“We understand you ordered the reverend not to marry us.”
“I did.” He waits for the shock of this murmur to spread across the cafeteria. “I need everyone to ask themselves. Why are we here? Is what we’re doing here just surviving? Or is what we’re doing preserving the human race? We aren’t yet, but we could become one of the last strongholds of people left. Don’t think I’m being dramatic. Refugee camps have fallen. The only successful groups out there surviving are road gangs, and they care nothing about families.”
“We should be allowed to marry to preserve families,” Annabelle says.
“This next part some of you aren’t going to like. What we decide here will create the future for our children, and right now one hundred and fifty people won’t genetically repopulate the planet.”
“So you’re saying we’ll have to have children by several dads.”
Laughter rumbles though the assembly. A lot of women did by choice before the end.
“At our current numbers, at least five children by five different fathers.”
He almost doesn’t recover the crowd. “Before everyone gets excited, we’re a long way from crossing the baby bridge. We keep expanding and growing enough food we’ll get more people. Realistically, and if possible, offspring aren’t the best idea right now. If it happens, it happens, but protecting helpless babies…we’re going to need more people first.”
“Why can’t we marry?”
“Because we will have to cross the ‘having children’ bridge eventually, so no marriages for a while until we do.” He holds back his actual feelings and the most logical reason. People died because they couldn’t shoot their bitten spouse.
A woman he remembers saving, but not her name, stands near the back. “What about opening a church?”
Absolutely not! He wants to scream, but not at the expense of sending this congregation into frenzy. “Most of you in the room belong to a Christian denomination, but we don’t have the resources to operate fifteen churches. For now, I suggest you take up prayers in the privacy of your home.” Where they fucking belong. “When we reach a point where we are stable in our community we’ll open one of the churches and set off times for worship of denominations. I’d rather use building space for beds. There are a lot of people who have earned the right to not have to sleep in the community center. Your prayers don’t need a building to be heard.”
Another person rises. “You don’t feel we are secure?”
“We have a long way to go before we move our resources away from so many guards being on duty. So as comfortable as I sleep at night in my bed, overall we’ve more work to do. Anyone else feel different?”
This soft murmur quells quickly.
“I remind you, supply requisitions need to go to Wanikiya. We’ll prioritize them. If you need something we see as trivial, but isn’t, make sure you explain what it’s for. We’ve become good at adapting and many items have multiple uses. I do ask that requests remain reasonable. Jimmy, I’m not commandeering you a Lamborghini, and if I do, like I’m not going to keep it for myself.”
The crowd laughs.
“Did you get hurt bad?” Emily asks her hobbling savior.
“Actually, it’s stiff from sleeping so much. A rolling stone gathers no moss.”
“What does that mean?”
“You need to read some of those books you’re in charge of.”
“Aren’t there more important jobs than shelving books?”
“I heard you did real well at building the fence.”
“Not funny.”
“No. No, because these people need to feel some part of what used to be normal in their lives. I remember getting our first VCR, and since then renting movies became the normal thing to do. Throw a party, rent a movie, give movies as Christmas gifts. Miss a season of your favorite show—watch it whenever you want on tape. You’re in charge of giving back some normal.”
“Sounds good. But passing out books while others are shot at by raiders doesn’t compare. I want to know that I’m useful,” Emily says.
“Practice shooting and we’ll assign you to guard duty.”
He jumps backward onto the tailgate of a truck. Dartagnan lays out a legal pad of paper and five tape measures of various lengths.”
“No measuring until the buildings are completely safe.”
Dartagnan nods. A group of men cut the fence from the post, securing it to an inner fence along the dog run. They peel it back, allowing the majority of the camp’s citizens to shuffle through.
Emily’s savior climbs into the truck bed to address his group.
He announces to the camp crowd, “For those of you who are new, we’ve crews building a fence around the next section of land we want to appropriate. Then we open up a hole in the old fence as we just did. Before we take it down, we’ve got to make sure no biters are waiting for us. Everyone will line the inside of this fence. Spread out. No more than arm’s length apart and we’ll step forward kicking over every blade of grass to make sure no undead reside in our territory until we reach the new fence at the end.”
“What happens when we run into a building?” someone calls out.
“The line halts at any structure and the commando squad,” five men in somewhat mismatched full tactical gear uniforms march forward, “will clear the structure. No one else enters a building until they clear it. Some biters will just sit in a corner and wait. These men will clear them. Then the line moves on. We’ve got to be sure no biters are inside the fence.” He must make sure everyone understands the importance of missing an undead. “Once clear, the homes will be emptied of everything. All supplies will be inventoried.”
The crowd stirs at what they hope is his next proclamation.
“Tomorrow, these homes will be assigned based mostly on seniority. Beds and a lot of the furniture will be replaced in the homes. I remind you we assign based on space. If there’s a bedroom, someone will get it.”
Many stuck in the community center’s makeshift sleeping quarters raise a cheer. Even those who won’t get their own room realize fewer numbers in the center will make life better and give them longer in the showers.”
