Fight Like a Man: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller (The SHTF Series Book 1)

by L. L. Akers

  He turned and threw his hands up in the air. “And where the hell are you, Dusty? I need you, brother. I. Need. You,” he screamed at the top of his lungs.

  The chickens that had been ignoring him scattered in the wind.

  He leaned against the barn, out of breath. He slid down the wall onto his rear end, sitting on the ground with his head in his hands. His bad tooth was giving him hell, too. He rubbed his jaw. He’d obviously missed his dentist appointment.

  Ozzie, the dog, slowly slunk over, his head down and tail between his legs. He sniffed in Grayson’s direction, took a few more steps, and dropped next to him. He lay his head in Grayson’s lap, coaxing a pat from the anguished man.

  One reluctant pat turned into more petting. Grayson couldn’t resist the big brown eyes looking up at him. “Damn dog. Been moping around for days looking for your mama, haven’t ya?” he said, his voice breaking. “Me, too, buddy.”

  Eyes turned up toward the sky, trying to clear them of their sudden blurriness, he breathed out long and hard. And then in again—a short, sucking breath. He dropped his head, wrapped his arms around Ozzie and pulled him close. He hugged the dog. Ozzie whimpered so he loosened his grip. The dog settled beside him and wagged his tail.

  Grayson knew his face was blood-red, he could feel the heat of it. His heart beat wildly, thumping against his chest. His blood pressure was up too high. He’d held it together for close to two days, but being out here alone, with only the dog for company—driving him crazy whining for Olivia—he was falling apart.

  This wasn’t the way it supposed to happen. Shit was going to get real in a few days—maybe even today. It could get ugly. They needed to get the house ready. They needed to be together. He needed his wife and daughter. He needed them here, with him. Without them, he had no reason for any of this. Yet they were stuck out there somewhere, with the crazies and the yahoos, and probably worse. And there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it.

  Damn it all. He felt something wet on his cheek. What the hell? He looked up again to see if something was dripping off the barn. Nope. His vision blurred once more. He blinked, spilling another tear. He laughed.

  Tears? I’m crying? What the hell? I haven’t cried since my momma died.

  He laughed at himself again. Now, for just a moment, he was glad he was alone. It wouldn’t do for anyone to see him cry. Yeah, he’d lost his shit. And he knew this was probably the last time it could ever happen. They’d come, and they’d expect him to be in control. Like he always was. The oldest, the wisest, and the meanest. But they also knew he’d protect them and get shit done. That was the way he was. That was what was expected from a git-er-done kinda guy.

  A calmness settled over him. Not sure if it was because of Ozzie, or just releasing some much-needed angst, he gave the credit to the dog. “Good boy, Ozzie. Good boy.” He rubbed behind Ozzie’s ears as he leaned his own head back against the old red paint. He deserved a break. He’d get back on it in ten.

  7

  The Ladies

  Olivia slowly blinked her eyes until her twin sister’s face came into focus.

  “What,” she muttered groggily. “What’s wrong?” she asked Gabby, who was kneeled over next to her, crying.

  “Olivia!” Gabby screamed, and pulled her close.

  Olivia pushed her away. “Stop! What? What are you crying about?” she asked, looking around at the chaos with a confused look. “Where’s everyone going?”

  Emma separated them, pulling on Olivia’s arm to get her up. “Come on. We’ve got to get out of here. You were hit in the head, probably by a cooler. It knocked you out. Shots have been fired. We need to go. Get up.”

  Olivia eyes widened. “Shots?”

  Emma looked around in a panic. “Gun shots. So, hurry. I think whoever was shooting is gone now, but we need to get off the beach to somewhere safe. Let’s go back to the room.”

  Olivia felt her head—her hand came away sticky and wet. She gasped and looked to her twin sister, Gabby. “This is why you’re crying? You thought I was shot or something?”

  Gabby cleared her throat and jumped to her feet. She turned as though looking behind her and discreetly swiped her tears away, and then reached down a hand for Olivia. “No, stupid. I was crying because you’re wearing my favorite bikini. It’s ruined now. Forget it. Let’s go.”

