In her opinion, between the RV, the escalator at the mall, two cars, three bikes, innumerable Molotovs, a lawnmower, and now a staircase, Brandt was entirely too creative at coming up with ingenious ways to completely destroy things. And he always seemed to enjoy it a little too much.
Oh Lord, Cade thought as she fought the urge to back up at the sight of his grin.
“I’m waiting until there’s more on the stairs,” Brandt said, much to her horror. He pushed a few wires aside, searching through them for a particular one, the single blue wire in the entire box. He’d shown her the insides of the box after he’d finished constructing the bomb (“Blue for cool, as in, ‘That explosion was way cool,’” Brandt had said at the time, much to her chagrin), partially so there would be someone who knew how to use it if he were killed, but also because, she suspected, he just really liked to talk about bombs.
It couldn’t possibly be because he liked to talk to her about bombs. Unless he just really enjoyed the sight of her nervous and twitchy.
“Are you nuts?” Cade asked. To distract herself from her nerves, she took his handgun and began reloading it, discovering, to her disgust, that her hands were still shaking. She grimaced and eyed the gun she’d dropped when she’d fallen on the stairs; it still rested just a step or two below the second-floor landing. She wondered if she could get to it before Brandt cut the wire. She really liked that gun.
“Just a few more,” he insisted. “We can kill a few while we’re at it, you know? Might help slow them down a bit more.”
A slow smile spread across her face, despite her trepidation. She glanced at the stairs once more, firing a couple of shots into the mass of infected making their slow, uncoordinated way up the staircase. Then she nodded in agreement. “Okay. Okay, fine. Do what you’ve got to do. Just do it right.”
“Of course,” Brandt said. He fingered the blue wire out of the bunch inside the box, slipped the blade of his pocketknife underneath it and, with a jerk of his wrist, sliced through it. Then he stood quickly, narrowly avoiding the railing, and grabbed Cade’s arm in a bruising grip, hauling her down the hallway. “Ten seconds! Everybody, get down!” he yelled.
Cade stumbled toward the end of the hall, Brandt still pulling at her arm, throwing her off balance. She didn’t make it to where the others crouched before the floor heaved up underneath her and threw her to her knees. She let out a cry and collided with the floor, flinging her arms out to catch herself. A blast of air rushed past her and slammed her firmly into the wooden floorboards.
A heavy body landed on top of her and shielded her from the flying debris. She grunted at the impact, waiting until the dust settled before trying to push herself up. She bowed her head and looked past her elbows at the destruction behind her. The explosion was sufficient to destroy the stairs—along with a decent-sized portion of the hallway where Brandt and Cade had stood. She slapped the floor in anger, pushed the body off of her, and struggled to her knees. It was Brandt beside her, Brandt who’d shielded her from the blast. Of course.
“Brandt!” she snapped furiously. “I thought you said it’d only take out the stairs above the landing!”
“That’s what it did, didn’t it?” Brandt said defensively, standing and offering her a hand. She glared at him, refusing to take it.
“Yeah, and half the fucking hallway, too!”
“Don’t blame me! You and Ethan were the ones who asked me to build the thing!”
“Why not blame you, you…you ben zona?” Cade snarled, reaching for a Hebrew insult when her mind didn’t immediately dredge up an American one strong enough for her taste. “You’re entirely too convenient, and besides, that shit was your fault!”
Brandt stared at her for a moment, clearly baffled. “I have no idea what ben zona means, but the way you said it implies it’s something really unpleasant, and I don’t think I appreciate it!”
“You are such a—”
“Cade, Brandt, that’s enough,” Ethan broke in, stumbling to his feet. Cade glanced at him as he helped Avi up and reached for Nikola. “Is everybody okay?”
“Couldn’t be better,” Cade muttered wryly. She finally gave in and took Brandt’s hand, gritting her teeth as he pulled her to her feet.
Remy groaned and sat up, pushing her dark hair out of her face where it had dislodged from her ponytail. She rubbed at her lower back, grimacing. “I feel like I’ve just been to a chiropractor,” she complained as Ethan helped her stand.
