Dead Country

by Bonnie Dee

  I was hard, my flesh burning like I had a fever and my heart beating faster than when I’d faced that zombie earlier. Ashleigh felt so good in my arms and it had been way too long since I’d been with a woman. And while my occasional girlfriend, Jane had been a nice girl, a comfortable girl, she’d never turned my blood to fire like this.

  I lifted Ashleigh and set her on the counter, moved in between her legs which she wrapped around my back. Her hand curved around the back of my neck and she kissed me so hard it stole my breath. I tugged the strap of her tank top down her shoulder and kissed her salty-sweet skin. My lips skated along the edge of her neckline and over the swell of each breast. Pulling her top lower, I released one and nuzzled its softness, found the perky nipple in the center and sucked it in.

  She moaned and hitched her hips forward on the counter so her crotch pressed against the bulge in my jeans. She ground against me and her whimpers nearly pushed me over the edge. Abruptly she pulled away from my grasping hands but only long enough to take off her top.

  I gazed at her breasts for a moment before seizing another nipple with my mouth. Soft. Warm. Soft. My mind was reduced to its primitive state and only those two adjectives filled it. And a verb. Need! I rocked against her, but it wasn’t enough to ease the aching.

  Her hands tangled in my hair, holding my head to her breast. She tugged me away and muttered breathlessly, “Condom.”

  I’d seen some in her bag when I packed her things and I’d had a “just in case” box in my room. I hadn’t really expected to need it during my summer break that had never ended but sprawled into fall and a new way of life.

  I picked her up and carried her to the living room. It felt like a dream—a very earthy, realistic dream—as I set her down on the floor and we stripped. Ashleigh was beautiful, lithe and lean with small, high breasts and dark, up-tilted nipples. I could’ve stood there feasting on the sight of her for a while but she held out her arms to me as she lay back on the couch.

  After swathing my cock with the necessary armor, I lowered myself over her. Our bodies slid together, warm and living. All thoughts of death were dispersed by the sensation of skin against skin. I pushed inside and her heat swallowed me. For many long minutes we thrust against each other, slow and easy, then faster and more urgently. She moaned as she bucked beneath me. I was reduced to grunting and rutting like an animal, basic and primal. Then sparkling bits coalesced and exploded in a shower of bliss that rained through me.

  I collapsed on top of her hot body, panting and boneless, feeling the best I’d felt in a long time. This was what I’d desperately needed—to feel alive again.

  “Was it all right?” I murmured against her neck. “Did you finish? Do you need me to do anything else?”

  She sifted my hair between her fingers. “You’re so sweet. Not many guys would bother asking. Yes, I came and it was good.”

  The warm glow percolating through me told me it had been, but the woman’s experience was a bit of a mystery. I knew sometimes they exaggerated or faked to stroke a guy’s ego. Ashleigh sounded satisfied so I believed her.

  We lay quietly, sweat drying on our bodies, the room growing darker as the sun set. The faint light from the kitchen cast the hollows of Ashleigh’s body into shadow. I ran a hand over the curve of her arm.

  “Will you come with us when we go?” she asked.

  I was silent for a moment even though my impulse was to shout hell, yeah. “I don’t know. There are things I have to consider, people depending on me here.” I slid my hand to her wrist and felt her pulse. “Daylon’s in a big hurry to leave, but you don’t have to. You could stay here. We could go later if we decided to.”

  It was her turn to pause as she traced idle circles on my back with her finger. “I’d feel… I guess disloyal to Daylon and the others if I bailed on them. We’ve been together for so long, depended on each other, kept each other alive. You know how it is.”

  “Once you’ve been in the foxhole with people it’s hard to leave them behind.”

  “That’s right.” She tapped a rhythm on my spine with her fingertips. “On the other hand, I’m really tired of traveling. It would be nice to stop and rest. And I’d like to spend more time with you.”

  “Me too. With you,” I mumbled, feeling as incoherent as an athlete trying to give an interview. “We hardly know each other, but I’d like to.”

  “And to have more crazy hot monkey sex,” she added. “That’d be nice.”

  I smiled as her chest vibrated with laughter. Why couldn’t life always be like this—a quiet moment in the aftermath of good sex? No bloodshed, no danger, just peace.

  The bubble burst as Ashleigh turned serious. “I’ve been thinking about Maureen all afternoon. When we tell her what happened today, she’s going to be terrified that she’s infected and it’s just not showing. If you could know or not know you were carrying a time bomb, would you choose to know about it?”

  I lifted my head and looked into her worried face. “I’d want to know the truth. Wouldn’t you?”

  “I’m not sure. It’s scary enough facing death without knowing you might turn afterward. I think I’d almost rather be ignorant. But we have to tell Maureen. God, I dread it.”

  “It won’t be easy.” I rose from the couch, held out my hand to Ashleigh and helped her up. “Still want that popcorn?”

  “More than ever. Let’s get snacks, crawl into bed, watch a movie, drink wine and screw all night.”

