Nuclear Dawn Box Set Books 1-3: A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Series

by Kyla Stone

  Dakota’s brow wrinkled. “You saved my ass.”

  “I think it’s safe to say that you saved mine in return.”

  That earned a tight smile. “Yeah, I did.”

  “You’re not bad with a gun,” he forced out, pretending at cool composure. “Who taught you to shoot?”

  “My crazy prepper friend. Who taught you to fight?”

  “I picked up a few tips here and there.” He gave a nonchalant shrug, turning slightly so she wouldn’t see the pained grimace he couldn’t hide.

  He rubbed his sore, bloody knuckles, scarred from dozens of street fights. His hands were already dirty, what did it matter? Blood speckled the five-dot tattoo between his thumb and pointer finger. He wiped it on his pants.

  It was Alejandro Gomez, second in command of the MS-13 chapter in Richmond, Virginia, who had taken him in like his own son, gave him a roof over his head, a job, a brotherhood.

  After a lonely childhood devoid of anything resembling love, at sixteen Logan had thirsted for any affection he could beg, buy, or steal. Alejandro had seen something in the nervy street kid who threw himself full-tilt into any and every fight, never backing down, never flinching, never shying from a split lip or black eye.

  Alejandro had offered him what no one else had before—belonging.

  And then he had taught Logan, mentored him, trained him to be his righthand man, his muscle, his killing arm.

  His assassin.

  He had done everything his mentor had asked of him. And then he’d done more.

  Until the day he couldn’t anymore, and prison and death became better options than the monster he’d become.

  After prison, he’d fled the state and never looked back.

  His demons had followed him anyway.

  29

  Logan

  Logan watched Dakota as she reached up as if to retie her sagging ponytail, remembered not to touch herself, and dropped her arms.

  She saw him looking and stared back at him, defiant. But her face was still pale, her pupils huge. Her hands were trembling.

  This wasn’t like the woman with the dead baby, whose life she ended out of pity. She’d killed a man in cold blood. She’d killed him for Logan.

  Another wave of nausea struck him. He bent, hands on his thighs, letting the blood rush to his head. His ears were still ringing. He tasted the coppery tang of blood in his mouth, between his teeth.

  Everything inside him felt sharp and jagged as broken glass.

  “Killing isn’t like the movies,” he said haltingly. “Unless you’re a psychopath, taking a life always has a cost.”

  “I know that.”

  She said it like she really did, like she had experience with killing. Once again, he found himself surprised by this girl.

  “There’s always a consequence,” she said. “But if it protects someone I care about, then I’ll gladly pay that price.”

  He looked at her. Really looked at her. The waning sunlight highlighted the strands of red in her hair, the sharp planes of her face, the glisten of her wide dark eyes.

  He’d noticed her the past few months working the tables at the Beer Shack—but only like he noticed everyone, sizing them up for potential threats then letting them go in his mind.

  She was just another young, dark-haired girl in a city of millions.

  But now he saw things he hadn’t before. Her long, messy auburn hair spilling past her shoulders, several damp strands curling against her cheeks. The dust caking her thick eyebrows, her solid jaw jutting proudly, those hard, flinty eyes cutting straight through him.

  She was beautiful the way a piece of cut glass was beautiful—and just as sharp.

  Dakota narrowed her eyes. “Glad you finally grew a conscience back there.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far.” Logan dropped his gaze and kicked at a pile of rubble with his boot. He hesitated, working his jaw before asking the question. “Don’t you feel guilty?”

  “For this scumbag? No.” She raised her chin as if daring him to contradict her. “Not even a little.”

  He was never sure which was worse: living with the guilt or not feeling it at all.

  He’d never doubted his decisions, his choices, even deriving a vicious pleasure at justice served, at taking vengeance into his own hands.

  He’d felt no guilt or remorse for any of the men he’d hurt or killed, criminals and thieves and murderers, all of them—not until the mother and the kid.

