Only The Dead Don't Die | Book 4 | Finding Home

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Only The Dead Don't Die | Book 4 | Finding Home Page 33

by Popovich, A. D.


  Uh-oh, here it is. Grump-pa had been extra grumpy all day. Twila held her breath and waited for the bad news.

  “Dude, like what’s wrong?” Justin and his smirks. She finally realized he couldn’t help it. It was just the way his mouth was.

  “Afraid to say much,” Grandpa whispered, “in the off chance the Ancient Ones are listening.”

  Mindy carefully put baby Starla in the baby sling against her chest. “I’ll go into my strongest Merkaba trance. Just don’t say any names or visualize the place. Sometimes when they pry, they pierce my first Merkaba shield before I have a chance to repair the tear. But, now I use two Merkaba shields. I’m working on a third one, but I can’t hold onto it for long.”

  So that’s how Mindy does it. I have to try two. Then three. Can I do four Merkabas? She had to be the very best at everything if she was going to go out there and heal humanity’s lost souls. Someday. Soon.

  They waited for Mindy to slip away into meditation. When her head suddenly tilted to the side, she knew it was safe. “Okay, tell us,” Twila insisted, excited to know.

  Grandpa continued when Mommy nodded it was safe to talk. “Well, there’s been a change in plan. My spirit guide—”

  Justin rolled his eyes impolitely. “Dude, since when do you have a spirit guide?”

  “Anyway—” Grandpa gave Justin the warning look. “Strange as it may sound, my granddaddy visits me on occasion. Used to think it was just nostalgia. But I’m starting to understand there’s more to it. Anyhow, he warned that those minions, as we call them, have caught on to us.”

  “Oh no!” Twila cried out. Why hadn’t she felt them?

  Ella stared at the twinkling, star-studded sky and shivered. “What if they’re out there—right now?” A tear sparkled down her cute, chubby chipmunk cheeks. Justin got all sweet and cuddly with her.

  They all stared into the moonless sky. Waiting for Grandpa to tell them to go to their cabins and lock the doors. But she wasn’t ready for the fun to stop.

  “Here’s the thing.” Grandpa played with the velvety coals, stalling. “I got a cryptic message to alter our route. Same destination, mind you. I keep seeing—”

  Twila’s head pierced with pain. “Don’t say it! Don’t even think it!”

  The metal trash cans next to the cabin fell over with a crash and rolled toward them. Justin and Luther jumped to their feet. Luther shot at the cans. Grandpa pointed his flashlight in time to see a sweet family of raccoons scamper into the darkness.

  Mommy laughed to herself. “Just raccoons.”

  Mindy’s eyes popped open in time to see Justin bending over, hands on knees, laughing. “D-d-dude, you should have seen your face—”

  Uncle Luther’s wide eyes danced with firelight. “Something’s messing with my mojo.” He paced around the fire with his gun and kept looking back as if the raccoons might turn into monsters.

  “Folks, think we outstayed our welcome. Let’s leave at first light. Please don’t think I’ve lost my mind when I take us on a roundabout route.”

  “Dean, we all trust your judgment,” Mommy said in her sweet voice. “Or we wouldn’t still be together.”

  “She’s right,” Luther added.

  “Alrighty then.” Grandpa’s voice suddenly went gruff. “Time for some shut-eye.”

  Mommy hurried her into the cabin while Grandpa and Uncle Luther shoveled dirt onto the campfire. It had been a fun two days at the cabins by the lake. But she saw it—evil tendrils poking at their collective protective bubble.

  The Ancient Ones’ minions were close . . .

  Chapter 36

  Dean Wormer squinted into the horizon, the sun missing his eyes thanks to the straw cowboy hat Justin had bought him. They hadn’t made much headway. According to his guestimations, they only made two to three miles per hour, if that. The rough terrain, tending to the babies, and resting ate up their precious daylight. A compelling sense forewarned time was of the essence. It was as if he braced his feet against the narrow center of an hourglass, desperately trying not to slip through.

  Perhaps his uptightness was due to the simple fact that summer came faster to the sparse deserts of New Mexico. They were well into May and needed to get to where they were going before the summer sun claimed them by way of heatstroke. He regretted his rash decision of avoiding the roads in lieu of the desert.

