“Do you have a better idea?” Rachel shouted.
Nicky cursed and helped Cage and Rachel drag the dead body away from the doorframe. Selena and Lindsay ran into the stairwell. Cage held the door open, waiting for Adam.
Adam sprinted up the sidewalk and through the broken glass doors. A zombie – a man with a dark moustache - reached for him. The zombie’s fingers grabbed his shoulder and Adam lost his balance. He tumbled head over feet onto the glassy floor.
“Adam!” Selena screamed.
Rachel ran to help. Ten more zombies busted through the front door. Adam shoved the moustache zombie off him. Cage wielded his pipe at the group that surrounded Adam and Rachel. Another swarm of zombies pushed through the door. They flowed into the building like rushing water.
“Get inside! Now!” Lindsay screamed from the stairwell.
Cage lifted Adam to his feet. Rachel fired a gun at close range. Two zombies wearing U of M t-shirts crumbled to the ground.
“Rachel, come on!” Cage screamed.
Cage, Rachel and Adam ran to the stairwell. Cage could feel the hot breath of the creatures on his neck. Over forty of them had filled the common room. More of them poured in through the front doors.
They ran into the stairwell and Nicky slammed the steel door behind them. The zombies hammered on the other side. A hand shattered the window. Dirty, bloody hands reached through the small squared opening in the door.
“I love how we keep escaping by the skin of our teeth,” Nicky said. “It’s never a dull moment.”
Selena wrapped her arms around Adam. “You made it, you made it.” His chest heaved from running and he was dripping with sweat. Selena planted kisses all over his face – his cheeks, his chin and his forehead.
“How did you get out? I didn’t see you on the roof,” Cage said.
“I fell,” Adam said. “A brick gave out and I was dangling in the air like a piñata, but I managed to pull myself up. I needed a diversion. I grabbed a sack of flour from the pizzeria, rubbed raw bacon meat all over it and put my shirt over the bag. I hoisted it back up to the roof and launched it over. They swarmed the decoy and it was enough time for me to get out. They caught wind of me once I was on the Strip and I had to haul ass. Sorry about leading them here.”
Nicky patted Adam on the back. “Bacon. Classic.”
“I’m glad you’re alive,” Rachel said.
“We’re in the same situation that we were in before,” Lindsay said. “Instead of a pizzeria, now we’re trapped in a dorm.”
Cage ignored her. “How long do you think we have until that door breaks down and all of those zombies come rushing in?”
Adam ran his hand over the steel door. It was vibrating from the zombies thrashing on the other side. “Fifteen minutes? We should go find Morgan and figure a way out.”
“We were dividing up,” Cage said. “Two groups. Each group takes three floors. I’ll go with Rachel.”
“Of course you will,” Lindsay muttered.
Adam looked at Lindsay. “Will you go with them? I think it will be better if Nicky comes with Selena and me.”
Lindsay rolled her eyes. “Fine.”
“We’ll take the top three floors,” Cage said. “Let’s meet on the third floor stairwell as quickly as possible.”
“What does your sister look like, Rachel?” Nicky asked.
“She’s eleven,” Rachel said with a broken voice. “Her name is Morgan. She has long blonde hair with bangs and blue eyes. She was wearing a neon yellow t-shirt that read, ‘Summer Science Fun’.”
Selena hugged Rachel. “We’ll find her. I can feel it.”
Rachel nodded with glistening eyes. “Thank you.”
The zombies pounded on the steel door. The groaning and hissing filled the dormitory.
“Let’s head upstairs,” Adam said. “Watch out for corners and open doors. Stick together.”
“I have to climb six flights of stairs?” Lindsay’s head fell back as she gaped up the stairwell. “Are you freaking kidding me?”
Rachel brushed past her and jogged up the stairs.
Cage followed. “Come on Lindsay, stay close.”
The stairwell was empty. Tiny bloody handprints were smeared across the wall on the second floor. The small hands made Cage sick. He quickened his pace, so Rachel couldn’t dwell on the sight.
