The Indiana Apocalypse Series

by E A Lake

  “Bullshit math,” I retorted, tossing my hands out. “They were slaves, Harry. I know it, Tony knows it and you know it. And keeping slaves ain’t right.”

  His smile grew and the twinkle in his eyes told me I’d stepped into some sort of well-planned trap.

  “And yet, you never once in six plus years seemed to have a problem with it,” he countered. “You’ve been sheriff here for a little more than four years. Never once did you send word to me, or anyone else as far as I know, about such an injustice, did you?”

  I shrugged, trying to come up with a sensible response.

  “Then one day,” Harry continued, softer than before,” it’s brought to your attention that someone, or rather a group of someones, you care for are part of the slaves, as you call them. And that changed everything.”

  He looked past me at Morgan again. “I mean no offense to you, Miss Kessel, with this next part, but it needs to be brought to light.”

  “Give it your best shot, Harry,” I said softly. “Because I’m starting to get bored with this one-sided bullshit.”

  “You find out your mistress is one of the women at Shaklin’s place…” He paused, I guess to find the best words so as not to hurt Morgan’s feelings. “And you see an opportunity to get even with a man you believe has wronged you as well as my daughter.” He held a single hand at about eye level. “Two birds, one stone.”

  “First off,” I replied, getting irritated. “I admit Morgan and I were involved. I also admit I’ve been looking for her to return ever since Carla left me…no, ever since I moved here.”

  Harry smiled as though he’d won the day. But I had a little something sour to feed him next.

  “But Shaklin and Carla had been fooling around longer than I’d been with Morgan.” It was my turn to pause and let that sink in for the old man. As usual though, he seemed unfazed.

  “Are you upset because your own sister is Wife Four?” he asked. “Does that come into play here at all? Maybe even make you a tiny bit angrier?”

  I sighed and sat back. “Belinda’s free to lead her life as she sees fit. I figure she hasn’t run off, because she knows the truth.”

  For a tense moment, my words hung between us.

  “And what truth is that, Quinn?”

  I leaned forward so our faces were a foot apart. “People who run off from Shaklin, regardless of what they mean to him, usually end up dead.”

  He seemed to take it all in stride, which I hadn’t expected.

  “Well,” he said, drawing out the l’s. “I guess you’ve put five young women in harm’s way then. Haven’t you, Quinn?”

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-FOUR

  Harry and I weren’t going to agree on anything. We argued semantics for the next 10 minutes before he threw his hands to the air.

  “I have a deal for you, Quinn,” he said after taking a few deep breaths. “One I want you to seriously consider. And it’s probably the only fair shake you’re going to get from Tony. If you turn this down, I’m washing my hands of the situation.”

  “Well, this ought to be good,” I muttered, winking at Art. For once, he hadn’t said a word for the whole meeting. That had to be a first. He’d always felt his two cents needed to be added to every conversation, whether it helped or not.

  “As a peace offering,” Harry said carefully. “He’d like you to return one of the women. After that, he’ll agree to sit down with you and discuss this like two civilized men.”

  My irritation was threatening to boil over. “I don’t think so,” I replied.

  Harry tried to slow me down. “If you return Charolette Weber to him, she can still honor her engagement.”

  “She’s being given away to a madman as a prize!” I shouted, slamming a fist on the desk. “I may as well kill her myself, because her husband-to-be has a way of going through wives pretty quickly.”

  “And she’s not engaged,” Morgan added, coming to stand next to me. “She doesn’t want to marry Winston Cutler. He’s a mean drunk creep from what I’ve heard.”

  Harry shook his head. “I know nothing of Mr. Cutler. I do know that Carla, Tony and the other three wives all stated that Charolette had agreed to marry the man. They swore it on the Bible. Well, they said they would swear to it in court. It’s basically the same thing.”

  “Bullshit,” I spewed. “She’s a toy being given to a drunk that likes to break toys. She does not want to marry Winston.”

