by Angela White
Samantha had noticed more bodies around here than in other places, and the dead had sores that made her push away horrible flashes of the bunker where she had killed. There had been a few live people, too–brief, distant glimpses of her fellow survivors that had her dropping out of sight as fast as she could.
Sam was armed now, but shame and paranoia were her constant companions. The pair had settled onto her shoulders, making her prefer the lonely solitude to the conversations she would be forced to have. What would she say?
“Hi. I’m Samantha. I had a pass to the government’s bunker, but my chopper crashed, and now I’m stuck out in this hell with you common folk.”
Not a good idea.
She did want to be around other people again. She longed for her old life back, but she could only be with one type. She understood that now. The thought of being alone didn’t bother her nearly as much as how everything had changed, how dangerous living had become. She had to find her own kind.
Sam scanned the last of the vehicles driving through the dirty slush, lingering on the distant shadow of purple mountains with dull, white peaks. They would be full of lavender columbine by now, gigantic ash trees and evergreens providing homes for the rabbits, cranes, and larks that she hadn’t seen down here. Up there, was an entirely different world.
Her leg had healed slowly and painfully, forcing her to spend two full weeks at a farmhouse south of the hunting lodge. She was glad the morphine had only held out for the first six days. Any more than that might have turned her into a junkie. Almost did anyway, she thought, still wanting that liquid gold buzz, even though normal Tylenol was controlling the pain.
Traveling was hard, though, and she had only been able to keep going because of the cart she had found in a shed behind a vandalized golf course. She had been on the road for almost a week now and still wasn’t sure if it had been hunger driving the wolves or something else. The way they’d tracked her, surrounded her, and waited for the storm’s cover, implied organization.
“Almost like they planned it,” she muttered, pulling her trench coat shut as the last of the muddy jeeps fell out of her view. It was a view that was distorted by the rain on dirty glass and the tier of dark Hanukkah candles that would stay that way forever. “They were the hunted before. Now, they were the hunters.”
Her words, spoken quietly, disturbed the occupants of the dank basement that she hadn’t noticed when she’d quickly limped down the steep wooden stairs. She had been seeking refuge from the large group of obviously dangerous men, but Sam suddenly realized her safe shelter wasn’t so safe. She froze in abject terror.
There was movement in the corner. It was a soft slither around a cobweb-covered ceiling beam, long and drawn out as it came closer.
Another ripple of movement came along the floor, a dark, weaving shadow under the inches of water–and then Sam’s paralysis broke. She had to get out of here!
Staying low, Sam swung the sharpened walking stick in front of her as she limped to the stairs, able to feel the snakes gliding toward her from above. There was no hissing, no noises except for hers, and it was menacing.
Samantha took the steep stairs two at a time, seeing another, larger snake coming from behind the wooden steps, and she lunged up the last three.
Unable to stifle a cry as she rolled, Sam lost her cane, and her bad leg took the brunt of her weight.
The air shifted near her arm, and Sam rolled again, hitting the wall. On her feet a second later, she quickly limped to the door, unable to see anything following but sure the angry reptiles were there.
The feeling was gone as she traveled through the heavily decorated front door, but she didn’t slow as the rain pelted her, only slid her goggles over haunted blue orbs. The ghost town around her was silent, smoking heavily in places, and Sam wondered if the fallout that was changing nature’s routines and habits was also affecting the people.
She had seen things since the war that made even Stephen King’s stories feel tame, and it was everywhere. There were dead corpses full of bullet holes, female bodies still lying with their legs spread and mouths open in mid-scream, the family dog impaled on a broken porch rail, blood smears in the shape of a small hand on the stone walk. Her attention landed on these things and flew away each time, but she knew she’d experience them up close and in perfect detail during her dreams. There was no escaping that hell.
2
Cesar and his slavers were indeed going to southern Wyoming, where survivors had been heard calling for help but had attracted his attention instead. These refugees read the Pledge of Allegiance and sang the anthems over the radio. Cesar couldn’t wait to show them who this new America belonged to.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Night Ride
March 11th
Pitcairn Island
1
Kendle flinched at a brilliant bolt forking across the cloudy sky, stomach churning as the storm roared toward them.
“Nice night for a ride!” Luke shouted over the thunder. “Come on.”
Kendle moved faster, fighting the stiff wind and driving rain. She pulled the cabin door shut and then shouldered the pack while she darted for the idling bike.
The storm had been growing all day. When Luke had said to pack a kit, they were going to higher ground, she hadn’t argued despite not wanting to be soaked and get a chill from a midnight ride. She would face anything that kept her off that merciless ocean.
Kendle threw her leg over the seat and grabbed ahold of his belt buckle. The bike jerked forward and Luke grabbed for her blindly. He snagged her jacket and pulled her back on.
He found her hand, wrapped it around his hips, and Kendle buried her head against his strong body, heart skipping in her chest. The angry sky above them lit up again, flashing wildly, and Luke wanted to comfort her when she jumped, but already had his hands full keeping the Yamaha moving steadily on the muddy path.
