Cisco smiled. “Good—so they’ll cause all kinds of trouble. When's it going down. Tonight?"
"I figured tomorrow," Jenkins said. "I want to give these guys a good long while to think about what might happen if they don't do what we tell them to. Plus, we could use the extra hands to bring in the last of the wood for the log cabin you want to build."
"Headquarters," Cisco said. "It ain't no log cabin."
"But you’re building it out of logs," Jenkins argued as he looked in his glass.
Cisco shook his head and waved off the argument. "Listen, we gotta time this just right."
Jenkins nodded. “You want to do it right after first light?"
Cisco shook his head. "No, the more I think about it, I think we have to do it closer to midday. That'll give the main group enough time to make it through the forest. Last thing we need is to have half of them all tangled up in the trees and branches and crap out there," Cisco said with a gesture toward the open tent flap. "I ain’t missin’ out on sleep to lead a bunch of idiots through the woods in the dark. No, we’ll wait till the sun comes up—that way we can pick our way through the forest with as little trouble as possible."
Jenkins nodded. "Fair enough. I'll be in position over here on the other side of the neighborhood," he said as he pointed at the map.
"No, I want you there," Cisco said as he adjusted Jenkins’ position.
Jenkins hesitated. “What for? I can cover four houses right here.”
Cisco slapped his hand on the table. "You gotta look at the big picture!" He jabbed a finger at the position he wanted Jenkins to occupy. “If you're here," he said as he drew his finger across the map in a straight line between the hand-drawn houses toward the forest preserve, directly across from Lavelle's house. "Then you'll be able to see my group coming in through here. Wait until you see the main attack begin, before you come in from behind.”
Jenkins stood there for a second, eyeing the map. Eventually, he nodded. "I see what you're talking about. Nice—that's smart," he said with a lopsided grin.
"That's why I'm in charge," Cisco said as he slapped Jenkins on the back. Hard.
The smaller man had to catch himself on the desk or risk kissing the map under the impact of Cisco's hand. When he looked up at Cisco there was a flash of anger, but it disappeared as soon as Cisco saw it.
“They’ll never know what hit ‘em," Jenkins said as he stood and adjusted his shirt.
Cisco grinned broadly. "That's the idea. This is going to finish them off once and for all, then Bee’s Landing will be mine."
"Then what?" asked Jenkins.
Cisco laughed. "Then the party’s really going to start, ese.”
Chapter 23
Braaten Forest Preserve
Northwest of Charleston, South Carolina
Reese accepted his paper plate of lukewarm baked beans and a plastic spoon, trudged along to the most vacant fire pit, and sat on a log. He stared down at the soupy meal in his hands, and sighed. Several rings of stones had been set up around the periphery of Cisco's camp in the middle of the woods, all with a blazing fire shedding light upon dozens of people, refugees turned to prisoners. It was the end of another long, exhausting day of slave labor under the merciless supervision of Cisco's guards.
Every muscle in Reese's body ached with exhaustion. His clothes remained perpetually wet throughout the day, soaked with sweat, and it was only at the end, as he sat in front of the fire, absorbed in the insect repelling smoke, that his clothes at last began to dry.
Across the fire from him, two men eyed him warily. They sat close enough to talk but didn't say a word. Reese nodded in their direction and got blank stares in return. He sighed again and put his spoon in the plate of beans. “I guess it's gonna be like that from now on, huh?” Reese said without looking up.
One of the men across the fire from him chewed thoughtfully and watched him, the other just held his plate of food and stared.
"Well, I guess it's better than you guys tellin’ me I'm an idiot for wanting to find freedom, for wanting to escape this place…” Reese said as he looked around. "Look at all those people over there sitting around their campfires. They work us like dogs, barely feed us, and look how the wall is going up around this place. Before long we’re going to be completely fenced in, trapped.”
