The girl’s shirt.
“Everybody is strip-searched?” Greg asked, scanning the guards around the room. Every single one was male. “What about the women?”
“Best part of the job,” the guard sneered. “Now move!”
Rage surged through Greg as he stared at that shirt. Oliver told him to play by the rules, but too many people played the game and still lost. At some point, somebody had to cry foul.
In one swift move, he yanked off his shirt. Even if it was the last act of his life, he wanted the world to know that he wasn’t part of this. He was here by force alone. With a traitor’s crossed-out star on his arm and whip scars on his back, he wanted everybody to know that if they didn’t watch their backs, he’d make them pay. For his sick mom. For his dead sister. For Carrie and his starving clan. The list was endless, including the girl with a neon orange shirt Greg didn’t even know.
The guard circled Greg. “Interesting.” Then he turned and called, “We’ve got ourselves a rebel!”
In an instant, six guards swarmed the small enclosure.
“Thought you’d sneak in undetected, did you?” the beefy guard asked. He motioned to the others. “Hold him.”
Guards grabbed Greg, and the beefy guard swung fast. The nightstick slammed into Greg’s stomach. The pain was blinding. The wind rushed out of him.
“Didn’t bring a bag. Said you weren’t armed to get out of the search. Clever,” the next guard said.
Black metal slammed against Greg’s jaw. His head snapped back, world exploding with light and agony.
“The boys inside will have a heyday with you. Protocol gives them—and us—the right to break you, starting right now. By the time we’re through with you, you won’t even remember the word revolution.”
Greg saw another flash of black. He tried to duck, tried to shrink, but there was nowhere to go. The nightstick smashed into the side of his skull.
Everything went black.
twenty-two
“HEY, AMBER,” BRADEN SAID, “what are you doing here?”
Amber startled, pulse jumping. Braden stood in front of her on the grass, making her feel stupid that he’d found her here. The clan cemetery sat in a quiet corner of the neighborhood. There was no reason for her to sit in the shade and play with the grass by her parents’ graves. That was something Carrie would do. At least Amber wasn’t crying. Of course, that was also something Carrie would do.
“I had to take Richard some noodles,” she said. And she’d been distracted ever since. If she went home, Carrie would give her more chores. “What are you up to?” she asked, noting with pleasure that he wore his red, homemade bracelet again.
Braden smiled. “I was bored. I finished work, so I came looking for you. Mind if I join you?”
“Do I ever?” She fluttered her dark eyelashes up at him, hoping to look appealing.
Laughing, he sat by her on the grass. She leaned into him to savor his warmth, even on a hot, humid day.
“I feel bad,” he said, studying Mariah’s grave. “I didn’t know her that well.”
He misunderstood Amber’s visit to the clan cemetery, but she didn’t correct him. She studied Mariah’s fresh plot of grass. Wilted flowers lay next to the rock that acted as her headstone.
“She was always nice to me,” Amber said. “Everyone else hated me after that raid, but she was still nice.”
Her gaze wandered back to her parents’ graves. During Mariah’s funeral, she’d had the overwhelming desire to stay behind and talk to her parents like she used to. In the lonely months following their deaths, Amber used to sit under this same tree and chatter away. Mostly she talked to her mom, but sometimes her dad, too, especially when Zach and Carrie drove her nuts. She hadn’t been here for a while. She hadn’t even talked to them today. But the shade, the warm grass under her fingers felt too good to leave.
She frowned. She really was turning into Carrie.
Rocks marked her parents’ graves like Mariah’s. Each one had three letters scratched into their sides: TGA and LLA. That’s all that was left of her parents. Their voices, even their faces, were fading from her memories. Time had become her enemy.
She brought her knees to her chest. “Is this going to happen to all of us?”
“What, die?” Braden shrugged. “I guess. Eventually.”
That’s not what she meant. Not exactly.
She counted rock after stupid rock. Eight graves. It should have creeped her out to know people’s bones lay beneath her, but what bothered her most was thinking that they’d started with forty people in their clan. One fifth of them were now dead. If she counted Jeff and Greg as MIA, that number rose to one-fourth gone. In six years.
