Tertiary Effects Series | Book 3 | Bite of Frost

by Allen, William

  I nodded. “So does all of the West Coast falling into the ocean, or being consumed by it anyway. And volcanoes erupting that have been dormant for hundreds of years. And the active ones going spastic. Oh, and don’t forget the hurricanes.”

  “What did you mean about the ammunition, anyway? We’ve got a few rifles and shotguns. For varmints mostly.”

  “Anything with a scope?”

  “An old Marlin .22 for skunks. An old Army surplus rifle I picked up for whitetail deer. 1903A3, I think they call it,” Earl admitted.

  “To answer your question, my brother Mike used to buy and sell at gun shows. He’s gotten some deals over the years on guns and ammo. I think we have enough 30-06 and .22LR to get you set up for a couple thousand rounds for each of them. You’ll need more firepower, though. Again, Mike can help get you set up.”

  “And you’ll do all this out of the goodness of your heart?” Lynette scoffed. “Please. You’re a lawyer, for God’s sake. What’s in it for you?”

  “If you all are dead and somebody else is squatting here, then we have a problem on our border,” I replied coldly, deciding to give Lynette all the truth she could handle. “We might lose someone I care about cleaning them out. You want to talk about self-interest, that’s the truth.”

  Lynette gave a small gasp, but I caught a cautious nod from her daughter. I paused, letting my audience digest my words before continuing.

  “Also, you might want to listen if I can convince Nikki’s husband to come give you all some lessons. He was a Green Beret for over a dozen years, and he’s forgotten more about setting up defenses and killing insurgents than most people ever learn. Just a suggestion. So, about purchasing the Fitts property, assuming you aren’t going to raise a stink, we need to get a move on and go see about the judge.”

  After that, we made our goodbyes and Nikki took a grip on my left arm, and Nancy copied her move on my right. Nikki seemed to be battling her emotions, but I could see a sly grin on Nancy’s face.

  “What?” I asked, looking at Nikki first.

  “I think you might have overdone it,” my sister hissed under her breath as we all split up at the truck. Then once we were back inside, she continued.

  “You might have tried some of that persuasive skill you learned in law school,” Nikki continued, looking over the seat at me with raised eyebrows.

  “Advocacy is overrated, when you can scare the shit out of them,” I retorted with an elaborate shrug. Then I turned my attention to Nancy.

  “What was it that tickled your fancy, missy?”

  “Uh, I think Lynette might have soiled her undies when you explained the inconvenience you might feel in stepping over her dead body,” Nancy replied with the same nonchalant manner I’d spoken earlier. “But you might want to watch that Heather. I think she’s got the hots for you.”

  “Meow, kitty,” I said playfully, having successfully translated her warning, but I followed with a sigh. “I’d really hate to see them get killed, but stupid isn’t a survival trait in this new world. Time will tell.”

  With that prophetic statement, my sister went back to ignoring me as she started the truck and eased it into gear. We still had a full agenda, but I could mark this meeting off my to-do list.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  As soon as the truck starting gradually slowing into the curve, I felt my hackles rise. With the back window rolled down in the mild weather, I was taking advantage of the temporary reprieve from the unseasonable cold. I mean, the thermometer barely tipped above fifty-five degrees, but after freezing the last week, the still-chill air felt nice, but suddenly I was feeling my skin crawl in a way that had nothing to do with the weather.

  We were midway between our place and the city limits, about five miles from New Albany, and coming into the only real bend in the road. This was designed to avoid a small gully caused by Cow Creek, and just around the curve I could just make out the edge of the bridge. Fortunately for the flood-stricken community, even the recent massive floodwaters never threatened the two-lane bridge due to the twenty-foot difference in elevation over the normally shallow creek itself.

  Parked next to the bridge, I saw another truck, an older model Dodge, faded to orange with what looked like a rust-streaked body. Facing us, the pickup was pulled over on the shoulder and rested with the hood propped open. Just another broken-down truck, cataloged by my rational brain. But my rational brain was no longer fully in control.

