“I kicked it under a bush.”
“Me, too. I’ll try to sneak away in the morning and bury them.”
The only sounds in the camp were crickets, frogs, and soft, muddled conversations as people settled into their tents. Isabel rolled onto her back, quiet for a time.
“If you could have,” Greg whispered, barely audible, “would you have stayed in Pete’s clan as an illegal?”
“Without citizenship? Are you crazy?”
Yes, but no crazier than Kearney or the rest of this camp. These rebels had fire in their veins. If Greg didn’t have a family and Carrie back in Shelton—or virtual handcuffs around him now—he could see himself joining a group like this, living off the land, always on the move. Not just hoping for a better life, but fighting to create it.
He felt Isabel shrug. “If I did, it would have only been for Pete. Nothing else about this life appeals to me. I actually like eating. Why? Would you?”
“In a heartbeat.”
She went up on an elbow and leaned far enough into his personal space that he saw her dark shadow above him. “Even now, after everything you’ve seen?”
“Especially now, after everything I’ve seen.”
“But you’d lose your green card,” she whispered urgently. “Your liberty.”
“Actually, I’d be gainin’ it.”
She huffed. “My uncle thinks he can turn you, but he’s wrong. So, you’re a fan of their stupid motto, Live free or die? If you feel so strongly, why not just run? If you were determined enough, I doubt even I could stop you.”
He rolled away from her. “I’ve got my reasons.”
“Then you better shut up,” she whispered, “because any more of this talk and I’ll turn you in myself. I can’t have you become a liability on me, Pierce. You’re on a mission. We own you now.”
“As if I don’t know that!” he hissed.
“Ah,” she breathed. “Uncle Charlie really did threaten them. So you’ll stab your fellow rebels in the back to keep your loved ones safe?” He heard a smile enter her voice. “And here I thought you were heartless.”
Using his arm as a pillow on the scratchy, dirty tent floor, he shifted around until he found a comfortable spot and begged himself to fall asleep.
Greg woke to the sound of a fire crackling and the smell of breakfast. Bacon. Eggs. Mush. He didn’t care what was out there, his stomach grumbled. He’d slept deeper and warmer than expected. Then he realized why. Isabel was curled up beside him, arm draped over his chest.
He threw her arm off him and scooted away until he ran into the damp tent wall.
Moaning softly, Isabel snuggled into her blanket.
Greg rubbed the crinks from his neck and stretched out his back. The joy of sleeping on a hard, rocky ground.
Isabel hoped to figure out the general plan of the rebellion today, including where and when they would strike next. This group was small, but she hoped they knew enough to help McCormick so she and Greg could move on and do the whole thing over again. Over and over, clan after clan until McCormick—or President Rigsby—was satisfied. If there wasn’t a dark-haired woman two feet away, Greg would have lain back down and tried to hibernate away this assignment. Instead, he grabbed his shoes.
Isabel rolled over with a deep yawn. “Sleep well, honey bun?”
“I’m gonna walk around for a bit,” he said, lacing his shoes.
She bolted upright. “Wait. Don’t go without me, sweetums.”
Greg rolled his eyes. She was overdoing the wife bit, but he waited anyway. The sun barely screened through the leaves, dancing on the sides of their blue tent. The morning was cool and damp with dew. Greg planned to head straight to the crackling fire to warm up.
Once Isabel was ready, they emerged from the tent. She grabbed his cold hand, interlacing fingers with him. He rolled his eyes again but didn’t pull free.
The illegals milled about. Some hovered around small fires, some worked on breakfast, and the rest—a small group of leaders—met off to the side, speaking in hushed, concerned whispers. McCormick would want Greg to eavesdrop on that little meeting, but Greg stayed close to the crackling fire, hands outstretched to absorb the heat.
A man handed him a bowl of steaming oatmeal. Greg sat on a log and Isabel snuggled into him with her own bowl. Greg had nearly finished eating when the group of leaders headed back to the fire.
“Sleep well?” Kearney asked, joining them.
“Yeah,” Greg said, setting his bowl aside. “Thanks for the tent. We appreciate the hospitality. Just put us to work today. We’re hard workers.” At least, Isabel better be.
Kearney nodded. “Good. You can help me dig pits for the new outhouses, Greg.”
Although Greg had dug more holes in the last six years than he ever cared to, he nodded. It was something mindless he could do. Something un-devastating to the rebellion.
“How are you at mending jeans, Isabel?” Kearney asked.
“Amazing,” Isabel said without batting an eye.
She probably hadn’t touched a needle in her life, but this was good. Already they’d been accepted in. If Greg could convince Isabel to lie low for a few days, give them time to settle before they snooped, he might even be able to—
“Kearney!” somebody shouted, tromping through the brush on a run. “Come quick!”
Kearney jumped up and met a young guy—Travis, if Greg remembered right—outside of the small ring of people. Travis held something up. Greg saw a flash of camouflage, and his stomach dropped.
