“Connie, you are a great mom,” I said, and I meant it. Whatever her problems before, she was all about protecting her kids; and that included Scott and Rachel now. As I turned to go back to the SUV, I heard Scott call out from the cupola.
“Company coming. Looks like a banger on a bike.”
He said it deadpan, like he’d been doing this job for months, years, instead of hours. I liked that about Scott. He was a quick study.
“He armed?” I asked before bothering to turn around.
“Yep. Take a look.”
The kid was probably only a few years older than me but looked at least a decade more weathered. I couldn’t tell if it was the malnutrition or the drugs, but something was wrong with him. I’d seen how irrational some people got when subjected to prolonged hunger, and this fellow looked like a prime example.
The scooter was one of those tiny little motor bikes built for the preteen crowd that were too fast and too unreliable for real bike stores, so the manufacturers hawked them as novelties or for around the neighborhood use. They still managed to get dozens of kids killed every year, and looked ready to claim another victim in this youth. He was all over the road trying to keep the deathtrap upright, and the four foot long rifle strapped across his back didn’t help his balance.
“Seriously?” I heard Connie mutter with a sigh.
“Alright. We are not waiting around for the freak show to get here. Let’s get turned around. Lori, if you’ll do the honors while I keep an eye on Dumbo here, I would appreciate it.”
Lori was happy to oblige and she and Connie had the two cars turned around in a few minutes. We only needed to backtrack two miles to reach the intersection and I was just sliding into the driver’s seat when the scooter driver poured on a last burst of energy and came sliding to a halt near my door.
“What’s the hurry, folks? Y’all don’t need to turn around. I’m sure we can come to some sort of accommodation for passage into town.” His voice was raspy and strained, and the way he was looking at me had my skin crawling.
“No thanks. We were just going in the wrong direction. Got our bearings and we’ll be on our way,” I replied, trying to be at least moderately polite as I started the engine again. I never took my eyes off the man, so when he slithered off the bike and stood glaring at me, I was ready. I’d kept the door half open to hear what the man had to say, but now he was fumbling at the rifle on is shoulder.
It was a Russian Model 91/30 Mosin Nagant. Decent rifles, especially if you couldn’t afford better. Not something you wanted to work as a quick draw weapon. I just looked at him like he was an insect crawling up my arm as he jerked the rifle around and started fiddling with the bolt, trying to throw a round in the chamber. Then I heard him muttering something.
I shot him in the head from ten feet away with the Glock and shut the door. The noise had been thunderous in the confines of the Suburban. The kids were all screaming and Amy looked at me like I was insane. I put the truck in gear and headed off down the road like nothing happened.
I reached the turnoff for Highway 49 and I heard the Amy pick up the microphone for the CB. She said something and handed it over to me.
Then I heard Connie on the radio.
“Uh, Luke, over,” she said hesitantly.
“This is Luke. What’s up?”
“Uh, everything okay up there?”
“Yes ma’am. How about you guys?”
“We’re fine. Uh, why did you shoot that guy? I mean, he was going for his gun and all, but you could have just closed your door. That bullet couldn’t penetrate the glass, could it?”
I could feel the stares of everyone in the vehicle with me as I replied.
“That is a big old bullet, but probably not. Thing is, I happened to overhear what he was saying, and I had to do something.”
The long pause made me think Connie had given up with the questions, but then she had one more.
“What did he say, Luke?”
“He was saying ‘meat’ over and over to himself.”
“Oh.”
And that pretty well served as a stopper for conversation. We would wait until we reached a wide spot in the road and stop. I made a point of speeding by the only rest stop we passed and nobody even suggested they needed to go potty. I guess word gets around.
CHAPTER THIRTY
After going around the decent sized town of Jefferson catching onto Highway 59 South, I found us a spot in the country with no houses in sight and stopped for a food and potty break. Scott emptied the five gallon cans of diesel and topped off our tanks while I spelled him on the machine gun. I ate a can of peaches and watched the dusty road, alert for any signs of trouble. Or movement. Or more cannibals. I saw nothing except a slow gathering of charcoal shaded clouds. Looks like rain, I thought.
