Survivalist - 20 - Firestorm Read Online Free PDF

Captain Darkwood?”
    Jason Darkwood didn’t quite know what to say, but nodded, the prophylactic closed at the open end with a rubber band and inside a small beaker of tepid water. It floated around like a communications buoy. “Here.”
    The Herr Doctor Rourke would wish to speak with you, Herr Captain.”
    *Teah, sure,” Darkwood nodded. He shouldn’t have nodded. The pain. The German medtech disappeared and, after a moment, there was a knock on one of the support posts for the curtain. “Come in.”
    It was John Rourke. “Doctor Rourke-“
    “Don’t stand up, Jason. How are you feeling?”
    John Rourke stood beside the bed, his parka absent, his double shoulder holster with his little stainless steel guns visible, worn over a black long sleeved military sweater. “In no special order of importance? Well, stupid, embarrassed, like I’m up shifs creek-was that a real place?-and in a lot of pain.”
    John Rourke smiled. “I couldn’t have you given anything really strong. Because of what you had to do. It’s quite important that we have a sample right away. What happened?”
    Jason Darkwood shifted position and his head ached all the more, so he fidgeted back. “Okay,” and he cleared his throat, a spasm of pain consuming him. “I took her back to her tent, like we agreed. Sure, I thought she was attractive, and maybe I would have tried something with her, but not that way. What’s she saying, anyway? I mean, I figured out why you wanted the test.”
    John Rourke pulled the solitary folding chair around and straddled it as he sat down. “No one’s told you, then. She’s dead.”
    Jason Darkwood felt his eyes open wide and the headache worsened instantly. “She’s-Now wait a minute.”
    “What do you remember?”
    Darkwood closed his eyes against the pain, and he thought maybe it would help him to remember. He remembered waking up in the hospital bed. He was told he’d been hurt and that it was urgent that he give a sample of ejaculant. He remembered things very fuzzily before that. “I can’t tell you.”
    “Can’t?”
    “I don’t remember, I mean. I took her to her tent arfd we went inside. Bang. What happened to my head?”
    “What do you mean, “bang”?” Doctor Rourke pressed.
    Darkwood shook his head, the pain consuming him. “I, ahh-We went inside and I don’t remember anything after that.”
    “What did you mean earlier when you assumed you suspected the reason we needed an ejaculant sample?”
    Darkwood licked his hps. His mouth was very dry. “I assumed something happened and she said I did something to her. I mean, what would you think if you woke up and your head felt ten times too big and somebody wanted you to jerk off into-“
    “Were you thinking about her sexually? I mean, at the moment you entered the tent?”
    “I don’t know. No. I was thinking I was cold. What the hell’s going on? What do you mean she’s dead? I’m a little slow today, but-“
    “Someone murdered Maritza Zeiss and then went to a great deal of trouble to make it appear you’d raped her. The way-“
    “I what?” Darkwood sat upright and his head felt as if it would explode and he blinked his eyes against the pain.
    Doctor Rourke began again. The scene, as it appeared, was that you had fought with her, raped her. Her mouth was bleeding. One of her nipples was partially torn off-“
    “Oh, God, Doctor-“
    Then, as it was supposed to appear, you slit her throat with a Mid-Wake issue fighting knife-” “I don’t even carry one of those.”
    Rourke smiled. “I know that you carry a duplicate of a Randall Smithsonian Bowie. Paul knows that, too, as of course, do your men, etc. The killer, or whoever put him up to it, didn’t. Just as you raked the knife across her throat, with her last ounce of strength she made a valiant effort to kill you, hitting you at the base of the skull with the butt of her flashlight. Evidently, you were opposed to be dead, too. Either the killer was in a hurry or he