Cade was crouched on the dumpster they’d had to climb on top of to get inside the Tabernacle’s fence line, her Galil sniper rifle clutched in her hands, her eyes skimming over the lot. The sun was settling closer to the horizon, and she was particularly worried about the darkness gathering underneath the trucks. The shadows of the tall buildings around them were stretching down the street. Not far away, the round tower of the Westin loomed over everything, many of its windows broken. It looked still and quiet, though that didn’t stop the shudder that rolled down Cade’s spine at the sight of it and the remembrance of what had happened inside it.
She tore her eyes away from the tower and onto the parking lot that she should have been paying attention to. Remy had climbed halfway into one of the trucks with Dominic and was trying to get it started. The truck’s engine whined, grinding as it struggled to turn over, and Dominic shook his head and motioned for her to climb down.
“Any luck yet?” Cade called, already knowing the answer.
“Not yet,” Remy replied. “There’s a promising one two trucks in, but everything’s in the way and we can’t figure out how to get it out.”
“Yeah, whoever the hell parked all these trucks should be smacked in the head,” Dominic remarked. “I don’t know how they thought this was a good idea. If they’d had to evacuate suddenly, they’d have been fucked.”
“I wonder how they evacuated,” Cade said, looking around and noticing that the vast majority of the lot was blocked in. None of the vehicles appeared to have been moved since they were parked.
“Probably by air,” Dominic said, approaching the dumpster. “That’s what I would have done, anyway. Troop carriers and shit. Not sure where I’d have landed it at around here, maybe the Centennial Olympic Park over there.” He pointed to the park in question, which was across the street. He looked around the parking lot again and added, “I’m going to check the smaller parking lot on the other side of the building. Maybe there’s something over there that we can use.”
“You should take someone with you,” Cade cautioned him.
“Already on it,” Dominic said. He turned and called, “Remy! Come give me a hand, would you?”
After the two had disappeared around the front of the building, Cade asked Keith, “Do those two have something going on?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I haven’t been paying much attention to anything beyond our general survival.” Keith climbed up onto the dumpster to sit beside her. “What are we going to do if none of these trucks are operable?”
“Keep going until we find one, I guess,” Cade said. “We don’t have any other choice. We have got to get out of here and get to Brandt before those fuckers that took him do something horrible to him.”
“What if they’ve already done something awful to him?”
“Then I’m going to rain hellfire and brimstone on their asses,” Cade vowed. “I’ll tear their heads off and burn the fucking place to the ground.”
“Tell us how you really feel, Cade,” Sadie said as she and her twin brother joined them. She carried her bow in her hands, and on her back was her torn backpack, which she’d rigged into a quiver with some strategic cutting, tearing, and sewing.
“Any signs of anything bad?” Cade asked, ignoring the younger woman’s comment.
“This whole city is bad,” Sadie replied. “As for specific badness, neither of us has spotted anything particularly unsavory. Yet. I figure it’s a matter of time before the infected figure out where we are and we end up neck deep in them.”
A truck rumbled to life on the other side of the building. Cade straightened and pushed herself to her feet, standing on the dumpster and turning in that direction. The engine was loud, clearly of the diesel varietya blessing, really, considering the vast majority of gasoline had gone bad over the intervening two years. The engine revved a few times.
“Sounds like they might have found something workable,” Keith commented, hopping down from the edge of the dumpster and starting toward the front of the building. The twins followed. Cade stayed where she was, keeping her vantage point on the higher elevation that the dumpster offered in case something unwelcome came along. Remy appeared at the corner of the building, a huge grin on her face. Behind her, the vehicle she and Dominic had found rolled into view on Luckie Street. It was large and sand colored, and the back of it was covered with canvas that was the same color as the cab.
“What the hell is that thing?” Keith asked over the rumble of the vehicle’s engine.