  Harry pondered that for a moment. “And you can bring her here so she can tell me that herself, I imagine?”

  “Not a chance,” I replied, putting my feet up on the desk. “She’s being well taken care of right now and she’s not coming out of hiding just to have you bully her.”

  Giving me a sigh, Harry glared at me. He had the same tough, thick skin his daughter did.

  “So, you’re going to be uncooperative about this,” he said. It was a statement, not a question. “You’re going to leave me in a tough spot, Quinn. And you’re going to place yourself in a much tougher one than mine. You need to think this through. Tony Shaklin isn’t going away.”

  “And neither am I,” I shot back. “If he wants to come and try to make a deal with me, let him come. If he wants to keep sending a long line of bounty hunters after me, then so be it. If he wants to lead an army against me, he knows where I am. He already came here once.”

  Harry looked away and at my staff. Well, Morgan wasn’t really part of the staff, but she showed up so much she might as well have been deputized.

  “Can either of you talk some sense into this man?” he asked. When they didn’t reply, he shook his head slowly and frowned. “I don’t like violence, Quinn. I never have. I can’t condone lawlessness in my district. But I’m just not sure what Tony’s reaction will be to your stubbornness. I’m not asking you to walk all five of the women back right now. Just give me Charolette and I promise you, I’ll make it clear to everyone down in Hymera — including Tony and this Winston Cutler fellow — that she is to remain in good health.”

  He glanced at me sideways. “You trust me, Quinn; don’t you?”

  I trusted Harry. I didn’t know why, but even after Carla left me, I never once held ill-will towards her father and I still didn’t. But I didn’t trust the other players in the scene.

  “I can’t do it, Harry,” I replied somberly. “And you know it has nothing to do with you. You’ve always been good to me, fair with me. But I can’t say the same about Tony.”

  He rose slowly and extended his right hand. I stood and took it. “I’d wish you good luck, son…but I’m afraid that won’t be of any help.”

  As he left, I considered his words. I’d probably signed my own death notice, but at least it was my decision.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-FIVE

  I was worked up after my meeting with Harry. Though I kept up the facade of being completely nonchalant with him, the whole situation bothered me like a piece of meat in a broken tooth.

  I lay in bed that night unable to sleep. Since I’d regained my memory, a lot of things had bothered me. I tried to sort through them all and categorize them as best as I could. But there were several thoughts that kept making their way to the front of my thoughts.

  Why had my memory come back so vividly? In the old books and movies, people regained bits and pieces at a time, here and there. Usually, the best was saved for the most crucial scene. I’d gone as far to ask the old doctor in town, Emmett Wallaby. He claimed it was unusual to get all recollections back at the same time. Called it a damned miracle.

  Morgan pointed out later that Doc Wallaby was so old, all he knew how to do was clean wounds and make plaster casts for broken bones. He was kind of old to be honest. She said, based on what she had learned in medical school, that while it was unusual for total recall of lost memories, it still happened. Plus, she added, when I’d awakened back at Shaklin’s farm, that probably took up so much of my brain power that I couldn’t recollect the past until I was back in a familiar spot.


  When I came to, while back on the couch, the world I woke up in was strange. Maybe she was right; perhaps the stark bluntness made my former mind shut down until I could digest it all.

  My life in Pimento was a luxurious cakewalk compared to the spartan conditions my friends lived in down at Shaklin’s farm. I had a pump in my kitchen and a room that was warm enough for plumbing even in the dead of winter. Four wood stoves throughout the house told me that much. I even had a make-shift composting toilet inside.

  Morgan, Sara, Sasha and Liv were expected to live with a single outdoor pump for three homes and one outhouse for the same. Whereas they had meat once a week, in Pimento I’d been turning meat away almost every day from well-wishers. They were treated like slaves by their boss — hell, they were slaves. The people of Pimento were free to come and go as they pleased.

