“Huh?” Eddie’s black eyebrows connected above his nose. “No, not the soldiers. You already know where they are. I’ve been looking into the sickness.”
Her gut clenched. She knew where they were supposed to be. But they hadn’t been at the Polytech campus. For all she knew, she was chasing spooks. Stop that! No more negative thoughts. Having dealt with teenagers for the last three years, she knew they could become a self-fulfilling prophecy. “And what have you discovered about this sickness?”
“They’ve got anthrax.”
Pursing her lips, Mrs. Rodriquez smoothed her dress over her knees. “They’re not coughing.”
That was what the anthrax victims were supposed to do, right? Despite her face mask, Audra smiled at the nurse. Thank heavens the woman hadn’t taken Eddie’s comment as a slight to her professionalism. She glanced in the rearview mirror. Stuart had done nothing but complain about his treatment since they’d boarded the bus at daybreak. “How can you tell?”
“Only a test can confirm it for sure but it makes sense. We were at Burgers in a Basket, the place where the attack happened. And there’re several forms.” Eddie turned the screen to Audra then the nurse. “The skin kind. See, it looks like a bite, a flea bite except the center is black.”
She glanced at the picture before turning her attention back to the road. Thanks to the large infestation of rats, she’d seen plenty of those recently. She absently scratched her arm. Maybe she’d gotten a few more last night. Or… a chill slid down her spine. Or, she’d spent too much time in the fast food restaurant. Her skin burned under the rake of her nails. “Are they deadly?”
“The skin kind?” Eddie turned the computer to face him, avoiding her gaze. “Nah. Some antibiotic cream will clear them up.”
“Good.” She forced her hand on the wheel. Wind buffeted the bus from the Northwest and rain hit her windshield.
“Our stinky friends in the back—”
“—the farting fifteen,” Mrs Rodriquez interrupted.
Eddie’s dark eyes sparkled with laughter. “Yeah, the farting fifteen.”
“Please.” Audra glanced in the back. Most of her passengers sat on the five gallon buckets that served as a toilet and rested their heads on the seat back. The croak of passing gas accompanied the watery splat of diarrhea.
Anguish etched deep grooves into Stuart’s ashen face.
She ignored the itch of guilt. Okay, she’d been irritated that they’d stolen her bread and wished the bread thief would suffer, but she hadn’t wanted them this. They’d been evacuating their bowels since midnight last night.
“Sorry, Princess.” Eddie cleared his throat. “The Flatulence Fifteen are probably suffering from gastrointestinal kind of Anthrax.”
She bit her lip to keep from laughing. Did he really think she’d object to the word fart? Had he forgotten she’d taught preteens? She’d heard far worse. Heck, she’d been called more obscene things. “What are the symptoms?”
The interior of the bus darkened. Rain pattered on the bus then pounded. White pellets danced on the road. The computer screen cast a ghostly pallor on Eddie’s face, distorting the gas mask into a pig snout and tusks. “Nausea. Loss of appetite.”
Appetite. She flipped on the wipers. They scooped up the pea-sized hail and shoved it to the side. “I don’t have much of an appetite thanks to the smell.”
Mrs. Rodriquez patted her shoulder then swept a hand over Audra’s forehead. “It is certainly isn’t a Thanksgiving Day feast kind of smell.”
Audra’s nose twitched with the alcohol scent of hand sanitizer.
Straightening, Eddie caught the computer in his hand. “Is she sick?”
“No!” Geez. His security duties didn’t include babying her. “I’m fine.”
They’d eaten all her bread.
“Princess A still rules from her Ivory Tower.” Mrs. Rodriquez skimmed her fingers over Eddie’s forehead, pushing his long hair to the side. “And Sir Galahad lives to serve her another day.”
Audra twisted her hand around the hard plastic. Eddie looked better with his hair wild, not tamed. He cocked an eyebrow at her. She shifted on the seat. Damn, why couldn’t bus manufacturer make a decent cushion? “Sir Galahad betrayed his liege, basically committing treason.”
“But he got the Princess in the end.” Jerking her head in Audra’s direction, Mrs. Rodriquez flashed her dimples.
“He did?” Eddie tugged off his gas mask and tossed it on the bench seat next to him. Crease marks curved over his chin and jaw.
Unbelievable. Mrs. Rodriquez was playing matchmaker. Audra squared her shoulders. Time to end such nonsense. “Are there any other symptoms?”
“Fever. Stomach pain.” The nurse’s smile dissolved on a sigh. “Blood in the stool.”
“Exactly.” Stubble rasped against his fingers as he rubbed the red marks on his left cheek. “Did you cheat?”
Mrs. Rodriquez swatted his arm. “I don’t have to cheat.” She nodded her head toward the passengers. “I’ve seen it all.”
God! Audra eased her foot off the gas as the speedometer needle inched toward seventy. The wipers squeaked against the dry windshield and she slapped them silent. “What are the chances for survival?”
Eddie closed the laptop and traced the Marine Corps insignia on the front sticker. “Better than for the kind that is inhaled.”
Which meant what exactly? It must be bad if he didn’t want her to know. “Tell me.”
“Three out of every ten survive Inhalation Anthrax.”
If three survived then seven… She gulped. The lump of nerves lodged in her dry throat. Then seven died. Seventy percent mortality. The very notion escaped her comprehension like gnats through a butterfly net. “But the gastrointestinal one is better, right?”
It couldn’t really be much worse.
“Yeah.” He shoved the laptop onto the seat. “Fifty to seventy-five percent will survive.”
Audra’s jaw slackened. Cold air washed over her teeth. Four to eight of the people on her bus would die from eating bread. Bread that she salvaged. She shuddered. Bread that she’d plan to eat. “But it looked clean.”
Sure the drink station had been a bit sticky. And there’d been grit everywhere.
“Apparently Anthrax is very hard to eliminate.” Eddie set his hands on her shoulders. His thumbs found the knots and rubbed them in circular motion. “They may have wiped everything down, but it didn’t kill it.”
“We’ll have to get rid of everything we took from the cursed place and burn it, so no one else can get sick.” Better use her hand than to have anyone else die over toilet paper. Fortunately, she carried most of those supplies.
“No burning.” Eddie shook his head. “Apparently that would expose us to the inhalation kind.”
Mrs. Rodriquez nodded to the computer. “Does it say how to treat it?”
“Antibiotics.”
Tension drained out of Audra each time Eddie completed a circle. “That’s good. We’re all on antibiotics. Cipro’s an antibiotic, right?”
The nurse’s lips firmed. “They’re not keeping those horse pills inside long enough to do anything.”
Which meant they’re not being treated with antibiotics. Audra resisted the urge to punch the dash. “So what are we supposed to do? Watch them die?”
“It’ll take two to four days.” Eddie’s hand stilled. “We should be with the soldiers by then. They’ll have medicines.”
“Why wait that long?” Mrs. Rodriquez scooted closer to the aisle. “I say we hit a hospital or pharmacy and pick up some antibiotics. I can use a syringe.”
Yes. Audra nodded. That was better than waiting around for the Grim Reaper to make an appearance. “Eddie, get on that computer and find every pharmacy in Payson.”
His fingers trailed down her neck when he pulled back. “I don’t think the yellow pages website is up.”