When Patrick kissed the bride, the boys let out a holler, and Roy started up a tune on his harmonica.
The next hour passed in a blur. For a little while, the darkness of their reality was pushed away. They ate the honey-flavored cake, celebrated with two of Georgia’s remaining bottles of wine, danced to Roy’s harmonica music, and laughed. Georgia insisted on wrapping up a piece of the cake for Jerry and his wife. The boys slipped off to hang soda cans on the front door of the cottage and light the candles that had been positioned throughout the little structure.
And then Patrick picked up his bride and carried her across the yard.
Maybe it was the wine that loosened Max’s tongue. He walked up behind Shelby, close enough to touch but not touching. “This could have been a double wedding, Sparks.”
“Is that what you want?” She didn’t turn, didn’t look at him. She just continued staring across at the cottage. “To marry me?”
“It’s what I’ve always wanted.”
A dozen questions flooded her mind, but she pushed them away. With Max, it was best to keep her questions and her emotions at a distance. She’d nearly knocked down that wall of reserve when they were battling their way through Austin. Then they’d returned to High Fields, and she’d been so focused on Carter that she couldn’t think about Max fighting the Cavanaghs day after day, night after night, for almost a week.
The evening that one of their neighbors pulled up to the house, the back of his truck filled with bodies of those killed in the fighting, Shelby had known a terror deeper than any fear for her own life. The driver hadn’t known who the deceased were. They’d put the bodies in the barn and laid them out so that families could come and pick them up. With each body that she helped to move, she’d braced herself against seeing Max’s face.
Standing in the last of the lantern light, with Max so close to her now that she could feel his breath on the back of her neck, she forced her mind away from that dark day. She couldn’t allow herself to love. Not that way. Not now. Maybe when the world settled again. Maybe when she no longer needed to identify bodies or help dig graves.
“Is it what you want, Shelby? Will you marry me?” His voice had turned suddenly serious, and she felt a river of goose bumps trickle down her arms. She fought the emotions and breathed in and out once and then again.
Instead of answering, she turned, stood on her tiptoes, and planted a kiss on his cheek.
“Get some sleep, Max.”
And without waiting for an answer, she hurried out into the darkness.
SEVEN
Gabe Thompson had set the prearranged meeting spot for 7:30 a.m. in Langford Cove. Though the rendezvous point was only thirty miles to the north, they had to wind their way through caliche roads and then pass through the roadblock. The drive took an hour and fifteen minutes. Fortunately, they were going north, away from Townsen Mills. Max didn’t care to see that devastation again, though he had a hard time imagining how it could be any worse than the last time they’d gone through.
They left High Fields as the sky was lightening but well before sunup.
Goodbyes with his parents were short and heartfelt.
“No more than a month,” Max promised.
His father pulled him into a bear hug, as he’d done with each person in their group. “You take the time you need. Whatever it takes to find answers and bring everyone home.”
His mom made a valiant attempt not to cry, but he knew she was struggling. She pulled in her bottom lip and stood as close to Max’s father as was humanly possible. “Godspeed, son.”
“Take care of him, Mom.” Max glanced at his dad and winked. “You know how stubborn he is.”
“That I do.”
And then they were driving down the caliche road, scaring up deer and causing doves to take flight.
Max drove, and Shelby sat next to him in the front seat of the old Dodge. Carter and Lanh were squeezed between supplies in the second seat—items that hadn’t fit in the back storage area, which was packed to the roof of the car. Patrick and Bianca followed in the Mustang, which was also full. They’d tried to plan for every scenario, tried to anticipate every need.
They drove at an even speed, but not too slowly, and always keeping a three-car distance between them.
Max constantly scanned the road, left shoulder to right shoulder, and then checked the rearview mirror before returning his eyes to the ribbon of road directly in front of them. There was little to see.
“So many of the power lines have fallen.” Shelby’s voice was detached, the objective observation of a reporter. She held her journal in her lap, but she’d yet to write anything. She’d told him after the flare and the chaos in Abney that she needed to record what was happening. Some days she struggled with that, but always she picked up her pen and began writing again.
“No maintenance crews.” Max glanced at the boys, who had their gaze pinned out the window.
Trees had fallen into some of the power poles, causing them to sag precariously.
“That storm last month could have knocked them down.”
“Or the one in November,” Carter said. “I thought it was going to rip the roof off the cottage.”
“I thought the cottage was going to end up in the creek.” Lanh sounded so serious that they all laughed, and it eased some of the tension.
Max knew there was nothing to fear here, no one to threaten them.
It was the desolation that tore at his soul. He’d grown up in this area, and it had been a thriving part of central Texas. Not anymore. What wasn’t destroyed was abandoned.
In places where power poles had come down, they’d dragged those around them into a lopsided stance. Brush had grown wild and was now encroaching on the road. Cars that had been abandoned on the shoulder now had thistles, nettles, and dove weed winding through their shattered windows. In the pastures, the weeds fought with the bluebonnets, which had begun to bloom.
“Is this what it looked like before?” Shelby asked.
“Before?”
“Widespread agriculture.” She waved toward the fields to the west. “It’s a carpet of blue.”
