The Break Free Series Box Set [Books 1-3]

by Fitch, E. M.

  Quinton staggered out of the swamp and came towards them. He looked from each face to Jack before shaking his head.

  "No," Jack whispered, staring.

  "I'm sorry, Jack." Even as he spoke, the whites of his eyes were staining yellow and his breath was coming fast and sharp. Emma stepped forward, tear tracks streaked her face but they were drying now. She took a deep breath and stretched out her hand. And it was now that Kaylee remembered all the times her sister had sat, one on one with Quinton, getting him to agree to shoot her if ever she turned. Maybe their arrangement was reciprocal.

  Quinton locked eyes with her sister. "You sure?"

  "Of course," she answered, her voice low. He nodded. His eyes blinked shut and he opened them, the lids fluttering rapidly as his cornea stained a deeper yellow. It was happening fast. The trembling in his hands was become forceful, spreading up his limbs.

  He tossed his gun at her feet with twitching hands. She bent to retrieve it.

  "I can do it," Bill offered, stepping forward but Emma shook her head.

  Quinton's breath was coming in a snarl now, his hands shaking with sickness, the whites of his eyes completely yellow. With only a moments hesitation, Emma raised the pistol, pulled the trigger, and shot Quinton straight through the forehead.

  He fell with a smack into the mud behind him, sinking slightly into the soft earth. A halo of blood mingled with the muddy ground around his head.

  No one spoke. Kaylee saw Emma tuck Quinton's gun into her belt and she turned, her back to the rest of the group.

  It took a moment before any one of them moved. Kaylee was empty. Grief would come, devastation and horror would come for what she had become when she brought that ax into Cynthia, for what her sister had to do for their friend, for the incredible loss of life that day. So much waste. First their father and now Quinton. Good and strong Quinton. His body lay in the mud, next to a dozen other infected corpses.

  "We can't leave him with them," Kaylee whispered, her voice low and soft but heard by everyone in their ever shrinking group. Her fingers, still holding Jack up, clung tighter for a moment. She saw a round of nods, but she had no idea what to do with Quinton's body. There was no shovel, no way to bury him. Just as there had been no way to bury her father.

  The river still moved swiftly behind them. The water was clean and clear now, still the occasional bit of floating debris. It was Andrew who moved back into the water, found the large piece of wood. He dragged it unto the shore, his father moving to help him.

  It was a large, flat slab of wood, something the dam must have dislodged as it exploded. It was big enough to support Quinton.

  Andrew and Kaylee pulled at Quinton carefully, the mud sucking at his body. It took most of them, Emma and Bill and even Anna, but they clumsily got him to the beach and then unto the board. Kaylee crossed Quinton's arms over his chest. His eyes remained unseeing, staring straight up into the sunny sky. He was really and truly dead. It took all of them together, all with injuries and pulling as best as they could, to get him balanced and floating in the water of the river.

  At the very last, just before they let him adrift, Emma pulled her pocketknife out of her jean pocket. She bent over the board near Quinton's head and scratched a clumsy cross over the surface.

  "He was raised Baptist," she murmured in explanation. As one, they let go of the board and Quinton joined Nick. Two Vikings floating into eternity.

  The water was freezing, but Kaylee didn't want to leave it just yet. Jack was breathing heavily, resting back against that one tree. As rest made their way toward the shore, Kaylee squatted low, so the water was lapping at her breasts, and rubbed her hands up and down her arms. Blood washed off her, rippling away with the moving water. Most of the blood had rinsed immediately, as soon as her body hit the water, but the rest was already dried, and she scrubbed at her skin until it flaked away.

  Her wounds started to ache. Not even hurt really, she felt so numb, both inside and out. But they ached enough that she remembered where they were. Her shoulder, the graze wound from the bullet that was further damaged by a broken pipe, her cheek and neck from Cynthia's nails. She brought handfuls of water to her face, scrubbing hard to loosen the blood that was caught there. She bent backwards, soaking her hair again and running her hands through before yanking it into a ponytail. She thought she might have other scratches, but she couldn't feel them now.

