The sight of the body reminded Ethan of the other body that was in the house somewhere. He breathed in slowly and glanced back at Nikola. He didn’t want to worry her, so he continued speaking casually, picking up where he’d left off.
“Cade is my best friend. She’s a marksman. Served in the Israel Defense Forces,” Ethan explained. He took a step forward and eased his way over Andrew’s remains, one foot at a time. Nikola hesitated as she glanced at the body, and Ethan wondered if her legs were long enough to step over him like she needed to. Ethan handed his gun to Nikola wordlessly before he picked her up and physically passed her over the body. “So basically, she’s perfectly suited to survive this kind of thing,” Ethan continued. “Maybe you’ll meet her sometime soon, if our luck holds out.”
“I hope it does,” Nikola admitted, her voice hushed. She stuck close to Ethan, right by his elbow, and he began to move toward Cade’s room, one slow step at a time. “I haven’t seen many people. You’re the first in a long while.” She slipped her backpack around and slid the aluminum baseball bat out of her bag, gripping it tightly in her hands. “It gets really old being by myself all the time.”
“I can imagine,” Ethan said. He paused in the doorway to Josie’s room and forced himself to look inside. The late afternoon was passing them by and early evening settling in, making everything around him more difficult to see. Ethan clenched his jaw and resigned himself to stepping into the room to make sure there were no dangers inside.
Ethan startled as he felt a sudden touch on his elbow. It was only Nikola, though, pressing closer to him in the dark hallway. Ethan shone the flashlight he held into the guest room. The beam of whitish-blue light illuminated the bloodstained bed in the center of the room. Ethan struggled to not close his eyes as he remembered what had happened to the little girl the month before.
The room was blessedly empty of anything that moved. Ethan breathed out in relief. “Come on, Nikola. We’ve got a few things to grab back here,” he said. He stepped away from the doorway and headed for the master bedroom.
Ethan had managed two steps down the hall when a shriek behind him pulled him back around again. He froze in shock as a small dark-haired girl pounced out of the shadows of the bathroom and slammed into Nikola. She bowled her over to the rough hallway carpet, and her small hands grasped desperately at the teenager’s face.
Chapter 24
As Gray slowed the Jeep to a stop, Cade leaned between the front seats to look out at the street ahead. It had taken them the better part of the early night to make the trip to Biloxi, and the ride had been refreshingly uneventful. Theo had spent most of the time in the front seat fiddling with the radio, changing from one station of static to the next as if he’d discover something to listen to by magic or sheer determination, until Brandt had forced Gray to pull over so he could swap places with the paramedic. And now, as Gray put the Jeep into park, the entire interior of the vehicle fell into stunned silence as the occupants took in the sight before them.
The RV rested halfway down the street from the intersection Remy had given them, exactly where the girl had said it would be. It sat like a great white beached whale among the sea of smaller cars that surrounded it, its metal siding illuminated dully by the moonlight overhead. And all around the RV and the cars surrounding it were the infected, masses of them, all simply standing and staring at the large vehicle as if they sensed that an uninfected person waited inside. Cade had no idea how they were supposed to get to the injured girl inside, not to mention get her out. Not with just the four of them against the dozens of infected.
“Fuck,” Gray breathed, a tremor in his voice. “How are we supposed to do this?” He gripped the steering wheel tighter, his knuckles turning white. Cade swallowed nervously. “It’s … it’s got to be impossible, man.”
Cade’s eyes flitted from Gray to the man in the passenger seat. Brandt sat with his eyes locked onto the street before them. There was an intensity in his gaze that Cade had not seen before. The look didn’t do much to alleviate her nervousness, mainly because she knew what he was thinking: that they were going to have to try at all costs. And “all costs” would probably mean they’d end up dead. That was how missions like that always seemed to turn out.
“We’ve got to do something,” Brandt said, surprising no one in the Jeep. “We can’t just leave her there. You heard her. Her ankle might be broken, and she’s out of food and almost out of water. If we don’t get her out of there, she’s as good as dead.”
