With shaking hands, I’d wrapped my fingers around a large rock and tiptoed my way to the opening of the cave. The creature was a horrible sight, its face twisted and warped with decay, its skinless fingers reaching through the opening, clawing at whatever it could find purchase on.
My stomach in knots, fear gripping my chest to the point of pain, I bent down on my knees and lifted that rock, and with a scream that could have shattered glass, I brought it down on its skull as hard as I could.
I’d been brave then, and I could be brave now.
I had to be brave.
Letting go of the fragile sanity that I’d been clinging to, sanity that I had only just regained after years of surviving on my own, I launched myself at the biter. Pushing past a flurry of rotten and frenzied limbs, my hands grappled for purchase on any part of it, finally finding its head. I gripped its skull between my sweaty palms, digging my nails into its decaying flesh, and I squeezed.
I squeezed and I squeezed, feeling the brittle bone beneath the leathered skin begin to crack. Mere inches from my face, its teeth were snapping, its eyes wide and wild as its hands clawed at my sides, tearing my clothing and pushing painfully into my skin.
And still I squeezed. Screaming at the top of my lungs, I squeezed until my arms ached and my throat burned, until I lost myself somewhere between that invisible place between this world and the next. I refused to die, but so did it. The creature fought for its false life just as I clung to mine.
To onlookers, it was a battle to the death. For me, however, it was a battle for life, a battle that I wasn’t strong enough to make it through, and yet I refused to give up. I wanted this life, this life with Eagle where I wasn’t alone. I wanted it so powerfully and profoundly that I couldn’t give up even if I wanted to, because Eagle had taught me how to live. He had brought me back from nothing and made me whole again, and I would be fucking sturdy for him, even if it killed me.
Wild with hunger, the biter thrashed and lost its balance, and together we toppled to the floor of the cage. Straddling its body, I kept my grip on its head and lifted it, then smashed back down against the ground with more force than I’d thought myself capable of. I smashed over and over until the skull cracked and the skin split. Bits of brain and fluid seeped out, and still I smashed it over and over without stopping, even after I felt the skull collapse beneath my fingers.
The snarling stopped, the hands digging into my waist went limp and fell away. But I couldn’t stop. Screaming, and shaking so violently that the world around me appeared to be vibrating, I continued to pound its head into the ground.
I smashed it over and over again until it was nothing but mush. There was nothing else there, nothing else beneath this rotten blood and shattered bone. I smashed until there was nothing left for my fingers to hold on to, and with one final sorrow-filled cry, I finally stopped.
My arms aching and my body sore, I looked up and out at the crowd, my vision blurry, and blinked as I stared at them. The silent faces gawped at me, their mouths open in shock, and then I fell to my side, broken and lost.
It was over. I had won. But how could this ever be called winning? I had discovered the secret, staring death in the face and sending it back to hell. Listening to the crowd’s screams for my demise, I had found it, the truth of this world, the key to our existence . . .
Beneath the blood and bone, there was nothing.
There was nothing.
There was nothing more than this. Nothing to reach for, nothing to wish for.
Nothing.
The world swam around me, blurring in and out of focus. It was over, but it wasn’t. It would never be over. Ever.
“Autumn!”
The guttural roar outside my cage startled me. Lifting my gaze, blinking past the bright sunlight in my haze of tears, I found Eagle gripping the bars. His hands, face, and shirt were covered in blood, and his expression was wild.
And his eyes, they were as black as death.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Eagle
My hand shook as I lifted the latch on the cage door, partially from the pain radiating from my split knuckles, but mostly from the fear that swam through me.
Watching me with blank eyes, Autumn was curled up on her side in the midst of the filth, covered in gore and blood. After swinging open the door, I all but fell inside. I kicked away the body of the rotter, then dropped to my knees and reached for her.
I hadn’t even touched her yet and she flinched. Squeezing her eyes shut, she cringed away from me.
“Are you bit?” I didn’t recognize my own voice. It was hoarse from shouting and pained from the punches I’d taken. When she didn’t answer me, I placed my hand on her shoulder. “Squirrel?” I whispered.
