Keo just barely managed to pull the trigger—he had a pinpoint bead on its head!—when it batted the gun out of his hand—
—Bang! as the round went off—
—and broke his left wrist in the process.
Keo would have screamed in pain if he had the chance, but he didn’t, because before he could even open his mouth, it struck him in the chest with the heel of its palm. He flew across the air and slammed into the three-foot wall, and his tilting momentum would have flipped him right over the edge if the creature hadn’t grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him back.
Jesus Christ, it was fast. How was it so fast?
Glowing blue eyes bored into Keo’s soul, and he couldn’t have looked away even if he wanted to. The eyes were hypnotic, their every beat seemingly in sync to his own heartbeat. (How is that possible?) The impossible sensations of cold and heat radiated from every one of its pores and reached out across the space between them to blanket Keo, and no amount of squirming he did could prevent it.
His body was imprisoned against the wall, and he could feel empty space behind him. The only thing keeping him from toppling over and falling, if not to his death, then a very painful landing, was a grinning abomination that shouldn’t exist at all, but there it was, there it was.
It leaned toward him, fingers tangled up in the fabric of his jacket. It wasn’t straining; despite its elongated frame and rail-thin form, the ghoul had the strength of ten men, if not more. And it could, right now, snap his neck if it wanted to.
It could do just about anything to him right now, if it wanted to.
“Haven’t you been enjoying our little game, meat?” it hissed. “I sense displeasure in how things are going. Why? Did you think it would end any other way? Well, did you?”
Keo grimaced. The sound of its voice was like gravel pouring into his mouth, scratching and clawing at his tongue and throat as it went down.
He pushed through the disgust to grit his teeth back at the creature. “If you’re asking for opinions, may I suggest you go fuck yourself.”
Even as he said those words, Keo remembered the knife on his left hip. Not his, but the spare Felix had given him. It was six inches of silver-coated metal, and all he needed to do was to reach for it and drive the point through the monster’s head. The brain on the other side was its Achilles’ heel. If he couldn’t shoot it, maybe he could knife it.
His fingers were already close to the knife’s hilt. Two inches, maybe less. It would take half a second to grab it, draw it, and raise it.
…grab it, draw it, and raise it…
One second. That was all he’d need. He’d have to catch it by surprise because it was so fast. So, so goddamn fast.
Maybe he needed just a little over a second…
“I’ve found her, you know,” the creature hissed.
Her? Keo thought, his eyes and every part of his focus on the creature leaning over him. He could feel its heat against his cheeks, the fluctuations going from ice cold to warm, then scalding hot, to freezing again. It was unsettling. Everything about this creature was impossible.
“I tracked her smell all the way to the city, and beyond,” it said.
“Beyond?” What the hell is it talking about?
Its lips—razor-thin, like bloody veins—creased into a smile. “The ranch,” it hissed, its hot breath brushing against his exposed skin, causing his body to pickle all over. “I found the ranch, meat sack. Your ranch.”
The ranch…
It was talking about Bunker’s ranch, just behind the city of Longmire. The same place Keo and Lara had called home for the last few months. Where they’d found peace and quiet and began talking about starting a family.
The ranch…
It had found the ranch. It had, somehow, tracked Jackson there. That meant it had found, by extension, Lara, even if it didn’t know she existed. (God, he hoped it didn’t know she existed.) Even if it didn’t know she was the only reason Keo was still alive now, desperate to get back to her.
The ranch…
It must have read the reaction on his face, because the creature’s smile widened, the corners creeping even higher. If it were still capable of human joy, Keo thought that was what it was flushed with right now. It had gotten to him, saw his response to its taunts, and it was bathing in his distress.
The fucker was enjoying every second of Keo’s misery.
Now.
Now now now!
Keo reached for the knife and drew it from the sheath.
One second. Maybe less!