I became aware of movement, but it was behind me and I knew the source. The cupola was a tight fit for two of us, but I could feel Amy’s body pressed against my back, her firm breasts rubbing up against me. I turned around, gave her a quick, hard kiss and sweetly scolded her for removing her bullet-proof vest.
“Sorry, honey, just for a few minutes. That thing really squishes my boobs. I don’t see how Lori puts up with it since she is so much more…”
“Alright, you’ve made your point, sexy girl. You want to pull off somewhere and catch some sleep. Maybe fool around. I get it.”
Giving Amy a silly grin, I knew the real reason for this visit. As easily as she could read me, I was starting to get a handle on Amy as times. Probably only when she wanted me to, though. The cannibal had freaked her out, had freaked all of them out. She was just needing a little reassurance.
“Actually, a nap wouldn’t be a bad idea. How much farther is it? Do you think we can make it today?”
I stopped to think on that. Doing the calculations, I answered her without looking away from the road. We’d come quite a ways already and adding up the miles took a moment.
“I make it another sixty miles or so unless we have to make any more detours.”
That garnered a sharp intake of breath from my girl. After all we’d been through, and all we had endured, to be this close was now almost more than she could bear.
“Do you think they will really like me, Luke? I know you said before that they would, but really? I couldn’t stand the thought of them sending me away.”
I reached back and gathered her into my arms.
“They will love you. And if there’s anything wrong, or you don’t like it, we can always load up and go back to stay with Darwin and Hazel. They’d love to have us there forever.”
“But this is your family, Luke. You can’t say things like that.”
“Yes, they are. And so are you. You are my family, Amy. Don’t you get it? I was barely human when I found you. Half the time I think you saved me, instead of the other way around. I love you.”
“Hey, you lovebirds ready to go?” Scott called out, and I saw Helena leaning in to her man for a kiss that made him laugh.
“Yes,” Amy said excitedly. “Luke says it’s only another sixty miles.”
“Heck, Luke,” Lori called out, “Why don’t you get out and walk that last little ways? I mean, other than when you started cheating with us, you still walked more than half of it.”
“I would Lori, but you have to take it easy on me. I’m sorely wounded and all.”
For some reason, my simple explanation got a round of laughter as we loaded up and headed back out. As our drive continued I realized we could use that little bit of laughter.
Marshall was a burned out shell of a small city, and looked to have gone up in smoke some months ago. From the presence of dead bodies in the street and the scattering of now tarnished brass near the corpses, it had not gone down easily. This put all of us on alert, and Scott tracked the machine gun back and forth seeking targets. I just stayed in the middle of the road since the bypass looked even worse and waited for the torrent of bullets that never came.
Whatever evi
l had visited Marshall had either died here or moved on to more fruitful environs. We found Carthage, the next city of any size, in similar shape, and I then remembered we’d crossed Interstate 20 in Marshall. Well, that explained it. I spoke up then for the benefits of the others in the vehicle.
“Did y’all notice when we passed over I-20 back in Marshall?” No, it seemed none of them did. I continued. “That is the second of two major arteries running east out of Dallas/Fort Worth. Likely, tens of thousands of people moved out of that mess and came right down this route.”
“No wonder it looks like a war zone. It was one,” Lori said.
“Yeah, and everybody lost. This place feels like it is full of ghosts. Can you go any faster, Luke?”
“On it, honey.”
And I did speed up a bit until I reached the outskirts of Center; the town where my mother taught school. The closest town to our ranch is Ripley but the small community only had a K through 6th grade elementary school, and mom teaches high school English. She made the ten mile commute every day. I was glad for her sake the lights went out in the summer, so she would not have had to walk home from school. Of course, Dad would have just driven over and picked her up. Well, all of us. None of his vehicles had the fancy electronics like Mom’s little Corolla.
