"But if yer three stayed..."
Nobody responded further.
They all got out of the vehicle and made the steep walk up the road that led to the church. Nobody asked why Pickle had stopped at the bottom of the hill. They all guessed why. He was being cautious. And his caution was justified when the person in front, Elza, told everyone to get down.
They went behind a brick wall that was opposite the defunct and abandoned youth centre. All peered over the wall to see six bikes outside the church. It was plainly obvious that the owners of the bikes had gone in the Church of the Good Shepherd, and Pickle gasped when Elza and Ophelia stood up, grasping their bats. It looked like the pair of them were going to take a chance and go in.
"What the hell are yer doing?" Pickle stood to his feet and grabbed a hold of Elza. "Yer not going in. Yer would be killed for sure."
"That's our place," Elza snapped. "Let go of me, Pickle."
Pickle gave her an apologetic look and released his grip.
"It's not your place anymore," said Karen. "And if they leave, what's going to be left for you? Let's go before they come out."
Reluctantly, Elza and Ophelia followed Karen, Pickle and Stephanie back to the jeep. It wasn't what they wanted, but they were going back to Little Haywood.
They had no choice.
Chapter Forty
Paul Dickson hit the tarmac with his tired feet and couldn't wait to get back through that gate of Colwyn Place, despite being aware that he wasn't the most popular of residents. He had had a falling out with John Lincoln, Stephen Bonser had never liked him, and now he had upset and frightened one of his very few allies: Joanne Hammett.
Going back and seeing the people didn't matter to Paul. All he could think about now was his bed and a bottle of filtered water to wet the inside of his throat.
The sound of an engine had made Paul go back into the woods once more and he continued to walk deeper in, hoping that he wouldn't be seen. The car roared by and now Paul turned and headed back to the main road. Walking in the woods was stifling and the bumpy ground slowed him down. It was safer in the woods, but it was quicker on the road.
His steps had stopped when he saw a human female to his right. She had her hand resting against a tree and was stood still. She was shaking with fright and smiled at Paul, hoping he was a friendly individual.
He could see the fear on her face. Was this man some psycho? There were plenty of them now.
He raised his hand and produced a smile to try and calm the woman, who was only twenty yards from him.
He called over, "Are you okay?"
She nodded, but remained where she was.
Paul placed his hand on his chest and said, "Don't worry. I'm not some kind of crazy person. I had a family ... once." He paused. He didn't know what else to say to this woman.
She took her hand off the tree and took a slow stroll over to him. She looked reasonably well-dressed and seemed in a healthy state.
"Going anywhere?" he asked her.
She shrugged and told him that she was staying with a family, but they had gone out to visit a relative and never came back.
"So you have a place?" Paul asked her. "How come you're out here, in the woods?"
She opened her mouth, but no words fell out. She seemed reluctant to answer.
"It's okay," Paul tried to appease her. "I'm staying somewhere. I got split up from a friend and I'm now heading back. You're welcome to join us."
She smiled, convinced that Paul was genuine and said, "Thanks, but ... I'm okay."
She glared at the machete that was under his belt. Clocking this he said, "For protection."
She patted her pocket. "I have a knife."
"It's been a rough few months, hasn't it?"
"Yes." She smiled. "You could say that."
Paul could still see that she was unsure of him and pitied the woman. He had no idea what she must have gone through to get this far.
"Look, I know it's a messed up world now, but I'm a good guy. I lost my family, only lost my son a couple of weeks ago, and I'm just like you ... trying to survive, for reasons I still don't know."
The woman smiled, but it was a thin smile, a sad smile. She had long dark hair, her face was clean and despite there being no make-up on her face, he could see that she was an attractive thing. She cleared her throat and said, "I also lost a son."
"I'm sorry." Paul took a step closer to the woman.
She added, "I lost him before the apocalypse. He was taken from me by some sick person."
"I'm sorry to hear that."