Kendle knew to mold her body to his so their matched movements would help keep them balanced. She held on tight, feeling his muscles flexing, controlling, his heartbeat comforting against her ear. These things were a relief, in spite of the fear. Overall, she’d much rather take her chances on land, with Luke.
There wasn’t a road or any lights that signaled other people and she shuddered when the path they were on narrowed suddenly by more than half.
Soon, they rolled under the protective canopy of a thick forest of tall, leafy trees. Sheltered from the worst of the weather pounding on the thick vegetation far above them, Luke took a moment to ask, “You okay?”
She pushed closer against him as lightning flashed again.
“Be there in half an hour.”
Kendle nodded. She was physically terrified, but emotionally, she felt only unbelievable gratitude that someone else was in charge of this crisis.
They traveled through the thick jungle for what seemed like hours to Kendle. Muddy, unseen, leafy plants and vines slapped at them from the dense darkness around their speck of a light.
The rain beat on them again when Luke turned onto an extremely narrow path that veered out of the trees and down a steep hill. The fast-moving bike hit the bottom, and Kendle clung to LJ as they shot upward, close to tipping over. They evened out onto a rocky path that led gradually up a tall hill dotted with heavily swaying banyan trees. Rain pelted their faces, wind stealing their breath in little, painful gusts each time he rounded a curve, and Kendle held on tight, waiting for it to be over.
Blindingly vivid lightning flashed, traveling toward them at thousands of miles per hour, and their ears were filled with roaring thunder.
It slammed into the ground, exploding in a ball of vivid red and white.
Ccrraaacckkk!
There was no way to avoid the flaming, bushy tree that crashed to the ground across their path. The bike tire hit the thick log at full speed, flipping them into the air.
Arm still deadlocked around his waist, Kendle screamed, and then the breath was knocked out of her as they
hit the mud. They slid toward the edge of the steep hill, causing her to lose her grip on Luke. Kendle sucked in air to scream again, hands clawing for purchase as she felt herself start to go over. The small breath shot out in another piercing shout as she began to fall.
Luke snagged her slick wrist, pulling it out of its socket for a second of awful pain before hauling her up and into his arms. “You all right, darlin’?”
She burrowed into his chest, and Luke held her close as he got to his feet. Moving to the muddy path that he had no trouble seeing in the dark, Luke had a brief, horribly real flash of trying to carry each villager out of ground zero and shook it away. Now was not the time.
The rain fell harder, washing some of the mud from their hands and faces. Luke didn’t stop to examine the bike. He carried her to a dark hillside and gently put her on her feet.
“Hang on a minute, little girl, and we’ll be inside.”
Kendle spotted nothing that resembled a shelter, and she was impressed when he pulled aside a large patch of grass as if it was a carpet, revealing a wide, steel door set into the earth.
Realizing the term “carpet” was right, Kendle watched him twist the combination. When the door opened and he disappeared inside, she followed with only a little hesitation. She had that unnerving sense of wrongness as she entered, but it wasn’t as bad as it had been previously, and she guessed that it was one of the few wounds that might heal completely with enough time. She had been on land for a little over three weeks, but a lot of the horror was still there, lurking under the surface of her polite smiles and casual words.
The storm’s sounds were muffled by the dirt. A light flared in the darkness, and then brightened, allowing her to look around, and Kendle was glad to know they wouldn’t be laid up short.
Luke lit the lamps hanging in each corner of the long, wide room, and Kendle stared in approval. Everything they needed was here. The walls were concrete, the floors, ceiling, chairs, and small table were all made of plain yellow wood–as were the long rows of shelves running the length of the rear wall. On those shelves, there were supplies. Serious survival supplies. Lamps, batteries, weapons, a gas stove hooked to a grill, many dusty boxes marked “fragile, handle with care.” It was all neatly arranged.
There were also personal touches here that were missing from his small cabin, like the pictures of a jungle behind soldiers holding rifles up. Were these the men he had served with in ‘Nam? LJ hadn’t said he’d been there, hadn’t even told her that he was a soldier, but she knew. He was much too tight-lipped and organized to be anything but military, and she’d figured the location by his age. He had told her he would be sixty-one on the sixth of July, but she was pretty sure that back in the day, Luke had been a badass. The young pilot in those pictures certainly looked the part.
“This is amazing. You built it yourself?”
Luke unfolded a blue tarp behind the open door as she got a towel out of the pack to wipe her face. “Dug it, mostly. Frank helped when I put in the walls and ceiling. We’re only three miles from the cabin, but we’re almost a hundred feet higher. Even a rogue wave won’t reach here.”
He ducked out into the storm, and Kendle forced herself to wait, hating the awful loneliness that swept over her every time Luke got out of sight. She could follow. He’d made it clear that he liked having her around. He hadn’t even wanted to tell her that the doctor had a room in town if she felt uncomfortable staying with him. She got the sense that he was lonely too, and his full days supported that. It spoke of someone wanting to be too tired to think or even dream when he went to bed, and that, she understood completely.
Kendle covered her face with her wet sleeve as she sneezed. Wrist aching, swelling a little, she glanced around for a place to change. Seeing nothing private enough, she settled for peeling off her drenched shoes and socks and hanging her dripping jacket over a chair. Shivering as she listened to the rumble of the storm, the castaway waited nervously for her host to return.