“Was she bitten?” someone shouted.
“She was! I saw! She was bitten!”
“Don’t let her out!” another voice screamed. “Shoot her!”
“You weren’t bitten,” I muttered to myself, my hand trembling as I reached out and lifted her arm, inspecting it. “You weren’t.”
Autumn whimpered in protest but made no move to stop me as I continued to search her. Her arms were battered and bruised, but free of teeth marks. Her face and neck, other than lined with tears and dirt, appeared fine. Grabbing the hem of her shirt, I pulled the material up and found her pale skin streaked with blood.
“Motherfuck,” I whispered, gently prodding the red skin around the three finger wounds at her hip where the rotter had almost clawed her apart. They would need to be cleaned soon or she’d be susceptible to any one of the number of infections these fuckers carried on them.
But she hadn’t been bitten.
Lifting her into my arms, I checked her other side and found two more small slices.
“You’re okay,” I said. Holding her head, I pressed her against my chest, where my heart pounded like a war drum. “You’re going to be okay.”
She didn’t respond. She barely even moved.
“Let me see her.” Jonah stood just outside the cage with Jeffers beside him, who looked just as beaten and battered as I felt. Behind them stood a row of guards with Liv in their midst. Her pink hair was covered in dirt and standing on end, and she shifted anxiously from foot to foot. As her eyes found mine, she grinned, and her tongue darted out to lick her bottom lip.
“She wasn’t bitten,” I growled, and turned my glare on Jeffers.
He shook his head. “We’ve got rules. The doc needs to check her before we let her out.”
I nearly told him to go fuck his rules. I was so sick of hearing about them, but even I knew when I didn’t have a leg to stand on. She’d need to be examined before any of those guards would allow her to leave the pit. If I tried to carry her through now, we’d both end up dead.
Stepping inside the cage, Jonah carefully moved around the body of the rotter and bent down beside me. After setting down a leather satchel, he held out his arms.
“May I?” he asked.
I glanced down at Autumn, who hadn’t moved, her eyes still squeezed shut. Cursing, I handed her over, helping Jonah lay her back down on the filthy floor of the cage. Once she was situated, I got to my feet and turned to Jeffers.
“I’m leaving,” I said, purposely keeping my voice low. “I’m taking her and my truck and we’re leaving. You are not going to stop me.”
“Adler—”
“No!” Glaring at him, I stepped closer. “You say I’m your family, that you couldn’t save us? You can. You can save me. You can open those gates and let me go.”
He stared at me through one bloodshot eye, the other so swollen it could barely open. “Mike!” he shouted hoarsely. Seconds later, a scrawny young guard was standing at his side, eyeing the both of us.
“Gimme your keys, Adler,” Jeffers said, gesturing with his hand. “Mike’s going to go get your truck. He’s going to grab you two scavenger supply packs, then drive it to the main gates. Then he’s going to tell the boys there that you’re free to leave.”
>
“What about her?” I jerked my chin to where Jonah was bent over Autumn.
Jeffers responded with an almost imperceptible nod. “Her too.”
I wanted to trust him; hell, I’d trusted him for most of my life. But that was then and this was now, and now the past was buried beneath a pile of bodies too deep to dig through to find the men we used to be.
“Why?” I countered. “Why would you just let us go?”
Jeffers’s lips twitched. “When have I ever been able to stop you from doing anything you had your mind set on?” When I didn’t respond, he let out a heavy sigh. “As far as Purgatory’s concerned, she’s paid for her crimes. But as far as I’m concerned, you’re both liabilities now, and can’t be trusted. I can either kill you or let you go. I’m letting you go.”
“No, no!” Liv shouted as she pushed through the guards. “You can’t do that!”
“Shut up,” he spat, only pausing to spare her a quick glance.
Jonah appeared on my right. “She wasn’t bitten,” he said quietly, giving me a tight smile and a nod. “And I’ve cleaned her wounds, but she’s suffering from shock.”