“It’s an M1078 LMTV,” Cade replied. “Standard military troop carrier. Should be perfect for what we need.” She strode to where Remy stood on the sidewalk and asked, “What sort of fuel level does it have?”
“Almost a full tank,” Remy said. “Dominic said it can get us pretty damn far before we have to worry about filling up. There are even a few empty tanks in the back of the truck that we can fill up with extra fuel for the road so we don’t have to stop too much.”
“Sounds good,” Cade said. “How long does Dominic think it will take us to get to Eden in this thing?”
“Six or seven hours,” Dominic answered, dropping down from the truck’s cab. “No more than eight, barring us running into any complications on the way.”
“That sounds doable,” Cade said. And nowhere near fast enough for my preference, she thought. Eager to get on the road to find Brandt, she added, “What do you say we get into the truck and get moving before the sun sets completely? I want to get out of the city before sundown.”
“That doesn’t leave very much time, does it?” Dominic observed. He hauled himself back into the cab of the truck, settling behind the wheel. Cade climbed in behind him, ignoring the ugly look Remy gave her as she took her seat on the passenger side of the cab. When Sadie made a move to climb up to take the third seat in the cab, Cade shook her head and pulled the door shut before she could get in.
“Cab’s closed,” she said. “Get in the back with everyone else. I’ve got to talk to Dominic alone.”
Once she was sure that everyone had gotten into the cargo bed, Cade signaled for Dominic to get the truck moving. She waited until they’d turned onto Centennial Olympic Park Drive before she spoke.
“I’m going to ask you a question, and I want you to be straight with me,” she said.
“Of course, Cade,” Dominic said. “You know I’ll be up front with you about anything.”
“What are the chances we’ll find Brandt in one piece?” Cade asked bluntly.
“Fifty-fifty,” Dominic answered. When she gave him an incredulous look, he shifted gears and shrugged. “You told me to be honest, so I’m being honest. Either he’s maimed or dead, or he’s not. Either way, at this point, there’s nothing we can do about that except pray.”
“That’s not something I’ve been very good at doing over the past couple of years,” Cade said. She slouched into her seat. “It’s hard to have faith when everything in the world is imploding around you, you know?”
“Oh, I know,” Dominic said. “Believe me, I know. I’ve struggled with that since… hell, since I got recruited into the DIA years ago. When you see the worst of humanity, it’s hard to focus on the good.” He shifted gears again and the truck picked up speed, the engine roaring under the pressure he was putting on the gas pedal. “Someday you’ll be able to focus on your faith again. Something will give you a reason to do that, whether it’s your baby or your husband, and when you get that back, things will be better for you.”
“Yeah. Until then, I get to worry over whether or not Brandt is still alive and, if he’s not, how I’m going to rain Hell on the military.”
“In the meantime, I think I might have remembered a little about Eden,” Dominic said. Cade’s hopes swelled, and it must have shown on her face, because he said, “Not very much, so don’t get too excited.”
“I think we’re at the point that every little bit helps,” Cade said. “What can you tell me?”
“Just a bit tha
t I vaguely remember from my days in the DIA,” Dominic said. “There was this plan in the event of a catastrophic failure at the CDC or a similar important government facility that involved Eden. I don’t remember all the details, but there were contingency plans in place to move essential services to Eden. I don’t know why they picked Eden. I’m not sure if there’s a strategic importance to its location or if it was chosen because of the name or what. I just know that we can probably expect a significant military presence in the city once we get there.”
“How significant?” Cade asked, already trying to calculate her odds in her head.
“Significant enough that, if we get into some sort of skirmish with them, I’ll be surprised if we survive,” Dominic said. “This is all assuming, of course, that they’re better off than we’ve been. For all we know, they’ve been wiped out too. I doubt it though, considering they were able to send out gunships and so many soldiers.”
“There’s more of a good chance than a bad one that we’re going to run into trouble in Eden,” Cade stated.
“Maybe, maybe not,” Dominic replied. “There’s also a chance they’ll listen to us and not shoot us on sight.”
