Requiem (After The Purge, Book 1)

by Sam Sisavath

  He kept his left hand in front of him while his right drifted over to the Beretta. The pump-action shotgun with the adjustable stock and pistol grip thumped against his back, and Wash was very aware of the loud crunching sounds he made with every step he took—

  He stopped and spun and drew the 9mm.

  It was a fast draw, helped by the advance positioning of the holster along his thigh. What a slayer in North Dakota, after getting a look at it, had laughingly called “a gunfighter’s rig.” Wash didn’t know anything about that; the holster was strapped that low because of experience and trial and error.

  He had twisted a full 180 degrees and was once again looking out at the road and the two grazing animals. His forefinger was in the trigger guard while his thumb worked back the hammer even as the handgun swung up to chest level. Wash would have pulled the trigger if he saw danger.

  But there wasn’t any.

  At least, no immediate danger.

  There was just the girl—the redhead from last night—standing next to the black horse and rubbing down its thick black mane as she looked across at him. “I thought you were going to the bathroom.”

  “Jesus Christ,” Wash said. “I almost blew your damn head off, kid.”

  She frowned. “Why do you keep calling me that?”

  “Why shouldn’t I?”

  “I’m twenty-five.”

  “Bull.”

  “You wanna see my driver’s license?”

  He shook his head and gave the adrenaline a few seconds to come down. Finally, he lowered his gun hand and walked back over to her. “You saying you have a driver’s license?”

  “Don’t you?” Before he could answer, she smiled. “Your fly’s open.”

  Dammit, Wash thought and quickly stopped to zip himself up.

  He might have caught her smirking when he looked back up, but that couldn’t have been true, because her back was already turned to him as if she didn’t feel any threat coming from him whatsoever.

  I could have shot you. You have no idea how close you came to dying, lady.

  Or maybe she did know and was just really good at hiding it. He wouldn’t put anything past this one.

  The animals in front of the woman continued to graze, oblivious to the almost-violence.

  “These are your payment?” the woman asked. In the light of day she was definitely not a kid, but he’d already known that after last night and only called her one anyway because of how annoyed she seemed by it. “For killing those ghouls?”

  “Yeah,” Wash said. He untied the black horse’s reins and led it away from her. “You were following me. Don’t deny it.”

  “I won’t.”

  “Why?”

  “I made camp outside of town after our run-in. Heard you walking by with your loot.”

  “It’s not ‘loot.’ I earned them.”

  “I helped. I killed one of them, remember?”

  “I didn’t ask you to, so it doesn’t count.”

  “Is this why your partner left? Because you don’t like sharing?”

  He grunted but didn’t gave her the satisfaction of an answer. He knew a probing question disguised as a snarky remark when he heard one.

  You’re not that smart, lady.

  She walked over to the orange-brown and began rubbing its mane. The horse lifted its head slightly to look at her before letting out a soft whinny of approval and returning to its breakfast. “He’s a beautiful quarter horse.”

  “He’s worth more than a quarter,” Wash said.

  “Funny.”

  “What was?”

  She squinted across the saddle at him. “Oh. You weren’t trying to be funny.” She smiled. “I was referring to the horse. It’s a quarter horse breed.”

  “I knew that.”

  “Of course you did.”

  “Not that I care what it is. I just ride them.”

  “You should care precisely because you ride them. You depend on them. We all do, now.”

  Wash walked over to the orange-brown and looked across the saddle at her from the other side, and for a second he forgot what he was going to say.

  It was her eyes. They were amazingly green, even more so now in the morning sunlight. Her skin was just as pale and her hair just as bright red as they had been last night, but they also looked…different somehow. Even that sharp, impish nose of hers—

  She was smiling at him. “I know I’m pretty, but I’m not that pretty.”

  “Usually people wait to be complimented,” Wash said.

  “I have a feeling neither one of us has time to wait for something to happen.”

  They spent the next few seconds staring at each other in silence. He waited for her to flinch or look away first, but she didn’t. Instead, she busied herself rubbing down the orange-brown while holding his gaze. He wished he could say she was unattractive, but she wasn’t wrong. She was right, though; she was pretty, just not that pretty. He’d seen prettier.

  “What do you want?” he finally asked. “It better be good, because you almost got yourself killed for it.”

  “Don’t be so dramatic. I knew you weren’t going to shoot me.”

  “People get shot all the time out here and no one ever finds out because their bodies disappear when night falls. What makes you so special?”

  “I’m not, but I knew you wouldn’t shoot me.” She touched her nose. “Not after I punched you and you didn’t hit back. You have a lot of self-control, even after fighting those ghouls. Most people wouldn’t have been able to resist after all that adrenaline.” She smiled. “You’re good at what you do. That’s obvious to anyone with eyes.”

  He squinted back at her, not exactly sure what was happening. Was she trying to play some kind of mind games with him? Was this all a prelude to something else?

