by Stasia Black
“Don’t see the problem with sticking to silver and gold,” Nix muttered.
Graham narrowed his eyes Nix’s direction. “Is that sarcasm? You know I’m not good with sarcasm.”
Nix’s face cracked into a grin. “No champ. No sarcasm here.” He clapped Graham on the back and Graham jumped forward out of his grasp like Nix had just jolted him with a hot poker.
“I don’t like nicknames either,” Graham mumbled.
Audrey understood the feeling. Nix was enough to ruin anyone’s mood.
“So what’s first on the list?” Audrey asked. “Are we checking out the Food Pantry?”
“Aw God, please say no,” Nix grumbled. “That place stinks. They’re always sprouting something or other. Don’t know why the food that’s already grown has to grow extra right before you eat it.”
“Didn’t you hear what I was just saying?” Graham said. “Sprouting beans and seeds prevents scurvy. For centuries the Chinese prevented scurvy by eating sprouted beans during long winters in the north. Captain James Cook kept his sailors from getting it during a three-year—”
“That was sarcasm.” Then Nix tilted his head. “Okay, more of a rhetorical statement. But still, same idea.”
Graham just shook his head in annoyance and then turned back to Audrey. “I thought I’d just show you around the square. Then if you want, we can go down to the river. And maybe take a drive over to the well the township’s named after.”
“A drive?”
“Sure,” Graham smiled. “The water truck goes out there twice a week and today’s a fill up day. We can hop on for a ride there and back.”
“Sounds great,” Audrey said and for once her smile was even genuine. Then she felt Nix’s calculating gaze on her. Dammit. Maybe if she was lucky there wouldn’t be enough space on the truck and they could ditch the guard dog.
In the meantime, Audrey kept her eyes peeled and she made mental notes as Graham led her around the square.
First, he showed her the communal laundry—they might have more access to water than most but that didn’t mean they squandered it. Next were the stables. Horse breeding had become a new boom business and Audrey couldn’t help fawning over a couple of new colts.
Sentries stood guard all over the stable, though. If she was going to take a horse instead of a vehicle, she’d have to be careful about it.
Next stop was an unexpected one—the library. A young woman who couldn’t be more than a year or two older than Audrey herself stood behind the check in counter. A tall man sat in a chair off to the right, observing Audrey and her entourage as they filed in the library.
The woman, Gina, smiled broadly as they came in. “I was hoping you’d stop by.” She came out from behind the desk and Audrey’s eyes widened, taking in her large, pregnant belly.
“Oh,” Audrey gasped.
Gina laughed. “I know, right? It still startles me whenever I look in a mirror.” Her hands dropped lovingly to her belly.
Audrey felt like there were things she was supposed to say. Small talk that happened when someone was having a baby. But she really hadn’t been around women in such a long time, and even back then, she’d just been a teenager.
“So, um,” Audrey fumbled, “when are you due. Do you know if it’s a boy or girl?” Then she winced internally. It wasn’t like they could just plug into an ultrasound machine or—
“It’s a girl,” Gina said, giggling. “The whole town celebrated when we found out. Every one of us counts, you know?”
“Hah.” Audrey blinked. So was this woman like, excited that in nineteen or so years her baby girl would get her own lottery? She couldn’t forget even for a second—beneath all the niceties, this place was seriously screwed up.
Gina must have mistaken whatever look was on her face because she hurried to fill in, “We have two doctors in town and a couple years ago one of the salvage teams managed to find an ultrasound machine that wasn’t fried by the EMPs. One of the doctors is even a surgeon. He specialized in podiatry.” Her nose crinkled slightly before she continued brightly, “But a surgeon’s a surgeon, you know? He had a residency at John’s Hopkins and everything.” She said all this like Audrey should be impressed so Audrey nodded and made an appropriately awed noise.
“John and I can’t wait to meet our little Johanna. Isn’t that right?” Gina reached out a hand to the man sitting off to the side and he came over. He stood at Gina’s back and wrapped his arms around her stomach from behind.
Okay, where was the barf bag on this ride? This was a little too much indoctrination for one morning. Audrey was more than glad when Graham made their excuses and they moved on to the salvage yard and the smithy at the edge of town.
“Scrapper teams are always going out and bringing salvage back.”
Audrey’s interest perked as they walked through what was essentially a large yard that looked several acres wide. All around her men sorted and separated junk, using crow bars and hammers to take apart everything from old computers to cars.
“Your basic salvage operation falls into three categories,” Nix said. “Luxury items, metals, and fuel. Pre-D-Day luxuries are getting harder and harder to find. You can make a mint on toilet paper and tampons these days.”
Audrey spun and gave him a wtf look but he just kept looking out at the salvage yard and talking like he was discussing the daily catch of fish.
“Other high value items are anything you can melt down,” Nix said. “Copper. Aluminum. Nickel. Steel. Then of course there’s your fuels. Most diesel and natural gas sources have been locked down, but every once in a while, you run across a real find.”
Audrey glanced around her at all the people so dutifully going about their tasks, morning light falling on the pristine little town like something out of a fucking Norman Rockwell painting.