  What probably boggled my mind the most was the blatant open beatings the women had to endure. How had a world that once had high-speed internet, driverless cars and more fast food than a person could ever imagine have devolved into something where innocent people were treated far worse than Chloe treated her dogs?

  Besides those two things, I was still bothered by the fact that Tony hadn’t gotten serious about my taking of the women – his property, as he called them. There’d been the few threats that I’d extinguished, a visit by him and Carla, and even a more or less social call from the district judge. But there was really nothing that I would have called substantial.

  When Tony Shaklin had a problem, he’d always met it head on. There wasn’t any thinking to be done the way he saw it, and I remembered it. Problem, conflict, resolution, problem solved, and usually to his liking. He met everything with a head-on gusto that most people didn’t possess.

  Except for the current situation. He knew a couple of gunmen wouldn’t be a match for me. Even two pairs of them. And his visit was far from his usual verboseness. He was almost subdued compared to the Tony Shaklin I knew. Even Harry hadn’t pushed that hard. He never demanded a thing; just a few friendly suggestions and he was on his way.

  The world had been turned upside down, thrown for a loop as my father used to say. And it seemed to me that even Tony Shaklin had problems nowadays.

  That’s what probably bothered me the most.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-SIX

  The following morning, I mostly played with my food: over-easy eggs, crispy smoked bacon and perfectly browned and buttered toast. Everything on my plate was just the way I liked it. Morgan had even perfected her coffee-making technique and served me a cup of hot, dark joe that should have made my heart race. But I was still troubled.

  She must have noticed my sullen mood. I guess it was kind of hard to miss after 15 minutes of me just sipping coffee and not touching my plate.

  “What’s bothering you this morning?” Morgan asked tenderly as she reached for my hand.

  “Nothing,” I mumbled. “Just didn’t sleep well, that’s all.”

  She squeezed my hand. “Let’s not keep secrets,” she said with a sweet smile. “I believe any relationship should be built on honesty, don’t you?”

  I looked at her, twisting my lips. She was one to talk about such a topic. Morgan had hidden so many secrets from me in the past month, I’d lost count. But I decided to keep that criticism — the obvious — to myself.

  “I don’t trust Shaklin,” I said, sitting back in my chair. “I don’t trust him one bit. He’s up to something. I feel it in my bones. Harry went away far too easy yesterday. Something’s not adding up here.”

  She nodded briefly. “I feel the same way, though I don’t know Tony as well as you do. But it’s not like him to give up or send others to do his dirty work. Never has been. I mean sure, he had his goons rough us up sometimes. But most of the time, the beatings came straight from him.” She pondered something for a moment, tapping her lips with a slim finger. “He’s not what you’d call shy about conflict. I’m not saying he thrives in it, but he does have a certain direct approach in dealing with it normally. At least, that’s been my experience.”

  I’d known Tony most of my life. The missing years had been pieced together by Morgan and the others. He was still the same man he’d always been. Just a little meaner now; certainly not anywhere near what I’d call meek.

  “So, what do you think he’s up to?” Morgan asked, pointing at my plate. She wanted me to eat, so I dug in.

  “I think he’s going to try and kidnap Charolette out from under our noses,” I replied, taking a bite of my toast. The raspberry jam was really good. “I think Harry tipped Tony’s hand yesterday.”

  “I thought the judge seemed kind of anxious about taking her back with him,” Morgan said. “If I’m honest, I almost think you could have made a deal with him where he took Charolette and you insisted that Shaklin leave the rest of us alone.”

  I nodded. I’d thought the exact same thing, though I never seriously considered extending an olive branch that included Charolette.

  Though I had to wonder, if I hadn’t gotten my memory back, would I have considered the deal? The girl meant nothing to me when I first met her back on Shaklin’s farm. Hell, none of them meant anything to me. She was tiny, cute and sweet, but what did I care? My own personal safety wasn’t even high on my list of priorities back then.

