I tug on the ladder with every ounce of strength I have left, trying to retract it far enough to prevent them from reaching it, but I’m left struggling to make it budge. I feel the veins on my forehead press against my skin and my teeth ache from the strain of clenching my jaw. I’m worried my arms are going to give out before this thing makes it up as high as it was when we found it. With another forceful tug, the ladder moves a touch, giving us an inkling of hope. Reese quickly sneaks below me and wraps her hands around the metal railings, pulling along with me. Between the two of us, we’re able to retract the ladder, finding that it folds into itself on this level—we’re safe for another few minutes.
The men are screaming at us from below, but I try to block them out as we focus on continuing upward. We manage to make it up at least another four levels before Reese stops to catch her breath. While waiting for her, I notice a crack in the window we’re in front of. I look around for something to break it with but there is nothing and neither of us have anything on us except the clothes we’re wearing. I pull my shirt off, wrapping it thickly around my hand, and punch through the glass. Recoiling from the shatter, I cover Reese so the flying shards don’t hit her. Reaching over her, I run my shirt-covered hand around the rim of the opening to clear the rest of the glass away, and without wasting another second I lift Reese up so she can climb in. As soon as I hear her feet touch the interior floor, I follow, dumping myself into what looks like an abandoned apartment. The room is lit only a bit from the dimming daylight but it’s enough to see everything around me. Everything it took my eyes two seconds too long to recognize.
My one thought is that those patrols are not doing a great job at finding their prey.
8
Chapter Eight
REESE
Ten. There are ten people sitting in this dark room staring at us as if we didn’t disrupt anything, as if this happens multiple times a day. Their eyes are all sunken, surrounded by black rings, and they look starved and sick, but mostly sick. Sin is in the process of shaking the glass shards out of his shirt and pulling it over his head as I stare dumbfounded at the people who aren’t exactly looking at me the same way.
“Hi,” I say quietly. “Are you all hiding?” Obviously they’re hiding. Ten of them are squished into this small room with no furniture other than a mattress and a folding chair.
A man sitting in the middle pulls himself up slowly against the wall. “Are you sick?” he asks us.
“I—I”
“No, we’re not,” Sin says. “Are you?”
“Yes,” the man says. “We all are.”
“How did you become sick?” I ask, hoping he knows, hoping he can enlighten us on this epidemic.
“There’s something in the water…” the man laughs, looking between us, trying to calm himself. The water?
“How is that possible?” I ask.
Through more laughter, the man recites:
A sleeper’s peeper is now the reaper
Take one sip and you’ll fall deeper
Asleep for days, in a haze
Until you wake with fury and blaze
Wake us once, shame on you
Wake us twice, we’ll hunt you
The man’s voice, along with his hysteria, grows in volume and I fear who can hear us outside. I want to hush him, but the crazed look in his eyes holds my unspoken thoughts at bay.
“I don’t get it,” Sin says.
The man finally tames his outburst and in turn, his voice turns cold as he clarifies:
There were sleepers posing as gate-keepers
All fresh water sources were infiltrated with a toxin home grown
Stolen from the young blood of one of our own
Still riddled and confused by what he’s saying, my only question is, “Is it contagious?”
The man shakes his head slowly. “No, Ma’am.” I drank water—that’s all I was given for three years with my meals. Does that mean what I think it means?
“What are your symptoms?” Sin asks.
The man grins, a grin I could have gone without seeing. There’s a sinister look in his eyes. “Are you lost?” the man asks.
“Let’s just say, we’ve been hiding in a hole for the past few years. We need to know whatever information you can give us,” I follow up with.
“Nightmare, despair, and glare,” he says, matter-of-factly.
“Nightmares?” I ask. I have already figured out that whatever this virus is, it affects the brain in some way, but I’m not sure I understand what he means about nightmares, and what’s with all the poetry and rhymes? Does this guy think he’s Shakespeare, or what?
