Dani accepted it and stared at the photo framed in the window on the front cover—my favorite picture from our “boycott prom” camping trip, with our faces smooshed together, cheek to cheek, our hair concealed in beanies, and the ocean just barely visible behind us.
“What…” Seconds passed before Dani tore her eyes away from the photo. Blinking rapidly, she looked at me, her green eyes luminous. “What is this?”
Unsure why Dani’s stunned reaction was affecting me so much, I bit at the side of my cheek and cleared my throat. “It’s a scrapbook…of us.” I opened it, so she could see the decorated pages inside. “I thought it would be nice if you had something in Washington, something that would remind you to come home every once in a while. But like a crappy friend, I ended up leaving, and I never finished it—obviously.”
“Oh…well, I—” Dani shook her head, apparently at a loss for words. “I—none of that matters anymore.” She shrugged. “Besides, I left first…” With an apologetic smile, she returned her attention to the scrapbook and slowly walked back to the bed. Lying on her stomach, she sprawled out on the comforter, scooting over to make room for me. “Come on. Let’s see what kind of silliness you packed in this thing.”
“I hardly remember,” I said, crawling up next to her. I settled in, resting my cheek on my hand. When I glanced over at Dani, I grew equally as excited as she was. “This is going to be like Christmas for both of us…”
~~~~~
After Dani and I pilfered through my room a bit longer, I decided nothing I owned, save for the woodcarving kit and a whittled starfish figurine I’d made with my dad’s help when I was twelve, was worth taking. Everything seemed frivolous and unnecessary or reminded me of a life I wasn’t sure I needed to remember. Dani and I exited my room and plodded down the stairs, through the living room, and out the back sliding door to find the guys.
We stopped mid-step at the sight of Jason and Jake sitting in the cushioned deck chairs, smoking cigars. I glanced between them, amused. “Since when do you guys smoke cigars?” I asked with feigned admonishment.
Jason took a few quick pulls of his stogie and looked over at us. “Since we found Dad’s stash in the woodshop.”
“Dad had a cigar stash?” I was beginning to think I hadn’t known my dad—the scatterbrained woodworker who spent more time in his shop than with his own kids—at all. Who the hell were you, Tom Cartwright? The fact that I didn’t know stung a little.
I glanced at Dani, whose nose was wrinkled. “Now you’re going to be stinky,” she said, making a show of waving the smoke away from her with one arm while she hugged the scrapbook to her chest with the other.
Jason only chuckled and nodded to the scrapbook. “What’s that?”
“Something Zo made for me,” Dani said, a smile spreading her lips.
Jason made a funny face. “Were you doing arts and crafts up there, or—”
Dani walked by him and swatted his arm on the way toward the deck stairs. Jason responded by swatting her in return—on the butt—eliciting a high squeal and giggle from her.
“Come on,” she said. “We’ve got a meeting to prep for. We need to get back to the ranch and wrangle in the others.”
Jason heaved a sigh, but laid his head back against the cushioned chair instead of standing and closed his eyes against the glaring afternoon sun. “I just need a few more minutes,” he groaned, reminding me of a little boy begging his mom for just a few more minutes of sleep.
“It might be faster to gather everyone over here; it doesn’t look like he’s moving anytime soon,” I teased.
“That’d be great,” Jason said, and he let a small smile tug at his lips. It was nice to see my brother so peaceful and…happy, a state I didn’t think I’d ever see him in.
“That’s all you’re bringing back with you?” Jake asked, nodding to the whittling kit rolled up in my back pocket as he stood.
He’d been so quiet, sitting there, observing. What’s it like for him to be at my house, in my hometown…smoking a cigar with my brother? I’d gleaned enough about Jake’s past—seen the death of his mother and sister, seen Joe and knew how badly Jake missed him—but I thought I would’ve liked to spend a day with him and the old man in another life.
I shook my head. “This is it, there’s nothing else I want to bring with me.” I fingered the outline of the starfish in my front pocket, strangely content with the fact that my past life had boiled down to only two items that connected me to my dad.
