“Cyrus,” Eve said, nodding.
“Don't worry,” he said. “You are now among friends. Again, I apologize for the circumstances of our meeting. The past is immutable, so we can only move forward and into the future, to a new day, to a new friendship.” He spread his hands. “I think you will like it here. We need people, women in particular, and if you follow our simple rules, you will find this to be the safest place left on the planet. We are out of the cold, the wind, the rain, and safe from the raptors. We have all the essentials for life, food, water, electricity, and most importantly, we are rebuilding what has been lost. So one day, you can tell your children that it was you who were responsible for ensuring their survival, for giving them a future.”
Andrea swallowed hard. Cyrus was feeding these women the same line of bullshit he often told the new members. Women had it worst of all. What they actually had waiting for them was an existence of sexual servitude. Being that Eve was so attractive, she would be highly prized. But first, Cyrus would spend the next couple of months trying to get her pregnant. If that did not happen, she would end up serving his men, to be passed around and enjoyed by all. If she did not adapt as many had, her life would become a long series of brutal beatings, one after another, leaving her broken and begging for death.
“How about you, child?” Cyrus said to Kate.
Kate stared at him blankly.
“She doesn't talk,” Andrea said. “I think she might be mute. Though, I don't know why. There is nothing wrong with her that I can determine. Except—”
“Hmmm,” Cyrus said, interrupting her. “She is quite pleasant to look at.” He grinned wryly.
Andrea felt a wave of revulsion slither through her. But what could she do about it? Nothing was the obvious answer. But could she? Could she ignore it and let this monster near Kate? Doing something now might jeopardize all that she had worked so hard to achieve.
Cyrus patted Kate on the knee. “I have the perfect job in mind for you, little one. Don't worry, we'll take good care of you, such good care.”
With a sidelong glance at David, Andrea hoped he might be able to stop what she knew would happen, maybe say something. But that was wishful thinking. He remained stone-faced and left to return the pot of water used to make the tea. She was all alone in this. She opened her mouth and closed it then opened it again.
“Cyrus,” she said. She paused. Given that she was not interrupted, she straightened her back and continued, “I don't think she's right in the head. She's very unpredictable. In fact, I think she might be dangerous. I'm not sure why, and who knows what she might do if provoked?” She stopped and looked at her feet.
“Go on.”
“I need her,” she said, and then quickly added, “just for a little while.”
Cyrus pivoted in his chair. He rested his elbows on the table and steepled his fingers.
“Why?” he asked. Again, his cheek bulged as his probing tongue pushed it outward.
“What if I were to keep her close to me? She could help me. I need help, as you know. I could keep a close eye on her. Young as she is, she might serve us better in this capacity.” Andrea stopped and swallowed. What she'd just implied might get her punished. Stepping between Cyrus and his playthings was dangerous, but she had to try. She'd failed before.
“I'm old,” she said, “and who knows how long I'll remain alive. I need someone young. Someone I can teach. An apprentice, so to speak.”
He appeared to consider the request. She swallowed again and adjusted her glasses, waiting for an answer.
“No,” he finally said. “I think not. I have other plans for her.”
“Plans?” Eve asked. “Like what, exactly?”
Tread lightly, Andrea thought at Eve.
“To the point, you are,” he said to Eve. “Indeed. My plans are mine and now is not the time to share. But, trust me, she will be well cared for.”
Andrea clenched her thumbs inside her curled fingers and squeezed. She needed to back off, needed to let go and forget. Perhaps she could find someone who could give her another bottle so she could drink away the pain.
She bit her bottom lip, and then said, “Please, I need someone like her to assist me.”
“I have hundreds of men you can choose from, and a few boys, other women, too. And you are telling me there is not one other that is suitable to assist you? Why not one of them? Wouldn't they serve you better than a mute girl?”
“It must be a woman. A young girl, preferably. One who can learn. The others, I'm not sure they can serve us nearly as well.”
“As well as what?”
Andrea thought about it for half a second. She already knew a few things about the girl, things that hurt her so deeply she was willing to put it all on the line to save her. She'd already stepped over the line.
She might as well go for broke.
“This girl,” she said, “maybe she is mute, but she's intelligent. I can see that. In addition, I can keep an eye on her. Perhaps even get her to talk. I suspect her not talking has nothing to do with her physically. I think it's mental. Maybe I can find out why. Maybe even learn where she came from. That information could be valuable, right? At least give me some time with her. Please.”
Cyrus glanced at David, who nodded slowly. He leaned backward in his chair and rocked it onto two legs, holding his fingers interlaced over his stomach. Her heart fluttered. She felt a bead of sweat accumulating on her forehead. His gaze was cold and penetrating. He was probing her for any signs of deceit. She worried that her asking for the girl was probably going to get someone hurt. Maybe her, maybe one of the others in her care. She was trading one for another. But still she willed herself not to betray the girl, not to betray her plans, and not to betray all the people helping her.
Finally, with a crash, Cyrus let the front legs of his chair slam forward.
He stood.
“The sunrise today was magnificent,” he said. “So, be thankful. Today, I will grant you this boon. But know this arrangement is only temporary, of course. We'll reassess her…value to our community later.”