How depressing was that?
“I meant,” she tried again, “are we all going to die young? Die early? Die…here?”
Braden stiffened. “You won’t die young.”
“But I could.”
“But you won’t.”
“But I could,” Amber insisted. “All of us could.”
Before he could argue, she heard some rustling off to the side. A flash of red darted through the patch of woods behind them.
“Zach?” Amber called.
More rustling, and Zach and his friend Tucker emerged in the small cemetery.
“Oh, hey. Hi,” Zach said, breathless. “What are you guys doing here?”
“What are we doing?” Amber asked. The cemetery wasn’t anywhere near where those boys should be.
Tucker lowered his eyes, looking guilty. They looked at each other, searching for a lie Amber could see coming a mile away.
“We, uh…lost something,” Zach said. “We were trying out Greg’s slingshot, but Tucker shot the rock too far. We lost it.”
“You lost a rock?” Amber challenged.
“Yep. Bye!” Zach said. Then the two scrawny teens took off down the street.
Amber didn’t know where Zach had been, but she could guarantee he didn’t want Carrie knowing.
Maybe there were some bribery possibilities.
“Zach thinks we live in a cage,” Amber said. “Maybe he’s right. The older I get, the smaller it feels. I mean, Richard’s been widowed twice in this same, stupid place, in that same, stupid house. How bad would that be?”
“It would be the worst thing ever,” Braden whispered. “But it won’t happen to you. I won’t let it. I promise.”
Surprised at the gravity in his voice, she turned. Braden’s face was inches away, his perfect, turquoise eyes looking more depressed than she felt. She reached up and smoothed the tanned worry lines between his brows.
“Okay,” she said happily, as if he could change her fate with a simple promise.
Having him that close with the soft breeze keeping them company was too tempting. Anywhere his arm touched hers, she felt a current under her skin. She tilted her chin up, begging for a kiss. Clueless, he sat back and raked a hand over the grass. She huffed softly. How had he missed that hint?
“What would they do if…I volunteered?” he asked.
“Who?”
Braden’s mouth twitched, but he didn’t answer.
The words finally registered. She turned sharply. “Volunteered for what?”
His shoulders lifted. “For service. Like Greg.”
“Are you nuts?”
“I don’t have a citizenship card,” he said, still stroking the grass. “But maybe the government is desperate enough that they’ll take illegals. I’ve seen five more fires since that one in Chicago. Things must be getting bad.”
“Exactly. That’s why Greg didn’t want to go.” Her eyes narrowed. “We hate the government, remember? Why would they recruit illegals when they’re trying to kill illegals like us?”
He was silent too long. “It could…get us out of this cage.”
Us.
Thinking of him fighting—on the wrong side—sent a chill down her spine.
“You’re crazy,” she said. “I’m not letting you go.”
/> His eyes rolled. “As if you could stop me.”
She whirled on him. “Why are you talking like this? The government doesn’t even know you exist, Braden Ziegler. And for good reason.”
“Which is why I’d have to volunteer.”
“No!” Her insides shook like an earthquake. “It’s bad enough that Greg left. We don’t even know if he made it to training, or if he’s dead, or if he’s killing other people like us. You can’t volunteer. You just can’t.”
“But Oliver helps us with—”
“Oliver’s an idiot!” she shouted in exasperation.
His jaw, still cleanly shaven—which she suddenly hated—tightened to a hard line. She didn’t want him to look like a patrolman. She wanted him to look like—and forever be—a squatter.
“Stop it, okay?” she said. “You’re scaring me. Let’s talk about something else. In fact…” She jumped to her feet and brushed off her jeans. “Let’s see what Maddie and Lindsey are up to.”
She held out a hand to help him stand, but he continued to stare up at her. He wanted to keep talking about this madness, about him volunteering to die, but she kept her hand out, waiting for him to take the hint. They were leaving that stupid cemetery and the subject. They were going to find his sisters and pretend they never had this conversation.