"In a strange kind of way..." She paused, unsure whether to finish her sentence. "I wouldn't want him to live in this new world, hungry, tired and full of fear. I'm not saying I'm glad he's gone—"
"I think I understand. My wife and daughter never came back when they left to go to the shops." Paul began to explain his background. "Me and my son managed to last three months after the announcement, then he was attacked."
"You actually saw him dying?"
Paul nodded. "My poor little Kyle. My big chap. Poor thing never managed to reach double figures. How cruel is that?"
"My son never reached double figures either. My Brian was a lovely thing. So cute. He was only six when he..."
"What happened to him?"
She lowered her head and mumbled, "He was kidnapped."
"Oh shit."
She added, "He was out playing and was snatched. He was sexually abused. Two days later, after I reported him missing, he was found in a field. Dead."
"And the father?"
She tried to compose herself, cleared her throat and added with a quiver in her voice, "He wasn't around in the beginning. Then he wanted to start spending time with him. He was devastated when Brian died and vowed to kill the man responsible, but the Murphy family were a well known bunch of thugs."
Paul looked at the woman with suspicion. Despite their demise, the Murphy name kept on popping up from time to time. Paul was lost in thought, but was soon snapped out of it when the woman asked if he was far from his destination.
"Not too far now. Don't worry, I'm not going to ask where you stay, but I will wish you good luck."
"Thank you."
"You sure you don't wanna come back with me?"
"Thanks. But I'm fine on my own. Really."
They both heard the tinny sound of a motor in the distance and looked at one another. Paul crouched down behind a tree and she did the same. They both waited in silence for it to pass. Paul could actually see that it was two mopeds going by. Once the sound faded in the distance, he stood up and so did the woman.
"Time to say goodbye then," he said and held out his hand.
She shook it and nodded. "Yes."
"I didn't catch your name," Paul said.
She smiled. "Does it matter?"
"Guess not."
Paul turned and walked away, heading back to the main road. The woman also walked away, in the opposite direction, heading deeper into the woods. He turned around and could see the back of her and continued watching until the trees swallowed her up. Where was she going?
"So long," he whispered.
*
Paul's feet were back on the tarmac and he had now been on the road for a few minutes. He could feel an irritating trickle of sweat running down from the back of his neck, down his spine to the top of his backside.
He began to think about the brief meeting with the woman.
He thought about her background, her son and how the poor thing had been killed by one of the Murphys. Fucking Murphys! They probably didn't know, or care, how much damage they had caused over the years. Fucking peasants!
Paul then remembered some of the things she had said to him, reliving the conversation, as his feet continued to walk along the road.
He suddenly stopped and scratched his head. "Wait a minute."
Her son was killed by one of the Murphys. It must have been Kevin Murphy, as he was a known sex offender. She also told h
im that the dad never showed interest until years after the boy was born. The son was also called Brian.
"Shit!"
Paul turned around and began running along the road, the opposite way. He tried to work out where he had come out of the woods when he had finished his conversation with the woman. He then veered left, entered the woodland and ran through the trees as if he was being chased.
Puffing and panting, he managed to run half a mile through the wooded area, without falling over, and could now see that the woods were thinning out and that there was a road further up.
He got out of the other side and was on the tarmac. He looked both ways and could see a body in the middle of the road, further up. "Oh no."
He ran towards the body and knew that it was her. It was the woman he had spoken to earlier.
His run began to turn into a jog, then a brisk walk, and could see clearly now that it was her.
She was on her back, she was half-naked from the bottom down, and her jeans and pants had been thrown to the side of the road. She looked to have been strangled to death after being raped. Paul Dickson wondered if he was cursed.
He guessed that he had said farewell to the woman only about fifteen minutes ago, maybe twenty. Now she was dead. She had survived for three months of this apocalypse, she meets up with Paul Dickson and she's dead minutes later.
