That idea, of random chance sealing a whole family’s fate, didn’t sit well with either the county judge or the sheriff, and they both shifted uncomfortably.
“Well, we haven’t found a will for either Wally or Byron, if that’s the question. Normally, the county attorney would have to…” The county judge sighed, stopping his explanation. “Talk to your neighbors. Then we’ll get a figure from the appraisal office. Have you had a chance to examine the property?”
I chuckled a little before replying. “I haven’t even seen the house yet. Can’t see it from the road.”
Peterson nodded. “Get the keys from the sheriff and go check the place out. Then come see me if you are still interested. You know you won’t be able to get financing?”
“I know. Fortunately, my brother and his wife were able to sell their house in Dallas to a speculator,” I fibbed. After the pile of bodies we had left in Fort Worth on the side of the road, a little misdirection might be in order, and the real estate agent had been located in Dallas. “They’ll be contributing, but they had to pay off their mortgage there, so it wasn’t as much as you might think.”
“A lot of that going around. I don’t even understand how the banks are still open, honestly,” Peterson pointed out, getting a grunt from the sheriff as well. “They aren’t making any loans, and everybody who can has been emptying out their accounts as fast as the limits allow. At least they are barred from carrying through on their foreclosures when the president extended the State of Emergency.”
“Glad the governor extended the moratorium on evictions for renters, but that just leaves the property owners in a bind,” Sheriff Bastrop noted. “The constables have better things to do than serving papers, anyway.”
“Well, I think that covers my questions for now, Bryan. Come see me after you talk to the Lovetts, and I’ll see what we can do,” Judge Peterson said, and it was clearly a dismissal. Taking my cue, I rose to leave, but the judge seemed to have one more question for me as I reached the door. “You thinking about controlling access to your neighborhood if we allow you to do this?”
Turning, I gave the judge my best shocked expression. “Absolutely not, Your Honor. That’s a county road running through our neighborhood.”
My mouth said no, but neither man could have missed my not-so-subtle nod as I shut the door behind me. Bet your ass we were closing that road as soon as possible.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The drive through town was depressing. I could feel the almost tension in the air as we drove past the single remaining grocery store open in New Albany, but the glassed front windows of the Woodshire Brothers store now boasted reinforced wood panels blocking not only the hostile weather but also the mass of customers waiting to be admitted.
“Must have gotten a grocery truck,” Wil commented. “Don’t see a Guard escort, though.”
“Probably already headed back out. Sucks to be the driver of that rig, though,” I observed. “Just makes them a big old target all the way back to the warehouse.”
“Nah, they’ll pin the back doors open, shows the trailer’s running empty,” Wil suggested. “That’s what I’ve heard, anyway. Never done it myself. No, the biggest target has to be the warehouses.”
“I heard from guys talking at the hospital that the Guard units not headed for the border are forting up at the warehouses to protect the goods there,” I added in, glad to be able to contribute to the conversation. I’d overheard two soldiers talking about getting on that gig, with both deciding they’d prefer to take their chances against the Mexican Army.
I was glad to share the rumors, since talking took my mind off the giant piles of flood-ruined debris stacked in front of too many stores and houses. “They got three platoons detailed off to guard the main warehouse in Lufkin.”
Once past the string of mostly closed stores of Main Street and the downtown area, I saw the residential areas showed as much, if not more, storm damage.
“I noticed management was limiting the number allowed in the grocery store,” Pat added as we took a turn and headed away from the center of town. “Makes sense.”
“We’re not guarding the store,” I pointed out, waving back behind us at the parked Sheriff’s Department cruiser positioned near the front entrance, helping to control access. “That’s the second most dangerous job, I reckon.”
“What’s the most dangerous?” Wil asked, curious.
“Domestic calls.” Pat answered instantly. “Can’t tell you how many times I had to patch up cops or deputies back in Austin who were out on domestic calls. Let me tell you, a stab from a butcher knife goes right through body armor.”
Wil winced, getting the idea. “Duly noted. We’ll stick to raiders, then.”
“That’s the idea,” I agreed. “Let the guys with that training deal with guarding the stores.”
As I said this, I thought about ones at the hospital, and the need to secure that facility. Maybe Pat could spend a few hours training them on securing buildings without getting ambushed, and I resolved to ask him about it later. I also wondered if Sally had any old training manuals in that field, and then I turned my focus back on the job at hand as Wil let us know we had arrived.
The white house at the end of the street could have used a new coat of paint, but the yard looked well maintained and tidy. I regarded the small, single story wood-shingled house and noticed the similar style to all the others on the block. Must have been built in the 1950s, I realized, as part of the employee housing for the foundry that once existed here, now long since been closed and nearly forgotten. Another victim of outsourcing as the good manufacturing companies died out or took their production overseas. Just another reminder of the lost jobs fueling this part of the state’s chronically unemployment.
