by Mark Lukens
She went back downstairs and into the dining room. “I found some boxes of shotgun shells,” she told Petra. “There are still plenty of boxes left up there,” she told Lisey.
“We should take all of them,” Petra said.
“We have to leave her something to defend herself with.”
“You mean something to shoot at us with,” Petra said.
Kate went into the kitchen and met up with Max. He carried more stuff out the back door to the truck. She went out there with him, stuffing the backpacks into the back with the boxes.
“I grabbed a bag of charcoal and a can of lighter fluid,” Max said.
“Do we have room for anything else?” Kate asked, looking at how packed the truck already was, and then looking at the shed next to the chicken coops in the distance.
“Only for a few more things,” Max said. “We should probably get going.”
“Hold on for just a minute,” Kate told him and then bolted away through the backyard to the chicken coops. There were no chickens inside the coops. She opened the shed and found what she was looking for—a bag of chicken feed. She grabbed it and carried it back to the truck.
“We can eat that?” Max asked dubiously.
Kate almost burst out laughing. “We’ll use this to get the chickens back in their coops at my house.”
Max’s face brightened. “Yeah, chickens.”
“Eggs.”
“Oh yeah. I didn’t even think about eggs.” He looked at the house. “I’ll go back in there and get Petra. You go ahead and get the truck started. As soon as we come back we’ll get the hell out of here. I didn’t see any other guns stashed anywhere near Lisey, but you never know.”
Max was off to the house.
Kate got in behind the wheel of the SUV, adjusting the seat and then starting the truck.
“Did you find any cat food?” Brooke asked.
“I’m not sure,” Kate said. “Maybe Max found some. But we found some tuna fish and sardines.”
“I think Tiger would like that.”
“Yeah.” Tears came to Kate’s eyes. She wasn’t sure why she was crying. Maybe it was Brooke sounding so normal now as she cared for the cat. Maybe it was relief from finding some food and drinks so they could survive a little longer. Maybe it was a guilty conscience for robbing Lisey at gunpoint. Maybe it was Lisey’s words about her parents really hating her. Maybe it was her mom’s letter to her. Maybe it was all of those things.
Max and Petra bolted out of the house and got into the SUV. Kate shifted into drive and tore away from the house, the back tires spinning just a bit, kicking up dirt and pelting the back porch stairs with it. She felt like a bank robber driving the getaway car from their latest heist.
She drove down the long gravel drive, and then out onto Appleton Road. She kept checking the rearview mirror, watching the house as she drove. But Lisey never came out with a weapon.
They sped down the road through the rolling hills, squares of neglected farmland and patches of trees stretching away on both sides of the road. They drove up over the next hill and then down into the wide valley where the Millers and the Bennetts once lived, then up another hill into a large patch of woods.
And then they were at her mom’s home again, their home now, at least for the next few days.
CHAPTER 55
Two hours later they had sorted through the food and supplies they’d gotten from Lisey’s house, taking an inventory and reorganizing the cardboard boxes; canned foods in one box, boxed and bagged foods in another box, their cases and packs of drinks lined up on the countertop. They bagged up more garbage from the kitchen and stored it upstairs in what used to be Kate’s brother’s bedroom.
Max and Petra dragged Kate’s parents’ mattress downstairs, making their camp in the middle of the living room a little more comfortable.
They splurged as the afternoon grew late and their work for the day was done. Maybe they ate more food than they should have, munching on the only bag of potato chips and eating a whole box of cookies between them, washing the food down with juice boxes and cans of soda.
Kate knew they should discuss their future plans, but she just didn’t want to right now. She knew Petra still wanted to travel south, but none of them brought it up. For now everybody seemed content to stay in the house for a little while longer. They all felt safe there for the moment. Kate knew that the feeling of safety wouldn’t last forever, so she wanted to enjoy it for now. The rippers and the gangs wouldn’t stay away forever, and eventually winter would come.
