by Kylie Scott
Daniel knew she was independent, knew she wanted to take care of herself. But there had to be a happy middle ground that allowed everyone to sleep at night. Something to stop the heart attack, or whatever it was, threatening to throw open his chest.
He wasn’t the only one in pain. Finn stood beside him, buzzing with tension.
“She’s fine.” Daniel leant against the side of a pick-up.
“Fine like Lindsay?” Neither man spoke for a minute. Then Finn turned on him, face set. “She doesn’t do this again. Run off out of our sight.”
“You gonna put her in a cage?”
“Fuck’s sake,” the kid bared his teeth. “You cannot be okay with this.”
An older man approached, hand in hand with a young woman. The fair-haired prince might have been strung out, but no one else knew. Finn was in pillar of the community mode, answering questions and offering reassurances. Yes, it was very sad, a great loss to the community. No, plans had not yet been made regarding the funeral. On and on it went. Death might be familiar, but Lindsay’s supposed suicide had rocked the town.
When the couple wandered away, Finn turned back to him. “You’re going to let her pull this shit? Are you serious?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Then what are you saying?”
“Same thing I’ve been saying all day. Calm down, wait and see what she comes out with.”
The kid grunted. “You could not be more fucking wrong. I thought you wanted to keep her safe.”
“How do you think you got an invitation into our bed in the first place?” Dan snapped.
Finn scowled at him, eyes furious. Yeah, well. It was going around.
“Her safety comes first with me. Always. Bossing her around will only drive her away. Trust me, I already tried it.”
An approaching rumble of engines brought the argument to an abrupt halt, as did the cry of the lookout sitting atop the cab of the garbage truck. The truck powered up and slowly reversed, clearing the entrance. A minute later, the first of the vehicles, piled high with supplies, cruised in.
The raiding party was in good spirits. Didn’t last long.
The flow of greetings cut off sharply as the pall engulfed the returning crews. And there she stood, all intact. Oh, thank fuck for that. Seemed sensation returned where he’d been deaf, dumb and blind before. His girl lived on and all was okay.
Finn marched up to the pick-up truck Ali rode in. She stood in the cage on the back of the bed, hair windblown and nose pink from the sun. She stilled at Finn’s approach, reading his body language just fine.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Lindsay’s dead, amongst other things,” Finn said, shoving a hand at her. “Come on.”
“What?” The color dropped from Erin’s face. Her father beckoned her down while Finn cursed in a low voice. Apt, since he had well and truly messed up breaking the news.
“How?” asked Erin.
“I’m sorry, honey. She killed herself.” Santa scowled, helping his daughter down. “I don’t know what to say.”
“She wouldn’t. It doesn’t make sense.” Erin stepped into her father’s waiting arms. “She … No. Why would she do that, Dad?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know.” He wrapped a beefy arm around his child and led her away, holding up an arm to keep others back.
“Come on.” Finn ushered Ali through the crowd as Daniel fell into step by her side, taking the hand she offered. Needing the connection.
Everyone spoke in hushed voices. Like the pro he was, Finn avoided getting them held up by the gathering. They were hustling her up the staircase toward home in no time, the sliding glass door downstairs firmly locked behind them.
The kid gripped Ali’s elbow like she was a criminal about to make a run for it. Nothing Dan could do. This spat was going to happen. Probably needed to. He had his own concerns with how she had taken off without a word, but going medieval was not going to work. He stayed close, ready to intervene if required.
“Finn.” She wrenched her arm free and turned about, facing them down. Something in the kid’s face had her flinching, mouth pinched and pained. “Relax, would you?”
“You think this is a joke?” Finn roared. Very young male lion. It would have been funny, except it wasn’t.
Dan opened his mouth to intercede, but his girl held up a hand, flicked him an unhappy but entirely capable look.
“No, I don’t think this is a joke,” she said. “But you do need to calm down. One of us needed to go. I went. End of story.”
