After The EMP Box Set [Books 7-9]: The Hope Trilogy

by Tate, Harley

“At the moment? No one.”

  Ben cursed. “That goes against every protocol we have! If I knew your group would be this sloppy—”

  Larkin cut him off. “Would you rather us bring you two dead nephews or one? Tracy had to apply pressure to Daniel’s wound and I had to drive. It was leave the pharmacy and try to save him, or watch him die and wait for the shift change.”

  Walter held out his hands. “It was a high-stress moment. I’m sure they did the best they could, John and Daniel included.”

  Ben began to pace, striding back and forth in a ten-foot strip of slushy gravel. After a few moments, he came back to the group. “What about the other man?”

  Tracy winced as she broke the news. “He’s loose. For all we know he’s back at his camp, assembling a crew to break in.”

  Ben turned as the door to the medical building opened and Brianna and Craig stepped out. “We need someone out there.”

  “We need to move the medicine.” Tracy spoke as calmly as she could manage. “If we don’t move it, we’ll lose more people. The barricades won’t hold against a coordinated attack.”

  “She’s right, Ben.” Walter nodded at his wife. “Even if my whole group sets up a line of defense, we can’t protect the pharmacy from a military-style attack. It’s too risky.”

  Ben’s shoulders sagged. It took him a minute to answer. “I don’t like it, but I see your point. Let’s head back to the barn and draw up plans.” He turned to Brianna and Craig as they joined the group. “We’re moving the pharmacy.”

  “It’s about time.” Brianna crossed her arms.

  “We need people out there covering it until we’re ready.”

  “I’ll go.” Brianna reached into her pocket and pulled out the Jeep’s keys.

  “So will I.” Craig reached out and gave his uncle’s shoulder a squeeze. “We’ll protect it until you get there.”

  “We’ll head out first thing in the morning.” Ben turned to the rest of the group. “Let’s get in and figure out what to do. Now.”

  Clifton Compound

  9:00 p.m.

  Tracy wrapped the flannel tighter around her shoulders as she stood on the porch to the sleeping cabin. Walter eased the door shut behind him before handing her a mug of steaming tea. She took it with a sad smile.

  “Penny for your thoughts.”

  “I don’t like Ben’s plan.” She blew on the hot liquid before taking a sip. “First Brianna goes to the pharmacy, now Colt and Madison. The kids should have stayed here.”

  “What if that guy comes back? They need the firepower at the hospital.”

  “I should be there.”

  “No. You pulled a twenty-four-hour shift and almost got yourself killed. You need rest.” Walter sipped his own tea. “If anyone should be there, it should be me.”

  “You have to go with Ben. He listens to you.”

  “About the medicine or the radio broadcast?”

  “Both. That medicine is important not just to the Jacobsons, but to us, too. I know they’ve been protecting it, but we have just as much of a right to it as they do. It’s not theirs.”

  “But it’s not ours, either.”

  Tracy sighed. “That doesn’t mean we should let some guy claiming to represent the government take it. Or leave it in the pharmacy where these new people can break in and steal it.”

  “Agreed.”

  “We have to stand up for ourselves.”

  Walter wrapped an arm around his wife. “Have I told you lately that I love you?”

  She smiled. “I never get tired of hearing it.” She sipped her tea again and leaned against the comfort and solidity of her husband’s body. “No matter what happens, we have to keep our family safe. That’s the priority.”

  “And the Jacobsons?”

  “God willing, they’ll be safe, too.” She thought about Madison and her brush with death. The crisis and panic Tracy felt inside as she searched for a rabies vaccine and came up empty was overwhelming. Grace and luck brought her to the hospital and the Jacobsons made it possible to save her daughter. They couldn’t give it all away now or let it fall into the wrong hands. She snuggled closer. “We need that medicine, Walter.”

  “Madison will be okay, even if we lose the pharmacy.”

  “But what kind of a future will she have?” John wasn’t much older than Madison and he was dead. Daniel clung to life thanks to Heather and their medical supplies. Any one of them could come face-to-face with death at any moment.

