by Mark Tufo
“Sure,” Jerome said as he shut the door taking a quick peek outside.
Gerald came over and handed the beer to Jerome.
“Sorry about this, man.”
“About what?” Gerald asked as the blade slid into his stomach, the impact as hurtful as if a sledge hammer had struck him.
“Why? We grew up together,” Gerald asked as he slid to the floor.
Jerome pulled the blade free. “You should have moved your truck quicker. The moment she hit your car you were a dead man...you just didn’t know it yet.” Jerome wiped his blade on Gerald’s shirt. Gerald wrapped both his hands around the gushing wound. Jerome stepped back and popped the top on the beer. He took his time drinking it, waiting for his friend to take his final breath. “You always were slow,” he added as he opened the door took a quick look around before exiting and going back to get his truck.
The Book of Riley: Part 3
My Name is Riley
Mark Tufo
This book is a work of fiction. Names, Characters, places and events are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual names, characters and places are entirely coincidental. The reproduction of this work in full or part is forbidden without written consent from the author.
Copyright 2013 Mark Tufo
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Cover Art by Shaed Studios, shaedstudios.com
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Dedications:
To my wife, a thank you seems so simple but neatly sums up everything.
To my beta readers:
Joy Buchanan
Vix Kirkpatrick
I hope you both have an idea of how appreciative I am of your extraordinary talents and your willingness to use them to help me.
As always, to the men and women of the armed forces and first responders. Your sacrifices do not go unnoticed.
PROLOGUE
Icely was wiping blood off of his neck with his left hand; with his right he was pouring a stiff glass of scotch. Schools, his security chief, was standing in front of Icely’s desk. His hands clasped behind his back. He’d been in the city since the beginning of the zombie apocalypse and he’d yet to see his boss so enraged. Schools turned slightly when the double doors opened up. Jerome Mueller, one of the gate guards, was escorted in. Icely did not turn.
“What’s this about?” Jerome asked Schools nervously. Schools ignored him.
Icely held the cool glass to his neck. “Aren’t you a guard of the eastern most route?” he asked.
Schools watched as Jerome licked his lips trying desperately to get some liquid into the rapidly drying hole in his face.
“I had the night off,” Jerome replied.
“Is that what I fucking asked?” Icely said, turning, his eyes boring holes into Jerome. The guard took an involuntary step back.
“N-no, sir. Y-yes, sir. I’m a guard on the eastern most route out of town,” Jerome stuttered.
“Notice anything unusual this morning?” Icely asked casually, sitting down as he did so.
“I-I had the night off, Icely. I...I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Jerome said, his eyes darting about wildly from Icely to Schools.
“You missed all those fucking alarms?” Icely asked, holding the glass to his forehead, letting his head bow down a bit.
“I got drunk...um, yeah I went to the dog fights and got shit-faced,” Jerome said, thinking he had hit upon a perfect alibi.
“I was there,” Schools said, turning just a bit more. “I didn’t see you, but then again, there were a lot of people. Did you see what happened to Thorn?” Schools asked, referring to the champion fighting dog that had lost his life to Riley.
Jerome’s eyes widened at first in surprise and then narrowed when he realized Schools was attempting to trip him up. He once again licked lips that were beginning to stick to his teeth from lack of moisture.
“Fine. I didn’t go to the fights…I still got drunk as a skunk.”
“What am I to think, Jerome? If a man lies about one thing, he’s likely to lie about another,” Icely said. “You know as well as anybody that if the alarm rings, no matter if you have the night off or not, you have to go to your duty station.”
“Fuck, Icely, for two alarms I went to that damn gate. Spent my damn entire night there waiting for nothing. Never saw so much as a pigeon shit on a statue. It was my night off!” Jerome said, hoping his loud vocals would profess his innocence.
“It’s the third time I’m concerned about,” Icely said softly and in direct contrast to Jerome’s outburst. “Schools, tell him what you found.” Icely rubbed the cool glass all over the top of his head.
“Found your gate partner Gerald dead in his home, stabbed to death,” Schools said, studying the other man’s face. He noted a hint of panic…and then the feign of surprise.
“Gerald’s dead?” Jerome asked. “We’ve been best friends for years.” Jerome tried his best to shed a tear. It wasn’t working; it seemed that fear had dried up his tear ducts as well. “Knife to the belly, who would do such a thing?”
“Haven’t you watched enough damn television to know better?” Schools asked. “Criminals really are stupid. It never ceases to amaze me.”
“What...what are you talking about?” Jerome asked.
“I never said anything about him being stabbed in the belly,” Schools said.
Jerome reached to his side and pulled out a large knife. Schools thought the man might be an idiot, but he was quick as a snake.
“Gerald was a fucking asshole, Icely. He let them girls get away, I was just saving you the time of having to kill him yourself.” Jerome held the knife out in front of him, dried spots of blood visible on the blade.
“How kind of you,” Icely replied never looking up.
That is one cool customer, Schools thought.