  He hadn’t wanted to care. He’d tried to convince himself it was an accident, a mistake, tried to put it from his mind the way he’d done a dozen times before.

  It hadn’t worked.

  He still saw the tiny figure that haunted his nightmares—the saggy Spiderman pajama bottoms, the thin arms clutching a ratty stuffed bear. And that small face framed by black curly hair disheveled from sleep, those wide dark eyes staring back at him, so young, so trusting.

  He knew what he’d done. He knew the truth. And the truth ate at him, hounding him, consuming him from the inside out.

  “You shouldn’t feel guilty, either.” Dakota’s eyes softened. “Not for this.”

  He went still. “For what?”

  She pointed behind him. “For that.”

  He turned slowly, his split knuckles flexing and unflexing, apprehension curdling his stomach.

  He’d forgotten about Hawaii, about what he’d done to him in his adrenaline-fueled rage.

  With growing dread, Logan nudged Hawaii’s body with his foot.

  Bone shards protruded from the back of the man’s skull. Something slick and pulpy oozed out. Brain tissue.

  The man was dead.

  That familiar, sick-spinning horror twisted inside him. Despair clawed at his throat. Despair—and thirst.

  He needed a drink. He was desperate for it. He needed to drown every shadowy demon until he felt nothing but numbness.

  He’d done this. He’d killed a man.

  He’d worked hard to put that part of himself behind a wall and brick it up tight. It was out now, for better or worse.

  The darkness, the hunger. The monster.

  It’s who you are.

  Darkness tugged at the edges of his mind, ruthless and unrelenting, threatening to drag him down into its depths. He was at the bottom of a black hole; he couldn’t claw his way out.

  Not this time.

  It’s who you’ve always been.

  A merciless, remorseless, stone-cold killer.

  You can’t escape who you are.

  His head ached. His throat burned. That insistent wanting seared through him, throbbing through his veins with a dark, pulsing, vicious need.

  He needed a drink.

  He forced himself to turn away from Hawaii.

  He had to get it together. The hot zone was no place to have a nervous breakdown.

  He holstered his pistol and pulled out his flask. He stared down at it, rubbing the gleeful, grinning skull embossed on the front.

  He needed to blot out the despair sucking at him. He needed the numbness, the forgetting, needed it like he’d never needed anything in his life.

  The demons were out now—hunting him, haunting him.

  That small, round face appeared in his mind’s eye, those dark, accusing eyes drilling straight through his soul, tormenting him. He could still hear the pleading voice whispering in his head: You don’t need to do this…please…we won’t tell…please don’t hurt him…

  “Logan?” Dakota was studying him, a faint line between her brows. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  He couldn’t do it without the booze.

  He uncapped the lid and held the flask to his lips. He breathed in the sharp fumes, already tasting them at the back of his tongue. He relished the anticipation of the liquid sliding down his throat.

  He’d been slow and sluggish when it counted. He’d almost died today. Would have died, if not for Dakota.

  He realized suddenly that he didn’t want to die—that was the astonishing thing
.

  Even more, he didn’t want his weakness, his failure to cause harm to Dakota, to Julio or Shay. He’d let his desire to anesthetize himself put everyone at risk.

  He’d told himself he didn’t care about anything or anyone. That he couldn’t. Maybe that was a lie.

  He could no longer afford to be numb, to dull his senses, to live in a half-stupor. Not now. Not in this world where the old rules no longer applied.

  He was done with drinking. He had to be.

  Even if that meant living with the whispers, the demons, the monsters.

  Even if that meant they destroyed him.

  He didn’t look at Dakota. He couldn’t bear it. Not now, not in this moment.

  His hand shook as he tipped the flask and poured the whiskey out onto the dusty asphalt.

  “Logan,” Dakota said softly.

  He curled his scarred, stained fingers into a fist. Words clotted in his throat. What could he possibly say? “I don’t…I’m—”

  A groan from behind them drew his attention.

