Thicker than Blood

by Madeline Sheehan

  As she looked into my eyes, her own glistening with tears, I pressed a hard kiss to her lips. “We’ll be fine,” I said firmly, keeping our gazes locked. She tried to turn her head, to look away, to hide inside herself like she often did, but I refused to allow it, holding tight to both her body and her gaze. “Do you believe me?”

  She said nothing, only nodded once, her chin trembling.

  “Lei, I promise you.” Pushing her dark hair away from her face, I pressed another kiss to her forehead. “I promise you,” I whispered, pulling her in for another fierce hug.

  Several more seconds passed while we caught our breath, trying to calm our nerves. I could no longer hear the shouts of the guards, and I had to believe that they’d moved away from us, instead of closer.

  Finally relenting, I allowed Leisel to leave my arms. Pulling away, she lifted her hand, showing me her gun. Smiling, I showed her mine. It was almost exactly like hers, though I carried mine with more confidence. Before the infection, I’d loved going shooting at the local gun range. Even though it had been a while since I’d practiced, I hadn’t forgotten the basics.

  “Eve.” Jami beckoned me toward him, gesturing at Alex to move toward Leisel, which he did immediately. Taking a moment, I watched as Alex sidled up beside her, his body language fiercely protective, and I marveled at how neither Leisel nor I had ever noticed the way he looked at her, the sheer intensity of it.

  He was incredibly quiet, sometimes to the point of infuriating, yet the way he’d always stared at her, those deep brown eyes of his seeing all of her. She was blind to it—to him, hell, to anyone. She’d had enough of men to last her a lifetime, and she simply didn’t care anymore.

  But then there was Alex, and the number of times he’d had to escort her to the clinic for treatment, some humiliating and some just damn painful. Other than the staff at the clinic and me, only Alex had seen most of the horrors Lawrence had put her through; only he knew the full extent of her pain.

  Leisel’s pain, I surmised, and the threat of losing her for good, must have been his turning point. The reason why he was willing to risk his life to get us out of here. Knowing what I knew, having seen what I’d seen, Alex’s behavior didn’t really come as a surprise to me.

  It was Jami who shocked me. Never in a million years would I have expected him to aid in an escape plan, let alone already have a plan of his own. He’d liked his job, this life, or I’d always assumed so, and I’d never thought that I was more than a passing distraction for him. But his willingness to help us, to leave with us, was evidence of much more caring than he’d ever admitted to me.

  “I’m going across,” Jami announced, his face hidden by shadows. “You wait here until you see my signal.”

  The three of us watched as Jami took off quickly across the street. Reaching the other side, he slipped between two closely erected buildings and disappeared from sight. Moments later, he reappeared and waved us across.

  Shooting Leisel one last glance, I mouthed the words, I promise, right before bolting out into the street. It was dark in this part of town, the darkness our ally, but without the shadows of the buildings to hide us, I felt overly exposed and vulnerable to anything or anyone that might be lurking. Rattling in my own ears, my breath sounded overly noisy, a neon sign to our whereabouts. But I stayed the path, never faltering, not daring to look right or left. My footsteps were quick, surefooted, until I’d reached the other side of the street, slamming into Jami as he pulled me into the dark safety of another shadowed alley.

  Not bothering to catch my breath, I peered around the corner, checking to be sure no one had spotted my mad dash for safety. Flashing lights snagged my attention, a flickering light from the lanterns that our guards carried, and though they were off in the distance, they were headed in our direction.

  When Jami waved Leisel and Alex across, she hesitated. Thank God for Alex, because suddenly he pulled her across the street, nearly carrying her since she suddenly couldn’t seem to run without slipping and nearly falling.

  Checking back up the street, I noticed the lights were growing closer, the footfalls and quiet shouts sounding nearer. As Alex and Leisel finally reached us, I pulled her to me once again, noting that she was breathless and shaking with fear.

  “This way,” Jami said, already walking off. We followed him, Leisel and me in the center, while Alex covered us from behind.