As I cruised in to where the first businesses marked the outskirts of town, I saw the first signs of trouble as several of the small buildings were now burned-out husks. I slowed, and I knew Scott was once again on close watch for trouble. Then as we neared the intersection where I turned for Hwy 87 and home, I saw the barricade blocking the road.
Unlike the mess of tangled big trucks and eighteen wheelers back in Daingerfield, this barrier looked well thought out and featured several cars positioned lengthwise along the street and posts anchoring the corners with what looked like heavy chain. There was a double lane still available for traffic and I saw a uniformed officer of some nature standing off to the side.
I pulled up to stop even as the panicked officer noticed the Humvee with a machine gun sticking out of the cupola. I didn’t recognize the officer but this close I saw he was wearing a faded and dirty uniform blouse with the Shelby County Sheriff’s Department emblem on the sleeve and worn looking blue jeans. He carried a holstered pistol and he had a black rifle of some sort slung over his shoulder.
“Turn off that vehicle and get out of the car!” he shouted, and I could tell he was urgently looking around for backup. The streets in the early afternoon were nearly deserted though, especially with the threat of rain in the air.
I held up my hands and yelled through the thick glass. “Deputy, we’re just passing through. Going to see my family over to Timpson.” Which was true; Ripley was over on the road to Timpson.
“Mister, I don’t care where you think you are going. You will turn off that engine and get out here now. And all the rest of you too.”
Alright; I’m sure this deputy had seen some terrible shit from rampaging raiders trying to overrun his town, but we were not going to be a problem. Just passing though.
I killed the engine then motioned for Amy to slide across into the front seat as I exited.
“Don’t do it, Luke. He looks crazy.”
“I have to. This is home, and he represents the law around here.” I hope, I thought to myself. Leaving the M4 wedged between the seats, I unfastened my seat belt and opened the door.
Before I could step on the asphalt, the deputy had hands on me, both hands on my left arm trying to spin me around. I don’t know what he was thinking, what with Scott up of the machine gun, but I spun with him and plucked the Glock out of my holster in one smooth motion, forcing the barrel up under his ear.
“Deputy, I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but acting like that will get you killed. Will you please settle the fuck down?” I looked around, trying to catch the eye of some passerby, but the streets were now completely empty.
Using my left hand, I quickly unfastened the deputy’s duty belt and let his holstered pistol fall to the ground, along with about twenty pounds of other gear. He surely had other weapons on his person somewhere, but I just wanted to get him to stop overreacting.
Looking around, I spotted a metal bench across the street facing out onto a park I used to play back when I was a kid after school. Before I started high school, I would go play touch football in that park until my mom came to pick me up.
“Deputy, what’s your name?”
“Mark.”
“Okay Deputy Mark, can we go over there and have a seat? I think we got off to a bad start here. There’s kids in that truck and I don’t want to them to overhear us if we need to discuss grown up things.”
The man nodded, and I noticed that he was still likely in his early twenties despite an already receding hairline. He looked nervous and maybe a little embarrassed on top of that.
I announced my intentions to the folks in the SUV and loud enough that Scott could hear me up top in the Humvee.
Once seated, I could see in my peripheral vision that several people were now watching the two of us. I kept my pistol in hand but rested it across my lap. The business end still pointed at the sweating cop, but did not appear as threatening.
“Now Mark, I think you must have mistaken me for someone else; or something else. Am I right?”
“You’re just another slick-talking bandit, mister. When the Sheriff gets here with his posse, you won’t be so smart-alecky then.”
“And is the Sheriff still Paul Henderson?”
“Well, of course. Everybody knows that, you simp. But knowing his name won’t get you off the hook. You can’t roll up in here in those stolen cars and stolen weapons and think nobody was going to notice.”