Oblivious to my inner musings, Jake took a final puff of his cigar. It seemed strangely natural to see him with one in his hand.
Walking over to him, I linked my fingers with his. “What about you guys? Did you find anything besides cigars?”
Jake gave my hand a quick squeeze. “Some tools that’ll come in handy when we’re ready to settle. Jason and I were talking, and we’re partial to this area. Some of that farmland back around Petaluma was pretty ideal for what we’ve been discussing.”
“Yeah?” I was surprised to hear Jake say that, a sudden feeling of unease making my heartbeat quicken.
He eyed me for a moment. “That okay with you?”
With a slight smile, I nodded. “I guess I just figured we’d keep going, a little further north, maybe. Not so close to…everything.”
He gave me a quizzical look.
“There weren’t as many tools as I thought,” Jason interrupted. “Umph,” he grumbled as he peeled himself out of the padded chair. “Damn, I forgot how comfortable these things are.”
“Let’s take them,” I said, untying the cushions from the chair closest to me. “We can use them—”
“For?” Jason asked, curious.
“For extra padding on the cart and wagon benches…for sitting around the campfire…for your throne, your highness.” I snorted. “Consider it my wedding gift to you.”
Jason laughed as he walked down the stairs toward Dani. “I kinda like the sound of that: Your Highness.”
“I’m sure you do,” I muttered.
“Come on guys, we gotta go!” Dani called from atop Wings. “Aren’t you finished with those nasty cigars yet?”
Jason, Jake, and I chuckled in response.
As Jake and I finished untying all the cushions, I glanced around at my friends, at my family.
Jason leaned against Wings, fingering the fringe of her chocolate- and white-colored mane as he gazed up at my best friend, his new bride. There was no doubt in my mind that he was murmuring something inappropriate as he received a playful smack on his arm and a giggle from Dani. They truly loved each other, and although I wasn’t sure when exactly they’d fallen in love, I was pretty ecstatic that they had.
“What are we doing with these?” Jake asked from beside me as he held up the cushions.
I looked up at him, unable to resist smiling at his beautifully rugged face and the warmth in his voice. “We can tie them to the saddles.”
“Are they really necessary?” he asked. I could see the curiosity twinkling in his eyes.
I shrugged a shoulder and wrapped my arms more securely around the three overstuffed cushions I was holding. “They’re not necessary at all, actually, but we came here to get some things, so why not?”
“I think you made your brother’s day.”
I gave him a mock bow. “It’s the least I can do.”
Jake leaned into me and pressed a soft kiss against my lips.
“We should get going,” I said quietly and watched him as he walked down the steps.
Despite the craziness that had become our lives, for the first time in years, I felt content. I even ventured so far as to think that, if we all stayed together—even if we stayed around here—we could be happy.
26
DANI
MAY 24, 1AE
Bodega Bay, California
It was late afternoon, though the gray, misty cloud cover spreading from horizon to horizon and blocking out the sun made it feel more like evening. I stared up at the
endless cloudy mass, trying to pick out the spot where the sun should’ve been.
“At least we don’t have to deal with the fog,” Zoe said.
“For once,” I grumbled, and Jason emitted a noncommittal snort. It wasn’t the “foggy season,” but the fog didn’t seem to care; it had been ever present since we’d arrived, lingering until only a few hours ago. By the time Jason, Zoe, Jake, and I had returned to the ranch from our excursion to the Casa di Cartwright, the dewy fog had finally dissipated.
As the only members of our group who were actually from Bodega Bay, Jason, Zoe, Grayson, and I were heading up our envoy to the “New Bodega” town meeting. Sitting atop our respective mounts, we rode along Westshore Road, past the turnoff to our home street, and followed it as it curved onto the peninsula. The bay was on our left, and our entourage of Gabe, Carlos, Jake, and Becca fanned out behind us. We’d selected which of us would attend the town meeting carefully, wanting people who could offer varying perspectives of the current state of the country.