“Like fuck. We’re trying to protect you here, Al,” Finn bit out. “You just go ahead and make the decision to put yourself in danger? Without discussing it with us first?”
“I want to protect you both too. Can you get that?”
“Protect us?”
“Yes.” Al threw herself into the nearest camp chair and started removing a boot with angry tugs at the shoelace. “If I’d mentioned the supply run to either of you, you wouldn’t have let me out of your sight.”
“Babe…” Dan took a big step forward, making to touch her, only to receive the stop-sign hand again.
“No.” Ali wrestled off a boot, dropped it with an almighty thud. “Did you think it would work differently for me? I care about both of you. The thought of either of you going out there … I couldn’t do it. Just couldn’t. It was easier to go myself. I’m not going to apologize. I’m not going to promise not to do it again.”
“Like hell you’re going out there again,” Finn said. “Ever. Over my dead body, Al.”
“Don’t you get it?” Daniel cleared his throat. “That’s what she’s afraid of.”
His girl glared at Finn, ready to re-launch the war. Shit, enough already. “There are going to have to be rules, for all of us,” Dan said.
“She’ll get herself killed!” Finn hissed. “How could you agree with this?”
“‘This’ being our girlfriend? The woman we’re supposed to be in a mature, adult relationship with?” Daniel enquired, tipping his chin at the foxy if furious Exhibit A. “Because we’re meant to be on her side. Within reason. I didn’t talk her down from the roof just to lock her up somewhere else. I do not want to lose her.”
The kid growled, and paced like a caged animal. Up and down, up and down, while Ali watched, nonplussed. “Fine, we’ll ease up. But you do not go out again.”
His girl rose to her feet, radiating fury. Dan was singed just being in the same room. “Not good enough. I won’t be wrapped in cotton wool while you two take all the risks. Do you really believe they’ll let us stay in your precious town if we’re not seen to be contributing? Seriously?”
“Al…”
“I’m not budging on this.”
“Then we have a problem,” said Finn.
“No, Finn. You have a problem,” his girl said. “There are some things I can’t do. Standing back while you’re in danger is one of those things.”
Finn’s nostrils flared. “I’m trained to handle dangerous situations. You are not.”
“I don’t care.”
“Al…”
“No, Finn. I love you, but no.”
The kid gave a good impression of a man who’d had the fight sucker punched right out of him. He stopped and stared. “You love me?”
“Yes. I love you,” she said.
Finn stared at her, face rigid and hands balled tight. “Shit.”
“Is that really so bad?” she asked.
The kid grabbed her and held on tight. And his girl fitted herself against Finn, her face in his neck, arms wrapped around him like she couldn’t let go.
Inside Dan’s ribcage something hurt, just like it had earlier today when he thought he’d lost her. No amount of rubbing the heel of his hand at it helped.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Ali stood belowground in a hardware store basement a half-hour north of Blackstone. Her itchy scalp and damp hair lay beneath her helmet-and-flashlight combo. The confining, dark
, hot and dusty space reminded her of old times, only this time she was under a building instead of above a house.
She and her supply buddy, Andy the goth, sorted stock. Others did the same above, clearing the shop floor. Boxes of rope and nails, flashlights and batteries sat in nice piles. All of the useable items were moved beside the stairs, where Andy then hauled them up to the trucks.
Dan was somewhere aboveground helping load, it being his day to babysit from afar. Keeping her men at home was no more feasible than their hopes to ground her were. No one was completely happy. The last few days had been full of terse words and tense silences. Eventually, something was going to have to give. Sweat covered her, sticking her t-shirt to her back. Hours must have passed because her muscles ached and her throat was bone dry. She squeezed by the stacks of boxes, searching for her water bottle.
“Andy?” He had mentioned getting a drink and disappeared a while back. She wore no watch. Had no clue what time it was or how long they had worked. “Andy, you there?”
And it was quiet, too quiet.