  We found the end of the alleyway heavily barricaded, secured by rusty corrugated metal and reinforced by wooden pallets and chicken wire. Seeing this, I started to panic, thinking that we were trapped, until Alex pushed past me and Jami bent down, slipping his backpack off his shoulders and pulling free a thick blanket. After handing the blanket to Alex, Jami bent down to give him a boost. Using Jami for support, Alex tossed the blanket over the top of the barricade and hoisted himself over.

  It was too noisy, metal scraping on metal, and the sound echoed loudly in the dark. My heartbeat headed into overdrive, but my will to survive—for us to survive—was firm. Even as the voices grew louder, the heavy footsteps came closer, even with the hopelessness of this entire situation, I refused to give up. In fact, I damn well demanded that we would get through this night.

  The soft fall of Alex’s body thumping against the ground signaled to us that he was on the other side. We waited, the three of us, with bated breath, for what would come next. “Clear,” he finally called out softly.

  Jami gestured for me to go next. Shaking my head, I pulled Leisel forward. “I’ll go once she’s over.”

  Glancing up at the fence, her eyes as big and wide as a doe’s, she swallowed hard and looked back at me. “I can’t,” she whispered, and shook her head.

  “You can do this, Lei,” I said to reassure her. “This is our chance, and you can do this, you have to.” Gently, I pushed her toward the fence.

  Nodding halfheartedly, she reluctantly climbed onto Jami’s back. Immediately he lifted her, allowing her to reach higher so she could pull herself the rest of the way up. She fumbled clumsily for her footing, finally finding it, then heaved herself to the top. She soon straddled the wall and scrambled awkwardly over the top, and just before she was about to drop to the other side, she glanced down to give me a small, nervous smile, and then she was gone.

  “Eve, you’re next,” Jami whispered.

  The alleyway was darker now, more oppressive, the moon having hidden behind the clouds.

  “Jami?”

  “Yeah?” he asked, glancing back to the other end of the alley.

  “Thank you for this. Words don’t seem enough. I—”

  Jami looked at me, his cocky smile back in place. “You can show me how grateful you are later, but for now, I need you to get your ass over there.” Slapping my ass, he winked at me.

  Suppressing a laugh, I grinned at him and shook my head.

  After I climbed on top of Jami’s shoulders, he lifted me with a grunt, and I found myself flailing for a moment before finally managing to grip the fence. As I pulled myself up and over, Jami’s hands gave me the final push I needed to scale the remaining height. Just as I prepared to drop to the other side, I glanced down at Jami, finding him smiling up at me.

  Freedom was so close, I could almost taste it, palpable on my tongue. Suddenly I found myself smiling back at Jami, grinning actually, my worry muted by the excitement I had for the future. Freedom and Jami had come at a price, but it was a price I was willing to pay, for both Leisel and myself.

  “You can do it, Eve,” he whispered, his eyes shining brightly, reflecting his own excitement. He kissed his palm, and then lifted it up to me.

  It was the first time Jami had ever shown me that he cared, and it took me by surprise. He’d never kissed me good-bye, never before shown me that I was worth something to him. Fluttering in my chest, my heartbeat was erratic at this newfound knowledge. My charming, cocky Jami had just shown me that he gave a damn about me, something he’d sworn to never do again, not after he’d lost everything. But he’d finall
y let someone in—me—and I felt privileged and happy, trapped in a blissful bubble of hope for our future.

  I was still smiling at him when my gaze caught on something moving behind him, and then my world slammed to a halt, everything suddenly moving in slow motion. The guards were nearly upon us, their lanterns lighting the area all around Jami. Men were yelling, running toward us with their guns drawn, shouting for us to drop our weapons and stay where we were.

  And Jami, oh my God, my brave and cocky Jami, he turned and raised his gun.

  “No!” I screamed. “Jami, no!”

  “Go!” he shouted back. “Go, Eve!”

  Jami didn’t look back at me as he let loose the first bullet, and while I should have been dropping down to the other side and scrambling for my own safety, I couldn’t move. I was frozen, caught in this horrifying, devastating moment.