Movement in the harbor caught my attention. “Look!” I pointed out at what I realized was the nearest of a handful of small vessels—both metal rowboats and inflatable dinghies—moving slowly as their oarsmen rowed them around the harbor.
Asking Wings to stop, I unbuckled my right horn bag and pulled out a small pair of binoculars, raising them to my eyes. The nearest boat stopped at a tiny buoy that was half red and half white. A quick scan of the water’s rippling surface around the boat revealed dozens of other buoys, all red and white.
The others drew to a halt around me to peer out at the activity in the harbor, and I glanced at Grayson. “Red and white buoy—that’s crab, right?”
“Yes,” Grayson said, squinting. “I count—”
“Seven boats, some with two people,” Jason said. “That’s a pretty big operation for a group of seventy.”
Grayson nodded. “Indeed, it is. We couldn’t have coordinated something like this before…”
I frowned. It made sense that others would have joined the Bodega Bay survivors, considering they had established the most stable—and sane—community we’d come across since all hell broke loose. And yet, I wasn’t overly excited about the prospect of leaping back into a settlement governed by anyone who wasn’t among my closest, most trusted companions. Sure, it helped that Grayson had been a member of the Town Council back when there were fewer than a hundred survivors, but he hadn’t been a part of the group for over four months. A lot could have changed in that amount of time, especially when the world as we knew it had ended in a matter of days.
“Look beyond them…to the harbor mouth,” Grayson said, pointing beyond the little boats. “A sail.”
Again, I brought the binoculars up to my eyes. “There are two more behind it a ways.” A thrill of excitement sizzled over my skin, and grinning, I handed the binoculars to Jason. I’d always loved watching the sailboats glide in and out of the harbor.
“Think they’ll be interested in our proposition?” I asked Grayson, not taking my eyes from the tiny triangle of white that was slowly closing in on the marina’s jetty. Though there were probably a few new faces on the Town Council, Grayson knew better than any of us if they would be interested in the plan we’d been hashing up since arriving in Tahoe. We wanted to settle somewhere we could be self-sufficient, but not completely isolated, and there was so much abandoned farmland in the nearby valleys, just a dozen or so miles inland. But if they didn’t want us here, rivals for what limited supplies remained in the area…
“Setting up a satellite agricultural settlement would only be to their benefit,” Grayson said. “I can’t imagine why they wouldn’t be interested in a mutually beneficial trade arrangement.”
“Only one way to find out,” Jason said, tugging his reins to the right and nudging his horse into motion.
Zoe, Grayson, and I followed suit, our horses falling into step beside each other while Jason led the way. I could hear the others’ mounts clip-clopping behind us. Everyone was being exceptionally quiet, and I assumed it was because they were otherwise occupied, examining their surroundings.
I returned the binoculars to my horn bag, then shot Zoe a sideways glance and frowned when I saw her expression. Her eyes were narrowed as she focused on the road ahead.
I did the same. “What is it?”
“A wall.”
It took me a moment—Zoe’s vision had always been better than mine—but I could just make out a tall, gray wall. It stretched away from the road on either side, extending to the left a dozen or so yards, all the way across the shallow beach until it sank below the water’s surface, and to the right, crawling uphill until it disappeared over the low crest. It was topped with an endless corkscrew of razor wire, and a chain-link gate crossed the road.
At my direction, Wings picked up the pace a little, carrying me ahead to ride beside Jason.
“What do you think?” I asked him. The wall was still at least a hundred yards ahead, but we were closing in quickly, and I could make out the shapes of a couple people standing on the other side of the gate. One was definitely carrying a gun…a big one.
“Smart,” Jason said, nodding slowly. “If they did what I think they did, and this wall cuts across all the way to the ocean…” He stared at the place where the wall disappeared over the hilltop. “They isolated the whole peninsula…pretty fucking smart.”
“It’s got to be at least a mile from here to the other side,” I said.
“We’ve been gone for almost five months, Red. That’s plenty of time to build a mile-long wall.”
