by Lori Whitwam
The group. I had to put my team first.
Marcus pushed away from the desk where he was leaning. “I think that covers it for now. You folks go on back to the kitchen. Smells like Jocelyn’s stew is about ready.” He turned to Theo. “Tell the rest to meet me and Tyler out front. I wanna fill them in and let them ask him questions if they got any.”
Theo nodded and opened the French doors, stepping out into the front entryway. Everyone else filed out, but I found myself lingering.
“C’mon,” Rebecca hissed, pulling at my elbow. “Save your drool for the stew.”
“I’m not drooling,” I argued, though I did toss a glance at Ty over my shoulder as I left the room.
“Hey, I’m not saying don’t look,” Rebecca said as we passed through the dining room. “Lord knows you haven’t looked at a man that way since we lost Quinn.”
As it did every time I heard his name, the little voice in my head prodded since I got Quinn killed—since I killed him. But somehow the voice wasn’t quite as loud or taunting as it had been before. “I’ve been busy,” I replied, with a heavy dose of bitch in my tone.
“Oh, unclench your cooch, girl. I’m just saying you’re a young, healthy woman, and there’s gonna come a time. But don’t get ahead of yourself. We don’t know this guy yet, and don’t know if he’s even coming with us. Hell, for all we know, Anton could shoot him and feed him to the pigs.”
I stopped. “There are pigs?” I hadn’t seen any. Or smelled them.
Rebecca rolled her eyes and shoved me into the kitchen. “No, I was speaking figuratively, dumbass.”
We filled our plates and settled at the kitchen table with Neil, which somehow led to the discussion of how a pig absolutely would eat a person if they happened to blunder into their pen in some sort of vulnerable condition. I decided if I ever planned to get drunk again, I’d never do it anywhere within staggering distance of a pigpen.
The front yard Q and A apparently over, the rest of the team began filtering though the kitchen, filling their plates and heading off to the dining room, living room, or front porch to eat. I noticed Ty with Marcus, grabbing plates and going back in the direction of the sitting room where we’d met earlier. I guessed they had more to discuss.
I joined Melissa in the yard with Skip and the lab, Nilla. I threw a stick for them until Skip got frustrated. Beagles should never try to out-retrieve a retriever.
As the sun was about to set, Marcus came out of the house, followed by what seemed to be all the team members who had been inside. “Folks, I got an announcement. Phil and Monte,” he nodded at our two escorts, “are gonna take Tyler out to the barn to settle the animals in for the night. We’re gonna have a meeting, talk about whether to take Tyler with us, or make other arrangements for him.”
Ty, Phil, and Monte started toward the barn, but Ty looked back at me, giving me a small smile and a nod. I wondered what that meant. I also wondered about what “other arrangements” might possibly be made.
Everyone gathered around, murmuring, until Marcus began to speak.
“We’ve all had a chance to hear Mr. Garrett’s story, ask him some questions. So now we gotta figure out what to do. To be honest, I never gave much thought to what to do if we ran into somebody out here on their own. Shoulda, I suppose, but too late for that now. We gotta deal with what’s in front of us, and we don’t have a lot of time. We’re out of here at first light. Who’s got something to say?”
Cody, the shy guy with the long, sandy hair spoke up. “On the pro side, he’s a blacksmith. I can do some basic metalwork, but he can probably make anything out of iron. Even some damn fine weapons, judging by that spear of his.”
“We got weapons,” Anton countered. Yep, still an asshole.
Cody wasn’t ready to let it go. “Yeah, now. But what if we have to run, or we get hit and somebody takes them? And have you ever put a shoe on a horse? I know I haven’t, and we’re gonna be counting on those horses for a lot. One goes lame, it’s a problem.”
“Can he fight?” Rebecca asked. “Can’t take anybody who can’t fight.”
“I’d say so,” I put in. “Their group trained in all kinds of weapon skills. Even taught workshops and gave demonstrations. He might not be a great shot, I don’t know, but that’s not our first form of attack, anyway.”