Isabel’s fingers dug into his leg. “No,” she breathed.
Government-issued bags.
Their government-issued bags.
Kearney ripped open Greg’s bag and grabbed a handful of supplies. Radios. Maps. Greg’s favorite gun.
Greg’s eyes darted around the camp, but Kearney didn’t give him time to formulate a plan.
“Grab them!” Kearney shouted.
The entire camp descended on Greg and Isabel.
thirty-eight
MEN GRABBED ISABEL and Greg and dragged them over to Kearney who held the two bags in front of them. Greg struggled, trying to regain his footing.
“What. Are. These?” Kearney said, veins popping out of his dirty forehead. On the side of each camouflaged bag was a single white star, the new seal of the United States.
Three guys held Greg. Isabel was a few feet away in the same predicament. Neither answered, but Greg’s mind raced for possible explanations that wouldn’t get them shot.
Kearney dumped the contents onto the dirt. Green cards, radios, pistols, and plenty of other condemning things which Greg didn’t see because one of the guys slammed a rifle down on Greg’s thigh.
With a scream of pain, Greg dropped to the dirt.
Another guy kicked his shoulder. Someone got his gut. His face. Pain exploded everywhere. His mind went cloudy. Greg could barely hear Isabel’s screams over his own. But one terrifying thought slipped through: he was going to die. Here. Now.
The beatings suddenly stopped. The men stood back, breathing heavily, leaving Greg to writhe on the dirt. His thigh. His shoulder. Above his own moans, he heard Isabel sobbing. Had they beaten her, too?
He needed to see. He forced his clenched eyes open, but instead of seeing Isabel, a green citizenship card hung inches from his face, held by Kearney.
“Gregory Curtis Pierce,” Kearney read. “Special Operative, Federal Patrol Unit. I knew something wasn’t right.” Standing, he flipped the green card, end over end, into the fire. Then he said, “Kill them both.”
A man grabbed Greg’s favorite pistol.
Greg squirmed, trying to scramble to his knees, but two guys held him down. He twisted, kicked, and clawed the ground, desperate to get free until something hard rammed into his temple, and he heard a gun’s safety click off by his ear.
“Wait!” he shouted. “Wait! Let me explain.”
“Oh, you’ve done enough talking, spy,” Kearney sneered.
Gre
g saw another fist coming but had nowhere to go. It slammed into his jaw. His head snapped back. The world turned to fog. When it cleared, metal grinded against his forehead.
Gun.
“Sixty seconds!” Greg yelled. “Just give me—”
A shriek pierced the air. “Greg!”
Squinting through a mass of legs, Greg saw Isabel on her knees, knife at her throat.
“Kearney!” Greg shouted with terror. “Give me sixty seconds to explain, then you can shoot us both. Please. Just sixty!”
Kearney crouched next to him, eyes ablaze. But he nodded at the guys holding Greg, and they loosened their grip.
“Sixty seconds. Go.”
Greg tried to sit, but pain shot down his thigh. They’d busted his leg, and his shoulder felt dislocated. So he spoke from the ground.
“You’re right. We’re government spies. They sent us to find the heart of the resistance.”
The man holding the knife to Isabel’s neck snorted. “He’s not helping your case, is he, princess?”
Tears streaked down Isabel’s face.
“I know it doesn’t look like it,” Greg said through gritted teeth, “but I’m actually on the rebellion’s side. What I told you was true. I hate the government more than anybody here, but they forced me into this ‘cause they threatened my family. I want nothin’ more than to see President Rigsby hang. And to prove it”—he motioned to the pile on the ground—“my commander’s trackin’ our movement right now through those radios. So, before you do another thing, you’d better destroy them.”
Kearney’s gaze flickered to the pile. “How do I know this isn’t some ploy, and those radios won’t blow up the second I touch them?”
Shouts of assent echoed through the group.
“Let me do it,” Greg said. “I’d love nothin’ more than to burn the noose they got around my neck.”
Kearney considered this a moment. Then he stood and tossed the radios into the fire. “Okay. Your sixty seconds are up.”
The pistol pressed into Greg’s skull again.
“The government’s onto you!” Greg yelled. “They know everything. They knew right where your camp would be, and that y’all have fifteen camps in this area.”
Kearney turned back slowly. “What did you say?”
“They just don’t know who’s leadin’ the pack or where the headquarters are. But it doesn’t matter. The whole wrath of the U.S. Army is about to descend on your rebellion, so you gotta move out and form a new base somewhere else, and you gotta do it now. Trust nobody. Don’t let anybody into your camps, not even people with scars.”
Kearney looked around his group. Then he shook his head with a sly smile. “Your numbers are way off, spy. We have twice that many and growing by the day. This area is perfect. We haven’t seen a single patrolman since we set up camp. You must know that, so you want us to move to a heavier-patrolled area.”