Adam, Selena and Nicky entered the third floor while they continued up the last three flights. Lindsay was breathing heavily, but she hadn’t complained again. Cage opened the door to the sixth floor. The floor was split into a giant ‘L’ with one window at the end of each hallway. Small pockets of moonlight filtered in through the windows. Twenty doors lined each side of the hallways.
Cage quickly did the math. Forty rooms per floor with six floors meant they had over two hundred and forty rooms to search. The noise from the zombies was getting louder. How much longer did they have until they broke down the door? Where would they hide? How would they get out of the building?
“Right or left?” Cage asked.
“Right.” Rachel’s Nikes squeaked on the linoleum. She poked her head inside the first room. “Morgan?”
“This must be one of the unoccupied floors. There’s not even sheets on the bed,” Lindsay said. “Let’s go downstairs.”
“Morgan might be hiding,” Rachel said. “We need to search all of the rooms before we go down to the fifth floor.”
Cage checked room after room. Where was everyone? Had someone evacuated the kids? It was a possibility. Maybe Morgan and the other children were somewhere safe.
They searched the floor without any luck and headed down to the fifth floor. Brightly colored sheets and blankets covered the small beds in the room. Cage even saw a few stuffed animals. He turned away. He had to believe that someone rescued these children, because the alternative was too horrible to imagine.
Rachel ducked into a room. She gasped and her hand flew to her mouth.
A young boy – one of Morgan’s classmates because he wore the neon yellow camp shirt – was inside the room. His skin was pale and his eyes were ice blue. He raised his little arms and his jaw slid open.
Cage reached for his pipe, but Rachel shook her head. Tears slid down her cheeks. She kicked the doorstop and the door slammed shut before the small zombie child could reach them.
“Morgan!” Rachel screamed.
Lindsay slapped Rachel on the arm. “Shut up! Are you stupid? All of the zombies in the building are going to hear you!”
Rachel thrust a finger in Lindsay’s face. “If you lay a hand on me again, I’m going to break it. Do you hear me?”
“Cut it out, you two,” Cage said. “We need to hurry up and find Morgan before the zombies break down the door.”
“Oh, shut up Cage.” Lindsay glared at Rachel. “And you, Blondie, you can’t scream for your sister like that. You’ll attract every dead thing on the floor.”
“What’s with the ‘Blondie’? You’re a blonde, too, if you haven’t noticed,” Rachel said. “It still counts, even if it’s fake.”
Lindsay’s eyes widened.
Cage butted in. “Lindsay, what if Morgan’s hiding? What if she’s under a bed or in a closet?” He poked his head in a room. “We won’t find her unless she hears Rachel’s voice.”
Lindsay rolled her eyes and walked down the hallway. “Traitor.”
“Morgan!” Rachel called out. “MORGAN!!!”
Lindsay shot her a dirty look. “You stupid b-”
Three zombies sprang out of the room. Two women and one child – all wearing the yellow camp shirts. Bloody arms wrapped around Lindsay’s waist. She screamed as they lifted her off her feet.
“Lindsay!” Cage tore down the hallway. He saw Rachel, out of the corner of his eye, running beside him. The three zombies already had Lindsay on the ground. Rachel and Cage were twenty yards away and he wasn’t sure if they could make it in time.
A little girl screamed from the other end of the hallway: “RACHEL!!”
<
br /> Chapter Twenty-Six
Rachel slammed on the brakes.
Morgan.
The terrified cry came from the other hallway. The zombies already had Lindsay on the ground and they were still three doorways away from her. Cage was almost there, but Rachel wasn’t sure if he could fight them off alone. Lindsay needed her help.
But Morgan needed her, too.
Cage glanced over his shoulder. “Go! Go get Morgan!”
“Cage!” Rachel’s heart squeezed. How could she leave him like this?
Lindsay screamed.
“Rachel, GO!” Cage reached the struggle and flung the female zombie off Lindsay.
Rachel gave one last fleeting glance at Cage, before she turned and ran as fast as she could toward Morgan’s voice. Rachel didn’t look back. She couldn’t. She didn’t want to see the zombies tearing into Lindsay.
Rachel had searched for Morgan for two days; she wasn’t going to lose her little sister now. She flew down the hallway. Moans filled the air. Lindsay was right. Rachel’s screaming had attracted other zombies. Had the horde broken down the door?