  Gunfire lit up the small space, small orange explosions of bullets being expelled at inhuman speed, and then suddenly, as if the wind had been knocked out of him, Jami dropped to his knees. My following cry was lost to the sound of gunshots and shouts, and still I could do little more than stare in horror as Jami continued to fire his gun, even as they fired back, riddling his body with bullets. He fired until his gun was empty, though his finger continued to click the trigger in hopes of more until his hand fell limply to his side, the gun falling from his fingers. The gunfire stopped then, the small space seeming smaller and darker than before.

  I didn’t even realize that I was still crying out until my throat began to burn. Just as Jami slumped forward, falling silent and still, something grabbed at my leg, promptly yanking me over the fence and into the darkness.

  My fall was soft, Alex’s arms catching me just before I crashed to the ground. As soon as I was standing, Leisel’s hand found mine and squeezed it before pulling me from the wall, away from the shouting and yelling, away from Jami and into the forest.

  We stumbled through the blackness, occasionally catching what sounded like the low moan of an infected. Keeping my grip firm on Leisel’s hand, I refused to let her go, even for a second. When she stumbled, I stumbled; when she fell, I fell. We were in this together; she was all I had left.

  It seemed as if hours had passed before the forest thinned and we reached a small clearing. In the moonlight, I could make out the outline of a truck, and as we grew closer, I noticed that it was old and rusted. What was once probably a beautiful blue now looked like a washed-out gray with patches of brown. Worse, it didn’t appear as if it had been started in years, and I found myself holding out little hope of it being a worthy escape vehicle.

  Regardless of its appearance, we piled inside. What choice did we have? The key was already in the ignition, and as Alex turned it, the truck sputtered several times before the engine finally turned over noisily.

  As we drove away, leaving the forest behind us, Leisel’s head came to rest on my shoulder. I could feel her body quaking, hear her soft sniffles as she cried silent tears while I stared blankly out of the window.

  Maybe tomorrow I’d cry. But not tonight.

  “He kissed me good-bye,” I mumbled, still staring into the darkness surrounding us. Taking a deep breath, I slowly released it, refusing to be anything but grateful. Grateful because my friend, my very best friend, had evaded execution, grateful that both she and I were now free of Fredericksville and all its hidden horrors.

  And that was all that really mattered.

  Chapter Seven

  Leisel

  I awoke to the faint chirping of birds off in the distance, and the sound of trickling water. For just a moment I was at peace, happy in that gentle place between waking and sleep, ignorant of the crick in my neck from sleeping sitting up, and blissfully unaware of all that had transpired over the past two days.

  And then it came back to me. Slowly at first—the pain, the violence, the crime—and I squeezed my eyes tightly shut, trying to block it out and enjoy the peace for just a moment longer.

  But it wouldn’t relent; all at once the rest of it poured in. My fear, my bloodstained hands, the bodies in the alleyway. And then later, while tucked neatly between Alex and Evelyn, when I’d cried and cried until the movement of the truck rocked me slowly into a blissful unconsciousness, all while Evelyn had run her fingers through my hair, pressed soft kisses on the top of my head, whispered soothing, calming words in my ear.

  But it should have been the other way around. It should have been me comforting her. After all, it had been her who’d lost someone she’d cared for. Not me.

  Weak.

  The word pounded through my thoughts like a wayward drumbeat until I could no longer stomach another second of being alone with my thoughts, and my eyes flew open. I blinked through tear-encrusted eyes, trying to see past the sudden blinding sunlight streaming in through the truck’s dirty windows.

  “Morning.” The sound of Alex’s deep, booming voice startled me. Twisting in my seat, I found him standing just outside the driver’s side door with his back to me. I blinked again, realizing that the sound I’d initially thought was trickling water was actually the sound of him urinating.

  As my face heated with embarrassment, I quickly turned away and caught a glimpse of myself in the rearview mirror. The truck was an older model, the windshield short and squat, and the turned-down mirror gave me an up close and personal view of my face that I didn’t much care to see. Dried smears of blood ran up and down both my cheeks, dark bruises ringed my eyes, my nose had a thin cut running across the bridge of it. My bottom lip was swollen, split in two places, and my neck…

  I swallowed hard, glancing away from the mirror, vividly recalling what Lawrence’s hand had felt like wrapped around my throat, his fingertips biting into my skin while I fought for my breath, while he took what he hadn’t been given.