  But it was hard to read her face. It didn’t help that he kept being drawn back to her eyes and that easy smile. That too easy smile.

  “What do you want, lady?” he asked, injecting just enough menace to let her know he wasn’t going to play her games—and hoped it was at least partially convincing.

  “You’re headed south. So am I.”

  “So? What’s that to me?”

  “You have two horses.”

  “That’s right. I have two horses.”

  “You don’t need two horses.”

  “I have supplies.”

  “You can spread them out between the two animals. Besides, a Tennessee Walker isn’t bred to be used as someone’s pack mule.”

  “You’re giving my horses names now?”

  Again, that smile that could have been condescension or amusement, or maybe both. “The black one’s a Tennessee Walker breed.”

  Dammit, Wash thought, and said, “We’re not in Tennessee.”

  “And you can find Arabian horses in America, too. What’s your point?”

  “My point is, you’re not getting it. Or the quarter horse.”

  “Why not?”

  “For one, you nearly got me killed last night.”

  “You nearly got me killed last night.”

  “I saved your life.”

  “I didn’t need saving.”

  “There were four of them.”

  “I was prepared to fight double that.”

  He narrowed his eyes at her, unable to decide if that was all false bravado coming out of her mouth or if she actually believed it. Like the last time, she held his gaze, and he had a feeling it wouldn’t matter how long he stared, because she wasn’t going anywhere.

  “You’re headed south, and so am I,” the woman said. “We can travel together. It’s safer that way. Like you said, people get killed on the road all the time.”

  “You don’t even know where I’m going.”

  “South.”

  “South is a wide, wide direction, lady.”

  She smiled again.

  “What?” Wash said, and that time the irritation came easily.

  “Lady is better than kid.”

&nbs
p; “Who cares.”

  “I’m Ana.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “It doesn’t matter what my name is or where I’m going. You’re not coming with me or getting one of my horses.”

  “I’ll trade you.”

  “With what?” Wash asked, and before he realized what he was doing, he looked her up and down.

  She was still wearing that black leather jacket from last night, a plain white T-shirt underneath it, and the same denim jeans that were probably a little too tight. It was the first time Wash had met a slayer who didn’t outfit themselves in cargo pants or the kind of clothes that came with a lot of pockets for extra supplies. He was pretty sure the woman couldn’t have fit anything beyond a pack of gum into those blues.

  She wasn’t wearing a gun belt and had nothing that looked like a gun on her that he could see. Not that she was unarmed, because he remembered how that knife had slid into her palm from inside her jacket sleeve last night. She carried a tactical pack behind her that was clearly carrying dwindling supplies. If he’d met her this morning for the first time, he wouldn’t have believed she was anything other than a frightened woman looking for some company on the road, and maybe he would have bought her story.

  Maybe that’s her game. Lure the threat in, then take them out at close range.

  “How long have you been out here by yourself?” the woman who called herself Ana asked.

  Too long, Wash thought, but he said, “Long enough to know better than to give one of my horses away for nothing.”

  “When was the last time you rode with someone?”

  Wash smirked, because he understood what she was trying to do with the question. It was her third attempt to figure out what he was doing out here without a partner.

  He said instead, “Answer my question. What do you have to trade?”

  “I have something you want. Kopiko.”

  He gave her a confused look. “I thought your name was Ana.”

  She unslung her backpack and unzipped it, then pulled something out before tossing it across the saddle to him.

  Wash snatched it out of the air. It was a bag with the words Kopiko Instant 3 in 1 Brown Coffee written across it, along with a picture of a steaming mug of coffee.

  “Coffee?” Wash said.

  “What did you think I was offering?”

  He ignored the question and asked her instead, “How do I know it’s not expired?”

  “Open it and find out.”

  “I will. How many do you have?”

  “That’s for me to know. But I’ll give you one every morning as long as we’re riding together. When we decide to go our separate ways, I’ll split whatever I have with you.”

  “How do you know I don’t already have coffee? Or that I even drink it?”

  She smiled.

  “You were in Harrisonville,” Wash said. “The mayor told you.”

  She shrugged. “Maybe. Do we have a deal or not?”

  “Mind as well tag along.”

  “Might as well.”

  “What?”

  “It’s ‘might as well,’ not ‘mind as well.’ Common mistake.”

  Wash grunted. “I want two bags every morning now.”

  “Two?”

  “Yeah, two. Just for being so annoying.”

  “One.”

  “Two.”

  She sighed. “All right. Two.”

  Wash pocketed the bag. “And you take the Georgia Runner.”

  “Tennessee Walker.”

  “Poh-tay-to, poh-tah-to,” Wash said.

  He turned around and grinned to himself. He’d entered Harrisonville on foot with an almost empty pack and ended up with two horses and enough food, water, and ammo to keep him from having to hire out again as he made his way down to Texas.

  And now he had coffee, so things were definitely starting to look up.

  “I saw that,” Ana said behind him.

  Dammit.

  Five

  “What’s your name?”