  My performance with the Lovetts, preaching about the dangers now inherent in the world, resulted in a heightening of my paranoia. Some might call it situational awareness, but I wasn’t kidding myself. Despite my efforts to play it cool, I’d managed to work myself into a scary place.

  Newly cultivated instincts kicked in as I ripped the AR out of the gun rack in front of me, thrusting it out to Nancy in the front passenger seat before grabbing my own. Slamming a magazine in the well, I charged the weapon in flagrant disregard for several safety measure taught by my brother-in-law. I then tossed a bandolier full of magazines in the front seat with Nancy.

  Nikki, sensing my activity, took her foot off the accelerator and lightly tapped the brake, slowing our progress.

  On top of my paranoia, I was assaulted by a sudden tightening in my gut as stories told by Mike, Pat, and now, Wil intruded on my observations. Stories about nasty places around the world where everything that moved could be a target. Stories about roadside bombs, RPGs, and blown-up convoys ran rampant in my brain. In short, ambush was already on my mind when I saw the flash of metal out the right-side window.

  “Stop the truck! Back up!” I screamed, thrusting my rifle out the open window and unloading half-a-dozen poorly aimed shots in the general vicinity of that flash of metal and movement I’d spotted. There, movement in the piles of refuse and drowned bushes almost straight out from where the truck came jolting to a stop. Maybe it was a camper, or a displaced person. Maybe it was nothing at all. Whatever the case, I followed my new instincts and unleashed as much defensive fire as I could manage.

  I didn’t think I would hit anyone or anything, but I wanted to disrupt the shooters for long enough so that…

  My neck snapped back from the sudden force as Nikki slammed her foot on the accelerator and began expertly backing Mike’s truck away from the ambush at thirty, forty, fifty miles per hour. Jeez, I thought in wonder, how did she do that? I could barely manage to keep a truck straight for a dozen feet while backing, but Nikki seemed to have no problem.

  After emptying the first magazine, my upper body hanging out the window, I thumbed the release, dropped it, and slammed home a fresh one even as Nikki brought the truck to a shuddering stop. Five hundred yards, I thought as I stepped out on the running board, as I aimed high and unleashed another salvo of rounds into the brush piles.

  “Anybody hit?” I called out, my breath coming in shuddering gasps as I fired again. I was now hanging off the door, left arm locked around the pillar, half-in and half-out of the truck as I sent more hate downrange. “Sound off, damnit! Anybody hit?”

  “Uh, nuh, no,” Nancy managed to sputter, clutching the AR tight in her lap. Her voice sounded faint and distorted, and I wondered if my shots had managed to blow out our eardrums. Levering myself up, I finished off the rest of the magazine and reached for another.

  Glancing back inside, I saw the front windshield stitched with a ragged row of holes that appeared to have struck at an angle before blowing out the driver’s side window. Shit, I wasn’t even aware we were actually taking fire. I was half-hoping I was suffering a psychotic episode. Then I saw my sister-in-law slumped in the driver’s seat and I began to panic.

  “Nikki! Nikki! Are you hit?”

  Shaking herself, Nikki turned to me, and I saw blood on her face I freaked.

  “Nikki! Where are you hit?”

  I had a terrible recollection of Sally, and I felt the surge of blinding hate pour though me, and I realized that my emotions lived so much closer to the surface these days.


  “What? I’m not…”

  Reaching up, Nikki touched the side of her head, flinched, and repeated the gesture more softly.

  “Just scratched up, Bryan. Even just safety glass can cut you. I’m fine. Better than Mike’s truck.”

  I noticed the engine idling, and I didn’t see any damage to the hood.

  “What’s wrong with the truck?”

  “Uh, somebody shot out the windshield,” Nancy observed as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

  “Engine’s still going, and I don’t see any smoke under the hood,” I replied dully. “Trust me, that’s all that matters right now. Can you back us up another thousand yards?”

  “Uh, yeah. Hold on,” Nikki warned, and she proceeded to back up the truck at a much slower rate, but again without even looking back. Then I saw she was actually studying the feed from the rear-view camera and I felt like doing a facepalm. In the heat of the moment, I’d forgotten that feature in our brother’s truck.