  Walter tightened his embrace. “She’ll have the best future we can give her.”

  “I hope that’s enough.”

  Her husband exhaled. “Do you remember the first day we dropped Madison off at kindergarten?”

  Tracy leaned back to catch her husband’s face. “Of course. I remember walking up to the trailer and thinking we had to be lost. I couldn’t believe they would put the kindergartners in a rundown mobile home because of overcrowding.”

  The school had been redistricted that summer and found itself over capacity with no means to house all the elementary classes. The temporary classroom trailers borrowed from another school weren’t fit to house farm animals, let alone children.

  “But what happened when we picked her up?”

  Tracy smiled. “We couldn’t get her to leave. Madison was gluing drawings the class made to the wall because she wanted to make her teachers smile.”

  “Exactly. If anyone can find the good in dark times, it’s our daughter.”

  “What if a positive outlook isn’t enough? If Ben agrees to hand everything over to the Unified States of America or whatever it is, then everything we’ve worked for these past nine months might be lost.”

  “We’ll convince him not to, but first, we have to move the medicine. That’s the priority.”

  Tracy kissed her husband and watched him head back inside to the warmth of wool blankets and sound construction. As the door shut, she turned back around to look out over the Clifton property. She couldn’t see much in the dark, but she knew the layout.

  They had turned a vacation spot into a home for not just one family, but three. Ten people working and living and surviving without anyone to answer to but themselves. Nine months without a government imposing its own rules and regulations. No police, no firefighters, no taxes. Nothing but the effort of their bodies and their minds and the strength of their convictions to keep them alive.

  How would Madison, Brianna, and the rest of the young people react to a new government imposing itself on their freedom? They were so independent now. Tracy thought back to life before the EMP. Teachers and coaches and bosses and police. Everyone telling them what to do every second of the day.

  It wouldn’t be easy to integrate back into a working nation. But if it meant safety and security and a chance to go back to life before, would they concede? She thought about all they had lost. Music, art, and movies. Great restaurants and beautiful gardens. Electricity and running water.

  In a way she was happier with this simpler way of life, but they gave up so much to have it. With a deep breath she turned to head inside. This couldn’t be the best it would ever get. Life had to improve, even if it took a few sacrifices to achieve it.

  She pulled the door open and eased into the comfort of the cabin. In the morning, they would head to the pharmacy and hope her daughter and the rest of their makeshift family were still safe inside the hospital walls.

  301 Days Without Power

  Chapter Eleven

  WALTER

  Mountain Lake Road

  8:00 a.m.

  “Can’t you hold it?” Walter careened into the U-Haul’s passenger door and grunted.

  “You want to swap?” Larkin gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles. “’Cause I’m happy to give you the reins.”

  Walter rubbed his shoulder where it slammed into the window. “Just slow down. If we end up in a ditch, there’s no way to dig it out.”

  “We should never have agreed to this plan.” Larkin kep
t his eyes on the road as the back tires of the fourteen-foot truck spun in the snow. “It would have taken more trips, but four-by-fours were the way to go.”

  “It would take too long. For all we know, those guys are on their way with guns and ammo and eager trigger fingers.”

  “Or we took out fifty percent of their crew and the one guy left standing isn’t eager for a repeat.”

  The rear tires slipped and the U-Haul drifted sideways. Larkin cursed and took his foot off the pedals. He eased the steering wheel to the left, turning the tires against the skid. The truck slowed as its right tire edged into the thicker snow bank and Larkin regained control.

  “At this rate, it’ll take all day to get there.”

  “We don’t have a choice.”

  “Sure we do. We can put it in a ditch, go get the Cliftons’ pickup, and tell Ben there’s a new plan.”

  Walter exhaled. He understood Larkin’s frustration, but loading up all the medicine in one vehicle made the most sense. They could drive it straight into the Jacobson’s barn and secure it without trouble. If the worst happened and the farm was compromised, someone could hop in the driver’s seat and get away with the medicine before it was taken.

