Holly went to the window and pulled the blinds down.
“Look outside, Marcus,” she continued. “You think that job titles really fucking matter now?”
Marcus looked at her, his eyes slanted and stern. Then, he looked away with pouty lips as he tried to digest everything she was saying.
She had begun to tear up, not convinced she was getting through to him.
“For Christ’s sake, Marcus. He pulled a gun on me.”
His head turned quickly toward her right as the radio on his belt began to buzz.
“Anyone there? Over,” David Ellis said through the walkie.
Not letting his eyes leave Holly and keeping Will pinned against the wall, Marcus slowly reached for the radio and pressed the button with his worn thumb.
“David. It’s Marcus. I’m out. Over.”
Will reached up, grabbing onto Jonas’ forearm and pulling himself up into the warehouse while the Empties remained distracted behind him by the road flare in the parking lot, the flare still spraying red sparks and smoke into the sky.
He looked over to see David and Marcus embracing, as if they hadn’t seen each other since high school. Holly had taken a seat to Will’s left, still trying to allow her nerves to recover from all she had seen and experienced during the impromptu rescue mission.
Jonas reached out his hand to Will and waved his fingers toward himself.
“I don’t think you’ll be needing that anymore,” Jonas said, looking at the gun.
Will looked at the rifle, reluctant to give it back. He had no trust for the people around him and hated the situation he was in, but knew that he was probably left with little choice but to hand the weapon over. He wasn’t going to start firing at everyone—he’d be dead within seconds—so he let the strap of the rifle slide off his shoulder and he handed it to Jonas.
Removing his hand from Marcus’ shoulder, David walked over to Will, smiling. He reached his hand out, offering it to Will in a kind of thank you or truce.
Will stood there for a moment, unsure what to do or think. He had no trust for this man. In fact, he hated him. A kind of hate that his humble blood had never felt for anyone else.
Reluctantly, he put his hand out and grasped David’s.
“Thank you,” David said.
Will nodded.
As Will loosened the grip of the handshake, David tightened it suddenly, pulling Will toward him and slamming his left fist into Will’s stomach as hard as he could.
Will let out a grunt and leaned over, gripping the pain in his stomach.
David brought his knee up across Will’s face, sending him to the ground. Will could barely move. He rolled on the ground, holding his stomach and writhing.
The crowd behind David began to rustle. Holly jumped out of her chair, screaming, and ran toward Will.
“Get her!” David commanded two of the other men in the room.
They came over and picked Holly up under her arms, moving her away from Will.
David leaned down and turned Will over at the edge of the dock, digging his knee into the middle of Will’s back with all his weight.
“What are you doing, David?” Marcus asked, walking toward him.
Jonas stepped in front of Marcus, shaking his head from side to side.
Marcus stepped back, looking down to the gun pointed at his stomach. He looked back up and glared at Jonas, a look of disgust in his eyes.
David used his strength to slide Will’s body across the smooth concrete of the warehouse floor, leaving Will’s head hanging over the edge of the dock, exposed to the world.
Holly kept screaming uncontrollably, piercing the air.
David rolled his eyes and turned around. “Take her inside!”
The two men carried Holly into another part of the building, her screams becoming a faint, white noise.
David grabbed Will’s head up by his hair. One of his eyes was nearly swollen shut, but Will could see the group of Empties only twenty yards away, still distracted by the flare. David leaned down into Will’s ear.
“You are strong, son,” David whispered. “Too strong. You must understand that I can’t have a threat to my control hanging around here, can’t you? We have to do away with that.”
“Fuck you,” Will said, spitting blood onto the asphalt below.
David pulled back harder on Will’s hair, making him groan.
“No. Fuck you, kid,” David replied.
David whistled.
Three of the Empties turned, spitting toward the dock. This caught the attention of the others, and they began limping toward the building.
Will tried to fight it, his head hanging over the edge—exposed—only six feet above the ground. He wiggled his body back and forth as David dug his knee harder into his back.
“David, don’t do this!” Marcus pleaded, Jonas still disrupting his path. “He saved me!”
“Yes, but he plans to kill me!” David said.
“Let’s just let him go!” Marcus said.
The Empties were limping closer.
“It’s not that easy, Marcus. This isn’t the same world. We have to do what we have to do to survive. Who’s to say, if I let him go, that he won’t just come back here and seek revenge on me for tying him up and forcing him to go get you?”
Closer. Dead arms beginning to extend.
“Yeah,” Marcus replied. “And I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him.” Hurt crept into his voice. “Let him go, David.”
The Empties were close. The first one could almost reach out and touch Will.
David licked his lips and grimaced, taking a tighter grip on Will’s hair.
He bit his lip and pulled back on Will, right before the baying creature could grab him.
Will rolled over and coughed, unable to catch his breath and in shock from his near demise.
David stood. He looked over to Marcus, running his hands together, holding the glare on him.
“Lock this piece of shit up,” David told Jonas, pointing down at Will.
