Concern crossed David’s face, and he cocked his head to the side as if trying to hear better. Ruth, Patton, and Jade all went quiet as they listened for the shouting. “It’s getting louder,” Patton whispered.
Matthew squeezed his son’s shoulder and then stepped off the front porch. He still held the shotgun tight in his other hand. He lingered on the steps, peering into the road that led down the mountain.
“—ad! Dad! Help me! Dad!”
The screaming got closer. Matthew’s heart leapt in his throat as a lanky teenager burst around the corner and ran for the hotel. He’d recognize that wild blonde hair anywhere. Allison ran as though she had wolves chasing her. One of her hands was up in the air and waving frantically.
“It’s Allison,” Ruth said breathlessly from behind Matthew.
“Allison!” Matthew cried out. He bolted toward his daughter. He didn’t know what had happened, but Allison wouldn’t be screaming for him unless something was terribly wrong. He also didn’t want to ask why she was alone.
He met Allison in the middle. She leapt into his arms and he enveloped her in a huge hug. Tears streamed down from her red-rimmed eyes. She wheezed for breath, and Matthew finally had to release her. But when he saw the fear on her face, Matthew’s own dread ignited inside his stomach. “What’s wrong?” he asked as she tried to catch her breath. “Allison, honey, tell me what’s wrong.”
Allison gasped for air and pointed back the way she’d come. “There’s some guys…with guns…”
“Where’s your mother?” Matthew demanded, hating that he sounded as if he were angry. He gripped her shoulder. “Allison, tell me where your mother is.”
If something happened to Kathleen…
“There was a van with food and supplies in it,” Allison panted and coughed. “These bikers were raiding it. One pointed a gun at Mom. She told me to run and get help. Dad, I’m so sorry, but that’s what she told me to do!”
“Are you okay?” Matthew demanded.
“I’m fine, but Dad, I left Mom with them. They’re a mile down the road. Who knows what could have happened!” Allison’s face was marked with distress.
“I’ll get her. Stay here,” Matthew said and gripped the shotgun tighter.
Allison nodded weakly and braced her hands on her knees. “Dad, be careful.”
Matthew didn’t stick around to hear anything else. Adrenaline surged within him. His wife was in grave danger. She needed help. She needed him. He ran, and it felt as though his feet flew over the road. Far too soon, his thighs burned with the exertion, and he tasted metal in the back of his throat. His lungs ached. He might have walked all the way from Madison, but he wasn’t used to full-on sprinting. Only the thought of Kathleen kept him going. At this point, Matthew knew all too well what awful things could happen. What awful things people who were pushed could do if their survival depended on it. It made him feel sick.
Matthew’s sweat coated the smooth handle of the shotgun. He kept it close and propped it up under his arm as he rounded a corner and the white delivery van came into view. Allison wasn’t wrong. A group of bikers stood close to it in a semi-circle. He could make out Kathleen in a heated argument with another member of the group, a man with a leather jacket decorated with a lot of patches. Relief zinged through him seeing that his wife was still standing and for the most part unharmed.
The rest of the bikers were focused on their argument. For a moment, Matthew caught sight of a gun in Kathleen’s hands. Matthew slowed and planned to approach carefully, but then he spotted a member wearing a paisley bandana slip his hand into his back jean pocket. He pulled out a switchblade, and flipped the blade out discreetly behind his back. Panic rushed through Matthew. The man widened his stance. His gaze seemed fixated on Kathleen.
Matthew didn’t have time to think. His wife’s life was in danger. He came to a stop and pulled the shotgun up to his shoulder. He aimed at the man and pulled the trigger.
The shot seemed to echo over the mountain like thunder. Matthew momentarily lost his hearing, though it soon came back with a low whine. He heard screaming. The man dropped the knife to clutch at his shoulder as he fell to his knees. Blood seeped from between his fingers. Matthew flipped the safety on and ran toward the man to make sure he couldn’t get the knife back again.
