“Is Roy in trouble?”
“You don’t worry about that, okay, champ?” He tousled the boy’s hair.
Bryan glanced nervously at Jessica, who stood just outside the door with the others. “Okay.”
Jess smiled, waving him over, encouraging the boy to join her. Upon reaching her side, Bryan took her hand, squeezed. Charlie nudged their calves, craving attention. David saw the terror in Jessica’s eyes. She knew what he was about to do, and she knew better than to try and stop him. But that didn’t keep her from trying.
David pressed past the small group, entered his room. He grabbed his gun belt, wrapped his waist. Slipped on his boots. Exited the room.
Her voice low, Jess said, “David, this was Doc’s doing, not Roy’s. Please, what you’re about to do—”
“What I’m about to do has to be done.”
Dr. Gonzalez said, “Whoa, wait, where are you—?”
But he brushed past the good doctor, ignoring her pleas. Another person started to come after him; Jessica stopped them.
Someone else had started something, and David intended to finish it.
* * *
On his way to Roy’s room and still holding his wife’s hand, the virtual wrecking ball inside David continued smashing away, exposing more and more glittering rage. He mined it readily, greedily, like so much gold or coal or diamonds. It sustained his essence, helped him… feel. And it was all his for the taking.
As much as it made him feel, this rage, it numbed him just as effectively. It was with the same hate he’d gone after Mitch, that same… feeling… that he was doing the right thing, for the right people—for Jessica, for Bryan, for himself. For the world. Except this time, that feeling had multiplied, was stronger.
Visions of himself, sitting inside the Dodge dually, parked on that tiny road just after putting down Old Man Bartlett. Him staring, drinking in the sight of his destiny, his identity—the ornate Walther P38 pistol, El Jefe. He’d accepted it, rejected it, and now welcomed it again. He’d have to, if he was going to do what he planned to do.
David believed in mind over matter, his hate-fanned heart and thoughts desensitizing him to physical pain. Sure, he hurt. He was human, after all. His body ached something fierce. Sammy and Guillermo had, as Dr. Gonzalez so eloquently said, done a number on him. He’d done the right thing that night, letting them go. He knew this, was sure of it. Felt… good… about it. But he also knew that if he ever saw them again, the outcome would be much, much different. With the way he was feeling, he almost hoped he’d see them again. Soon.
The hate also soothed his sadness. Hate instilled hope, because hate forced him to act, to actually do something. Sadness was an anchor, dragging, drowning, pulling him beneath his own tears. But hate… hate was buoyancy, a life preserver in sorrow’s vast ocean.
His anger management coach tritely referred to hate as a four-letter word, and therefore ugly and useless, not to be uttered inside the four walls of his office. Of course his coach had a four-step program to curb such tendencies. David left pissed-off more often than not. During his last visit, David told the fucker off, a fitting finish. Told him since he liked the number ‘four’ so much that maybe he should consider accounting. Or maybe a spot on Sesame Street.
Or better yet, take four of these, shove them up four of your holes—don’t care which—and don’t fucking call me at four in the morning.
Farther down the hall, David detoured, ducking into one of the south-side exterior rooms. Most of these outer rooms remained unoccupied, deemed less safe because of windows. A few folks resided in these rooms, but most stayed to the interior ones. Significantly less chance of being awakened in the middle of the night by a shuffler slapping the glass. Or worse, waking up dead because one broke through.
Prying the blinds, he peered through the window, seeing what he’d hoped to see—men scouring the grounds. The Janitor was out there, along with Randy, Lenny, and several others, all armed and searching. Observing for a minute or so, he noticed Roy was not among them. This bode well for David. Roy was most likely in his room, and with almost everyone outside, David would have Roy all to himself. A very valuable lesson awaited Roy, and David aimed to teach it.
Back in the hallway, David’s boots echoed off buffed floors and brimmed with an experienced killer’s calm composure. Except he wasn’t an experienced killer, had yet to kill a living soul.
A living soul.
But it didn’t matter that he had only dispatched the dead. They were good practice, and besides, he didn’t desire to kill. He didn’t want to kill the man he was on his way to see. To talk to. To teach. But he had to be ready to kill. Be prepared to. Just in case.
