The Will to Love

Quinn drew abreast of Morgan as he walked swiftly toward the hospital.

“Laura suffered a broken ankle. She had surgery here. Then, shortly after the surgery, she developed a blood clot. They had to string up her leg with a pulley, and she was tied down like a roping calf.” Morgan grinned wryly. “My wife is not one to lie in bed all day and do nothing. We had to wait until some blood-thinning drugs were flown in from Seattle for her.” He rubbed his hands together. “Today, she gets out of her contraption and into a wheelchair. The doctor says the clot is dissolved and her ankle is stable enough for her to be a little more active.”

“Almost two weeks in a bed would drive me nuts,” Quinn muttered. It would. He was restless by nature, and loved the outdoors and the strenuous activity demanded of marines.

“Yes, well…” Morgan chuckled “…if it hadn’t been for a tiny baby the team rescued from beneath the rubble, Laura would never have survived bed rest. She’s been taking care of Baby Jane Fielding for the nurses. And the hospital staff bring up other infants so Laura can hold them and bottle-feed them. They’ve been keeping her busy.”

Quinn smiled knowingly. There was no doubt about Laura’s maternal side. He liked that about women in general, although in his world, he saw mostly women marines, with tough, demanding jobs. Still, he saw that nurturing side in many of them, too. It was something he enjoyed about women, in or out of the service.

They hurried into the chaotic, busy hospital and up an elevator. Quinn was glad to escape the bustle once they arrived at the private room where Laura Trayhern sat in her wheelchair, an infant wrapped in a pink blanket in her arms.

“Hello, Quinn.” Laura greeted him warmly as he approached. “You look well.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” he said, nodding to her and smiling. The infant was suckling strongly on a bottle of milk. “I’m glad to hear from Mr. Trayhern that you’re doing okay.”

“I’m fine.” Laura lifted her face toward Morgan as he bent and gave her a kiss on the brow. Then he gently stroked the baby’s dark, soft hair.

Quinn saw the man’s face change remarkably. For a moment, he glimpsed the love burning in Morgan’s eyes for his wife of many years. And when Morgan ran his fingertips caressingly across the baby’s hair, Quinn saw tenderness replace his normally stoic expression. But as Morgan’s fingers lifted away, Quinn saw the same hard mask fall back into place. Despite that, there was no doubt in his mind that Morgan loved his wife and the orphaned baby.

“Come over here, Son. Let’s sit down and go over this new plan that you’re going to initiate for the basin.”

Moving to the two metal chairs near the venetian-blind-covered window, Quinn excused himself from Laura. Morgan handed him one of two red folders and sat down. Opening his copy, Quinn saw a set of signed orders with his name at the top. The other members of his fire team were named, as well.

Scowling, Morgan studied the folder opened in his lap. “We’re initiating a basin-wide plan B today, and you’re a part of that effort—you and your fire team. It’s a trial balloon. A work in progress, so to speak. We don’t know if it will work or not, so you’re an experiment of sorts. We can’t afford to put a full squad of ten men into each area. Camp Reed doesn’t have the personnel to pull that off. But by splitting up a squad into two fire teams of five people each, plus their leader, we have a chance to do something rather than nothing.” He looked squarely at Quinn. “So you’re it. You’re our test case. You’re to play it by ear and see where the energy flows in this changing situation. You’re the only fire team we’re putting in there for now. If it works, we’ll insert others later.”

“Five marines in each given area?” Quinn asked.

“That’s right. We’ve divided the basin into twelve quadrants. These are huge blocks of real estate. We’re talking ten to twenty square miles, depending upon the location, the population of the area and so on.” Scratching his head, Morgan gave Quinn a rueful look. “Believe me, Logistics has been wrestling with this nightmare. The basin has no law enforcement. Without backup, the police in some areas can’t do what they’ve been trained to do. There are no highways to drive on to get to a problem area. They’re pretty much limited to handling problems within walking distance of their base of operation.”

Morgan pulled a sheet of fax paper from his file folder and handed it to Quinn. “This is Deputy Sheriff Kerry Chelton. She is the only surviving member of the law enforcement agency in Area Five. Kerry contacted us by radio a week ago, and I’ve had the pleasure of talking with this young woman a number of times. Damned intelligent and resourceful. She found a gasoline generator, some fuel, and managed to retrieve a radio from the sheriff’s building, which collapsed and killed everyone inside it. She calls us every night with reports. Beautiful woman, isn’t she?”

Taking the paper, Quinn saw the photo on it. For no explainable reason, his heart contracted instantly. The black-and-white picture showed a woman with dark hair, cut to just below her ears. With her heart-shaped face, full but compressed lips and wide eyes, she was a very attractive woman, Quinn decided. The head shot showed her in her law enforcement uniform. The resolve in her large eyes was obvious. She exuded confidence.

“Yes, sir, she’s a looker, no doubt,” he murmured.