  Olivia looked down at the black and white suit, now black and white with red splatters of her own blood dotting it. Emma shook her head at Gabby, seeing right past her charade. Gabby was trying to save face.

  Olivia accepted the hands of her sisters, wobbling a bit when she was on her feet, and offered Gabby a short apology. “Sorry. I’ll replace it,” she mumbled.

  “Damn right you will. Come on. We need to take care of that cut on your head.”

  The girls hurried off the beach toward their room.

  The man who’d been in the room next to them passed by in the hall. He was dragging a rolling suitcase and had a carry-on case slung over his shoulder. This guy had an old classic car, and they’d passed him several times on the way to the beach, arriving within minutes of each other. He obviously was coming from the same area that they had. She couldn’t remember where they’d started seeing him on the road, but they’d definitely passed each other several times in the last few hours of travel. Gabby and the girls had been surprised when they saw his car parked next to them in the parking deck. It was an even bigger coincidence when he was assigned a room on the same hallway as theirs. But they hadn’t spoken to him at all before now, not wanting to get his hopes up—they were all married after all—and he didn’t look like the type of guy to just have a friendly conversation with.

  Later, the girls had seen lots of classic cars cruising the main strip, and heard that there was a show going on. Probably a hundred or more were at the beach right now.

  The man’s hands were full and he had his keys in his mouth as he rolled past them. He looked fifty—trying to be forty—exhausted, sweaty, red-faced and breathing hard. He gave them a brisk nod and kept walking.

  “Wait!” yelled Gabby.

  The man turned around.

  “Where are you going? Do you have gas?”

  “Shhh!” The man looked around to see who had heard her and then dropped his suitcase to give the ladies his full attention. After looking them over from head to toe, he smiled, patting his thinning-hair in place and tugging the wrinkles out of his Tommy Bahama tropical orange with green palm trees shirt. A tacky gold chain lay nestled on a bed of too-much-too-gray-chest-hair. He gave them a million-dollar smile—or at least a few grand, seeing as how his fake teeth looked like a pack of perfect bleached-chiclets against his leathery-dark tan. “Yeah, I do now. I’m not leaving my girl here. I’m driving her home. She’s a classic 1970 Plymouth Roadrunner. Top of the line. She won some awards at the show here. Want to walk out and look at her before I take off?” He beamed, waiting for their oohs and awws.

  Gabby rolled her eyes. Looks like they had a real ladies man on their hands. “I don’t really care what kind of car it is. We need a ride home. Where you headed?”

  Ladies-Man grabbed his things and started walking backward. “Nope. I can’t be giving everyone a ride. I’ve spent the last eight hours buying gas one can at a time. Didn’t find enough so I had to crawl under a few cars and siphon it out with a screwdriver and an oil pan. Had to funnel it into cans, and had to walk and carry it back myself. Spent the last of my cash and nearly broke my back, too. But I’ve got plenty now to get me home and I’m not making any detours. I’m outta here.”

  “Wait!” Olivia said. She hurried to him, throwing a mean look at Gabby from over her shoulder. “I’m sorry, my sister is snappy. She’s dehydrated and hungry. The thing is, I’ve been hurt.” She rubbed her head to show him, not aware that her injury was painfully obvious already. “We really need to get home. You said you used the last of your cash? We’ve got cash. We can pay.”

  “I don’t want cash. I was glad to get rid of
most of my own.” He laughed. “Those suckers don’t know in a few days, cash will be worthless. That gas was worth a hundred times what I paid for it, and I paid out the ass.”

  “What will you take in exchange for a ride then? How can we pay?”

  Ladies-Man gave her another reptilian smile, his eyes wandering down. “Well, if you need a ride that bad—”

  “—we don’t. Forget it!” Gabby snapped and pushed her way in front of Olivia.

  He shrugged and turned to walk away again, the leer sliding from his face.

  “No, wait,” Olivia said. “My watch. It’s a Rolex. It’s got to be worth a fortune in gold and silver alone. And it has diamonds on the face. You can use it to trade.”

  Ladies-Man held out his hand. Olivia hurried to take it off. She held it up to him. He reached for it but Gabby reached in and snatched it away. “You can have it when you get us home.”