  They had spent last night at an abandoned miner’s camp along the Pecos River, which they’d been attempting to cross to no avail. As luck would have it, this morning they had stumbled upon a defunct railroad line. The long-forgotten tracks may lead to an intact bridge. Not that he was lost; Dean knew roughly where they were based on the mountain ranges—his compass on this walkabout to—finding home.

  Nonetheless, the rocky gorge looming ahead threatened a dead-end. And the foreboding train trestle wasn’t exactly what he had in mind. The gang wasn’t going to like it. Nor did he.

  Standing at the edge of the timber trestle, Dean focused in with the binoculars, awestruck. The trestle must have been a magnificent feat in its day. It spanned the gorge in a scene right out of an old Western. Consumed with the breathtaking panoramic view, he could almost imagine smokestacks dissipating into the sky.

  But is it crossable? He rubbed at his chin. Footsteps from behind told him the gang had caught up to his scouting run.

  Justin parked the wheelbarrow next to him. “We’ll never get Ella on that,” he echoed into the gorge.

  “Now, son, she’ll have to. Every bridge from here to Kingdom Come is blown.” It was the only way to cross the Pecos.

  “Duh, then we should look for a boat, not some hellacious bridge,” Justin’s biting tone belittled.

  “Trust me, I considered it. As you well know, any petrol west of Last State has long gone bad. And we certainly can’t row our way across this part of the Pecos. Not in those currents.” Not with babies. He looked down at the river swollen from spring’s snowmelt. It’s a shame they hadn’t come across any shallow areas like Horsehead Crossing. That was feasible.

  Dean focused on the trestle, scanning the span’s multitiered lattice framework as it curved around the bend, out of sight, smackdab into the rocky canyon walls. He knew what that meant. A tunnel. He tested the first couple of feet for sturdiness, stomping on the wooden planks.

  “Like, where does it go?” Justin spouted.

  “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.” Providing—we get to it. Dean forced a fake chuckle at his feeble joke, already feeling Justin’s dramatic eye roll behind him. Dean turned around to catch Scarlett shaking her head. Luther didn’t look none too happy either.

  “Holy crap! Are you serious?” exclaimed Ella.

  “Ooh, Grandpa—” Twila moaned. “That looks scary-fun.”

  Funny, how he’d grown accustomed to her calling him Grandpa Dean. But the recent promotion to Grandpa made his heart swell every time. His prospects of becoming a granddaddy had manifested in a way he never would have foreseen.

  “Lordy, Lordy! The sun done messed up your mind.” Luther peered over the edge. “Just looking at that makes my balls shrivel.”

  Twila covered her mouth and turned away, giggling.

  “Scarlett, Mindy, Twila—think we can cross it?” Dean finally asked. The two women eyed each other while Twila plopped to the ground. He gave them space to do their meditation thing.

  Meanwhile, he hard-headedly fiddled with the wheelbarrow they had scavenged along the way since they had lost the last of their carts to the rocky terrain. He had MacGyvered the axle’s steel base for the umpteenth time. But it was about shot.

  Luther knelt beside him. “If you want my opinion”—he hesitated—“it’s too hairy.” He wiped the back of his head. “With kids,” he added. The fellow sure knew how to sweat.

  Dean shrugged. Of course, he knew that. Maybe it was too much to ask. “Now, don’t you start in. I feel like an ass for even considering it.” He exhaled away the exasperation settling in and patted himself with the dam
p handkerchief he kept tied around his neck. “Let’s see what the gals have to say.”

  He and Luther messed with the wheelbarrow all the while waiting their response. Thing was, he didn’t think they could make it back to the miner’s camp before dark. Trekking across the rocky landscape in the dark was far too treacherous, especially with rattlers and coyotes, and God knows what else lurking the desert canyon’s nooks and crannies.

  Finally, Scarlett shuffled to him. She squatted down to take advantage of the measly shade offered by the emptied wheelbarrow tilted on its side. She met his eyes and offered a thin smile, but it didn’t reach her eyes.

  “Well?” Dean urged her on.

  “Absolutely nothing came to mind,” Scarlett said flatly. “I’m flying blind.”

  Twila scurried over. “And what’s your say in this?” Dean asked, not wanting to hurt her feelings.

