Dale had never spoken with his daughter about his love life and the feeling of starting now left him feeling strange and somehow way too far behind the curve.
“Those lies Randy was spreading around town, that Sandy and I had been having an affair and that I had something to do with your mother’s death—I was worried what it might do to you.”
“Really?” Brooke said. “I was angry back then, but I was a dumb kid, trying to deal with what happened as best I could. I never cared about those stupid rumors, I knew they were lies.”
“You did?”
“Of course,” she said, as though the word ‘Duh’ was soon to follow.
“Listen, Brooke, I cared deeply for your mother, you know that. And when I found myself developing similar feelings for Sandy I couldn’t help feeling a surge of confusion and guilt, like I was somehow being unfaithful. Then those rumors showed up and I was suddenly reeling all over again, but this time because I worried how you might react to having a new woman around. It just seemed like so much all at once.”
Brooke grew quiet for a moment, running her hand down Duke’s furry back before she said, “You remember that time you started choking on the cheese from that pizza we ordered and Mom came up behind you and gave you the Heimlich?”
Dale let out a deep laugh drawn from the very bottom of his abdomen. “How could I forget?” Happy tears were streaming down his cheeks. Duke ran over and started licking his face. He nudged the dog away, his demeanor turning serious. “Your mother saved my life,” he said. “In more ways than one.”
•••
The three of them arrived home shortly after that and discovered a handful of traders in the driveway. After Billy had come by, people had started showing up on their own with something to trade. Dale’s only suggestion was that they come between four and five. Since then they’d seen ever-growing lines of neighbors and townspeople looking to hawk anything useful for a few gallons of drinkable water. Having them arrive later in the day meant that any power drained from his battery bank while refilling the cistern would be replenished during the few hours of remaining sunlight.
Ann and Walter were busy filling buckets and making trades. A few trades were even occurring among those waiting to be served. It was a strange new economy he had stumbled onto, one no longer based on the strength of the US dollar nor the gold supposedly used to back it.
“I expected to see more,” Dale said with a tinge of disappointment. He was referring to the handful of people in front of him.
“More came by earlier, but mostly to complain.”
“Complain? What about?”
“Somehow they’ve gotten it into their heads that you’re holding this water hostage so you can control the town.”
Dale let out a sharp, threatening laugh. “I couldn’t give a rat’s behind about controlling Encendido. I’m just trying to make sure there’s enough for me and my family.”
“You don’t need to convince us,” Walter said. “We know exactly what your motivation is. But you know how these things go. One guy starts talking to another and before long some vague idea’s turned into an unshakable new reality.”
A scruffy-looking man in his early sixties nearby pushing a shopping cart filled with bags of topsoil spoke up. “Folks feel like they’re being used in some sort of power play between you and the sheriff’s department.”
Dale turned to the man. “I never asked anyone to come here and trade water for goods,” he told them. “People started showing up on their own. All I did was suggest they come by when it was most convenient for us. The truth is, I don’t really need to do this, especially if it starts doing more harm than good.”
“Don’t let it bother you,” Ann told him. “People are just hurting and feeling powerless to do anything about it.”
Dale looked around and saw that Brooke had already walked away to feed the chickens and check on the goats.
Colton and Nicole were still boarding up the windows on the first floor, which left Shane as the only one unaccounted for.
“Where’s my brother?” Dale asked.
“Not sure,” said Walter. “Went off to get some supplies, I believe.”
“I hope he was smart enough to take his gun,” Dale said.
“With the way things had been shaping up lately I can’t imagine that he wouldn’t.”
Just then they heard Brooke let out an ear-piercing shriek and come running toward them. Dale drew his pistol, scanning the brush behind her for a possible assailant. Duke was also on high alert, barking, his ears pitched forward.
“What is it, boy? Who’s there?” It was still daylight, but that didn’t mean someone couldn’t be stalking in the open terrain along the edge of their property.
Duke tore off past Brooke and into the brush.
When she arrived Dale grabbed her, asking her who she’d seen.
“It’s not that,” she told him, out of breath. “It’s the goats and most of the chickens. They’ve been poisoned.”
Chapter 33
Zach
Zach and his two companions were fifty miles east of Tucson heading south when they came to TJ’s Full-Throttle Roadhouse. Parked out front was a row of fifteen choppers.
From inside, it sounded like a raucous party was in progress.
That’s definitely one way to ring in the end of the world, Zach thought to himself as he made a signal with his right arm and pulled off the road. In the end, their score from the Wells Fargo had netted a little over three hundred bucks. Not a great score, but surely enough to buy a few drinks before heading back on the interstate.
After they pulled to a stop and dismounted, Dannyboy immediately came for his shotgun in the cargo trailer.
Zach stopped him at once. “You’re not heading in there with that. Stick a pistol down the back of your pants. We’re aiming for discretion.”
Upon entering, the three men were hit at once by the smell of stale beer and dirty ashtrays. The bar was much larger than it had looked from the outside. Against the left wall was a long wooden bar. In the distance, a scantily clad woman on a stage was doing a bad job of karaoke, minus the music and the lighting. Providing the latter were a series of chandeliers hastily erected overhead. The rest of the floor space was taken up by tables presently occupied by burly men in black leather. Women were a far scarcer commodity.