She rounded the corner at a jarring pace. “Morgan!” Rachel peered into the passing rooms. “Morgan!”
A zombie stumbled out.
“Rachel!” Morgan’s voice came from the end of the hallway.
Without slowing down, Rachel unleashed a swing. The bat cracked the zombie’s chin and it fell backward into the wall. It reached for Rachel, but she ran past its arms.
“RACHEL!”
Rachel pumped her arms. She was almost there. The voice was coming from the last room on the left. She flung herself inside and skidded to a stop. Two child zombies clawed at a wooden closet. Long scrape marks splintered the wood.
The children’s blue eyes locked on Rachel. She recognized one of the zombies as Annabelle – Morgan’s roommate. The other zombie was a redheaded boy.
Rachel sucked in her breath. “Morgan?”
The closet doorknob twisted. “Rachel?”
“No!” Rachel cried as Annabelle reached for the closet. “Stay in there, Morgan. I’m going to get you out. Hold on.”
The boy hadn’t taken his eyes off her. Rachel gripped her bat. She could never imagine anything more horrible than what she saw now. Those poor, innocent children.
Annabelle hissed.
Rachel said a silent prayer and disposed of the two child zombies. Before she opened the closet door, she covered the bodies with a pale purple comforter. “Morgan?”
“Rachel?”
“It’s me.” Rachel opened the door.
Morgan ran into her arms. “You came for me,” she said.
“Of course I came for you.” Rachel wiped her eyes. She squeezed her little sister tight and then checked Morgan’s arms, legs and stomach for bite and scratch marks, but she didn’t see anything. “Are you okay? Did any of those things hurt you?”
“I’m okay,” Morgan said. “I hid.”
“The whole time?” Rachel heard a crash down the hallway, followed by moaning. They’d have to get out of the dorm soon. The place was swarming with zombies.
Morgan nodded. “I pretended like I was hiding from Gene. I stayed quiet the whole time. No one knew I was in here until I called your name.”
“You hid in there for two days?”
“Yeah, I had crackers and a water bottle.”
Rachel pressed Morgan against her. “I’m so sorry.”
Crashes came from the hallway. Moans and groans. The sounds of the zombies advancing up the stairwell filled the building.
“Rachel!” Adam’s voice echoed.
“In here!” Rachel screamed.
“There are other people?” Morgan’s face lit up.
“They helped me find you.” Rachel hugged Morgan and breathed in the smell of her little sister’s hair. She’d never let her out of her sight again. Adam and the others ran into the room and closed the door.
“We are in big trouble. The zombies broke through the door downstairs,” Nicky said.
Rachel wiped her tears away. “I found Morgan!”
She had expected cries of joy, but no one said anything. She blinked her teary eyes into focus. Adam and Selena held the door shut against the zombies on the other side. Lindsay and Nicky pushed a dresser in front of the door.
Lindsay.
What was Lindsay doing with Adam’s group? Rachel looked around. A horrible feeling filled her stomach. “Where’s Cage?”
Selena swallowed. “Rachel, we -”
Rachel rose to her feet. “Where’s Cage?”
No one said anything. Lindsay was a mess. Her clothes were torn. Her hair was matted against her splotchy face. Lindsay had been crying, but she was alive, which meant Cage saved her from the zombies in the hallway.
This wasn’t happening. The room began to spin. Rachel steadied herself against the closet door. “Lindsay, where’s Cage?”
Lindsay covered her face. She started sobbing. “I don’t know.”
The moaning and groaning grew to a fevered pitch. Had all of the zombies from the Strip made it into the dorm? Rachel turned to Adam and Nicky. “Where’s Cage?”
Blood was splattered across Nicky’s shirt and his hairline was wet with sweat. He didn’t say anything; he only frowned.
“I don’t know,” Adam breathed. “I think he’s gone.”
Rachel’s knees buckled. Selena grabbed Morgan from Rachel’s arms and Adam helped her to the bed. How could she sit at a moment like this? The sound of the zombies was too loud for her to think. How many of them were out there? Where in the hell was Cage?
“Gone?” Rachel said. “What does that mean? He’s dead? He’s a zombie?”