  If only they had clothes with them, anything so she could strip off what she was wearing and not be forced to relive the nightmare every time she looked down. But they didn't. And the only person who knew where the motor home was, where every one of their possessions was, had just drifted off down the river after her father. So she loosened her shirt and drug it over her head, beating it into a rock before rinsing it clean. She didn't bother with the jeans.

  Somewhere, fleetingly and in the back of her thoughts, she dredged up the memory of the framed photo of her family, the one she had had since the beginning, her mother's face smiling up through shiny glass. It was the one thing she took with her, tucked down the front of her shirt as she ran from her apartment building the night her mother was bit. She knew exactly where it was in the motorhome, tucked safely into a drawer next to the bed. She'd never see it again. Just like she'd never see her father or Quinton.

  When she looked back to the shore, her eyes searched first for Emma and then settled on Jack. She saw Anna, her head bent close to Jack's side. He was grimacing again, his face twisted in pain. Bill and Andrew each had a shoulder, holding him firmly braced against the tree. Anna stuffed the hole in his side with bunches of wet cloth, using a long piece to wrap around his stomach, holding the rest firmly in place.

  "You okay?" Anna asked him. Kaylee scanned him, her eyes darting over his body. Despite the goosebumps raised all along his abdomen, a thin sheen of sweat covered him.

  "You tell me," Jack answered, breathing heavily through grit teeth. Anna sighed, not answering.

  Kaylee walked out of the water, her eyes on Jack. Bill came up beside her.

  "It's man made," he said, his voice low as he pointed. Kaylee followed his line of sight and noticed a grey, filthy PVC pipe jutting from the mud. It looked like it had been there for ages, seeping water from the reservoir into the surrounding ground. Kaylee scanned the area, she saw another pipe, this one actually pumping water, fifteen feet from the one Bill had pointed out.

  "Something Marsden cooked up to keep visitors at bay?" Andrew murmured. "Like the electric fence?"

  "Does it matter?" Emma asked from his side, staring into the swamp. It stretched for as far as Kaylee could see.

  "No, it doesn't," Bill said. He gestured down the length of the beach. "I say we go the length, it has to end somewhere.We need to get out of here."

  He was right. Kaylee wasn't sure if anyone else had made it out of the power plant. Most of them had been eaten as they crossed the yard and Maggie had flown off in the opposite direction, so there was no knowing exactly where she had ended up, or if she got out safely at all. And Marsden remained unaccountable.

  She looked up at the rest of the group for the first time. Emma was hovering over Andrew, his hand reaching up to grip hers.

  They ran at least three miles before the woods thinned a bit and it looked safe to cross. Emma insisted she go first and she bounded into the woods before anyone could argue. She walked in a zigzag, kicking through the leaves and scattering them in clouds, but she didn't come across any bodies. The group followed cautiously.

  The strip of woods wasn't deep at all. A meadow, wide and empty, was what greeted them on the other side.

  "If ever I wanted to burn something down," Jack murmured, looking back at the oppressive piece of forest, "it'd be those woods."

  It was a nice thought, knowing no one else would fall victim to it, but they had no gasoline, no explosive.

  "We should keep moving," Kaylee said, her voice hollow. Jack nodded and they ran on.

  Chapter Twelve

  They
walked in a slow line, heading in the direction that seemed most promising for finding food or transportation. They didn't know where Quinton had hidden the motorhome and tanker, even Jack's Hummer. They were gone. One direction was as good as any other. The woods and meadows seemed never ending, no road or track anywhere in sight. Twice Emma climbed to the top of a tall tree, scanning overhead for anything helpful. Both times she came down shaking her head. Despite the fact that Kaylee's clothes had not yet fully dried, her throat was uncomfortable with thirst. But they had no water. And they couldn't go back, even if they could drink the water that had mingled with the bodies in that marsh.

  The group limped, their feet dragging through the woods and into the grass filled openings between tree lines.

  "Stop," Anna rasped from behind. Kaylee turned, taking in the sight of Anna stooped over, a hand gripping the side of her head. "I can't do it anymore. I need water."

  "We all need water," Bill said, moving to put a hand at her elbow. She jerked her arm away, an uncharacteristic flash of annoyance coloring her features.

  Andrew shifted in the tall grass of the meadow, his eyes moving from Anna to the nearest tree line. His gaze was agitated, his stance restless. Emma's matched his.