  “Ben’s plan is a good one. We just need to take our time and we’ll get there.”

  “Easy for you to say.” Larkin’s shoulders bunched as the road dipped into a gradual descent. The hospital sat in a small commercial district just above Interstate 80 at the base of the foothills, nearly two thousand feet lower in elevation than the Cliftons’ place.

  Once they reached Northwoods Boulevard, Walter hoped the truck would gain traction from the better asphalt of a major road. He checked his watch. Just after eight in the morning. Ben expected them by nine. If Larkin kept the truck on the road, they should make it.

  Larkin slowed to turn onto Northwoods and the U-Haul slid. Walter reached for the armrest built into the door. The back of the truck kept sliding, twisting the cab in slow motion toward the south and a tall curb.

  “Hold on!” Larkin twisted the steering wheel in the opposite direction, trying to angle the front wheels away from the concrete and back onto the road. “I might not save it!”

  Walter braced himself. The U-Haul shimmied. The rear tires were spinning, completely tractionless in the melting snow and ice. Walter held his breath. They were going to hit the curb. He didn’t think the truck would clear it. If they popped a tire, they would be stranded. Ben would be waiting for hours. Madison, Brianna, and Colt would be vulnerable.

  They had to do something. Walter shouted. “Try the brakes!”

  “I did!” Larkin cranked the steering wheel back in the other direction and the entire truck shuddered. A rear wheel came off the ground and they tipped toward the west. It wasn’t enough.

  The U-Haul hit the curb and jumped it one wheel at a time. Thud, thud. The back ones followed. Thud, thud. The truck’s worn-out shocks squealed and the cab bounced up and down before the whole thing came to rest in the front yard of what used to be a ski-themed restaurant.

  Larkin shoved the gear shift into park and threw off his seat belt before stepping out of the cab. He stalked across the snow-dusted weeds and stopped on the edge of the road. Walter gave him a few minutes before getting out and joining him.

  “Thanks for not killing us back there.”

  “We’re never going to get this thing back up the mountain.”

  “Ben’s got his F-150 rigged up with some sort of a snowplow, remember? He’s going to lead the way. If we can get to the hospital, we can make it to the Jacobson’s place.”

  Larkin pinched the back of his neck. “What if that radio transmission you heard is true? If America is no more and we’ve got some Unified States thing in its place, what are we going to do?”

  “Take it one day at a time, I suppose.”

  “I’m not risking my life in this truck just for Ben to turn over the medicine to the first guy he sees wearing an official uniform.”

  “It may never come to that.”

  Larkin looked over at Walter. “If it does, I’m telling you right now, all deals with the Jacobsons are off.”

  Walter exhaled. “Understood. Want me to take a turn trying to steer that thing?”

  “Knock yourself out.”

  Two hours later, Walter pulled into the parking lot of the hospital, exhausted from using all his strength to keep the truck on the road. Sweat dripped into his eyes as he backed into a clearing made by Ben’s truck at the front doors.

  He glanced over at Larkin. “Remind me never to offer to drive again.”

  The younger man chuckled. “Told you so.” He climbed down from the passenger side as Colt and Brianna appeared in the hospital entry.

  “About time you two showed up.” Colt reached out and gripped Walter’s hand before pulling him in for a quick hug. He lowered his voice. “Too much longer and I’d have had to duct tape blondie’s mouth shut. She’s not exactly a fan of this plan.”

  “Neither am I.” Larkin joined them and Colt leaned over to shake his hand. “I didn’t survive this long to die in a U-Haul on the side of the road.”

  “I told you this was a terrible idea.” Brianna stopped a few feet away from the men, hands on her hips. “Ben’s lucky you made it when you did. I was ten minutes away from telling him to shove it and loading up the Jeep.”

  “We still could.”

  Walter shook his head. “The hard part is over. All we need now is to load up the U-Haul and follow Ben to the farm.”

  Brianna rolled her eyes. “Have you forgotten how much medicine is back there?”