The man across the fire continued to eat his beans, his plastic spoon scraping against the paper plate. The other man looked down at his food, glanced at the other fire pits crowded with people attempting to stave off the hordes of mosquitoes that descended upon them at nightfall, and looked back at Reese. A flicker of doubt crossed his face.
Reese smiled to himself and took a spoonful of the beans. "If they just cared a little bit more…they could heat these things up…” Reese mumbled as he chewed. "It wouldn't be that bad…honestly…”
Footsteps on the gravel alerted Reese that someone else planned to join them at the fire. Morgan—the man who'd warned him to stop trying to convince people to escape, approached the fire with a weary smile on his face. He greeted the other men, then turned and saw a Reese. The smile faded.
“Ouch,” Reese muttered. “It’s okay…you don't have to sit here if you don't want. I know I'm an outcast. I promise I won't try to convince you to run away."
Morgan looked at the other two men who shrugged, then sat down halfway between them and Reese.
"It's not that I don’t…” Morgan began. He glanced at the other two men, then looked down at his plate. "What you talk about is dangerous."
"Freedom always is…to tyrants and the oppressed."
"That's easy for you to say," Morgan snapped as he looked up suddenly. "Your wife isn't being held over there at gunpoint and forced to cook."
Reese stirred the beans on his plate. "You're right. I have no idea where my wife is. I don't even know if she's alive or not. I don't know if my daughter’s alive or not." He looked back down at his plate as a lump formed in his throat.
No one said anything, the four men listened to the crackling fire for a long moment.
Morgan cleared his throat. "Sorry."
Reese shrugged one shoulder. "Don't worry about it…hey, it's the apocalypse, it takes a little getting used to, am I right?"
The man who'd finished his beans on the other side of the fire snorted. He looked up at Reese and nodded. "Still sucks," he grumbled in a deep voice.
Reese shook his head and scooped up another mouthful of beans. "Preaching to the choir, brother."
They lapsed into silence again as the men with food continued to eat. Reese glanced up at the sky, backlit by the fire in front of him, and wondered when Jenkins would make good on his promise to deliver him to Cisco. Reese smiled, thinking about what it might feel like to end the life of the monster that ran the prison camp, who’d had kidnapped both his wife and his daughter, and…
He looked back down at the half-eaten beans on his plate. "Who am I kidding?" he muttered to himself. “I’m no killer."
"What?" Morgan asked conversationally.
Reese waved him off with his plastic spoon. "Nothing. Just muttering to myself…” Reese said as he sighed. “I guess it's a sign of the times."
Morgan glanced at Reese, then looked at the other two men. "You sure about this?" Morgan asked.
"I am," the man who hadn't touched his beans said. He put the plate on the ground between his feet and brushed his hands as if to remove something vile. "And I know more like-minded folks." He glanced at Morgan. “I ain’t stayin’ here till they work us to death or get that fence out yonder fixed. That ain’t gonna happen.”
The man next to him continued to eat his beans in silence, but he nodded along.
Morgan took a deep breath, then let out a slow steady sigh. "Well, I guess there's nothing more to say." He turned and looked at Reese, then pointed his spoon. "All this talk you been spreadin’—about trying to escape? You got a plan?"
Reese smiled, looked down at his plate, and shook his head. "A plan? Shoot no. An o
pportunity? Maybe…”
"You're asking us to risk an awful lot on an opportunity," Morgan growled.
Reese looked up at him and narrowed his eyes. "I haven’t asked you to risk anything, mister. Are you the one that almost turned me over to the guards that first day? You made it abundantly clear this here is no place for revolution." Reese snorted. “Besides, all I want to do is get out of here and go home."
"Yeah? You still got a home to get to?" asked the man across the fire who still had a full plate of beans.
"Maybe," Reese shrugged. "But maybe’s good enough for me. Not like I have anything else. Besides, home’s not far away. Maybe a couple miles.”
"Where's that?" Morgan asked.
"My guess is…if I’m right about where this place is…then home is just a couple miles that way," Reese said as he hesitated for a moment to get his bearings, then pointed.