The large man led Will into a small room, shutting the door behind him.
David watched the door close and then retreated to his office.
Marcus stood in the middle of the warehouse, looking out of the large bay door at the Empties. At the very left edge of his view, he saw a white car appear, moving down the hill that led into the industrial park.
“They’re back!” Leon yelled from the loading dock. Along with Jonas, he was David’s other primary member of security. He pulled a radio from his belt and repeated the same message to someone on the other end.
On the side of the building, there was an area twenty feet wide that extended all the way to the rear of the building, surrounded by an eight-foot tall chain link fence. Marcus walked to the edge of the dock and watched the white car pull up to the fence to his left. He jumped as Leon lit a road flare and threw it out into the parking lot to his right. The Empties howled and followed the flare.
“All clear,” Leon said into the radio.
Marcus heard a rumble and watched as the fence began to open, allowing the vehicle to drive through to safety.
“And that’s that,” Leon said, smiling at Marcus.
Marcus looked across the warehouse to the yellow door that led into David’s office. He could see him sitting at his desk with one hand to his chin and his other scribbling notes on a piece of paper. Marcus strode to the room and barged through the closed door.
David looked up from his notes to Marcus, laying his palms flat on the desk.
“What the hell are you doing, David?” Marcus asked.
David shook his head, smiling, and looked back down at his papers.
Marcus brought his fist down onto the desk, knocking over a cup full of pens.
“Answer me!”
Jonas, back from tying up Will, approached the window with Leon. David looked up and waved them off, signaling to them that everything was okay.
David sighed and put his palm up, pointing t
oward the chair at the front of his desk.
“Have a seat, Marcus.”
The chair in front of him was a standard wooden office guest chair with an ugly blue cushion. Marcus pulled the back of the chair and sat down, never letting his eyes leave David’s.
David licked his lips, supported himself on the desk with his elbows, and leaned toward Marcus.
“You have to understand something, Marcus,” he began. “I have nothing but the best intentions for all of you. You realize that, right?”
Marcus nodded. “Yeah, but…”
David cut him off, holding his index finger into the air.
“Rich and Mike have made multiple trips out there. And the news they have brought back hasn’t been pretty.” David grabbed his coffee mug and took a sip, the steam rising in front of his face. “The world has changed, Marcus. And we have to change with it.”
Marcus shrugged and shook his head. “Okay, but what does any of this have to do with holding that innocent guy hostage in there?”
David clasped his hands together. He looked out the window of his office and saw the people, his people, each in their assigned position, doing as he asked. The power brought a certain tingle through him; it was almost an erotic, arousing sensation.
“He’s a threat, Marcus.”
Marcus squinted his face. “To what? Your little kingdom here?”
David leaned back. “You’ll see, Marcus. Just be patient, friend.”
The eyes of Marcus’ friend had changed. He saw it now, just like Holly had warned him in the building next door. He slowly rose from his chair, pushing it back under the desk.
“Okay,” Marcus said softly.
Hands in his pockets, he turned and headed for the door, knowing that those eyes stared into the center of his back the entire time.
Before he made his exit, Marcus turned back to David and asked him one more question.
“Did you put a gun to Holly’s head?”
For a moment, David remained quiet. He ran his fingers over the stubble on his chin as he tried to read the reasoning behind Marcus’ question by looking into his eyes.
“Whatever it takes,” David said as he looked back down to what he was writing.
Marcus shook his head and exited the room.
Chapter 20
Gabriel
“Dylan, just sit back!” Gabriel commanded.
The boy kept leaning into the front seat, distracting Gabriel, who was trying to keep the white car in his sights.
They were speeding past old vacant businesses in a poor part of town. There were abandoned gas stations, coffee shops, and boutiques lining the road. It appeared that most of the people who survived were following the house arrest brought down by the government. Everyone except the person in the white car.
In the distance, he saw the car veer off onto the entry ramp of a highway.
Gabriel exited onto the ramp when he reached it. He saw the car climbing a hill in the horizon.
When the car disappeared over the hill, he finally lost it. Gabriel drove over the hill, but never saw the car.
“Shit!” he yelled, banging his hands on the steering wheel.
He came to a stop on the shoulder, realizing he wasn’t sure where he was. Nashville was unfamiliar to him, and he had been so focused on the car in the distance that he wasn’t paying attention to where he was going. He only knew that he was on a highway. Like everywhere else, many cars had been left abandoned. There were a few undead drifters in the distance, far enough away to where they were of no threat to him and Dylan.
Dylan moved into the front seat. As he did, he saw something in the distance.
“What is that?” Dylan asked. He was pointing the same way the truck was headed.
Smoke rose on the horizon, not far from where the truck sat. Gabriel threw the shifter into Drive and pressed the gas with his toes.
A couple of miles down the road, he reached an exit that looked like it led to the smoke. He veered the truck to the right and took the ramp, dodging abandoned cars and more of the undead.
