Dallas nodded and watched as Crosby and Einstein went up the stairs.
“Pete, can we speak to you for a moment?” Tate said as he Coco rose, shooting Dallas a look she disregarded. “Privately?”
Pete glanced at Dallas, then answered, “Come on back to the bedroom.”
When the three of them were gone, Isabella sighed loudly. “If it’s any consolation, we’ve only had to shoot five of those things. Our son says they’ll move toward cities or anywhere where there’s living human meat.”
“Oh really? Has he seen this for himself?” Dallas thought about Einstein’s hunting comment.
“He said they seem to gather together and move as a unit. No one knows why. They just do. That’s why we’ve not had to deal with them very much. People cleared out and the things left as well, as if following them.”
Tate and Coco came out of the bedroom with somber faces.
“So, I take it Pete doesn’t have room for you,” Dallas said without the venom she felt.
“That’s not what we talked about. Anyway, we’re gonna lay down here and try to get some shut eye,” Tate said, lying down on one of the sofas.
Isabella rose and addressed Dallas. “You should, too, hon. You’ll be safe down here tonight.” She opened a closet and pulled out several blankets of varying colors.
Dallas took one and held it to her. “Thank you.”
When Einstein came back downstairs with his hands full of weapons, Pete locked them in a trunk in the second bedroom. “I’ll leave the key under the mat so after we leave you can get to them.”
Dallas thanked them for the food and watched the family disappear into the bedrooms. The resulting silence was deafening, and Dallas let Tate stew in his own disloyal juices.
“Meet me in the kitchenette area,” Dallas whispered softly to Einstein, who immediately made his move to the small kitchen area.
Once there, she whispered, “You get everything?”
He nodded. “Grabbed everything I could get my hands on. Are you okay?” “Yeah, why?”
He made a face like the answer was obvious. “They’re taking our Hummer.”
Dallas shrugged. “Nothing we can do about it except get the first good night’s sleep in a week.”
“We’re not gonna fight for it?”
She looked at him and the slight panic in his eyes, and realized she sometimes forgot he was just a kid. “That’s not a fight we can win, Einstein. Those people could have just as easily shot us all. Instead, they fed us, let us sleep here, and have been kind enough to share information. So no, we’re not going to fight them for it. In the morning, we’ll make our way to the sign and wait for Roper, unless you have a better idea. At this point, I’m all ears.”
Einstein cast a glance over his shoulder. “Do we have to take them?”
She didn’t need to follow his gaze. “They, like everyone else, are in survival mode. Don’t take it personally. I don’t.”
“Exactly. And looking out for number one and two means to hell with the best interests of the group. They’re dangerous. I say we leave them.”
“I just can’t kick a pregnant woman to the curb.”
He looked into her eyes. “Then could you just kick her?”
Dallas chuckled. “What’s the number one rule in those games you play?”
“Don’t panic.”
She smiled. “Will you let me know when it’s time to panic?”
He laughed. “Never?”
“Exactly.”
Roper, Butcher, Cue, and Peanut were back in the saddles at daybreak. Peanut had fallen in love with Gwen, so Cue-Ball got on Lance and, single file, they rode quietly through the crisp morning air with Zeus trailing along behind. Roper wasn’t sure of the wisdom of bringing a dog with them but seriously doubted they would have been able to talk Peanut into coming with them without her massive canine companion. And he was huge. He had the broadest chest of any Rottweiler she’d ever seen, with an enormous head like a Mastiff. She wondered if maybe he was part Mastiff, since his body type was so thick.
She also wondered what Dallas and Einstein would say. Yes, it was becoming harder to move as a single unit, but what kind of people would they be if they walked away from a child in need of help? Cultural mores no longer applied in this apocalyptic world. That much they had seen. Maybe a bigger group was a stronger one and they should start thinking like the Neanderthals who ran amok, raping, pillaging, and plundering in order to sate their own desires. Once humans turned on humans, survival became that much harder. You can’t bring a pocket knife to a gun fight, her granddaddy always said. At some point, they would have to fight back with the same type of force.