“I’d rather see a carpet of food,” Carter joked.
By the time they returned, the bluebonnets would be interspersed with Texas paintbrush and Indian blankets. Max vowed to himself that everyone in their group would see that change. He’d lost too many friends in the last nine months. In one way, it had hardened him to the cruelty of life. In another way, though, his insides were raw and bleeding.
The few houses fronting the road appeared to have been abandoned long ago.
Most were burned.
Langford Cove looked even worse.
The first structure on the east side of the road was the 2A school—grades K through 12 held in two connected buildings. School was definitely not in session, and the Langford Lions wouldn’t be competing anymore. Max remembered clearly how proud folks were when the new athletic facility had opened. Now it lay in ruins like the rest of the school—windows shattered, doors torn off, the press box and stands burned to the ground.
Where there had been a string of stores on the west side of the road, charred ruins sat like props for an apocalyptic film.
Feed store—gone.
Taxidermist—closed.
Grocery store—looted.
On the east side of the road was the bank. Made of brick, it had avoided complete destruction, though Max could see that the windows had been busted and the office furniture lay scattered across the lawn. What was the point? What good would any money in that bank do anyone? There was nothing left to purchase.
In front of the bank and bordering the road was a square grassy area. Formerly, it had held park benches and a gazebo. Those were gone, though Max couldn’t imagine how or why anyone would want a gazebo.
None of that mattered.
What did matter was that Gabe Thompson was waiting for them, and he’d brought along a very sweet ride.
EIGHT
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Carter was out of the Dodge before Max came to a complete stop. “Whoa!”
“Is that our ride?” Lanh hopped out and followed Carter over to the military vehicle.
“Hey, Dr. Bhatti. I mean, I guess I heard your name is…uh…Gabe Thompson.”
“Good to see you, Carter.”
“Might take me a while to get used to that name.”
“Then I will answer to both…for a while.”
The man standing in front of Carter looked exactly like the doctor who had lived next door to him in Abney. They’d been neighbors for a week, until the explosion in their neighborhood that had killed his girlfriend, wrecked their house, and sent them scurrying to High Fields.
The doctor looked the same, but he also looked completely different.
He stood straighter, acted more confident, and seemed like what he was…a military guy.
While everyone said hello, Carter and Lanh circled the Humvee. Bigger than an SUV, it looked like a tank and was the color of sand.
“That’s at least a nine-inch ground clearance,” Lanh said.
“Oversized, all-terrain tires.”
“Off-road suspension package.”
They peered in through the open driver’s door.
“Wow.”
“Exactly.”
“Think he’ll let us ride with him?” Lanh asked.
“Only one way to find out.”
They made their way back to the group. Everyone had slipped past the pleasantries and begun to plan the trip.
“Unusual ride, Gabe.” His mom walked over and pressed a hand against the side of the vehicle. “Are we taking this all the way to Kansas?”
“We are.” Gabe stepped closer to her. “Shelby, I want to say I’m sorry about what happened in the capital, with Danny Vail—”
“That wasn’t your fault.”
“No, but if I had known, I would have stopped him. Unfortunately, we didn’t become aware of Danny’s duplicity until he led a coup against the governor.”
Max let out a long, low whistle. “He was in charge of that?”
“Yes, and he will be tried as a traitor if he’s ever caught.”
“We still have trials?” Bianca asked.
“We will.” Gabe looked absolutely certain. Carter admired that about the guy. “One day we will.”
Everyone was quiet for a moment as that thought took root. Could it be that the people who were causing suffering, who were preying on others, would one day pay for their deeds? Carter didn’t know. He wasn’t sure exactly what the future would look like, only that it would be different.
“I’ve always wanted to ride in a Humvee,” Carter said. He’d seen them pass through Abney a few times on their way from Fort Hood to points unknown.
“This is actually a JLTV, or joint light tactical vehicle. It was designed to replace the Humvee.”
“That’s a mouthful,” Lanh pointed out. “Could we just call it a Hummer? Or a baby Hummer?”
“Whatever works for you.”
“The governor gave it to you?” Patrick asked.
“I believe it was a loan.” His tone was dead serious, but a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.
“We definitely need those kinds of friends.” Bianca walked up to the vehicle and opened the front passenger door.
Carter leaned in, trying to take in all of the technology he’d glanced at earlier. “Does this stuff work?”
“Anything not satellite based does. As you know, the satellites were fried along with the grid.”
“So why does it still run?” Max asked.
“Ruggedized it.”
“I realized you could do that to a laptop,” Shelby said. “Didn’t know they had anything big enough to protect a tank.”
“They can be armored up. There’s a good supply of gasoline in the back, and I managed to get a few weapons and some extra ammo, plus some food and utility packs for everyone.”
“Then we’re as prepared as we can be.” Patrick nodded toward their cars. “We brought more food, tents, and our own handguns and rifles.”
Gabe reached into the Hummer and handed Shelby and Bianca a radio that looked to Carter like a SAT phone, only there were no satellites anymore.
“They’re preset to the correct frequency. Their radius is supposedly 50 miles, but that’s questionable. They should operate fine between vehicles.”
