She held the elbow of her husband while they walked. “Now I understand why you’re in such a hurry. If they do show up, you’ll be trapped here.”
“That’s it exactly,” he replied.
They walked together for fifteen minutes before Chester came into view. Unlike the flattened and flooded Paducah, or the flood-scraped riverfront of Cape Girardeau, this town was whole and apparently unaffected by the disasters of the past few days. He kept the belief until he got into the small business district. Many windows were shattered. Treetops had been cracked. No lights were on in any of the small shops.
Muriel needed a few short breaks, but Francis tried hard to keep her moving. They passed the gas station on the way to the couple’s house, which was reassuring, but they also passed several pickup trucks full of men with guns.
“I think that’s our town militia,” Francis remarked. “We always talked about disaster preparedness, but I never thought I’d see men with guns like those. I’m glad they’re on our side.”
Minutes later, they all heard a short burst of gunfire.
“Sounds like they got him,” the older man joked.
He was more committed than ever to get back on the move. Grace was still out there. That reminded him of an important tool he could easily find in the large town. “Hey, do you have a phone I could use?”
CHAPTER 16
Crow Agency, MT
The guard pointed his gun toward the three of them, but not at them directly, despite how it appeared at first. It was more a way of getting their attention, especially Asher’s. “My orders are to make sure no one takes a sand grain from this meteor. I saw you picking things up just now. Show me what you’ve got in your pockets.”
“It’s a meteorite, actually. That’s what meteors are called when they fall all the way to the surface of earth. And if you saw me pick up the little rocks, I’m sure you saw me throw them down. I think they might be radioactive.”
The guard stepped back, lifting his glass to get a good look at him. “Really?”
Asher held out his hands, palms up. “See? My hands are empty. I don’t have any burns, either, which may mean I was being a bit dramatic. The odds are this rock is fine, but I’d keep those kids away from it to be extra safe.”
The officer put his rifle over his shoulder. “I hope you’re right. When I showed up, those kids were sitting and climbing all over this thing. I’m sure the second I leave, they’ll go back to screwing around. It’s what kids do.” The man glared at Logan as if he knew why his father had sent him there.
Out of nowhere, a cat’s meow interrupted the discussion. “My phone!” she exclaimed. “Oh my God, I have to take this.” The guard had secured his gun, so she didn’t think it could hurt to pull the phone from her pocket. When she did, the meowing ringtone went off again, getting louder. Logan and the guard both chuckled.
She held up a finger. “Excuse me.” Then, taking a few steps away from them, she tapped the Accept Call button. “Hello?”
For a few seconds, the line sounded dead. However, a man’s voice came out of a static-filled crackle a short time later. “Hello? Hello? Grace?”
“Daddy!” she blurted out. “It’s me!”
“Oh, Grace, thank God. I’ve been worried sick I wouldn’t be able to find a telephone to call you…”
“Where are you?” she asked, not letting him finish.
Dad laughed. “You won’t believe it. We’re in a little town in Illinois called Chester. It’s kind of like a smaller version of Paducah. It’s quaint, actually.”
She was delighted to hear Dad’s voice, and she wanted to reply about the coincidence of knowing a ranger named Chester, but she’d been thinking of Mom a lot recently and needed to hear her voice. After all their misfortunes in the big city, she wanted to tell her she wasn’t as far off as Grace once thought, in terms of safety in city environments. Since she wasn’t one to willingly apologize to her mother, this was her opportunity to build on their last phone call. She was prepared to use words seldom uttered to either of her parents: you were right. “Sounds great. Is Mom there?”
Dad went silent for a long ten-count before eventually replying, “Didn’t you get my messages?”
A warning flare went up. Something in his voice wasn’t right.
“I got your message, yeah. It said my warning helped you get safe, you and Mom loved me very much, and you were heading out to me.”
Dad spoke quickly. “But you didn’t get the second one? I left two.”