Ready or not, here I kill.
His heart beat a solid rhythm of rage, pushing out fear and sadness while powering confident forward motion. Roy’s room should be just up the hall and around the corner. David was sure he’d have plenty of time to enlighten the man.
At Roy’s door, David stood a moment, listening, thinking. Mulling over what he was seriously considering. Justifying it.
Tell him like it is. Be firm. Direct. He’d put Bryan in danger, nearly gotten him killed. Roy is a… problem. Fix the problem.
Despite his rush to discipline this man, David’s sudden overblown confidence collided with conscience. He believed he was doing the right thing for the right person. But was he? He told himself, convinced himself, this was for Bryan. And it was with his thought of the boy that the child’s own words echoed again:
Right, because we should always do the right thing.
“Right,” he whispered to the door, “because I’m doing the right thing.”
He raised his knuckles, poised to knock. Then stared blankly, frozen at the sight of his own fist, his own hand. Cuts. Scratches. Future scars. The ring on his finger. The ring that matched his wife’s.
Focus on what needs doing. Get your shit together. Cry later. Better yet, no more crying…
Sound and stink emanated from the room. Roy wasn’t alone. Something was going on behind that door. Not a struggle, but not something of mutual agreement, either. Didn’t matter to David, though. He had a lesson plan prepared, and if he had to ask others to leave, so be it. No one else would get in his way today.
His hand fell to the butt of his pistol as he considered the weapon’s necessity. To pull or not to pull. Before entering, or after. He wanted to make an everlasting impression. Roy answering the door, eyes finding David with a gun in one hand, a soulmate’s decomposing body part in the other? The vision would certainly ingrain a memorable message into the man’s brain. Permanent remembrance, a tattoo of terror.
David tugged the Walther—El Jefe—from the crossdraw holster on his left hip. Hands full, he kicked the door with the toe of his boot.
“Roy.” David waited a moment, then kicked the door a second time. Louder, “Roy.”
Shuffling, frantic whispers. A growl?
The door cracked open. A crazed eye peered through it. Heavy breathing.
“Roy, we need to talk.”
The eye disappeared, then reappeared. “David. I’m, uh, kind of… busy in here. At the moment. We’ll talk later. Okay?”
The door closed.
David breathed a deep breath, wincing at the pain in his core, then kicked the door again.
It cracked open. The same eye. “David, I’m—”
“Open up, Roy.”
Hesitation, reluctance. “I… I can’t right now—”
“Yes, you can. And you will.”
“I’m sorry, David, but—”
“Open it. Or I will.” He held the gun for Roy’s eye to see.
Silence. Unwavering stares. Noise from the room. A guttural, chesty growl, like someone gagged, unable to speak. A tang on the air.
“Now, Roy.”
“Please, David, don’t take him.”
“Take him?” David furrowed his brow. “Take who?”
“Just, just please go away.”
&nbs
p; David tapped the wood with the butt of his pistol. “Open up, Roy. Now.”
After a trembling sigh, Roy swung open the door, then immediately clasped his own forearm. “David, it’s not what it looks like. The Janitor said I could—”
“What the hell?” Jaw unhinged, David stopped midway through the door. His instinct was to shoot it, stab it. Kill it.
“Gabriel knows. He knows Scotty’s here. He told me I could.”
Rivulets ran from Roy’s eyes, almost indistinguishable from copious sweat. “I couldn’t leave him out there, David. I couldn’t. He’s my boy. I couldn’t leave my poor, sick boy out there with the rest of them. You understand, right? You understand?”
In the room’s corner, tied loosely to a chair, was Roy’s adult son. His undead son. The same son that had wandered up to the fences a week ago. The sole reason David’s plan to run down the shufflers with the soil compactor was postponed.
Aborted.
The Infirmaries had won that decision. All because of this squirming, writhing, stinking dead man.
We can’t kill them. They’re sick, that’s all. They’re just sick. We’ll find another way.
“Roy, I can’t believe Gabe agreed to this,” he said, pointing his gun at Scotty.