Shock was fine. Shock I could deal with, even fix. I couldn’t fix a bite.
Yanking my keys free from my jeans, I slapped them in Mike’s waiting hand. As he hurried off, I turned and headed back into the cage to find her curled up on her side again, her watery eyes staring at nothing.
“We’re leaving,” I muttered, and bent down to scoop her up in my arms. “I don’t know where the fuck we’re going, and we’re probably going to die tomorrow, but fuck it, I’m getting you out of here.”
Her response was to press her face into my chest above my bicep and fist her hand in the back of my shirt. It was more of a response than I’d expected, and I took it as a damn good sign. Holding tightly to her, I stepped out of the cage, and the crowd roared their protests.
Jeffers turned to the crowd, his hands raised in the air. Cupping his hands around his mouth, he bellowed, “She wasn’t bitten!”
Somewhere to our left, the same statement was shouted through a megaphone, and the crowd roared their disappointment.
“Like hell she wasn’t!” The angry shout came from Liv, who’d stepped away from Jeffers and closer to the gathering of guards. “I saw her!” she screamed, her eyes wild. “She was bitten!” Whipping around, she wrenched a gun from the hands of the guard closest to her.
The gun discharged and I ducked and turned, trying to shield Autumn with my body.
“No!” Jeffers shouted as the second explosion rattled through the air.
“No!” Liv screamed. “No! Get off me!”
Looking back, I found Liv buried at the bottom of a pile of guards, the gun wrestled from her grip. Then I looked at Jeffers and time seemed to slow down; everything and everyone was suddenly moving in slow motion as I stared in horror.
Holding his side, his eyes on me, Jeffers staggered backward drunkenly. A red stain grew beneath his palm as I watched, and spread across his midsection.
Time sped up again as my thoughts coalesced. I needed to get Autumn out of here, far away from here, far away from Liv and Jeffers before all hell broke loose.
“Fucking go,” Jeffers growled at me. Gripping the bars of the cage, he glanced down at the blood seeping through his shirt and swallowed hard. “I’ll deal with it. Just go.”
The crowd was shouting. Some were running while other surged forward, their anger and panic hanging thick and heavy in the air. I stared at Jeffers for several long seconds, wanting to say more, wanting to say something . . .
But there was nothing left to say.
With Autumn still in my arms, I pushed past a stunned Jonah, past Jeffers, and ran into the crowd. It was utter chaos. With everyone pushing and shoving one another, and running in different directions, no one paid us any attention.
I ran fast and hard, breathing in quick erratic spurts as I pumped my legs as fast as they could go. There wasn’t time; there wasn’t any more fucking time. I needed to get to the gates before word of what happened spread to the guards there, and the entire place locked down.
Spotting my truck coming slowly around the bend that led to the lot, I slowed down, trying to appear calm as I approached the main entrance. It didn’t matter. Once they’d caught sight of us, all of the men stationed there pointed their weapons directly at me.
I stopped dead in my tracks as sweat beaded on my forehead. I could only imagine what we looked like, Autumn covered in gore and me covered in blood. And I had nothing on me, not one single weapon. Just my own two hands, and both of them currently in use.
“Stay where you are!” one of the guards called out.
“What’s going on?” another one shouted. “We heard gunfire!”
Glancing down at Autumn, I found her eyes open and staring up at me.
“I want it all to burn,” she whispered, her pupils constricting as she looked up to the sun.
Before I could think of a response, my truck pulled up beside me. The passenger side window rolled down, revealing Mike. He glanced from me to the guards at the gate, and noting the standoff, his eyes went wide.
“They’re good to go!” he shouted as he jumped out of the driver’s seat. “Jeffers’s orders. Open the gates!”
I swallowed hard as my palms went slick, causing my grip on Autumn to slip some. Seconds ticked by while the guards glanced at one another. Cutting my eyes right, I scanned as much of the area behind me as I could. No one was coming. So far, so good.
“You heard ’im! Open the gates!”