It laughed and grabbed the knife by the blade with its bare hand and ripped it out of his grip. Keo hadn’t even managed to lift the weapon high enough to attempt a strike. The ghoul had been too fast, too ready, and for all he knew, it’d just been luring him in to make the attempt just so it could spoil it, so it could cause him even more distress as he saw his improvised plan go up in smoke.
It pushed him further against the wall, then almost over the top. The only thing keeping him from going completely over was the ghoul’s fingers holding onto a thick wad of his jacket. A simple effortless shove, and he’d go right over. It wasn’t a terribly long fall—just one floor—but it would hurt nonetheless. And if he happened to land on the wrong body part, it might also cost him more than that.
The creature tossed the knife away. Keo watched the blade clatter against the floor, landing close enough to Felix’s unconscious form that it nearly cut the slayer across the forehead as it skidded past.
Felix. He was still where Keo last saw him, his back turned to Keo. The slayer hadn’t gotten up or even shown signs that he was alive. For all Keo knew, he might have been dead. Keo didn’t know how badly the man was injured. Had the creature actually killed Felix before throwing him at Keo? There had been no time to check on Felix’s condition, but given how little the man was moving now…
He’s dead. He’s probably dead.
What about…
Huston. She had gone silent a while ago, but Keo hadn’t noticed until now because he had his own problems to deal with. She was also where he’d last seen her, but not on her knees anymore. Huston lay sprawled on the floor, a dark red pool of blood getting bigger underneath her unmoving body. Her detached right arm, somehow still gripping onto her pistol, rested a few meters away.
There was a good chance Huston was dead.
A “good chance?” Oh, who was he kidding. The medic was 100 percent dead. One hundred fucking percent.
And he was next.
The creature was holding its cut hand over Keo’s head. He tried to turn away as thick drops of blood dripped onto his forehead and slowly, disgustingly slid down the bridge of his nose and cheeks.
“What do you say, meat sack?” it hissed, its voice digging into his skin like knives. “Should I make you one of mine? This game of ours has run its course, don’t you think? Maybe I should take you along with me, as I descend on this ranch of yours. Would you like that? Would you like to go home?”
It loosened its grip on his shirt, and Keo’s body tilted dangerously over the top of the wall. He stuck out both hands in search of a handhold but couldn’t find any. He fought through the urge to grab at the creature’s extended arm to keep himself from falling. He imagined it howling with laughter if he did that.
“Answer me, meat,” it hissed. “You’re starting to bore me.”
Then, out of the corner of Keo’s right eye, there was movement.
Felix.
Felix was moving.
The creature either heard or glimpsed the slayer rolling over on the floor, or it saw the shocked expression on Keo’s face and figured it out, because it turned its head to look in Felix’s direction.
“Still alive?” it asked in a singsong voice that told Keo it wasn’t the least bit scared. If anything, it sounded almost happy, maybe because it meant it could torture Felix, too, once it was done with Keo.
Felix had rolled over onto his back. Blood dripped from gashes along his cheeks
and forehead, and his nose might have been broken. He was bleeding from a dozen other cuts, and blood pooled greedily around him, more dripping from his chin.
The slayer was holding something in both hands, clutched against his chest. In his left was a small cream-colored object that looked like a long block of cheese. Keo had no idea where Felix had been hiding it all this time, but he knew exactly what that metal device sticking out of the object was, and why there was a yellow cord running from it over to a mustard-colored boxy device in Felix’s right hand.
Felix grinned at Keo, revealing a wall of blood-covered teeth. “Hey, Keo, time to make the donuts!”
The ghoul whirled around, shouting, “No!” just before Felix pressed a switch on the detonator.
Keo heard the loud and satisfying click! just as the ghoul let go of him and lunged toward Felix.
It was fast. Impossibly fast.
But it wasn’t fast enough to stop the block of C4 in Felix’s palm from detonating.