A twinge of anger touched Roy’s tone. “Don’t point your gun at my son.”
“He can’t stay in here.”
“He can, and he will.”
Scotty growled, the duct tape blocking a bilious breath. Didn’t matter. David could smell the zest of death just the same.
“He’s gotta go, Roy,” David said, moving toward Scotty.
Roy moved in front of his boy. “No.” He shook his head. “I can’t let you.” He was sweating profusely, breaths shallow.
David wagged his pistol at Roy. “Why are you holding your arm?”
“It’s nothing.”
“It’s something.”
More anger and impatience in Roy’s voice. “I’m fine, I said. Now go, leave before—”
“Let me see it.”
Roy hesitated. “David, if you don’t leave now, I’m going to have to—”
“Look me in the eye and tell me, Roy.”
“Gabriel said—”
“I don’t give a shit what Gabe said.”
“What do you want from me, David? Huh? Just what the hell are you doing here?”
David crossed the room, stood nose-to-nose with Roy. He held his dead wife’s hand to his face. “This, Roy. This is why I’m here.”
Roy flinched. “What is that?”
“What the fuck do you think it is?”
“Looks like a… a hand…”
“Goddamned right, Roy. Right on the fucking money. Now, for the million-fucking-dollar question, whose hand is this?”
Roy twisted his head away from the hand, eyes closed tight.
“Whose hand, Roy? Clock’s ticking.”
“I don’t know.”
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s my wife’s hand, Roy. My wife’s. She’s dead, just like your boy over there. And you know something else? You damn near killed another boy.”
Roy opened his eyes, not understanding. “I don’t… I didn’t hurt anyone.” He tried to move away.
“Yes, Roy. Yes you did.” David shoved him, and Roy bumped the wall. “A child, Roy. How’s that feel on your conscience? Huh? That you’d sacrifice a young, living child for your own dead one?”
“I didn’t—”
David fumed. This conversation was going nothing like he’d planned. He was succeeding only in making himself angrier with every word. He’d lost focus, lost direction. He gripped his gun hard.
“It’s your fault, Roy. You told my boy to go outside. Outside.” He pointed the barrel to the window. “To go… play. While your dead boy, dead, Roy… stays inside.”
“The little kid? I told him to stay inside the fence.”
“Oh, you told him to stay inside the fence. Well, not only did you risk his precious young life by subjecting him to that pit full of rotting monsters, another fucking monster found him and found me.”
“I don’t under—”
“Some lunatic murderer, Roy. Thinks he’s Doc Holliday, roaming the countryside. He got inside the fence, where you told Bryan it was safe. Where you told him to go play. He could have been killed. Murdered. And it would have been your fucking fault.” David pressed his forearm to Roy’s throat. “Do you fucking understand me?”
Roy was burning up with fever, sweat diving off his nose, his chin, his eye lids. David pulled back.
“What the fuck is wrong with—?” And David understood what he’d walked into.
Roy’s eyes were losing their life glow, his words harder to come by. He sounded drunk. “David, I didn’t know… I didn’t mean to… please… don’t tell Gabe… I was only trying to…” He slid down the wall and into a heap on the floor, his hand falling away from his arm—his badly bitten arm.
“Shit,” David whispered to the dead and soon-to-be-dead. He glanced at Scotty, noticed the blood framing his mouth, his chin.
“Fuck.”
He knelt beside Roy, checked the wound. It was bad. Deep. Scotty had taken a nice chunk out of Roy’s arm, all the way to the bone. It was only a matter of time.
End it. Finish it now. Gotta finish what you start.
David stood and stepped back. He didn’t have his knife, hadn’t replaced his old one yet. Regardless, he couldn’t just leave Roy there. Or Scotty. He had to handle the situation. The problem.
Too dangerous. It’s too dangerous to leave them here. Inside. Got to keep it safe inside. Roy’s a problem. Scotty’s a problem. Together, a big problem. Fix the fucking problem.
He glanced around the room, saw no one else. His own breaths had shallowed, nerves firing in anticipation of a physical altercation. One that could still happen.
