Triple Threat - James Patterson Page 0,46

I pushed back. But when President Hardinson calls you herself, it’s not easy to say no.”

Jesus. I’ve learned by now that Freitas isn’t a very good actor. From his expression, I think he’s telling the truth. So the White House thinks there’s a real chance HAC might have spread to humans. Maybe it’s not just a dumb rumor after all.

“Fine,” I say. “Let’s assume these feral humans really do exist. How do we possibly explain it—scientifically? We’d have to throw out the entire pheromone theory.”

“Not necessarily,” says Sarah. She’s blotting her glistening forehead with a bandana. I’ve forgotten how hot she looks when she’s, well…hot.

“Yes necessarily,” I reply. “HAC is caused by animals misinterpreting human scents as attack pheromones, which triggers aggressive behavior. And they detect those pheromones through the VNO gland at the base of their nasal cavity. A gland that human beings don’t possess.”

“You’re saying humans aren’t affected by pheromones at all, Oz? Come on.”

“Despite what the makers of Axe body spray might have you believe,” I answer, “the scientific jury is still out on that one.”

“Precisely,” says Freitas. “Perhaps we perceive them in a different way. Perhaps these feral humans aren’t using their olfactory organs at all. Maybe they’re absorbing pheromones through mucous tissue in their lungs.”

“Right, like how nicotine is absorbed from smoking,” says Sarah. “Simple.”

I exhale a long sigh—and suddenly can’t help but wonder what scary, invisible airborne particles might have just entered my bloodstream. I hate to admit it, but Sarah and Freitas have the beginnings of a decent working theory. I just pray it’s not needed.

“All right,” I concede. “Maybe it’s possible. But that still doesn’t explain—”

“Gevaar, gevaar!” shouts one of our guides, suddenly dropping his machete and whipping out his Desert Eagle handgun. I don’t speak Afrikaans, but I understand exactly what he’s saying. Danger.

Our whole team freezes, and we scramble to ready our weapons.

Something is rushing frantically through the dense bushes to our left. I can’t make out what—or who—it is, but it’s heading right for us, fast.

Kabelo raises his rifle and unleashes a volley of shots in their direction.

“Don’t shoot!” Freitas yells, grabbing Kabelo’s gun. “We need them alive!”

“I need me alive more!” he huffs, shaking off Freitas’s grip.

“There may not be many of them,” Freitas pleads. “And they are your countrymen. Please, at least hold your fire until we see what they—”

“They’re jackals!” I shout, almost relieved to glimpse some furry paws and pointy snouts through the leaves, instead of human hands and heads. “Let’s take ’em out!”

I start shooting my Armalite AR-10 first, and the rest of the team quickly follows suit. We’re bombarding the underbrush with bullets, but it’s impossible to see how many jackals we’ve hit—or how many in the pack are still charging at us.

The remaining animals—about five or six of them—finally burst out of the vegetation, all yipping and frantically snapping their sharp jaws. They’re fast as hell and impossible to hit, even by over a dozen men and women with semiautomatic weapons.

Three jackals get close enough to attack. Dr. Chang gets a big chunk of his leg bitten off by one before stabbing it to death with a bowie knife. A second jackal lunges at Kabelo, who crushes its head with his rifle.

A final jackal leaps up directly at me—but I shoot it, midair, and it’s dead before it hits the ground.

We all take a moment to catch our breath and regroup. Chang’s injury is much more than a flesh wound, but he’ll survive.

I wipe off the jackal blood that splattered onto my face when I shot the animal from such close range. If I’d missed? I wouldn’t have much of a face left.

Then another thought enters my head. An even grimmer one.

If a pack of three-foot-long rabid jackals almost managed to kill us…just imagine what a pack of feral humans could do.

Chapter 16

Chloe steps out into the wet Paris afternoon, holding Eli in her arms. She had hoped the rain might have let up by now, but the day is getting late and it’s still coming down in buckets.

Screw it, Chloe thinks, draping a slimy plastic trash bag over her and her son’s heads. She’d rather get a little wet than be out on the street after dark.

And they have a hell of a lot of ground to cover.

It feels like a lifetime ago, but it was only last night that she and Eli barely made it out of her parents’ apartment building alive. She’d flagged down a gendarmerie Jeep, but there