Adam kneeled in front of her. “Lindsay told us that he saved her from a group of them, but more came. The zombies broke down the door and rushed the staircase.”
Rachel was about to throw up. “Is he dead?”
“He created a diversion – with himself – to get Lindsay to safety,” Adam said. “But there were a lot of them. Lindsay said he ran in the opposite direction of the stairwell. That means he would have been cornered with about thirty or forty zombies after him.”
“Is he dead?” Rachel repeated. She couldn’t breathe. This was her fault. One hundred percent. She ran away from Cage. She left him behind.
Rachel felt numb.
Lindsay sank to the floor. The pounding on the door grew louder. “He told me to run,” she sobbed. “So I ran, but when I looked back he wasn’t there. Zombies filled the hallway.” Her eyes narrowed at Rachel. “I told you not scream! Didn’t I? I told you they’d hear your screams and come after us. This is your fault!”
Rachel glanced at Adam. “Tell me the truth. Is Cage dead?”
“There were a lot of zombies, Rachel,” Adam said. “In a very small space.”
Rachel jumped to her feet. “Stop saying that! Will one of you give me a straight answer? Did any of you see his body? Did you see him walking around as a zombie?” She looked at each one of them.
Adam stood up. “No.”
“Then he might still be alive.” A small spark of hope fluttered in Rachel’s stomach. He had to be alive. Had to be. She would search for him until she found him.
“It’s possible,” Adam conceded.
“We have to find Cage before it’s too late,” Rachel said.
The growling drowned out all sound. Death was literally at the door. The wood vibrated on the hinges as the zombies pounded against it. Cage was somewhere on the other side of that door fighting for his life. She knew it. Rachel wouldn’t give up on him. She’d find him if it was the last thing she did.
END OF BOOK ONE
Acknowledgements
First, I have to thank my brother, Chano, for this book. When we were children, we’d sneak out to the living room and watch zombie movies, always discussing how we would survive if there was an attack. I am thrilled that we were able to come up with this storyline. It has been a long time in the making. T
he setting of the novel is also very dear to me, because I was born in the great City of Flint and I have many family members still living there.
I want to thank my parents, Ruben and Lisa, for driving me around Flint. We drove through the “escape route” that Rachel and Cage used in the novel. I wanted to make it as real as possible. Location names were changed, but I hope I kept the authenticity of the book alive. I have to thank my cousin, Brooke Benson, for sending me pictures of Flint and answering all of my stupid questions.
Thanks to my husband, Joe, for listening to me ramble on about plot and setting and characters all-day and everyday. A special shout out goes to my sweet son, Jackson, for taking long naps and going to bed every night at 7:30 on the dot so mommy could write. Thanks to my mom, Joe and Chano for editing. As always, I have to thank my very talented graphic artist, Rahul Philip, for the amazing artwork on the cover. To see more of his artwork, please visit his website at: http://www.rahulphilip.com
For more information about Love & the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 1, Zombie Apocalypse Trilogy) and the upcoming Death & the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 2, Zombie Apocalypse Trilogy), please visit the following websites:
http://www.chelseabellingeri.com
http://www.facebook.com/chelseabellingeri
Follow me on Twitter: @C_Bellingeri
Other Titles by Chelsea Bellingeri:
The New England Witch Chronicles Series (Young Adult):
New England Witch Chronicles (Book 1)
Conjured (Book 2)
Wicked Betrayal (Book 3)
All Hallows Eve (Book 4)
The Zombie Apocalypse Trilogy (Young Adult)
Love & the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 1)
Death & the Zombie Apocalypse (Book 2) – Coming 2014!
Monster Club Series (Middle Grade)
Monster Club: Case of the Ivy Hollow Werewolf – Winter 2013!
About the Author
Chelsea Bellingeri is the author of the best selling young adult series, New England Witch Chronicles. Chelsea received a Juris Doctorate from New York Law School in New York, New York in 2007, and a B.A. in Sociology, with a concentration in Criminal Justice, from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Tennessee in 2004. Chelsea lives in Tennessee with her husband, Joe, their son, Jackson, and their dog, Eli.
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