  “Can’t think of a better way to spend the evening.” I followed her to the kitchen, my gaze riveted on the sway of her bare ass.

  We cleaned our dishes, grabbed food and a bottle of wine from the Baileys’ collection and went to the master bedroom. Clothes were strewn on the floor and a half empty backpack sat on the bed.

  “Tanesha’s stuff,” Ashleigh said. “I’ll miss her. She was funny and smart-assed. We met her before we left Vegas. She always butted heads with Daylon. Told me once he reminded her of her big brother, always trying to boss everybody.”

  She cleared the bed and plumped up the pillows while I checked on the generator. I was so damn happy to be having a date night with Ashleigh I didn’t even cringe when she picked The Princess Bride from a cupboard full of DVDs she found.

  “This was my favorite movie when I was a kid. I used to watch it over and over.” Ashleigh turned on the TV and inserted the disc into the player. “My mom and I didn’t spend a lot of time together. She was always at work or on a date with some new guy or hanging out at bars or someplace. The girl next door would babysit me. But I have one memory of watching this movie with my mom, laughing and saying the lines out loud. She could be a real bitch, but sometimes she could be a lot of fun too.”

  I felt guilty for every time my dad had tried to spend time with me and I’d shown no enthusiasm. I didn’t like swinging at pitches or tossing a football. I avoided helping him work on the car engine. He hadn’t understood my interests either but at least he’d tried. But I’d been too young and ignorant to realize having a parent who cared was pretty special.

  I climbed into bed beside Ashleigh and we leaned against mounds of pillows, eating popcorn and getting buzzed on expensive wine. I’d never been more content. It was ironic to find such happiness in the midst of chaos. Or maybe it was because these moments were stolen from a world in tatters that made them seem so special.

  As the movie unfolded, I spent more time watching Ashleigh than the screen. And I couldn’t stop touching her. I grazed my fingers over her arm then stroked her leg, sliding my fingers all the way up between her thighs. Then I teased her there until she groaned and her eyes closed. By the time Westley and Buttercup were fighting the Rodents of Unusual Size, I was between Ashleigh’s thighs, bringing her off with my hands and mouth.

  After she came, no question about that this time, I rolled onto my back and she straddled me. Spilled popcorn crunched beneath my back as I thrust into her until lights exploded behind my closed eyelids.

  I felt like a
starving man offered a banquet and gorging. I couldn’t get enough of her. Later, as the hero in the movie was resurrected from the dead, we came together again, less desperately this time. I filled her slow and easy, pushing into her from behind as I admired the curve of her neck, the line of her back, the profile of her face against the pillow. As our bodies slapped together, once more I felt the rising urgency grow until my body couldn’t contain it. I groaned and shuddered and drove deeply into the shelter of her body as if it were a refuge from which I’d never emerge.

  Afterward, Ashleigh stroked the hair from my sweating forehead and gave me a kiss. “Who knew popcorn and The Princess Bride could be such an aphrodisiac?” She smiled at me. “You should really think about going with us. If you don’t know how to ride a motorcycle, you can ride behind me.”

  I studied the dark outer ring of her irises surrounding that amazing pale blue. “You should think about staying here. Durbinville’s not so bad.”

  Ashleigh didn’t answer but scooted down in the bed and rearranged the pillows. She curled up beside me as Westley rescued Buttercup. I wrapped my arm around her and closed my eyes.

  When I opened them again, the TV screen was blue and someone was pounding on the door. I jumped out of bed and threw on Mr. Bailey’s bathrobe. The gray light coming through the bedroom window told me it was nearly morning. Ashleigh put on the other robe and we hurried to the front door.

  Once more Fes waited there. He looked back and forth between us in our matching Bailey robes and his expression said Good job, Pasman as clearly as if he’d spoken aloud. “Daylon said you’d be here. Why are you here instead of at your house?”

  I ignored the question. “What’s going on?”

  He looked at Ashleigh. “One of your group showed up at the gate about an hour ago. A girl named Tanesha. She’s alive.”

  * * * * *

  Chapter Ten

  “I raised my hands and said ‘Don’t shoot. I’m not a damn zombie!’” Tanesha concluded her tale. “I wasn’t about to get killed after I made it through all that.”

  “You’re safe now. You’ll be okay.” I put my arm around her shoulders and hugged her.

  “I don’t think so, Ashleigh,” she muttered. “I highly fucking doubt any of us will be okay.”

  Tanesha resumed eating the plate of eggs and toast someone had brought her and glared at the people grouped around the conference table, both townies and the remains of our group. “I can’t believe you left me out there. Why didn’t anybody come back for me?”

  “We did,” Fes answered. “Yesterday morning we stopped at the Wilkins farm to check for survivors before going to warn the other farmers.”

  “Yesterday?” Tanesha’s full lips were drawn into a tight line. She stared at Daylon. “You should have searched that same night. I was waiting for you. I counted on you to come for me.”

  “We didn’t think anyone had survived. We only found dead bodies and a few zombies,” Fes said.