Again, he begins:
Nightmares are real, they don’t happen only at night
Nightmares happen when your eyes are at full sight
Your world shifts and you lose the control
Finding what’s real only leads to a black hole
“How can you know the difference between what’s real and what isn’t?” I ask.
“Some know and some don’t know. I’m fortunate enough to know those who don’t know.” He turns around, looking down at the people perched up against the wall.
“Was the reaction to the water instantaneous?” I ask Shakespeare, still questioning for the sake of my own sanity, now remembering what my anger and hunger have caused me to do.
Again, he shakes his head. “No, what’s better than a little surprise? For the sleepers all wanted it to be a disguise.”
“Do you need help?” Sin asks. Clearly, the man is beyond help. “We aren’t staying here. There are patrols out front. They know we came in here.”
The man’s eyes widen and his forehead crumples into a hundred wrinkles, showing despair like I’ve never seen in another human being. “You just killed my family and me.” His words turn to cries. “I’ve kept them safe in here for what feels like an eternity.” An ache in my heart takes over every nerve in my body. Telling this man it wasn’t our intention to cause harm won’t help right now because I know exactly what those patrols will do when they find them.
I place my hands over my heart, clutching the material covering my chest. “I’m so sorry,” I whisper.
The man falls to his knees and turns to his family, gathering as many of them as he can within his arms, crying into the head of a young man who couldn’t be more than fourteen or fifteen. “I let you all down,” he continues to cry out before reciting another rhyme.
I did my best to keep you safe from the devil’s wind.
Forgive me. Forgive me, God, for I have sinned.
Please, please protect them from the tough.
We have suffered enough, God, we have suffered enough.
What have we done? I know what it feels like to lose my family and now I’ve caused this for someone else.
The man stands back up and walks past us across the room to a closet. He presses up on his toes, reaching up to the top. Retrieving a pistol, he brings it down to his chest, holding it tightly as he closes the closet door.
For a moment I think that he might want to kill us, and I wouldn’t blame him. But if he’s thinking with logic, which I’m not sure he’s capable of, he probably already knows that won’t stop the patrols from coming in here. I don’t want to take my eyes off of the man, but I look over to Sin, needing his face to focus on. I find Sin’s eyes large, pained, his mouth agape, and his hands clenched by his side. Not much scares Sin, but he is most definitely scared right now.
I take a couple of steps back, taking Sin’s hand within mine. We have no weapons, no form of protection. We’ve been cheating death for far too long and we both know it’s a only matter of time before it catches up to us. The man turns to face us. “You killed my family, and this is on you.” Tears are still rolling down the man’s cheeks.
“What’s your name?” Sin asks. We’re running out of time. I can feel it.
“Why don’t you just call me Romeo?” He takes the pistol and presses it up against his head. “Though, poi
son would have been a much better way to go.” He pulls the trigger, and I squeeze my eyes closed against the loud blast. The floor thumps below me as his body makes contact. What the Hell? Rhyming? Romeo? Suicide? I’m afraid to open my eyes, afraid to see the aftermath. Sin pulls me in against him, cupping his hand over my head, hiding my face in his chest. I cling to him, trying to absorb strength to deal with this reality we have uncovered.
“Dad?” A grief-stricken voice startles us both. We look up, finding a teenage boy crawling across the blood-covered ground until he reaches the man. He’s pounding on his chest, crying and screaming, “No, no, no, please don’t leave me. I wasn’t dead. You promised you wouldn’t leave me until my day came. You promised me. You promised.” I have nothing to say to him. Words are mixed up in my head and I can’t conjure up a solid thought. I only know I’m covered in someone else’s blood and he died because of us.
Without a word, Sin pulls me toward the front door, opening it slowly before peeking out into the hall. “It’s clear.” I don’t want to decide which way will be safe because I can only assume the patrols will be coming up in both directions at any moment. It has been less than five minutes since we stepped into this building but we’re only on the sixth floor.