And she couldn’t help thinking that this whole day felt like the first thirty minutes of a horror movie. She’d loved watching them when she was a kid. For the first half hour of the movie, everything was always hunky dory.
The crew of the space ship got along perfect. The family moved into the old fixer upper that just needed a little tender loving care. The community appeared to be a well-oiled machine of friendly neighbors and PTA meetings.
Until night fell and then shit started getting real.
So if Jacob’s Well Township looked so picture perfect on the outside, just how rotted would the underbelly be once the sun went down?
Chapter 8
NIX
She was trying not to let on but Nix could see the way Audrey’s body was stringing tighter and tighter with every hour that passed.
He could also tell she was less than pleased when he told the driver of the water hauler truck to take a hike and took his place behind the wheel. With Audrey in the center seat of the narrow front bench between him and Graham. Nix had the pleasure of watching her squirm the entire drive out to Jacob’s Well.
It was probably wrong to get so much amusement out of the situation. But she was safe. And she was scrappy. She had spirit.
He’d been trying to put his finger on it all day, and that was what it was.
Too many of the women they rescued were just… broken. Not beyond repair. But damaged bad.
Nix looked out at the fading sun while Graham nattered Audrey’s ear off about Jacob’s Well, the large natural spring that had a nine-foot circular opening at the top. It did indeed make it look like a well. Nature made. It went down about thirty feet before breaking off into a series of underground caverns. A couple of the Commander’s men had tried diving it but no one got very far before having to come up for air.
Nix had seen the well a hundred times, anyway. He was far more interested in watching Audrey. Her red hair flashed in the setting sun. A thousand little golden starbursts. Then there were her eyes. And the way she seemed to soak up every little thing Graham told her about the town.
No doubt she was planning her next escape attempt. He’d talked to Holder and Crawfor
d about her multiple attempts last night. It had him smiling all through his morning calisthenics.
Scrappy.
It would serve her well.
The few times he’d even considered putting his name in for the lottery, it was the thought of those world-weary, wounded women that had him pulling back. Not because they were broken. Lord knew he was no one to judge. But a woman like that, and the way he liked what he liked in the bedroom? No, it’d never work. He’d only terrify some poor girl even more.
A woman like Audrey though? Scrappy? Full of spirit? Ready to give back as good as you gave?
It just might.
As long as you keep her safe.
His gut went tight as Audrey turned his way, her hand going over her eyes. She wasn’t looking at him. Or at least she was pretending not to even see him. That was okay. She could pretend all she wanted. All day, the awareness between them had been as thick as the air before a storm.
“So how far beyond the well does the border of the township go?” Audrey asked.
Nix covered his smirk. Come on, baby, you can do better than that. Her pretenses of subtlety had dropped off as the day wore on. When they’d walked through the corn and grain fields, she’d eyed everything from the storage granaries to the horses the farmers rode to the hoes and spades they used to till the fields. It was like he could see her ticking off boxes in her head.
Food. Transportation. Weapons.
The question was when she was going to make a run for it again.
Tonight, if she was impatient.
Nix cocked his head and narrowed his eyes at her. This was the woman who had tried three times last night to escape. Patience probably wasn’t her strong suit.
“Alrighty,” Danny said as he came back to where they were standing. He’d stripped off his shirt and Nix shook his head. Showing off his muscles might have worked for Danny back in the day but five minutes in Audrey’s presence and Nix knew that was the totally wrong approach to take with her. If he could have smacked Danny up the back of the head he would have.
“Got the tanker all filled up.” Danny grinned at Audrey, oblivious to her rigid posture. And then the dumb bastard just kept on staring after she nodded politely back at him.
Danny was no master of subtlety either. “I’m really looking forward to getting to know you, Audrey. Can’t tell you how long I waited for...” He wiped his hands on the sides of his jeans and all but bounced where he stood. “You know.” He gestured her way. “To meet someone like you.”
Audrey’s eyebrows dropped in confusion though she kept smiling vaguely. “Someone like me?”
Danny just kept that goofy grin on his face. “You’re real pretty.”
The smile dropped off Audrey’s face and Danny stepped back, his face going ashen. “Sorry, was I not supposed to say that?” Danny looked to Nix and Graham. “Till like, the official courtship stuff starts tonight?”
“Tonight?” Audrey’s voice sounded about an octave higher than normal. “You’re one of the…”
She whipped around and looked toward Graham like he’d betrayed her. “Did you bring me out here so you could— You think you can just gang up on me like this?”
“What?” Graham squeaked, hand pushing his glasses up over and over like he did when he was upset about something. “No, it’s not like tha—”
“Get back,” Audrey said, stepping back so she could see all three of them, her hands up like she was ready for an attack.
Nix sighed. He knew he should have brought the dart gun. “You got us. This was all a big conspiracy. We showed you around town today as an elaborate ruse just to get you out here alone so we could have our wicked, wicked way with you.”
If looks could kill, Nix would be sliced into ribbons on the ground by Audrey’s glare.
“No we didn’t!” Graham exclaimed. “I swear, Audrey, that’s not true at all—”
“Sorry I forgot my sarcasm sign to flash at you,” Nix pushed Graham aside and stepped up in front of Audrey. She didn’t back up but her fists clenched and her fighting stance went even more rigid.