  The first responders.

  30

  Maddox

  Maddox paused beside a body.

  Mutilated and wrecked almost beyond recognition, the clothing was in tatters, parts of the body so burned—muscle, tissue, flesh—only charcoaled bones remained.

  He couldn’t drag his gaze from the face—the eyes melted into a viscous goo, only a few blond wisps of hair remaining on the scalp. And the fleshless grin, all the more grotesque because the lips were entirely gone from the wide grinning mouth, completely burned away…

  A fly crawled over the face and disappeared inside the right ear.

  More flies followed.

  Revulsion burned the back of his throat. What had this person done to deserve such suffering? Whatever the sin, he had no doubt the person had earned it.

  He did not feel an ounce of pity for this mangled ruin.

  This man and all the others were dead. They’d been punished for their wickedness. He no longer felt pity for anyone, not even himself.

  Once, he had been capable of it. Once, he’d pitied a girl. Loved her, even.

  But he’d been shown the error of his ways. He had the scars to prove it, did he not?

  By the grace of God, he’d been given another chance. A mercy.

  Love was a weakness. He’d been weak when he allowed her to escape the first time. But that weakness had been beaten out of him.

  Now he was purified, filled only with righteous anger and an urgent, burning sense of purpose.

  His father was right. Like all emotions, love was a tool to be manipulated. He had allowed himself to be used, allowed the girl to manipulate and deceive him.

  But no longer.

  He’d learned from his mistakes.

  And now, once again, he had been spared.

  Chosen for a purpose.

  He clambered over smoking debris, careful not to touch anything. The smoke seared his throat and scorched his lungs. His eyes stung so badly tears streamed down his cheeks.

  For two days, he had walked and rested and walked again, journeying through the desolate ruins of the city.

  Everything was smoldering. Smoke filled the sky. Up the street, a bank burned furiously. The whole city seemed to be on fire.

  For the Lord shall execute judgment by fire…

  The heat burned relentlessly through the smoky haze, the south Florida temperature soaring unbearably. His body burned with its own inner heat, his skin hot and clammy.

  A part of him wanted to give up, to join the legions of the lost.

  But this was a test. A test of his devotion, his endurance, his conviction.

  Why else would his father leave him out here in this hell? Why else would the Prophet send him here when he knew the reign of fire was about to descend?

  It was a test, and he would pass it.

  Just like the sickness clenching his guts was a test.

  “Do you need water?” a woman asked him.

  He blinked and looked around, startled.

  Two women stood not five feet from him on the sidewalk. The first one held out a bottle of water. She wore two backpacks, one on each shoulder, both stuffed full of bottles of water.

  A woman next to her had somehow procured a wheelbarrow and filled it with jugs and bottles of water, Gatorade, and apple juice.

  He accepted the water and gulped half of it immediately. Sweet and cool, it slid down his parched throat. His empty stomach roiled with nausea.

  Without warning, he bent and retched violently. Liquid and sour acid splattered against the asphalt, a few droplets landing on his shoes. Spasms racked his body.

  He straightened, wincing, and wiped the back of his mouth.

  “You have radiation sickness,” the woman said kindly. “There’s an emergency field hospital set up not too far from here at Miami Jordan High School. I can give you directions.”

  He managed a polite smile. “I know where to go, but thank you. You should leave, too.” The gift of the water made him feel suddenly charitable, even if he had just vomited it back up. “It’s not safe. Any of the buildings could collapse at any moment. Fires are everywhere.”

  “We’re doing God’s work,” the woman said. A boiling red blister the size of his fist marred the right side of her face. He could see the pink of her scalp where her stubby gray hair had burned away.

  “We won’t just leave these people to suffer alone,” the second woman said loudly, a plump Haitian lady in her fifties.