“But how are we going to get her out?” Cade asked. She kept her voice low in the presence of the infected, and she realized that the others were doing the same. Another silence fell over the Jeep’s interior at her words. Cade closed her eyes and tried to focus, to come up with an idea, any idea. But all she could hear was Brandt’s quiet breathing in her right ear and Gray’s fingers drumming on the steering wheel in her left.
“We need to get me in there,” Theo said suddenly. Cade turned to him in amazement. Theo unzipped his medical bag and started to rifle through it as he continued. “She might have a broken ankle, right? That means it will be difficult, if not impossible, for her to run. And if she can’t run, then we have a problem in itself right there.”
“He’s right,” Brandt said before Cade could reply. He tore his gaze from the street long enough to look at each of them in turn. “I think I have a plan, but I’m not sure how you’re going to like it.”
“I really hate when people start their plans off like that,” Cade muttered. “But that’s way more than what I have to offer right now.” She motioned for Brandt to continue.
“Okay, so here’s what I’m thinking,” Brandt started. “Gray, you’re going to stay with the Jeep and guard it. After we get out, you’ll take it two blocks in the direction we came from and wait for us there. Theo, you’re going to take whatever you need with you. Cade and I will cover you and try to clear a path to the RV.”
“And if one of us gets infected?” Theo asked solemnly. He transferred supplies into a smaller bag as he spoke, picking up and packing or discarding items as he saw fit.
“We’ll cross that bridge if we come to it,” Brandt said a bit flippantly. “My plan isn’t perfect. We’re going to have to make it as close to the RV as possible with as little noise and attention as we can manage. That will be easier said than done.”
“If not impossible,” Cade grumbled.
“The cars,” Gray said. He nodded toward the street, where cars lined the sides of the road, jammed up against the curbs, shoved against each other, a few halfway onto the sidewalk itself, the very definition of bumper-to-bumper traffic. “I’m sure you could get reasonably close to the RV if you hide behind them.”
“‘Reasonably close’ doesn’t equal ‘inside,’” Cade pointed out impatiently. “Besides, the moment we have to abandon cover, they’ll see us. And when they see us, we’ll have to shoot. And when we have to shoot …”
“… it will bring even more down on us,” Brandt finished for her. “But we’ve got to do something. We can’t leave her there.”
“You mean we won’t,” Gray corrected. Brandt glanced at him but didn’t acknowledge the truth of Gray’s words.
“It’s the best plan I’ve got,” Brandt confessed. “We’re going to have to go with it. Unless someone else has a better idea?”
Silence fell in the Jeep once more. Cade shifted in her seat uncomfortably and let out a sigh. “I think this is the point where, if Ethan were here, he would kindly inform us that this is a suicide run,” she said. Her eyes met Brandt’s for the briefest of moments. “But I also think you’re right,” she conceded. “We have to try. We can’t call ourselves decent people unless we do.”
Brandt studied her for a moment, perhaps trying to assess just how serious she was. But then the spell was broken. He gave her a short nod and drew his gun from its holster. He topped off the ammunition in its magazine calmly, almost mechanically. “We should get moving then. It’s after midnight
. We probably don’t have much time before they notice we’re here.”
Nearly an hour later, Cade crouched behind a battered old Buick, her trusty Jericho handgun in her grip as she peered around the side of the vehicle. Her rifle rested reassuringly against her back. She touched the strap gently, as if drawing energy and strength from it. The coast appeared to be clear from her vantage point, but she wasn’t going to move until Brandt signaled to her.
Speaking of Brandt …
Cade leaned forward another inch and spotted the man kneeling behind a pickup truck, Theo crouched beside him. The sound of the infected surrounding the RV ahead of them masked the noise of Brandt rustling in the bag over his shoulder. Cade wondered what in the world he was doing, until he pulled out one of the glass bottles she and Brandt had carefully measured out. It was over half full with amber liquid. Brandt opened the bottle and crammed a rag into it. A slow smile spread across Cade’s face.