  Ladies-Man thought a moment while he looked over the girls one by one, moving his eyes quickly away from Gabby’s venomous stare and back to Olivia and Emma, who were both staring at him in desperate hope. “Alright. I’m going as far as McBee, South Carolina. Don’t know where you’re going, but I’ll drop you off there. That’s about a hundred miles. That’s the only deal I’m making—and it’s in exchange for the watch.”

  Gabby walked the other way. “No, thanks. That’s only halfway home. Not worth it. We’ll find someone else who’ll give us a ride, and won’t make us pay for it with a fifteen-thousand-dollar watch—or anything else,” she snapped.

  “Fifteen-thousand-dollar watch?” Ladies-Man asked. “Look, we got off on the wrong foot. I’m Larry.” He gestured stupidly to himself. Like who the hell else would be Larry? “I’ll take you ladies all the way home in exchange for the watch but I’ll need enough gas to get back home myself. Do you think you can do that? It might mean siphoning any gas you have in any of your husbands or family or friends’ cars, deal?” he asked as he looked at their ring fingers, all which were adorned with wedding rings.

  “Yes,” Emma and Olivia both happily said in unison.

  Gabby rolled her eyes.

  Olivia was overjoyed. “Of course! My husband keeps a lot of gas stored. He’s a prep—”

  “—a puppy groomer, she meant to say. She fumbles her words sometimes,” Gabby interrupted. “Olivia’s husband does mobile dog grooming so he probably has a tank full of gas and I doubt he’s working. He’s probably too worried about us.”

  Olivia gave Gabby a what-the-tarnation-are-you-talking-about-look, until suddenly her eyebrows raised and her eyes widened. “Yes, puppy groomer is what I meant to say. I’m sure the van is topped off. My husband always fills it up before coming home. When are we leaving?”

  “Twenty minutes. And no suitcases. My trunk is full of gas. You can hold a bag in your lap. I’ll meet you in the parking deck. Look for a—”

  “—we know what your car looks like. We passed you on the way here,” Gabby interrupted.

  “Oh. Well then. Twenty minutes.” He hurried away.

  “We’ve got to take our suitcases. Gabby, you think you can make him change his mind?” Olivia asked.

  “No. And we don’t want to be stuck out on the road with no gas. We’ll just grab your bug-out bags from your car after we grab a few things from the room.” She pushed the door open to their room. “Anyone got some sort of bag we can put some things in here?”

  Olivia groaned. “My beach bag! I left it out on the beach. And it’s got my phone in it.”

  Gabby shook her head. “Too late. No time.”

  The ladies ran around grabbing essentials. Emma and Gabby grabbed their cell phones—even though they were useless for anything other than looking at their photo galleries.

  Olivia grabbed the extra water and the few snacks they had left. They all snatched up their make-up bags, and grabbed clothes from their open suitcases, throwing everything into a pile on the bed as they worked. Gabby spun around, looking for anything else they needed. Emma had her sneakers in her hand, Olivia had her flip-flops— “Wait. Don’t take your flip-flops, Olivia. What if we have to walk?” Gabby asked.

  “I don’t have anything any more comfortable. These are Rainbows; they’ll be fine.”

  Gabby sighed. “Just hurry. We don’t want him to leave without us. Where’s a bag?”

  Emma threw up her hands and shrugged. Olivia shook her head.

  “Geez. Give me your biggest T-shirts. I’ll make us a bag just to carry this to the parking deck, and we can grab your BOB’s and transfer some things into those, if they’ll fit. I hope they’re bigger than mine. But we’re not taking anything out of them; especially not the guns and ammo. If there was ever a time we needed those survival bags, it’s now. Thank God Grayson made us each get one.”

  Olivia shuffled back a step. “Did I mention I needed to talk to you guys about those bags? I…er…didn’t bring them,” she stammered.

  8

  Jake

  Jake tied the last bungee cord around his small bag, fastening it just in front of the seat to his mountain bike. It contained an extra tube and a small patch and tool kit. He also had a backpack that he’d wear. He’d packed light. First, he’d run his errands, then head to Grayson’s. The homestead was nearly an hour by vehicle, and while he had no experience with walking it, he assumed it wouldn’t take more than a day to ride there on a bicycle. He just hoped the tires held up.

