She presses into me, and my mind registers a subtle change. I step back slightly, my breathing ragged, searching her eyes in confusion. Finding no answer other than a plea for me to continue, I glance down and discover the something that has changed. My breath catches again. Her breasts stand proud and bare before my eyes. She takes my hand from her face and places it against her chest. I have never felt anything this perfect. I cup her breast gently, the silky weight filling my palm, and she releases a long, shuddering breath. She crushes her lips against mine, our tongues dueling as I press both my hands into her flesh.
“Bed,” she gasps. “Need…”
She is already pulling me down as I groan my assent. I follow her down onto the mattress, my hands becoming trapped between our bodies. She is clutching my back, pulling me even further into her, our mouths moving frantically against each other. Her thigh slips in between mine, pressing up into me. I am so wet, so ready, and she is so hot and perfect and…
I still my hands and pull back, breaking the kiss.
I finally understand my fear.
“Taylor?” Her voice is thick with passion, her eyes still unfocused with want, and I nearly give in. I struggle to slow my racing heart. I lean back and slip my hand to her side, unwilling to break contact with her skin but needing my hand to be somewhere less intimate.
“Taylor?” she questions again, by now realizing something has changed. “Look at me.”
Her hand strokes my cheek. She searches my face, giving me the space I need to explain, or not.
“It’s okay,” she says, pressing a gentle kiss to my forehead. “It’s okay.”
Her acceptance gives me the strength I need.
“I want you,” I whisper. “I need you. And tonight I…but I don’t want to rush. You deserve more.”
“You don’t always have to treat me with kid gloves, you know. I’m a big girl, Taylor. I know what I want.”
There is no scorn in her words, just a simple truth. I smile, kissing her softly.
“And I know what I want. I want to give you everything. I…”
I want desperately to say the words, to tell her I love her. And I do love her. I know that already. But the words fail me. They are stuck inside, unable to pass my lips. And that is the problem, the reason I stopped. For the first time in my life, I need the words to come before the act. I need to bare my soul before we bare our bodies.
“Kate, I…” Time passes, with me locked in some surreal war inside my brain, fighting to simply say what I know in my heart. Once again, Kate saves me.
“I know.”
I don’t know how she knows, but I know that she does. She kisses me again, a slow, deep kiss that conveys patience and desire all at once, relieving me of any fear that I, once again, have hurt her.
Exhaustion hits me, and I long for nothing more than to fall asleep in her arms. I reluctantly climb from the bed so I can remove my shoes, taking the opportunity to remove hers as well.
“Do you want…” I nod toward her still bare chest, point to her discarded shirt, feeling uncertain. She glances down, as if she’s forgotten that she is shirtless, and then smiles up at me.
“I’m good if you are.”
Just because we aren’t going to have sex doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy some quality naked time. I start to climb back into the bed, but she stops me with her foot.
“Uh-uh. This bed is a shirt-free zone.”
I grin, shucking off my shirt and slipping back into the bed so quickly she doesn’t have time to protest until I am already safely under the covers.
“Not fair,” she whines, snapping my bra strap. “There is a definite inequity here.”
“Oh?” I say innocently. “Well, we can’t have that.”
Slowly I reach behind my back and unhook my bra, sliding it off my shoulders and tossing it over the side of the bed, my breasts remaining hidden beneath the blanket the whole time.
“Tease,” she laughs, turning onto her side. I slide up behind her, pressing my now naked torso into her back. We both groan at the sensation. It is the most perfect thing I have felt in all my days. She pulls my hand around her side and up to her chest, pinning it close to her heart. Within minutes I fall into a dreamless sleep.
Chapter Twenty-six
November whispered its way across Burninghead Farm, and all around the farm the trees showed off their resplendent fall coats, a mixture of scarlet and gold. The month began surprisingly warm, but the air carried a crispness that spoke of a harsh winter to come. The trees picked up on this and, despite the mild temperatures, the ground was quickly becoming littered with fallen leaves. As nature waged the eternal battle between style and substance in its preparation for the cold, Duncan was consumed by the fierce urgency of now.
They had made great progress on the wall that would protect them from the world, completing it on two sides of the farm. They were about halfway finished with the western wall, but it was clear they were running out of time. Winter in Indiana could be unpredictable, and despite the fine weather they were currently experiencing, all it would take was a little breeze from the north coming across the Great Lakes to turn the ground into a frozen tundra that would rival Siberia for its impenetrability. So Duncan picked up his pace, hoping that with a little luck and a lot of hard work, they could outrace the wind.
Duncan was a man on a mission, and he was not the only one. Although they had not spoken of it, his entire crew seemed to sense that time was of the essence, and they worked with a new determination to get the job done. Beside him, Taylor set a hard pace, but she had lost the anger and desperation that had worried him only a few short weeks ago. She seemed content now, working to finish the job simply because it needed finishing and not because she was trying to fight a war she could not win. That made Duncan smile.
They had lost time the day before, only a few hours but time being as precious as it was, the loss had Duncan working even harder today. A new family had found its way to the farm, a man, his wife, and their ten-year-old son, looking famished and exhausted. Buck had spoken to them a while, given them food and water. Eventually, Buck had done what he always did, which was invite them to stay and call all the farm’s residents together to break the news.