“Dispensing the king’s justice and all,” Icely said, holding his glass up. “I guess I should thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” Jerome said, relaxing a bit, not realizing Icely was being sarcastic.
Schools often wondered how there could be so many criminals running around when the vast majority of them were idiots.
“Bends, show him how grateful I am,” Icely said.
Bends was the large man behind Jerome who had brought him to Icely. Bets had been taken on Bends’ previous job – it ranged from bouncer to bodyguard, and a couple even had him as a mafia enforcer. He’d only smile when someone would ask, and the pot would grow larger as more and more guesses came in. It was Vegas and some of the old habits died hard; folks would bet on just about anything here.
Schools heard the whistle of the riot stick as it sliced through the air, and then the sickening crunch of bone as the baton splintered the side of Jerome’s knee. It was hard to tell which came first – the scream, or the collision of Jerome’s body with the floor. The knife, as if planned, flew through the air and landed flush on Icely’s desk.
Jerome was rocking back and forth on the ground, knee up to his chest, both hands wrapped around it in a protective gesture. “My knee, my knee!” he kept sobbing.
“Shut the fuck up,” Icely said in a conversational tone as if he had asked the man if he would please pass the iced tea.
To his credit, Jerome mostly did. There was some slight sobbing but he bit back most of the cries.
/> “Bends, please sit him down,” Icely said.
The big man grabbed Jerome under the armpits and neatly deposited him in one of the two leather chairs in front of Icely’s desk. Jerome’s posture never changed; he had been clutching his leg on the ground, in the air, and still was as he was seated. Tears were now freely running down his face.
“Know what I hate most of all?” Icely asked Jerome.
Jerome shook his head from side to side.
“Liars…I hate liars most of all,” Icely said, taking a big pull from his drink.
Schools thought that was a slightly skewed view of the world considering Jerome had just killed someone. But then again, Jerome had lied to Icely while he had killed another.
“So what happened out there?” Icely asked. “And if you bring up that drinking bullshit again I’m going to have Bends shove that nightstick up your ass so far it’ll tickle your tonsils.”
Bends looked as his crowd-control wand wondering if it was long enough to do as Icely said. He deduced he would have to use part of his forearm to get the task complete, but that it could be done. Gonna get messy, he thought.
“The bitch got away. She slammed into the front end of Gerald’s truck and took off. Gerald told me he got word we couldn’t shoot them.”
“See? How hard was that?” Icely asked, spreading his arms wide, a beaming smile across his face.
“I’m sorry,” Jerome said.
“These things happen,” Icely told him. “But you know what I hate almost as bad as liars?” Icely intoned. “Losers,” he replied quickly before giving Jerome a chance to speak. “Bends.”
With the one word, the stick was once again hurtling through space, this time making impact with the side of Jerome’s head. An ejection of material sprayed from the strike, blood shooting up with bits of hair, scalp, and connective tissue. The second blow created a fissure; Schools could see the pink of brain as Jerome’s skull separated by as much as two inches at its widest point. Jerome’s legs were thrusting about violently as if in the throes of a mal-seizure.
Urine pooled in the chair and then trickled to the ground in a pattering. It was the smell of released bowels that nearly had Schools turn away. And through it all, Icely was staring intently at Jerome, his eyes nearly glistening with excitement as he watched the other man die.
“Want a drink?” Icely asked Schools when, after ten agonizing minutes, Jerome finally and thankfully stopped twitching.
“I don’t like to start much before nine,” Schools told him, trying to find some humor in this violent beginning to his day.
“Bends, get him out of here,” Icely said as he got up to pour himself another drink.
“Icely, the girl and Mia have almost a two hour head start. When are you going to let me chase her down?” Schools asked. He thought the time away from the city and his boss might do him some good.
“Do you know where they’re going?”
“How could I?” Schools asked. “And the longer we wait, the better chance they have of getting away.”
“Relax, Schools, you’re too uptight. Look at how at ease Jerome is,” Icely said as Bends pulled the limp body out of the room. “I don’t see you smiling…that not funny for you?” Icely asked.
“The punishment needed to be done. I’m just not a fan of the way it was carried out,” Schools told him.
“Po-tay-to, po-tah-to, who gives a fuck?” Icely said nonchalantly.
“It’s your call, Icely.”
“I’ll be ready to leave soon,” Icely said. “Now go get a team together.”
“You’re coming?” Schools was shocked.
“I think the town will be just fine for the few hours I’m gone.”
“That confident?” Schools asked.
“I am. I know where they’re headed,” he said as he tossed a picture onto the desk.
Schools reached over and grabbed it. The girl Jess was arm-in-arm with a thin boy only a little taller than herself; the Red Rocks amphitheater was their backdrop. He turned the picture over. On the back it read ‘Justin & me 2010’ with a few smiley faces and hearts drawn on it. Schools placed the picture back on the desk. “A little presumptuous, don’t you think?” Schools asked.