  Lacerations laddered her arms, a dozen cuts marking her broad cheeks and forehead. Dried blood streaked both her ears and trailed down her neck. “We’ll do what we can, as long as we can, God willing.”

  He saw more people now. Ahead of him, a few dozen survivors dug through the rubble of a mid-rise apartment building with sticks of twisted rebar, a few with shovels, others with rag-wrapped or gloved hands.

  Their faces were dirty, blackened with soot or smeared with dust, their hair matted against their heads. Every one of them soaked in sweat, many in blood.

  “What are they doing?” he asked, perplexed.

  “They’re getting people out,” the hairless woman said proudly. “They’re choosing to save lives.”

  He stuck the bottle of water in his back pocket and watched in astonishment.

  In the midst of suffering and misery, people were helping each other.

  In addition to the diggers, another handful of people whose wounds weren’t debilitating had banded together to pull doors, sheets of corrugated metal, and long planks of wood from the rubble to use as stretchers.

  Grimly, they lifted several of the wounded onto their makeshift stretchers and began the slow, painstaking journey through the unstable rubble, ruptured gas lines, sparking tangles of power lines, and fires to safety and medical aid—wherever that may be.

  He did not help.

  He did not want to help.

  Didn’t they know they were beyond redemption?

  Their actions mattered little now.

  It was too late for them. For all of them.

  Just like it was too late for Dakota Sloane.

  “‘Who can endure the heat of his anger? His wrath is poured out like fire, and the rocks are broken into pieces by him,’” he murmured one of the verses his father had forced him to memorize as a child.

  “Can you say that again?” asked the woman with all the cuts. With her free hand, she pointed at her bloody ears. “I can’t seem to hear too well. I think my eardrums ruptured in the blast.”

  He just stared at her.

  “I’ll be fine,” she said to the question he hadn’t asked. “Thank the Lord I survived. Don’t worry about me. I’m blessed, is what I am. Jesus would be out here helping the suffering. We show love through our actions, don’t we? It’s the least I can do.”

  Love had nothing to do with it, Maddox thought darkly.

  It was as the Prophet had preached all those years, warning them, preparing them. But no one
had listened, no one but the faithful few at the compound.

  The world was an obscenity. Marred and impure. Contaminated. It could only be purified through fire.

  And after the fire, the radiation, descending like an invisible army of vengeance.

  Those who believed they’d escaped God’s wrath would soon learn the truth, including these forlorn souls digging in the rubble in vain.

  Even these two sincere but mistaken women.

  He realized suddenly he didn’t know how long he’d been walking, the last time he’d stopped to rest. Or even how close he was to his goal.

  His stomach wrenched painfully. His body ran boiling hot, then cold, then hot again, sickly sweat stippling his skin.

  His head was pulsing now like someone was chipping at his skull with a chisel.

  He ignored it all.

  He had faith the pain would end soon.

  This was a test he would pass.

  Maddox smiled benignly down at her. “How far is it to the Palm Cove subdivision? I’m looking for my family. They live on Bellview Court.”

  “Palm Cove?” said the other woman. She pointed ahead. “Less than a half mile northwest of here.”

  “God bless you,” he said.

  31

  Dakota

  “What can we do?” Dakota crouched beside the wounded man. The female responder knelt beside her. Logan stood behind them, standing guard, his pistol in his hands.

  They were sheltered beneath the shade of the sagging gas station overhang. The pump next to her was filmed in white dust, the nozzle hose drooping off its hook, dark liquid drizzling from its tip. The air stank of gasoline and smoke.

  The smoke stench was stronger now. The fires were getting closer.

  The male responder—a short, slight Korean-American man in his thirties—lay on the oil-stained concrete between them, his legs sticking out straight in front of him and elevated by a medical bag.

  He had a round, youthful face, his full cheeks slightly pockmarked from old acne scars, the fuzz of a faint mustache above his upper lip. His eyes were closed, but he was conscious, grimacing and hissing labored breaths through gritted teeth.