At Any Cost Box Set: Books 1 - 3

by K. M. Fawkes

  He nodded. “My favorite was Glenfiddich,” he answered. “Though I never drank it with other people. Always thought it was a drink better enjoyed on your own, in a quiet room. Preferably one that wasn’t very well lit.”

  He ducked down, somewhat embarrassed at having shared so much, but Alice’s laughter rang through the room—shockingly bright in the flickering candlelight. Garrett thought it was the first time he’d heard her laugh, and glanced up at her, surprised. Even the thought of alcohol seemed to have loosened her up a bit.

  “You’re right about that,” she replied. “It’s the sort of drink that deserves your focus. Your attention. Having so many other people around…” She waved her hand, taking in the crowd. “Kills the expectation. The appreciation.” She shrugged and gave him another half-grin. “But this is the situation in which we find ourselves. I think we’re both getting pretty good at making the best of a bad situation, right?”

  Julia reappeared at that moment with Alice’s drink, handing her a small glass with two thumbs’ worth of amber liquid at the bottom.

  “Plenty more where that came from,” she said cheerily. “You have some catching up to do.”

  Looking around, Garrett realized that there was something he hadn’t noticed the first time he looked at the crowd: everyone looked like they’d already had three or four drinks. Many of the faces were downright ruddy, and several people were swaying on their feet, talking with their hands and allowing their voices to grow too loud. Yes, there had been quite a bit of drinking going on before he and Alice arrived.

  And for that, he couldn’t blame them. Drinking allowed you to forget, and there was an awful lot about the current world that encouraged forgetting.

  “Drunk, most of them,” Alice murmured. She tipped the glass to her lips and took a dainty sip, closing her eyes and holding it in her mouth for a moment before swallowing.

  Then she gave him a glance out of the corner of her eye, accompanied by a lift of the eyebrow.

  “That’s not Scotch,” she said wryly. “That’s whiskey. And not even good whiskey. I’m guessing Johnny Walker, and it ain’t Black Label.”

  Garrett burst out laughing at that, his belly shaking with mirth.

  “In that case I’m glad I took a pass,” he said.

  Alice tipped her head from side to side in a gesture that said it wasn’t the worst thing she’d ever tasted—but it also wasn’t the best. “It’s better than nothing, I suppose,” she observed. “It’ll accomplish the same thing, at the end of the day.”

  Garrett was about to say that it would probably also accomplish a bigger headache the next morning when someone lurched into him from the left, knocking him into Alice and sending the remains of her drink flying into the wall.

  “Hey!” Alice shouted.

  Garrett turned, ready to lay into whoever had run into him, but stopped when he saw that it was Steve. And that he was definitely more than three drinks in.

  “Why if it ain’t Garrett,” Steve said, slurring his words. “Our glorioush leader!” He slapped a hand down on Garrett’s shoulder and guffawed. “Leasht that’s what I hear. Glorioush. Just don’t seem so glorioush to be lettin’ traitors go unpunished, though, do it?” He ducked down and peered into Garrett’s eyes, doing his best to keep his own eyes from crossing.

  Garrett took a step back—both because of the alcohol fumes coming off Steve and to give himself some room, in case this came to blows. He didn’t think Steve would stand up to one punch, honestly, but he also knew he would be smarter to get out of this without allowing any physical trouble.

  “No one could have proven that he was a traitor, Steve,” he said. “We can’t just go around shooting anyone we don’t like.”

  “Don’t see why not,” Steve said. He threw his arms out grandly, splashing whatever he’d had in his cup across the people to his right.

  “Because that would make us just as bad as those bikers,” Garrett answered, knowing as he said it that logic wasn’t going to make any difference to Steve when he was this drunk. Not that it ever did.

  Steve suddenly rushed at Garrett, grabbing him by the front of his shirt and pushing him up against the wall. “You sayin’ that’s a bad thing?” he hissed, his speech suddenly clear and malevolent. “You sayin’ I would have been wrong to take care of this town, take care of the people?”

  Behind Steve, Garrett could see some of his friends—Alan, Scott and the rest—cheering Steve on. Laughing at his antics. Agreeing with everything he said. And looking around, he could see that they weren’t the only ones. Other people had questions written on their faces, too. Questions about Garrett’s leadership, about the decisions he’d made.

  They may have voted to let him maintain his leadership, but that didn’t mean they actually trusted him. And suddenly it was all too much. All the work, for nothing. All the responsibility, just to come up against people who didn’t appreciate him. Didn’t even like him, most of the time. All the questions. All the anxiety.

  For what? So people could doubt him? Pretend that nothing was wrong, and watch Steve heckling him like this?

  He turned back to Steve, allowing all his frustration to bleed into his gaze.

  “You know what?” he hissed. “You think you’d be such a great leader? I’d like to see you try it. If that’s what you want, if that’s what everyone wants, then go ahead. Be my guest. I’ll gladly hand all that responsibility over to you. Because I’ll tell you what, Steve. I’ve had enough.”

  He turned and stormed out of the house, not caring who had heard him or what their reactions were. Not caring whether he was doing the best thing for the town or the people who lived there. Knowing only that for the first time in what felt like years, it wasn’t his job to make any further decisions.