Cade clutched her sniper rifle to her chest, the barrel pointed toward the window. The wind rushing into the cab tugged at her dark hair, and there was a tightness in her chest that tried to stuff itself in her throat. She fought it back, swallowing hard, struggling to keep control of herself and not let hopeless despair take over. “Thank you, Dominic. For being honest with me.”
Dominic smiled without looking away from the windshield. “Anytime, Cade. Anytime.”
Chapter 30
Jude had passed out on one of the built-in bench seats within minutes of clambering into the back of the cargo truck, his slender body stretched out along the bench that wasn’t the epitome of comfort but was better than some of the surfaces he’d slept on since the outbreak began. He managed to sleep for the first three hours of the trip from Atlanta, and he didn’t wake up until they’d passed through Spartanburg, South Carolina.
If he’d been able to talk, Jude would have groaned when he opened his eyes and blinked in the hazy darkness in the back of the military cargo truck. He rolled his head to the side and spotted his sister lying on the bench across from him, sprawled on her back with her feet still resting on the floor. Remy sat on the floor near the end of the truck bed, her knees drawn to her chest, staring at the receding topography. Jude took a mental inventory on who was missing and remembered that Dominic and Cade were in the truck’s cab. Which left Keith.
Jude twisted around, lifting his shoulders off the bench seat to get a look in the direction of the cab, and spotted Keith sitting against the front of the cargo hold, his legs stretched out in front of him. His jeans were stained with blood and ripped right above his knee, and the bandage he’d covered his wound with peeked through the hole in the denim. Keith thumbed through a paperback book, a dim flashlight propped against his right shoulder to aim onto the pages. As he turned another page, he looked up and smiled when he saw Jude staring at him.
“You’re awake,” he commented, sitting up straighter. He folded the corner of the book’s page down and tucked the paperback into his bag. “Did you sleep okay?”
Jude shrugged with one shoulder and pushed himself into a sitting position, rubbing at his eyes with the heel of a hand. He fumbled for and found his ink pen and notepad, flipping open to a fresh page and scrawling onto it, Where are we?
“North of Spartanburg,” Keith reported. “We’re about halfway to Eden. You feeling okay to make this trip? Cade said something about giving us a chance to get off the crazy train before we got too close to Eden to have the decision made for us.”
Yeah, I’m okay so long as Sadie is, he wrote. He tapped the pen against his bottom lip, deciding what to write next, then, Are YOU okay to do this? He left his own desire for Keith to stick around unspoken—or unwritten, as it were—out of worry that he wouldn’t take it well. He hesitated, then flipped the notepad around to show Keith what it said.
“I’m fine with it,” Keith said. “These guys saved me. The least I could do is help them out in repayment.”
Jude nodded and slid off the bench. He sat beside the other man, falling the last few inches when the truck hit a pothole that jarred the entire vehicle. He tumbled sideways, falling onto Keith and sprawling across his lap. Keith laughed and levered him back into a sitting position. “You okay?”
Jude picked up the notepad he’d dropped. I’m fine, he scrawled on it. What is the plan when we get there?
“I don’t know,” Keith said. “I guess it depends on what we find ourselves facing.”
Remy turned to face them. “What are we talking about?” she asked, raising her voice over the rumble of the truck.
“What to do when we get to Eden,” Keith answered. “I think that depends on what we’re expecting to run into.”
Remy crawled closer to them, catching Sadie’s arm and shaking it to wake her up as she passed. Sadie sat up with a startle, flinging her arms out to swat at whatever had grabbed her, catching her swing before it could actually hit Remy.
“Let’s look at this logically,” Remy said, settling on the floor near Keith’s feet and tucking her legs underneath her. “Considering the way the military reacted when they showed up at Woodside, it wouldn’t be unreasonable to assume that we’ll be met with the same hostility that we received there. I think we should come up with a plan to fight back if we are attacked in Eden.”