I shook my head. “Mark, did you ever ask to see my identification? Or even ask me my business before you started throwing your weight around? Cause I gotta tell you Mark, if this is how you deal with bandits, you are not long for this job.”
“HOLD IT RIGHT THERE, MISTER,” I heard the familiar voice cry out, “YOU LET MY MAN GO AND YOU MIGHT GET OUT OF THIS ALIVE.”
I turned slowly, letting the older man see my hands were now empty. I saw Mark look down and I hissed at him, “You reach for that pistol and I’m going to kill you and make it last a long fucking time. For your information, dumbass, I’m not a bandit or raider.”
Something in my voice made him stop. Or maybe it was the look of death he saw in my eyes.
“Sheriff, it’s Lucas. Lucas Messner. I didn’t want any trouble here sir, but I think your man Mark here is a little confused about some things.”
The older man took a cautious step closer and I saw his eyes grow wide as recognition hit him.
“Jesus, son, everybody thought you was dead. What in the heck is going on here?”
“Sheriff, it really is me. And I haven’t turned to a life of crime. Just the opposite, actually. I’ll explain it all, but first, you have to tell me. Is my family alive?”
CHAPTER THIRTY ONE
The driveway was long and winding, designed to slow down intruders I had learned as a child, and I drove with fear active in my stomach. Sheriff Henderson had not seen my father in two months, and that was when he came to town briefly to report killing a group of looters attacking the ranch. He said little but Sheriff Henderson said he looked upset and tired. I could imagine, but I wondered if it was something else.
And since then, nothing. I wondered if I would find another scene reminiscent of the Thompson house. Or worse.
Amy sat with her hand clenched tight, her fingers interlaced with mine. Whatever we found, we would be together. That was our promise to each other, and nothing else need be said. At the massive gate, I saw a pair of small bunkers behind the mass of wrought iron. They looked carefully groomed to prevent dirt or sand from leaking out of the bags. Somebody was still doing things right, I thought.
When I pulled up to the gate, I waved for Scott to hold back. As I had learned in town, certain military equipment in the h
ands of bandits was not unheard of, so I wanted to spare anyone on the home front that worry. Or at least, let them see we weren’t crowding the place. Of course, if anybody but my family was now living here, I would have to kill them all. But there would be time for that later.
I got out and, like before, Amy slid over to take the driver’s seat. Thankfully, she did know how to drive. I’d never asked her, which was an oversight.
Walking up to the familiar sight of the metal gate, a black wrought iron creation featuring a mighty stallion rearing back on his hind legs, I felt the moisture began to touch my eyes as the first hints of rain began to fall. Just the rain, I told myself.
“Hey old man, you in there?” I found myself calling. It was actually one of the things I was always hearing my mother call out to my father when he was busy in one of his shops. The two had been married a long time and I could still hear the love in their voices as they teased each other.
I heard a rustling in one of the dugouts, and like a prairie dog checking the landscape, a familiar gray head popped up, and I saw the business end of an AR-15 pointed in my direction. I saw irritation and some other emotion etched into the man’s careworn, tired face.
“Dad?”
Silence, then I heard my father croak out, “Oh, lord, son. We thought you were dead.”
“No, Dad. Took a long time to get here, and I’ve got me story to tell, but that can wait. I’ve also brought some friends, Dad. Good people I’ve traveled with along the way. They are hard workers and proven fighters. And I’m going to marry one of them once thing settle down.”
That was a little too much coming at my father at once. I decided to back up.
“Dad, who’s here? Who made it?”
He paused, and I dreaded whatever he was going to say next.
“Son, your mom and Paige are fine. So is your Uncle Billy. Some of my old friends showed up and are pitching in too. But Luke, your grandfather, he… didn’t make it. We were raided near on two months ago. We managed to kill all of them, but Pops took two in the chest.”
Hard Rain Falling (Walking in the Rain Book 3) Page 22