Troy watched them with what almost looked like amusement in his vacant eyes.
“Like you did for Cora,” Paul replied, an imaginary bull’s-eye floating on Troy’s forehead.
“We can still save him!”
“I told you there is no cure! There is no reversing this. He-is-dead!”
Curtis set his jaw and tightened his grip on the Glock. “And you will be too if you don’t drop that fucking gun.”
“And you’ll be next,” Wendy added.
Paul hesitated, a scowl wrenching his face, and then lowered the gun with a scream like he just dropped a three-hundred-pound deadlift. “You’re going to get us all killed!”
Stephanie stepped forward. “Curtis, you have to stop and think. That is not Troy.”
Curtis returned his attention to his older brother, studying him through thin eyes as waves rolled to shore in the background. “Troy? Can you hear me, brother?”
Paul hung his head, the car show guy flickering through his memory banks. He’d tried communicating with that poor bastard and it nearly got him killed but Curtis needed to figure it out on his own. Jamming the Beretta into its holster, Paul folded his arms across his tank top and leaned against an ornate wooden bar, watching the show unfold with an impatient look dancing in his eyes.
Wendy slowly lowered her gun as Curtis went closer to Troy.
“Curtis!” Stephanie’s hand slid to the empty holster on her hip. “Stay back.”
Around the pool table, Curtis stopped in front of a stand-up Asteroids machine playing on demo-mode and stared into Troy’s dark eyes. “Are you in there, Troy-boy?”
Troy cocked his head to one side, flexing his bloody fingers open and shut. Open and shut. Open and shut.
“Curtis, please get back.”
“Shut up, Steph, and go find some rope.”
“Rope?” she gasped. “For what?”
“To tie him up. What do you think?”
“I think you’re insane!”
Curtis turned a heated glower her direction and Stephanie huffed out a frustrated breath and galloped downstairs.
Paul swapped an irritated look with Wendy. “You gonna keep him like a pet, Curtis? Take him for long walks on the beach and teach him to do tricks?”
“Fuck you, Paul! He’s my brother and I’ll do what I see fit. Not you!”
Paul rolled his eyes and went behind the bar, grabbing a crystal decanter with, what looked like, some expensive whiskey floating inside. Pouring a finger’s worth into two curvy rocks glasses, he slid one across the shiny bar top to Wendy. She wavered before taking it. He cheered her and knocked it back, exhaling as the smooth burn slid into his stomach.
Wendy drained hers and slid the glass back. “Paul is right,” she said. “I’ve seen what happens when someone turns. There’s no coming back from that, Curtis.”
“So that makes you an expert?” He spit to the floor. “Fuck you and fuck him too! You’re the reason Troy got bit in the first place.”
Paul poured two more shots, grinning like he just heard a stupid joke that wasn’t even close to being funny.
“Oh, you think this is funny, radio star?” Curtis turned his back on Troy and aimed the gun at Paul’s head. “How about this? Think this is funny?”
Wendy drew on Curtis in a flash. “If you don’t lower that goddamn gun I will shoot you in the face.”
“Not without his okay you won’t, you bimbo puppet.”
Wendy cocked the hammer back with an authoritative click.
Curtis grinned. “Isn’t that right, Paul?”
Staring down the barrel of Curtis’ gun, Paul knocked back another shot and clenched his teeth against the burn. “I don’t care if she shoots if you. Saves me the trouble.”
Troy lumbered forward and reached for Curtis, pulling his jaws back wide. Paul grabbed the bottle, not his gun, and poured another round as Troy’s heavy steps rattled the floor. Curtis spun around and staggered backwards. Thundering back into the room, Stephanie raised the gun in her hand and got off a shot before Curtis could stop her. Troy’s head jerked back and his body followed, landing on the floor with a double thud.
Curtis’ eyes bulged from their sockets, jaw dragging on the floor. Slowly, he turned to his sister. “What did you dooooo!”
She spread her boots and shot wet daggers at him, chest rising and falling. “Curtis you are my brother and I love you but if you point that gun at one more innocent person, I swear to God I will shoot you next. This is not who we are! This is not who Dad raised us to be! Do you understand me?”