“What if we’re not attacked and we go in guns blazing?” Keith countered. “Then we’re at risk of killing innocent people unnecessarily. God knows there are few enough of us as it is.”
“We shouldn’t risk our lives on maybes,” Remy retorted.
“Everybody is overthinking this,” Jude signed, and Sadie translated for him. “When we get there, we should send an emissary in to talk to them first. This will reduce the risk to the rest of us, and it will give us the chance to have our points of view explained to the people in charge, assuming there is even anyone left in Eden. This might be a wild goose chase, after all."
“The man has a point,” Keith said.
“You would agree with him, wouldn’t you?” Remy replied.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“That’s enough, guys,” Sadie interrupted, waving her hand between them like she was trying to distract two dogs that were at each other’s throats. “We’ve got plenty to worry about without getting ugly with each other. I think Jude’s idea about the emissary is a good one. It reduces the risk to all of us.”
“There’s a pretty big risk that the emissary, whoever it ends up being, could get killed,” Jude signed. “That’s why I think it should be a volunteer who understands the risks. It can’t be me, because it needs to be someone who can talk.”
There was a thud from the front of the truck, and the vehicle jolted like it had run over something. Remy scrambled to the tailgate and stared out of the rear of the truck before letting out a laugh. “Whoever is driving up there ran over a couple of infected,” she reported before crawling back to them.
“Must be Cade behind the wheel,” Keith said. “She’s probably hit her quota of patience for the day and is running over whatever comes into our path.”
“So long as she doesn’t trash the truck in the process, I don’t care what she hits,” Remy said. Her fingers flexed against the hilt of her sheathed bolo knife, and Jude caught a glimpse of an anticipatory gleam in her eyes. A shiver rolled down his spine at the sight, and he was struck with the sensation that this woman was unstable. He couldn’t put his finger on what about her made him think so, but something made him think she was taking a slow, steady slide into a dark and ominous place.
He shook himself free from the concerns and refocused on the conversation around him. The others’ talk had devolved into another argument, low and intense, debating who should serve as the group’s emissary to get them into w
hatever facility they might find so they could locate Brandt and save him. Instead of trying to join into the debate, he leaned against the cool metal of the truck and let the voices roll over him, fighting against the stir of nervousness at the impending potential fight they all faced.
Chapter 31
Much to Ethan’s relief, the soldiers didn’t immediately open fire on him and his two companions. It was the one thing he was grateful for in this entire situation. He couldn’t handle watching Kimberly die. He remained motionless, fighting the urge to grab her hand as a squad of the soldiers separated from the rest and started toward the three of them, their rifles raised and pointed at them unwaveringly.
“Excuse me, we need to speak to someone in charge,” Ethan said when the squad got to within earshot.
One of the soldiers replied, his voice muffled by the respirator he wore.
“I’m sorry?” Ethan said, looking at the masked man in confusion.
“He said get down on the ground,” Chris said, already sinking to his knees. Ethan hesitated and motioned for Kimberly to do the same, and they both dropped to their knees. The soldier who’d given the order barked something else, and Chris repeated, “Face down on the ground.”
Ethan eased onto the warm pavement between Chris and Kimberly. Heat radiated through his clothes, and he turned his head to the side to look at Kimberly. She was already staring at him, her eyes wide with worry, her fingers curling against the pavement. “It’s okay,” he mouthed to her, hoping that his reassurances wouldn’t turn into a lie.
Kimberly smiled waveringly and inched her hand toward his. He met hers halfway, resting his on top of hers and squeezing. Then his backpack was pulled off his back, and gloved hands yanked his arms behind him. Cold steel handcuffs closed around his wrists, and he was jerked to his feet. A surge of panic welled up in his gut, and he fought to not struggle. Two of the soldiers grabbed him under his arms and started half carrying him and half dragging him toward the rest of their squadron.
The Becoming: Redemption (The Becoming Series Book 5) Page 18
