by James, Jill
Teddy’s heart broke at April’s bland retelling of her ordeal. The words recited in a monotone, as if the girl were reading a book about someone else’s life. If those men weren’t dead already, he would have marched back in through the heat and flames to kill them again. He stared down the road. He could only pray the rest of the ‘church’ would be harmless without the head of the snake leading them.
Michelle’s head came up. “Maya,” she said, staring at the inferno.
He shook his head. “Bennett killed her when he shot me.”
“Everyone else left before we went in,” the young couple explained together.
Ran and Cody stepped forward and introduced themselves. Michelle stepped back to Teddy’s side, her shudders vibrating through her body. He swept her into his side and wrapped an arm around her shoulders as the kids chattered about the RV yard and the people there.
Teddy swallowed harshly. The RV yard was no longer the safe haven they had built. At the end of the road in front of them they might find it abandoned and desolate. His gaze swept over the woman at his side. Her chopped hair did nothing to diminish her beauty and strength, but her arms wrapped around her torso as if it were cold instead of the muggy, hot night it was, brought his anger forth again.
He yearned to grab her into his arms and carry her to safety, except safety didn’t exist anymore. Certainly not back at the compound, probably empty by now. They wouldn’t know until they checked it out.
“Okay, guys,” he called out. “We aren’t out of here yet. Check your weapons and stick together. The living aren’t the only things to worry about.”
The three young people walked in front of them, their chatter dying away as they left the parking lot and church inferno behind. Michelle strode at his side, her pea-shooter held at her side.
“You know that thing won’t kill anything, right?” he whispered.
“It took care of Billy Joe Bennett well enough,” she hissed back.
He held out his hand and took the small gun, looking even smaller in his large hand. Putting it into his pocket, he handed his machete to her.
Moans gathered strength on the road ahead. Ran and Cody rushed forward and took out most of them, a few slipping through to be dealt with by Teddy’s gun. Looking around to make sure he hadn’t missed any, he spotted Michelle decapitating a rotten skinbag on the sidewalk. Its head rolled one way and its body dropped to the ground with a wet splat.
She turned toward him. “This is cool. No wonder Emily likes it so much. You can take out all your anger on these things.”
“Not so fast, zombie-hunter woman,” Teddy said, shaking his head. “You can never forget these are people. Or, at least, they were. Someone’s mother, father, sister, or brother.”
“Or husband,” she whispered, her face turning white.
He pulled her in close, knowing the kids had the lookout. “Or husband. You did what you had to do. Would he have wanted to stay undead?”
“No,” she mumbled against his chest.
“Jed and Beth would thank us if they could. We do this for the families that wouldn’t or couldn’t do it.”
***
Michelle brought her head up and gazed at Teddy’s serious face. “For the families.”
“For the families,” he intoned back.
“Let’s go home,” Michelle said, turning to continue walking. Her heart rate sped up at Teddy’s silence. He hadn’t seemed excited to get back to the RV yard at all. He was hiding something, but her fear and sadness kept her silent. Whatever it was, they would know soon enough.
They tramped down the road, their boot heels making the only sound in the coming dawn. She gazed at the sky as the sun rose and painted it with a wash of pink and orange. The trees gleamed with sunlight instead of being black blobs in the dark. How could such simple beauty still exist in the evil world she’d seen?
Stopping at the painted red line, she whipped her head back and forth. “Where’s the hum?”
The others spun around, weapons raised. No zombs huddled along the repel barrier, although their moans could be heard further down the road from the direction of the camp.
Her heart rose in her throat. Were they all dead? Emily? The boys? Tears blurred her vision until she scrubbed them away with the heel of her hand. Not her boys. Not her friend Emily.
Teddy started jogging to the entrance of the RV yard and the rest of them followed. About a dozen skinbags pressed against the gate, moaning and rattling the barrier with the squeal of metal.
Michelle swung the machete as one zomb’ shambled toward April, the only unarmed member of their group. Ran had tried to give her a knife earlier, but the girl informed them she had no idea how to use it.
April jumped back as the first one hit the ground and Michelle was already on the next. A zomb’ was headed for Teddy’s back, but she took it out with a swipe of its calf. The thing fell at Teddy’s feet. He turned and grinned at her.