“We need grazing land for the cattle. I encourage everyone to plant a garden. The more food we grow the better, but if you do tend a garden, request some fencing to keep the cattle out…and a shovel.”
“Why a shovel?” someone asks.
“Every home should be issued shovels if cattle are going to roam free.” He turns to Wanikiya. “We should drag in one of those dumpsters they rent out for moving. So we compost.” He addresses the crowd, “If you thought your old neighbors who didn’t curb their dogs were a nuisance, wait until you have cows fertilizing the lawn.” That sends a laugh among them.
“Let’s get this section cleared,” Wanikiya howls.
The crowd disperses, assuming the line along the fence.
He drops back to the tailgate.
“Shouldn’t I be in the line?” Emily asks. Some already think she’s extended favoritism. She wants to prove she is like everyone else.
“I may need a runner, and I always keep someone to help watch Dartagnan if I have to check on something along the line.”
Emily nods. “Once this area opens, what happens next?”
“We need more grassland, but we’ll also expand into some more homes. Everyone has earned their own room. The fence team will get this inside fence down and then get a day off. Working outside the fence, they’ve earned it.”
“Why didn’t they fence in a few more houses?”
He shakes his head. “This needs to remain a slow process. Keep everyone safe. The guards protecting the construction workers have picked off more biters in the past week than in the last month. There seems to be a growing number of undead.”
She notes troubled lines across his face and the white hairs peppering his sprouting beard. “That bothers you?”
“This part of the state wasn’t heavily populated before. We don’t
keep a formal count of the undead. Those numbers would panic people, but we’ve eliminated more biters than there used to be people in this area.”
“Someone at the military base said some of the soldiers would discuss how these things were drawn to where people were. Most figure it’s the noise the living make, but what if something else attracts them?”
“Keep that theory to yourself,” he orders. “But it may not be wrong.”
“She’s a smart one for being young,” Wanikiya says.
A tarp covers the ground. People assigned to house cleaning crews carry out boxes of people’s once prized possessions. Other people separate the items putting any food in one truck.
“It’s redundant to move everything out to the canteen only to bring a lot of it back,” Dartagnan comments as he sketches the house on the legal pad.
“Completely redundant, but we’ve reached a state of fairness. Food will be added to the supplies. Guns to the armory. Furniture will be reassigned based on need. This family had a baby. The crib will be given to a woman who needs it. If it stays in the house no one may remember it’s there.”
“You don’t think someone would offer it if it’s needed?”
“No. People hoard just to have something after so many have lost so much.”
Emily chews her bottom lip. “I guess…makes sense.”
The five men in tactical battle armor drag a dead biter from a house and toss it into a truck containing two other corpses.
“Finally, the last house.” The tall one removes his helmet marching toward a white cargo van with the words ‘tactical unit’ spray painted on the side.
“Looks like everyone earned their meals today.” He hobbles around to the cab of the truck.
“You’re priority?” Emily wonders.
“There’s no entitlement any longer. You work, you eat. You need something, you earn it. No one has more than they need to survive. No extras. No handouts.”
“You didn’t approve of the refugee camps,” Emily realizes.
“The military should’ve handed out guns and sent every last person to take back their homes. Now when the base falls, we’ll end up with a few renegades and more biters to deal with.” He has to use his hands to pull his left leg into the truck cab. “They should’ve been training those people to defend themselves instead of coddling them.”
“Were you always this rough before the world was destroyed?” She slams the passenger door.
He laughs. “That person died.”
“I don’t want the person I was to be gone.”
“You’re fifteen; you never developed into a person.”
“You act like you know so much about teenagers. No kid in their right mind would hang out with you.” Emily notes the pained look on his face and stops before she twists the proverbial knife she just thrust at him.
“The people who we keep encountering have lasted the last nine months because they are quite psychotic. It’s the only way to survive in this new world.”
“I didn’t mean it that way. If you are crazy, I’m glad, because you saved me.”
“People will just have to accept the new rules it takes to rebuild a life.”
One of the men cleaning out the house carries out four DVD players.
“One reason I go on the supply runs alone. I won’t have altercations over a useless item.” He points to the DVD players.
“What if I brought some family heirloom with me?”
“I don’t want to take away Grandma’s china from you, but if you’re carrying that garbage when you’re fleeing the corpses, then you’ve proven my point in this redundant exercise. Those people had four DVD players. Who needs four DVD players?”
“You’re asking a lot of people to change a mindset they think they were born with.”
“Tell that to the biters.”
He hobbles from the truck to his farmhouse. Dartagnan hops from the truck bed and races through the door, notebook in hand. Emily follows.
“You’re going to have a long walk back to the community building.”
“You wouldn’t drive me?”
“Gas’s a luxury.”
“I’d more to talk to you about. And you’ve an empty bedroom. I could just stay here and you can take me to work in the morning.”
“You just have it all figured out.” He climbs the steps of the porch. “I doubt we’ve much to eat. I don’t keep much food, and what’s in the kitchen is Dartagnan’s and I don’t want to deal with his tantrum when a tin of Spam turns up empty.”
