She smiled, clearly pleased by his cooperation. She had freckles just under her left eye. They were cute freckles.
“Did you kill Lucky?” she was asking him while picking up another spoonful of chow.
“No,” Smith said.
“Billy says he saw you at Lucky’s place when it was torched.”
Billy?
That was probably the kid with the stupid grin.
“Billy’s wrong,” Smith said. “It was already burning when I stumbled across it.”
“Is that the truth?”
“Yes.”
He opened his mouth up for another spoonful of mashed potatoes and bits of jerky. It was better the second time for some reason.
“What happened to the horse?” Smith asked. “Sally.”
“She’s being taken care of. How did you end up with her? They said you were riding her when they found you.”
“It was just there, next to the burning house.”
“So you decided to just take her?”
Smith shrugged. Or as much as he could while roped to the big pole. “It would have been a waste to just leave her out there alone. Besides, I’ve been walking for a while and didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth.”
She grinned, but unlike with the boy earlier, hers was a lot more pleasing to look at. “That’s funny.”
“What is?”
“‘Gift horse in the mouth.’ Appropriate, in this case.”
He smiled and temporarily forgot that he was being held prisoner.
“What’s your name?” she was asking him.
“Smith,” he said.
“Is that your last name?”
“Yes.”
“What’s your first name?”
“John.”
She might have rolled her eyes. “Seriously?”
He attempted another sorta-shrug. “It’s a name.”
“It’s that, all right.” Another spoonful of potatoes and jerky. “I’m Blake,” she added, before he could make a comment, “I know, it’s a guy’s name. I’ve heard it all before.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything.”
“No?”
“A name’s a name.”
“Just like your name, Mr. John Smith.”
“That’s right. Nice to meet you, Blake.”
“Likewise. Well, mostly. You’re probably not feeling pretty good right now.”
“I’m feeling a lot better, actually.”
“Oh yeah?”
“I like this visit better than my last one.”
“Because I brought you food?”
“That, too.”
Blake smiled. “Cute. You’re cute.”
“Question…”
“No, you can’t leave. Not yet.”
Not until Mandy shows up, I take it, he thought, but said, “Not that.”
“What’s the question, then?”
“Am I bleeding? I was shot in the temple earlier.”
“No, you’re not.” She leaned closer to get a better look. “Bandage is still in place. You did a pretty good job with it.”
“I’ve had experience, unfortunately.”
“Ooh, dangerous man.”
“Stop flirting with the enemy and just feed him, will you?” a voice said from the open door behind Blake.
Smith looked past her at another woman, about the same age, except she wasn’t nearly as pleasing to the eye as Blake. Not that she was ugly, but compared to the blonde in front of him, everyone would probably come up short. His guard wore a ball cap over short brown hair, and hard brown eyes looked back at Smith with suspicion. Unlike Blake, she wore a gun belt with a pistol in the holster and wasn’t nearly as friendly.
Blake ignored the other woman and continued feeding and talking to Smith. “Don’t mind her. She’s always grumpy. That’s why we call her Gramps.”
“Gramps?” Smith said.
“Short for grampa. ’Cause, you know.”
“She’s always grumpy.”
“Uh huh.”
The woman Blake called Gramps rolled her eyes at them. “Hurry up and feed him already.” Then, as she turned to leave, “And stop flirting!”
“I wasn’t flirting!” Blake called back at her.
“Yeah, you were!” Gramps called back. Smith followed her through the slits in the wall as she went back to standing guard outside.
Blake was smiling at Smith. “I wasn’t flirting.” Then, holding up another spoonful, “Much.”
Smith opened his mouth and took another tasty bite of mashed potatoes and jerky. It occurred to him that maybe the food wasn’t really all that good after all; it was probably more the company.
Probably?
Yeah, it was probably just the company.
“Where am I, anyway?” Smith asked.
“Our place,” Blake said.
“Yeah, but where, exactly? Is this some kind of junkyard?”
“Uh huh.”
“What are you guys doing in a junkyard?”
Blake shrugged. “One place is as good as another. All I know is that it’s not Gaffney.”
“You guys are from Gaffney?”
“We escaped from there,” Blake said.
Eleven
He remembered the gratitude on Mary’s face and the simple “Thank you” she had said to him before she and her son rode off with Hobson and the others. Their destination was Gaffney, which at the time Smith thought would be a safer place for the two of them than walking around out here with him. Anything could happen where he was going. Like, for instance, finding a horse, only to get shot off said horse moments later.
There were a lot of dangers in the wilds of what used to be America. Smith had learned that the hard way multiple times. So had mother and son after what had happened to them with Peoples and his two pals.
Except maybe Smith had been wrong.
“You guys are from Gaffney?” he had asked Blake.
“We escaped from there,” Blake had said.
That…didn’t sound good.
It didn’t sound very good at all.