“Do you think there’s another fire escape on the other side of the building?” I ask Sin.
Seemingly enlightened by my question, he pulls me across the hall, trying the knob on the door. It doesn’t turn. We walk down to the next door and try that one as well, but still no luck. We make it down three more doors before one opens. Scared of what we’ll find in here, I instinctively close my eyes as we step inside. Sin locks the door behind us. His hand slips from mine and the sound of something being dragged along the floor forces my eyes back open. “It’s okay,” he says.
Sin places a coffee table up against the door, followed by a sofa. Looking around the room, I’m a little surprised at what I see. We’re in a fully furnished apartment, decorated with modern decor. The peacefulness of my surroundings brings me in further until I step into the kitchen where I find a small four-person table with the chairs neatly tucked into place. However, there are plates sitting in the center of four navy blue woven placemats with white linen napkins placed evenly next to each setting. As I continue observing the scene, I notice that the forks and knives are scattered on each plate as if dropped there in a hurry. The silverware lies on top of what looks like disintegrated food—black crumbs. With another step closer, a slight rotting odor reaches my nose, but it’s nothing compared to what I’ve been forced to inhale over the past day. It’s as if a family picked up and left right in the middle of a meal. But why?
I move over to what looks like a pantry and open the door, finding rows of canned food. “Sin! Food! There’s food we can eat! Come here!”
He runs in, shushing me. “Reese, you cannot raise your voice. These walls are paper thin and they will hear you.”
“Sorry, but look.” I point inside of the pantry. Sin moves past me and immediately tears open each drawer until he locates a can opener.
“You hungry?” A devilish grin tugs at his lips as he peers over at me.
“I mean, I could eat, I guess.” I match his smile with my own. “Something that doesn’t taste like bacon would be a dream.”
Sin closes his eyes, his grin still present as he lets out a soft chuckle. “You are disgusting.” He brushes by me, snagging a few cans and puts them down on the counter. “But it totally does taste like bacon.” He’s quick to open all four cans of Spam and two cans of vegetables. There was a time I would snarl at the thought of eating Spam, but now it sounds as good as a fresh cut of prime rib.
I rummage through the drawers until I find two forks. I hand one to Sin and he hands me a can in return. “Slow, don’t forget. You’ll get sick.”
I take a few bites, releasing the savory taste as it slides down the back of my throat. My stomach screams for more and at a faster rate, but I try to keep myself at a snail’s pace. I eat more than I’ve eaten in years and my stomach feels filled to the rim. I could die a happy woman now. Sliding down against the cabinets, I close my eyes to savor and relish the sensation of fullness. Sin follows, letting out a long and loud sigh. “That was amazing,” I tell him.
“We’re definitely going to get sick from eating as much as we ate, but it was worth it. And there’s more.” No more than a few seconds after his last word, I feel bile moving up my esophagus. Will I ever be able to stomach more than a few bites? I stand up and vomit everything I just ate into the sink. Hell. That’s what this is. Pure Hell. I press on the water lever, but water doesn’t come out. Of course. Sin pulls himself up and opens the refrigerator, snagging a small bottle of soda. He unscrews the top and spills a little into the sink, enough to wash the vomit down.
Hopefully he has more soda because now he’s vomiting too. Just awesome. Right as he finishes, he pours a little more of the soda into the sink, washing his remains down too.
“Round two?” I ask, my voice sounding as if I swallowed a rusty nail.
“Let’s give it a few minutes.”
“Do you feel that?” I walk closer to the front door, listening for a sound to match the vibrations I’m feeling under my feet. Sure enough there are voices, men’s voices. Sin rushes over to my side and slips in front of me. Both of us remain quiet as I press my cheek against his back, feeling his heart pound heavily. He’s holding his breath, too. I hear knocking and door knobs twisting on neighboring apartments. They’re trying each one. Who would let them in? As they pass by this apartment, they knock and try the knob. Please, keep walking. I pray while listening to the sound of a hand twisting the doorknob of this apartment. I relax and inhale as the knob recoils a little from the movement. My chest deflates as I hear them move to the apartment across the hall, but it only takes a second to register that we didn’t lock the apartment we walked out of. They’re going to find that man’s family and it’s because of us.
