The Glock 17 was a Gen4 with MOS configuration for easier aiming. Smith thought that was a bit overkill. He’d given Anne one of the AR rifles and left her along with Mary to watch the other three women. They didn’t look especially convinced about Smith’s plan, not that he asked for their opinions. It wasn’t that Smith was a misogynist or anything, but, well, it was his neck on the line and the only person who needed to be comfortable with that was him.
Even so, Mary insisted on coming with him.
“I can help,” she said.
“No, you can’t,” Smith answered.
That had drawn a scowl from her. “I can help,” she had said again, gripping the AR rifle with both hands as if to prove that she could. Or maybe, more likely, to remind him that she’d used something like it before, on Peoples’s poor face not too long ago.
“I need you here,” Smith said. “I need you to watch over them.”
To drive his point home, Smith glanced over at the other four women. Mary did, too, and that finally convinced her.
“Just be careful,” she said.
“I plan to.”
“No, John, I mean it. Be careful.”
He nodded. “I will.”
“Promise?”
He thought that was a little childish. He wasn’t going to be careful? It wasn’t like he wanted to get killed out there.
“Yes,” he said anyway, just before she leaned in and kissed him.
That was a surprise. He hadn’t been prepared for it and was about to pull away…
…but didn’t.
Mary’s lips were soft and pliant and oh so sweet, and he found himself leaning into her kiss instead of pulling away. He’d forgotten the other women were in the barn with them, probably watching (probably, because he didn’t stop kissing Mary back to confirm), but he didn’t particularly care.
It was Mary who pulled away first. There was just a ghost of a smile on her face, barely visible in the slightly semi-dark of the part of the barn they were standing in.
“You promise,” she said, quieter than before, as if she only wanted him to hear.
“Yeah,” Smith said, thinking to himself, Remember Blake, you fucking asshole?
He did remember Blake, and that made liking the taste and feel and everything about Mary’s kiss even more problematic.
He was still thinking about Mary’s kiss as he slid out of the barn and into the just-a-tad-too-bright ranch property. It was still dark, but there was already a huge difference between now and the last time he was out here.
Still, all he could think about was Mary—
Get your head in the game! You wanna die?
No, he didn’t.
So focus!
The shooting had lessened noticeably, with only the occasional gunshot or two, and then a long period of eerie quiet again. It was very clear to Smith now that he was eavesdropping on to two sides that had realized they weren’t going to take out the other, and were settling down for a long fight.
That, unfortunately, wasn’t something Smith was good with. He was perfectly fine with sitting out a protracted battle where no one was shooting at him, but the problem was what happened after that. Sooner or later, someone was going to win, and when they did, they’d come after him and the women.
Mostly, they’d come after Smith.
…and Mary.
And Mary? Why did he just think about Mary again? He should have been more worried about his own hide right now.
Shouldn’t he?
Goddammit. This is getting confusing.
The door he’d stepped through was on the other side of the property grounds, so he wasn’t immediately afraid of being picked off by a sniper from the house or the hills as soon as he poked his head out. He hugged the wall now, the big red barn’s two-story structure blotting out most of the scattered morning sunlight rising and leaving him with some cover. Not a lot, but some. The house was somewhere in front and to his right, with the hills—and the attackers—behind him. There were open flat fields in front of him, but Smith didn’t see anyone out there when he’d peeked out earlier through a crack in the door.
Smith moved quickly, remaining mostly quiet thanks to the socks he was still wearing. Or he thought he was being pretty stealthy. He might have been making a whole lot of noise for all he knew, but he didn’t think so.
When he finally reached the corner and the front of the barn, Smith leaned out and looked right toward the house some fifty meters away.
The windows were just as blown out as he’d seen it earlier, but now with spreading morning light to help his cause, he could make out that one of the double doors was just barely hanging on its hinges. The front side of the building was damaged by bullets, and there wasn’t a single window that was still intact—
Pop!, followed by a resounding pek!, as a round blew off a chunk of brick and mortar just above one of the second-floor windows. A flash of movement as someone scurried away from that opening and behind some better cover.
Smith remained where he was, listening to the shot echoing, echoing…then fading completely. Erratic—or was that excited?—voices from the house, but he was too far to make out any of the words.
He couldn’t hear anything from behind him either, but what Smith focused on the most was that he was quickly losing what little cover he had. The morning was coming up fast on him, and he didn’t need a watch to know it wouldn’t be long now before the whole valley was awash in daylight. Even now, he could feel the warmth on his skin underneath his clothes.
Smith thought about turning back and returning to the barn to rejoin the women. It was a far better option than standing out here waiting for something to happen. He wasn’t going to get a much better look at the house or however many people were still alive in there, that much was certain. As for the attackers…
Go back. Make sure Mary’s safe.
Mary? Why was he thinking about Mary again?
Get focused, man! Focus!
He couldn’t go back to Mary yet. He still had to find out who the attackers were, and they were on the other side of the barn.