  “We’re so lost, not even the bad-d-d ones know where we are,” his adopted granddaughter replied in the tone of a wise woman. “They . . .” Twila paused and cocked her head at the azure-blue sky. “Think we’re dead.”

  “Good to hear,” Dean mumbled. “Now, Scarlett, you know me. I wouldn’t suggest this if I knew of another way.” He felt used up. Defeated.

  Scarlett gently massaged his aching shoulders. “I know.”

  Luther stormed off in a bout of good ole southern cursing.

  “Tell you what,” Dean decided suddenly when images of the gals falling to their deaths invaded his consciousness. “I’ll do a test run.” He should at least see if the trek was feasible.

  Scarlett’s brows knitted tighter. But she didn’t try to stop him. Dean studied the sun while taking a swallow from his going-on-empty canteen. The sun would settle below the crestline in another hour or so, making the crossing all the more perilous.

  Justin and Ella stared at him as he made it to the edge of the bridge. “You mind if I borrow your tire iron?” he asked Justin. He could use it to pressure test the old wood. “Say, Twila, do you have any chalk left?”

  “Dude, I should be the test dummy.” Justin stepped forward. Ella tugged him back by his elbow.

  “Naw, this is my brilliant idea.” Dean hadn’t meant it to sound so snide.

  After digging through her backpack, Twila proudly offered him a pinkie-size nugget of blue chalk.

  “I’ll mark the good spots with chalk. That ought to make it easier.” And safer.

  Ella made the sign of the cross, then fondled the crucifix around her neck. “Wait!” She removed the pendant from Mateo’s neck. “Wear my Archangel Michael pendant. He’ll protect you, like he did mijo.”

  He could use all the good luck he could muster. “Why thank you, Ella.”

  Scarlett fastened it around his neck. “Dean”—fear leached through her voice—“are you sure this is a good idea . . .”

  Frankly, this had to be his worst idea since the day he had jumped the ATV over Crooked Creek some fifty-odd years ago. “Evel Deavil,” his cousins had cheered. Of course, the foolish kid in him had been oblivious to the possible fatal consequences.

  Luther handed him a flask. “You’ll be needing a swig of Southern Comfort.”

  “Don’t mind if I do.” Anything to settle his nerves.

  Twila darted to him and gave him a tight hug. “My grandpa’s the bravest grandpa in the whole wide world.”

  Dean tousled her hair before grabbing the tire iron. He took his first step on the trestle, looking down. Mistake. Vertigo rippled through him. Luther tugged him back by his pack.

  “Bro, honestly, I don’t think you’re up to this,” Luther dickered as if Dean had lost his marbles.

  Dean loosened his pack’s straps, giving him better agility. “I’m fine. I should adhere to my own advice and not look down.”

  He stepped to the side of the gorge to size up the situation. The river roared a good fifty feet below. Whitecaps told him the river was rough. “Looks like a vessel of some sort got hung up on the rocks.” He zoomed in. “Yep.” Some poor sucker had taken a houseboat of all things down the river. Had he been out of options . . .

  “Alrighty then, ready as I’ll ever be.” Dean poked the tire iron at what was left of the creosote-treated decking. The rails and ties had been stripped who knows when, leaving two narrow pathways on each side of a three-foot gap.

  He banged two times on each section before stepping down, avoiding the rotted planking. Taking it step by step, he marked Xs on the sturdy planks, all the while refusing to look down at the river raging in all its glory.

  He came to an area where the decking sagged. He jabbed it with the tire iron. Just as he thought. The old timber disintegrated into flaky chips and twirled down. Time to switch sides. He reached over and jabbed the planking on the left side of the track. Intact. He stepped light-footedly to the other side of the decking. That move might prove fatal for Twila’s short legs.

  He made it to the bend in the tracks to be greeted by a tunnel blocked off with wire-meshing another fifty yards or so ahead. Well, at least he had the sense to carry an array of tools in his handy-dandy tool belt.

  The trek was going smoother than he had anticipated. That was until the toe of his boot clipped something or other. He couldn’t seem to shake his boot free. He poked at the wood.