“How you doing back there?” Roper asked Peanut, who had proven to be a superior rider to poor Cue, who needed a break every half hour.
“I’m good. I love this horse! So does Zeus!”
Peanut had slept with Butcher the night before, with Zeus practically on top of them. The dog and girl were inseparable, and even though they had a long way to go today, she knew that dog would run with them even on bloody stumps.
Butcher rode up alongside Roper. “You tired?” she asked Butcher.
“A little. It’s not every day a hundred and fifty pound dog sleeps on top of me.” “I know. I’m a little worried about that.”
Butcher glanced back and knew they were far enough away from the others to talk. “We have no choice, do we? Besides, that thing’s a weapon. I’ll back you on this, but I don’t think Dallas will mind, and who gives a crap what those two yahoos think?”
Roper grinned. “Yeah. We’re carrying some dead weight here. I think when we all get together again, we need to formulate some guidelines for survival as a group.”
“Ah yes, a ‘Come to Jesus’ meeting.”
Roper laughed. “Something like that.”
They rode for most of the day along the ridge-line, traveling up and over hills turned brown by the early California sun. They passed cattle Roper knew would soon die. When she could, she would open gates to give the domesticated ranch animals a chance at survival, much to the grumbling of Cue, who felt this was just wasting precious time. The dog showed no signs of tiring, and every time they stopped, Peanut would jump off her horse and love up the massive dog.
They’d heard chopper blades cutting through the air periodically and would race to the nearest cover to prevent detection. So far, they hadn’t made any visual contact with the helicopters, which was just fine by Roper.
Other than releasing the gates, they rode five hours without stopping until they finally came to a small hill overlooking the frontage road.
Pulling out her binoculars, Roper scanned the freeway dotted with abandoned cars. There, on the sign, she saw the big D with the circle around it.
“They made it,” she said, handing the binoculars to Butcher, who surveyed their surroundings.
“Of course they made it. They’ve got a goddamned vehicle,” Cue groused under his breath as he hopped off his horse and rubbed his rear. He had been complaining for the last two hours about his ass being sore.
Roper checked her watch. They’d made great time. “Come on. We’ll wait for them under those eucalyptus trees.”
They’d heard those distant sounds of choppers earlier in the morning, so seeking cover was still vital to their safety. They had been waiting for almost an hour when they saw the Hummer driving down a frontage road and taking off, away from them.
“What the hell?” Roper muttered.
“They’re leaving us?” Cue-Ball asked incredulously. “I knew it was only a matter of time! They ditched us! They fucking ditched us!”
“Shut up,” Butcher commanded. “Dallas must have her reasons. Maybe she’s going for gas.”
Roper barely nodded, her heart in her throat. “She wouldn’t leave us. I know she wouldn’t. Something must—”
Before the Hummer was out of sight, a Blackhawk flew over the hills and hovered over the road in front of the black jeep.
“Oh no. Oh shit. No-no-no.”
“What’s happening?” Cue asked.
“It’s the chopper. It’s probably asking for confirmation...checking to see if there are—”
The chopper fired a small Hellfire missile at the Hummer, lifting the armored vehicle into the air before it exploded into thousands of pieces.
“No!” Roper screamed, starting for the saddle.
Butcher threw her arms around her to prevent her from mounting Merlin. “It’s too late, Roper. We can’t help them. They’re…they’re gone.”
Roper struggled to turn in Butcher’s grasp, tears in her eyes as she reached for the binoculars. “No. No, I need to make sure...make sure no one survived that. Maybe one of them—”
Gently taking the binoculars from her, Butcher shook her head. “Trust me, babe. That missile destroyed everything and everyone in it. They’re…they’re really gone.”
“They’re gone…no…I can’t accept that. I can’t.”
Just as Butcher released Roper, Cue said, “Well, now we’re screwed.”
Butcher whirled around and punched him in the mouth so hard he fell back against the tree trunk. “Shut. Your. Fucking. Mouth!”