Wil pointed out the short driveway to the detached garage, and I pulled in and parked the farm truck. I’d considered taking the little pickup for the improved gas mileage, but the emphasis was on the little part in my mind, and of the three of us, only Pat stood a bit under six foot. None of us were fat, but trying to squeeze the three of us, not to mention the gear claimed from the Sheriff’s department, in that Datsun sounded too much like packing a clown car. Plus, my Chevy one-ton had a massive toolbox for us to store all our long arms and newly acquired radios and whatnot from the department. I only had an inkling of what we’d picked up since Pat and Wil had loaded the truck while I was chatting with the judge and the sheriff, so I would have to wait until we got home to check out the goodies.
“You sure he’s home? I don’t see a rig here,” I noted, and Wil gave a chuckle before waving me ahead.
“You don’t think he parks that beast here, do you? Do you ever see Ethan’s at Wade’s?”
I admitted that I had not, now that he mentioned it.
“It’s over at the yard. Much easier to deal with, and less likely for somebody to steal the thing when there’s a guard on the gate. No, Shawn’s here. That’s his truck,” Wil indicated the dark blue, late model Ford F-150 with the Supercrew Cab configuration.
When I killed the engine, Wil held up a hand before we exited the vehicle.
“I’m sure he’s seen us already, so go slow. Shawn’s a good guy, but like the rest of us, he’s probably seen his fair share of shady shit since this all started.”
“Following your lead then,” I replied, and Pat, sitting bitch in the middle between us, nodded.
We slid out of the truck then, pausing as I leaned over and popped the bottom hatch on the massive toolbox in back. I retrieved the large canvas shopping bag from the cargo compartment and pushed the steel door shut with the back on my hand.
This little space was a handy feature I’d discovered on-line when searching for a secure toolbox to mount on the back of the farm truck. This start-up company in Pennsylvania was building steel crossbed toolboxes, mainly aimed at the oildfield service truck market.
In addition to the lockable, hinged doors on both ends that came up like wings, the manufacturer also
included a pair of matched bottom compartments measuring a foot tall, two feet wide, and four feet deep. Unlike the main side doors, I never bothered adding a lock to these compartments, and they were mainly used to transport groceries rather than tools. I thought of the two spaces as the trunk for the farm truck, and they proved their use many times over the years.
Now loaded down with the grocery bag, I followed Pat while Wil led the way around to the wrought iron front gate into the yard. I noticed the grass here, like our own, showed a yellowish tinge to the green, and looked to be recovering from weeks of too much rain. Our steps on the stone pavers leading to the modest front porch showed the dirt beneath to still be waterlogged, though, and I had to focus on my feet to keep from slipping.
“Side door,” Pat murmured, and I only realized what he meant when I heard the ominous sha-shenk of a slide pumping. Shotgun chambering a shell, I thought as I looked over to see an extremely large African-American gentleman staring down the barrel at the three of us.
“What do you…Wil?”
Instinctively, all three of us raised our hands in response to the sound of the pump shotgun cycling at close range. You don’t argue with a 12 gauge this close. I held the canvas bag tight and lifted it to show no weapon in that hand, too.
“Hey, Shawn,” Wil replied calmly. “Just wanted to come and check on you guys. These are my neighbors, Pat and Bryan.”
“How do?” I said politely, and I saw the barrel lower a fraction, and then drop entirely.
“You vouch for ‘em, Wil?”
“I do,” Wil replied immediately. “They’re as good as blood kin to me, Shawn.”
Now, that expression might sound quaint and old-fashioned to most city folk, but blood kin was still a thing in this part of the world. If you have a second cousin who you considered close and reliable, they might be considered blood kin, while a no-account sibling who drank too much and beat his wife, maybe not so much.
“Well, I guess ya’ll can come on around the side of the house. We’re set up out back,” Shawn explained with a little sigh. That was the only thing little I could see about the man.
He was tall and thick-set, but mostly with muscle. Whatever fat he might have been carrying before Rockfall appeared to have been melted away in the months since. His hair was cut short to the scalp, but he had a goatee that rivaled a Fu Manchu. If I hadn’t known he was a classmate of Wil’s, though, I would have gauged him to be in his late thirties, maybe even early forties. Clearly, the apocalypse wasn’t treating this man gently. His face was lined with stress and worry, even though he tried for a pleasant face upon seeing his old friend.
We followed Shawn around the narrow concrete block-lined path, with the side yard only measuring six feet from the wooden security fence on one side to the old asphalt shingles of the house on the other. Here, as well, I could see where the flood waters marked the shingles up to a high-water mark of nearly three feet. I shuddered, thinking about how much damage the house must have endured from the unceasing rains and the hurricanes, and I wondered how the roof was still in place. Older construction sometimes meant better, I was coming to learn, but even thick structural beams had their limits.
Around the corner of the house, we found a collection of chairs and tables no doubt retrieved from the home and arranged in a circle around what at first glance appeared to be a waist high brick block, but I quickly realized it was an outdoor, built-in grill. We had one of them out back at home used by Beatrice for some of her food preservation projects. This one, however, I judged from the pots and bowls arranged on the slate top preparation table next to the grill, seemed to be dedicated to its original use. Shawn and his family were using the wood-fired grill for cooking and boiling water.