“You’re gonna pull a muscle standing like that. Fighting’s all about being loose.” He reached out to readjust her stance and she swung at him. He barely ducked out of the way in time.
Feisty. He’d have to add feisty to the list of things he liked about her.
She swung again and he grabbed her hand midair. “Now look, woman, you gotta fight smarter.”
She growled and swung with her free hand. He captured it in his other hand and continued shaking his head at her. “If you’d landed that hit, all you would have gotten out of it was a broken hand,” he chided.
Well that just seemed to piss her off more.
“Oh yeah?” she asked, eyebrows lowered and eyes wide. “Please do tell me more, oh wise master.”
The next thing Nix knew, she was yanking and rolling backwards—and he was flying through the air.
He landed hard on his back, all the air knocked out of him.
What the— How had she managed to fucking flip him?
She stood over him, dusting her hands off, a satisfied smile on her face. “You were saying?”
He tried to sit up but she was quicker. Her booted foot landed on his hand.
“Ah ah ah,” she said, steel in her voice now. “Just remember, if you try to touch me with this hand tonight during whatever this courtship bullshit is, I’ll personally ensure that every single one of these fingers ends up broken before morning. You got it, pal?”
It would probably piss her off if he grinned right now.
So with as straight a face as he could manage, all he said was, “Got it.”
Chapter 9
AUDREY
For all her bravado, Audrey was scared shitless as the four of them road back to town. Yes, four. There was no space in the cab so Danny climbed onto a narrow ledge on the back of the tanker and was apparently just holding on.
Maybe he’d fall off on the way back. She should be so lucky.
God, his muscles had been even bigger than Nix’s. This morning she wouldn’t have even thought that was possible. He wasn’t as tall as Nix, but he could probably choke her to death without even breaking a sweat.
Remember your training.
It didn’t matter how big her opponent was. You just had to use their own strength against them. She’d fought men off before who wanted what these men would eventually try to take. Okay, just one man, but still.
Her back went ramrod straight at the memory. She’d been asleep when the spineless little shit attacked. She’d woken up to hands squeezing her breasts and yanking at her jeans.
She’d screamed and screamed but no one was around to help. Charlie was off with Uncle Dale hunting.
He knew that. He’d waited for them to go.
Her own cousin.
Uncle Dale’s son, Rodney.
He was just eighteen but he was plenty big. He took after Uncle Dale—brawny with big, broad shoulders—and he was always eating more than his share to stay that way. Charlie hadn’t liked the way he’d looked at her for a while by that point but Audrey always told him not to be ridiculous. Rodney was related to her, for God’s sake.
She’d never be so naïve again.
When she started fighting back, Rodney had dragged her off the cot and slammed her on the floor.
But he was the one who’d been in for the rude awakening.
He never had the patience for Uncle Dale’s jujitsu lessons. He relied on his size and brute force.
One broken nose, dislocated shoulder, and bitten off pinky finger later, he’d learned better.
That’s right, she’d bitten his damn finger completely off. He was the one left crying on the floor in a crumpled ball while she locked him in the bunker and scrambled up the tunnel to the backyard. It was the first time she’d been outside in eight years.
And she couldn’t even enjoy it. She’d raced across the yard and into the house, hiding in the closet until Uncle
Dale and Charlie got back.
Uncle Dale didn’t want to believe it of his son. Audrey could see it broke something in him to hear it.
Didn’t stop him from choosing his son over her. Charlie was welcome to stay, but she had to go.
His excuse?
Rodney was becoming a man and with there being no women around, well, Audrey was just ‘too much temptation for the boy.’
Rodney was still down in the bunker during all this. Charlie wanted to go down there and kill him. When Uncle Dale got in his way, Charlie punched him.
She and Charlie left the next day, never speaking another word to their uncle.
And Audrey would always have to live with the knowledge that if not for her, Charlie would never have had to leave Uncle Dale’s.
He’d still be alive.
The truck bounced when it hit a pothole and her thigh glanced off of Nix’s. She jerked it back. Nix didn’t look her way but she still saw a smirk tip the edge of his lips.
She looked back and forth between him and Graham. So they hadn’t attacked her at the spring like she’d first thought. Apparently they were committed to this veneer of civility. But if she was ‘too much temptation’ for her own cousin, how did she think these sex-starved men who’d been promised a wife would behave?
She could play their game.
Sure, one bitten off finger didn’t make her a cold-hearted killer, exactly, but she liked to think she could take care of herself.
Just not Charlie. Or Dad.
Well, she was the only one left, so what did it matter anymore?
Only minutes later, they were back in town.
“All right,” Graham said as he climbed down from the truck. “Clark told me he’d have dinner ready at the residence tonight. Mateo will be there too. So we can just head over th—”
“What? Who’s Clark? And R— R whatever?” Audrey ignored Nix’s hand to help her down from the cab and got out Graham’s side.
“Um.” Graham pushed his glasses up his nose. For Christ’s sake, why didn’t he just get some better fitting glasses? They sat crooked on his face too.