Roper wiped her tears and glared at him. “Show some respect here. Our friends…our friends have been blown to bits, and all you can worry about is how that impacts us?”
Slowly rising while rubbing his jaw, Cue dusted himself off. “No disrespect, ladies, but we can’t help them. We have to worry about our own lives now. We’ve got no—”
“You son-of-a-bitch!” Roper was all over him, swinging away, hitting Cue’s head, shoulders, and neck with fists that felt no pain. “Shut your fucking mouth, God damn you!”
Cue covered his face with his arms but Roper kept punching away, tears falling, anger swirling around her like a dust cloud.
“Stop fighting! Please stop fighting!” Peanut’s tiny voice said.
Roper would have continued had Butcher not put both arms around her and pulled her back. “That’s enough, Roper. Save your strength. He’s just an asshole.”
Cue uncovered his face and took a step toward them, but Zeus’ low, guttural growling stopped him in his tracks.
“Zeus doesn’t like you,” Peanut said matter-of-factly.
“Easy boy. Good dog.” Cue backed slowly away, hands in the air. “Call off your dog, kid.”
Peanut frowned. “My name is Peanut.”
“And your name is asshole,” Roper yelled at him. “You better stay the fuck away from me, Cue!”
Butcher held her tighter. “Take it down a notch, Roper. There really isn’t anything we can do and this isn’t helping. Pull it together.”
Roper glared at Cue, but stopped struggling against Butcher’s grasp. “Fine. I’m fine. Let me go.” She straightened her clothes and returned to her horse, tears already falling. The sense of loss creating a ball of grief she was unprepared for.
Butcher stepped up to Cue and whispered something to him before returning to Roper and helping her with the saddles. “I need you to hold on,” Butcher said softly. “That little girl is counting on us to keep it together. I know this is hard. I know this hurts, but you have to hold it in until you’re alone.”
Impatiently wiping her eyes, Roper countered, “Keep it together? Why? So our own military can blow us to bits?” She whirled around. “So they can do that to us?”
“I know this is hard on you, Rope—”
“No, Butcher, you really don’t. As pathetic as this may sound, Dallas and Einstein were as close to family as I’ve had in a really long time. I lost more than survival buddies just now. I lost people I truly cared about…and for what? To what end?”
Butcher bowed her head. “I am so sorry.”
Hoisting herself onto the saddle, Roper grabbed the horn and stared straight head, letting the tears fall freely down her face. “She promised,” she whispered softly. “Now what am I going to do?”
They rode in silence for hours. Every now and then, Roper would sniffle and wipe her nose with the back of her hand. It all felt so futile now. She hadn’t allowed herself to wonder what it might be like to lose Dallas and the boy. She’d not let herself do any sort of outcome around that possibility. Part of her just wanted to give up, to just say fuck it and strike out on her own, but she couldn’t. And, quite suddenly, she felt the pressure Dallas must have experienced as leader of their little tribe.
Suddenly, she felt an enormous weight on her shoulders.
“Roper, we’ve been riding for hours. We’re all hungry, and the horses need water. We really ought to stop.” Butcher cast a glance over her shoulder at Peanut. “And that poor little girl is about to slide right off her saddle.”
Roper didn’t look back. She didn’t need to. She knew the horses needed watering. She knew everyone was hungry. She knew she was driving them too hard. She couldn’t muster up enough energy to give a damn.
“Pull yourself together,” Butcher growled at her. “That little girl didn’t ask to be in this predicament. I know it hurts. I know you’re sad beyond measure, but we have a responsibility to that little girl to do the right thing.”
When Roper didn’t reply, Butcher said, “Fine. We’re riding parallel to the freeway and stopping at the first diner or McDonald’s we come to. There has to be something to eat somewhere.” Turning to Cue and Peanut, she said, “As soon as we come to a diner or restaurant, we’ll stop and rest.”
“There is a God,” Cue-Ball grumbled. “Not that my ass would know.” His left cheek and jaw were puffy and discolored from his earlier pummeling.