Rebecca shot me a look, brow arched, hinting at her earlier observation and cautioning against getting ahead of myself.
“He could be an asset,” Marcus agreed. “He’s big, strong, seems healthy, and has a lot of skills. Besides the blacksmith thing, he says the group liked to share what they knew at their meetings, so he’s also got good skills in woodworking, leather tanning, and even making mead.”
“What the hell’s mead?” asked Cooper Merriweather, our all-around woodsman guy. “And what do we need with it?”
Marcus gave a small laugh. “Near’s I can tell, it’s something between a wine and a beer, made with honey. Never had it, but I figure it’s gotta be better than that flammable corn whiskey shit you been makin’.”
Cooper raised a hand and ducked his head, admitting defeat.
“But maybe most interesting,” Marcus continued, “is he also knows how to make armor out of metal and leather. Not full on knight stuff, but gauntlets to protect our arms, helmets, breast plates, even chain mail. If we can find materials and he can teach some of us to make it, that could be real important. The stuff we’ve been patchin’ together don’t ever fit right, and it’s more trouble’n it’s worth.”
That was as interesting as the weapons. Some of the guys had found football arm guards at a college football field, but they were “man-sized,” and flopped around on my much smaller forearms. Most bites happened on the hands and lower arms, but protection that didn’t hinder as much as it helped was hard to come by.
“But what if he ain’t who he says he is?” Gil Traynor asked. He sounded crankier about the situation than I thought he should be. Maybe it was because he’d been named to the radio post when Isaac was injured, but Marcus wasn’t letting anyone but himself near the radio until we got wherever we were going, leaving Gil nothing to do but find things to be unhappy about.
“Hey, you haven’t been around that long, either, Traynor,” Theo said, his dark eyes flashing. “Where do we draw the line? How long do we have to wait, how many questions do we have to ask, before we take a chance—with some precautions, of course?”
Gil didn’t have an answer for that, so the conversation continued. I glanced over to where Melissa and Faith were sitting on the porch steps, Skip between them. They were listening intently. Melissa. She was my priority, my perspective. I realized I had to factor what was best, what was safest for her, into any decisions. That would be my guideline.
Javier Alvarado spent a lot of time in the countryside as a scout, and he raised another concern. “What if he’s a plant? What if the marauders have people scattered around, small groups, and when they see a chance, they drop one or two for us to find? Get on the inside, tell them where we’re going? Their best chance to take us is to hit us on the road.”
“Well, he doesn’t know where we’re going, does he?” said John Kim, our other radio guy and security expert. “I don’t even know, and neither do you. Only Marcus does, and the escorts.”
I looked at Marcus and saw him absently put one hand on the leather pouch hanging at his belt. I hoped nobody else had noticed. I suddenly had a strong feeling that’s where he had the map showing our destination. I trusted these people, I truly did. Mostly. It wasn’t smart to trust anyone completely these days. What if someone just got curious, but then got snatched by marauders? Anybody would tell what they knew, given the right motivation, whether pain or reward.
The debate raged on for another half hour. Opinions ranged from Tyler being only slightly short of a messiah, destined to bring strength and prosperity to our group, to something in the neighborhood of the antichrist, there to rain death and destruction down upon our heads. Maybe he was t
he one who slaughtered a village somewhere.
Things were getting ridiculous. Honestly, I thought some of the younger and more shit-stirring members of the group were throwing wild scenarios out there purely for entertainment purposes. It wasn’t like we had cable anymore. We were living the ultimate reality show.
I scooted over to Melissa and Faith. “What do you girls think?”
Melissa pushed Skip off her lap and pursed her lips, her gray eyes thoughtful. “I’m not sure. I mean, we can never be sure, can we?”
“No, honey, we can’t.” It sucked, but there it was.
Melissa looked at Faith, who gave her a nod. “I say he comes with us.”
