Duplicity by Vicki Hinze Page B

lieutenant fitted out in chemical gear who looked a breath away from piddling on the floor.
    “Why the hell did you hit the panic button, Harrison?”
    O’Dell shouted not a foot from the young man’s flushed face.
    “I couldn’t breathe, sir.”
    “Well, excuse me, son.” O’Dell waved a wide arm.” Did you hear that, men?” he shouted to the fifteen others, two of whom were women. “Lieutenant Harrison couldn’t breathe.” O’Dell harrumphed, then riveted a scathing gaze onto Harrison. “Well, now. Let’s just stop the war because the lieutenant here can’t goddamn breathe in his chemical gear.”
    He again waved an expansive hand, his voice echoing, bouncing off the walls.
    “Oh, wait. Wait.” O’Dell touched a hand to his temple, then fostered a feral smile. “It’s okay, Harrison. You don’t need to breathe anymore because you’re dead. You pushed the panic button, son. You killed yourself and all these other men, and you contaminated half the base. Now, isn’t that a fine day’s work you’ve done?”
    The lieutenant did his best to sink through the ground.
    Tracy wanted to rescue him; he looked like a lost, wounded puppy. But she knew better than to interfere. Not only would it tick off Gus O’Dell, her superior officer, it would make Harrison look even worse in front of his peers to be rescued by a woman.
    Some things never changed. Men’s egos ranked among them.
    Had that been, in part, what had kept Adam Burke silent after his arrest? No. Not ego. -Not with him. Even beaten and ‘ shackled, he’d retained his dignity. He was too self-confident to be intimidated. But being confident didn’t make him innocent. He had to be guilty. Had to be.
    O’Dell ranted himself out, and Harrison slunk back into the sixty-by-ninety-foot, metal-lined concrete chamber for another run at it.
    When he was sealed inside, looking like a frog in his mask, O’Dell glanced at her. “What do you want, Keener?”
    She didn’t waste time on small talk. Already she had decided she didn’t like Gus O’Dell, and she didn’t want to give him the opportunity to return the disfavor. “Was there any evidence of mitosis in Burke’s team members’ eyes?”
    “I have no knowledge of mitosis being an investigative finding.”
    O’Dell didn’t so much as glance at her. He kept his gaze pinioned on the window in the metal chamber door. God help Harrison if he pushed that red panic button. “I understand you spearheaded that exercise, sir.”
    “I spearhead many missions, Captain.” O’Dell nodded at one of the trainees, “Crank, get ready to haul Harrison’s panicky ass out of there.”
    Tracy stepped into O’Dell’s line of vision, and then smiled. “On that mission, did you issue Burke orders to separate from his men?”, “No, Captain, I did not.” O’Dell looked past her shoulder, checking on Harrison through the window. “If there’s nothing important to discuss, I’m a little busy at the moment.
    A man’s life. Nothing important? “Just a few more questions, Major. Please.”
    He let out an exasperated sigh and scowled.
    Tracy backed.up a step, until she realized he was still looking past her at Harrison. The lieutenant now lay prone on the chamber floor.
    “Get him out of there,” O’Dell ordered.
    Crank reached for the chamber door.
    “Wait!” O’Dell shouted, the color draining from his face. “Hit the green button!”
    Crank stopped dead in his tracks. His eyes stretched wide and his Adam’s apple bobbed three times. Hard. “Oh, shit.”
    A cold chill rippled through Tracy. She wasn’t sure what exactly had happened, but their reactions proved everyone in the hangar had just survived a close call.
    Crank turned to the control panel and depressed a lighted green button. When he then paused outside the simulator and monitored the second sweep on his watch, she figured it out. The chemicals inside the chamber were lethal. Pressing the green light triggered something to neutralize