  He didn’t answer her when she asked the first time.

  Or the second time.

  On number three, he finally broke down.

  “Wash.”

  She might have almost laughed. Almost. But she caught herself in time and just allowed a small smile to slip through.

  “Like car wash?” she asked.

  He sighed. “Yeah. Like car wash.”

  “Is that short for something?”

  “Yup.”

  “It’s not washateria, is it?”

  He shot her a quick look, and she laughed.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  “No, you’re not.”

  “I am. Really, I am. It’s not polite to laugh at someone’s name, and I was raised better than this. So I’m sorry.”

  He shook his head and faced forward and wondered how long this nascent partnership of theirs was going to last before he lost it. Were bags of instant coffee really worth all the hassle he was going to have to endure? He hadn’t even tasted the one she gave him yet, so he didn’t know if her part of the bargain was even any good. Instant coffee could last for years—sometimes decades—but the flavor was always the first to go. And without flavor, what was the point?

  They had been riding for about ten minutes with Ana on the Walker to his right. He had shifted some of the bags over to his big orange-brown to lessen the load on the other animal, and he no longer had its reins cinched to his saddle horn. So what exactly was keeping her from kicking the horse’s flanks and taking off? Well, there was the Beretta in his holster…

  Right. As if you could actually shoot her if she did take off.

  But she didn’t try to run with the horse or the supplies, and he didn’t understand why. It wasn’t because she wasn’t a risk-taker. Everything he knew about her since last night pointed to the exact opposite.

  So why was she still riding next to him?

  She wants something, obviously.

  What, is the question.

  He didn’t buy that she just needed someone to ride south with her. While it was true that the roads were dangerous, and people did die or go missing on them often, she didn’t strike him as someone who feared the unknown. So what was she? What was her end game?

  Wash had a feeling, though, that he was only going to find out the answer to that one when she wanted him to know.

  “What about you?” he asked.

  “What about me?” Ana said.

  “What’s Ana short for?”

  She didn’t answer, but she did smile at him. She did that a lot, and he couldn’t help but ask himself how much of it was genuine. The lack of overt weapons on her, the tight jeans, the easy smile… How many of those things were all part of her I’m not dangerous, come a little closer so I can stab you in the neck with my hidden knife presentation?

  “I’ll make you a deal,” Ana said. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know about me when we get to know each other a little better.”

  “What makes you think I want to know everything about you?”

  “Don’t you?”

  “You think way too highly of yourself, lady.”

  “It’s human nature to be curious.”

  “I’m not the curious type.”

  “I don’t believe you. They call it ‘human nature’ for a reason. It’s in all of us.”

  “Not me.”

  “Uh huh.”

  He gave her an annoyed look. Maybe he didn’t want to wait to find out her end game. “What’s your deal?”

  “Deal? I don’t have any deals that I’m aware of.”

  “Yeah, you do. Last night you were ready to cut my throat. This morning you’re begging to be my friend.”

  “‘Begging?’”

  “Basically.”

  That smile again. “Things change.”

  “Like what?”

  “Harrisonville gave you horses.”

  That’s it? I don’t buy it,
he thought, but said, “So that’s all it takes, huh? Get something you want, and suddenly you’re all nice and friendly?”

  “That’s how the world works, Wash. Or haven’t you noticed?”

  “What were you doing out there last night, anyway?”

  “You first.”

  “You know what I was doing. My job.”

  “And that’s all it was?”

  Wash didn’t answer right away and tried to recall all the things he might have said to her last night.

  Dammit. I asked her about One-Eye, didn’t I?

  Shit. Should have kept my big mouth shut.

  “That’s all it was,” Wash said anyway. “Now it’s your turn, so spill it.”

  She flashed him that amused look that told him she didn’t believe him for even a second and wanted him to know it. But she said instead, “You know where Omaha, Nebraska, is?”

  “Home of the Little League World Series?”

  “You’ve been there?”

  “I’ve been around pretty much everywhere once or twice.”

  “I was resettled in a town nearby, alongside the Platte River. It was called N15 during the occupation, but the residents changed the name to Newton after The Walk Out. A friend of mine from there went missing, and I came down here looking for her.”

  “Was that what you were doing last night? Looking for your friend?”

  “Yes, in a manner of speaking. My friend stopped at a campsite near the Nebraska-Kansas border a few days ago. I found ghoul tracks there. That’s how I followed them down here into Kansas, then outside of Harrisonville.”

  Wash recalled the way she was going from nightcrawler to nightcrawler, staring at their faces.

  “You thought she might have been turned,” Wash said.

  “She, or some of the other people that were with her.”

  “You know you can’t tell even if she had been. The transformation—”

  “I know,” Ana cut him off. Then, with less conviction, “That’s what they say, anyway.”

  “Because it’s true. Once you turn, you don’t look like yourself anymore. You’re just another black-skinned bag of bones. A husk of what you once were. That’s it. End of story. Next.”