  “Agh!” A gnarly hand reached up from below. Then, he smelled it. How’d one of those things get up here? He kicked the hand away with his other boot. It dawned on him. Clumsy, dim-witted dead-heads couldn’t climb the scaffolding. But, X-strains could. And X-strains traveled in hordes.

  By the time he realized his peril, another ugly bastard popped up through the track’s center gap. He booted it in the head, ripping flesh from bone. Another popped up next to him. Dean reached for the Glock in his hip holster and squeezed-off two rounds into its flesh-molten face. A swift swing of the tire iron sent it reeling over the edge.

  Spine-tingling howling rendered him deaf. For Christ Sake! How many are there? No time to count. He fired away at the grisly heads popping up from below. Until it was time to reload.

  He reached for the loaded magazine in his hunting vest. Something grabbed him from behind. Dean tried to break loose, falling flat on his ass. The Glock fell through the center gap. Its dull thuds bounced off the lattice-framework, announcing his death warrant to the gorge.

  The dead-head drooled onto his cheek, zeroing in for the kill-bite. And there was the tire iron. Within reach! Dean swung at it, sending it over the edge.

  They were everywhere, at least a dozen anyhow. Dean hurried back as fast as he dared. He knocked one over the edge with a home-run swing. One of them yanked him to his knees from below. He went down kicking and yelling, hoping to warn his friends. Of course, they would have heard the gunshots by now. Knowing Luther, he’d be there any second. If Dean could just hang on a tad longer . . .

  The X-strainer growled with the baring teeth of a rabid wolf. Dean resorted to his last move. He rolled to his side. Falling through the trestle’s gap. He banged against the timbers, grappling to stop his freefall. But, the sands of time claimed him as he slipped through the center of the hourglass.

  Chapter 37

  Luther Jones gobbled the last hunk of smoked fish with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach minutes after Dean left to inspect the bridge. I’m not liking this one iota, he mulled to himself.

  He knelt beside the wheelbarrow and absentmindedly spun the tire. It still rubbed against the brace. He pried the frame from the wheel with his wrench until the wheel spun freely. He was sick of dealing with the piece-of-shit wheelbarrow. But sometimes Twila rode in it. After all, she was only a kid.

  Why had Dean taken them through the damn desert? Frustrated, Luther sorted through the pile of supplies next to the wheelbarrow. They didn’t need two first-aid kits. Time for more downsizing. He tossed out the sissy bandages but kept the tourniquet and the long-expired antibiotic ointment. As far as he was concerned, the rest was junk, junk he was tired of hauling.

  They had
gone through their supplies numerous times, each time weeding out a little more. Like Justin’s big-ass tent. They had left it behind after losing the last cart much to Justin and Ella’s dismay. Thankfully, they had scavenged pup tents from the KOA campgrounds, which the adults wore strapped to their packs along with sleeping bags.

  He deliberated over the pots and camp stove. He already had a camping cookware set in his duffle. As for the stove, well, he was ready to scrap it. But Ella wanted it. It must give her comfort knowing she could cook—when they had food. Their food and water had dwindled along with his patience. A dilapidated train bridge . . . had Dean lost it?

  “Grandpa!” Twila’s screech sent chills down his spine.

  Luther dropped the camp stove. Gunshots shattered the desert’s deadly silence. Don’t tell me Dean ran into marauders way out here? Maybe a mountain lion or a wolfpack. That had to be it.

  “I’m going for Dean.” Justin took off for the bridge.

  “Wait up!” Luther warned. “I’m coming with you. And, we be taking it slow on that rickety thang.”

  Scarlett crept to the edge of the bridge, eyeing through the M4’s scope. But Dean had made it past the bend in the bridge. There was nothing to see.

  Luther re-shouldered his duffle. No time to take it off. “Scarlett,” he called out. “Hang back while we check it out.” She needed to protect the children. Ella wasn’t good with firearms. As for Mindy, he doubted she had ever fired one.

  “Remember, follow Dean’s marks.” Luther stepped lightly onto the first blue X.

  “Careful,” Ella’s panicky cry called out from behind.

  Luther eyed the span for movement. That smell. He took a deeper whiff. The pungent stench clogged his nostrils. “Zs! They must be at the other end of the bridge.”

  “Dean, we’re coming!” Justin darted off down the bridge, hopscotching along the X marks.

 

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