Luke rolled the wrecked but fixable bike inside and leaned it against the wall so that the mud would drip onto the tarp. He quickly glanced away from Kendle’s transparent shirt and slacks.
He rinsed his hands and then retrieved a coil of rope and a blanket from a shelf, aware of how her eyes lingered on him while he attached the rope to the ceiling near the bunk beds.
Luke threw a long blanket over it to duplicate the area he had made for her at the cabin when she’d said she preferred to stay with him, if he didn’t mind.
“I’ll make some coffee while you change,” he offered, going to the tarp to take off his muddy boots.
Kendle quickly ducked behind the blanket, grateful. She couldn’t wait to be warm and dry again. Being wet reminded her too much of her nightmare on the ocean.
Luke tossed his soaked, mud-streaked coat over the other chair and couldn’t stop himself from stealing peaks at the slender shadow on the wall while he wiped his face and then got the water heating on the stove. He was decades older, with blood on his hands that he could never atone for, but he couldn’t deny the want. He’d been alone for a long time, and she was beautiful, young, brave…
He’d found himself hoping for signs of interest. She had told him that her career had kept her busy, that there was no husband or even a boyfriend to mourn, and Luke had been able to read nothing else. She was nice, friendly to him and good company, but also careful and closed-off. She’d clearly had a fortress around her heart, and Luke had decided he wouldn’t even try to breach those walls without at least knowing whether she saw him as an eligible man or just an old man.
“How long did all this take?” Kendle asked from behind the blanket.
Luke forced his gaze away from her alluring shadow, thinking she had to be the strongest female he’d ever met. Even the resourceful island women would still be in tears over that narrow escape, and she sounded like nothing had happened.
“Over four years.” He got the cups out, wiping the dust from them, listening to her movements.
“Anyone else know it’s here?”
“Probably. Everyone out here has a hole-up. It’s the way you do things on Pitcairn.”
“How long have you lived alone out here?” It was the first personal question she’d asked, and his reluctance to answer was clear when he finally did.
“All my life, it seems like.”
Kendle tossed her dripping sweater over the rope, hiding her underclothes beneath her slacks, and came out from behind the blanket.
Luke felt his lungs tighten. Her vivid red skin was a sharp, sexy contrast to the simple white dress that outlined a perfect young body. For an instant, Luke considered asking her outright to be his woman. Common sense returned quickly, with guilt on its heels.
He turned away, missing her look of relief. Those were choices she definitely wasn’t ready to make yet. She was weak, vulnerable, still dealing with the grief of losing her sister. Men and sex were the last things on her mind…right?
“How long do you think we’ll be here?”
“Day or two. We’ll be able to see the beach come dawn. If the crabs and sandpipers are out, I’ll know for sure it’s okay. Likely, I overreacted.”
Kendle pulled dry anklets over slender feet. “I’m okay with it.”
Luke ducked behind the blanket while Kendle wandered the far ends of the long room, impressed. She and her parents had each had an area in their homes, but his was the king of all shelters–medical supplies, survival books, a long box with a picture of a thermal tent on the side, and a generator in the corner. All these things said Luke was a realistic, reliable person–but the creature comforts, like the cigars and chocolate bars, said life with him wouldn’t be cruel either.
Life with him? Kendle asked herself sharply, hearing the clink of pants with a belt still in them hitting the floor. Are you conceding your real life for this? Not even planning a single, foolish attempt to get back?
No. Going on the water was unthinkable. Unless a plane came, she was here t
o stay.
With Luke?
Kendle wasn’t sure yet, wasn’t sure how much she could give him. There were younger, more arrogant men here. She’d met them and been asked out by a couple but had said no, even letting one think she and Luke already had something going on so he would take the hint and leave her alone.
She felt safe with Luke. She knew instinctively that he was her own kind, and while she knew people who’d started relationships with less, she didn’t think she was ready for all the complications that always came. She owed him a great deal, and he was definitely one of the good people, but his demeanor said he’d done terrible things in the past. She often wondered if his solitary life here was a self-imposed penance for it.
There was a choice coming, though. She felt it in his heated gaze when he thought she wasn’t looking, felt it when they shared a meal over a flickering candle. While it flattered her, she didn’t encourage him or lead him on. Luke was a full-grown man who could easily take what he wanted if provoked, and that was nothing to play with when you were almost alone together on a deserted island paradise.
“Where did you get all this stuff?” she asked, needing to fill the silence as he emerged from behind the blanket. His big, scarred hands were tucking in a plaid shirt around lean hips, and Kendle found herself thinking again that he was in great shape for sixty.
“Plane used to come. Some of it’s from crashes or what the tide brings in. A little came from people leaving, not wanting to take it to the mainland with them.” He paused, looking at her with dark eyes lined by the coming of old age. “Some from my time in the service.”
Kendle recognized the first information he’d offered about his past. She stopped herself from asking anything, knowing he expected it but didn’t really want to give it. Instead, she sat down, still shivering a little.
Luke took a long suede jacket from a wall peg and draped it over her shoulders, not letting his restless fingers make contact with her skin.