"You telling me your home…your family…could be just a couple miles that way and you're still sitting here?" asked the man across the fire.
“In case you hadn’t noticed, there's an awful lot of guys with guns walking around here," Reese muttered as one of the aforementioned guards strolled by and sneered at them, barely lit at the edge of the fire’s circle of light. Reese lowered his voice. "Haven't exactly found the right time to slip away." He glanced over at the other fires. "Besides—there's a lot of people here that need help, too. Not sure I could live with myself if I just walked away and left y'all here."
"That's a mighty noble thought," said the man still eating his beans. "But in the end, it’ll probably get you killed."
Reese scraped up the last of the beans on his plate. He grunted. "Well…something will at some point. The way I look at it, there may as well be a good reason behind my death.”
He stared at the fire. The three men on the other side of the fire shared a look.
"Well…” Morgan said as he shifted slightly closer to Reese. He cleared his throat and glanced around for guards. “We’re open to ideas. And like he said," Morgan said with a nod toward the man across the fire who hadn't touched his beans, "there's more of us out there, just waiting."
"You got something up your sleeve, mister?" asked the other man.
Reese shook his head and tossed his plate and spoon into the fire. He watched the plate curl up and blacken as the spoon bubbled and dissolved. "Not really a plan…but like I said, might have an opportunity to cause a little change around here. Just don't know when it's gonna come knocking."
They sat in companionable silence for several minutes as the insects of the night serenaded them, the fire crackled, and the logs broke into embers. Reese estimated they had another hour or so of firelight before their allotted firewood ran out and they were forced to lay on the ground and catch whatever sleep they could. A quick look at the other fires showed several people already curled up in the protective circles of light attempting to sleep.
He rubbed his healing shoulder, not relishing the idea of sleeping on gravel again.
Morgan looked up at the sound of footsteps and boots crunching on gravel. "Head’s up," he whispered. “Jenkins.”
Reese sat up straighter, just like the others, but his eyes narrowed as the wiry, whip-like man approached with a smile on his face.
"You," he said as he pointed at Reese. "Get up and follow me." He turned and walked off back toward the center of camp.
As he turned, Reese noted instead of the usual single pistol on his hip, he carried two, one on each side. Reese's heart raced. This is it. As he stood, he brushed off his legs, and the movement brought him closer to Morgan. "Be ready. Opportunity just came knocking."
“How are we supposed to know when to act?” Morgan whispered.
"You'll know." Reese replied. He stepped over the log and walked over to Jenkins.
"You ready?" Jenkins said under his breath as they walked toward the command tent in the center of the encampment.
Reese eyed the other fires, and the watchful stares of those who glared at him. Some of them shook their heads and looked more disappointed than angry. They probably figured him to be an informant. It was the second time that people had seen him walking with Jenkins. He shrugged off the resentment and tried to ignore the hairs on the back of his neck that stood up as they grew closer to the command tent.
"Ready as I'll ever be," he muttered.
Jenkins nodded. "Good. Cisco's in there expecting his evening meal. I’ve got a gun for you,” he said as he walked closer to the tent. “Walk in there, put it to the back of his head, and pull the trigger. Don't say anything, don't do anything. Just kill him.”
"What about the guards?" Reese asked as he caught sight of two burly men standing on either side of the tent flap.
"Don't worry about them, they’re with me." Jenkins replied. He cast a glance down the side of the tent as they approached. "But most of the ones in camp aren’t. I managed to swap out the usual guards…but if any of the others notice, they're gonna start asking questions. So, your time is limited." He drew a revolver from his hip and handed it to Reese. "Make the most of it."
Chapter 24
Lavelle Homestead
Bee’s Landing Subdivision
Northwest of Charleston, South Carolina
Cami looked down at the recumbent form of her elderly neighbor. She shrugged. "So that's where everything stands. What do you think of my plan?"
"You mean the part where you’re going to put your daughter in harm's way, or the part where you're going to stop a bloody revolt?"
