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  “Okay, are we ready to report in?” Grace had selected the rust-colored armchair at the end of the coffee table so she could be more or less in the middle of the gang.

  “Go for it,” said Autumn.

  Using a special high-tech phone she’d brought on the mission for just this purpose, Grace pressed in the number for their commanding officer, Major Drew Connell, who expected their call.

  “About time you reported in,” came his voice immediately after the first ring. He was in a time zone three hours later than theirs, so it would be 0930 at Ft. Lukman. Grace knew, though, that he referred not to the time today, but that they had been around a couple of days already.

  “Ah, but I’m sure you loved the suspense of waiting,” she said lightly. “Only—well, nothing much to report so far, sir.” She gave a rundown of her first couple of days at the medical center, followed by her late walk-through last night with Tilly. “The lab floor, where biohazard materials are taken to be tested, was pretty quiet. I only saw one person—a doctor. He seemed reluctant to talk about why he was there, so I’ll find out more about him, but he’s my only potential suspect so far.” Grace didn’t mention she had a personal history with that doctor, although she suspected it would eventually have to be revealed.

  Next, Autumn gave her report. Her cover as a communications officer allowed her to access the base’s aircraft hangars. She hadn’t been around long enough to explore them all, but she’d seen nothing suspicious in those she’d visited so far.

  Ruby, too, had a background in aviation, so she had also started checking out the base’s facilities, but hadn’t yet done anything worth mentioning, other than fiddling with some of the security cameras on the night of the full moon.

  Kristine finished. “Bailey and I walked the hospital grounds several times, especially near the remote storage area at the far end of one of the parking lots, and I showed Grace the tunnel leading to it—a way the test materials are transported. I’ve talked to a few military guards who hang out in that area, and I assume some materials are being stored there now. Nothing notable about the building housing the incinerator, either.”

  “Good job, all of you,” Drew Connell said. “Now, get busy. We need results as quickly as possible.”

  “How’s Melanie?” Grace asked. Drew’s wife, Dr. Melanie Harding-Connell, a veterinarian, had introduced Grace to Alpha Force. She was pregnant with the couple’s first baby. She wasn’t a shifter, but Drew was.

  “Getting along fine,” Drew said. “She’s due within the next few weeks.”

  “Our best to all of you,” Grace said, and hung up. She’d be interested in learning all about the baby’s arrival in this sort-of mixed marriage.

  A short while later, Grace walked with Kristine to the medical center. They’d left both dogs in Grace’s apartment to keep each other company, since there would be no therapy visits today. Neither would Kristine snoop about the hospital grounds. They’d both just perform the jobs that were their covers, as would Autumn and Ruby.

  Grace was glad that this assignment made use of her background as a doctor. Alpha Force was, not surprisingly, a small unit, and its members handled whatever missions they were assigned. She knew that recently Lt. Patrick Worley, also a physician, had played the role of a dog musher in Alaska to apprehend some pretty nasty bad guys.

  Once at the hospital, Grace went to the doctors’ lounge, where she again donned a clean white medical jacket over her scrubs and pinned on her name tag. Then she started her rounds, saying hello to the nurses at their stations and visiting rooms of patients she’d already been assigned.

  And watching for other doctors…but no sign of Simon this morning. At least not yet. Would he try to avoid her?

  That wasn’t like the Simon she’d known—until he’d transferred to another school.

  The first patient Grace saw was a woman whose child had brought home Fifth disease from school—a common illness causing a facial rash. By the time the redness appeared, the illness was no longer contagious, but it was easy to pass to others before symptoms were obvious. It was mostly harmless. However, this particular mother had suffered severe anemia as a result and had been hospitalized. Fortunately she was doing well, and Grace didn’t spend much time with her.

  When she went back into the hall, a nurse hurried over. “Dr. Andreas, the E.R. called and requested that all infectious disease specialists head there. Only two of you are on duty right now. Several patients were brought in with something that might be contagious and they need a fast diagnosis.”

  Grace hurried down the stairs to the E.R. There, she asked the nurse in charge about the situation for which she had been summoned and was directed to an area down the main hallway. When she walked into the large preliminary examination room, she noted several nurses including Kristine, six apparent patients, and Simon, who stalked out of one of the patient cubicles separated from each other by long blue curtains. He wore gloves and a sanitary mask covering the lower part of his face, but there was no mistaking his muscular build and dark hair.

  Grace quickly donned a mask and gloves, too, then approached as he removed his gloves and scrubbed his hands at the large sink. “What does it look like, doctor?”

  Simon stepped back. Grace was struck by the intensity and concern in his golden-brown eyes. “Symptoms include diarrhea, vomiting, fever and severe abdominal cramps. The six who just came in are a flight instructor at the base, his family and a couple of neighbors, who ate take-out food from a restaurant a few miles from this area last night. Chicken salad, they said. My suspicion is shigellosis, since that restaurant had problems with it a while back—sanitary conditions suspect, cited by the local board of health. Could be something else, though. Their symptoms seem a lot more severe than what we saw before. We’ll need tests run.”

  “Life-threatening?” Grace asked tersely. At Simon’s nod, she hurried into the first examining station.