Then Keo was flying backwards through the air along with chunks of the wall he’d been pinned against, even as an intense heat swarmed and swallowed his body whole. Large and small pieces of the mall’s second floor zip-zip-zipped! around him, some coming inches from breaking open his face.
All Keo could think as he freefell through the air was Don’t break your neck! Don’t break your neck in the landing!
Twenty-Six
“Keo.”
Felix was dead. Blown up. Huston, too. He still couldn’t shake the image of the medic on her knees screaming as blood poured out of the stump that used to be her right arm. That image was going to stay with him for some time.
“Keo, can you hear me?”
He was supposed to be dead along with them. He might have been, if the concussive force of Felix’s blast didn’t send him flying off the second floor where he was able to avoid most of the mall as it caved down. That was probably the only thing that had saved his life. At least, he thought he was still alive. Wasn’t he? Must be, because dead people didn’t have stupid, inane thoughts.
“Wake up.”
Huston, bleeding…
“Wake up.”
Felix, grinning at him just before he clicked the detonator. How he’d managed to hold onto it and the C4 after everything that had happened, after all their plans went out the window, Keo would never know. Maybe that was what he was doing while the ghoul was torturing Keo. Ol’ Felix was putting his bomb together while he lay on the floor. But Keo would never know the truth now. In the end, the slayer had gotten the last laugh.
“Come on, wake up.”
How badly was he hurt? That was the big question. He wasn’t even sure when he’d regained consciousness. Was it morning? Was it still dark? Shit. If it was still night, then all it would take was one little ghoul to stumble over his body and finish—
“Keo!”
Who was calling his name? The voice sounded familiar, even though it seemed to come from very far away. The other side of the planet. Maybe the moon. What did words from the moon sound like?
“Keo!”
Like that. Calling his name. Why was someone on the other side of the moon calling his name? Now that was odd.
“Wake up!”
Was that…Lara? No, it couldn’t be Lara. What would Lara be doing here? She was supposed to be back at the ranch, safe and sound. He’d made sure of that. He hadn’t allowed her to come with him because she was everything to him. Besides, it was a quick jaunt up and down the Texas coastline. He could do that in his sleep—
“Wake up, goddammit!”
Lara… No, it wasn’t Lara. It was just Huston again. Like last time. But Huston was dead. Wasn’t she? Or had she actually survived?
“I said wake up, mister!”
Why not? He’d survived. Why couldn’t the medic have as well? Hell, for all he knew, Felix might have also—
“WAKE UP!”
He woke up. Or he opened his eyes.
She’d let her hair grow out, and it fell around her beautiful face, her crystal blue eyes full of life against the morning sunlight.
…the morning sunlight…
She smiled down at him. “Keo.”
“Yes, ma’am, what can I do for you?” Keo said. Or croaked out. Then he was coughing as his chest constricted and about a hundred different particles of dust trapped inside his nostrils and mouth and throat tried to choke him to death.
“Water! I need some more water!” Lara was shouting.
Lara. It was Lara.
His Lara.
What was she doing here? It was too dangerous. There were ghouls…
No, not dangerous. Morning sunlight against his skin, causing him to blink as he looked up at Lara while she tilted his head back. Keo opened his mouth and let warm liquid satisfy his parched mouth and flow down his throat. He swallowed it greedily, white dust covering his eyes, obscuring parts of his vision.
But the parts that he could see—Lara, hovering protectively over him—was everything.
“What are you doing here?” he asked. Or, again, croaked out.
She shook her head and sighed. Not quite exasperated but clearly annoyed. “I told you no meandering, didn’t I?”
“I wasn’t meandering. I was laywaid.”
“Laywaid? That’s not a word.”
“Bunker says it is.”
“It’s waylaid, you numbskull,” a familiar voice said from somewhere in the background.
Lara turned her head to look at the speaker. “Don’t call my man names, Bunker.”
“He’s an idiot,” the man said.