That section of the second floor suddenly dropped at least a foot, tilting toward the blown-out end of the stairs, the entire hallway shaking violently. Cade slid backward a few inches before she managed to brace her boots firmly against the hardwood floor. Brandt grabbed her hand again to help her, and she managed to keep both feet on the floor without much difficulty.
“We’ve got to get the hell out of here,” she said, dislodging her hand from Brandt’s and taking a slow step toward the end of the hallway. Brandt retrieved his gun and nudged her along, walking backward as he trained his weapon on the remains of the staircase. Once everyone was in the bedroom at the end of the hall, Cade pushed the door shut for added security.
Gray stood on the roof outside the window, motioning for the others to hurry. “What the hell blew up?” he asked. Much to Cade’s surprise, he didn’t appear particularly bothered by the prospect of an explosion. Perhaps they were all becoming oddly immune to Brandt’s creative ways of diverting the infected.
“Brandt blew up the stairs,” Nikola announced. She followed Theo out the window, grasping Gray’s arm tightly. He put his other arm around her waist and set her lightly beside the window.
Gray laughed and reached for Remy. “Come on, let’s go,” he said, helping her through. “I think we can get to the van from the roof. It’s parked right at the side of the house. If Cade can keep those bastards away with that rifle of hers, we can get in through the sunroof.”
Cade climbed onto the roof with a groan, waving off Gray’s attempts to help, and dragged her duffel bag and rifle out behind her. “Why me?” she complained.
“Probably because you’re the best shot we’ve got,” Ethan said gruffly, sliding out the window. As his feet found the roof, he stumbled and slid down several inches on the sloped surface. He caught himself by the windowsill and straightened before he went to the edge and looked down.
Cade knelt and quickly checked over her rifle, mostly out of habit but partly out of concern that it had been damaged when she’d fallen on it on the stairs. She glanced up in surprise as Brandt dropped down beside her and began rummaging through her bag. “What are you doing?”
“You should know I’m not going to ditch you and make you cover all of us by yourself,” Brandt said. He pulled an additional sidearm from the bag and twirled the two guns he held like an Old West gunslinger. Cade rolled her eyes, even as a large grin spread across her face. She was glad to have Brandt by her side in a tight spot yet again. He and Ethan were the only ones on whom she relied without question.
“So how are we going to do this?” she called to Ethan. She slid down to the edge of the roof and checked out the ground below. Everything was comparatively quiet after the trouble they’d had inside; none of the infected had reached this side yet. The van sat like a quiet sentinel on the grass, completely undisturbed, waiting patiently for their arrival. “Just jump down?”
“Yeah,” Ethan answered. He too studied the van’s surroundings intently. “It’s not too far, I don’t think. And like Gray said, we can climb in through the sunroof.”
Brandt slid down to take a knee beside her. “If you can get down there and get the van started, I can help everyone onto the van,” he offered. Ethan stared off the roof for a long moment, as if measuring distances with his eyes. Then he jumped off. Cade’s heart leaped into her throat, and she sucked back an involuntary gasp. Ethan landed on the van with a thud, and she leaned forward to make sure he was okay. Thankfully, he was.
“Jesus, Eth!” she called down. “W
ay to give me a heart attack! A little warning next time, please?”
Ethan merely waved at her and shrugged, grinning like a fool. “I’m not planning to jump off any more roofs anytime soon!” he replied. He leaned down and ripped free the blue tarp covering the front end of the van, revealing the already-opened sunroof, and shoved the tarp to the ground. He slipped down into the sunroof and waved again to get Brandt’s attention. “Get Remy down here first! She can help Cade guard while we get everybody else in the van!”
Brandt reached out a hand to take Remy’s, but she pushed it away and moved to the edge of the roof. “I’ve got this,” she said confidently before she jumped off, leaping to the van unassisted. Cade was impressed; the slender woman’s jump had the grace of a gazelle.