As much as I agreed with his assessment—that building a wall and isolating the peninsula had been a smart move—I couldn’t help the creepy feeling that bunched my shoulders and made my skin crawl. Walls were built for two reasons: to keep something out, or to keep something in. And sometimes, both. I shivered.
Zoe caught up to us, guiding Shadow in close on my other side. “What are you afraid of?” she asked, and I appreciated that she hadn’t simply peeked into my mind to find which memories were floating closest to the surface.
I met her eyes for a moment. “Just déjà vu.”
“Ahhh…I’m sure this won’t be anything like the Colony.” She offered me a supportive smile as our horses drew to a halt before the tall, chain-link gate, but I could see doubt shadow her eyes.
The two men on the other side of the gate watched us as we dismounted but didn’t say anything until Jason, Zoe, Grayson, and I stepped up to the fencing.
“Which one of you is Daniel Grayson?” the man without a gun asked. He was the younger of the two, maybe in his late thirties, and was wearing khaki slacks and a light blue button-down shirt, giving him a clean, businessman vibe. In lieu of a weapon, he was holding a clipboard. The other man, dressed in dark attire more appropriate for guard duty, scanned our group with a cautious, watchful eye.
Grayson bowed his head for a moment. “I’m Daniel Grayson, envoy for the Bodega Bay Town Council to the Colony.”
The businessman nodded in greeting. “I’m Lance, the Town Council’s secretary. I was sent here to meet you and to give you a brief tour of New Bodega before the meeting.” His eyes moved from Grayson to me, Zoe, and Jason, then grazed over the others, who were still sitting in their saddles behind us. His attention returned to Grayson. “We weren’t expecting all of you to come.”
“This isn’t all of us,” Jason said.
Again, Lance’s attention shifted to Jason. “I’ll need to gather some information from each of you and go over some ground rules before you enter.”
Jason exchanged a look with Grayson. When the older man raised his graying, bushy eyebrows and shrugged, Jason nodded once. “Fair enough.”
Lance looked down at his clipboard. “I’ll need the name, place of origin, and type of mutation of every person who walks through these gates.”
“Type of mutation?” Gabe said from behind me. After a brief moment of creaking leather, I heard his footsteps on t
he asphalt as he approached. “That’s not quite accurate. Everyone here went through the same mutation—”
“—which you can tell Lance and the Town Council all about when we meet with them,” Grayson said, cutting Gabe off before he had the chance to launch into full-blown scientist mode. “You already know my name,” he said to Lance. “I’m from Bodega Bay, and my mutation has yet to be identified.”
I waved. “And I’m Danielle O’Connor. I’m from Bodega Bay, too, but I was living in Seattle when everything happened, and I’m a drifter—a two-way telepath, but only with animals.”
Lance scribbled down my information quickly, then turned his attention to Zoe.
“Zoe Cartwright, from Bodega Bay but was living in Salem, Massachusetts, and I’m an empath.”
Getting the bizarre impression that we were introducing ourselves at some sort of an addicts support group meeting, I stifled a giggle. I always reacted inappropriately when I was anxious.
Lance stopped writing and glanced back up at Zoe. “Can you be more specific, please?”
Zoe bit the inside of her cheek. “I can, uh, sense other people’s emotions and see their memories.”
Nonplussed, Lance nodded while his pen moved across his page. When he once again raised his eyes, he looked at Jason.
“Jason Cartwright, Bodega Bay by way of Joint Base Lewis-McChord, and I can increase and decrease others’ Abilities—er, mutations.”
“Army?” Lance asked.
“Yes, sir—Green Beret.”
Lance raised his eyebrows. “Colonel Marshall, the man in charge of the defenses around here, will be very interested in your service record.”
“Colonel…is he Army?” Jason asked.
Maintaining eye contact, Lance shook his head. “Marine Corps.”
Jason frowned thoughtfully, looking somewhat impressed. His eyes moved to the wall. “His idea, I take it.”
Lance nodded. “It wasn’t easy, but it’s proved more than worth it.”
The Ending Series: The Complete Series Page 119