  But recalling her as a child, watching her grow in my mind’s eye, changed everything. Charolette wasn’t going anywhere; she represented the child I’d never had. My paternal instinct to protect her was strong and I’d do anything to keep her safe.

  “We have to tell Charolette she might be in danger,” Morgan said, jolting me out of my daydream.

  I stared at Morgan; she was right. But that would open a whole new jar of crap to deal with — a very large jar of it.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-SEVEN

  She took the news better than I’d expected. At least at first. She gave us a smile as she glanced up from the bucket of soapy water beside her. I guess the floor had grown a new layer of dirt during the night.

  “Why don’t you stand up and talk to Quinn,” Morgan suggested. “Wiping down the floors can wait for now.”

  Charolette wiped her brow with the back of her hand and shook her head. “It’ll be flu season soon. Germs can spring up at any time. The best way to stay ahead of them is to keep everything sparkling clean.” And with that, she went back to scrubbing.

  “So,” I said, knowing that her anxiety had already taken her to some other world, “we think it would be best for now if you stayed indoors most of the time.”

  The second the words left my lips, I realized that was stupid advice. The only time she had been outside in the last week or so was to shake some rugs or scrub the front porch.

  “And when you do go outside,” I continued, seeing Morgan scowl at her younger friend who wasn’t listening, “I’ll have Robert, Ronnie’s brother, with you.”

  Her scrubbing paused for a moment. “Is he going to be carrying a gun?” she asked without looking up.

  “Of course he’s going to have a gun!” Morgan exploded on her. “Shaklin wants you back. It’s not safe to be outside alone for you. Given that scenario, don’t you think the person watching you should have a gun? The other people will; the ones who want to take you back there.”

  “I don’t like guns,” she whimpered. “Guns make me nervous. And when I get nervous—”

  “For the love of God, Charolette!” Morgan screeched. “You live in the bathroom now. And everything makes you nervous. When are you going to get over all your fears and get on with your life? How do you ever expect to find a husband with so many phobias?”

  Well, I suppose what Morgan had said needed to be said. I just didn’t think her tone, or volume, helped.

  Charolette refused to answer and tried to ignore Morgan. Ha, good luck with that, young lady.

  Morgan knelt and grabbed Charolette by the shirt collar. “Robert is going to be attached to your hip until Quinn gets this figured out! Got it?” />
  Charolette trembled before nodding. Morgan released her shirt and gave her a hug.

  “I love you, sweetie,” Morgan said quietly. “I don’t want anything to happen to you. I don’t want to live in a world that doesn’t include you.”

  When Morgan stood, both ladies were wiping away tears. In the middle of insanity, she’d provided a touching moment of humanity. Her tenderness touched me deeply.

  She took my hand and led me towards the bedroom. “Oh, Charolette,” she said, peeking over her shoulder. “There’s a spider on the wall behind you. You’d better kill it before it gets in your shirt and bites you.”

  Charolette shrieked and leapt to her feet, swatting and flailing at the bare wall. There wasn’t a spider there; there wasn’t even a spot of dirt on the wall.

  Morgan grinned as she skipped playfully with me in tow. That’s my girl.

  CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED THIRTY-EIGHT

  “I don’t want to watch the freak,” Robert said, shaking his head. “I’d rather watch Ronnie’s girls, alone and all hyped up on sugar. Charolette drives me frickin’ nuts.”

  I suppose we should have checked with Robert before volunteering him for the duty. My bad.

  “She makes me wash my hands and face outside before I can come in,” he whined. “And then when I come inside, she makes me wash again. And she makes me take my boots off outside; I can’t even take them off inside the door. She’s too weird for me. Hell, she’s too weird for anyone.”

  I needed this guy to keep an eye on Shaklin’s obvious target. I understood his apprehension with the task. Spending time with the young woman was a little bit like trying to herd a litter of kittens. Given the fact that anyone near her was a target for a cleanliness inspection, she’d be on Robert’s case most of the time. He wasn’t the cleanest person I’d ever known.