Heads turned as they walked in. Dannyboy and Hawkeye were on the verge of dropping a load in their shorts.
“Take a deep breath, boys,” Zach said. “These are my kind of people. Just be cool and let me do the talking.”
They moseyed to the bar, dozens of eyes tracing their progress. The bartender wiped the patch of lacquered mahogany before them and set the wet cloth aside.
“We ain’t got no beer,” he said. “Only hard alcohol.” His smooth and round belly pressed against the edges of his Harley Davidson t-shirt. Poke him with a pin and he was liable to explode.
“We’ll take three shots of Jack,” Zach told him.
The bartender grabbed a bottle from the back wall, poured three drinks, but held them a few inches off the bar. “That’ll be three hundred.”
Zach had anticipated some kind of inflation, but those three drinks represented everything they’d come away with from the bank heist. He pulled out a small wad of cash and laid it on the table. The bartender scooped it up with his free hand and fingered through the bills. When he was satisfied, he set the drinks down.
Hawkeye glanced around nervously. “Looks like no one here is worried about catching the flu.”
He meant on account that none of the bikers were wearing a mask, but neither were they.
“I got hit already,” Zach said, “and managed to come out the other side just fine. You two did the same, which means we ain’t got nothing to worry about.” He held up his shot glass and the others did the same. “Cheers to freedom.” They drank, turned their glasses upside down and banged them on the bar.
“Where’s TJ?” Zach asked the bartende
r.
The fat man turned and regarded him strangely.
“This place is called TJ’s, isn’t it?” Zach asked. “So where is he?”
“Dead,” the man said with even less charm than he’d shown when serving their drinks. “Pig flu got him. I took over after he left.”
The woman on the stage was still singing and the sound of it was starting to really get on Zach’s nerves. “I guess things worked out all right for you then.”
The bartender scowled.
A man two seats down said, “Hey, Frank, this guy giving you trouble?”
Frank suddenly seemed worried. “No, Johnny. I’m sure he didn’t mean nothing by it. I don’t want no more fights in here. Last time the place nearly caught fire and burned to the ground.”
Johnny lit the tip of his cigarette and exhaled. “Maybe you three better find another watering hole. Doesn’t seem anyone here likes you.”
“We go wherever we like,” Zach said, without looking in Johnny’s direction. “Keep talking out of turn and you might get hurt.”
Johnny rose up and the girl stopped singing right away. In fact, the entire bar seemed to stop on a dime, drawn by Johnny’s clear signs of displeasure.
Frank, the bartender, looked more worried than Hawkeye, if that was even possible. “What you say I give you another drink, Johnny, and we forget the whole thing?”
A few of the other bikers rose from their seats.
“Maybe after I whoop this punk,” Johnny said.
Zach glanced around. “Looks like you got a lotta guys on your side. Won’t exactly be a fair fight.”
“If I give ’em the order, they won’t interfere.”
“What are you suggesting?”
Johnny grinned, revealing gaps where there should have been teeth. “I’m suggesting I teach you some manners.”
Zach stood up, removed the leather jacket he was wearing, along with the pistol from the waistband of his jeans, and handed them both to Dannyboy. He was lean, but powerfully muscled.
“I’m not much of a fighter,” Zach said, balling his hands into fists.
“Then I’ll kill you without breaking a sweat.”
Two bikers moved to block the exit.
“Oh, and if your two sissy friends try anything stupid, we’ll make sure they die real slow.”
Other bikers pushed tables and chairs out of the way to clear room for the fight.
Back in prison, Zach hadn’t had the strongest swing, although he could take a hell of a beating. Johnny slammed a fist into the palm of his hand. His arms were large and rippling with muscle. Clearly he was strong. But big muscles required a lot of oxygen, which meant he didn’t have a lot of stamina.
The two men had no sooner moved into the center of the bar than Johnny came out swinging. The first shot glanced off Zach’s cheek, but he stepped back quick enough to keep from absorbing most of the crushing impact. Cutting left, Zach feigned one to the face and landed two in Johnny’s sizeable gut. Johnny might not have been as bloated as the bartender, but he wasn’t far off. Johnny grunted and kept on coming, Zach using his superior agility to dodge and weave. He moved around the open space, daring Johnny to catch him. At one point, Zach came too close to a group of bikers, who grabbed and held him in place. Johnny pounced, swinging madly. The blows felt like strikes from a sledgehammer. Zach elbowed the bikers behind him, broke free and gave Johnny a straight jab to the nose before ducking out.
Johnny turned to find him, a thin trail of blood running from his left nostril. He was a little slower now, his mouth open, gasping for air. The fat man was starting to tire. And yet on Johnny came, his fists down by his sides.
“Keep your hands up,” Zach said, as he landed another strong jab. Johnny’s head snapped back. He was a tank with one speed and direction, forward, and Zach was using his own momentum against him. Zach landed two more shots to the belly when he heard something in Johnny’s belly crack. The fat man let out a hail of wild punches, connecting a couple of shots on Zach’s body and face. The pain was searing, but somehow Zach enjoyed it. A primal reminder that he was still alive.
