He had only two that he could see: Follow through with the Judge’s orders—kill or capture Mandy—or turn her into an ally instead.
Well, that wasn’t actually true. He had a third option: Leave.
Except he couldn’t do that. Not with Blake still in the police station, and Mary and her son under the watchful eye of Stephens—or one of the Judge’s other men. If Smith even had any doubts the Judge might carry through with his threats, all he had to do was consider the chain of events that had led him here.
Yeah, the Judge was going to do exactly as he had promised if Smith didn’t fulfill his part of the bargain. Not that Smith thought he was going to get off scot free even if he did do exactly what the Judge wanted. There would be repercussions. The moral ones, Smith thought, he could live with; it was the other consequences that he wasn’t looking forward to.
No, he only had one real choice: Mandy.
Unfortunately he wasn’t sure if the woman believed everything he had told her from just the expression on her face. Then again, she had stopped Roger from pulling his gun, and she hadn’t called for the other armed people standing guard outside the building.
Mandy, who had been standing since Smith came in, finally sat down in a chair behind a large desk that was riddled with scars. Slivers of sunlight pierced the room from two holes in the wall behind and slightly above her head. Roger remained standing on her right, literally assuming the role of “right-hand man.”
For the next thirty seconds or so, Mandy stared at Smith, trying to read him. He welcomed that, since he didn’t have anything to hide.
Well, not too much, anyway.
“You took a big chance coming here and telling me all this,” Mandy finally said.
“I didn’t have any choice,” Smith said.
“You had a lot of choices. You could have ridden away on that horse they gave you.”
“No, I couldn’t.”
“Why not?”
“They were watching me the whole time. Maybe even the guy who tried to kill me yesterday,” Smith added, tapping his bandaged temple. “Besides, the Judge has friends of mine back in Gaffney.”
“Blake?”
“Her, too. Along with a mother and her son.”
“What are their names?”
“Mary and Aaron.”
“How did they end up in Gaffney?”
Smith told them—everything, from the encounter with Peoples and his two dead friends, to Hobson’s posse tracking them down from Peoples’s faceless corpse, to Mary deciding to leave with the Gaffney men.
“She didn’t know what she was getting into,” Smith said. “I didn’t, either. We both thought they’d be safe there.”
“You know that’s not true now,” Mandy said.
Maybe, Smith thought, but he didn’t think that was the right answer. Right now, Mandy and Roger saw Gaffney as the enemy, and as much doubt as he had about the people there being “prisoners,” he gave the duo what they wanted.
“Yeah,” Smith said. “We had a short chat before I came here.”
“They let you talk to her?” Mandy asked.
“They wanted me to know what would happen to her and Aaron if I didn’t follow through on the Judge’s orders.”
“He’s using them as leverage against you.”
“Pretty much.”
“Sounds like the Judge, all right,” Roger said.
“Would he do it?” Smith asked. “Would he follow through on his threat if I’d taken off instead of coming here?”
“Yes,” Mandy said without hesitation. “He would do it, or worse.”
“What could be worse?”
“You were here last night. You saw the ghouls?”
“I saw a ghoul.”
“There was more than one,” Roger said. “And they didn’t get in through our perimeter fence by themselves. They were let in.”
“By who?”
“Who do you think?”
“Gaffney’s men?”
Mandy nodded. “It’s something new. They haven’t done it before—use ghouls in their fight with us.”
“How are you so sure it was them?” Smith asked.
“Because someone cut out a section of the fence last night to let them in,” Roger said. “They chose one of our few blind spots. Last time I checked, ghouls weren’t that clever, and they sure as hell don’t know how to use wire cutters.”
“We thought the ghouls had gotten you and Blake,” Mandy said. “Gramps was crying all day and this morning. A lot of people were.”
“Gee, I didn’t know you guys cared about me that much,” Smith said.
Roger snorted. “It was for Blake, genius.”
Smith smiled. “I know, Roger. Relax.”
The other man narrowed his eyes back at Smith, and he didn’t relax even a little bit.
Mandy stood back up and walked around the desk before leaning back against the front edge. She seemed to have lost any fear of him—if she ever had any to begin with. Smith had a feeling the older woman was used to fighting for her life and not giving a damn about the kinds of trouble she got into. Maybe that was why she had bucked the Judge’s reign in Gaffney, then stuck around just to remain a thorn in the man’s side.
“So you want me to go back to Gaffney with you,” Mandy said.
“It’s the only way they’ll let me back in there with a gun,” Smith said.
“You good with that gun?” Roger asked.
“I’m pretty good, yeah.”
“So how’d you get ambushed out there yesterday if you’re so good?”
“I got shot from a distance. Hard to do anything when someone has his scope set on you and you don’t even know he exists.”
“Sounds like an excuse.”
“It’s a good one.”
“Says you.”
“Enough,” Mandy said. Then, to Smith, “You know that they have spies watching us right now, don’t you?”
“You watch them and they watch you back. Makes sense.”
“My point is that those same spies the Judge has out there likely saw you come in here.”