He turned around and headed back, keenly aware that most of the shadows he’d been using as cover earlier were gone.
Smith picked up his pace.
Scratch-scratch from the other side of the wall, now to his left. Horses moving around, either sensing him or hearing his movements. He hoped it wasn’t the latter because he didn’t think he was being that loud. Was he?
No, definitely not.
The side door was in front of him, just five yards away, with the other corner on the other side. He needed to find out who the attackers were. What were the chances they were Mandy’s people? That was the ideal answer, but there was no guarantee of that. For all he knew, it could have been another group that had stumbled across the ranch and decided they wanted it for themselves.
He had to find out one way or another, and that meant getting a good look at the attackers.
Something flicked in the corner of Smith’s right eye, and he turned his head to look. It was, he would realize later, the only thing that saved his life. If he hadn’t stopped moving and turned around, the bullet would have struck him either in the temple or somewhere else along the length of his head. Bottom line: He would have been dead.
But he wasn’t, and instead he heard the soft, almost muffled pop! of a suppressed rifle firing, just before the bullet zipped! past his face, inches from slicing his nose off at the bridge, and piercing the barn wall.
A loud snicker and the suddenly wild clop-clop of hooves moving around as the horse on the other side of the wall jumped, spooked by its own near-miss. At least Smith assumed it hadn’t been hit, because he was too busy ducking his head and running.
The pop! of a second muffled rifle shot, followed by the almost simultaneous pek! as the sniper’s second round smashed through the wooden boards somewhere behind Smith. He didn’t know exactly where, just that it was too damn close, and he could feel splintered wood
flicking against his back as he ran.
And he was running.
Fast.
Or as fast as he could, anyway. He hoped it was fast enough.
Shit. He better be fast enough!
Then the side door in front of him burst open, and Mary lunged outside.
“Get back inside!” Smith shouted.
She saw him and froze, one hand on the barn door, the other holding her rifle. He didn’t know why he shouted, because all it did was paralyze her in place.
Even as he ran, Smith glimpsed sunlight glinting off the sniper’s rifle scope out of the corner of his eye for the third time.
He dived at Mary just as the sniper fired, and Smith crashed straight into Mary, knocking her into the door. She must have bounced off it, and he along with her, because soon they were both tumbling to the ground. Mary was screaming as he held onto her, his arms wrapped tightly around her waist.
Was she hit?
Was he hit?
Sunlight filled Smith’s eyes as he landed on his back and rolled over, Mary clutched tightly in his arms. He waited for the sniper to fire again.
One second…
Mary was still screaming.
Two…
He wasn’t sure what she was screaming at, or who.
Three…
Him. She was screaming at him.
Four…
Why was it taking the shooter so long to get another shot off and finish him?
Five…
And Mary was still screaming even as she somehow got loose from his arms.
Six…
Why was she screaming at him?
Seven…
“…bleeding! John, you’re bleeding! Oh my God, you’re bleeding!”
Oh, that was why she was screaming. Because he was bleeding out, which meant he’d been shot and was probably gonna die pretty soon.
Makes sense, he thought as he closed his eyes and drifted off, with the sound of Mary’s voice in his ears, screaming his name over and over and over…
Twenty-One
“What happened?”
“You were shot.”
“Yeah, I figured that part out. What happened after that?”
“Oh. They showed up.”
“‘They’ who?”
“I don’t know. They.”
Mary was looking off to one side. Smith turned his head slightly to follow her gaze.
Two figures stood nearby talking quietly. He wasn’t sure if they were doing that on purpose to keep him and Mary from eavesdropping or if they were just— No, they were definitely trying to keep their conversation a secret.
One of them looked familiar…
Roger. It was Roger. Mandy’s second-in-command.
Mandy’s replacement, now, as far as Smith knew since Mandy was dead and the folks at the junkyard would need a new leader.
He was lying on some kind of futon in the same mobile building that Mandy had called her command center/office/living quarters before she was unceremoniously picked off by the Judge’s sniper yesterday. Or was that two days ago? Smith had no idea how long he’d been unconscious after getting shot.
He struggled to sit up, but Mary was there, grabbing his arms. “Hey, what are you doing? Stay down.”
“I need to get up.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Yes, I do.”
“No, you don’t,” Mary said, and pushed him back down.
He would have resisted her if he could, but he couldn’t. Not only did he not have the strength, but there was that look in Mary’s eyes that made him want to do what she said.
Caring. She cared for him.
Shit. This is no good.
Smith lay back down on the soft bedsheet and sucked in a fresh lungful of air. His head was spinning slightly, though it wasn’t nearly as bad as when he’d been grazed in the head by a bullet days ago. Still, it was enough that he didn’t think he could have made it to his feet anyway, even if Mary wasn’t there to insist he stay down.