  When Nikki pulled us to a halt and shifted the transmission into park, I gave a sigh of relief. At approximately fifteen hundred yards from the start of the ambush, they would need a really good sniper to make that shot.

  “Can you make it home from here?” I asked, directing my question to Nikki.

  “I think so,” Nikki replied, exhaustion in her voice in the familiar pattern of adrenalin bleed off. “Why? What’s running through that squirrel cage of a brain now?”

  “You and Nancy go home. Get on the police radio right now and report this. Let everybody know there was an ambush on the county road, and where. Call the hospital and warn those guys to be careful. Then button up at home and wait for everybody to get back.”

  “Uh-huh, and what are you planning on doing?”

  “Look, I’m not in Pat’s league, but I know some stuff. I’ll go scout that ambush site, see if I actually hit anything. Sniff around. You know, be my usual nosy self.”

  “You know that’s crazy, right? You aren’t trained or equipped to do something like that by yourself,” Nikki reasoned. In the last few seconds, she’d managed to pull herself together and sound halfway coherent in her protest.

  “Honestly, I don’t want to, and I don’t want to abandon you two to the drive home. But, somebody needs to go, now, before whoever that was manages to fade into the background. We need intel, and I’m maybe not the best choice, but I don’t want either of you out there right now.”

  While I spoke, I was sliding my magazine carrier over my shoulder, fitting my arms through the vest-like arrangement and locking the mechanism in front. I wasn’t wearing my body armor, not wanting to carry the extra weight on what was supposed to be a jaunt into town. That absence made me feel very naked, but needs must, and all that. Lesson learned, if I survived. Always pack for battle.

  “Nancy, are you okay to cover Nikki?”

  “Yeah, I…fuck, that was just crazy.” Nancy hissed, rubbed her hands together. “Somebody just started shooting at us. Tried to kill us, for real.”

  “Well, we tried our damnest to kill them right back, but yeah, that just happened. Now you need to shake it off and get ready to watch Nikki’s six while you guys get out of here.”

  Saying that, I noticed my own hands starting to quiver and I slid the sling of my rifle over my head and folded my arms across my chest to conceal the shakes. At the same time, my lungs continued to heave like bellows at a blacksmith’s shop. That’s what happens sometimes when I mainline adrenaline and the fight or flight instinct kicks in. In truth, despite my bravado, I felt as if I had just finished running five miles with Pat chasing me with a switch. Training, or so he called it. In short, I felt done in, but again, I knew I couldn’t waste time.

  As if she could read my mind, Nancy reached up and pulled my canteen out of its pouch and offered me the hard plastic bottle. Fumbling with the lid, I finally got the container to my mouth and took a long draw on the water. I was thirsty, and I drank deep. Giving me a satisfied smirk that told me she was trying to get her head straight, Nancy then refilled my canteen out of the gallon jug we kept in cubby under the center console, somehow not spilling a drop. She then stuffed the canteen back into its holder on my belt and gripped my still-quivering right arm.

  “How did you know?” She asked, and I could tell despite the brave front, this woman I’d allowed into my heart was scared, too. “How could you tell they were there?”

  “Nikki, get this truck turned around, and I’ll try to explain,” I finally said, acknowledging my sister’s curious gaze with a nod. She’d taken the few seconds of distraction to flip down the visor, checking the wound at her hairline and dismissing it for the moment.

  “I was already on edge, thinking about what I’d said to the Lovetts,” I started, noting how Nikki horsed the big truck around in the center of the road without driving off either narrow, eroded shoulder. “Then we were driving, and I started to think about all the horror stories Pat and Mike told about driving into ambushes. Then I saw movement out of the corner of my eye as we rounded the curve. That truck, parked on the shoulder, and the placement of the tires caught my eye. Then, to the right, I caught movement. At first, I thought it was a boat oar I saw, and then I realized it was the outline of a rifle. That’s when I started acting instead of reacting.”

  “That’s why you threw my rifle at me and told Nikki to hit reverse,” Nancy reasoned, and I could see the gears turning. “And what if it had been just a boat oar, with somebody fishing in the creek?”