The man with the paisley bandana reached for the weapon and cried out in surprise when Matthew kicked the knife away from him. That cry of surprise quickly turned to one of pain as Matthew stomped on the man’s fingers. The man clutched his fingers under one arm and stared at Matthew with a mix of rage and hatred. Other members of the biker gang lunged for their fallen friend and pulled him to safety, surrounding him as though they could be a protective wall.
The man with the leather jacket that Kathleen had been arguing with looked shocked and horrified. “Don’t shoot us. Christ, please, stop shooting! We haven’t done anything wrong!” he yelled.
“Kathleen, come here,” Matthew said. Kathleen looked dazed, but inched closer to Matthew and away from the bikers. He glanced at her and felt his heart sink. He couldn’t believe how pale she looked. Was it because he’d shot someone? Her eyes seemed wide and focused only on the leader of the biker gang. Her handgun looked steady in her hands.
“We weren’t hurting anyone,” the man in the leather jacket said. Matthew began to sense the stirrings of rage behind his fear. “We were just trying to get some food and supplies when this crazy woman started waving a gun at us. I swear to you, we didn’t mean any harm, just don’t hurt us—”
“Shut up,” Matthew said. He felt like the situation was spiraling out of his control. “You don’t need to say anything else.”
One of the women who were bent over the man Matthew shot stood up. “We don’t want anything from you except to be let go peacefully,” she said and gestured to the vehicle. “If you want it so bad, you can keep it. Just let us go. Take it and you’ll never see us again.”
Matthew looked to Kathleen to see if she had anything to say. Dark circles dulled the skin underneath her eyes. Her face had an unnatural sickly pallor to it as if she had a fever. She looked unwell. Matthew knew he had to get his wife out of this situation and somewhere safe. He took a deep breath and nodded to the woman. “Agreed,” he said, keeping the shotgun leveled at the bikers.
For a moment, he could see how he and Kathleen looked to the bikers, as though they were the threat, holding these bikers at gunpoint. Yet he knew that they were simply defending themselves. These people were strangers, and he was very familiar now with the kinds of actions strangers would take to get what they wanted. He couldn’t trust anyone but his family. “Get out of here,” he said.
The bikers clambered onto their bikes and helped the man Matthew had shot onto one of the vehicles. The leader of the group pursed his lips and then stepped forward. “I’d like to have our gun back, please. It’s the only thing we have left to defend ourselves with.”
Matthew narrowed his eyes. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Kathleen bite her lip. Matthew shook his head. “No, I’m sorry. No.”
Matthew wondered if the gun he wanted was the one Kathleen held. At the same time, he didn’t want to hand the biker a weapon only to have him turn that gun on him and his wife. He didn’t want to give the leader any sort of advantage. If Kathleen gave back the weapon, there was a good chance he’d turn on Matthew and shoot him right back. He remembered Jade and how quickly she had turned on him when things didn’t go her way. “We’ll be keeping the weapon, thank you very much,” Matthew said.
The leader looked frustrated and opened his mouth as if to argue. “We’ll need it. It’s dangerous out here. We need to have some way to protect ourselves.”
“I’m sorry, but no,” Matthew said.
The leader muttered something under his breath and shot Kathleen a nasty look. He eased away from them and hopped on his bike. Others threw equally hostile glances over their shoulders and shouted at Kathleen and Matthew before taking off to ride back
down the mountain toward Galena.
As soon as they were around the corner and out of sight, Matthew lowered his shotgun. He turned to Kathleen and enveloped her in his arms. She felt small, and she couldn’t stop trembling. She seemed to not register the hug, and so Matthew hung onto her until she uttered a soft bewildered sob. Her arms slowly rose and went around him before clinging to him tightly.
“I’m so glad you’re safe,” Matthew murmured into her hair. He hoped his presence would help calm her or alleviate whatever shock she was in.
“I’m okay,” she whispered through her tears. “Did Allison find you?”
“Yes, she’s safe at the hotel,” Matthew said and pulled back just enough to be able to look into her big brown eyes.
“Patton?” she asked.
“Safe. Everyone is safe back at the hotel,” Matthew said and brushed a couple of stray strands of hair behind her ear. He couldn’t help himself and leaned closer, giving her a closed-mouth kiss. “I was so worried about you,” he said.