  “That’s because I’d already taken off in that damn pickup, numbnuts. But first I hid out all night, freezing my ass off in the cornfield because I didn’t dare go into the house. When I finally got a chance to make a run for one of the trucks, the damned thing was a stick shift. Why don’t they teach you that in driver’s training? By the time I got it moving, I was surrounded by zombies, then a mile down the road the thing runs out of gas. I’ve been running, hiding, circling around and getting lost in the corn since then. And no one came looking for me!”

  “You’re right. I should have come. I’m sorry,” Daylon said.

  “We were sure everybody but us was dead,” I added.

  “Oh, there’s plenty of dead out there but I’m not one of them. They’re headed this way and we’ve got to get out of town before we’re surrounded.”

  “Yes, I think it would be best if you left town,” Janice Myers spoke from her seat at the head of the table. “A few people came to me last night to ask about some sort of incident in their neighborhood. They said some of you warned them to keep their doors locked and later told them it was a safety preparedness drill. What exactly happened yesterday? Is this some new program you’ve instituted on your own, Brian?”

  “What the hell?” Santa didn’t sound so jolly. “What’s going on?”

  Everyone remained silent for a beat before Daylon answered. “I wasn’t honest with you when we arrived, Ms. Myers. I hid the fact that a boy in our group was sick. We wanted to give him a chance to recover in comfort. If it turned out he was infected, I planned to take care of the situation. But the boy improved. Yesterday morning he was completely normal and we thought the crisis was past.”

  I interrupted Daylon. “Yesterday, I returned to Brian’s house to find Lainie dead and Jeff missing. We found him and killed him.” I glanced at Jake, whose face paled as he listened. He knew what this indicated about Maureen’s bite. Just because she’d shown no signs of fever, didn’t mean she was well.

  “You brought an infected person into this town,” Nancy practically shrieked then glared at Brian. “And you knew about it?”

  “Brian found us searching for the boy so we had to tell him,” I lied easily. “He was the one who killed Jeff.”

  “We didn’t think you’d give us sanctuary if you knew so we kept quiet,” Daylon said. “My call. My mistake. But it’s over now with no harm done.”

  “This is outrageous. You put the entire town in danger!” Nancy’s shrill tone was really grating on my last nerve. Even Janice Myers’ voice didn’t sound so annoying when she spoke.

  “You should’ve told me about the boy. He would’ve been quarantined and no one would have been put at risk. And Brian, you should’ve told me as soon as you found out.”

  “We asked him to give us one more night before he ‘turned us in’,” Daylon added a sarcastic edge to the words. “The damage was already done and it was already late in the day. Too late to find other shelter. But we’re leaving now just as soon as we pack.”

  “You damn well better believe you will. We should throw your asses out of town,” Angry Santa said.

  “Richard can’t ride with his broken arm,” I interrupted desperate to slow things down. I wasn’t ready to go, but it no longer looked like staying was an option. “And Maureen…”

  “She’s fine.” Jake rose abruptly from his chair. “But she needs that vaccination. We’ve got to go somewhere they have it. Topeka’s the closest city, right? So we should go there.“ He braced his hands on the table and leaned threateningly toward Myers. “Tell your people to let her out now. We’re leaving.”

  “All of us,” Daylon added. “Richard can ride with Carl or drive a car. You must have some abandoned ones around town.”

  Myers stared at him as if unable to believe his presumptuousness. “There’s no extra gas or supplies for you. I have an entire town to take care of. You’ll have to find what you need on the road.”

  I waited for Daylon to lose his temper but he was chock full of cool, accepting her right to put her people first. “I guess there’s nothing else to be said then. I apologize for the lie and thank you for your town’s hospitality.” He rose and left the room. Jake and the other guys followed.

  Tanesha pushed back from the table. “Thank you for breakfast. And thanks a bundle for letting us work as your field hands and getting half of us killed. Smart idea, letting visitors do your grunt labor.”

  Things were moving too fast with no time to discuss or make a plan. The countryside was crawling with zombies and we were about to head out into them. So far our motorcycles had proven a good way to travel, easy on gas and able to skirt traffic jams. We’d dodged zombies all along our way, but hadn’t come across a really large group yet. I was full of doubt about this journey. Or maybe I just didn’t want to leave Brian. Last night had been— corny as it sounded—special. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye.

  I’d been with my fair share of men for entertainment’s sake, no depth to it, and knew what that felt like. And there’d been
a couple I’d imagined I was in love with, like my first high school boyfriend who’d stolen my virginity and my heart and done a great job of smashing both. That hadn’t been real love at all, but with Brian I felt something different because he was a completely different sort of person. For the first time I felt like a partner instead of an appendage. He’d listen to me and talk with me not at me. We could have the kind of relationship I’d always wanted and never known how to have. But only if I stayed, which it was pretty clear the council wouldn’t allow. Or if Brian came with me.

  I followed the others from the meeting room. Myers asked Brian to remain behind and I found myself alone in the hallway with Fes.

  “We need to talk,” he said.

  “About what?”

  “About Brian. He’s not the kind of guy you usually go for is he?”