Paul crouched down and placed his fingers over her eyes to close them. He then wondered how her demise came about. It couldn't have been the WOE clan. She would have heard them approaching. They always seemed to travel by moped, sometimes a pickup. It must have been some random nutjob, lurking about in the woods. He checked her pocket and pulled out the small knife that she kept there.
She never had chance to pull it out.
It was small and looked blunt. He threw it into the woods and placed his hand on the woman's forehead. "I'm so sorry that this happened to you."
Paul put his arms under the woman's armpits, and began dragging her to the side. He lay her down gently and felt guilty for leaving her there. She was going to lie there for months, being nibbled on by the animals of the woods, but there was nothing else he could do. He had no tools to bury the woman, and he had no time to do it even if he did have the tools.
He pulled out his machete and prepared for the unexpected. If there was a psycho out there, then he wasn't very far away, but if he or she was hidden and saw Paul Dickson walking with a large blade in his hand, they would think twice about jumping the man. Or so he hoped.
He thought about her story once more: Brian. The Murphys. The father not being around in the early years.
He was sure that the dead woman was Vince's old flame, the mother of his dead son, but couldn't be one hundred percent certain. He released a heavy sigh and decided that this was a story that Vince didn't need to hear once he returned to Colwyn Place.
He headed back into the woods, his senses on high alert, and headed back to the main road, the road back to Little Haywood.
Chapter Forty One
Jez was peering out of the bedroom window. He could see the evening drawing in and knew that darkness was only a few hours away. He could hear Craig snoring in the other room and had a look around the room that had been given to him. He liked Craig. Craig was a tough bastard, and Jez knew he was in better hands with Craig than those nutcases with the mopeds. However, he knew that if ever he was caught by any of those members on the road, he would be killed for his betrayal. There was no doubt about that.
He yawned and headed for the bedroom window once his ears picked up the sound of an engine. He wasn't nervous. The doors were locked and was sure that the vehicle he could hear was probably just passing by. He peered out from behind the curtain once more and saw a black Range Rover pull over.
From where he was standing, he could see that the vehicle was full of people and was taken aback when a good-looking woman, brown hair and tied in a ponytail, stepped out of the vehicle. She went to the side and pulled down her bottom clothing to urinate. Jez continued to watch, and once the woman returned to the vehicle and the Range Rover sped off, he released the curtains and went back to lie on his bed.
He wondered if the people in that vehicle were good guys and wondered if they had a place to go to. He put his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. He had a twinge in his groin area and now couldn't stop thinking about the woman that had got out of the Range Rover.
*
This time Pickle had decided to go to Little Haywood another way. Instead of going along Sandy Lane, he decided to go through Draycott Park and into Slitting Mill. This route produced memories for Karen as they went by her old street. She thought of Gary, when she left him as a Snatcher, and remembered when she returned some weeks later with Pickle and Vince and destroyed the Snatcher that was once Gary.
As the vehicle went through Draycott and out of Rugeley, there were dozens of bodies, mainly charred, and a burnt our car that used to be a Porsche. It belonged to prison officer Jamie Thomson and was stolen from the prison staff car park by escaped inmate Gary Jenson.
Pickle was on the Hednesford Road and went by Stile Cop Road on the left, then took a right into Slitting Mill. The black jeep went along the road and Elza announced from the back that she needed to 'wet her flaps.'
"Wet yer what?" Pickle thought he had misheard the woman, and Karen was now in the passenger seat, laughing at Elza's comment.
"I think Elza needs to go to the bathroom," Karen tried to explain to the driver. "A piss, Pickle."
"Alright, alright," Pickle huffed. "I get it."
He pulled the jeep over and parked it at the side of the road.
"Try not to peek," Elza tried to tease as she got out.
"I'm gay," Pickle said and laughed. "Minge just isn't ma thing, yer know. But if Vince was here..."
Once Elza was finished, she got back into the vehicle and Pickle drove away, heading back to Little Haywood, back to Colwyn Place.