“Kerry has been in regular contact with our radio group at H.Q. She’s been helping us formulate stage two of our rescue efforts.” Sighing, Morgan said in a low voice, “There’s a lot of people out there dying right now. We just can’t get to them soon enough. The water mains are broken, so there’s no fresh water supply, or at least, not enough for the millions that are trapped out there. And food, while less of a problem now because people can go to their homes and eat whatever canned goods they find, will be disappearing shortly, too. Kerry has been scouting as much of Area Five as she can every day and giving us nightly reports. She’s telling us what the needs are, and we’ve been trying to organize community groups in each area to help stabilize the situation. We’re trying to find local police, state troopers, sheriff’s deputies—anyone in law enforcement—to become the hub of this wheel we’re building. Without law and order, chaos continues.”

“Yes, sir, I’ve been hearing plenty about that gang in Area Five.”

“Humph. Those survivalists. They call themselves Diablo—or Devil. And you, Quinn, are going to be taking them on.” Morgan gave him a hard look.

“I’d like nothing better, sir. They killed two marine pilots in cold blood. That’s reason enough to go after them.” At the thought, anger tightened his chest. Yet when Quinn studied Kerry’s photo again, his heart sped up and thumped violently for a beat or two. Part of him was eager to meet this inventive woman. Another more prejudiced part of him didn’t believe a woman could be that resourceful. Yet Morgan obviously admired and respected her, so she had to have the right stuff. In Quinn’s experience, women were not especially handy or practical. Nurturing others was one thing, but there really wasn’t much place for that in the Marine Corps. And he really didn’t like the integration of females into male slots in the corps. Not at all.

“At 0800, Quinn, you are to go to LZ Echo with your fire team. The pilots of that Huey will take you and your team into Area Five. They’re going to drop you at a destroyed shopping mall parking lot. Deputy Chelton will meet you there. She has a makeshift H.Q. set up nearby with that generator. What she needs now is help.” Morgan eyed him with a slight, twisted smile. “Firepower, in other words.”

“And who’s in charge, sir?”

“Both of you will be.”

Quinn frowned. “But sir, to run an operation like this…going after Diablo…why should a civilian have any say over what we do?” He struggled with his choice of words and tone of voice. The term civilian had sounded disrespectful. Instantly, he was sorry for how he’d framed his objection.

Trayhern’s face darkened, and his blue eyes turned icy for a moment. “Listen to me, Quinn. That woman just lost everyone she ever cared about two weeks ago. Most people would be so stunned with such grief and loss they couldn’t think straight. Kerry has single-handedly set up a base of operations for Area Five. She has tracked Diablo. She’s been like Lara Croft, Princess Xena and Supergirl all wrapped into one. Without her constant input, her observations and suggestions from the field, we wouldn’t be launching this second phase so soon. She’s been able to help us define what is needed out there.

“Your fire team was chosen because you have emergency medical training. We’re desperate for medical intervention out there. Without Kerry’s guidance, we couldn’t have formulated this concept we’re starting to put together to help the folks. Your team is an experiment. If it works, we’ll do more of it.”

Stung by Morgan’s censure, Quinn lowered his gaze and looked at the file. Kerry’s photo stared back at him. She wasn’t smiling, but she had a softness about her face. Her nose was thin and fine. Her eyes were far apart, her gaze clear and direct. Swallowing hard, Quinn nodded. “Yes, sir, I hear you.”

“Don’t go in there with a chip on your shoulder about women,” Morgan warned him in a growl. “The last thing I need on this mission is a man who’s prejudiced about what women can or can’t do.” He reached out and tapped Kerry’s picture. “She’s the kind of woman I like to hire for Perseus. Kerry thinks on her feet. She’s creative. Trustworthy. And she doesn’t miss anything. Maybe it’s because of her training in law enforcement, but she has an eye for details. And without her input, Quinn, we would be up a creek right now. She’s just about the only one out there who has radio contact with Camp Reed. Ask yourself how she managed to jury-rig that. No, I think she’s one hell of a person. And I want you to go into this assignment with that same attitude.”

Chastened, Quinn felt his heart contract when Morgan called Kerry trustworthy. Maybe he was still feeling the pain of his breakup with Frannie Walton, a civilian secretary he’d met in Oceanside nearly two years ago. Since then, he’d had a lot of trouble trusting any woman. After the way Frannie had treated him, he’d crawled into a dark hole of hurt, his pride wounded. She’d been a social climber and on an emotional level, Frannie had been anything but reliable or trustworthy. Quinn had been raised in the backwoods country of Kentucky, where women were still women. They didn’t try and take a man’s job away from him. Nope, they were good wives, raised kids and stayed home to cook, clean and be mothers.

Rubbing his chest above his heart, Quinn tried to pay attention as Morgan explained what was expected of him and his fire team.