He’d tried asking Blake for more information about Gaffney and what exactly made it a “hellhole” according to her, but the woman wasn’t willing to talk too much about it.
“You don’t want to be there if you don’t have to,” was all she would say, and any further attempts he had to broach the topic got him nowhere. He could almost see the black clouds forming above her head with every Gaffney question he threw at her. She did not want to talk about that place with him.
After she finished feeding him, Blake produced a bottle of water. The container itself didn’t look all that clean, but the water inside was a different story. The taste was lukewarm against his throat, but it was better than nothing.
“Stay right here,” Blake said when she picked everything up to leave.
“Where are you going?” he asked her.
She didn’t answer. She opened the door and closed it after her, but not before glancing back and—did she just wink at him, before leaving?
He couldn’t be entirely sure. There was too much sunlight outside and chromed car parts trying to blind him, but he was pretty sure that was a wink. Or maybe he just wanted to think she had winked at him.
Now that he was alone again, but more importantly awake, Smith was able to finally get a better feel for his binds. The pole he was fastened to didn’t move when he pushed back against it. It also wouldn’t budge when Smith tried going side-to-side. The ropes were tight, and despite Smith having struggled against it for some time, he couldn’t feel any loosening anywhere along the length.
Unlike the last time when he was able to wiggle his way out of his bindings, he had no such luck here. His longer-than-usual arms weren’t going to do a bit of good with ropes that had his entire body lashed against what felt like a very stout telephone pole. And, for all he knew, that was exactly what it was.
He couldn’t get free, and no one had returned to talk to him. He cou
ld see glimpses of people moving around outside and could hear chatter every now and then. Unfortunately, the figures weren’t talking loud enough or weren’t near enough for him to eavesdrop on their conversations. The ones standing guard outside—he assumed the oddly-nicknamed Gramps was one of them—also weren’t very talkative. Smith counted two figures out there but couldn’t get a better look at the second one. They didn’t go anywhere, either, though one of them did leave for a few minutes before returning. Smith assumed he or she had gone to the bathroom or to fetch something to eat, because he smelled food a few minutes later. More seasoned beef.
He waited for this Mandy person to show up and get this over with. Though, if he had his choice, he was hoping for Blake instead. Eventually, the room around him started to dim noticeably, signaling the coming of evening. The shadows outside got darker, and both his guards were replaced by two new ones. Both guys this time, and they weren’t any chattier than Gramps and the other one had been.
Smith wasn’t sure when he drifted off. One moment he was awake, and the next he was in la la land. He blamed it on the wound, but that was probably just an excuse. He was just tired, though he wasn’t entirely sure why.
When he opened his eyes a second time, there were two people standing in front of him, both of whom he’d never seen before.
The first was a woman in her fifties, with almost entirely gray hair. She stood next to a young man in his twenties. They were both wearing gun belts and holstered pistols and were in the middle of a conversation before he woke up.
The interior of the shack was almost completely dark, and Smith wouldn’t have been able to see his new guests if one of them—the man—wasn’t holding an LED lantern in one hand. It was night outside the building, with only a few scattered lights here and there to keep the junkyard from becoming a complete sea of black. Smith guessed he’d slept through the entire day, which explained why he was feeling much, much better.
“Looks like Sleeping Beauty’s awake,” the man said.
The woman turned to look at Smith. “It’s about time. We thought you were going to sleep all day.”
“It’s been a long day,” Smith said. Then, looking from the woman to the younger man, “So, what have I missed?”
“We’re trying to decide what to do with you,” the woman said.
“Do I have a say in the matter?”
“No.”
“Just wonderin’.”
Smith had seen plenty of leaders and followers in his time, and it was very clear who was who here. The woman was the leader, even if she was an entire foot shorter than the man. It wasn’t the huge gap in their age, either, but the way she stood and stared at Smith, very much as if she was trying to decide what to do with him.
She was trying to decide, and not the “we” she had claimed earlier.
“Billy spotted you at Lucky’s when he was killed,” the woman said.
“You’re Mandy?” Smith asked.
“That I am. Now, tell me about Lucky.”
“I don’t have anything to tell you. Billy’s wrong. The house was already burning when I stumbled across it. I didn’t know there was anyone inside. Or who started the fire. Or why.”
“You’re saying Billy lied?”
“I’m saying Billy jumped to conclusions. Ask him again. I bet if you press him, he’ll admit to it.”
Mandy and the man exchanged a brief look. Smith couldn’t tell if they believed him or not. He was hoping his very honest face was believable, because it would have certainly been ironic if it wasn’t since, well, it was the truth.
The woman looked back at Smith. “Say we believe you about Lucky. And that’s a big if. When did you decide to steal Sally?”
“I wouldn’t call it stealing,” Smith said. “The horse was there, and I took it.”
“What do you call taking something that doesn’t belong to you, wise guy?” the man asked.