“Thanks,” he yelled.
“No problem,” she yelled back.
Ran and Cody finished up the rest and walked up to the gate. With the skinbags now dead dead, silence filled the morning air.
Where was everyone? Had they all died?
Teddy turned to her. “When I left to get you, a bunch of folks had been sick earlier. They turned and we had to put them down.”
Her hand flew to her mouth. “Emily? Rogue Vantage?”
Teddy shook his head. “No, Emily and Seth were fine. The boys too. They demanded I go get their mom.”
She smiled slightly, still worried about the total silence. “So where is everyone?”
“The group was headed to Ryde,” Cody added. “Should we yell, Teddy?”
Ran rolled her eyes at her boyfriend. “No, Doofus, just climb over and open the gate. We can’t stand out here all day.”
As if to punctuate the problem, a moan rose from the field beside the RV yard walls. She watched with one eye on the young man scaling the fence and one on the area around them.
Cody jumped down on the other side and raced to the controls. In seconds the metal barrier rolled back and they hurried inside. The gate shut with a clang.
She caught her breath. They were safe inside. It didn’t bring the rush she’d expected and anticipated. The yard stood dark and silent, not the bustling hive of activity she’d grown used to in the past year. Safety was an illusion, just as Emily had said.
“Hello? Anyone here?” Teddy called out in his deep baritone.
“Over here,” came the reply from the firepit, now unlit with a wisp of smoke curling into the morning air.
They strode over and found Seth huddled over Emily, her cries building in intensity until she ended with a scream loud enough to bring every zombie in the area running for mealtime.
Her emotions warred inside her; did she rush to help Emily or find her boys? Emily’s groans settled it. She had to help her friend. Teddy would find out about her little ones, she was sure. The big man loved them as much as she did.
Teddy started peppering Seth with questions and the man answered as best he could with her friend trying to crush his hand in hers.
“Everyone left with Paul, Suz, and Josh for the next safe zone. Jack left with Lila. He gave Paul command until he makes it back ... if he makes it back.”
He caught Michelle’s eyes. “Paul took the boys and the Madison twins with their group. We stayed for you guys. Emily wouldn’t hear of leaving without you. I was going to make her leave if you didn’t get back today.”
She coughed on a held breath she didn’t know she was holding and brought her attention to Emily, crying and panting on a cot.
“Where’s Doctor Shannon?”
“She had to go with Jim. He isn’t doing well and she had to drag him out of here. He wanted to go after Beth, but Shannon stopped him,” Emily got out between moans.
“Where are Jed and Beth?” Seth asked, looking around.
Teddy just shook his head.
Michelle stared do
wn into Emily’s face. “I did it all for nothing. Jed and Beth are gone. Bennett killed them.”
Emily grabbed her hand. “It is never for nothing. Could you have lived with yourself if you hadn’t at least tried?”
A scream erupted from her friend as Emily’s body bucked on the cot. Tears for the dead would have to come later. Now was for the living.
She wiped the tears from her eyes and squatted at her friend’s side. Michelle tried to keep her voice light and cheerful. “You weren’t supposed to have the baby yet. I go away for a few hours and look what happens.”
Emily reached up and grasped her shorn hair. “Look at you. You’ll be a zombie-hunter yet.”
Teddy leaned over. “She already is. You should have seen her, Miss Emily. Whacking skinbags right and left. Protecting my ass. I might have to become the zombie-hunter’s man.”
“I’ll settle for being the zombie-hunter’s woman who occasionally saves his butt,” she whispered, staring into Teddy’s eyes.
He leaned in and his mouth swept across hers. “What about the zombie-hunter’s wife?”
She kissed him back. “That too.” Her voice caught and wavered. “Yes, I’d like that very much, Teddy Ridgewood.”
“Yo, lady having baby here,” Emily butted in.
They laughed and got down to the business of birthing a baby. Men could joke about killing zombies, but giving birth was tougher than slaying the undead any day.
She’d quickly sent Ran, Cody, and April on chores to gather what she needed to help Emily and what they would need when they left. Looking around between Emily’s contractions, she knew for sure that this was no longer home. Glancing over at Teddy talking to Seth, she knew just as sure home was wherever that big, beautiful, wonderful man was.