“I understand.”
He limps from the shower wrapping a towel around his waist.
“The water’s so much hotter here.”
Emily’s unexpected voice sends his hand to reach for a gun currently not on his hip.
“We don’t have to share the water with fifty other people, and you’re not invited into my bedroom. I’m not dressed. It’s a good way to get shot,” he says.
“I saw you naked at the gate.” Emily rubs the top of her right foot with the bottom of her left, failing to pretend she’s not nervous standing before his bed.
“As far as I’m concerned that’s different. I don’t like the idea of you being in my bedroom alone.”
“Do they hurt?” Emily points at the three bruises on his chest.
“Maybe a little more than I’ll admit.”
She takes a step toward him slipping the bathrobe loose on her shoulders. His chest tightens against the bruises. His blood pressure elevates, thumping in his neck. Her alabaster skin wrinkles of goose flesh from the impeding offer she’s about to make. His breath quickens. He touches the purple marks.
“Too painful to…”
She lets the robe fall to the floor. Her supple soft virgin skin heaves with each breath. She swallows with nervous anticipation. She wants him. She knows what to expect. She knows what is supposed to happen, only she doesn’t really know. No amount of slumber party gossip or even letting a boy feel her up through her shirt after she won harvest queen is like this moment.
He’s a man.
Strong.
Experienced.
So strong.
Certainly he’s made love to women before. She’s barely kissed a boy, three, in fact, and one girl, Suzie Baker. It was a stupid truth or dare bet. Suzie used too much tongue.
Three quick breaths. Her chest heaves with her excitement, bouncing her breasts with each breath. She relishes his eyes never leaving her body. She never thought she would have it in her to just stand nude before a man. She fights the urge to run from the room and hide her body under a blanket. She wishes her B-cups were bigger. She knows he likes women with curves.
Funny.
She doesn’t know. He barely glances at any of the women in the camp as far as she’s noticed. He reaches out with his left arm. She touches it. Big, powerful, not pretty, but rock hard muscle. He grips her neck and the back of most of her head with his hand. He’s got huge controlling hands. His rough touch dominates her and yet is so gentle. She feels her nipples constrict. They harden. No fantasy about some dreamy boy band member ever made them so firm. No fantasy has ever made her feel she has peed herself. Oh, god, she hopes her nervousness has not made her pee.
No. She knows girls get wet. She just didn’t know this much. He pulls her closer cocking his head and pressing his lips on hers. It’s forceful and yet not too rough. She closes her eyes. More wetness soaks her upper thighs. She opens her mouth and he pulls away, biting her bottom lip. Not a hard bite, a tease. He releases her and kisses her again. She opens her mouth inviting his tongue inside, but he just massages her lips with his. Impatient she rams her tongue into his mouth. He clamps down on it with his teeth just enough preventing her pulling back and yet not hurt.
He massages her trapped tongue. She flushes. Her eyes roll back into her skull. No boy kisses like this. To be with a man, she knows this is right. He uses his right arm to pull her lower body closer and twists her leg around his back. She wants to jerk away, e
mbarrassed by her growing wetness against his leg.
He stops.
Now she knows she peed. No guy wants that.
“I can’t do this.” He keeps her close.
“What! Why…why not?” The last thing Emily wants is for him to stop.
“You’re an amazing girl.” He holds her at arm’s length. “You’re too young.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re fifteen, a young fifteen.” He shifts his eyes from admiring her bosom. “I’m a bastard, but not that kind of bastard.”
“I want this. I want you. I want my first time to be with a man.” Tears run from her eyes. She holds in the blubbering wail. Trying to convince him she’s a woman would not be evident in near temper tantrum screams of protest. “Why don’t you want me?”
Knowing full well he shouldn’t, he continues to admire her soft breasts. The soft skin seems even more vibrant than any woman he’s ever been with. It could be her young age or her desire or the length it’s been since the last time he’s held a woman. But it seems to be the softest, flawless most perfect skin. He rubs the back of his two fingers up and down her arm. “You need to be older.”
“I may not get a chance to get older,” Emily protests. “I may not get the chance to choose who gets to touch me. I don’t want my first time to be a gang rape behind the pig barn. I want it to be my choice. To be special. To be where and when I say. I’ve met most of the women you’ve rescued and brought into our community. Not many of them haven’t been assaulted or had the attempt made. Even if next week I am brutalized, at least I had this. I had a beautiful moment I asked for.”
“You certainly behave older than just fifteen, but it doesn’t feel right. I feel it isn’t right.”
“That’s why I want it to be you. This will mean something to you, too. I won’t be tail etched on your nightstand.”
“It’s not love.” He speaks from experience.
Each breath makes her breasts rise. His eyes seem trained not to look away. “I will always love you for saving me, but no, this is not love, not like a husband and wife.” She begins to shake. “I’ll do whatever you ask, everyone behind this fence will. You saved us. You protect us. You keep us going. That’s a love I can’t explain. Grant me the right to choose who I give myself to.”
No Room In Hell (Book 1): The Good, The Bad and The Undead Page 24