An hour later, they came upon a diner with cars still in the parking lot. Bloody handprints and drag marks painted the macabre scene below them as they surveyed the area.
“That doesn’t look good,” Cue said, glancing around to see if the coast was clear. “I vote no. No, I vote oh hell no.”
“Look around you. There’s no one here for miles. I say we go see if there’s any food or water.” Butcher didn’t wait for a reply from Roper and rode down the short hill to the entrance of the drive-in before withdrawing her rifle from its holder and climbing off the horse.
“We gonna just let her handle this on her own?” Cue asked, spurring his horse down the hill.
Roper slowly followed as Peanut trailed her. By the time she reached the driveway, Butcher had checked inside four autos before jumping back from the fifth. “Oh shit!”
Cue joined her, covering his mouth and stumbling backwards. “Jesus H!”
When Roper got to them, she peered in and saw a baby, still in its carrier...only it wasn’t just a baby. It was a zombie baby, straining at the straps and snapping its jaws. The low, growling hum emanating from its torn open throat was ghoulish.
“Gimme that thing,” Cue said, grabbing Roper’s gun. Stepping back, he raised the rifle and blew the baby’s head off. “We need to get out of here. This is a bad idea. A really bad idea.”
Butcher looked at Roper, who shrugged. “Horses need to rest. If all we have to worry about is a baby man eater, I say we give it a shot. I’m hungry. Anyone else?”
Butcher shook her head in disgust as she helped Peanut off the large horse. “Whattya say, Peanut?”
The little girl immediately ran over to Zeus and threw her arms around his neck. “I think Zeus is tired and needs a rest.”
“Then it’s settled. We’ll clear it all out and see if there’s anything left to eat.”
Clearing it out consisted of shooting a man eater that had managed to get its foot wedged in a hole in the cement, and shooting another that was still strapped into the passenger seat of its car in the parking lot.
Once inside, everyone carefully checked for any more man eaters. When there were none to be found, Butcher showed everyone the exit possibilities in the event someone came upon them, living or dead. Roper made sure the horses were under the overhang so no choppers could see them.
As she gently patted Merlin’s nose, Roper closed
her eyes and let her grief wash over her, restrained tears tasting saltier and more bitter—and she was bitter. Bitter, angry, and so far beyond sad, she wasn’t sure how to recover. “I wish I knew what to do,” she said, leaning her head against the horse’s and sobbing. “I feel so…lost.”
“We got food inside,” Peanut said, tugging on Roper’s jacket. “Come in and eat.” She slipped her hand into Roper’s and pulled her inside.
“Is that—” Roper stopped and smelled the air. “Butter?”
Butcher nodded and pointed to the counter. “Have a seat. I’m making pancakes.” “Pancakes? How?”
“Gas stove. Even with the infrastructure down, it’ll take a while for the gas to run out of the pipes.” She nodded. “Sit. Sit. There are no eaters around here. Hell, there aren’t even many other dead bodies.”
The three of them sat at the counter while Butcher cooked and watched her in silence until the bells on the front door clanged.
Whipping around, Roper had her hands on her rifle in half a second and pointed it directly at Dallas’s chest.
Dallas?
Roper blinked, unsure she was truly seeing who was standing at the door no one had thought to lock.
“Smells like breakfast,” Dallas said, smiling at the stunned group. “Hope you haven’t started without us.”
Roper’s rifle fell from her hands as she ran to and crushed Dallas in a bear hug. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God! We thought—” The floodgates opened and Roper wept, her face buried in Dallas’s neck. “I thought…I thought—”
“Hey, hey, it’s okay, Roper.” Dallas gently eased out of Roper’s vise-like grip and tipped her chin up. “We’re all fine. It’s all good. No one got hurt. Well…none of us. Can’t say the same for the poor folks who took our Hummer.”
“I can’t believe you’re really here.”
When Dallas reached out to wipe Roper’s face, she understood the fear and sadness she must have been feeling. She’d been there once before and it sucked. Big time.
Riders of the Apocalypse (Book 1): Ride For Tomorrow Page 14