He turned from the storm in her eyes to Troy, gun hanging limply at his side. Paul tipped the glass back while letting his fingers dance on the butt of his gun. With a loud scream, Curtis stomped out of the room, calling Wendy a bitch under his breath and smacking a picture to the floor that broke into pieces. Stephanie holstered her gun and fell into a leather couch, burying her face in her hands to avoid looking at what she’d done. What she had to do.
Paul came around the bar and crouched down, picking up the splintered frame and brushing glass from the smiling family of five at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. He shook his head, wondering where they went, and set it back on the sofa table. After a long while, they carried Troy’s body down to the beach and set it outside the fence. Then they went back for Cora and watched their bodies burn with some firewood and lighter fluid they found around the fire-pit while Curtis pouted inside. The smell of burning flesh made Paul both sick to his stomach and hungry for barbeque chicken at the same time so he urged everyone back inside the gate and locked it behind them. Inside the house, he found a quiet bedroom and convinced Wendy to leave him alone before taking a long nap that would end in a hair-raising scream.
Chapter Five
More glass broke inside the house and Wendy looked at Paul from the Adirondack chair next to him but he kept his eyes on the fire pit, blurring the flames into dancing blobs, his vocabulary closed for business. There was nothing left to say. The unspeakable had come knocking and every day somebody opened that door. Today it was Troy and Cora. Tomorrow it could be him. It was real and it was terrifying and Paul thought he would’ve grown numb to it by now but he hadn’t. It was too much not to feel. Even a squadron of heavily armed Navy Seals would be packing shit sandwiches in their pants at this point. This was so beyond fucked up it was almost funny, like when you get the giggles just before going to bed. Blowing out a long breath, he zipped his hoodie up higher, grimacing with the movement. Every muscle in his body throbbed. He hurt inside and out and what were the odds of surviving something like this on a daily basis when those things never stopped coming? Never went to work or watched movies. They just kept coming and eating and coming and eating and what were the odds of surviving when they never fucking stopped?
Never!
Tipping back a glass of whiskey, he watched faint clouds slip past the moon like ghosts, turning the ocean as dark as the look gripping Stephanie’s face. She blamed him for Troy. He could see it in her watery eyes from here and maybe she was right. Maybe this was as much his fault as everything else. After all, he led them out onto that beach with no warning and that was on him. No one else. Stephanie looked up and met his tired gaze across the fire, sending an icy shiver down his spine.
Turning away, Paul dug his toes into the cold sand while flames licked at his cheeks and whiskey kissed at his pain. Deep down, where common sense sometimes likes to hide, he knew this wasn’t his fault. No, this was their fault. Those things. This blight. And the way the never-ending string of atrocities nearly made him forget about the one simple fact that a dead pharmacist murdered his wife pissed him off more than anything else. Sophia deserved to be mourned and he couldn’t even give her that. He couldn’t give her loyalty in marriage and he couldn’t give her respect in death.
The fire popped and he laughed, drawing Wendy’s bloodshot eyes. She pulled a flannel shirt tighter around her, giving him a queer look he didn’t acknowledge.
; Four.
That’s how many were left. Two men and two women against millions of those ambling corpses out there in the dark. Stephanie rested her elbows on her knees and stared into the flames through distant eyes, a whiskey and Coke wrapped in her hands and a long coat draped over her shoulders. Paul knew what she was seeing play out against that curtain of fire. She missed her brother and her home and this wasn’t looking good and he didn’t blame her for blaming him.
“Are you okay?”
Stephanie’s eyes rose to Wendy, the fire spitting embers into the night. “I’m fine. I just…” She looked back to the pit and grew quiet.
“I know and I’m sorry, sweetie,” Wendy said, looking like she was about to say something else but closing her trap instead.