  The next half hour was busy—especially because several other patients with similar symptoms were brought in. Whether it was a severe dysentery-like outbreak of the highly infectious shigellosis or something different—something worse—it appeared to have resulted from food from the same dining facility. Grace directed that lab techs obtain fecal and other samples from each patient and take them to be tested. She assumed that Simon did the same.

  The smells in the ER area were nauseating, especially, Grace assumed, because of her enhanced senses even while in human form. But as a doctor, she had encountered odors as bad, or even worse, before. After examining each patient and directing the medical tests to be taken, Grace moved on to the next. Simon appeared equally busy.

  Eventually, a lab tech returned with a preliminary result. Simon had apparently been correct: shigellosis, but a highly toxic strain, perhaps a mutated bacterial version. Almost all the patients appeared ill enough to be admitted to the medical facility. Grace prescribed antibiotics—hoping that this strain was not resistant—as well as other medications to ease the severe symptoms.

  After a while, the worst of the emergency seemed over, although a couple of patients remained in serious condition. Grace’s adrenaline was still pumping, but she felt she’d done well in helping the majority of the admittees. She’d keep a close watch on those who were the most ill.

  She’d also been highly impressed while observing Simon in action. He might be sharp-tongued and enigmatic when dealing with her, but she truly admired his gentle, caring attitude while dealing with suffering patients.

  What a conglomeration of contrasts this man still appeared to be. Was he a viable suspect in the biohazards thefts?

  She peeled off her latest pair of gloves as well as the mask, and headed again toward the room’s main sink. Unsurprisingly, Simon was there, too.

  “What a morning!” she exclaimed. “It’ll be interesting to get a case history on each of them. Confirm that the infection came from the restaurant, although that seems pretty clear.”

  “Right.” He didn’t look at
her as he dried his hands on a paper towel from a sanitary container.

  “We’ll have to keep a close watch still, of course, to make sure that the antibiotics we prescribed are effective. And—”

  “You’re right, Grace. As always. See you later.” He turned his back and started walking away.

  Obviously he had no interest in talking to her just then. Well, so what? She was busy, too.

  Still, she felt inordinately hurt by his slight. She had an urge to kick him in that nice, firm butt she watched with angry interest as he headed for the examination-room’s door.

  And followed him. As she exited the room after him, she called, “Yeah, see you later, Dr. Parran,” and headed in the opposite direction. Feeling upset. Angry.

  Not a good time for her cell phone to ring. Especially when it was her commanding officer, Major Drew Connell.

  She walked out a door for privacy as she answered.

  “Any new developments, Grace? I heard from Colonel Otis that they’re likely to have a large enough batch of contaminants to incinerate them tonight or tomorrow.”

  “I wondered about that,” Grace said. “Especially after today.” Holding the phone tight against her ear in the warm breeze as she strolled along a path beside the building, she related what had occurred in the emergency room that morning. “A lot of samples of probable shigellosis-infected fluids were collected, maybe a more virulent strain than we normally see. We still have work to ensure the outbreak is stopped. Plus, we have to make sure no one gets hold of these samples and creates a man-made shigellosis outbreak. I know some strains are fairly harmless, and the disease can’t be passed to more than a few people at a time, but it sometimes appears on lists of possible biological weapons, since the worst varieties can get pretty severe and there’s no vaccine.”

  “So you and Kristine, and maybe Autumn and Ruby, too—how about keeping watch on that supposedly secret storage area in the parking lot tonight? This might be when our bad guys make their move. And it might be a good thing to have different perspectives in addition to human.”

  “That’s what I thought, too. I’ll take a look around, and if it appears useful I’ll shift. I’ll also tell Autumn to. We’ll report to you in the morning.”

  For the rest of the day, Simon avoided Grace as much as possible.

  Too many possibilities of her getting in his way. Asking questions.

  Distracting him with her luscious body as well as her inevitable curiosity.

  He regretted—to some extent—his abruptness with her, but he needed to step back. Get some perspective. Ensure that he had time, and his thoughts, to himself that night.

  He hadn’t been joking with Grace last night, near his lab. Biohazard materials had been stolen before around here—including during the prior outbreak of shigellosis, which seemed a lot more benign than this one.

  The latest shigella bacterial samples would be a practical haul for the thief.

  “What do you think?” Grace asked Kristine. They were in Grace’s car in the parking lot behind the medical center. Both were in civilian T-shirts and jeans, to blend in with visitors to the medical center once they exited the vehicle. They’d left their dogs in their living quarters again, at least for now.

  “The best places for a wolf to hide aren’t too near this building.” Her aide peered first at the open space near the building, then away from the rows of cars and toward the vegetated areas near the perimeter fencing.

  “My thoughts, too. A hawk, though—maybe only Autumn should shift tonight and just perch somewhere to watch.”

  “Sounds good. I’ll let Autumn and Ruby know.”

  He prowled. At the edges of the medical center.

  Hiding in bushes. Sometimes between cars. Concern about being seen. But he was faster, now, than any human. More cunning.

  Elation. His shift, late this night, was on his own terms. His human awareness, in wolf form, was the best ever.