He took a few seconds to get a better look at his wound. Or the bandage wrapped around his midsection. The bullet had struck him somewhere in the side; he knew that because that was where the throbbing pain was coming from. It must have gone clean through, considering how much he had been bleeding after getting shot. Not that he’d seen all the blood, but that was what he guessed from Mary’s terrified voice as she screamed his name after he collided with her and they both fell to the ground.
The lower half of his midsection was wrapped in gauze tape. Whoever was responsible had done a pretty good job from the looks of it. There was pain from the spot where he’d been shot, but not of the debilitating variety. At least, he didn’t think so. Then again, he could have been swimming in morphine or some other painkiller and not know it.
“What happened?” he asked Mary.
She was dabbing his forehead with a slightly damp towel while kneeling next to him. He wasn’t sure how long she’d been there, but she looked at home leaning over his prone form. Or maybe he just wanted to think that she looked at home because she felt like home to him.
Yeah. This is definitely no good.
“You were shot,” Mary said. “I already told you that.”
“By who?”
“One of them.”
Mary glanced over at Roger and the woman he was talking to, the two of them standing close to the door. They were much farther than he’d realized when he first looked over in their direction. No wonder he couldn’t hear what they were saying; they were standing well across the elongated building a good twenty yards or so. Smith didn’t recognize the woman Roger was talking to; she was blonde, early twenties. She wore a gun belt and carried a rifle over her back. Roger was, too. They looked very much like two people that had just been in a firefight. Or waiting for one to show up at their doorsteps.
“Why did they shoot me?” Smith asked.
“She said she didn’t recognize you when she fired,” Mary said.
“‘She?’”
“The one that shot you.”
“Who was she?”
“I don’t know. I think they called her Grampa?”
“Gramps?”
“I think that’s it.”
“Figures.”
“Who is she?”
“Someone I’ve met before.” Then, “She said she shot me by accident?”
“Yes. Why?”
Smith shrugged. Or did something that slightly resembled a shrug. “She didn’t exactly like me when we first met.”
“You’ve been here before?”
“Yes.”
“So you know these people?”
Smith turned to look over at Roger again. The man was staring back at him now. “I’ve met them, yeah.”
“They saved our lives,” Mary said. “After you were shot, they converged on the barn. I think they were going to attempt to take on the house.” She paused for a bit, before continuing. “Apparently they’d been preparing for the attack all night, but then you showed up and the woman, Gramps, took the shot.”
“So they took the house?”
Mary shook her head. “After they found us and the others inside the barn, they decided to retreat. We came back here instead.”
“What about the ranch?”
“It’s still there.”
“It wasn’t taken?”
“No.”
“So last night was all a waste of time.”
“Depends on your perspective,” a voice said.
Smith turned his head as Roger walked over to them. The woman was leaving the building, closing the door after her.
Up close, Roger looked different than the last time Smith saw him. It was in the way he walked, the way he talked, and even the way he stood with his hands on his hips as he sat down on the edge of a dirty couch and stared back at Smith.
“You attacked the ranch but didn’t take it,” Smith said. “Sounds like a waste of time to me.”
“It wasn’t,” Roger said. “W
e got what we went there for.”
“Which was?”
“Jackie and the sisters.”
“And Carol?”
Roger shook his head. “We didn’t know about her. But we got her, too.”
“You attacked the ranch just to save your friends?”
“That, and to let the Judge know that killing Mandy isn’t going to put a stop to this. We’re not going to just go away. Not by a long shot.”
“They didn’t get everyone,” Mary said.
Smith looked over at her. “Who did they leave behind?”
“No one,” Roger said.
“My son,” Mary said.
“He’s in Gaffney. We can’t do anything about that. Gaffney’s…more complicated.”
“But the ranch wasn’t?” Smith asked.
Roger shook his head. “The ranch is isolated. It’s not a town with hundreds of buildings and streets and places to hide. We’ve—” He stopped himself for a moment. Then, continuing, “Mandy and me have been talking about attacking it for a long time now. It was the most obvious choice to take the fight to the Judge.”
“Gaffney didn’t send help?”
“We kept expecting it. They would have heard all the shooting last night. And they had radios. But no one showed up to help the ranch. I had people waiting just in case.” He shook his head and looked thoughtful. Smith wasn’t sure if that was disappointment or relief on his face. “But no one showed up. Maybe they thought the ranch wasn’t worth saving.”
“Or maybe the Judge thought his men could hold out against you. Which, in this case, he was right.”
“Maybe.”
“So what happens now?”
Roger shrugged. “We haven’t thought that far ahead.”
“By ‘we,’ you mean you.”
“Yeah,” Roger said, a little quieter that time.
“You’re in charge now.”
“I guess I am.”
“You made the call to attack the ranch.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, thanks. You saved our lives. Even if Gramps did shoot me.”
“She didn’t know it was you. She was too far away.”
“Was that her excuse?”
Roger chuckled. “That’s what she claims, anyway.”
After The Purge, AKA John Smith Box Set | Books 1-3 Page 43