I didn’t waste time taking a breath. Wrenching open the passenger side door, I shoved Autumn inside. “Nothing’s burning today,” I muttered, and slammed it shut. Keeping my eyes on the guards, I circled around the back of the truck and by the time I was in the driver’s seat, the gates had already begun to open.
When I glanced out the back window, I saw a group of men burst free from the opposite field, all of them headed in our direction. Friend or foe, I didn’t care; I wasn’t going to waste time waiting to find out. I slammed my foot on the gas and the truck lurched forward in a spray of grass and dirt. Shouting curses, guards went running left and right as the truck sped past, clipping the still-opening gate.
Autumn’s arms shot out, bracing herself on the dash as I made a hard right onto the road. Shifting gears, I reached for her and wrapped my hand around her bicep, then yanked her up against me. Then I punched the gas again and raced down the road as if our lives depended on it.
Which they did.
Chapter Forty
Autumn
We drove for hours in silence. I slept some, and when I wasn’t sleeping I stared out the window, watching the scenery pass by in a blur. Never once did I look back the way we’d come.
After a considerable amount of time had passed, Eagle brought the truck to a stop in the middle of the road and climbed out, leaving the engine running, I turned in my seat, watching as he leaned against the bed and scanned the empty horizon. I kept watching him, following his every movement, wondering if he was going to abandon me here like he’d done before. Leaving me in Liv’s hands, allowing me to be put in that cage and handed to the biters.
The biters . . . I shivered, my teeth chattering as I remembered its bony hands on me. Turning back in my seat, I slumped down and wrapped my arms around myself, trying to get warm.
The driver’s side door opened and Eagle stood there, the dying sunlight at his back highlighting the streaks of dried blood covering him. He stared at me a moment, looking as if he wanted to say something. Instead, he climbed back in the truck and gripped the steering wheel.
“Where to?” he asked, staring straight ahead. “The beach? Up north?”
I didn’t answer him; I couldn’t. My voice was gone. I was so cold. There was nothing left. Nothing at all.
“The Grand Canyon?” He glanced over at me.
I blinked sluggishly, feeling like there was lead in my veins.
&
nbsp; “How about Disneyworld?” He smirked, but it was more of a snarl. His face was covered in blood, the dark streaks distorting his features.
The blood, the blood, the blood.
My heart pounded in my chest, its beat erratic, almost feverish.
The blood, the blood, the blood.
I stared at the dried blood on him, feeling cold and sick to my stomach. A moan slipped past my lips, the first sound I’d made in hours. I wanted to scream, I wanted to scream and yell, but I couldn’t seem to manage anything but a pitiful moan.
“Talk to me, Squirrel,” he said, and I thought he sounded sad. Or maybe it was guilt.
I didn’t know. I couldn’t think. There was so much blood everywhere.
How did I not notice the blood before now? The biters, they’ll smell us from miles away. They’ll be coming now. They’ll come and they’ll—
“The blood,” I whispered, cringing. “The blood . . .” I looked away, unable to say more.
Eagle glanced down at his shirt and his hands. “Shit,” he muttered, and a muscle twitched in his jaw. “Shit, Squirrel, just sit tight. I’ll find us somewhere to clean up.”
Putting the truck in gear, he started to drive again. My gaze stayed on him, unable to stop staring at the blood.
The blood, the biters, the snarls, the teeth. Bony hands on me, digging into me, ripping open my skin. Blood and death. Blood and death . . .
The truck jerked to a stop, and I watched as Eagle climbed out, leaving me alone again. I stared after him, wondering if this was where he’d leave me, and found that I didn’t care if he did.
There’s nothing left. There’s nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing . . .
My door opened, startling me. I jumped as hands pulled me sideways and out of the truck. Outside, the sun was warm against my freezing skin, but Eagle was even warmer. As he held me against him, I felt his warmth and leaned into him, squeezing my eyes shut, desperate for more.
“Here we go,” he said.
I felt him stop and there was a small splash, and beyond that the rush of water echoed in my ears. I kept my eyes closed, whimpering as he lowered us both into the water, and the cold engulfed us.
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