Apokalypsis Book One

by Kate Morris

  “Best thing that’s happened to me in a long time, this virus shit,” he told her. “Lot better than serving out my time in that fleabag shithole.”

  He was released from prison. This man who was going to rape and probably kill her and take their food supply was released as a non-violent offender. That’s what he’d made it sound like. There was nothing non-violent about what he was doing to her and about to do, and he seemed proficient at the task and knowledgeable.

  “Stop, please,” she said, trying another tactic. “I’ll give you whatever you want. I’ll give you our food and money. We don’t have much, but you can have it all.”

  He ran his hands all over her body, making her want to vomit, then ripped her shirt the rest of the way. “You’ll do that anyway when I’m done with you, girl.”

  “You don’t have to do this,” she said, trying to reason with him.

  “Bitch, I ain’t had a woman in three years,” he told her as if it made this acceptable. His hand tugged her panties to the side, and he reached inside and touched her as no man ever had before.

  “Please, I’ve never had sex before,” she pleaded, attempting to find some shred of humanity in his heart. “Please, don’t hurt me.”

  He was trying to get her legs apart, but Jane was still fighting him.

  “Stop fightin’ me, or I’ll make it hurt even more, girl,” he swore, spittle hitting her bare back. “I’ll do things you’ve never even dreamed.”

  He jammed his hand between her legs from behind and groped her roughly again. Then he ran a calloused palm over her butt cheek before slapping her hard there. It was enough to enrage Jane that he would take this from her without feelings or consequence. He unzipped his fly and pressed himself against her and moaned. She reared back as he leaned over her, preparing to rape her. Her head struck him in the nose. He screamed bloody murder at her, gripped her upper arm, and spun her around. His nose was gushing blood, but Jane didn’t care. Her forehead was bleeding where he’d caused her to hit it against the sharp stone and bricks of the fireplace hearth. She could feel it running down her forehead.

  He glared at her, so Jane backed up.

  “Now I’m gonna hurt you real bad, bitch,” he swore and spit blood on the hardwood floor. Jane backed up further, bumping into the hutch.

  Her eyes darted around looking for escape. There was only one way out. It was behind him. She wriggled her wrists trying to free them from his leather belt.

  “Get away from her!” Nana Peaches shouted as she stormed into the room, startling the man.

  “What are you gonna do, old woman?” he sneered and reached out and snagged Jane by the arm again. Her limbs were shaky and unstable, so he hauled her up against him as if she were a child.

  “You let her go. I let you go,” her grandmother promised. “That’s the only deal you’ll get here today, mister.”

  Jane was relieved to see the pistol in her Nana’s hand. Her stance was confident, not fearful and timid.

  “I don’t need your permission to take what I want around here, old woman,” the man told her. “That pistol don’t scare me none.”

  “Young man, you’d better move on, lest you find yourself doing so with a few extra holes in that body.”

  He pushed Jane as hard as he could apparently because she smacked into the hutch. She couldn’t do anything to stop herself because her hands were still fastened behind her back. She hit the hutch and then the hardwood floor. It was the last thing she remembered.

  Jane coughed, startled at her surroundings. Her eyes came slowly into focus, and she blinked a few times to clear her head. Everything was fuzzy. Was she blind? Was she dead? Then she felt the cool, hardwood floor against her thigh. As her eyesight cleared, she realized she was on the floor staring at the wall in the dining room. She recognized the wallpaper. She coughed and sputtered again.

  “Jane!” Roman screamed. “Jesus,” he swore under his breath, his voice drawing closer.

  She tried to find him but couldn’t. He wasn’t in front of her, and the room was nearly dark. It wasn’t that her vision was gone; it was just that the sun had set. How long had she been on the floor?

  Her arms were still pinned behind her as she tried to move. Roman quickly freed them, but the muscles were so sore and stiff from being like that for a while that she could barely move them. Then she felt his arms sliding under her, lifting her gently off the floor and cradling her against his chest as he strode from the dining room. He paused to take a wide step. He stooped and placed her carefully on the sofa and wrapped her in an afghan her grandmother had crocheted.