“Molotov,” Cade breathed out with a big grin. “Badass.”
Brandt chose that moment to give Cade the watched-for signal, beckoning her to join the two men. Cade ran to them in a low crouch, her rifle banging painfully against her shoulder blade. She made a mental note to tighten the strap if the three of them actually made it out of this suicide run alive. She dropped to one knee beside Brandt and squinted at him in the darkness.
“What’s the plan?” Cade hissed. She looked at him expectantly and adjusted her grip on her gun.
“Molotov cocktail,” Brandt said with a smirk. “I figure those bastards might be a little thirsty. Besides, it will create a nice diversion when I smash it against that building over there.” He pointed to a brick storefront about fifty yards away.
Cade measured the distance with her eyes, frowning at the numerous cars that blocked the path. “Can you manage that far?”
“If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you didn’t have any confidence in me,” Brandt teased. He gave her what she could only define as a shit-eating grin and flipped open the silver lighter in his hand. He struck the wheel with his thumb, and a bright flame burst forth. Cade rolled her eyes and gritted her teeth in exasperation.
“That does nothing to answer my question,” she snapped.
“Well, we’re just going to have to see, aren’t we?” Brandt said. He touched the flame to the alcohol-soaked rag stuffed into the neck of the bottle and abruptly stood. He drew his arm back as if ready to throw a football. His arm snapped forward, and the bottle shot through the air in a perfect arc. Cade ducked, and her eyes followed the flaming missile of their own accord as it struck the brick wall and shattered on impact. A wave of flame washed out over the stones and illuminated their path. The sound of breaking glass echoed across the street.
“Go!” Brandt ordered.
Cade wasted no time. She leapt to her feet, stumbling over a crack in the pavement. She recovered quickly and raised her handgun, pointing it toward the masses of infected as her free hand grabbed for Theo. Her fingers found the strap of his bag, and she used it to haul the paramedic to his feet even as she started forward. She ran toward the RV as fast as her boots would carry her, dodging between cars and around luggage and other debris littering the street.
The infected swarmed forward in response to the presence of the three humans making their way through their ranks. Cade swore and aimed her gun at the nearest of the infected—a woman in a shredded band t-shirt and the remains of a pair of khaki pants. She squeezed off a shot. The bullet struck the woman in the chest; she staggered and quickly recovered, resuming her chase. Cade didn’t dare slow down or stop to take another shot with more careful aim.
There was a flash of light in the corner of Cade’s eye. Brandt had thrown another Molotov cocktail, and fire spread among the thickest group of infected merging onto Cade’s position. Cade pointed her gun into the burning mass, but before she could fire her weapon, the group of infected began to scream. The unholy sound sent a horrific chill up Cade’s spine. She squeezed the trigger—once, twice, three times—and two of the infected fell, writhing in pain and burning.
As Cade skirted a four-door sedan, Brandt appeared at her elbow. Distracted by his appearance, Cade nearly ran right into the sedan’s opened back door. She caught the edge of the door and swung herself around it as Brandt panted out, “Path should be clear enough to get to the RV.”
“I really fucking hope so,” Cade gasped out. She glanced back and saw that Theo was barely keeping pace with them; he looked winded, and she could hear his panting, even with the several feet of distance that separated them. “We’re almost there!” she called back to Theo, trying to reassure him and give him motivation to keep moving. As if the infected all over the street weren’t motivation enough.
Three more sprinting steps took Cade right to the door of the RV. She beat her hand frantically against the door to rouse the occupant’s attention as she grabbed Theo by his shirt and pulled him in close to her. The paramedic flattened himself against the side of the vehicle and watched the surge of infected coming toward them. Cade sucked in a breath and raised her handgun. She was about to squeeze the trigger, but she froze as Brandt stepped protectively between her and the oncoming horde. He had another bottle of liquor in his hand, and he lit the rag he’d stuffed into it.