“He’s my idiot.” She turned back to him. God, her eyes were so blue, and how he loved the way they sparkled in the sunlight. “Aren’t you?”
He smiled up at her. “Yes, ma’am.” Then, “How did you find me?”
“It wasn’t hard. We just followed the path of destruction. How much of that was your doing?”
“Only a small part.”
“Now why don’t I believe you?”
“It’s true.”
“I definitely don’t believe you,” she said, and sat him up further.
Keo scanned the destruction. There were blocks of concrete in piles scattered across the length of the lobby. Glass fragments carpeted the floor, crunching every time Bunker walked over them as he went through the rubble, poking at crevices with his AR rifle. The rancher looked as if he’d come armed with everything he had. Keo hoped they’d brought along a spare horse with them, because he didn’t think he could walk that far home.
The acidic smell of vaporized ghoul flesh stung his nostrils and the exposed parts of his face. He wanted to move but couldn’t, so made do with sitting on what felt like a part of a fallen wall as Lara tended to him.
She was cleaning his face with a wet wipe while keeping him sitting up with her other hand. The cold and wet towel tingled against his skin, and there was feeling in his legs and arms, so that meant he wasn’t paralyzed from the explosion and subsequent fall. The rest of him was a throbbing sea of pain and aches and bruises. His shirt was open, and there were bandages along his face, arms, legs, and chest. He didn’t even want to see what he looked like underneath the articles of clothing Lara hadn’t cut away to treat his wounds.
But he’d get to see, because he was still alive.
He was still alive!
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“What do you think I’m doing here, mister? Looking for you.” She continued cleaning him, moving around to get at every part of his face and neck. “God, you look like shit. And that’s me being nice.”
He managed a grin. “That’s you being nice?”
She frowned. “You’re so wrapped up with bandages that you look like a mummy right now. You have burns along your arms and body and face. Plus, I’m going to need to make splints for your legs before we can even begin trying to move you.”
“That good, huh?”
“Worse.”
“Can’t possibly
be worse.”
“It’s worse. You’re in really bad shape. I would ask if a building fell on you, but I already know the answer. Can you feel your legs?”
“Yes.”
“Is there pain?”
“A little,” he lied.
Not that Lara believed him, by the look on her face. Of course, Lara had seen plenty of injuries in her lifetime. Even if she didn’t have that experience, she could probably read the lie on his face easily enough. Most people couldn’t—at least, Keo liked to think most people couldn’t—but it was impossible to lie to Lara.
“Just a little, huh?” she asked.
“I’m fine.”
“The hell you are.”
“I’ll get better.”
“Yes, you will, because I’ll make sure of it. You got that?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I’m glad we’re on the same page. How’s—”
“Jackson,” Keo said, cutting her off. “Did she find the ranch?”
“She did,” Lara said, nodding. “And she brought me what I needed, thanks to you.”
“She’s okay?”
“I tended to her wound, but she was touch and go all night. She was still unconscious when Bunker and I left her at the ranch.”
Lara stopped wiping his face and leaned forward. She kissed him softly on the lips, as if afraid she might hurt him if she pressed too hard. He was glad she’d gone the gentle route, because he wasn’t sure he could handle anything stronger, even if it did feel incredible.
“You did good, mister,” she whispered. “Really good.”
“Aw, shucks,” Keo said.
She sat back and smiled. Then she looked down and put her hand over her belly.
It was a little more obvious now even underneath the thick fabric of her jacket and the vest she was wearing. Not by very much, because she still wasn’t that far along. Anyone who didn’t know her situation wouldn’t have guessed.
He put his hand over hers. “You’re okay?”
She nodded. “We’re doing fine, and we’ll stay that way because of you.”
Everything about her was radiant, and he was reminded of what people used to say about how pregnant women always had a glow about them. He hadn’t believed it before. But now, looking at Lara as she glowed in front of him, he decided they were right after all.
Road to Babylon (Book 8): Daybreak Page 25