The Savage Dead by Joe McKinney Page A

Ramon had promised his best people to support her on this, and this young man here had just identified himself to her with the code that everything was right on schedule. Definitely a good sign.
    â€œSí,” she answered back, using the prearranged signal. “Es solo un corto viaje.”
    â€œMuy bueno. Los otros paquetes ya han sido en-tregados.”
    She nodded. Inwardly, she let out a little sigh of relief. What Ramon promised, he delivered. He’d always told her that, and he’d never failed to follow through on his promises. But it was still good to know that the other parts of the plan were falling into place. She was almost ashamed to admit it, but as she was reading up on the bacteria to be used, and the logistics involved in introducing it into the cruise ship’s deli meats and sushi and butter supply, she’d had serious doubts about Ramon’s ability to pull the whole thing off. Actually, she’d been feeling more than doubt. If she was honest with herself, she was terrified. But now, with everything coming together, she felt better.
    Walking quickly, she made her way to the passenger sign-in and customs registration terminals.
    From here on out, she was going to be on a tight schedule.
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    Pilar was among the first passengers to board the Gulf Queen when the gangway opened at noon.
    The ship itself was an extravagant maze of hallways, stairs, and levels leading off in every direction. Crew members in crisp white uniforms were everywhere, smiling and greeting the passengers as they made their bewildered way to their staterooms. But Pilar had memorized the layout and knew exactly where to go. She headed down to Deck 5, found her stateroom, and slipped inside.
    On the bed was a monkey made out of twisted and folded towels. She smiled, despite the nervousness that had started to twist her stomach again, and set her carry-on luggage aside. The room was small, consisting of a double bed, a bathroom, a built-in desk, a small couch, and two chairs, all of it crammed into about 200 square feet.
    But she didn’t pay attention to the cramped quarters. She wasn’t going to be spending a whole lot of time in here anyway. What really mattered was under the bed.
    She got down on her hands and knees and said a silent prayer what she needed was actually there.
    It was.
    Secured to the underside of the bed with duct tape she found three nylon gun cases, one large and two smaller ones. She removed them all and put them on the bed. First, she unzipped the largest of the three. Inside was a German-made .40 caliber Heckler & Koch MP5, one of her personal favorites, and enough ammunition to fill the six thirty-round magazines tucked into the case’s pockets. One of the other gun cases contained a pair of Glock 22 .40 caliber pistols and three fifteen-round magazines for each gun. Pilar was pleased with the setup. The fact that both the machine gun and the pistols used the same ammunition would give her some added flexibility when things started to get crazy.
    Which was another thing.
    These weapons were one of the two packages the porter down at the terminal had promised her were in place. The other was the perfringens and lactobacillus bacteria that Ramon’s people had introduced into the deli meats and butter supply in the Gulf Queen ’s kitchens. If everything moved according to schedule, and based on what she’d seen so far she saw no reason to believe that it wouldn’t, by the early morning hours the first victims of the necrotizing fasciitis would start to turn. The models she’d seen indicated that the rest of the nearly 7,000 passengers and crew would be dead or dying by nightfall of their first full day at sea. And by the time they reached Cozumel, the Gulf Queen would be nothing but a nightmare that the Americans would be forced to shoot out of the water.
    But before that could happen, Pilar had a lot to do, and that was where the third gun case came in.