Paul let out a long breath that tickled the flames as he melted into the chair. That’s the world they lived in now. One full of endless apologies and regrets and your number could come up at any second. He was sorry about Cora and blamed himself for leaving her in that house with someone who’d been bitten. It was another mistake and that was on him as well. She was a sweet woman who didn’t deserve to go out like that and Paul felt guilty as hell for thinking about how much easier this would be without her. Cora was a functioning alcoholic who couldn’t function without Brock and she probably would’ve gotten them all killed at some point down the line. After all, when she disappeared that night, she left the Chevelle’s backdoor unlocked and blunders like that could be fatal these days. At the same time, he wished she was here and felt he’d let Brock down, leaving another hole in his heart that would never heal.
A patio door slammed shut and Curtis stumbled from the house with an acoustic guitar in one hand and a bottle in the other. There was a stagger in his step and a cigarette dangling from his lips.
“Oh shit,” Paul whispered to Wendy, brushing a hand against his gun just to make sure it was still there.
Curtis stopped in front of the fire with a destructive look dancing in his eyes. He cleared his throat and shifted in the sand, shadows jumping across his face. “I want to apologize for earlier. I’ve been to known to have a bit of a temper out on the track but I don’t usually go around pointin guns at people.” His bloodshot eyes gravitated to Paul. “I’m sorry, Paul. That wasn’t cool and I…” He shook his head and stumbled a little, searching for words and coming up short.
“It’s okay,” Paul said, bailing them both out. He wanted to hear it about as much as Curtis wanted to say it.
Stephanie crossed her legs and rubbed a hand up and down her jeans. “Why don’t you sit down before you fall down.”
Curtis’s gaze flicked to Wendy. “And I’m sorry I called you a bimbo puppet. That was wrong too.”
She laughed. “Oh honey, you’re going to have do a lot better than that to offend me.”
He gestured with the bottle, spilling some whiskey to the sand. “I’m also sorry I said your boobs are crooked. That wasn’t right.”
Wendy’s smile dropped. “You think my boobs are crooked?”
“God Curtis,” Stephanie groaned, pulling on his hand.
He yanked his hand back and staggered a little with the motion. “Listen, I realize we’re all reeling from this nightmare and I just got caught up in the moment and I’m sorry.” Dropping into the blue chair next to his sister, he flicked his smoke into the fire. “I’m sorry, sis. I wasn’t thinking right.”
Stephanie pulled him into her arms. “I’m sorry too, baby brother,” she whispered in his ear. “We’re going to get through this.” She held him for a long moment, embers rising into the night while Paul and Wendy traded a somber glance.
Drawing apart, Curtis discreetly wiped some glistening tracks from his cheeks and lifted the whiskey bottle into the sky. “To Troy!” he said, taking a long pull before passing it to Stephanie who shook her head. He held it out to the others and received silent looks in return. With a limp shrug, he set the bottle down and strummed a few chords on the guitar. “Found this in the older brother’s room upstairs, the kid with the curly hair.”
Paul watched him tune the guitar, mind shuffling on random. He smiled at how he ended up here with these complete strangers, having a bonfire on the beach and singing Kumbaya. Taking a long drink, he extinguished the smile and, once again, entertained the possibility he was already dead because this shit couldn’t really be happening. Not for real. In fact, he bet he could pull his gun out, shoot himself in the head and he’d wake up in one of the bedrooms inside to face this living hell all over again in the morning.
This plague was like the mafia.
There was no gettin out.
Curtis stopped strumming and took a quick swig of whiskey, flames jumping in his eyes as he quietly examined the others. Paul filled his glass from a bottle at his feet and Curtis started picking at the strings with surprising agility, bringing to life a smooth melody without missing a note. A rock guy through and through, even Paul could recognize a melancholy Garth Brooks when he heard it.
A dramatic pause brought out the water softly rolling ashore in the distance and the call of a loon. Curtis shut his eyes, struck a perfect chord and began singing out of tune. “Sometimes late at night, I lie awake and watch her sleeping…”
Paul shifted uncomfortably in his chair while Wendy stifled a laugh. Stephanie slowly shook her head at Paul, silently communicating a heartfelt apology for her brother she needn’t. He rolled his eyes at her, bringing the hint of a smile to her full lips. Seated around the fire, they drank and listened to Curtis and it didn’t take long for the moans and snarls to reach the fence, startling the horses. Twisting around in his chair, Paul brushed his hand against his gun and watched the things reach for him through the iron bars.