The RV’s door flew open and rammed Cade hard on the shoulder. Cade sidestepped away from it and bumped into Theo, nearly knocking them both over. A girl’s voice came from the dim insides of the RV.
“Get in! Quick!”
Cade didn’t have to be told twice. Her hand found the strap of Theo’s bag again, and she swung Theo around and shoved him into the RV more roughly than she intended to. She was sure that Theo would forgive her for any bruises he’d sustained.
Once Theo was securely inside, Cade turned back to Brandt. He’d lobbed his glass grenade, and it had shattered, the flames spreading across the pavement. As the clothes of the infected caught flame, the awful screams surged in volume. Cade forced herself not to clap both hands over her ears. The infected staggered into each other, their mouths wide and their hands clawing the air.
“Oh jeez, come on!” Cade shouted. She grabbed Brandt’s shirt and pulled him away from the infected. He whirled around and pushed her to the door, and they both stumbled into the dark RV. Brandt slammed the door behind them, and in moments, he’d locked it and begun to barricade it as a temporary measure of protection.
Cade slouched against the white Formica countertop in the RV’s small kitchenette, panting and trying to catch her breath. She closed her eyes for a moment as her chest heaved. When she opened them again, Cade looked around the RV’s compact interior.
The RV was a stereotypical affair, on the cheap end of the spectrum, the type of RV a lower-middle-class retired couple might purchase for a road trip. It was dark and cramped, especially with four people crammed into it—intended, as it was, for maybe two people. Empty food packages and water bottles littered the floor by the couch-like bench near the front of the RV. The bench itself showed signs of recent habitation; pillows were piled at one end of the couch, and a woolen blanket lay in a pile in the middle of it. And the presumed former occupant of the couch perched on the driver’s seat at the front of the RV, turned sideways with her foot resting in Theo’s hand. The paramedic had wasted no time beginning his examination of the young woman’s injured extremity.
“You must be Remy,” Cade said as she moved a bit deeper into the RV to examine what little was there.
“Yeah. Remy Angellette,” the young woman said, her voice strained, her face pale. She held the steering wheel in a white-knuckled grip as Theo prodded at her ankle. She looked like she was about to pass out—the perfect way to cap off the entire situation. “I’d say I’m pleased to meet you guys,” Remy continued haltingly, “but considering the circumstances, I’m kind of not.”
Cade chuckled at Remy’s attempt at humor. A loud thud against the side of the RV interrupted any reply Cade could have formulated. Cade jerked to atten
tion, and Brandt rushed to look out the window above the bench.
“What’s the story?” Cade asked as she joined Brandt. She holstered her handgun and slung her rifle from its spot against her back. She gripped the weapon tightly, her fingertips pressed hard against the steel in her hands.
Brandt didn’t answer right away. He nodded toward the window, and Cade climbed onto the bench to look out. Another bang shook the RV. Cade caught a glimpse of the street, and her eyes widened in shock. “We’re totally surrounded,” Brandt said tonelessly. He raised his voice as the infected outside threw their bodies against the sides of the RV. “And they are definitely aware that we’re in here.”
Cade swore. Her nerves made her hands shake, and she tightened her grip on the rifle to hide the tremors. “Shit. How long do we have?” she asked. She took two steps across the narrow aisle to look out a window on the other side of the RV. If anything, more infected were massed on the passenger’s side than on the driver’s side, which was downright sparse in comparison.
“What’s going on?” Theo called from the front. He wrapped Remy’s ankle in an elastic bandage, looping it around and under her foot to immobilize her ankle as much as possible.
“We’re surrounded,” Cade announced. The thudding outside the RV increased, and the entire vehicle rocked with the impact. Cade hugged her rifle against her chest as her nerves threatened to get the better of her. Theo looked up from his work.
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