Andrea knew well what that meant. For now, though, she would be able to save the girl from him. If she could later prove the girl was indispensable as a medical assistant, then Kate might be spared the fate that awaited Eve.
It was a small victory, but still a victory.
She stared at Cyrus, displaying nothing but kindness and submission. Internally, she wanted to cut out his still beating heart and serve it to him raw on a platter surrounded by his kidneys, liver, spleen, and lungs.
“Thank you,” she said graciously, bowing her head. “You are most generous. I'm sure this will work out well for all of us.”
-22-
WALKING DEAD
JESSE STIRRED. IT was dark outside. Nighttime. Hand shaking, he touched his brow. It was hot and dry. His entire body felt crusty, beaten down, and his shoulder was throbbing like a real son-of-a-bitch. He clenched his hands into fists and tried to bend forward. That hurt even worse. Sucking in air, he sat back up and looked around.
A sound split the air. He recognized it. Perhaps that was what had woken him up.
The tortured screech repeated.
Raptors.
They were hunting.
He lolled forward and found he was sitting in the passenger seat of the Dodge pickup truck, buckled in tightly. He shook his head to clear it and glanced out the side window. Outside, it was too dark to see more than the tips of the weeds glowing under the moonlight. Stars dotted the horizon. There was a blueness to it all, too.
Near dawn.
He saw something flicker in the rearview mirror. Another screech reached his ears, coming from a different direction, off to his right.
A man jogged across the street to the passenger side of the truck. He stopped in front of a small campfire burning about ten feet away.
Jesse could see the silhouette of a shadowy figure dressed in a long black coat.
Cory.
; The white gauze wrapped around Cory's head was enough to trigger the memories of what had happened. All began to make sense again, a blurry, stomach-churning sense.
Jesse rapped his knuckles on the glass and flopped back against the headrest, slurping drool into his mouth. Thick bandages covered his left shoulder and caused him to come to rest twisted toward the passenger window.
Cory came alongside, checked, and opened the door.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Fine,” Jesse breathed.
A moment passed between them. Neither had to say a thing, and yet, Jesse felt a deep understanding and camaraderie with the man. The guy had saved him when he could have very easily left him to die.
Jesse drank from a canteen Cory held up for him. Much of the water dribbled down and soaked into his torn shirt, but it helped to clear away the confusion and soothe the rawness in his throat.
“You going to be okay?” Cory asked.
“Never better,” Jesse replied.
Cory said nothing. He went to the fire and retrieved a spit of cooked meat. Raptor, thigh meat, probably, heavy, dark, and often laced with connective tissues.
“Here, eat.”
Jesse wasn't hungry. His stomach ached too much to eat. But he knew he should.
“Eat,” Cory repeated, this time with more emphasis.
Closing his eyes, Jesse pictured he was about to eat a giant cheeseburger. Even that didn't make him hungry. He took a bite and began to gnaw on it. “Thanks,” he said between chews.
“Want more?”
“No.”
Jesse tried to raise his hand to point but couldn't.
“Hey, Cory,” he said.
“Yes, what?”
“Behind you.”
About fifty feet away, raptors were coming through the weeds with their heads poked up above the tall stalks and swiveling back and forth. They hissed and spread out. Jesse tried to free himself from the seatbelt, but his muscles would not obey. He fumbled, reaching for the release, trying to press the button to unlatch himself but could not seem to mash it down.
He tried again.
No luck.
Cory backed into the truck, shutting the open passenger door. All Jesse could do was feebly rest his head against the window and watch.
“No, don't,” he said. “Don't.” Clumsily, he patted his waist with the back of his hand, feeling for the familiar bulge his M9 made at his hip. It was gone. But his shotgun was on the seat beside him within easy reach.
Cory walked around to the other side of the truck. Jesse had trouble tracking him. His neck muscles were too weak. Cory then made his way back to the fire carrying the crowbar Jesse had found in the basement. He stopped to pick up a burning stick with his other hand.
Raptors stepped into the street. They scratched the pavement in challenge.
“Cory,” Jesse tried to say, but it came out as a mewling rasp.
The raptors shifted and continued forward until they were about twenty feet from the man in black. Cory seemed to change his mind about how he would deal with the raptors. He stuck the burning stick back into the fire, lowered the crowbar, squatted down on his heels, and waited.
The raptors approached warily, four in total. Three were about half the size of Cory. The other was nearly his same height. Their eyes reflected the bright moonlight above. All were scarred horribly, thin, and malnourished. Their jaws opened and closed mechanically, and they hissed and took occasional swipes with their fore claws. The large one cocked its head sideways, blinking rapidly.
Jesse heard a sound that, at first, he didn't believe. Whistling. He didn't recognize the tune, but it was coming from Cory. The guy appeared completely at ease with raptors closing in on him. They continued to approach, moving with suspicious flicks of their tails. Cory made no threatening moves in response. Instead, he remained near the fire, continuing to whistle. He had stuck the metal crowbar in the ground next to him, within reach, but he was otherwise unarmed. A raptor came around the front-end of the truck, sneaking up on Cory from his left.
“No, watch out,” Jesse said, rolling his forehead against the greasy window.