“Opportunity. I didn’t know what happened, or why. I just saw a horse that no one was using. It would have been a waste to just let it wander off.”
“So you took it.”
“Yeah, I took it.”
The man chuckled, before saying to Mandy, “Well, at least he’s not a complete liar.”
“I don’t have any reasons to lie,” Smith said. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“You took what wasn’t yours,” Mandy said.
“I didn’t know that at the time.”
“You should have assumed.”
“You know what happens when you assume?”
“Who shot you?” the man asked.
“I don’t know,” Smith said. “I was hoping you guys might be able to tell me. Maybe it was the same guy who burned down your friend Lucky’s house.”
Mandy and the man exchanged another look. For some reason, Smith had a feeling they already knew everything he’d just told them, but either wanted him to confirm or…
Something else was going on that they were keeping from him.
Oh, who was he kidding. There were a lot of “somethings” going on here that he didn’t know but had stumbled into.
Hobson and that posse of his, for one.
This Judge person back at Gaffney, for another.
And thirdly, the death of someone named Lucky, whom Smith had never even met.
“You guys want to tell me what’s going on around here?” Smith asked.
Mandy looked back at him. “What do you know about Gaffney?”
“Nothing. I’ve never been there.”
“And the Judge?”
“I’ve heard the name, but that’s it.”
“Where did you hear it from?”
“Some guys on horses. One of them called himself Hobson.”
“You know Hobson,” the man said.
“I met the guy. I wouldn’t call that ‘knowing’ him.”
“How did you meet Hobson, and why?” Mandy asked.
“It’s a long story.”
“Look around you. You’re in no position to hold anything back from us, Mister…”
“Smith.”
“Smith?”
Smith sighed. “Yeah.”
The man chuckled. “Couldn’t have come up with something better, huh?”
“It’s a name,” Smith said. Then, to Mandy, “Blake told me Gaffney isn’t a nice place to be, but she didn’t elaborate. Is she right?”
“Depends,” Mandy said.
“On?”
“On whether you agree with the Judge or not.”
“I don’t know what any of that means,” Smith said.
“No, I don’t suspect you do.”
“What’s wrong with Gaffney? Who is this Judge person everyone keeps talking about?”
Mandy ignored him and turned back to the man. “We need to think this through. What we do next may set off a chain of events that we can’t take back.”
“This was a long time coming,” the man said. “We were never going to avoid this forever, Mandy.”
“I know, but it’s not something to take lightly.”
“You know I’m not taking this lightly. But it was going to happen, sooner or later.” Then, “Do we tell the others?”
“We have to. We don’t keep secrets from one another here, remember?”
Smith had a feeling they’d forgotten all about him. “What about me?” he asked. “What happens to me now?”
“We haven’t decided yet,” Mandy said.
“Don’t leave town,” the man said.
“Funny,” Smith said.
The man grinned, before he turned around and left the shack with Mandy.
“Hey,” Smith called after them.
They ignored him and closed the door. He heard chains jangling, then a lock snapping into place.
Swell, Smith thought as the shack around him started to darken even further now that they’d taken the only source of light away.
Outside, he could hear the crickets chirping, along with the shuffling of boots against the
grounds.
Other than that, it was just him in the dark, lost with his own thoughts.
Most of all, the image of Mary and her son, Aaron, riding off to Gaffney, where he thought they would be safe.
“Shit,” Smith said out loud.
Twelve
Smith wasn’t sure when he dozed off for the second time (technically the third time he lost consciousness, but who was counting?), but it wasn’t long after Mandy and the guy whose name he didn’t know left. He was either very tired or the bullet had taken more out of him than he’d admitted, because he couldn’t remember the last time he fell asleep without realizing it twice in one day.
This time, it was different.
This time he didn’t open his eyes because he woke up. He was startled awake by the sound of gunfire, and Smith’s immediate thought was, That’s not good. That’s definitely not good.
Smith didn’t need to be able to see more than what he could at the moment—which wasn’t very much at all—to know there was a back and forth going on outside. The shack was lightless, which meant he was essentially sitting in the dark. That in itself was already an eerie feeling, but now he was stuck in the middle of a gun battle—
Pek! as a round slammed into the wall to his right.
The bullet easily punctured through the thin wooden board and exited the other side of the shack.
Close one!
Okay, so it probably hadn’t been that close, but when you were tied to a pole and sitting on the floor without the ability to do anything to save yourself, even a couple of yards was way too close a call.
He was listening to handguns and rifles firing back and forth, along with pings! of those rounds ricocheting off the vehicles and other metal junk that surrounded him. Someone—or, more likely, someones—was attacking Mandy’s group.
The question was who and why?
Or maybe the big question was, how was he going to—
Pek! as another bullet entered the shack from his right and embedded itself into the pole about a foot above Smith’s head. Splinters flicked across the air, a few of them landing in his lap.
After The Purge, AKA John Smith Box Set | Books 1-3 Page 22