Duncan was lost in his work and his thoughts and barely heard the pickup crunching the dirt as it pulled up to a stop only a few feet away. Margie jumped down from the driver’s seat, closing the heavy truck door with a deceptively soft click. The tightness of her lips told Duncan something was wrong. He hopped up and out of the ditch just as Margie reached its edge. She spoke before he could ask the question, but her words were not directed at him.
“Taylor.”
Taylor looked up, shading her eyes with her hand against the afternoon glare. She smiled at Margie. “What brings you out here?”
“Dad needs to see you,” Margie said. Her voice was all business, and yet Duncan sensed a certain sadness beneath her words, and it was directed squarely at Taylor.
Taylor’s face dropped. “What’s wrong? Did something happen?” she asked even as she jumped up out of the ditch to stand next to Duncan. “Is everyone okay?”
“Everyone’s fine,” Margie said reassuringly. She even gave a hint of a smile, but it quickly faded. “Something…Dad just really needs to see you.”
“Is Kate all right?” Taylor asked, still somewhat panicked. Duncan’s mind raced over what Buck could need to see Taylor so urgently about, and why it would have Margie upset. Kate seemed like the logical answer.
“She’s fine,” Margie said, squeezing Taylor’s shoulder. “This isn’t about her.”
Taylor relaxed slightly but her concern remained.
“Then what?”
“Better for Dad to explain. Just come with me, okay?” Margie said, turning back to the truck. “You come too, Duncan,” she said over her shoulder.
Taylor looked over at Duncan, but he was as confused as she was. He shrugged slightly and followed Taylor over to the passenger side.<
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Clearly they were not going to get any answers out of Margie, and they rode back to the farmhouse in silence. Duncan’s mind flew through a dozen possibilities, analyzing and rejecting each one in turn. Tension radiated off Taylor, and he could tell it was taking every ounce of her control not to yank the steering wheel out of Margie’s hands and demand she give them some answers. Duncan felt the same. Patience was definitely not one of his better qualities.
Taylor sprinted up to the farmhouse when they finally arrived. Duncan was fast on her heels, bursting through the doorway.
“In here,” Buck called out, and they ran into the kitchen.
“What’s going on, Buck?” Taylor demanded before her feet had even stopped moving. Duncan looked around the kitchen in complete confusion. If they had not been cryptically summoned to the farmhouse, Duncan would not have had any clue that anything was going on. Buck sat with the new man, two half-drunk cups of coffee sitting before them on the worn kitchen table. Duncan was not sure what he had expected, but this was definitely not it.
“Have a seat, Taylor,” Buck said with a smile that did not reach his eyes.
“I’ll stand, thanks,” she answered curtly. “Is everyone all right?”
Clearly Margie’s answer to that question had not satisfied Taylor, just as it had not satisfied Duncan. Duncan tried to read Buck’s face, but it was an impenetrable mask.
“You meet Adam yesterday?” Buck asked, nodding toward the man at the table.
Taylor gave a terse nod, waiting for Buck to explain something of relevance. “Buck…” she said warningly.
Buck sighed. “Adam’s got a bit of a story to tell. Better to let him tell it.”
Taylor immediately looked at Adam.
“Well, you see, Kim and I—Kim’s my wife—we were huddled up with a few of the other survivors from our town. We had our boy…did you meet him? Well, we were real lucky, all of us making it through and everything. It was a miracle, I’ll tell you that.”
Adam grew quiet, lost in the notion that somehow his whole family had survived intact, Duncan supposed. Taylor shifted impatiently.
“Oh, sorry. Anyway, a bunch of us were doing fairly well over in Iowa, for a while anyway. Eventually, food started running low, and JJ—he was the leader of our group—well, he started acting kind of crazy. Started thinking folks were stealing food and whatnot, just getting real paranoid. Of course I started thinking that I was the one who was being paranoid, but we had a family meeting one day and Kim felt the same, and we decided we’d best be leaving. A few nights later we took off. I felt bad sneaking off in the dead of night like that, but it seemed better that way somehow. We thought we’d head to Kim’s brother’s place near Columbus. We didn’t know whether he’d made it through the plague or not, but it was someplace to go. We’ve been traveling for a long time. It’s tough with the boy, we have to take it kind of slow, but we wouldn’t change that for the world. And then we stumbled upon this place and here we are.”
Duncan looked back and forth between Adam, Buck, and Taylor, trying to figure out why they had been summoned to hear that story. Taylor was trying to figure out the same thing, and Duncan watched a tide of frustration and bewilderment ebb and flow across her face.
“I’m glad you found this place and you’re safe,” Taylor said more compassionately than Duncan would have expected. The question of what in the hell was going on hung in the room like the proverbial 800-pound gorilla. Duncan had never really understood that expression, but it seemed fitting nonetheless. “But why did you call me up here to tell me that? Buck?”
Buck looked up at her, his face a world of concern. The knot in Duncan’s stomach grew.
“Tell her what happened in Illinois.”
“What about Illinois?” Taylor asked, the tension in her body exploding through her vocal cords.