“I figured.”
“Then how are you going to just take me back to Gaffney with you, and have it be convincing?”
“I haven’t thought that far ahead, but I’m sure we can come up with something. This is your place, after all. You know all the ways in and out. Besides, the Judge’s men can’t possibly watch every inch.”
Mandy smiled.
“So I’m right,” Smith said.
The woman shrugged.
“These spies,” Smith said. “Is it possible one of them is the asshole that shot me yesterday?”
“Maybe,” Mandy said. “Given the kind of shop the Judge runs in Gaffney, what do you think about the people—almost all of them men—who voluntarily works for him? I used to think Hobson was different. I used to even think he was a good man, but he’s just the same as the rest of them.”
I guess we both made that mistake, Smith thought.
“Mandy, you’re not seriously considering this,” Roger said.
Mandy looked back at him. “I am.”
“This is insane.”
“Yes, it is,” she said, turning back around to look at Smith, “but it might be the best chance to end this once and for all. We’ve tried, you know.”
“What?” Smith said.
“To take out the Judge. But we could never get close enough to the town to assassinate the fat fucker. Given the chance, I’d shoot him myself.”
“So here’s your chance.”
“I thought that was going to be your job?”
Smith shrugged. “I don’t really care who pulls the trigger, as long as the job gets done.” Then, “So. We doing this or what?”
Mandy smiled, then stood up and walked over and stuck out her hand. “All right, Mr. John Smith. Let’s try not to both get killed, huh?”
Smith shook her hand and thought, Yeah. That’s the trick, isn’t it?
; Twenty
Mandy’s horse was a light brown gelding with a dark mane, and was just slightly smaller than the American Paint horse Travis had “handpicked” for Smith. She rode the animal with her hands bound with duct tape in front of her while Smith had the reins of her horse tied to the horn of his saddle, leading her across the open grounds back toward Gaffney.
They had left the junkyard in the back, almost at the same spot where the Judge’s people had cut the fence to let the ghouls in last night. According to Mandy, there had been three of the creatures, even though Smith was fortunate enough to have only encountered one of them. Unlike Blake, the rest of Mandy’s people did have silver weapons at the time and were able to defend themselves against the surprise mode of attack.
Mandy was certain Gaffney’s spies were confined to watching the front entrance, but just in case, Smith had “abducted” Mandy by gunpoint on foot out the back, before they continued on horseback. From a distance, it would have looked somewhat convincing.
Somewhat.
They had gone half an hour, and no one had shown up to intercept them yet. Smith wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or not, though. A part of him expected the Judge’s men, led by either Hobson or Travis or one of the others, to be waiting in an ambush as soon as he left the junkyard, either with or without Mandy.
But there was no one out there, just like there hadn’t been anyone when he first rode through earlier. At least, no one that he could see. He couldn’t help, though, feel eyes watching him, and that made continuing this charade with Mandy necessary.
Their path back to Gaffney took them near the remains of Lucky’s house, just as it had when Smith first rode through less than two hours ago on his way to the junkyard. There was still a black spot where the house used to be, but soon even that would disappear with the passing of the seasons. They were close enough Smith thought he could still smell some of the soot from the fire.
“Lucky,” Smith said.
“Don’t count your chickens yet,” Mandy said. “Luck has a way of turning on you out here, Mr. Smith.”
“No, I mean Lucky. The guy whose house was torched yesterday. What happened to him?”
“The guy whose horse you stole?”
“Borrowed,” Smith said.
“The guy whose horse you borrowed?”
“Yeah, him. I never found out what happened to him.”
“Someone burned down his house.”
“I got that part. But why? Who was he?”
“Once upon a time, Gaffney was called Miller’s Post. Then it became N23. You know why, right?”
“It was a ghoul-controlled settlement.”
“Uh huh. During that time, N23 was run by two people. The Judge and Lucky. Of course, back then he wasn’t going around calling himself the Judge.”
“What’s his real name?”
“The only person who knows that is Lucky, and I guess he took it to the grave with him.”
“Who killed him?”
“Who do you think?”
“The Judge?”
“There’s no reason anyone else would. We wouldn’t.” She paused and seemed to think about what she was going to say next before finally continuing. “Lucky was…complicated. There’s a reason his cabin was almost exactly halfway from our place to Gaffney. He was friends with the Judge from their N23 days, but he didn’t agree with everything that fat slob did. As far as I know, about four years ago they broke off their partnership and Lucky built himself that house in the middle of nowhere. I don’t know how he did it, honestly. But it wasn’t there until four years ago.”
“He sounds impressive.”
“He was.” She paused again. Then, after about ten or so seconds of silence, “He saved my life. When I escaped Gaffney, he was the one who took me in. Hid me, when the Judge’s people came looking.”
“He wasn’t scared of them.”
“Lucky wasn’t scared of anything. Why else would he build a house all the way out here? The guy was fearless. For four years, he lived his life alone out here.”
“So what changed yesterday?”
“I don’t know,” Mandy said. “Maybe the Judge just got tired of him helping us.”