He took her hand to stand but dropped it the second he was up. “Actually, I think my dad needs some help. I better go, Amber. Catch you later, okay?”
It would have been okay if he hadn’t told her he was bored when he showed up, if he hadn’t dropped her hand like it disgusted him, and if he hadn’t refused to kiss her—or even look at her—now.
“Fine. Yeah. Sure,” she said.
Seething, she marched down the sidewalk. Braden didn’t know what he was talking about. Volunteering to join the enemy, to kill people like them? He was insane. Luckily, the government was on her side. They’d arrest him before they’d let an illegal join their cause. Braden wasn’t going anywhere. Thankfully.
Sometimes their cage didn’t sound so bad.
* * * * *
From the time the sun was up, Carrie sat by her window, watching the empty house across the street. It had become her routine: sitting, thinking, and watching the sun’s first rays touch Greg’s empty house. Two weeks. He’d been gone two weeks, and every morning she sat in the same spot. Lame, but she couldn’t seem to stop.
She was proud of herself for sitting on her ripped green couch at all. It took a while to do that much after Jenna’s death, and only after a stern lecture from Amber.
“That couch was ours before you ever gave it to Jenna,” Amber had said. “Mom and Dad used to read to us here. It’s the last thing we have of theirs, so sit down!”
Now Carrie spent the first few minutes of every day wondering if Greg made it to Naperville, wondering how he had adjusted to being back under government rule, wondering what he looked like in a green uniform, gun attached to his hip, aiming at who knew what.
Had they noticed his scars yet? Punished him for it?
Killed him for it?
How long before he found out about his mom, or would he?
The ache of missing Mariah hadn’t dulled yet. May was too heartbroken to let Carrie forget for long. And try as she might, Carrie couldn’t squelch the fear that Greg had followed his mom—and far too many others—to the grave.
But once the sun was up, she forced herself to get moving. Life pushed her through the days and weeks.
With Greg gone, she had expected Zach to mope around, but instead he helped more and fought less, all with Greg’s slingshot hanging from his back pocket. Somehow she’d neglected to tell Zach that Greg also left a NY Yankees hat for him. It lay smashed under her pillow, making her the most pathetic female on earth, but she didn’t care. Zach got the baseball and slingshot. The hat was hers.
Possibly forever.
After teaching school, Carrie packed up some muffins and wandered the neighborhood for the newest blooming flowers. She cut several branches of purple lilacs from behind Kovach’s house, letting the flowers’ sweet aroma enliven her. When Greg asked her to care for his family, she’d planned to take Mariah flowers every day as an excuse to check in on her. Now it only seemed right that May be the recipient.
Carrie knocked the clan signal on the Trenton’s front door. When no one answered, she let herself in.
CJ lay on the couch, snoring. May wasn’t anywhere to be seen, but Carrie guessed she was in her bedroom napping as well. Greg’s grandparents slept more than they ever had, but people dealt with grief differently—which probably explained why she’d barely seen Richard the last two weeks. He was becoming the hermit he had been before Mariah moved in.
Quietly, she made her way into the kitchen and set the corn muffins on the counter. Then she exchanged the old flowers in the jar for the fragrant lilacs. Lilacs were May’s favorite. Hopefully they’d lift her spirits.
She puttered a few minutes, refilling their water bucket and hand-washing their dirty dishes. She thought about peeking in on May, but the house seemed so peaceful. Plus Rhonda Watson was in the backyard, hoeing the garden. The Watsons were in charge of the crops, but knowing how much Carrie loved it, they’d relinquished some of the responsibility to her.
She slipped out the back door.
Rhonda’s head came up. “Hi, Carrie. How are you?”
The question implied more than typical concern. “Good enough. How are the tomatoes?”
“Dry.” Rhonda shielded her eyes from the bright sun. “Everything is.”
“We might need to do a water line if it doesn’t rain again soon.”
“Yes, I think you’re right.”