But for now they enjoyed their bounty, and they enjoyed their sugar rush. They played games with Brooke, word games like I-Spy and charades. And they laughed.
It felt so good to laugh.
When it was almost dark, Kate got up and went to the back porch. It was colder now. Max suggested they find or even make some kind of wood-burning stove. He said they could pipe the smoke outside. Yes, it would keep them warm and cook their food and boil their water, but how long would it be before the smoke drew rippers? Or worse.
Kate felt helpless and hopeless. When would they ever be safe? Would life always be like this now? Would they always be cold, always hungry, always looking for more food, always scared, always nervous? Yet she also felt a spark of hope inside of her, and strangely enough that spark of hope had come from Lisey and her talk about the Dragon. Lisey had said that they had all seen the Dragon in their dreams, but she hadn’t mentioned the blind woman, or the man and his son, or the other two men. So maybe that meant that Lisey was never meant to be with them. Kate was meant to be with Max, Petra, and Brooke. But not Lisey. The blind woman had come to them, not her. And throughout the last few days Kate had found her way to Brooke, and then they had found Max and Petra. So maybe that meant that they would eventually find the blind woman and the others with her. And when they were together, maybe they would finally find somewhere safe.
Maybe it was a silly thing to believe, a hopeless thing to pin her hopes on, but she couldn’t help feeling better just thinking about the others out there.
She took her mother’s letter out of her jacket pocket and unfolded it, reading the words again in the fading daylight. Her mother’s words made sense now; she saw now why they had been rounding up the townspeople and poisoning them, all of them believing the Rapture story. She imagined Pastor Samuels gathering them all together and convincing them that the Rapture was happening. And her mother had believed all of it up until her death. She just hoped that her mother and the others hadn’t suffered at the end.
“I’m sorry,” Kate whispered as tears slipped out of her eyes. “I forgive you. And thank you for forgiving me.” She didn’t believe Lisey’s story about her mother saying she had always hated her. She had the power of choice now, and she chose not to believe Lisey. And she had the proof of her mother’s forgiveness and love right here in her hands, right here in this letter.
Kate refolded the letter and stuffed it back into her jacket pocket. She wiped her eyes and stared out at the backyard she’d seen her whole life until she’d left at eighteen years old. The backyard looked different, yet it still looked the same. She felt good at this moment, safe for now. And she would try to hold on to this feeling. She would try to live for the moment because she knew it wasn’t always going to be like this. Things would get worse before they could get better.
“But we’re okay right now, Mom,” Kate whispered. “We’re going to be okay for a little while now.”
As the night overtook the backyard completely, hiding everything in blackness with just a star-spotted inky-black sky above them, she turned and went back inside, shutting the back door and putting the wooden bar in place that Max had made. She went back to the others, and they huddled around the lone candle, talking and laughing.
A THANK YOU
Thank you so much for reading my book! I hope you enjoyed it, and I hope you’ll check out the next books in the Dark Days series. I’m hard at work on the next two books in the series,
and I hope to have them available in the next few months.
Being an author is a dream come true for me, and it only happens because of readers like you. I thank you from the bottom of my heart.
I love to hear from readers. Please feel free to follow either my blog or newsletter (or both!) for updates, sales, articles, and more. Just click on the links below. Thank you!
Blog: https://www.marklukensbooks.wordpress.com
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Mark Lukens has been writing since the second grade when his teacher called his parents in for a conference because the ghost story he’d written had her a little concerned.
Since then he’s had several stories published and four screenplays optioned by producers in Hollywood. He’s the author of many bestselling books including: Ancient Enemy, Sightings, The Exorcist’s Apprentice, Devil’s Island, Followed, and many others. He’s a proud member of the Horror Writers Association.
He grew up in Daytona Beach, Florida. But after many travels and adventures, he settled down near Tampa, Florida with his wonderful wife and son . . . and a stray cat they adopted.
He loves to hear from readers!
You can find him on Facebook here:
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And he can be reached via email at [email protected] or [email protected]
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