  When he got into the front yard, he found that someone had lit the fire pit, though it was deserted. He dropped into one of the seats next to it and stared moodily into the fire, questioning everything. Hating the situation. Hating that he’d done what he did—and at the same time, wondering if it was actually the best thing for the town, and the people.

  A moment later, Alice appeared out of the dark, melting into the firelight like she’d been born from the night. She took a seat next to him and reached out to lay her hand on his arm.

  “You know they’re just drunk,” she said. “None of them meant for that to happen.”

  He didn’t bother to look up at her. “And what if it’s for the best? What if it’s actually better for the entire town if I step down, let someone else take a shot? It’s not like I’ve done anything all that great, anyhow. Raids to find food and water. Hell, anyone can do that. But the decision to take the tanker? Then the decision to fool the bikers when we went to give it back?” He paused, letting himself feel the pain of what had happened that day. “All I did was lose Riley and Bart. Maybe even get them killed. What sort of leader does that?”

  “A leader who’s willing to take chances,” she said, moving her hand to take his and squeezing. “A leader who can see the bigger picture, see how important it was for us to stand up to those bikers rather than backing down. You said that if we gave into them, they’d never stop bullying us, and you were right! You said that we could be brave, when none of the other people thought that, and you were right then, too! You were right to let Lance go, though no one will tell you that. It was the moral thing to do. The right thing to do. You’re exactly the leader this community needs. You’ve got the bravery for it. The brain for it. The heart for it.”

  Her voice softened, and she swallowed before continuing. “Hell, you care more than five other men put together, your heart is so big, and everyone in this town knows it. You’re the one we can all count on, Garrett. And don’t you forget it.”

  Her voice died away on the last note, and Garrett stared at her, hardly daring to breathe. The things she’d said… Well, whether the whole town thought them or not, he suddenly realized that Alice thought them. And though he’d known it before, somethi
ng about hearing her actually say it changed things.

  A warmth was growing in his belly that would have rivaled five Scotches, and his fingers were twitching with the need to reach out and touch Alice’s face. Did she really think so much of him? Was that really how she saw him?

  “I’ll always have your back, Garrett,” she finished on a whisper. “I can promise you that much.”

  He didn’t think any further. Looking deeply into her eyes, he began to lean forward, his hand going up to her cheek and cupping her jaw. He hadn’t known it until right now, but everything in his body was screaming for this to happen, and if she truly felt that way about him…

  To his shock, Alice yanked herself back, throwing herself up onto her feet.

  “I’m going to go home,” she said shakily. “Get some sleep. We all need to be well-rested tomorrow. Never know what’s going to happen.”

  And she turned and almost ran the other way, leaving Garrett sitting in the firelight, staring after her in shock, confusion, and something that felt disturbingly like hurt.

  Chapter 9

  When he woke up the next morning, it was to someone banging on his front door. Garrett cast his gaze toward the window, wondering what time it was, and saw that the sun was barely over the horizon. Early, then. Way too early for anyone to need him. Particularly after everything that had happened last night.

  His heart skipped a beat at the thought, and then started hammering away again, and he bit his lip, wondering if anyone would even remember what he’d said to Steve. If anyone else had even heard it. He hadn’t said that he would step down—just that he would allow the people to decide. Would they have questions for him? Was that why someone was banging away at his door? Or had something happened, something that required some sort of immediate decision?

  Renewed hammering on the door had him jumping out of bed and grabbing for a T-shirt, then stumbling out of the bedroom and toward the stairs. He took them two at a time, his panic building as the knocking continued, and by the time he threw open the door he was ready for the worst news possible.

  Alice stood on the other side, her face flushed, and the rest of the night came flooding back to him. The fire pit after the scene with Steve. The things she’d said. Oh God, the fact that he’d tried to kiss her—and the fact that she’d practically run away from him to keep him from doing so.

  He cringed, then cringed again at the thought that she might have seen him do it. And in that moment, he knew he had to apologize. Had to somehow explain why he’d done what he’d done, and make it okay with her. She was the one and only person he truly trusted, and he couldn’t lose her over a stupid miscalculation.

  “Alice, about last night. I’m so sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. Well, I know what I was thinking, but I can see now that it was probably the wrong thing to think. And I want to offer my apologies. I don’t want anything to—”

  She reached out and shoved him right in the chest.

  “Save it,” she said. “I don’t want to hear your apologies. I need you to get dressed. Something’s happening at the schoolhouse, and you need to be there.”

  Garrett gaped at her for a moment, too surprised by this sudden change of direction to truly understand it, and it took another shove from her and a harried “Get dressed!” before he was moving quickly back up the stairs, his mind running through the possibilities. What was happening at the schoolhouse? Surely not the gang from Helen Falls. If they’d invaded, he would have heard shouts from the watch, gunfire, explosions, shouting…

  So if it wasn’t them, then what the hell was going on?

  The two of them rushed toward the schoolhouse, Alice still refusing to tell him anything, and arrived breathless to see that Steve had set himself up on the top step of the stairs to hold some sort of pep rally. His buddies were surrounding him—though they were keeping themselves to the lower steps, Garrett noticed—and were cheering him on, throwing up cries and pumping their fists with everything that he said.