  “The girl has a point.” Larkin rolled his shoulders. “I vote for Craig to take the first shift.”

  “All by himself?”

  “Sure beats me doing it.” He leaned back against the truck’s sidewall, blocking a picture of a Doppler radar forecast. Walter leaned over to read it. “Oklahoma Center for Weather Research, Forecasting & Education.” He shook his head. “Not a lot of jobs for weathermen now.”

  Colt licked his finger and stuck it in the air. “Forecast for the next two months: cold enough to freeze the balls off a pool table.” He jerked his head toward the hospital. “Let’s get on with it.”

  Walter ducked his head and smiled. Even if they disagreed on the best method to secure the medicine, he’d grown to love every member of his new family and was thankful to know them. He followed the men inside where Craig and Ben Jacobson were positioned at the entrance to the pharmacy.

  “Our apologies on the delay. Roads were a little slippery.”

  “Understood.” Ben turned toward the fire doors. They were bent off their hinges.

  Walter frowned. “Did you break them down to get in?”

  “Someone beat us to it.” Craig frowned. “When Brianna and I got here, the doors were wide open, but that wasn’t the worst of it.”

  “What was?”

  Craig’s mouth turned down in a grimace. “Some jerk boobytrapped the pharmacy with a smoke grenade. I about shot my own foot off reaching for my gun.”

  “Anyone inside?”

  “Nope. But whoever it was messed the place up pretty good and cleared most of a shelf.”

  “What did they take?”

  “A little bit of everything. No rhyme or reason to it that we could see.”

  Walter nodded. “Amateurs. Not someone familiar with medicine.”

  Larkin chimed in. “Could have been the guy we fought off. He didn’t look like a medical professional if you know what I mean.”

  Ben agreed. “That’s what we figure. He got in, grabbed what he could and left behind a parting gift.”

  “That could mean he’s gone for good.”

  Larkin shook his head. “Or that he’s shown his boss the haul and they’re planning to take the rest any minute. That guy wouldn’t have gone through all the work to get in just to take an armful and leave. He’ll be back.”

  “Then we need to hurry.” Walter strode into the pharmacy.
His daughter stood in the back, pulling an armful of medicine off a shelf. He hurried over and waited until she dumped the medicine in the box before giving her a hug. “Are you all right?”

  Madison nodded. “I’m fine.” She pointed to a row of boxes closest to the door. “You can start with those.”

  Walter smiled. Madison was all business and Walter appreciated it. He stepped over to the first box and picked it up. It was labeled Acarbose to Dibucaine. “What’s in here?”

  “All the drugs that would fit in the box from the first shelf.” Madison waved at the rest of the pharmacy. “Everything’s alphabetical by generic name.”

  Walter nodded in understanding before carrying the box past Larkin and Colt, who lined up to take a load. Without a medical professional like Heather Jacobson or at least a drug index, he wouldn’t know what ninety-nine percent of the drugs in the pharmacy even were. He’d be liable to kill someone with the wrong drug before he helped.

  It was another reason they needed to keep the alliance with the Jacobsons on good terms. Heather was one of the most useful people around for miles. Maybe even in the entire state.

  Craig caught up with him, carrying two boxes stacked on top of each other. “Thanks for driving down here. Larkin said it wasn’t easy.”

  Walter smiled. “You’re welcome. Thanks for protecting the pharmacy.” He set the box on the truck bed and Brianna picked it up and carried it into the back. Craig did the same and they walked side-by-side back toward the pharmacy. “How’s Daniel?”

  “Stable. Heather says he’s lucky they found him when they did. If Tracy hadn’t kept pressure on his wound, he’d have bled out for sure.”

  “Sorry about John.”

  Craig nodded and the pair lapsed into silence, carting box after box out to the truck for Brianna to pack away.

  The sun hung high in the sky by the time the last box made it into the truck. Walter leaned against the side and chugged a bottle of water. “I’m glad that’s over with.”

  Larkin looked up at the countless stacks of boxes. “Now comes the hard part.” He grimaced. “We have to drive it uphill.”