Carrie sighed. The new crops were still small and tender, making them susceptible to drought. Even her prized tomato plant looked droopy. So far, this June had been hotter than any in her weather journal. They could spot-water a few plants from May’s well, but they didn’t want to risk the well running dry either. But a bucket assembly line would bring water all the way from Logan Pond to May’s backyard, a three-house journey.
“Maybe we can organize it for tomorrow if it doesn’t rain,” Carrie said. “We can tell everyone tonight.”
“Is there still a meeting tonight?” Rhonda asked.
“Yeah. At least, I think today is Thursday.” Oliver hadn’t stopped by since Mariah’s death two weeks ago. The days were blurring together. People were stressed that he hadn’t returned, but Carrie insisted he was just busy with his partners. He’d warned her that he might have a hard time breaking away to see her.
In a short time, it felt like she’d lost three of her best friends: Greg, Mariah, and Oliver.
“Oh,” Rhonda said, picking up her hoe. “Sasha said we might not have the adult meetings anymore. She doesn’t think we need them.”
“What?” Carrie said. “Why not?”
Rhonda shrugged.
Carrie couldn’t believe it. Greg had started the weekly adult meetings as a way to implement his new plans. “But we need those meetings now more than ever. We’re in the middle of the Dixon’s well and have two others to dig. Plus the barricade needs work. And now that Mariah’s gone…” The words choked off. Greg’s fourth idea had been to find medical help in other clans. It was the only idea the clan voted down. But his third idea, consolidation, still needed work. “Now that Mariah’s gone, someone needs to tell Richard to move into the cul-de-sac. And what about—”
“Whoa, Carrie,” Rhonda interrupted. “Calm down. I was just telling you what Sasha said. I’m still fine to meet every week.”
“We need to.” She didn’t know why she was so defensive. They were Greg’s ideas, not hers. But with everything else falling apart, the least they could do was keep things progressing at home.
As she knelt to weed the carrots, something in the back of her mind nagged at her, telling her she could be doing more. She thought about Greg’s fifth plan, the one that only she knew about: the farmers’ market in that
flower shop. There had to be a way to make it work. But how? Illegals like her had no business being in Shelton. Yet the thought wouldn’t leave her alone.
Two rows later, she had it.
The solution.
By the time the sun lowered in the western sky and the adults congregated in May’s living room, she resigned herself to make it happen, even if it went against clan rules to do so.
For the first time in weeks, she felt a tiny spark of hope.
twenty-three
“THANK YOU ALL for coming,” CJ said to the hot, stuffy room. They opened all the windows for a cross breeze, but people still fanned themselves.
Carrie was disappointed Richard hadn’t come. He knew Greg’s ideas better than her. He should have taken over the adult meetings. While she understood Richard’s mourning, she hoped he didn’t become the hermit he had been before Mariah moved in. Poor CJ sat on a chair up front, too tired to stand and lead.
CJ asked for updates, and Rhonda reported on the water bucket line. That went over as well as Carrie had expected.
“Still no Oliver?” CJ asked Carrie.
She shook her head. “No.”
“Great,” Sasha said from the back of the room. “What if there’s another raid he hasn’t told us about? I think we should start posting guards again.”
“Agreed,” Dylan said. “We can’t take a chance on this. Not after all that happened. Guarding is safer until Oliver returns.”
People groaned around the room—everyone hated around-the-clock guarding—but no one disagreed. Reluctantly, Carrie nodded as well. Better safe than sorry.
“In that case,” CJ said, “Dylan, will you make a schedule and let everyone know when they’re up?”
Dylan didn’t look thrilled, but he nodded.
Terrell stood next. “I’m meeting with Barry tomorrow. What supplies does everyone need?”
Without mentioning her reason, Carrie requested bike chains and inner tubes, which earned her strange looks. Terrell said he’d try but not to get her hopes up. The rest of the supplies only took a few minutes, and then the room fell silent. Normally Carrie didn’t mind the silence, but tonight she couldn’t bear it. She’d been churning on Greg’s fifth idea all day—actually a combination of the fourth and fifth. With a quick breath, she took the plunge.
Citizens of Logan Pond Box Set Page 58