  He would watch where samples were stored. He would—

  Wait. The sounds. Human voices in distress, and more.

  The smells—ugly. Unnatural here.

  Something was wrong.

  He carefully slunk toward the area, staying in shadows.

  All night so far, Grace had felt frustrated. She’d hoped to shift into wolf form, but she knew her decision and Kristine’s made sense.

  Instead, only Autumn shifted, as they’d discussed. The others had, one by one, pulled their cars into the area near the outbuilding and parked, looking as if they were there to visit a patient in the medical center. Each walked casually by the glassed-in office where the guards sat and peeked in. Then they drove somewhere else and parked again, and covertly kept an eye on the area.

  Kristine had gone first. Then Ruby. Then Grace, and then they started the routine all over again. They all reported to one another by phone.

  “I saw a little activity in the office,” Ruby had said a few minutes ago, after her second swing through the parking lot. “Could be a delivery was made then, since a couple of people were there in hospital jackets. I hid behind a van and watched for a while. They left and the guards settled back down. Everything appeared fine.”

  Now it was Grace’s second turn. She pulled once more into the parking lot and drove toward the far end. She parked several rows from the building, finding a spot near a couple of other cars in the sparsely occupied lot. Then she sauntered in the direction of the building, surrounded by its drought-tolerant landscaping.

  Was that the scent of a wolf? A shifter? Or was her mind playing tricks?

  She looked around, peering into shadows, seeing and hearing no movement. But the scent did not go away.

  Was she simply daydreaming of Simon…again?

  She tried to shrug off the sensations as she neared the guards’ office. She saw no one through the glass window.

  Could they be on a break? Unlikely that they’d both be gone at the same time.

  Grace looked around. She still saw no one else around. And then she inhaled deeply, purposely invoking her enhanced senses once more.

  That’s when she smelled a different scent—something incongruously chemical in the warm night air.

  “Damn!” she whispered as she put her hand over her pocket, feeling the small pistol she had hidden there, just in case. She headed toward the guard enclosure.

  The scent, though still faint, grew stronger the closer she got.

  The gate in the wire fence wasn’t locked, and Grace burst through it. By the time she looked through the window into the building, she suspected what she would see: two bodies in uniform, lying on the floor. Were they still alive?

  She pulled out her weapon, sighting along it as she pivoted. She saw no one else. Leaving the door open to dissipate any remaining chemical in the air so she could enter as safely as possible, she hurried in, felt for pulses. Yes, thank heavens. They were merely unconscious.

  One more thing to do, then, before calling for assistance. She checked the door to the adjoining storage area.

  It was unlocked. No surprise.

  Neither was she surprised to see that it was empty.

  The biohazards specimens were gone.

  Chapter 4

  “You’re sure you want to do this now?” Kristine asked.

  Grace stood with her aide in almost total darkness, sheltered by hedges, between the hospital grounds and air-force base. Nighttime heat surrounded them, as well as the slight aroma of jet fuel. They had left both dogs in their apartments.

  The investigation of the theft was currently the focus of the security units at both the hospital and the air-force base, but no one was scouring this remote location—not for this moment, at least.

  “There’s no better time,” Grace said.

  “But there’s too much activity. You’ll be seen.”

  “I’ll be careful. If I get in trouble, you can create a diversion.”

  “Yeah,” Kristine grumbled. “And then I can get arrested for being the thief.”
r />   “You’re too good for that.” Grace gave Kristine a joking punch on the arm. “Besides, you brought Tilly’s leash and collar, didn’t you?” She looked at the large backpack that Kristine wore over her camo-colored T-shirt and khaki shorts. Except for the backpack, the outfit matched Grace’s.

  “Of course.”

  “Then if I’m seen, you’ll—”

  “Tell everyone that your dog escaped from your quarters and I’m looking for her, which is why I’m carrying the leash—to hook her up when I find her. As long as she remembers her manners and doesn’t bark inside the apartment, that works fine.”

  “She’s a great dog.” But Grace didn’t need to remind Kristine of that. They’d both worked with Tilly and with Kristine’s dog, Bailey, knew they were well trained. “Okay, it’s time now. I have to act fast to get access to any remaining scents or other clues before they disappear—or are hauled off as evidence.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Kristine gave a joking salute.

  When they’d found the guards unconscious and the biohazards missing, Grace had immediately directed Kristine to call the security assigned to the hospital and tell them to send EMTs. The men’s lives could be at stake.

  Then they had contacted Ruby Belmont to let her know what had happened. “Is Autumn still shifted?” Grace had asked, standing outside the room containing the unconscious men. “Do you know if she saw anything?” But Autumn hadn’t yet returned.

  While they waited for official help to arrive, Grace had tried to use her heightened human senses to detect the scents of who had done this, but the chemical smell of whatever had been used to knock out the guards, though light, nevertheless overwhelmed any other aroma. Plus, while she was unshifted, Grace’s abilities were limited.

  Grace and Kristine had waited long enough to be questioned briefly by those conducting the investigation about why they happened to be in the area at that late hour. Colonel Otis had been called, and he would know their real reason, but they told the guards only that they had been taking a long walk for exercise before going to bed and had heard a groan.