Drawing my attention away from the grill, I noted three more adults scattered around the small backyard in various states of agitation. Two ladies and another man, all three also African-American though the other man looked to be of at least a shade or two lighter complexion than the two women. That man stood with his hands behind his back, but I thought I saw a small flash of metal as he turned more fully to face us, and I figured he was concealing a weapon of some sort.
At least one of the women seemed to recognize Wil and offered him a welcoming wave. She stood next to the make-do brick oven and had just set aside her paring knife to make the gesture, and I saw a bandage fastened across the back of her forearm. About thirty-five, with an oval shaped face and a slightly snubbed, button nose, she was slender in a way that made me think this was a recent occurrence. Glancing back at Shawn, I then finally noticed his clothes seemed a size or too overly large from his current, still impressive, frame.
“Hey, Wil, what brings you out this way? And bringing new friends?”
“Hey back at you, Winnie,” Wil replied easily, obviously trying to smooth any nerves at our unexpected arrival. “Sorry to drop in unannounced, but I couldn’t get through when I tried to call. Susanne got worried, so you know…”
“She made you come check on us,” the lady, Winnie, finished the sentence for him, and her genuine grin widened to show her even white teeth flashing prettily in contrast to her dark coloring.
“Seems I needed an escort,” Wil continued, “so I brought my buddies Pat and Bryan. They’re Wade’s neighbors, and they are probably the reason I’m still alive.”
“No kidding?” Shawn asked, shouldering the shotgun on a sling as he drew near. “What happened?”
I pegged him at about six feet, five inches tall, so maybe an inch over my height, and at least forty pounds heavier. Still, his face looked tight, almost gaunt in this light. In fact, he looked like a boxer who’d been cutting weight for a match, except I didn’t know of a weight restriction above heavyweight. Clearly, he’d been sacrificing time at the table, probably in deference to his kids.
As I was appraising Shawn, I realized Wil had paused his answer, glancing around.
“Where are the kids?” he asked, concern lacing his words.
“Out back,” Winnie replied with another touch of a smile. “William is trying to teach Courtney how to fish for crawdads, and Kenia’s just agitating things with Tara.”
“Oh, so all is well with the world,” Wil responded loudly with a guffaw, then lowered his voice to only encompass the adults in the yard.
“Night before last, we had a dozen raiders try to hit Wade’s place from the back,” Wil explained, all trace of humor gone. “Pat and Bryan are part of a group that caught them coming through the wire.”
“Drive them off?” the other man, still unknown to me, if not Wil, asked cautiously.
“Killed the whole lot of them,” Wil corrected drily. “One of theirs was wounded, and we’re taking care of her at Wade’s. That’s where Susanne is, or she’d be here today.”
Wil’s response seemed to make the group tense up again, instead of relaxing them as he’d hoped. Sensing the mood change, Wil gave me a look and I unfroze, taking a slow step over the stone-topped counter and lifting the bag up without asking permission to set it on the table.
“Susanne and some of the ladies out at our place wanted us to drop these off for you,” I explained awkwardly. “Just some things from the garden there and our place up the road.”
“And you just decided to drop by over here on Tram Road and see how the other half lives?” The question from the still unnamed man came with a hard edge that wasn’t that big of a surprise to me. Some people don’t take to charity, especially those who need it the most.
“I’m sorry, I don’t believe we’ve met,” I replied, trying to diffuse the situation. “I’m Bryan Hardin, this is my brother-in-law, Patrick Parker.” I didn’t extend my hand, sizing up the dynamics and deciding I didn’t want the other man to take his hands out from behind his back. Whatever he was holding, I figured Pat and I would be killing him before he got it halfway around.
“McKenzie Dunbar,” the man replied grudgingly, trying to go for polite. “And I know who you are.”
I
tried not to react to the name, and I thought I copied Pat’s deadpan poker face, but the man must have been extra sensitive because his fuse lit off about two seconds after he said his name.
“Why are you smiling? Did I say something funny? You think all black men have names like Tyrone or LeBron?” He demanded angrily, and the other woman turned to say something with a hiss under her breath.
“No, sir, but unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know that McKenzie Dunbar is the name of the biggest civil defense law firm in Houston,” I stated evenly. “They have, had,” I corrected myself, “over six hundred lawyers in half a dozen offices around the country. Now, I know your momma and daddy didn’t name you after the firm. They only changed it to that about ten years ago after absorbing Whitaker Dunbar, but they had billboards all over the city. So, if I cracked the least bit of a smile, it was the same one I have when I get introduced to someone named Howard Johnson, or Arthur Andersen.”
“What? There’s really a bunch of lawyers with my name?” McKenzie Dunbar looked around, his eyes wide, and I saw Shawn’s shoulders begin to shake ever-so-slightly, the vibration increasing ever so slightly, undulating up and down like the hula girl on the dashboard of a Dodge Dart going ninety miles an hour, but turned sideways.
“Man, I told you about that before, but did you even pay me any attention?” Shawn all but bellowed. “Yes, there’s a big old law firm in Houston with your name on it.” Turning to me, he asked seriously.
”Are there at least a few black lawyers there? Just to shut him up,” Shawn continued, hooking a thumb over his shoulder at McKenzie.
Tertiary Effects Series | Book 3 | Bite of Frost Page 12