Thanks, Scotty. Thanks for denying me my first real kill.
He raised the P38, squeezed the trigger. His ears screamed, pissed at the auditory assault inside the tightly closed quarters. Scotty’s skull rocked back as the 9mm bullet found his forehead, the blast painting a messy mural of remembrance on the wall behind him.
David didn’t hear Roy reanimate. Didn’t need to. Roy’s arm twitched first. Then his leg. His torso. A weak hiss. His head, a slow-motion bobble, finding muscle control in death. Roy’s eyes were a dead giveaway.
“Damnit, Roy.” Aiming his pistol, David finished it.
Chapter 7
“Damn, home skillet. I think you nailed his ass to that tree.” Mallory laughed his wild dog laugh, slapped his knee, then slapped TJ on the shoulder.
“Fuck yeah, I did.” TJ lowered the rifle, brought the edge of his hand to his brow. “Motherfucker better recognize.”
“Right on, sharpshooter dude.” Mallory held his palm high, high-fived his buddy, then tried to high-five Laura.
“I’m good,” Laura said, her arms folded.
Pouting, Mallory said, “Aw, c’mon. Don’t leave me hanging. Gotta celebrate our boy’s superior marksmanship, dudette.” He pinched his thumb and forefinger together, saying, “Then we really celebrate with a ‘lil something something, know what I’m saying?” He smiled wide.
Before she could answer, a familiar voice boomed behind the trio. “Yeah, I know what you’s saying.”
Mallory spun on his heal, slapping his hand to his heart. “Damn, big dude. Scared the shit outta us. Again.”
TJ rocked his head back so he could look up at Lenny. “Like a goddamned eclipse walking up on us. What are you, like ten-foot-nine or some shit?”
Mallory nudged TJ. “Yeah, but his voice is so low can smell shit on his breath.”
Lenny said, “Told you three to just keep an eye out. Not shoot nobody.”
“A little late for that,” Mallory said through a giggle.
“What you mean?”
TJ pointed with his rifle toward the tree line. “Downed the motherfucke
r, right there by that big ass tree. Sumbitch won’t be bothering us no more. You can mail my reward money to Five-five-five, Bad Ass Motherfucker Boulevard, Your-Mother’s-House, Seven-five-seven-fuck-you.”
“Fucking A,” Mallory said. Another of his high-pitched giggles scratched the quickly souring air.
Lenny and Randy exchanged glances.
Randy said, “Janitor ain’t gonna like this.”
The group could see the Janitor coming around the corner, leading another cluster of men.
To Randy, Lenny said, “Better go check.”
“Right.”
“You three,” Lenny said, “Stay.”
TJ said, “Hey, we ain’t no fucking dogs, man. Better show us some—”
Lenny flashed a feint and a growl, and the three misfits flinched. TJ fumbled his rifle. Mallory stumbled into the wrought iron fence.
Randy snickered.
“Asshole,” TJ said. He waved a finger. “Both of you. Assholes.”
Laura said, “This whole place is fucked up. I mean, shit. You people have deadies in the pool, deadies in the tennis courts. You weird fucks probably sleep with those damn things.” Throwing her hands up, she started toward the building. “We’re so outta here. C’mon y’all.”
Mallory started after her, making a show of widely circumventing Lenny.
“Don’t let the rattlers bite ya on the way out,” Lenny said.
TJ didn’t move. “No, we ain’t going nowhere. The old man said we could stay.” His hand grasping the barrel, he thrust his rifle butt-first into the grass, as if planting a flag and staking a claim. “So we stay.”
Lenny shrugged. “Whatever. It’s your funerals.”
The trio looked around at one another. Finally, Laura said, “And just what the hell’s that supposed to mean?”
“When Janitor finds out you killed a man, you gonna be just as dead.”
Laura, TJ, and Mallory traded more nervous glances.
TJ spoke up, pointing to the tree line. “But that dude, I mean… y’all was gonna shoot him, anyway. Wasn’t ya? Shit, man. We did you fuckers a favor. You fucking owe us.”
Dead South Rising (Book 2): Death Row Page 6