I hadn’t had any predictions of her reply, but wanted to know more. “Why?”
Melissa met my eyes, something she once hadn’t been able to do with anyone. “He’s not familiar, but that doesn’t mean he’s bad. He can’t help it if he’s on his own. He’s not familiar to anybody anymore. Doesn’t mean he should be left by himself to get killed.”
I nodded, considering. “That’s true. But if we don’t know he’s bad, we don’t know he’s good, either.” I didn’t think he was bad, but I was playing devil’s advocate. I suspected I needed to hear evidence laid out for myself as much as for the girls.
“You’re right,” Faith chipped in, blonde head bobbing. She adjusted her slightly crooked wire-rimmed glasses on her nose before continuing. “But in the world before…before it got like this, do you think there were more good people or bad people?”
Interesting question. Where was she going with this? “Good, I hope,” I said. “Bad things happened, but there were more good people, living their lives, helping each other. At least in the world I knew.” It had been a sheltered life, but I imagined that had been the case for an awful lot of people. I wondered if the ratios had changed since the outbreak.
“That’s what we think too,” Melissa said. “And I’ve been watching him. All those months after we came to the Compound, before I’d talk to anybody, that’s all I did. I watched. I got good at reading what they were like, really like, inside. And I think Ty is okay. I think we should give him a chance.”
That sealed it for me. I didn’t want to let my unexpected attraction for Ty cloud my judgment, and needed some fresh perspective away from the drama of the group conversation taking place behind me. I turned to see if they were making any progress.
“That’s it, that’s it, people,” Marcus called above the din of multiple conversations. “I think we’ve looked it over about every way we possibly can, given the information we have to work with.”
“So, what happens now?” Davey Kline asked as the group quieted.
“Now,” Marcus said, his sweeping gaze making contact with each person, “now we vote.”
CHAPTER NINE
We were given several options. We could take Ty with us, making him a provisional member of the group, and make a final decision before arriving at our destination. We could leave him at the farm with some basic supplies and a pat on the back. The third option we were given was to leave him at the farm for now, and the escorts would pick him up on their way back and take him to the Compound, still unaware of our new location.
That last option drew some more debate. Could we send an unknown, a potential spy, into the Compound with the threat looming over us? The argument was plenty of people knew its location; the marauders surely did. He was perfectly capable of finding it on his own, and if the marauders wanted a spy inside, there were any number of easier ways to accomplish that objective. Hell, there were probably spies inside already.
I was worried about how people would react to the outcome of the vote. Would members of our team be angry or resent other members who voted differently than they did? Should we go inside and find paper and do a secret ballot? It turned out Marcus had a simpler idea.
“Let’s not make this more complicated than it has to be, people. We ain’t got time for it,” he said. “Get in a circle.”
Everybody looked at him like he’d lost his mind. Melissa even giggled.
“I’m serious! Now move!”
I felt like I was in kindergarten, getting ready to play a game or something. But when Marcus said he was serious, he meant it, so we all hurried to comply.
“Okay, now put your arms out to your side, and spread out so you’re not too close to anybody.”
All right…
“Turn around, facing out from the center.”
I got it now. I could barely see the people on either side of me in my peripheral vision, and would have no idea what the others in the circle were doing.
Marcus recited the three choices to us again, to be sure we were clear on which number went with each option, and then he counted them off. “One!” I raised my hand. “Two!” I lowered my hand. “Three!” I kept my head down and waited, my heart in my throat, which didn’t make sense. I barely knew Ty, and it’s not like we were voting on whether or not to form a firing squad at dawn.
At Marcus’ command, we broke from our circle and gathered around for the result.
“Before I tell you the outcome,” he began, his expression deep in no-nonsense territory, “let me be very clear on one thing. This vote is final, and will not be discussed further. I don’t care if you think you know how somebody else voted, and you disagree. You will abide by this vote, and you will not give anybody any shit about it. I will not have dissent among this team, and if there is, we’re gonna have a different kind of vote. Understood?”