“Try to keep the noise down,” Cade ordered, rising to her feet. She tossed Remy some extra ammunition and looked at the ground again. They were making entirely too much noise, and the prospect of the infected noticing and coming after them before they were all off the roof did nothing to calm her nerves. “I don’t think we’ve been noticed yet. Let’s keep it that way, okay?”
Once Nikola was safely on the van and sliding inside, Brandt assisted Avi down. Gray accepted Brandt’s help in turn, but Theo decided to go on his own. He landed on the van with a thud loud enough that Cade winced.
“Fuck, Theo, keep it down!” Cade ordered hoarsely. She looked toward the front of the house. Sure enough, several of the infected had taken notice of the group. They began making their way around the corner of the house, some moving quickly but most at a slower pace. She swore and brought her rifle to her shoulder, aiming at the infected man in the lead of the pack. He’d once been a young man in his late teens but was now skinny and gray, almost bald, with one hand missing below the wrist. Bullet wounds riddled his torso. He was obviously far into what they’d come to call the second stage of the virus’s effects, post-death but still animated and still violent. Cade shuddered and squeezed the trigger, sending the bullet directly into the man’s head. He crumpled to the ground in a heap. It was the only mercy she could offer him.
She immediately repositioned herself, taking aim at a middle-aged housewife with the remains of an apron hanging haphazardly around her neck. She fired her rifle but was forced to immediately shift her aim to the infected behind the woman she’d just dropped. “Damn it,” she swore under her breath before grinding her teeth together and squeezing the trigger again. Five more infected swept around the corner of the house as her bullet met its target. “Brandt, the van, now!” she snapped. Remy opened fire from the van’s roof, joining her attack with Cade’s. “There’s too many of them! I can’t handle this many, even with Remy’s help!” She dropped to a knee to steady her aim, the shingles scraping at her skin through her jeans.
“Not going without you,” Brandt said stubbornly. He aimed his weapon into the growing crowd of infected and fired three shots.
Cade took aim at another target. “Brandt Evans, I swear to God, if you argue with me, I’m going to shoot you and dump your carcass in the van myself,” she threatened.
“Oh, fine, fine, but you better be right behind me,” he warned. He turned and took two steps, dropping out of sight and landing on the van almost silently. Yet another thing that impressed Cade about him: despite his stature and musculature, he could be as silent as a cat when the need arose. Cade often wondered where he’d learned it—she’d met other Marines during her service in the IDF, and while all of them had been incredibly well trained, they hadn’t been anywhere near Brandt’s level. Brandt had yet to indulge her curiosity and explain how he’d gotten so good at what he could do.
She shot down two more infected that got that got uncomfortably close to the van and her companions. Then she looked at the vehicle itself and contemplated the distance. Brandt knelt by the sunroof, and Remy had slid down inside it; she stood on the seat, beckoning to Cade urgently.
“Come on, Cade! We’ve got to get out of here!” Remy shouted, heedless of the noise she made. It was pointless to mind her volume, anyway, since the infected had already zeroed in on them.
Cade fired one more shot, a bit of a sloppy one; it dug into the dead grass in front of its intended target. She shook her head in disappointment and grabbed her bag, tossing it to Remy as gently as she could. Then, as Remy yelled for Ethan to get the van moving and as the vehicle started to roll toward the nearest gap in the infected, Cade leaped, rifle in hand, and landed on her knees on the van. Unfortunately, the surface of the van was too smooth for such a move, and she slid across the roof, letting out a startled cry and nearly dropping her rifle as she scrambled to keep from falling to the grass on the other side as the van began moving. The infected were too close. If she hit the ground, there was no way the van would be able to stop in time to help her.
A hand closed tightly around her wrist. Brandt knelt by her, hanging onto her arm with one hand and clutching the roof rack with the other. She fleetingly wondered how he’d moved to her aid so fast, but mostly she let out a heavy sigh of relief and clutched his arm. He dragged her more securely onto the van, making sure she wasn’t going to fall again before letting go of her. “You okay?”