Cami massaged her aching thigh. The bullet wound had a long way to go to heal, but she found it bothered her especially when she was upset. "Yes."
Marty's lips pulled back in a rictus of pain that she took for a smile. His skin appeared paper thin and stretched tight crossed his skull. If anything, he looked even paler than he did before the attack that ended with the abduction of Amber. She questioned whether he had more than a week left as he clung to life by a thread.
"Oh, go on—stop looking at me like that," Marty said. "I ain't dead yet. Besides, I kinda like that Jo girl…"
"Marty…” Cami said softly as she reached out and touched his cheek. “Jo’s older than me, she’s no girl…”
"At my age, anyone younger than me is a kid,” Marty wheezed. “Look, your plan’s sound, missy, it'll work."
"What kind of a mother am I to put my daughter out there like this?"
Marty grinned at her again. "The kind of mother that doesn't have much of a choice. That bullheaded daughter of yours is going to do it one way or another—it was her idea."
"So, you think it'll work?"
Marty nodded as he looked up at her from the pallet of cushions and blankets on the floor. "I'd bet my life on it."
"But I'm betting my daughter's life on it…” Cami said as she looked at the floor.
Gary knocked against the doorframe in the living room. "Cami, there's a group of people heading across the street from Harriet's house. They’re armed."
Cami looked back at Marty. "This is it,” he warned. “You remember what I told you about cover fire?"
"We'll have people up in the FROG, the front room, and at both sides of the house. They're going to cover every angle I can manage."
"Good,” Marty said with a grin. “You make sure that Spalding woman's people know that they’re covered, too.” He grabbed her hand and gripped it with surprising strength. "Now get. Show that woman who's boss."
By the time Cami worked her way through the house and found Amber and her team, Harriet Spalding was walking up her driveway, a gaggle of HOA officials and nervous looking residents following her like ducklings.
"Amber, are you ready for this?"
Her daughter stared back at Cami with a firm countenance. "You bet I am. She's been trying to take over this neighborhood almost as bad as Cisco. I'm so sick of her crap."
"We all are," Mia said. She looked at Cami. "None of us are being forced to do this Cami. We want to. It'll work."
&
nbsp; Cami narrowed her eyes out the open front door as Harriet marched up the steps. “It better…” Cami said. She stepped forward and met the group on the porch. “Hello, Harriet."
"Cami," Harriet said with a sharp nod.
"To what do I owe the honor?” Cami asked as she peered over Harriet’s shoulder. "Looks like y'all brought a lot of firepower. You guys coming to volunteer for patrol duty? We got another one heading out in a few minutes…”
“We ain’t here to volunteer for anything. We’re here to demand what's rightfully ours."
Amber tapped Cami on the shoulder and slid past her in the doorway. "What might that be?" she asked as she stepped in front of her mother.
"Oh—hello, Amber. I'd like to talk with your mother please," Harriet said.
Cami watched as the men behind Harriet exchanged glances. Amber stepped sideways on the porch out of the way, but before Harriet could speak, Mia Stevens filed out behind her, along with Elizabeth Adams, Amy Orchard, and several other women from the neighborhood. Yolinda the baker was last—she smelled of yeast rolls as she stepped by, her apron still dusted with flour.
"Oh—I…well, hello, ladies…” Harriet stammered.
Cami grinned as the men behind her shifted position and glanced nervously at each other again. She noticed sweat trickling down the brow of more than one.
"What exactly did you want to talk to me about?" Cami asked as she leaned on Marty's cane.
“I—we," Harriet said as she gestured over her shoulder at the men that supported her, "have come to receive…donations…”
“Let me get this straight,” Cami said genially, ”you came here to my house to take my supplies?"
"Oh, come on, Cami,” Harriet said, flustered. “You said it yourself—you regret not telling everybody about all the stuff you had sooner—”
"Yeah! My family’s been hungry for—” one of Harriet’s goons began.
Broken Tide | Book 6 | Breakwater Page 17