  “Where’s Connor?” he asked with urgency.

  She looked around. The room was a wreck. Everything flooded back into her vision and memory. The man, the coffee table he’d thrown her onto, his violent behavior, her grandmother.

  “Jane! Can you hear me? Where’s Connor?”

  She regarded Roman with weary eyes, “The basement. He made me leave him down there. Then he locked the door.”

  “Stay here,” he shouted in her face as if she were deaf. “Do you hear me? Wait here. Don’t move!”

  She nodded, her head doing a weird bobbing motion that she could scarcely control. A minute later, he returned carrying Connor, who was sobbing and red-faced. He placed his little brother on the opposite sofa and covered him with a blanket.

  “Connor, wait here,” he told him. “The house is locked now. No more bad people can get in here. You wait here. Do you understand? Don’t move off this couch.”

  Connor nodded, traumatized and scared. Roman then went to Jane and lifted her in his arms again.

  “Where are we going?” she asked weakly, her head screaming at her as if it would split in two from pain.

  “Shower,” he said. “I need to get you cleaned up.”

  He carried her up the stairs easily and gently placed her on the closed toilet seat in the bathroom. Next, he turned on the water in the shower.

  “Where’s Nana Peaches?” she asked with confusion. When she furrowed her brow, it hurt, so she stopped. “Where’s my grandmother?”

  “Let’s get you cleaned up,” he said, avoiding eye contact.

  “Roman, what happened? Where’s my grandma?”

  He knelt in front of her and cupped her cheek softly. His eyes were tortured. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t here. I’m so sorry.”

  “Your mother,” she said, remembering the reason he left them.

  He shook his head, tears springing to his eyes. “Gone. She’s gone.”

  “Oh, Roman,” she croaked, feeling her own tears well.

  “Did he rape you, Jane?” he asked, anger returning.

  “I don’t think so. No, no, he tried. He was going to,” she said. “I tried so hard to fight him, Roman. He was too big.”

  Then the memories came back entirely. They flooded into her brain at lightning speed.

  “We took the apples to the cellar. When we came back up, he was there, just standing there in the kitchen. He made Connor stay in the basement so he wouldn’t see. Then he took me to the living room. I fought him.”

  She wanted so badly to be proud of herself for putting up a fight, but in truth it was pathetic. He’d won. Very easily.

  “Nana came in and told him to leave me alone,” she said. “Did she shoot him? Is he dead?”

  Roman nodded slowly. Jane felt relief and even tried to smile, but it hurt too much to do so.

  “Thank God,” she remarked.

  He shook his head. “Jane, she…she’s dead. I don’t know what happened. It looks like maybe they wrestled over the gun and she was shot, too. I don’t know. I’m not sure. He’s outside on the ground dead. He must’ve stumbled away and died out there.”

  A tremble deep within her began, and she couldn’t stop it. Jane shook her head, knowing he had to be lying.

  “N-n-no, no, she had the gun,” she said with disbelief. “She threatened him. He pushed me, and I think I hit something and blacked out. I woke up on the flo
or. She’s down there. Or she’s outside. She’s not dead…”

  “Yes, she is, honey. I saw her in the dining room. I checked her. I saw her before I saw you. I was just on my way out to look for you because I didn’t see you on the other side of the table. I already checked her for a pulse, Jane. She’s gone.”

  Jane flew into a tangent and started pummeling his chest and shoulders. He pulled her close and let her do what she wanted until she melted into a ball of tears and anguish against him. After a while, Roman pulled back.

  “Come on. You need to shower, Jane,” he said. “You’re…there’s blood all over you. I need to get your wounds cleaned and covered. That man could’ve been infected.”

  She nodded and stood on weak legs as he stood.

  “I can help you,” he offered, to which she quickly shook her head, not wanting him to touch her. Everything hurt.

  Then she remembered she was in her underwear and shredded top and felt embarrassed. She tried to pull the blanket around her, but it was small. Roman took the hint and went to the door.

  “I’m going down to deal with Connor. If you need me, just yell. I won’t be far.”