The large raptor in the approaching group stopped. The two next to it came at Cory straight on.
The two were keeping him distracted.
Jesse saw another in the side mirror moving around the rear bumper. All together, they had Cory surrounded. He patted his hand on the seat next to him, feeling for his shotgun. He found it, but when his hand closed around the barrel, the gun slipped off the seat and landed on the floorboard, making it impossible to get to while still buckled into the seat.
“Run,” he said in Cory's direction. He wanted to yell, but couldn't get the words out of his mouth any louder than a hoarse whisper.
The raptors crept closer. Jesse continued to watch the one in the side mirror.
Closer.
Still closer.
Then the one coming at Cory from behind lunged, jaws open, claws outstretched, one-hundred percent committed to its attack.
With a sudden, almost instantaneous ferocity, Cory reached for the crowbar and whipped it around in a circular motion. The hooked end of the bar caught the leaping raptor in the neck. The momentum of the strike carried the bar to the raptor pouncing from the opposite direction, slamming the body of the first into the body of the second. Cory twisted his hips, spun on his heels, carrying the twin raptors along with his stroke, hitting a third that had tried to charge him from straight on. He then rose to standing and drove them all to the ground. With his foot, he crushed the heads of the three in turn. The single remaining raptor and its remaining companion hissed, turned, and sped off across the street and into the weeds.
Jesse blew out a sigh of relief, knowing he should have trusted Cory's abilities a little more. The man had kept himself alive and traveled cross-country all the way from New York. He had to have killed thousands of raptors along the way.
This was just a warmup for him.
With the attackers now dead or chased off, Cory jammed the bar back into the dirt, collected the three corpses, and tossed them next to the fire. He wiped his hands on his jacket, returned to the truck, and opened the door.
“Nice work,” Jesse said.
“Feeling better?” Cory asked.
“Peachy.”
“Can you walk?”
“Of course,” Jesse mumbled. He grinned and again tried to reach the seatbelt release, but the twisting motion caused the pain in his injured shoulder to ignite, and he slumped against the seat.
“Apparently not,” Cory replied. “Rest. We'll figure it out in the morning.”
Jesse, seeing yellow stars, pulled his head back. He thought of his handgun again and wanted to ask Cory where it was.
Then something new demanded his attention.
“Cory, you better get in the truck.”
“What?”
“Now would be good.”
Cory took notice of what Jesse had seen and stiffened. At least a dozen or more raptors were moving through the tall weeds across the street, coming shark swift, heading for the driver's side of the truck. Cory snatched up the crowbar again and went to the fire.
“No. Get in the truck. Drive. Now.”
“I can't drive,” Cory said.
“What? You can't drive? Seriously?”
“No, never learned how to. Move over.”
“Can't, I'm stuck,” Jesse said. He tried again to get the seatbelt to release, mashing the button with his thumb.
Cory leaned inside, unbuckled the seatbelt, and maneuvered Jesse into the driver's seat.
Jesse nearly passed out from the pain, but he got his legs past the center console and into the driver's side footwell. He slumped forward against the steering wheel, recovering. Cory hopped in the seat next to him.
“I can't,” Jesse said. He lifted himself away from the steering wheel and checked the mirrors.
The raptors had reached the truck. Some split off to go around to the still
open passenger side. Cory leaned over to buckle Jesse into the driver's seat.
“Close the—”
Before Jesse could finish, a raptor stuck its head through the open doorway and started snapping and tearing at Cory.
Cory kicked the raptor's head into the door panel with his foot and knocked it outside the truck. He pulled the door shut with a clang. More raptors leapt into the bed of the truck and started smashing into the rear window. Those impacts made a dull thumping sound inside, but the window held. Even more jumped on the hood, skittering and sliding as they tried to balance themselves on the smooth metal surface. Two of them pecked and scratched at the front window, creating a flurry of wild movement, and tearing off the bladeless wiper arms.
Jesse watched as the solar charger he had put on the truck earlier spun off the roof and went bouncing over the hood before dropping over the front-end. He hoped it had given the battery enough of a charge.
He felt for the key in the ignition and was slightly surprised it was still there. He turned it. The pre-start light in the dashboard winked on. It would take a few seconds for the glow plugs to heat up enough for the diesel engine to start.
“Start it,” Cory said.
“Not yet.”
“Why?”
A loud boom rocked the cab. Cory twisted in his seat and raised the crowbar. He was ready to smash it through the window.
“No,” Jesse said.
“No, what?”
“No, use the shotgun.”
Cory picked up the shotgun from the floorboard and pointed it at the raptors pounding against the back window. Another thump sounded as a raptor head-butted the window. The front windshield, already pitted and cracked by small fractures, shattered into a spider web pattern on the passenger side, and the entire window sagged inward. He aimed the shotgun at the first raptor trying to break through.
Jesse checked the dashboard again. The light was still lit.
A few more seconds.
A raptor punched its head and neck through the windshield, pushing past the protective layers of plastic film. It snapped at Cory. He crammed the shotgun in the creature's mouth and pulled the trigger.
Red Asphalt: Raptor Apocalypse Book 2 Page 17
