light and the hunch she’d had, right before the things had attacked the airport.
If her hunch was correct…
She ran into the hall and grabbed Hoffman by the arm. “Garrett! What are you waiting for? Let’s go!”
Thirty minutes later, they were screaming westward in a C-21—a USAF Learjet — toward the Dugway Proving Ground in Utah.
CHAPTER 25
The sleek B-1B Lancer — called the Bone by those in the close-knit B-1 community — started its target run, rising slowly above the horizon from the north, wings swept back for high-speed efficiency. The bomber’s long, graceful lines made it look like an angry gray goose in one hell of a hurry, its cockpit glass glinting in the sun like two infuriated eyes probing the terrain below. The on-board targeting avionics were controlling every aspect of this run, ensuring perfect speed and altitude, calculating exact drop points, constantly analyzing wind speed and direction, air density, and other environmental factors that could affect the flight paths of the forty ground imaging radar sensors it was about to pound into the silent, infested ground outside of Omaha, now some ten miles distant from its current location.