“You’re to set up an H.Q. with Kerry. She’s your civilian liaison or counterpart. Without her, you’d be a duck out of water. She knows the turf, the people and the area. Twenty-seven years old and a graduate of law enforcement, she was on the fast track in the sheriff’s department.

“Right now, Kerry needs help in continuing to organize the people, to keep peace and to stop the slide into chaos that’s happening more and more. People are desperate. They need water, and are willing to steal from others to get it. Kerry is trying her best to locate a well in her area, but so far, no luck. Even if they do find one, there’s no guarantee it will have clean water, given the lack of sewage facilities.”

“Our mission, then,” Quinn murmured, “is threefold, right? We’re to try and hunt down Diablo and corral them. We’re to help Kerry Chelton set up an H.Q. And lastly, we’re to help organize the area so it doesn’t disintegrate into turf wars over water and food?”

“You got it,” Morgan said, satisfaction vibrating in his voice. “Now, you may find that one of those three takes priority. We don’t know which one that might be yet, so be flexible and let this thing evolve as the situation develops. Kerry has been working hard for two weeks to set up some kind of organized response. She’s been instrumental in bringing civilians together and getting them to work with one another. What she needs is muscle. And that’s where you and your team come in. You’re military, and people will respect that more than anything. With Diablo ranging across Kerry’s area, people are going ballistic. Your presence alone should help calm a lot of fears.” Morgan turned to another page in his file.

“The Diablo have an MO—modus operandi—of going into a house they think might have a stash of food or water. They move in small groups, maybe one to four men. The men talk with the house owners, pretending to be part of the rescue effort, and ask if they have children.” Morgan’s voice deepened with fury. “If the answer is yes, one member will find and hold the child hostage, at gunpoint. Then the rest of the pack come out of hiding and ransack the house for food, water, money, jewelry. The home owners are helpless. They can’t stop them. They don’t want their children hurt. To date, Diablo have already killed five people, not including the two Marine Corps pilots. They don’t tolerate any rebellion by anyone.”

“They shoot first and ask questions later,” Quinn muttered, anger stirring in him again. It was one thing to prey on adults, quite another to involve innocent children. His mouth flattened. Right now, he’d like nothing better than to get his hands on the leader of that gang.

“Exactly.”

“Do you know who’s heading up Diablo?”

“No, but Kerry thinks she knows and is trying to piece it together for us. She’s been trying to shadow their movements.”

“That’s dangerous.”

“Sure it is,” Moran agreed, “but she’s fearless, that woman. She’s been tailing them without their knowledge whenever she gets a chance. She calls in their last position, and that helps us keep tabs on them, and to protect helicopter crews flying into that area. Right now, it’s a cat-and-mouse game. We keep changing our landing area to outwit Diablo and get basic goods to the civilians. And on days when she can’t detect them in Area Five, the helo goes back to the original LZ, which is her H.Q. set up at the destroyed shopping center. That’s where you’ll be flown into today.” Morgan’s mouth quirked. “But that’ll go only so far. What we need is the gang captured and extricated. We’ve got a brig cell waiting for those bastards.”

“Then you’ve come to the right team, sir. We’ll find them and be Thor’s hammer to ’em.”

Grinning sourly, Morgan studied the marine, whose face was dark with anger and set with determination. “Thor’s hammer” was an old saying in the corps. Morgan could recall many times when, as young officers during the Vietnam War, he and his friends at an officers’ club would toast to Odin, Norse king of the gods. The Norse god of thunder, Thor, hurled thunderbolts at his enemies. Yes, Quinn was no doubt going to be Thor’s “hammer”—his lightning bolt—in this situation. Morgan had full confidence in him.

“We’re counting heavily on you, Quinn. You’ve worked twice with me on important missions and I know you’re a warrior at heart. You have the medical background. If anyone can track down Diablo, you can. You come from Kentucky hill people, and they’re the best hunters and trackers in the business. That’s one of the reasons I chose you—you’re one hell of a bird dog on a scent.”

Laughing shortly, Quinn nodded. “Yes, sir, I am.”

Morgan straightened and placed his hands over the file. “Just try to get along with Deputy Chelton, okay? That’s the one fly in this ointment. I know you’d rather work with men. That’s your background and I understand that. But Kerry is exceptional, Quinn, and I feel you two will make a hell a team. Dodge is infested with bad guys, so to speak, and she needs some muscle to help get them out of there.”

“Then you’ve come to the right person, sir.” Quinn felt a lethal resolve flow through him as he met and held Morgan’s deep blue gaze. “We won’t let you down. My team and I have been together nearly two years. We know each other’s thoughts, and we’ve been battle tested. I want Diablo more than most, sir. I don’t believe in using children as shields. That’s unforgivable.”

“It is,” Morgan agreed unhappily. “Everyone’s traumatized by the quake. Having these survivalists roving around and adding to the chaos, endangering and scaring children and killing adults, isn’t acceptable. We all need to pull together, work together in order to survive this nightmare.”