“Oh right,” Adam started nervously. “Well, after a few weeks my son got pretty sick. I didn’t think it was the plague, not after all this time, but we were terribly worried. We knew he needed medicine. Luckily, about then we stumbled on a small town that had a group of survivors. They were real nice and welcomed us in, like you folks here, and they had antibiotics and stuff. They were starting to run a bit low on supplies, but they shared with us anyway. I don’t know what we would have done if we hadn’t found them. We stayed there for about a week and then left. That was about two weeks ago.”
Adam stopped again, and Duncan still had no idea what any of this meant or had to do with them. But he saw Buck staring up at Taylor, watching her, so he turned to look at Taylor, too. Her skin had gone pale, as if she had just seen a ghost.
“It’s not possible,” she muttered.
“Tell her the name of the town, Adam,” Buck prodded gently.
“Asheville.”
Taylor stumbled backward, the simple word knocking her back with its weight. Duncan, for his part, was too stunned to react to steady Taylor, but she recovered her footing. For an instant, Duncan was consumed by a joy he had not known was possible at the revelation. All hope was not lost. There was still a chance Taylor’s family, or some of it anyway, was alive. Duncan did not know he could be this happy for another human being, but he was, and it thrilled him. He started planning the search party in his head, the rescue mission that would bring Taylor’s family home.
And that was when it hit him, why Buck was looking concerned. What if her family was still dead? What if she had just been given this gift of hope only to have it dashed again? Taylor had nearly come undone the first time she had found out her family was really and truly gone. Duncan did not think she could survive the loss a second time, even as the person she had become here at Burninghead Farm. Plus, there was the added factor that for Taylor, Illinois was home. If her family had somehow survived, Taylor might not be coming back. Duncan now worried that no matter what Taylor found in Illinois, they might lose her. It was completely selfish, Duncan knew, to be thinking such things, but for this one moment he did not care.
“Are you sure?” Taylor asked woodenly, quietly. “Are you sure it was Asheville?”
“Yes,” Adam said, nodding.
“Could you describe it?” Her voice was childlike, and tears began to gather.
“It was like most towns, I suppose. I’m not sure I really know how to describe it. They were all staying at one end, had taken over some houses on this cul-de-sac. On the way out of town there was this really pretty church, with a big white steeple. I remember it because there was this huge stained glass window in the front, of the Virgin Mary kneeling before the crucifixion.”
Taylor gasped. Duncan knew without even having to be told what it meant. It was written all over Taylor’s face.
“That church is on the east side of town,” she said, tears brimming over to meet the stunned smile on her cheeks.
She turned to Buck then. “Buck?”
Buck stood. “Go pack a bag. Duncan, go help Kate out in the barn. She’s getting one of the horses ready and some supplies.”
Taylor seemed startled by the knowledge that Kate already knew, as Duncan was himself. He figured Buck had his reasons. Taylor ran out of the room, the screen door slamming behind her. Duncan’s mind was chaos. He was happy for Taylor, yet he feared losing her. He could only imagine how Kate was feeling.
Chapter Twenty-seven
I race to the dorm, ignoring the burning in my lungs and in my thighs. My mind runs even faster, a blurring mixture of thoughts and memories ground into one beautifully unbearable truth. I know the likelihood is my family is still gone, but as long as Asheville remains, hope remains with it. Despite everything that has happened since the world came to an end, or maybe because of it, I want nothing more than to let hope take hold.
I pack up my meager belongings in a haze. I am outside myself, watching with detached interest what I choose to shove into my backpack and what I choose to leave behind. For some reason, I struggle over whether to bring my towel, putting it in and then taking it back out of my ba
g, back and forth until finally I zip up the bag, the towel still lying on the bed. I throw the bag over my shoulder and grab Mugsy, safely cocooned in her scabbard, and head out to the barn.
I don’t know what I will say to Kate. I want to stay here on the farm and live this new life I have built, that I am still in the process of building. But my family calls to me, pulling at my blood and demanding I finish what I started all those months ago. The real question is what I will do after, once I have either found my family or found my hopes ground out like a cigarette beneath my boot heel. For that question, I have no real answer. My brain is in too much chaos to know anything for certain, other than I have to go.
Kate is in the barn when I arrive, holding Stu’s reins. Fitting. The black monolith is saddled up and waiting, and he eyes me in that way of his, as if he knows exactly what I am all about. He stomps his hoof, but he does not seem perturbed like the last time I was here. Instead, he seems to understand the gravity of the situation and has accepted his part in this mission of mine. I am sure I am reading too much into Stu, again, but I am equally as sure I am right about his intentions.
I stand frozen in the dirt and hay, overcome with the reality of all that I am leaving behind. I meet Kate’s gaze. I try to read the myriad of emotions I find there. She smiles gently, trying to tell me it is all going to be okay. I take the last few steps to stand before her.
“I have to go,” I say.
“I know.”
“I have to find out.”
“I know.”
She strokes my face, and I feel her willing me the strength I need to see this through. And then I know the answer, know without the slightest doubt that no matter what I find in Illinois, I will be coming back. I will be coming home.
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