There were nods and nervous rumbles of agreement.
“All right then,” Marcus said with a sharp nod. “The vote results are as follows. Option three, to send Tyler Garrett back to the Compound with Monte and Phil on their return trip, received four votes. Three votes to provision Mr. Garrett and send him on his way. But the winner, with thirteen votes, is to accept Tyler Garrett as a provisional member of this team, with a final determination to be made prior to our arrival at the fallback location. That is the ruling.”
I heard some disgruntled comments, but I heard more people expressing relief and pleasure that we weren’t so jaded and broken that we couldn’t even give a person a chance anymore. I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. I completely agreed.
“Neil, I imagine you want to go check, make sure Wilhelm hasn’t chased everybody up into the hayloft, so go ahead and give Tyler the news. Then he can come get to know everybody a little better before we bed down for the night.” Marcus waited until Neil was on his way, sent a couple of guys off to stand guard, then turned back to the house. “C’mon, folks. I wanna get a look-see in that basement before we hit the sack.”
Once back inside, we automatically split into groups to accomplish the remaining evening tasks. I wasn’t feeling up to exploring a dark, dank, possibly zombie-infested basement, so I decided to help prepare beds for the night. I put Skip on the screen porch with the cats to keep him from roaming. Despite being a hound breed known for its ability to chase down small, fast-moving, furry creatures, Skip really loved cats. It was kind of creepy. He trotted to the corner where all four cats were sleeping in a pile, plopped down beside them, and contentedly tucked his nose under the chin of a big orange tom.
I turned and headed for the stairs, and looked over my shoulder to find Melissa and Faith tagging along. We discovered four bedrooms upstairs, but one was set up as a sewing room and lacked a bed.
Faith squinted one eye—this was her ‘thinking face’—and said, “Definitely not enough beds for everybody.”
What did she expect? “No, but we can maximize what we have.” I strode across the hall to the bedroom where Ty had been holed up earlier. “Here, help me move this.” I began tugging the heavy double mattress off the box springs.
The girls quickly caught on, and we soon had the mattresses off all three beds. “Box springs don’t look very comfortable,” Melissa noted, her expression skeptical.
“Better than the floor, or hanging off the loveseat i
n the sitting room.” I threw a blanket onto the box springs in the small back bedroom. “Besides, some of us will be on guard duty, and Neil and Patrick will most likely sleep in the barn, so we’ll be pretty close.” With the large sofa in the living room, and a comfy-looking recliner, we should be relatively comfortable tonight. No doubt we’d all slept in worse conditions.
We raided drawers and closets for pillows and blankets and distributed them the best we could among the bedrooms. There were plenty of blankets, quilts, and afghans, but pillows would definitely be first come, first served.
A whoop and some happy laughter drew us downstairs. We found Theo in the dining room, at the back of a crowd of at least a dozen people crammed into the kitchen. I clutched his arm and pushed up on my toes, trying to see into the room.
“What’s the source of all the merriment? I see a bunch of cans and some jars of something red.”
Theo threw an arm companionably around my shoulders. “Yes, jars of tomatoes and jams, labeled just last year, and a bunch of cans of indeterminate age.” He withdrew his arm and shoved his long, dark hair out of his face, revealing the oddly bright twinkle in his brown eyes. “Seriously, some of the cans aren’t even expired, but some almost qualify as antiques. We’ll use the good ones, but I’m thinking we’ll pass on the ones of something called Fruit Float, which appear to date to around 1974.”
I peered over his shoulder and saw Javier, who was actually smiling. “Javier isn’t smiling because of a jar of strawberry jam. I wasn’t even sure he could smile until just now.”
We were jostled out of the way by Davey, as he pushed past us carrying two big buckets of water and sloshing some of it on my shoe in the process. The chattering crowd parted to give him room to reach the large farm sink. Theo chuckled. “What you can’t see from here is the two cases of beer sitting on the table.”