“Why are we even taking our vehicles?” Max asked. “We’d all fit in that beast.”
“There may be places that a military vehicle won’t be welcome. If so, we’ll hide it and take yours.”
“But there may be places our vehicles can’t go,” Patrick pointed out. “That thing can go off road and through streams.”
“In which case, we’ll hide yours and take mine.”
When he opened up the payload area, Carter let out a long, low whistle.
“That’s a lot of guns.”
“M16s. I brought ten.” He passed a military-grade backpack to each of them. “It’ll feel heavy at first, but everything you need is in there should you get separated—first aid kit, emergency blanket, water purification tablets, and some MREs.”
“Why did we take stuff from Georgia’s pantry?” Carter asked Patrick.
“Because we don’t know how long we’ll be out on the road, and we may need to trade some of this stuff. We were trying to plan for every contingency.”
There were murmurs of agreement and thanks as they all struggled into their packs. Only Patrick looked comfortable in his. Max barely managed to get his arms in his, and when he did, the waist belt was around his rib cage. While the others laughed, Gabe showed him how to lengthen the straps. Carter’s mom and Bianca looked swamped by theirs.
“Those were the smallest I could find,” Gabe said, but they waved away his apology and assured him they’d be fine.
“Each pack also has a 9mm pistol. Are you all familiar with how to use a semiautomatic?”
Each person in the group nodded. Carter was suddenly glad that Roy had insisted on training them on every type of weapon they had.
“When we stop tonight, we’ll go over how to clean the pistols as well as how to use the M16s. For now, I want to emphasize that you keep this with you all the time—if you step out of your vehicle, you’re wearing your pack. Your backpack is a part of your person. This way if we’re ever separated, you have a fighting chance.” Gabe turned to Carter, who was already pulling out his insulin supplies. “Split those up between yourself, your mom, and one other person. I want you to be sure you have enough in your pack to last you a week. Clear?”
“Crystal.”
“All right.” Carter’s mom stared at the radio in her hand and then up at Gabe. “I guess you have our route planned.”
“I have an ideal route mapped out, but it’s important that we stay fluid. There’s a good chance that we’ll have to stop and turn around a few times.”
“With that thing?” Lanh shook his head. “You could go over anything in your path.”
“You’re correct.” Gabe stuck his hands in his pockets, and then he leaned in and lowered his voice, as though he was sharing a state secret. “We could, but our mission is to reach the Flint Hills of Kansas. If it’s more expedient to go around a vicinity—to avoid trouble—then that’s what we do.”
He pulled out a laminated map and spread it across the hood of the Hummer.
Max pushed in closer for a better look. “You want to follow Highway 281 north.”
“It’s what we came up with last night too,” Patrick said.
“Best to avoid the urban areas.”
“Like Dallas, sure. But are we certain we want to go the Wichita Falls route?” Shelby traced a different path—Highway 183 north through Goldthwaite, Early, Rising Star, and on up to Seymour, which lay fifty miles southwest of Wichita Falls. “Smaller towns. We could cross the Red River a few miles past Vernon. Less chance of running into big groups.”
“We have intelligence that Midla
nd to Lubbock and Amarillo has been taken over.”
“By whom?” Patrick crossed his arms and scowled at the map.
“Good question. All we know for certain is that they are not friendly to the Texas government.”
“Who would want that area?” Carter asked. “The Panhandle is desolate on a good day.”
“There’s oil there,” Lanh said.
“Exactly. Though we’re not sure what they’re going to do with it since it still has to be refined. But if they’re pushing south, Vernon would be their next stop. Our best bet is this way.” He tapped the Wichita Falls route. “Cross the Red River past Burkburnett and then shoot up west of Oklahoma City and straight into the Flint Hills.”
Gabe suggested that Max lead, followed by Patrick, and then he’d bring up the rear. Everyone started toward their vehicles—except for Carter and Lanh.
His mom looked at them quizzically, but Max began to laugh.
“They want to ride in the Hummer.”
“JLTV,” Carter corrected.
Shelby shook her head, but then she waved them on.
Gabe tossed a radio to Carter. “You two can take turns being my radioman.”
Then the engines were rumbling, and they were on their way. As they drove north through what was left of Langford Cove, Carter looked out the tinted windows and saw a pickup truck lying on its hood. Spray painted across the side was a symbol—an X inside of a circle. He had no idea what it meant, but it seemed menacing somehow. Red spray paint dripped down like blood. Carter understood that whoever had been inside the vehicle hadn’t survived. And whoever had killed them? That person was marking their territory.
NINE
Shelby and Max pulled over to the side of the road a few yards shy of the top of the hill. To the west was Hamilton Municipal Airport. Little of it remained other than charred blacktop and some planes that were mere burned-out shells. To the east were uncultivated fields as far as they could see.
The other two vehicles pulled in behind them. Wearing their packs, they jogged the final few yards to the top, Max darting behind a tree and Shelby following. They were less than a mile outside of Hamilton. Though the sun was shining, the wind was picking up from the north, and Shelby could feel it beneath her layers of clothes.
Light of Dawn Page 4