“Can I fucking push already?” Emily growled at her.
“Let me look,” she growled right back at her.
Emily started crying and Michelle started apologizing.
“Just get it out of me,” her friend screamed.
Michelle took a peek under the sheet the kids had brought over for Emily. “I see the head.”
Seth ran over and took Emily’s hand. “You can do this, sweetheart.”
“Don’t you sweetheart me. That’s what caused all this.”
Michelle smiled in spite of the situation. Emily had been declared infertile in her old life and she’d been over the Moon to discover she would have a baby after all.
She turned back to the sheet and reached to guide the baby as best she could. She’d taken a class years ago about emergency birthing, but all she really could do was guide the baby and catch it and pray it was enough.
“Hand me a towel,” she ordered and found one quickly in hand. As the baby slid out, she grasped it firmly and set it on the towel. Him on the towel, she saw just as she wrapped him up and brought him to Emily’s chest.
“You have a son,” she declared, her smile wide enough to split her face. Emily’s was just as wide and full of wonder.
“I have a baby,” she whispered, her fingers touching his cheek.
Tears slid down Michelle’s face as she reached to deal with the afterbirth. She wrapped it in another towel. They could cut the cord in a moment; she just wanted to watch Emily and Seth with their miracle. In the normal world, birth was a miracle. In the Z virus world, it was proof that life went on. Human life.
“It hurts,” Emily screamed. “What’s happening?”
Michelle’s heart raced. Please don’t let her be hemorrhaging. I can’t lose her too. Please, God.
Sometimes God heard prayers, she thought as it wasn’t a gushing river of blood she saw between Emily’s thighs, but another head.
“I hope you have another name picked out,” she said, getting another towel from Ran and bringing out another wrapped bundle. “For your daughter.”
Seth took the baby and held it by Emily’s face. “Twins,” he whispered.
Emily turned her face to her daughter. “Carla Beth. You are named for your father’s mother and the sweetest girl I’ve known.”
Seth reached and touched his son. “Jed Robert. You are named for two brave men.”
She started in her seat. There was only one Robert among their friends. Wincing, she realized in an instant that wasn’t true anymore. Wiping her tears with her forearms, she smiled, wanting to believe their friends and loved ones lived on in these little namesakes.
Michelle finished up and gathered the soiled bundles. She stumbled to a water barrel and scrubbed her bloody hands. She ached, but it was a good ache. Out of all of the tragedy of the last couple of days, there had been a miracle. She smiled. Two miracles.
Someone walked up and wrapped big strong arms around her. She leaned back against Teddy’s broad chest. This was safety. This was security. The only kind that lasted. The kind that didn’t rely on walls and gates.
“We need to wait here a day or two to let Emily rest, but what do you want to do after that? We could stay here, rebuild, or we could join the others in Ryde.”
She stared at the gray concrete walls that now seemed more like a prison than a sanctuary. She turned and gazed at a man willing to be right here where he belonged. She smiled at a man who put her needs and safety first.
“Let’s go get our boys, my zombie-hunter husband.”
# # #
If you enjoyed The Zombie Hunter’s Wife I hope you’ll keep a look out for Book 3 – Jack and Lila’s story, coming 2016, A Time to Kill Zombies.
Dear Reader,
The Zombie Hunter’s Wife is Michelle and Teddy’s story. When Teddy just appeared in Book 1 I knew he had to have his own story. Michelle had such a sad back story, I just knew she needed a happily ever after.
Thanks, Jill James
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Other books by Jill James
The Time of Zombies Series
Love in the Time of Zombies
A Time to Kill Zombies (coming soon)
The Lake Willowbee Series
Divorce, Interrupted
Dare To Trust
Defend My Love
The three novellas are also available as audio books.
The Lake Willowbee Series (3 novellas in boxed set) is available in ebook, paperback, and audiobook.
Tempting Adam
The Wild Rose Press and Amazon
Short Stories
The Christmas Con: A Short Romance
The Reluctant Bride: A Lake Willowbee Novella
Shifters of San Laura
Book 1- Dangerous Shift
Available in paperback at Amazon and Createspace
Author Links
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Jill.James.author
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/jill_james
Website: http://www.jilljameswrites.com