No reply came to her call, the echo of her own voice and her breathing the only sounds. Labored and loud. Shit.
She couldn’t say when the dozen sets of feet thudding overhead had petered out, but she knew she was alone. The building sat silent.
They had left her behind. How? No way in hell would Dan leave her, and yet the quiet was complete.
Her water bottle sat on a box containing snail bait, right beside where her gun should have been. Without a weapon, she’d be dead.
Panic bent her double and her lungs flattened like a hand held her down.
“Stop it,” she snarled, wincing when it echoed back. Quiet. She should be quiet. The sun couldn’t have set yet, impossible. Where was a fucking watch when she needed one? “Calm down,” she whispered. “Think.”
All comfort bled out of the space and the dark pressed in claustrophobically. She needed to get upstairs. She forced slow steps, made her way over and around the boxes. Tiptoed up the stairs and through the door with its broken lock. She flicked off her light, set her helmet aside, delaying.
What was the point? Either way, she needed to know.
Ali stepped out onto the shop floor. It was empty. Nothing moved. Things were scattered here and there, articles deemed unimportant. The afternoon sun shone through dusty plate-glass windows with splendid shades of copper and red. It lit up the dust motes floating about.
Her heart fisted as a meltdown commenced, which helped nothing.
Something nudging the side of her boot snagged her attention. It was the weight of the holster shifting on her leg. Finn had buckled the ankle holster onto her himself this morning before heading for the station, making her love him that much more.
She was so fucking scared it was hard to think straight. Trembling fingers fumbled for the catch, pulled the weapon free and flicked the safety off.
The hardware was wide open, front doors busted, the back the same. Things were stirring out on the street. Shadows moving. The moaning might have been her muddled mind, but it was doubtful.
The sun ducked behind the line of buildings across the way. Above her was a foam ceiling. It wouldn’t hold her.
Out on the street there came a low, drawn-out groan. Her muscles trembled.
Move.
She bolted for the back door, keeping low, trying not to make a target of herself. The building behind this one was three-stories high, blocking out the afternoon sun and casting her in shadow. Still a better bet than the open space of the street front.
There was an overgrown patch of grass running alongside a fence, a docking bay with a van parked in it. The windows had been blown out and a long-dead body sat in the driver’s seat, rotted arm hanging down, skin like leather.
A forklift was parked alongside the back of the building, a pallet stacked with bags of potting mix weighing down the front. In lieu of a ladder, it looked good. It was also the only option.
More moaning.
“Go. Go. Go. Go.” Ali chanted under her breath, navigating the climb from inside the forklift’s cab onto its front load. The gun in her hand slowed her down.
Something grabbed her. She almost screamed. The noise stuck in her throat, wanting out.
A grasping hand clutched at her boot. She kicked out, dislodging it for a moment. Where the hell had it come from so fast? Over her shoulder she saw decaying features smeared with dirt and dried blood, eyes empty of color, as though the irises had bled to white. The remains of his torn greasy shirt named him “Mike”. In less than a minute she could put a bullet smack bam through Mike’s forehead. Be done with him, no matter the noise. But noise would draw more of them.
Fuck. The rabbit went wild in her chest.
She scrambled onto the forklift roof. Mike tugged at the hem of her jeans, scratching and clawing at her pants, trying to pull her back, skewing her balance and sending her onto one knee.
Nothing could save her sweaty grip on the gun.
The pistol slipped from her hand, clattered to the ground. Going, going, gone.
She gave a helpless groan, shaking with fear and adrenalin. “Oh, fuck you, Mike.”
She kicked out, boot connecting with the hard bone of his skull. Mike reeled back onto his ass.
Ali scrambled to her feet, perched atop the forklift. There was a narrow window off to the side of the building, about the right height to give her the leg-up required. It would be difficult. She stretched out. Her fingers could just reach the edges of the gutter. The muscles in her legs screamed in protest, thighs and feet and everything in between. Ali pulled herself forward, increasing her hold on the gutter inch by inch. Metal dug into her fingers, but she had it. It held and she wasn’t letting go. She stuck her left leg out to kick in the window, the crack in the glass painfully loud.