  He felt like a fool. For years, Grayson had warned to always keep his gas tank on full. But that was a pain in the ass. That meant stopping to fill up nearly every other day. Who does that?

  Olivia had driven the girls to the beach and he was using Gabby’s car. But it was nearly on empty, the red light shining bright. Not nearly enough gas to get to the farm. He could drive it as far as it’d take him, but he couldn’t bring himself to abandon it on the side of the road—Gabby would wring his neck.

  And his own everyday truck was at the dealership on an airbag recall. His other truck, an old ’57 Chevy, was in Grayson’s barn, ripped apart. If he could get it back together, he could fill up with the gas they stored behind the barn.

  One more look over supplies and he’d take off. He wasn’t looking forward to it. He’d barely ridden the bike since Gabby had brought it home, hoping he would use it as therapy for his leg. He and Gabby had been in a terrible car accident years ago. He’d been banged up pretty bad, Gabby had been shook up too, but worst of all, his mother-in-law had lost her life. Jake now carried the limp from the accident as a grim reminder of that dark night. Riding to the farm was going to be painfully slow—emphasis on the pain part.

  He snapped a warm bottle of water into the holder, and hung Gabby’s TSS ball cap from the handlebars. It had an attached mag light on the bill. He dug in the bag, his fingers pushing aside his wedding picture, three bottles of water and one Gatorade, six Cliff energy bars, a Lumens flashlight, two Bic lighters, a map in case his regular route was diverted, a bandana, a good knife, a small bottle of Monkey-Butt to help with the chafing from riding, a bundle of paracord, a tarp, and a change of clothes, including several pairs of good, thick hiking socks, and a small first aid kit.

  At the bottom, his fingers brushed the shammy-towel. He was careful not to unroll it. Within that towel, he’d hidden a Glock .40. He hoped he wouldn’t have to use it, but if he did, at least thanks to his brother-in-law, he knew how—logistically anyway.

  Grayson had been adamant that they all learn to shoot, and Jake was the worst shooter of the bunch. He’d lined up at the range beside Gabby, Olivia and Emma as Grayson played Range-master and Instructor and paced behind them. His wife, Gabby, was a crack-shot. Soon, they were calling her Annie Oakley. Her first day there she marked a tight grouping and sometimes dead-center hit on her targets.

  Her little sister, Emma—who was married to a cop and got plenty of instruction on the side—did almost as well and felt very comfortable with a firearm. Emma’s husband, Dusty, was beaming with pride for her.

 
; When comparing targets, Grayson had teased him and said with more practice, he too could ‘shoot like a girl.’ Jake had thought he was being insulted until a few other guys at the range had made the same remark amongst each other. Apparently, women seemed to be natural shooters.

  Except poor Olivia, Gabby’s twin sister. Grayson had been thoroughly aggravated at his wife’s inability to get comfortable with the gun and remember even the basic instructions. When he’d step behind her to give her a pointer, she’d frequently turn with the gun in her hand, aimed at Grayson. Jake had a hard time not laughing as he watched Grayson hit the floor, screaming “Don’t muzzle me!” over and over again. Olivia would lift her ear protection to ask him what he said, only to be startled by the blast of the other shooter’s firing, and Grayson yelling for her to keep her ears on while on the range. Olivia would get so flustered, she couldn’t remember a thing.

  Jake, Gabby and Emma would all laugh at their antics. They began calling them The Honeymooners. In reality, they kind of were. Married just shy of two years they were still feeling their way around each other. Dusty and Emma weren’t married much longer; only three years. It was their wedding where Olivia had met Grayson, when he’d come in to stand up for his little brother as best man. He and Olivia had been caught in a hurricane on the island together, and fell in love, marrying exactly one year later in the same lighthouse that Emma and Dusty had married in.

  After only one day on the range, Olivia had asked if Emma’s husband, Dusty, could give her instructions instead. Jake wondered if it had stung Grayson’s pride to be replaced by his little brother. But Olivia didn’t do it out of malice—she’d never intentionally hurt Grayson’s feelings—she’d just felt it would be safer and less stressful for Grayson if he wasn’t trying to teach his own wife. Not to mention avoiding marital conflict.