“Shit,” Sin whispers.
“Should we help them?” It’s our fault.
Sin looks down at me, his eyes dark and unfocused. He shakes his head with dejection as he places his hand heavily on my shoulder. “We can’t.” He’s right. Screams filter down the hall and I can’t help but consider what the patrol told me about the dangers of waking someone from a nightmare. Is that what just happened? More screams commence and I hear loud thuds, body-sized thuds. What are they doing to that poor family? We should have tried to help them. We’re horrible people. “Take that look off your face, Reese. We couldn’t help them.”
The thuds and screams continue for several more minutes, informing us that these people are not giving up without a fight—a good fight.
Neither Sin nor I have moved in what seems like a half hour, but silence has now replaced the horrible noises we’ve been forced to listen to. “Do you think they’re gone?” I ask.
“I think they’re all gone—family included,” Sin replies.
I pull in a deep breath, feeling like I haven’t taken one in the entire last half hour.
“We’re staying here,” Sin continues. “There’s enough food to last us a little while. We’ll build up our energy and strength, then keep moving until we can find our next source of food and shelter.”
“I don’t think that’s the answer, though. We’re prolonging the inevitable. We need to do something,” I argue.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. This is how the world is now and if we don’t adapt, you’re right, we are only prolonging the inevitable.”
What he is saying technically makes sense, but how do we just begin a new life living like nomads, with little food and no money?
Sin leaves the conversation, probably hoping I don’t bring up any further valid points. I get it, we’ve been running for way too long and sitting in one place that appears to be away from danger for a little while will be a pleasant break.
“There’s a bedroom in here and this mattress is like a cloud of fluff
. Holy hell we’re going to have the best night’s sleep tonight,” Sin shouts in a whisper.
I follow him into the bedroom, finding the same clean and modern feel in here. “Home sweet home, I guess.” This feels so wrong, not that there is anything right about the world now.
If we’re going to do this, I might as well do it right. “I wonder if there are clean clothes—I mean, I’m sure there are. There has to be.”
“I’m guessing there is,” Sin says. “Sweet.” I turn to see what he’s found as he’s rummaging through a nightstand. He pulls out a long knife and slips it through the belt on his pants. “Check the other one.”
I walk away from the clothes I was going to maul and pull open the other nightstand. “Just a Bible,” I tell him. “And condoms.”
Sin laughs as I hold them both up. “Sort of sacrilegious, but we’ll go with it,” he says. “Plus, one of those we can put to good use.”
“I’m not too religious, so I’m not sure about that,” I say with a wry grin.
Sin takes the knife back out of his pocket and places it down on the nightstand. “I don’t know,” he says. “I’m pretty sure you’ve already contradicted that theory.”
“What are you talking about?” Sin makes his way around the bed, quickly taking me into his arms, pressing every inch of himself against me in the most incredible way. If I have to be trapped in this God-forsaken new existence with someone, I’m glad it’s with him. Being with him is all that makes this situation bearable right now.
“Bed sex will be a new one for us,” he whispers seductively into my ear as he meticulously peppers kisses down the length of my neck. My breaths go missing with each touch and it doesn’t take long before my knees give up the battle, allowing gravity to pull my body down to the mattress. Sin removes his shirt as he climbs over me, giving me the most delicious view of every chiseled and defined muscle in his upper body. The rest of our clothing disappears quickly in a blurry haze as we find ourselves tangled between the sheets. “I love you,” he whispers, his words dancing deliciously against my lips.
Unlocked (No Way Out Series Book 3) Page 6