Ali wedged her foot into the space and reached for the moon. She was stuck stretched between the window and the forklift. Mike, the tenacious bastard, yanked on her boot, still sitting atop the machine.
Mike moaned, a noise that wound down to a death rattle. It sounded like someone had squeezed the air out of him, accordion-style. The poor guy was probably frustrated over watching his meal get away. Another infected stumbled around the corner, drawn by fuck knew what instinct.
God help her. Panic reduced her to an implausible leap of faith.
Ali pushed off with her toes, dislodging Mike’s claw, and put her weight on the leg stuck akimbo in the window. She clutched at the gutter and dragged her sorry self up. Her arms felt like fire, no, like lead. It took forever. Her ribs scraped on the gutter and her fingers tingled, thick and numb.
She didn’t fall a story to the street below and become a broken-boned meal for the horde. Fucking up wasn’t an option because she was getting home. Yes, she was.
The aluminum roof blistered her hands and cheek. It was a piss poor welcome to safety.
Ali rolled onto her back, folding her arms over her body, trying to keep her exposed limbs off the scorching metal. The hot pain through her t-shirt was the final insult.
She lay there and cried from relief and horror both as the sunset faded and the infected gathered below.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
“What do you mean she’s missing?”
Santa blanched, held up his chubby mitts in a placating gesture. “Now then, son, calm down. She’s a smart girl.”
“I. Want. Facts.” Finn clamped his teeth shut, his stomach ready to spill. People milled about amongst the pick-ups piled high with the day’s takings. He ignored the audience and the pounding of footsteps behind him. “Explain to me how she was the only one who got left behind.”
“What’s going on?” Dan demanded, landing a heavy hand on Finn’s shoulder. “Finn?”
“They lost her. They fucking lost her.”
The big man’s mouth opened then closed. “What? Andy said she took the first truck back.”
“No. Where is she, Dan?”
“Finn, I swear, I thought
she was already home. I was going to give her a serve for leaving without me.”
Erin stepped forward. “Andy came back in one of the other trucks. We don’t know where he is now. He told me the same thing.”
“You left her there.” Finn grabbed Dan’s arm, ignoring the tremble in his fingers. “How the fuck could you leave her there, Dan?”
“I … I thought…”
“You were supposed to watch her!” Finn raised his fist. Dan didn’t even flinch. Just stood there, patiently waiting to take what was coming. He didn’t even say anything. Just looked completely gutted. Soul destroyed. His gaze vacant and the color gone from his face.
Finn knew how he felt.
“We need to go get her,” Finn said, letting his fist drop. He couldn’t do it.
“I’m in,” Erin said. No hesitation.
“Calm down, people.” Santa’s bushy brows clumped. “It’s nearly dark. You cannot—”
“Like hell I can’t,” Finn snarled. Dan’s fingers dug into his shoulders, holding him back. “She is not staying out there alone. Move that truck now!”
“Son…” Santa started up again.
Finn literally felt himself snap, heard the noise like a crack in his skull. He lunged at the prick.
“Finn! Shit.” Dan’s arm grabbed around Finn’s waist, dragged him back. “Calm down. This is not helping. You wanna hit someone, hit me.”
Finn snarled, pissed off beyond belief. But he let Dan pull him back.
“It’s nearly dark,” Dan said. “We can’t do a damn thing by going back out there now but get her into more trouble.”
“Explain,” Finn demanded, his heart racing.
“Ali knows how to hide. She’s really good at it,” said Daniel. “We go out there now, we’ll put her in danger. She’ll try to come to us.”
“I want her back.”
“I know.” Dan’s arms wrapped around him. The man was the only thing stopping him from hitting the ground. “I know. And I’m so fucking sorry, but we’ve gotta be smart about it.”