She thought back to when Misha returned her phone. It wasn’t the time to explain to Dad how a deadly hitman took her phone right as he’d tried to call her, nor was it the proper place to say how she got it back. However, if Dad left a message while the Russian jerk had her phone, was it possible they spoke to each other? “Did you talk to a Russian, by chance?”
“What? A Russian? Is that your friend Asher Creighton? Isn’t he the man you were caught on camera with out in Yellowstone?”
“No; if you didn’t talk to anyone, then don’t worry about it.” The man she’d talked to earlier, Colby, had called Mom her father’s ‘buddy.’ The term never sat right with her, though she wasn’t sure why. She became frustrated at her own confusion. “Dad, forget about all that. What was your message?” Grace was certain her mother was involved.
Dad was quiet for another five or ten seconds. She was so anxious to hear his reply, it was hard to accurately gauge the time. When he finally spoke, Grace heard the pain in his voice. “I’m sorry, Gracie. Your mother died—”
Her brain snapped off as a defensive measure. She’d been anticipating those words, based on Dad’s cagey way of speaking on the phone. It was totally unlike him to be wishy-washy. She lowered the phone away from her ear and looked toward Asher. He saw something in her eyes, perhaps also sensing the tension, and came rushing over to hold her upright.
“Grace, what is it?” Asher asked quietly.
She let herself be held for a moment. Then, building her resolve, she put the phone back to her ear. Dad was still talking, but she cut him off. “Dad, did you say Mom is dead? That can’t be. I just talked to her the other day. Are you sure?” She tried to build on what the man had said on her call. “Colby said you and her were together…”
Dad sounded exhausted. “He did? Believe me, she wasn’t with me. She died saving the life of a young girl when one of those rocks fell near our house. I did get to say goodbye, though.” He laughed a little. “And your mom let me finally tie her in our clapping game.”
Grace sniffled in response.
Dad kept talking. “She also made me promise I would come out to Yellowstone and help keep you safe. It’s why I’m taking our boat up the Mississippi River. I’m coming for you, Gracie.”
Grace fought off a dizzy spell. It was as if blood was having trouble going up into her brain. It, like the rest of her, was wrapped up in the sadness of her heart. Every ounce of her wanted to burst out in tears and scream in rage at the world for taking Mom away from her right when they’d made amends. Holding in another sniffle, she tried to be reasonable. “Dad, I’m not in Yellowstone anymore. I’m two days to the east, on the Crow Reservation, of all places. I know it sounds insane, but I’m traveling with a geologist and we’re checking out one of those rocks which fell from the sky the other day. I’m standing right next to it, in fact.”
Dad’s voice became muffled, though it sounded like he was talking to someone on his end. After a short exchange, he came back on and spoke clearly. “I’m sorry I have to talk about things other than your mom, but we might lose this connection at any time. If you’re moving, we have to pick somewhere to meet you. Where are you going?”
She spoke in monotone. “I was heading to Kentucky to be with you and Mom.”
Dad clicked his tongue. “Look. You don’t have to come all the way here. In fact, it’s better that you don’t. Kentucky is a mess right now. Paducah’s gone. Kentucky Lake’s dam broke and the whole lake drained out. You’re
better off staying somewhere far away, at least for now. I don’t have a US map anywhere on my boat, so it’s hard to envision somewhere in between us.”
Grace looked at Asher, who remained at her side. “Do you know anywhere my dad could meet us? It has to be somewhere out here; he doesn’t want me going to Kentucky.”
He seemed to think about it. “We could go back to where I live, in Denver. It would give you a safe place to wait for him.”
“Is it halfway between us?” She preferred to meet him in the middle, if possible. “He’s in Illinois right now.”
“I think he’ll have farther to go, but Denver is still a long way for us, too.”
She heard Dad calling out in the phone. “Denver is great! If you have somewhere to go, that’s ideal. You don’t want to be caught out in the middle of the country with things being the way they are.”