“If tomorrow never comes,” Curtis sang on. “Will she know how much I loved her? Did I try in every way to show her every day, that she’s my only oneeeeeee?”
The rotting hands grew in number, the moans and hacks getting louder with each verse. Like all front row ticket holders, they wanted closer to the stage. It was never enough.
Paul cleared his throat and unsnapped the strap over his gun. “Umm, Curtis?”
Curtis gave his fans outside the gate a warm nod because that’s what they were to him now. Fans.
Nothing more.
Nothing less.
“Cause I’ve lost loved ones in my life, who never knew how much I loved them…”
Paul slowly shut his mouth and sank into the Adirondack chair, tipping his glass back and resigning to let Curtis get it out of his system. Those things weren’t getting inside so what was the point in starting another war? The guy was an emotional roller coaster and Paul didn’t feel like another ride. Ten minutes later, he gave Stephanie a faint smile and headed off to bed while Curtis played on for his screaming fans lining the gate.
☠
Back flopping onto a twin bed in a guest room that looked more like an expensive hotel suite, Paul flipped on the nightstand light and stared at the ceiling. The peace and quiet was so thick it made him squirm. This world balanced between two extremes: running for your life and sheer boredom. Without TV or cell phones or the career he loved to divert his attention during the down times, his mind ran away on him and it was tired of running. His family and friends were gone and the only things left to think about during quiet times like this centered upon the gloom and doom pressing against his lungs. All the simple pleasures in life were gone as well. Hitting the links. The bike trails through downtown. Grilling up some burgers on the back deck. Gone. A thing of the past – like long distance charges and developing film. At least they had electricity. He told himself that even though he knew this place was just a mirage. A fantasy. Sooner or later, something would have to give. There had to be more to life than just this.
He yawned and stretched out on the bed. The good news was he didn’t have to wake up at three in the morning to go to work in the dead of winter anymore. It wasn’t much in the face of extinction but it was enough to make him smil
e. If that was the biggest pro in this world, they were in more trouble than he thought. He sighed, mind shifting to Stephanie. Tonight was her first night without Troy and it would hurt. She seemed like a good person with her caring attitude and hair like Sophia’s and Paul vowed to try and lift her spirits but not tonight. Tonight he just wanted to sleep and never wake up.
A light knock on the door jerked him from his rambling thoughts. “Yeah?”
The door cracked open and Wendy poked her head inside. “Are you okay?”
He locked his fingers behind his head as she stepped inside and quietly shut the door.
She folded her arms and stared at him from the foot of the bed. “Do you mind if I sleep in here tonight?”
Paul groaned. “This house has five bedrooms in it, Wendy.”
“I know, I just…don’t want to be alone tonight.”
“You said that last night, and the night before.”
She dropped his tight gaze and dug her toes into the carpet. “It’s just one night.”
“Whatever.”
Her face brightened and she slid into bed, joining him in watching the ceiling. “So…Curtis is a good singer, huh?”
“If you mean terrible by good, then yeah.”
Soft laughter brushed her lips. “That couldn’t have been any more awkward. And thanks for leaving me out there like that.”
“You’re welcome.”
“He’s still playing.” Leaning up on one elbow, she studied his profile, the hurricane-proof walls mercifully drowning out Curtis in the backyard. “But I’m glad we found them.”
He turned to face her. “Yeah?”
She nodded, biting her lower lip. “I like it here.”
“Probably not a lot of hot showers left in the world.”
“Not to mention movies that still play. Tomorrow I say we watch The Vow and eat popcorn and just take the entire day off from everything.” She set a soft hand on his chest and toyed with his chest hairs through a black t-shirt he found hanging in the master closet. “Thank you for everything.”
Dead Series (Book 2): A Little More Dead: Gunfire & Sunshine Page 5