  She just stood there for a long time after Roman left. Then Jane looked in the mirror and was sorry she did so. Her hair was a tangled, knotted mess. She had a bruise on her cheekbone, a laceration to match the one from yesterday on her forehead and bruising on her jaw. Both upper arms were bruised, and so was her hip, terribly so. Her eyes were sunken and black underneath, haunted. She stopped looking, having seen enough, and instead stripped and got in the shower. Everything on her just felt numb or painful to the touch. She collapsed onto the floor of the tub and sat there with her legs drawn up crying and hugging around her knees as the shower beat hot water down on her.

  All she could think was that her grandmother, her one constant in this world was gone, murdered by the man who wanted to rape her. She was just gone, and Jane was robbed of saying goodbye to her, of thanking her for saving her life. She’d died alone on the dining room floor. Jane just wanted all this madness to end. She wanted to wake up from this nightmare.

  When she could not cry anymore, she stood and washed her hair, which was also painful because she found two new lumps on her head. As she was toweling off, Jane vaguely remembered that Roman indicated his mother was also dead. He’d lost everyone but Connor. The look in her eyes staring back at her in the mirror matched the one she saw in his last night. He’d changed. Now, so had she. In a forty-eight-hour period, they’d both become adults in a way. Everyone they cared about was being taken from them, picked off one by one. Now they only had each other. She felt physically and emotionally drained and broken. The only family she had left was her father, who she couldn’t reach. The only person she had at all was Roman.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  He rushed down the stairs and ushered Connor out to the truck, careful of his little brother seeing Peaches or the dead man.

  “I need you to stay here for a minute, okay?”

  “I’m scared,” he said and started crying again.

  Roman gave him a bottle of water, “Drink this, buddy. I need to get Jane. We need to go to our house tonight, okay? It’s not safe here.”

  “Where’s Miss Peaches?”

  His words cut into him. This was all his fault.

  “She’s not coming with us,” he said. “Just stay here and if anyone comes down the lane, beep the horn. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  Connor curled up on the front seat as if he were afraid even to put his legs down. Roman felt like shit about this. He never should’ve gone to the med site today. He should’ve been here for them. He knew he’d never forgive himself for it, either. He was also not going to repeat this mistake.

  Roman rushed back in, found the linen closet upstairs, thanked God for the fact that Jane was still in the shower, and took two sheets downstairs to the dining room. He covered her body and collected the gun. He dislodged the magazine. Two rounds were missing. Then he ran outside and covered the man, who was in the backyard. He wasn’t a detective, but he figured Peaches tussled about with the man and ended up getting shot first. He was just glad she was still able to kill him. Son-of-a-bitch piece of shit.

  He heard the door to the bathroom upstairs open and darted back up. Jane came out in a towel and nothing else. A few weeks ago, he would’ve been thrilled at seeing Jane Livingston damp and sexy and in nothing but a towel. Tonight, he just felt guilt and shame. Her small body was covered in bruises and lacerations.

  “Come on, Jane,” he said, going ahead of her into her bedroom. It was small but tidy. A tall dresser to his left. “Let’s get you dressed and get out of here.”

  “But my grandmother,” she said softly as if she were still in a daze. “I need…”

  “I’m taking you and Connor to my house. You’ll be safer there. I’ll come back and take care of everything.”

  “No, I need to help. You can’t do this by yourself.”

  He ignored her, gently grasped her slim shoulders and encouraged her to sit on her bed with the soft-looking and worn, hand-sewn quilt. Roman dug through her drawers and found her panties, socks, a pale-yellow t-shirt, a mint green sweater, and jeans.

  “Here, Jane,” he said. “Put these on. I’ll be back for you in five minutes. Hurry. I have Connor waiting out in the car for us.”