Now Johnny was really starting to slow down. He’d given up pursuing the elusive Zach, stopping to plant his hands on his hips, his chest heaving in and out. And that subtle wince whenever Johnny drew in a breath wasn’t lost on Zach.
Slowly, the roles were beginning to shift. Zach began moving in, going for the broken rib, winding his opponent even further. After a final devastating shot to his busted ribs, Johnny threw up a hand to call it, but Zach wasn’t done. And not even Johnny’s crew was ready to save their leader. He’d broken the golden rule, that you never ever surrendered, and Zach knew it was time to finish him.
With Johnny’s body shattered, Zach switched focus to the man’s face, pummeling it mercilessly. A few moments later, Johnny fell to the floor where Zach began kicking him.
That was when something extraordinary happened. The other bikers moved in. But not to help Johnny. One by one they each took turns stomping the man who had once been their leader and was now little more than a red pulp. Without a word spoken, Zach understood what had happened. There’d been a changing of the guard. Their new leader had just been elected.
Chapter 34
After a short break for target practice, Dale and the others headed back to work. He was making some progress with the Remington, growing more at ease with operating the bolt and reloading it under pressure, all while landing rounds on target. As with anything else, becoming a good shooter had more to do with muscle memory and practice than it did any natural or innate talent.
When it was his turn to watch the others, he’d been impressed with Brooke’s speed at changing magazines on her pistol. Even Nicole and Shane, who tended to spend the least amount of time on their improvised range, had gotten better.
If there was another confrontation—Dale stopped himself. When there was another confrontation, he hoped all this time spent honing their skills would pay off.
Walter was beside him walking in his slow and deliberate way. The man’s energy and spirit was that of someone half his age and Dale was often left scratching his head that Walter was such a hard worker. Colton wasn’t too far behind him in that department. The kid was something of a racehorse, full of energy and firing off in all directions. Once his untamed and somewhat unpredictable nature was reined in, as it had been over these last few days, it was amazing what he could accomplish.
Dale glanced over. Next to him, Walter was deep in thought.
“Are you thinking about the defensive additions we’re making to the property?” Dale asked.
Walter shook his head. “No, I was a lot further away than that. Back at Chosin Reservoir.”
The name sounded somewhat familiar. “Where is that? New Mexico?”
The old man laughed. “No, it’s in Korea.”
“You were thinking about the war,” Dale said, not sure if he should press any further.
“Get to be my age and you can’t help but go there sometimes. Usually little things trigger it, like the look on someone’s face or a word they use.”
“What was it about Chosin Reservoir that sticks out the most?” Dale asked, eyeing the empty enclosure where his milking goats used to live.
“I remember our battalion was stationed at the top of a hill. There were so many in Korea, each named and numbered, that one tends to flow into the next. It was the night we were attacked by the Chinese. Outnumbered more than ten to one, we watched in awe as they streamed over the hills and through the valleys like ants. Anywhere you shot you were pretty much guaranteed to hit one, but there were so many it didn’t seem to matter. We were watching a tsunami rolling toward us with nothing but terror in our hearts.”
Dale felt terror in his own heart just listening. “What’d you do?”
“The only thing we could. We ran for our lives and nearly lost them in the process.”
“Is that what you think will happen here?” Dale asked. “That we’ll be ov
erwhelmed and destroyed?”
Walter grew quiet and finally said, “I sure hope not.”
They reached the garage where they had already started piling the sandbags they would use for the second-story firing positions. Next to them were pieces from dismantled bed frames. After the most recent attack, Dale had decided that mattresses in each bedroom should be laid directly on the floor. The metal from the frames would be cut up and sharpened into points for use in the booby traps they’d begun setting around the property.
These last few days, Brooke and Nicole had dug holes at key points around the house.
Dale had asked Walter to lay out what he felt was a likely plan of attack should Randy and his deputies decide to hit them again. It was a strategy often overlooked when setting up home defense, but one that might turn out to be vital. As Walter explained it, when you understood where your enemy would take cover, you knew where to place your traps and lines of fire.
The three they employed were pitfalls, Apache foot traps and gun traps. The pitfalls were each about three to four feet deep and lined along the bottom with sharpened metal or wooden spikes. A flimsy cover resting on a simple hinge would swing away under the slightest pressure. The resulting fall and impalement might not be enough to kill a man, but it would certainly knock the fight out of him and leave him with a gushing foot wound.
The Apache foot traps operated along similar lines. A cylindrical hole was burrowed into the ground and wooden or metal stakes placed at a downward angle around the edges. Acting like a set of curved carnivorous teeth, they would keep an attacker’s foot impaled in place until one of the good guys finished them off.
And finally there were the gun traps. Take an old weathered shotgun or rifle that had been sawed down to its smallest possible size and attach it to a wooden or metal plate next to a firing pin. Loaded with a single shot and activated by a tripwire, it was sure to incapacitate anyone who crossed its path.
Defiance (The Defending Home Series Book 1) Page 13