“He didn’t know Lucky was helping you?”
“Oh, he knew.”
“So why finally do something about it now? After four years?”
“I don’t know, Smith. I really don’t know.”
“Something must have changed.”
“Something must have, but I don’t know what.”
From the look on her face, Smith could tell she’d been mulling over the question for some time now but was no closer to the answer. He had never met Lucky, so he didn’t know what kind of man he’d been, but for someone to stand up against the Judge all these years, he had to be a pretty impressive guy. Unfortunately for Lucky, impressive only got you so far out here.
“You really think this is going to work?” Mandy asked him.
Smith smiled. Not at the question but the timing. Mandy had waited until now, when they were halfway to Gaffney, to finally ask it?
“Having a change of heart?” he asked.
“No,” Mandy said.
“Good, because it’s a little too late for that now.”
“I haven’t changed my mind. I still think this is the best chance we have to take out the Judge. I just hope you’re as good with that gun as you claim to be.” Then, before he could respond, “Are you?”
“Yes,” Smith said.
“How good?”
“Good enough that if I’m in the same room with the Judge and I have this gun on my hip, he’s a dead man.”
“That’s if this works and you end up in the same room with him with that gun on your hip. What if they take it away from you?”
“I won’t let them.”
“Maybe they won’t give you a choice.”
“You don’t understand how this is going to work, Mandy. The easy way has me taking you into Gaffney and straight into the Judge’s office with this gun strapped to my hip. The hard way has me shooting my way in. One way or another, I’m going back into Gaffney armed, and I’m not leaving until the Judge is lying in a pool of his own blood.”
“All this because the Judge told you he’d kill a woman and a boy you’d never met until yesterday if you didn’t do what he wanted?”
“Yeah, that about sums it up.”
“It has nothing to do with right and wrong?”
“Who’s right and who’s wrong?”
“What do you mean?”
Smith shrugged. “You think you’re on the side of the angels. The Judge probably feels the same way.”
“Except we know he’s not.”
“You know. Or you think you know. Like I said, he probably feels the exact same way about your little feud.”
“‘Little feud?’ He keeps people there against their will, Smith. He makes women do things they don’t want to do. That’s a violation of their human rights. Everyone deserves to have a choice, even now.”
“If you say so. I’m not here to argue Gaffney politics with you.”
“Why not? Why don’t you care?”
“Because of exactly that.”
“I don’t understand…”
“Because I don’t care.”
“You don’t care?”
“Yeah. I don’t care. Why are you so surprised?”
He didn’t glance back at Mandy, but he could feel her staring daggers at his back.
After a long silence, she said, “But you were there, in Gaffney. How could you say we’re not in the right after seeing the place for yourself?”
“It’s not my cup of tea, okay? I wouldn’t stay there if they begged me to, or offered me a hundred virgins. But that’s me. Maybe the others want to be there. Did you ever think of that? Gaffney gives them security. There’s not a lot of that out there, you know.”
“What about your friend? You told me she wants out.”
“She didn’t e
xactly say that,” Smith said.
“What did she say?”
He shook his head. “Not much. We were being watched at the time. She probably didn’t say everything she wanted to say. The truth is, I don’t really know if she wants to stay there or not. But I’ll find out one way or another when I get back there.”
“I can’t believe you think Gaffney is a swell place.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“What are you saying?”
Smith sighed. He didn’t know why he was having this argument with her. He didn’t care about Gaffney. He didn’t care about Mandy’s battles with the Judge, either. But he’d been drawn into it, and the only way out was to help one side win. That meant either Mandy or the Judge would have to die. Smith wasn’t Mandy’s biggest fan, but he was even less of the Judge’s, so the decision had been easy.
“Look, I don’t know what you want me to say here,” Smith finally said. “I just don’t care about any of this. Once I get my friend out of Gaffney—if she wants to leave—then I’m gone. I have no interest in what you people do to each other; it’s not my problem. If I have to kill the Judge to untangle myself from all this, then so be it.”
“Jesus Christ,” Mandy said. “Remind me never to get on your bad side— What is that?”
“What is what?”
“That,” Mandy said.
Smith glanced back at her. She was looking off to one side.
He followed her gaze to a series of hills in the distance, not far from where Lucky’s homestead used to be. Smith recognized them. He’d been standing on one of them when he first saw the burning house, and then later—
…and then later the sniper was there when he took a shot at Smith.
In the second or two it took Smith’s memory to be jogged, sunlight glinted off a glass object resting on one of those hills.
“Get down!” Smith shouted even as he threw himself off the Paint.
The first shot was an echoing crack! that seemed to come from a mile away, the sound seemingly ricocheting off every hill and little thing jutting up from the flat Nebraska countryside.
Smith landed on his chest, his hands keeping his face from an up close and personal introduction to the hard ground and eating a mouthful of dirt. He rolled over, already reaching down for the SIG Sauer even as the horse took off like a bullet, kicking up thick swirls of dust around him.
After The Purge, AKA John Smith Box Set | Books 1-3 Page 28