At the end of the ramp, he took another right and let the car creep down the street, his foot barely touching the gas pedal.
Gabriel’s eyes widened as he looked down and saw two black tire marks on the street in front of him. They looked fresh and he could smell the burnt rubber in the air. He let the car settle at the top of the road. On the corner, there was a sign that read Space Park East - Industrial Park. Gabriel saw that the road went for about half a mile with small buildings on either side before it hit a curve. The smoke rose still, further east from where they parked, but Gabriel could sense there was life down this street.
He pressed down on the gas and followed his instinct down the road.
Chapter 21
Will
Will was locked in a small room, only about ten feet wide by ten feet long. The floor was carpeted, all four walls painted a slate blue—more than likely somebody’s office in the previous world. Now, it was empty aside from the prisoner. Above his head, built into the wall he sat against, was a window that brought in the pale light of the overcast day.
Jonas had restrained from roughing Will up more when he put him in the room, instead only tying his hands and stuffing a dirty sock in his mouth before leaving him sitting on the floor, alone.
Will suspected that Holly might be in a similar situation to his, perhaps even in the next room over. Clearly, David Ellis wanted full control of his camp. A disobedient flame like Holly would need to be extinguished for him to keep it.
Outside the door, Will heard footsteps. A door creaked open just down the hall from where he was entrapped. He heard the muted panic of a woman who sounded like she was gagged the same way he was.
Holly.
Will listened as her shrieks got louder before progressively fading. He closed his eyes so he could concentrate on her voice and estimate how far away they were taking her until her voice disappeared.
Then Will heard footsteps again. This time, they stopped in front of his room. He heard a click and then looked up to see the door open.
David’s eyes glared at him.
For a moment, he just stood in the doorway and stared down at Will. It was an act of intimidation, which Will found almost comical at this point. He sat on the ground, blood dried at the mouth, staring back into David’s determined eyes.
David entered the room, his boots clicking on the floor. He pulled a bowie knife from his pocket, which finally made Will stir.
“So you are afraid,” David said, grinning, as he waved the knife inches from Will’s face.
He pulled a cloth out of his pocket and began running it up and down the blade of the knife, cleaning it.
David knelt down with the knife in his hand, the blade pointed at Will, who began to squirm and yell through the sock. David reached toward him and pulled the sock from his mouth. Will gasped for air.
“I’m going to give you another chance,” David said. “While I see you as a threat to my agenda, I think that you could be of very good use to my plans here, if you want to be. If you play by my rules.”
Will caught his breath. Staring into the eyes of a man who had tried to feed him to the dead, he couldn’t help but question the motive.
“I have family out there. I have to find them,” Will said.
“You think you have family out there. But you don’t know for sure,” David said. He pointed toward the front of the building. “For all you know, they could look like those ugly fucks outside by now.”
Will’s blood went cold. He glared at David, wanting nothing more than to snatch the knife from the psycho’s hands and slash his throat.
“We can be your family, William,” David said.
Will let out a ‘pssh’ noise and then looked away. He stared at the wall for a moment before looking back at him.
“Fuck you.”
David let out a small laugh. He looked down at the knife.
“Wrong answer.”
&nbs
p; He leaned in and put the knife to Will’s throat, freezing when he heard the shouting behind him from another room.
“Who the hell is that?” the voice shouted.
David looked behind him, letting the cold blade stay rested against Will’s throat. He looked back at Will and flashed him a smile
“I’ll be back to finish this,” David said, patting Will on his cheek.
He pulled the knife away from Will’s neck, stood up, and left the room, leaving Will behind to think about how much time he possibly had left in his life.
In the bathroom across the hall, Marcus peeked through the crack in the door at the hinges, waiting for David to leave the room. Once he did, Marcus moved quickly into Will’s room, being sure to quietly open the door and close it behind him, holding the handle down to prevent the loud click.
Will’s eyes got wide when he saw Marcus. He began to squirm and try to work his way out of the ropes again.
Marcus put his finger to his mouth, signaling for Will to hush. He walked over to him and pulled a knife out of his pocket.
Will pulled his head away, waiting for Marcus to take the knife to his throat.
“David send you in here to do his dirty work?” Will asked.
Marcus smiled. “Not exactly.”
He reached behind Will and began to cut at the ropes with the knife.
“What the hell are you doing?” Will said.
“Shut up and listen,” Marcus began. “Holly was right. That guy out there, that monster…that isn’t the same David Ellis that I know.” He kept sawing at the ropes. “We gotta get Holly and get the hell out of here.”
“Where is she?” Will asked.
Marcus nodded toward the door. “They’ve got her out there, tied up like you. I think David aims to make an example out of the two of you.”
The ropes came loose and Will took turns rubbing his wrists with his hands.
“Come on,” Marcus said, offering Will a hand to help him get up. Will accepted, pulling himself up and almost falling, his legs fast asleep.
Empty Bodies Box Set | Books 1-6 Page 14