“Yeah, just…damn. I almost fell,” she said. She shook off the tremors that roiled through her from adrenaline overload and slung her rifle over her shoulder, making sure the strap was secure before she motioned for Brandt to head to the sunroof. Remy ducked inside, hauling Cade’s bag in with her, as Brandt wrapped an arm around Cade’s waist and guided her to the sunroof while moving to it himself.
Once inside the van, she took a moment to stand on the seat and look back at their safe house as the van pulled away from it. They’d been there long enough that it’d begun to feel like home. It was a feeling she hadn’t had in a very long time, a feeling of peace and security despite the world in which they lived. That once peaceful and secure place was now completely surrounded by the infected, who threw themselves at the windows and doors and walls of the house, streaming inside to look for their prey. Several infected noticed the van moving away and gave chase, but they were no match for the vehicle as it skidded onto the street and steadily accelerated. The infected quickly fell behind.
Cade shuddered again and dropped into the van, pushing the sunroof closed with a click. They’d come so close to being overwhelmed, the closest they’d been to death since the world fell. The thought made her stomach cramp painfully. She slumped in her seat and let out a slow, shaky breath, trying to steady her nerves.
Brandt leaned over her to pull her seatbelt across her chest and buckle it securely. He did the same for himself then took her rifle from her. “You okay?” he asked again, his voice hushed.
“Yeah, I think I’m okay,” she assured him, just as quietly. “I’m just a little rattled. That’s all.” He nodded and reloaded her rifle before offering it back to her. She checked the safety and rested it on the floor between her knees, the barrel against the van’s carpeting. She breathed in deeply then asked, “So where are we going?”
“Where else can we go?” Brandt asked. He motioned to the front of the van. Ethan was behind the wheel, Nikola in the passenger seat beside him; the maps they’d consulted the day before were spread out in her lap, crumpled and wrinkled as if they’d been hastily gathered and haphazardly folded. “I think Ethan’s decided we might as well head on to Atlanta.”
“Do we have a plan? Supplies?” she asked, looking at Brandt worriedly. He shrugged and glanced in her duffel bag, avoiding her gaze as she added, “Are you ready for it? Are we?”
Brandt finally shifted his eyes to Cade. His gaze was solemn as he said quietly, “Does it really matter if we are? I think we have to be.”
* * *
Ethan didn’t slow the van until he’d driven it well out of town. His heart hammered wildly in his chest, and his hands shook. He glanced compulsively in the rearview mirror as he drove, despite the fact the van’s speed outpaced any infected in existence, even the ones that could g
o at a full run. The adrenaline pumping through Ethan’s veins made him mash his foot harder and harder on the gas pedal. It was exceedingly dangerous to drive so fast with the sun disappearing over the horizon. After dark wasn’t a wise time to travel. It restricted Ethan’s view of the road ahead, and that could prove fatal.
Ethan took his foot off the gas and let the van coast to a slow stop in the middle of the road. He shoved the gearshift to park and jabbed the hazard button out of habit; red and yellow parking lights strobed rhythmically across the cracked pavement. Once that was done, he slumped over the steering wheel, trying to calm his breathing and heart rate. He gripped the wheel to hide the shaking of his hands and drew in breath after breath, fighting back the nausea stirring in his gut.
He shuddered as he realized how dangerously close to death they’d come. Anything could have happened. The infected could have bitten one of them. The detonation that had demolished the stairs could have easily taken out the entire second floor—hell, the entire house. When things went wrong for them, they went wrong dramatically, and he felt a wave of relief as he realized how lucky they were. He swallowed and closed his eyes, feeling Nikola’s worried gaze on him. He turned his head, forehead still mashed against the steering wheel, and gave her a small smile, trying to be reassuring. Then he straightened and flipped on the van’s overhead lights to get a look at everyone. He had to make sure they were okay, and he wouldn’t believe they were until he saw them with his own eyes.
Ground Zero Page 11