  “Then I would have pulled a Hostetler, and killed an innocent person,” I replied with some emotion in my voice as I caught their eyes in my gaze. Nancy first, then Nikki. “But I couldn’t risk your lives. I’m sorry if that sounds cruel, but I was ready to face the consequences. Fortunately, I think I turned out to be right after all.”

  “Why stop and reverse, though? I know Pat always said if he found himself in an ambush, the best thing was to push through with maximum force and then flank the attackers,” Nikki asked, and that simply reinforced my opinion that my sister was a dangerous woman to cross.

  “Split second decision,” I admitted. “We hadn’t tripped the ambush yet, and I had no idea how deep they’d set up. Better to back out before you get engaged if you can. Live to fight another day.”

  “Amen to that,” Nancy murmured. “Why do you feel like you need to go back now?”

  “Gather intel, and maybe pick off any stragglers.”

  I felt two sets of eyes on me, but I ignored the glares for now. I reached under the bench seat, withdrew a cardboard box, and grabbed a double handful of fresh magazines for the AR. I’d left several empties littering the floorboard, but I would leave that cleanup for later, or let someone else worry about it. Stuffing the magazines into the emptied front pockets of the rig, I calculated how long it would take me to slog back to the curve on foot and I felt my resolve slacken as I began to second-guess myself. Nope, not going down that road, I decided.

  “When you radio Dispatch, please try to let them know I’m there without giving too much information away,” I asked Nancy, and she gave me a slit-eyed stare before replying.

  “You worried about somebody listening in? And how in the heck am I supposed to warn them about you being on-site without giving away the game?”

  I shrugged apologetically as I swung the door open once again, using the angle of the truck to hide what I was doing, hopefully, from any watchers from back the way we had just come.

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “But you’re a smart woman, so I was hoping you’d figure it out.”

  Nancy hissed a sigh.

  “I’ll think of something. Just be careful, and come home to me, okay?”

  Her simple words hid a ton of vulnerability, and I realized that this woman felt the same for me as I did for her. We weren’t using the ‘L’ word yet, but it was coming.

  “You got it,” I replied, trying to mask my rising apprehension with a jaunty air as I backed out of the rear seat and
hustled over to the side of the road. I didn’t hesitate as I slid into the debris-strewn ditch and hunkered down to watch as the truck receded in the distance.

  Time to get down to business, I chided myself as I adjusted the sling of my rifle and crouched down, trying to make myself a smaller target in the flood-littered ditch as I worked my way back towards the scene of the attack. Because I knew one thing with complete certainty, and that was when Patrick Parker heard about this attack, he would be here as soon as he knew she was safe. After that, whoever pulled off this little ambush had better hope I caught them first.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  By the time the Sheriff’s Department showed up, nearly thirty minutes had elapsed by my watch. In my heart, I’d aged a couple of decades as I stood over the pile of bodies. Six adults, all apparently shot in the back of the head and dumped in the gulley for the scavengers to feast.

  They were all face down, and I didn’t have the heart to climb down and check the bodies. I’d found them easily enough, following the sound of crows fighting over the fresh remains. I might have thought I was ready for all the bad stuff this new world could throw at me after walking into that butcher shop in Fort Worth, but I was sorely mistaken. I was still washing the vomit out of my mouth as I turned to see the Department SUV pull up and park on the shoulder just past the old bridge.

  The old faded red pickup was gone, no doubt used in the flight of the assholes who set this up. One bright spot came early on in my approach, when I found a pool of blood back near the scrub trees and brush piles. Whoever I’d hit, they were going to be in a bad way. Nobody loses that much blood and walks away from it.

  Two deputies I vaguely recognized piled out of the SUV along with Buddy Cromwell, and I raised a hand in recognition as Buddy ambled over to me. Buddy was dressed out like his two men, wearing the heavy body armor and bearing AR-15s like I was carrying. Bud and his boys looked tired, and I thought one of the deputies, a tall black guy wearing mirrored sunglasses even in the cloudy weather, looked like he had a bandage wrapped around his left forearm.