Kathleen let out a tearful laugh. “Worried about me? I was terrified something had happened to you!”
“At least we’re together now,” Matthew said, bringing her back into a hug. When he released her, she wiped her eyes and bent down to grab two mountain bikes. Matthew took the second one from her, and together they began to walk up the mountain toward the hotel.
“I had to walk all the way from Madison,” he said dramatically, and Kathleen seemed to come back alive as he told her about his travels and they headed home.
3
The guards hauled Max into the medical bay and handed him off to the hazel-eyed nurse on call. Max blurrily read her name tag as she hoisted him up onto an examination table: Sheila.
Sheila shone a light into his eyes and asked him to follow it. He groaned and clutched his sides in pain. He felt as though every inch of him was covered in bruises. Sheila continued to ask him a series of questions as she poked and prodded him. Does it hurt to breathe? Can you move your arms? If I press here how much does it hurt on a scale of one to ten? He answered in a daze before she declared him to have severely bruised ribs, two black eyes, and that he was one more face-punch away from a concussion.
“Thanks,” he said as she handed him a set of painkillers.
Sheila studied him to make sure he swallowed them and then noted something on her chart. “Eric will be here soon to take you back to your cell.”
“Is that wise?” Max asked and tried to laugh but ended up uttering a huff of pain instead. “Don’t want to go back if I don’t have to.”
Sheila paused and brushed a strand of black hair back from her face. “Who did this to you?” she asked softly. “What happened to you?”
Max tried to smile this time and felt grateful that none of his teeth had been knocked out. “I ran into a door,” he said.
She didn’t smile in return. “You should report this. I should report this. It’s much worse than the last time you ended up in here.”
“Oh, I’m sorry I forgot that we had met before.” He’d meant it to come off as flirtatious, but against his will, Max’s smile faltered. Sheila shrugged and moved to buzz Eric in. She gave the guard a genuine smile and asked, “How is Robbie?”
Eric nodded his head in appreciation. “Much better, thank you for asking. We took him to the pediatrician you recommended. I really like them. Down to earth.”
“I’m so happy to hear it.” Sheila beamed.
Max sighed and tried to drown out the chit-chat. He didn’t want to hear about Eric’s kids or about how they went to a baseball game earlier that week. It all sounded so…normal. And for Max, his life had definitely transformed into something unrecognizable. When Sheila and Eric moved on to talking about summer plans, Max felt like an object in the room, something to be talked over because he was a prisoner. It happened more often than he’d thought it would. To drown out the way it made him feel, he focused on his injuries. Every breath he took left his ribs aching. His legs shook. A black ball of anxiety rolled in his stomach.
Finally, Eric nodded goodbye to Sheila and approached Max. He motioned for Max to hold out his wrists. Max sighed again, this time deeper. “I don’t see why you’ve started shackling us all the time,” he complained.
“It’s a new policy,” Eric said.
“Sure,” Max said, raising his eyebrow. “I wonder what other strange new policies will be enforced now that the power is out.”
“The generators are on,” Eric said, helping Max to his feet.
“Small miracles,” Max muttered.
Eric locked the shackles and helped Max stand up fully. “You should be more careful. Colin is scheduled to be checked out once you leave.”
“That guy doesn’t have a scratch on him,” Max said and hated that the low-simmering anxiety leaked through his words. “Why would he need to come to the medical bay? I didn’t even get a chance to fight back. He barely got smacked in the jaw.”
Eric motioned for Max to follow him out of the medical bay. “I thought the two of you were friends.”
Max snorted and looked up to the ceiling. The generators made the lights give out a soft whirring sound. But even with the lights on, the prison was still full of dark shadows and even darker hallways. Some days, the sunlight barely made it through the windows. “Nah, Colin has been out to get me since day one,” Max said.
Eric gave him a strange look but remained silent as he led Max to his cell. Eric unlocked his cell and ushered Max inside, bending down to unshackle his wrists. “Try not to get into any more fights, okay? For my sake,” Eric said as he locked the door behind him. “Breakfast will be on its way shortly.”