  She nodded jerkily and began removing the towel. She was obviously out of it. Roman averted his eyes and left, closing her door softly behind him. Then he went to their linen closet again and grabbed down a piece of luggage. It had to be some sort of antique because it was made out of tapestry material done in a blue floral print and had wooden handles. It didn’t matter. He just needed to fill it with some things. He dashed to the bathroom and tossed in her brush, which she must’ve just used because it was discarded in the sink bowl. He also took maxi-pads out from under the sink because he didn’t know if she’d need anything like that tonight. Her deodorant, toothbrush, and hair ties were next. Then he went to her bedroom and found the door open. When he entered, she was curled up into a fetal position on the bed and not moving. Roman ignored her. He had to for now. He rummaged her drawers and jammed as much of her clothing into the bag as he could. Then he found a gym bag on the floor of her closet and took the few pairs of shoes she had, as well as jackets, hoodies, and pants on hangers.

  He slung the pack, carried her bag, and went to her. “Jane, come on. Let’s get out of here.”

  He didn’t wait for her to respond. Roman got an arm under her waist and pulled her to her feet. They had to keep moving. It was the key to their survival for a while.

  After he had her slip her feet into boots by the door and placed her and the bags inside the truck, they drove to his house where he left them both upstairs in his room. They were exhausted, cried out, traumatized, and depressed. He knelt beside Jane where she was laying on his bed pressed into Connor’s back and placed the pistol he collected from Peaches on the nightstand.

  “I’m setting the alarm,” he told her.

  “Don’t go!” she exclaimed in haste, a tear immediately slipping down her cheek.

  He shook his head. “I have to. Stay here with Connor. If that alarm goes off, shoot anyone that comes through that door. When I come back, you’ll know it’s me because the alarm won’t go off. You have the pistol and the shotgun. Use both if you have to.”

  She nodded, and Roman stood. Looking down at them brought up every worst nightmare possibility to the forefront of his consciousness. He leaned over and kissed them both on the cheek.

  Roman rushed back out, setting the alarm on the way, and sped over to Peaches’s farm. He hauled the dead man’s body away first, using the wheelbarrow they’d used the other day to transport crates of apples. He dumped him in the woods behind their property. As he was pushing the wheelbarrow back to the house, he heard the same cannon sounds in the distance they’d heard last night. Then he heard the air sirens letting people know of the curfew. He tu
rned and looked to the north where it seemed the booms were coming from. Every once in a while, something would explode, jar the earth beneath his feet, and an orange and silver glow would temporarily light the night sky. If it weren’t for his neighborhood, he might’ve been able to see the source better.

  He hurried and dragged Peaches from her home and placed her more carefully inside the wheelbarrow. It seemed wrong to do. She was such a classy, dignified woman, but Roman couldn’t do all of this without help, and Jane sure as hell wasn’t helping him. He didn’t want her to see her grandmother in this state. She’d bled out from the bullet wound in her stomach. He pushed her out just past the apple orchard she loved so well, dumped her body on the ground and rolled her into the sheet again. Somewhere in a nearby neighborhood, a dog barked as if he sensed Roman’s wrongdoing. Then he dug a shallow grave. It took a few hours to do. He hauled her body down into the three-feet-deep hole and covered her in. When he was done, Roman sat on the ground and drank a bottle of water. He was exhausted, it was after midnight, and he still had a ton of work to do.

  He jogged to the house and backed the truck over to the side door, letting down the tailgate. The phone in his pocket bleeped. It was his friend Brian. He took the call and talked to him for a few minutes. Both of his parents were dead. Destiny’s father and twin brothers also died earlier in the evening, all from the fevers. His friend was driving to Destiny’s to be with her and her mother and look after them. Roman told him about his own parents and now Jane’s grandmother. He warned him about the dangers they’d faced and to beware of rapists and murderers, not just the ones who were infected.

  Roman began hauling the food supply out of the basement to the back of the truck. It was no longer safe to live in this house. They had to hole up somewhere safer, and his neighborhood seemed better than her house standing all alone and ripe for the picking. He even looted their fridge and freezer and took all of the food there that they could eat. Load after load he carried to the truck. Crates of apples, the supplies they took from the stores the other day, and canned goods. He ran back downstairs to pick up the last two crates of apples from the cold cellar portion of the basement and accidentally stuck his foot through an old wooden pallet under him.