Elza and Karen were talking about when they bumped into them at the Lea Hall building. They talked about Vince and when he touched Elza and she attacked him. Elza thought he was a creep, but Karen soon stuck up for him.
"He's alright once you get to know him," she said. "I hated him at first, but he grows on you."
"So do tumours," scoffed Elza.
"He's nice." Stephanie also joined in. "I like Vince."
"I know you do." Karen grunted, "And you saved his life. I'm trying to think when I started to like him."
Pickle laughed, "I think it took about four weeks before yer two started becoming civil to one another."
"Okay," Elza spoke up and added, "if he's a good guy, then I believe you. Looks like me and Ophelia are gonna be getting to know him if we're staying at this Colwyn Place."
"It'll be good having three newcomers," Pickle commented. "Feels like we don't belong there at the moment, but I'm sure that feeling will pass."
"How do you mean?" queried Stephanie.
"Well, I had a minor altercation with John Lincoln, the guy that runs the show, and Paul has had a few run-ins with the locals."
"Are you saying that they could throw you out?"
"I don't think that'll happen," Pickle said. "They don't have much muscle in that place. They'll need me, Karen and Vince there, even Paul. Anyway, Vince is a legend round that area."
Pickle was pondering whether to tell them the story about Paul and Joanne, but decided not to. "We'll need to keep a close eye on Paul when he gets back." He looked at Karen.
She nodded. "If you think so. I hope he makes it back."
"He will."
"So who are the strong personalities in this camp of yours?" Elza asked. She then looked to the side and noticed Ophelia had nodded off.
"John Lincoln," Pickle began. "A man called Stephen Bonser, James Thomson and another fellow by the name o' Terry. It's a bit o' a them and us mentality at the moment with a few o' them, but I'm sure it'll settle down. Maybe they're just paranoid o' us."
"Well, if
it doesn't change, and you think this Lincoln guy is going to kick you off the site..." Elza allowed her sentence to trail.
Pickle looked at her through the rear view mirror. He could see that Ophelia was asleep and Stephanie was staring out of the passenger window. "Go on."
"Then maybe we should kill the strong characters. Tell the rest of the folk this is how it is from now on, then we can all stay and everyone knows where they stand."
Pickle laughed, convinced that Elza was joking, "And how would we kill them?"
"Easy. We stab them while they sleep in their beds."
Pickle looked at Elza once more, using the rear view mirror, and lost his smile when it was clear that her face was solemn.
He had to ask, "Are yer being serious?"
"Why not?" She shrugged her shoulders as if what she had stated was nothing. "If they're prepared to throw us out."
"If we did that, then we're no better than Jason Bonser, the Murphys and Theodore Davidson."
Elza laughed, "I have no idea of the names you just mentioned. I'm from Birmingham, not from around here."
Pickle and Karen peeked at one another with astonishment on their faces. Pickle scratched at the side of his head in thought and said, "Let me get this straight. Yer quite prepared to butcher four men?"
Elza nodded. "If it means staying in comfort."
"I could never agree to that." Pickle took a left and they went over the Wolseley Bridge. They weren't far away now.
"You're too soft, Pickle."
"One thing I'm not, and that is soft." He glared at Elza and added, "We will speak no more about killing innocent people in their beds. Got it?"
"Pickle, I was joking." Elza smiled and shook her head.
Pickle smirked at Elza through the mirror and admitted, "Yer got me."
Elza had just told Pickle that she was joking about killing four residents she didn't know, but he played along. He didn't believe her. He thought she was being serious and thought that he would have to keep a close eye on Elza Crowe and her companion Ophelia White.
Pickle turned into the street once the gate was slid back and hoped that Paul had arrived. It was getting late. If Paul wasn't here, then Pickle was going back out the next day sometime, whether Lincoln liked it or not.
Snatchers (Book 10): The Dead Don't Care Page 17