  It was exactly like the jocks at his high school trying to rile people up for the game that night, he thought. Complete with the ruddy faces, and probably the hangovers. Only this was for something a lot more serious than a football game.

  “That man!” Steve suddenly yelled, pointing at Garrett upon his arrival. “He told me just last night that he would step down! He’s shown himself to be a less-than-stellar leader. A coward!”

  A roar from his friends—though Garrett noticed that the townspeople gathered between Steve and Garrett weren’t yelling along. It looked like everyone had been gathered, however, so the whole town was hearing this.

  “A traitor!”

  Another roar. But only from Steve’s friends.

  “Someone who has led us into trouble. Likely gotten some of us killed, in fact! Made trouble with the local bullies and given them a reason to hate us!”

  And at that, there was some murmuring in the crowd. Garrett didn’t like it—but he also couldn’t argue with them. He was carrying the guilt over Riley and Bart heavy on his shoulders, and he would have been a fool to think that no one else had had the same thoughts. But that didn’t make him a bad leader. It didn’t make him irresponsible. It made him a man who had tried to do his best, but had run into some trouble.

  It certainly didn’t mean that Steve would be a better leader, though that seemed to be exactly what Steve was building up to.

  “I say I should be the leader from now on!” Steve roared, confirming Garrett’s suspicion. “I should be the one making decisions! I’ve been in this town longer, I know you all better, and I swear that I won’t get any of you killed!”

  More shouting and cheering from Steve’s friends there, but Alice tapped Garrett’s hand and pointed with her chin at the people around them, and he could see what she was noticing: the people of the community didn’t look at all sure that Steve would make any sort of leader. In fact, more of them looked worried than not. They were glancing back at Garrett, as if they were wondering whether he was going to do anything, and casting doubtful—and even angry—glances in Steve’s direction.

  “Garrett has done nothing but scare us since he got here!” Steve screamed, practically frothing at the mouth now. “He came in and immediately started fearmongering. Well I ask you, what should we be fearing? We’re in the middle of the desert, in a country that has lost its government. No one is going to bother us. He’s been riling us up for nothing!”

  His voice broke on the final outburst, and Garrett almost gasped.

  “The man should have been a preacher, or a politician,” he muttered to Alice, who huffed out a laugh.

  Steve wasn’t finished yet, though.

  “He’s been scaring us to try to keep us from making any decisions of our own!” he shouted. “Telling us we had to flee when we have a perfectly good town right here. Telling us we have to be ready for something to happen when we’re what, four days along, and nothing has happened? Who would believe this man anymore? Who would want him at the front of our group?”

  Suddenly his voice dropped and he looked around at the crowd, arranging his face into a more responsible mask. “And that’s why I was so glad when he said he’d step down and hand over the reins to me. So glad he finally saw reason and bowed to my natural leadership abilities. We’ll be better off without him. And I have some changes I’m going to start making immediately. That group from Helen Falls isn’t coming. We’re going to stop with that foolishness right now and start cleaning up this town. Enough with these barricades! We want our furniture back in our houses, don’t we? We’re going to go back to life as it was before. Before Garrett and his friends came into the picture.”

  “I never told you I would step down,” Garrett called out, no longer able to hold his tongue. “I said that if everyone wanted it, I would consider it.”

  A ripple ran through the crowd, everyone growing stiff as they started to look back and forth between Garrett and Steve. Garrett felt Alice grow tense next to him, and flexed hi
s own hands, balling them up into fists. If a fight was what Steve wanted, then he was going to give it to him. And everyone here seemed to know it.

  In fact, he was willing to bet everyone here had already chosen a side. Even if they didn’t realize it yet.

  Garrett was just taking a step forward, ready to get up the steps and come face-to-face with Steve and his ego, when a gunshot rang out and Steve fell to the ground, screaming in pain.

  Chapter 10

  Garrett yanked the gun from his waistband and dove for the side of the building, flying through the screaming crowd as people ran in all directions, shouting for their friends and family. He hoped they were all running for cover—if they were smart, that was exactly what they were doing—but just for the moment, he wasn’t worrying about anyone else. He was running for his own life.

  As the leader of the community, he was also keenly aware that he would be the first target in any shootout. The first to be shot—or the first to be taken hostage. Neither sounded appealing to him.

  He rammed his shoulder into the corner of the schoolhouse on his way by, and ducked down to his knees on the other side of the building, chest heaving and gun up in front of his face, finger on the trigger. Not two seconds later, Alice was next to him, her rifle at the ready.

  “Where are the shots coming from?” Garrett said, trying hard to listen. To his ears, it sounded as if they were coming from everywhere.

  “Sounds like there are at least four guns,” Alice said. “I can’t pinpoint their exact locations but we definitely have multiple shooters.”

  “Dammit,” Garrett breathed.

  No one in the town was primed for an invasion. Those who had guns had probably left them at home when they were called to this stupid meeting by Steve.

  No one was prepared because he’d wanted to get up there and brag.