by Ryan Schow
She looked at Elizabeth and smiled, then she said, “Would you like that?”
The girl nodded, her young eyes looking up at Lenna, who looked so beautiful he almost couldn’t stand it.
“Well you can stay with us for as long as you want,” she said. “Forever even, if you choose.”
She looked up at Jagger and he gave her a reassuring nod. “You want to go back and play with the kids?”
“Yes, please.”
“Well then,” he said, “off you go.”
She walked down the hallway, leaving Jagger with Lenna. He turned to her and said, “She survived something horrific. I couldn’t leave her alone. And I’m glad I didn’t. That little angel is someone very, very special.”
“You’re too far away from me,” Lenna said. He went to her and she hugged him around the waist. “Sometimes I wonder if you’re even real right now.”
“I am. We are. And now we’re back together.”
Chapter Eighty-Three
My husband is back. My brother is back. Lenna finally has her husband and the boys have their father back. Indigo has her mother, too. She has my brother and the chance to let go of her father, maybe make a new life, one I actually want. Indigo seems to be throwing herself into Rex and he’s been freaking googly-eyed over her. Even Macy is feeling better and hanging out a lot with Hagan, Ballard and Atlanta. And I love, love, LOVE little Elizabeth! She’s such a blessing to our family, one more person to adore, a terrific balance to our family.
And Stanton. Oh my God, Stanton.
Rider told me about the attack across the street because Stanton kept it to himself. So when I heard what he did, I have to say, my attraction to him soared. SOARED! My man has his confidence back, one he’s earned and continues to earn. All of this makes me wonder if we are in bad times, but good times, too.
I know it’s hard to imagine a reality like this being possible. Especially in a world as downtrodden as this one. But with all the craziness of life behind us, we are forced back to each other. Our jobs no longer rule us, nor do school activities or things like consumption and ego. Our families are everything to us. We will do everything to protect them, to take care of them, to grow and expand them. Who would have thought?
Not me.
But now…now for the first time, I’m hopeful, Stanton is hopeful, our families are hopeful. I’m not sure where this will go, and I’m positive there will be new struggles, but now that we are together, we are most certainly stronger as a group than either of us were on our own.
The sun is going down on the horizon and we’ve had a good day of collections. I walk down the hall down and out back where I find the guys. They’re smoking fat cigars and drinking warm brandy. I catch them talking about the best way to defend the college, but also how many people they can take in and what it takes to sustain all of us.
These will most likely be our conversations for awhile, but one day they won’t. One day this abnormal will be every day’s normal. I pray for that day.
And I know in my heart that day will come.
Chapter Eighty-Four
The prisoner sat in a jail cell, unwilling to sleep, fists ready and jaw set. There were four other men in there with him, brutes through and through. One of them was now dead. He was the guy who couldn’t stop snoring, the guy who kept everyone awake. Two of the three guys now asleep, they were the ones who beat this guy to death hours earlier.
Behind him, the prisoner heard rubber soles walking on the polished concrete floors of the jail. He turned around, saw the deranged Mall Cop who had been playing guard.
“C’mere,” his jailer whispered.
The prisoner got up and walked to the bars, using every last ounce of energy he had to not look whipped.
Through the bars, the guard handed him a peach and said, “Eat quietly, toss the pit out here when you’re done.”
He did.
The next night the guard came by and found the prisoner beaten badly. In the center of the cell, one of the remaining survivors was sprawled out on the floor with his skull stomped in.
“What happened?”
The prisoner shrugged his shoulders. He had swollen knuckles and one of his shoes was gone. In the corner was the other man, also looking sufficiently trampled, but not dead. He was holding a shoe. The third man was asleep. He slept all the time.
“He take that?” the guard asked, nodding at the guy with the shoe.
“I’m gonna get it back.”
“Then what?”
The prisoner shrugged his shoulders, narrowed eyes on the guy with his shoe.
“If you could get out of here,” the guard asked, quietly, almost conspiratorially, “where would you go?”
“Home, of course.”
“If you even have one,” the guard challenged.
“Home isn’t a place anymore,” the prisoner replied, “it’s a person.”
“Your wife?”
He shook his head, held the guard’s eye.
“Girlfriend?”
“Daughter,” he replied.
“She got a name?”
“Of course she’s got a name.”
“You want another peach, or am I wasting my time on you?”
“Her name is Indigo.”
“That’s a beautiful name,” he says, un-holstering his weapon and taking out his keys. “It was also my grandmother’s favorite color.”
With that, he pointed the gun inside the cell, but no one moved. He opened the door, stepped aside for the prisoner and said, “Good luck, friend.”
Nickolas Platt stood and looked at the guard, eye to eye to see if he was full of it. Apparently he wasn’t. Nick walked out of the cell and said, “Thanks.” Then: “You got any extra shoes? Size ten maybe?”
“The world is full of dead people, friend,” he said, handing Nick a small peach. “You’ll have no problem finding a pair of shoes. Like I said, good luck.”
“Thanks,” Nick said wondering how the hell he was going to get from San Diego to San Francisco on foot. “I’m pretty sure I’m going to need it.”
END OF BOOK 3
The next adventure begins in May, 2018!
Follow Indigo’s father, Nick Platt, as he slogs through the California mires in the second trilogy of this über successful, post-apocalyptic adventure series.
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Ryan Schow, The Last War Box Set_A Post-Apocalyptic EMP Survivor Thriller