  "It's probably better if we-"

  "Bill, I'm serious," Anna interrupted. "I'm dizzy and my vision's going."

  "Let's just get to the next patch of woods," Kaylee coaxed, coming back and taking Anna by the arm. Kaylee's whole body felt heavy, weighted down, and yet empty at the same time. But she knew one thing, they had to keep moving forward. She could see the blood seeping into Anna's hair again, the wound on her head kept doing that, the bleeding starting and then stopping. She needed to rest and she was right, she would need water soon. Kaylee caught Bill's eye, nodding to the injury. Anna clamped her hand to her head and grit her teeth, moving forward.

  It was slow going. When the dam had burst and they were swept up in the torrent that followed, everyone had taken a beating. Bill and Andrew were both limping, their gate slow. Jack's breathing was coming sharper and Kaylee could see the sweat beading on his neck.

  "Do you hear that?" Emma murmured after a minute, shushing the rest. She stared past the trees just ahead of them before breaking into a jog. "This way," she called back to the rest.

  The shade of the woods was cool, a breeze filtering through that set off another round of shivering in Kaylee. Not that that was new, she hadn't been able to stop shivering since she dove off the dam and into the icy water below. Even after her clothes had stopped dripping, she felt chilled completely through.

  Emma was darting through the tree line ahead. Andrew called for her to wait up. But then Kaylee heard it too, the unmistakable cadence of water flowing over rocks. She sped up and almost ran into Emma.

  It was quiet, running slowly and shallow through the trees. It bubbled over low rocks and carved out ruts in the forest floor.

  "Oh, thank goodness," Anna murmured, falling to her knees by the flowing water. Her hands were already scooping up the cold liquid, pulling it towards her mouth, when Kaylee yelled.

  "Stop!"

  She could just see him. A torso. The innards floating from his severed waist, blackened and shriveled, like seaweed caught in the current. His eyes were deep yellow, almost brown, and his breaths rasped unevenly over broken teeth. At her cry, he groaned, a weak, guttural sound followed by the snapping of his teeth, the bone fragments scraping together as his jaw restlessly chewed. His arms stretched out, reaching, but there was no shift, no movement towards the group.

  "Son of a bitch!" Anna exclaimed, water sifting from her fingers. Bill already had his hands under her arms, hauling her to her feet. They followed the line of the water, drifting upstream. Jack pausing only momentarily to sink his knife into the back of the infected man's skull. He fell forward, a waterlogged corpse, with a dull thud.

  They traveled another mile upstream, following the cool and tempting water. No one saw any more infected. The sun hovered over the horizon, reaching fingers of orange and red into the sky. It was just visible through the thinning trees. "I can't make it any longer," Anna murmured, falling to her knees by the stream. Before anyone could stop her, she had a handful of water to her mouth, then another. The wound on her head was bleeding again, another slow trickle down her temple.

  Every muscle on Kaylee burned with injury and exertion. She knelt next to Anna, pressing her face low to the water, closing her eyes and letting the current wash over her features before taking a long pull of the cold water. When she emerged, blinking the stream out of her eyes, she ripped the hem of her shirt off, rinsing it first in the water and then pulling Anna closer and wrapping it around her forehead. She tied it off tightly, ignoring the grimace from her friend. It probably wasn't comfortable, but it would keep her from bleeding anymore.

  "Thanks," Anna whispered.

  The trees had shifted from the tall, thick oaks and beech trees to thin pines. Just ahead, on the edge of the tree line and butting up against another rolling meadow was a small copse of trees, mostly white birch. Kaylee brought another handful of water to her mouth before moving back. Pine needles covered the forest floor, long dead but soft. They cushioned Kaylee's tired body as she lay back and looked through the bare tree branches at the dimming sky.

  The group began to take inventory. From where she lay, Kaylee could see Emma had a nasty scratch that started at her hip bone and cut across her stomach and under her ribs. Emma was fingering the slice ripped through her shirt when she caught her sister's eye.

  "Broken pipe, I think," she said.