“It was found in the car she came into town in. It’s a zombie apocalypse…people only take what is absolutely necessary, and yet she has this on her.” Icely grabbed the picture and rolled it into a ball, hurtling it at the wall. “She’s going back to find him.”
“It’s possible, Icely, or maybe they were on vacation there. You have no proof other than—”
“I fucking said she’s going there!” Icely screamed as he thrust himself up, his chair skittered to the wall.
“We’ll be ready to leave when you are,” Schools said as he turned and left.
CHAPTER ONE
“There’s no one coming?” Mia asked for at least the seventh time, plus more. She kept looking through the rearview looker as if she thought it was broken. Every time she asked, Jess would turn around and look out the back.
“Nobody,” she replied.
I sat there looking at my pack. Mia was our newest addition; she seemed like a nice enough two-legger and Jess liked her just fine. I was going to keep an eye on her for at least a little while, even if she had helped us escape. If the cat was right, there weren’t very many trust-worthy two-leggers. Something that made my stomach hurt just to think about. I didn’t necessarily believe the cat, but it seems to me she’s been right at least as many times as she’s been wrong and I am not going to have that little self-serving feline tell me ‘I told you so’ again.
“Mia smells nice, think she has any milk?” Zach asked.
Patches, who had been slumbering (seems that’s all she ever does), jumped up when Zach spoke and had to work hard at not falling off the wheeler seat. Out of us all she’d been having the hardest time adjusting to the baby ‘speaking’.
I knew what he was asking. I’d seen Zach suckle from his alpha’s teat before. I did not smell that on her. If she had ever been with child it was a long time ago.
Ben-Ben was curled up and sleeping next to Zach, his legs began to twitch and he would let out involuntary yips. I figured he was having a bad dream.
“Ben-Ben,” Zach said, reaching a fat fist down to the dog’s sensitive snout. He gripped a bunch of the dog’s whiskers and yanked.
Ben-Ben pulled back awake, his eyes wide with fright. It took him a few moments to figure out where he was. “Riley, it was the worst dream ever!” he cried.
I figured he was dreaming about the lost defense of our home or any of the other bunches of things that had gone wrong since that night. Maybe he was even remembering his days at doggie jail. I shuddered thinking on any of them. I should have known beforehand when he spoke.
“There was this giant piece of bacon!” he started, drool falling from his maw. “It looked so soft, and fat was dripping from it. I just wanted to eat it so bad.” He whined. “But every time I tried to move closer, the bacon would move, too. And then when it finally stopped moving, I was stuck in deep, wet ground. I couldn’t move my paws, Riley. It was the worst thing ever!”
That’s the worst thing ever? I thought. If only that was the case.
“Oh, you poor baby,” Mia said, turning to look at Zach. “You must be starving.”
“I’m starving!” Ben-Ben barked, licking her paw.
“Umm, Mia, you’re drifting off the road,” Jess said, bracing her hands in front of her.
We were all tossed around as the wheeler was jerked back onto the hard ground.
“Sorry,” Mia said sheepishly. I could tell she was embarrassed.
Mia looked up again at the rear viewer. “I don’t understand why he isn’t following. He’d never give up so easily.”
“It’s a good thing, right? Maybe he just doesn’t think we’re important enough,” Jess said with hope.
“It’s not if we’re important enough, it’s that we defied him and he needs to make an exam
ple out of us. People will think if we could do it then so could they, and pretty soon his power will be undermined. He’ll never allow that.”
Two-leggers had horrible noses, and we had so much distance on him, I wasn’t sure why they were so concerned. I had heard and shared in their happiness as they said we had entered into Arizona and then another strange place called Utah. How far could he track us?
I once heard alpha male say ‘great minds think alike’. It was two summers ago and he had just come home from a place he called ‘work’. (Sounded like walk to me, I never understood why I couldn’t go with him). She-alpha had come out the front opener to greet him, kind of like a good butt-smelling. And before he could offer her his greeting, she said ‘Ice cream’.
“Just what I was thinking – great minds think alike,” he had replied with a smile.
I had not known what that velvety sweet treat was until we all piled into the wheeler and headed out to a small home that traded paper and metal for the stuff. Best trade ever! Can’t eat paper or metal.
Jess’ other brother Daniel, who died the night of the dead ones, had gotten a huge serving of the treat. When he went to lick it, part of it had fallen off and onto the ground. He had cried almost as much as when he had fallen off his two-wheeler and made life fluid come out his knees. I didn’t see the problem; I had sniffed at the ice cream once and licked it clean off the hard ground, loving every tongue full, even at the end when my tongue got hot from licking the ground! Oh that was heavenly.
“We’re two states over,” Jess said. “How can he follow us?”
And just like that, the fond memory of the fallen treat was wiped from my mind.
“We’re on the same road we left town on…Route 15. How hard do you think it’d be?” Mia asked back.
“Can’t we take another road?” Jess asked. I could smell the waves of panic coming off of her.
“Maybe, but I don’t know the area and we don’t have a GPS. Check the glove box for a map,” Mia said.