Grace’s heart remained broken, but she still chuckled at Dad’s understatement. If they made it back together, she had plenty of stories to share. “I know all about what’s out there, Daddy. Don’t worry about me. I’ve got a good wingman with me.”
“So, we meet in Denver? Do you have an address, by chance?”
She conferred with Asher. He said he would take her to his boyhood home, though both his parents still lived there. Grace relayed the address to Dad.
“Grace, listen. You have to find weapons to defend yourself. Right now, that must be your priority. I’ve already encountered several men who wanted to do me harm. They’ll pay extra attention to you…” He paused for a long moment. “A beautiful young woman.”
She didn’t want to hear any compliments, though she briefly enjoyed the verbal comfort of her father’s love. If only he could shoot through the phone lines and be there with her. “Dad, I have pistols, bear spray, and tasers. I’m ready for anything. But…” The whole time they’d been talking she’d heard the anguish in Dad’s voice. She’d lost a mother, yes, but he’d lost his best friend and wife of twenty years. If she could ease his pain, even a little, she figured it was worth a try. “But I have something I want to give to you.”
“What is it, honey?” he replied.
“Listen.” She held the phone between her ear and shoulder, then clapped once as loud as possible. Her voice was wobbly, but she didn’t want it to be a downer. She wanted to cheer him up. “I’m taking over Mom’s spot. I’ve got a one-point edge in your goofy clapping game.”
She listened for his reply, fighting off the tears. She thought he might have laughed, but the line went dead a second later. There was nothing to be heard but a disappointing hiss, signaling she’d lost service. “Well, double crap.”
She was on her own again.
Chester, IL
“Grace? Hello?” Ezra looked at the old land-line telephone though there was nothing to be gleaned from the exercise. Muriel and Francis’s phone was probably from the 1990s, with nothing but push buttons on the device. He appreciated the old-school reliability of phones connected to wires, and it reminded him of a similar phone in Roger’s house back at the lake, but for once he missed how cell phones could show you the status of the communications network. “Damn. She’s gone.”
Butch patted him on the shoulder. “At least you talked to her. Gave her a place to meet. Imagine if we’d gone all the way to Yellowstone and she went all the way to Kentucky at the same time. We’d all feel pretty stupid.”
Ezra chuckled to be polite, but his heart was caught in the phone network somewhere between him and his daughter. What was she going through? How did she get those weapons? Who were her friends? What would she find on the way to Denver? As a father, he spent normal days and nights worrying about her. The apocalypse made those earlier worries seem petty by comparison.
He perked up a little at what his daughter had managed to do. He thought she would wither at the news of Susan’s passing, but she’d actually tried to cheer him up. She’d started the clapping game again for his benefit. Sadly, he didn’t have time to shoot one back before the line cut out. He was already looking forward to playing the next hand with her.
Francis brought him out of his introspection. “We have a daughter, too.” He offered them a seat at his kitchen table. His house was small and quaint, with lots of antiques lining crowded shelves in every room. In one brief look-see, Ezra recognized cookie cutters, rulers, a shelf of chicken figurines, and some colorful glass bottles presumably from the old days. The couple seemed to hoard trinkets.
“Where is she?” Butch asked. The two of them sat at the table while Muriel puttered around the countertops nearby.
Francis sighed. “Oh, she’s been gone for decades. Kay has her own grown kids to deal with. She went to school over in Carbondale, but then she moved to New York City. Wanted to live the high life; said it was the highest form of culture in the world. Once she was there, she never came back.” The old guy laughed, but not in a good way.
“Hey, at least you know the rocks didn’t fall on her. They all fell out west.” Inwardly, Ezra added, with my daughter in the crosshairs.
“Yeah, E-Z’s right. Your daughter and your grandkids are well away from all this mess we’re in. Safe. Someday you should go visit her.”
Muriel walked over and set a plate in front of Ezra. “Care for a sandwich?” Her rose-scented perfume almost made him reject it, but it sure looked good.