  Kaylee nodded. They had two guns, a functioning lighter, no food. Kaylee had lost every one of her possessions with the exception of her mother's medal. Emma had her regular and her utensil pocketknife, she never took them out of her pockets. Jack had a knife. The rest only had the clothes on their backs, and even those were tattered. All the clothing had tears, some from the debris ridden water, some from deliberate rips so cloth could be used for bandages.

  "Are you okay?" Anna asked in a low voice. Her eyes raked over Kaylee, lingering on her cheeks and shoulder. Kaylee's immediate thought was that no, she was not okay. Her father was dead. Her mother long gone and her sister most likely infected with an incurable sickness. Quinton was no longer with them, their unelected leader. They had no car, no idea where the nearest road was, and barely any ammunition for the two guns that had survived their escape from The Mill. Her chest felt like a void had opened up in it, a deep hole that was sucking her down.

  But Anna wasn't asking her if she was mentally okay. Her eyes were raking her body, cataloguing the blood stains and tears in her clothing.

  So Kaylee nodded and held still, knowing Anna would want to examine. Sure enough she drifted closer, peering at her wounds, her hands fluttering close to Kaylee's skin.

  "I'm okay, what about you?" Kaylee asked, her eyes flitting over Anna's head. Her own father's face flashed before her eyes, the skin shifted, odd jags and points from the broken bones beneath. She could feel the muscles of her face contract in a grimace, the hole in her chest enveloping any other possible reaction.

  Anna merely shook her head, dismissing her concern. "If I had anything, bacitracin or something..."

  "Don't worry about it," Kaylee murmured, looking at Anna's unusually pale face.

  "Is this from a bullet?" Anna whispered. She was pointing to Kaylee's shoulder. She nodded and Anna grimaced.

  "Tell us what happened," Bill prompted. Kaylee owed them that. Exhausted as she was, the rest deserved to know what had happened that resulted in the loss of Nick and Quinton, the explosion of their safe haven. When Kaylee started speaking Anna went to her side, examining the bullet wound more closely and sighing.

  Kaylee heard her voice recounting the details of the night as though from far away. It sounded like her, sort of, but it was flatter, more hollow than she had ever heard her voice before. She told them how she left to look for Emma after realizing Marsden had lied about th
e fence, how she found Emma chained, how she had been knocked out and woke to Cynthia and Marsden and Danny, how she had killed Cynthia. She was glad she felt far away when she told them this part, glad her voice and the rest felt a million miles away. She didn't look to Jack or Andrew. She didn't want to see the look of disgust or horror, or even worse pride or understanding crossing their features. She didn't want that stuck in her brain. She'd rather not know the reactions to what she said. And, though she'd never admit it aloud, a small part of her was glad her father would never have to hear this. Throughout it all, she could hear Emma murmuring, speaking low to Andrew.

  There was no privacy in the group. There had only ever been the illusion of it in the firehouse. Now, here in the woods, out in the world; there were no walls, no separation. And so when Kaylee heard Emma whispering in her low voice to Andrew, she ignored it. It was easy to tell from her tone that it was private.

  But she couldn't not hear the words either.

  Andrew remained separate from the group, his eyes cloaked in grief as he stared toward the setting sun.

  "It's not your fault," Emma whispered, coming to kneel in the pine needles behind him.

  "The others didn't even have a chance, bitten before they could cross the yard. I cut the electricity, they're dead because of me."

  "They're dead because of Marsden. You had no choice but to cut the power. If you hadn't, Quinton wouldn't have been able to get in and then Kaylee would be dead. I'd be dead."

  Kaylee saw the pain spasm across Andrew's features, his jaw clenching and his forehead wrinkling.

  "If the infected didn't get them, the explosions would have. Marsden was out for every one of us," Emma whispered, stopping him.

  "I'm so sorry, Em." Her hand reached out for Andrew's shoulder and he clutched at her fingers like they were a lifeline. She was just behind him, on her knees so she could whisper directly to him. She let her head drop until it rest against his back. She looked scared. It took Kaylee a minute to place the look, because there was not much to be scared of now. They got out, they made it. Sure the woods may contain hordes of roaming infected, but there was no direct threat at the moment. Grief she could have understood, and admittedly, she could see that in her sister's features too. But it was more than that. And then she realized, Emma was scared for Andrew, worried about him. Something shifted in Kaylee when she realized, but she couldn't be sure why that was.