  And then the blood. The memory of the blood covering me, covering the entire room, washed over me in one suffocating wave, so very real that I could taste the sharp metallic flavor all over again.

  “Evelyn,” I managed to croak out. Alex bent down, resting his forearms on top of the open window.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  Not trusting my voice, I simply nodded. He watched me for one long uncomfortable moment before pointing. Following his finger, I turned in my seat and took in our surroundings.

  We appeared to be parked on the side of a deserted two-lane road, surrounded by mostly open land. I quickly spotted Evelyn, some several dozen yards away, as she emerged from behind a large oak tree. She was moving slowly, much slower than usual, looking disheveled and a bit dazed. I stared at her, squinting to see her better as she continued down the small incline of pasture. Her body language, her movements, her facial expression, it was all wrong and I hardly recognized her. This appeared to be Evelyn at her lowest, internalizing her pain, letting it press her down until something as simple as walking became strenuous.

  I’d only ever seen this Evelyn once before. The day she’d lost Shawn.

  “Eve!” Alex shouted, bellowing from behind me, causing my entire body to flinch. “Three o’clock!”

  My eyes darted right and found nothing, then left, Evelyn’s three o’clock, and my breath caught in my throat. I’d seen the infected before, God knows I had, too many to count. But even so, they struck the sort of fear inside of me that no fist, no weapon, no living person ever could.

  In the beginning, when Thomas and I were holed up in Evelyn and Shawn’s home, the four of us had waited for weeks for someone to come and save us—the army, the national guard, the Red Cross, anyone to take us somewhere safe. During that time, the infected had been everywhere. Milling down the streets, in every nook and cranny, pounding on the house, trying to beat their way inside. Those who had once been our neighbors, friends, and family had all succumbed to the infection and become monsters.

  I’d even had to endure the horror of watching my own husband turn, watch as the fever overtook him, as the bloody pustules formed all over his skin. I watched him cry
tears mixed with blood, and gasp my name with his last few breaths. Then I’d watched as he awoke, his eyes clouded over, as a garbled cacophony of hoarse groans and animalistic gurgles erupted from his throat. And just as he’d lunged for me, his jaw snapping, his teeth bared, I’d watched as Shawn had speared my beloved husband through the skull with a butcher knife. The very same butcher knife he’d used to carve the turkey every Thanksgiving.

  I’d seen the infected in Fredericksville too, the stragglers who had somehow managed to find themselves at our walls. But it was always from afar. Even during the one and only wall breach during the first year, the invasion had been short lived, resulting in very few fatalities.

  But now here we were, in the great wide open, just the three of us, the birds, and the three infected shambling their way toward Evelyn. My only source of relief to draw from stemmed from the noticeable difference between these infected and the ones from the beginning. These were slower than I’d remembered them to be, less steady on their feet, and unable to move quickly.

  Alex was already jogging around to the front of the truck, a rifle in his hands. He paused in front of the hood, drawing himself to his full height. Lifting the weapon to eye level, he squinted, peering through the scope. His index finger twitched on the trigger, and a bullet cracked in the air, the small explosion echoing around us.

  I watched, clasping my hand over my mouth, as one of the infected fell. Its two companions paid it little mind as its body crumpled to the ground, their focus only on Evelyn. Who, to my complete and utter horror, wasn’t running away from them, but toward them.

  Something like a war cry flew from her lips as she rushed them head-on, her gun in her hand. My head buzzed with a pounding chorus of fear and anxiety as she flew across the lush grass, her arms and legs deftly pumping as she headed straight toward death itself.

  What was she doing? Why would she be so reckless when here was Alex, complete with a rifle and an excellent shot, to boot?

  “Help her!” I screamed, throwing myself at the windshield, pounding on the glass with clenched fists. “Alex! Do something!”