“Thanks, I’m starving,” he blurted out, before seeing the condition of the meat. It was ham, as best he could tell, but it was a deep gray. When he glanced around the kitchen, and saw how there were no lights on, or illuminated digits on the microwave oven, he remembered the power wasn’t working. As the woman put a similar sandwich in front of Butch, he decided he had to say something. “Um, ma’am, I don’t want to be rude, but I think your meat supply has gone rancid. There’s no power to keep it chilled.”
She studied her husband’s plate and sandwich, still in her hands. She tactfully lifted the top layer of bread, then sniffed the meat. Ezra thought it was beyond apparent the meat was no good, but she seemed to have trouble recognizing it for what it was. In the end, she set the plate in front of her husband.
Francis gently shoved the plate aside, clearly unwilling to burst the woman’s bubble. He looked toward Ezra and spoke quietly. “She’s having a hard time adjusting. We were in Grand Tower to watch her sister’s house for a few days, and we were there when it completely washed away. We almost didn’t make it to the high ground…”
Ezra had no intention of eating lunch as served, so he switched up the conversation to get back on task. The boat was still at the waterfront. The pirates were still out there. It was worth the delay to speak with Grace, but he couldn’t get wrapped up in these people’s lives. Muriel needed some serious grief counseling, and maybe a lesson on food safety. “Sir, we really need to get that gas. You said you could drive us?”
“I will.” Francis kissed Muriel on the cheek. “I’ll be back soon.”
“Thanks for lunch, ma’am,” Ezra said, to remain courteous.
The men left the kitchen in a hurry. Once free of his wife, Francis seemed to double his pace. He drove them to the gas station, helped them pay manually with a credit card, and then got them to their boat three separate times, adding five gallons of fuel per visit. Once the tank was full, Butch stowed the almost-empty gas container, but Ezra stopped him.
“We may not get this lucky again,” he said quietly to Butch while Francis waited in the truck. “We should get an extra five gallons for the trip.”
“That’s a great idea.” Butch strained to look over the bank of the creek, toward the main channel. “And I don’t see our pirate friends, yet. It’s now or never.”
Francis drove them up the hill and they retrieved five extra gallons for their reserve. On the way back, the unmistakable shape of the three-tiered towboat appeared in the distance. It shoved whitewater out of its way as it sliced the river in the main channel.
“Son of a…” he sighed. “We got one fill-up too many.”
Denver, CO
“Howard, would you gather your security team and see if any of the PWI crewmembers need help evacuating the blast zone?” He chuckled to himself; the blast had already taken place.
“Roger that,” his loyal lieutenant replied before running out into the smoke-filled street.
Petteri clasped his hands and reveled in what he’d done. It was no surprise the PWI workers refused to evacuate when the sirens kicked off. They thought he was bluffing, and it’s what he was counting on. “It will teach you to come onto my turf, you stupid peons.” His voice was venomous and vindictive, two aspects he hid from everyone, Howard included. If the authorities ever pursued this “accident,” his people wouldn’t be lying when they said Petteri seemed cool and collected, not to mention concerned, at all times.
When gunfire erupted out in the smoke, it didn’t surprise him, either. It provided the pretext for what he’d planned to do next. He tapped on his phone and waited for the other party to pick up. “Hello, Mr. Stricker. I’m glad I caught you.”
“What do you want?” the man asked in a tired voice.
“Is that any way to talk to your best friend?” Petteri made himself sound pleasant.
After an obvious attempt to quell some cussing, the Secretary of Homeland Security composed himself. “How can I help you, Mr. Tikkanen?”
“Much better!” he said with glee. “I have a problem only you can solve. And don’t worry, it isn’t anything you’ll disagree with.” It was his way of telling the man he couldn’t object, but one could never assume the line wasn’t bugged. “I’m in Denver right now and I’ve had multiple encounters with armed citizens. You can hear them from my tent, can’t you?”
Impact (Book 3): Adrift Page 13