“Another new policy?” Max asked. “Now I can’t even go to the cafeteria?”
But Eric didn’t answer.
Once Eric was out of sight, Max stumbled to his bed and collapsed in it. Eric wasn’t wrong about Colin. Colin had welcomed Max on his first day in prison with open arms. They’d both been part of the same drug ring. Both of them had gotten caught and were paying their dues in the system. The only difference was that Colin hadn’t sung like a bird and had taken his ten to fifteen years without parole without implicating the cartel. On the other hand, Max had rolled on the cartel, earning him five years maximum with parole.
Sure, he might have kept that fact from Colin in the beginning. He needed someone in his corner during the those first terrifying days of incarceration. Max had been a newbie and easily taken advantage of by others, but with Colin on his side, a lot of the other inmates didn’t harass him as much. Max learned as much as he could: who he could trust, who he had to watch out for, when he’d be safest.
He just hadn’t thought Colin would find out about his betrayal so fast. When Colin discovered that Max was the one who had given up the names and dates for future drug exchanges that had landed even more of the cartel in jail, he swore he’d kill Max. Max hadn’t just betrayed their cartel, he’d also betrayed Colin personally. Colin and his cronies took to beating Max up at every possible opportunity. When Max’s life had been threatened, he’d asked for a block change, but didn’t get it. The most he got were a few more watchful glares from the guards. Colin was still able to corner him when he least expected it. There was nothing to stop Colin from jumping him and pummeling him until he lost consciousness. This time had been no different.
Max rolled onto his side on the bed and uttered a soft moan of pain. The beds were hard, the sheets thin, and all he wanted was to be anywhere else than here. He pulled the blanket up and over his shoulder, making sure he could see the door to his cell in case anyone unexpected wanted to pay him a visit. Tears pressed against his eyes, and he closed his eyes tight to get rid of them. Tears were a weakness he could not afford to show.
Come to think of it, this had been one of the worst beatings he’d been through. Usually, the guards pulled fights apart within a minute or two, but this fight had gone on for far too long. At least five minutes. The longest five minutes of Max’s l
ife. Which seemed…odd.
Max cracked open his eyes and peered at the bars of his cell. He didn’t hear much. No guards on rotation. The breakfast Eric said was on the way hadn’t shown up yet for some reason. More and more, the schedule of prison life had been out of whack since Kathleen’s last visit. He’d been spending more time in his cell than usual. It was as though the best solution for the prison to control their prisoners was to keep them confined. In fact, a lot of the guards he’d known fairly well had seemed to disappear without warning. The guards’ rotations had become more spread out, the allotted recreation time cut down to nothing, and most meals served in trays delivered to cells instead of taking the inmates to the cafeteria. At first, he’d wondered if it was simply a hiring turnover, but even then, the erratic behavior wasn’t normal. It wasn’t normal that he could’ve gotten his skull smashed open because of a hiring problem.
He pressed his lips tightly together. Things had become so strange since the power had become unreliable. Were guards just not showing up for work? Was the state not supplying enough money? God, he hoped this wouldn’t become a slow descent into anarchy.
But honestly, that was what it felt like. If the electricity went out completely and the generators finally quit, the inmates could be on lock-down permanently. And if that happened, if there was truly something larger going on, Max wouldn’t be surprised if the guards vanished completely, to be replaced with angry inmate leaders and their surveying goons who selected who they wanted to release, leaving those who had no allegiance to rot in their cells. Max would definitely be left to rot.
Without guards, a five-minute scuffle could turn into a ten-minute beatdown. Max wouldn’t survive a ten-minute encounter with Colin. The anxiety in his stomach flared into something frantic, making him feel like a dog trapped in a too-small cage. Without that protection, Colin could easily kill him. This wasn’t about him serving a sentence. He was battling for his life.
Max swallowed hard. He closed his eyes again and told himself to sleep. Hopefully, these thoughts would go away with rest. But there was still no guard. There was still no food.
EMP Catastrophe | Book 2 | Erupting Danger Page 2