“They suspended all local sweeps so you wouldn’t run!” Greg said in exasperation. “I’m tellin’ you, they’re onto your game. They’re ready to wipe out the whole rebellion, but you can’t let them.”
For a second time, Kearney’s eyes darted from person to person. Greg chanced another peek at Isabel. A guy still held a knife at her neck. She not only looked terrified but sickened by what Greg had divulged. He didn’t care. If his life was over, something good better come of it.
Kearney crossed the small circle and crouched in front of Greg again.
“Why are you telling me this?” he said. “We’re just going to kill you both anyway. Surely you know this.”
Live free or die.
Greg finally understood the words. If his death helped somebody else live free, especially those in Logan Pond, then it was worth it.
The pain in his head, shoulder, and leg pulsed and throbbed, making Kearney’s face go in and out of focus, but he set his jaw.
“‘Cause you gotta win,” Greg said. “The only people I care about live in constant fear and starvation. Your rebellion, this new civil war of yours, is their only chance at a real future. You gotta take Rigsby down.”
Angry shouts broke out in the group. Several, including the guy holding Greg, yelled at Kearney not to listen and just shoot them already. Others seemed to be considering what Greg said. But Kearney glared at Greg and only Greg.
Then something changed in Kearney’s demeanor. His gaze swept beyond the group toward the woods and the sky.
Suddenly urgent, he called, “Pack up camp. We’re moving out.”
A ripple of surprise rocked the group.
“We’ll keep these two as hostages and make examples of them,” Kearney continued. “Let the government know what happens when they send spies. Drew, send word to the other groups and tell them we’re on the move. Tell them to head for—”
Greg saw a blur of movement. He heard a grunt, and the man holding Isabel dropped. Isabel scrambled across the ground, grabbed something from the pile of supplies, and shouted one word at Greg.
“Run!”
Before Greg could process, she lobbed something into the air. A second later, an explosion rocked the ground. Smoke, wood chips, and dirt rained down on Greg.
A hand grenade.
It was enough.
Chaos erupted.
Greg punched the guy’s knees holding the gun. The guy dropped. Greg swung around and kicked another guy. Something popped in Greg’s bad shoulder, causing more pain, but the guy fell.
Greg’s path was clear.
Another explosion shook the camp, close enough Greg felt the heat blast on his back.
More screaming. Smoke filled the air.
Rolling, Greg grabbed his pistol and aimed it at the next guy who grabbed him. The guy’s hands flew up, face white as a sheet. He wasn’t an adult. He was just a kid, barely older than Zach. That snapped Greg out of what he’d nearly done. He chucked his gun into the woods and stumbled back. His leg wasn’t working, so he dragged it behind him as people ran for cover.
A third explosion, this one near the tents.
Greg searched for Isabel. He couldn’t see or hear her through the smoke and mass of people, so he took off into the woods on a lumbered run.
Adrenaline and six weeks of heavy training pushed him through the agonizing pain. He darted in and around the thick underbrush, away from the camp. But he couldn’t hold the pace. His upper leg was on fire, and his shoulder killed. Finding a thick tree trunk, he doubled over to catch his breath. Then he listened and peered around the tree.
Nobody followed, but he could hear the chaos back in camp.
A few gunshots fired off.
Isabel.
His stomach churned with acid. They’d killed her. She was dead.
All he could think was that should have been him.
Isabel had saved his life.
His insides started to shake quickly followed by his hands. Balling them into fists, he assessed the extent of his injuries. His shoulder hung awkwardly in front of him. Dislocated. An eye was swollen shut, his lip was fattened, too, and fresh blood thickened the side of his beard. But his leg worried him the most. Hopefully it was just a deep bruise and not a cracked thigh bone. His leg had gotten him this far. It would have to get him the rest of the way.
But first he had to fix his shoulder.
Gathering his courage, Greg rammed it against the massive tree trunk. With a cry, he fell back, tripped on his bad leg, and ended up on the ground, clutching his leg, swallowing back a scream.
Stupid, idiotic move.
The second time he tried to fix his shoulder, he was more prepared for the jolt of pain. He still had to bite back a shout as he threw himself at the tree, but he felt the pop in his shoulder. His arm sat at a more natural angle, but the agonizing pain continued. He tried to rotate it with little success. For all he knew, he’d only made it worse.
Giving up on his shoulder, he spotted the position of the sun and set a course due west, straight for Shelton, Illinois.
As he limped
toward home, his conscience began to eat at him. Every step, every drag of his bad leg, the same word sounded over and over in his mind:
Isabel. Isabel. Isabel.
He had deserted her. She saved his life creating that diversion, and he ran without a second glance. Just because he’d heard gunshots didn’t mean she was dead. He didn’t even like her, but she was still his partner.
Isabel.
Isabel.
Isabel.
She was probably dead. Or maybe she had escaped like he had.
But if not…
She was the enemy, a true spy, but they’d hold her hostage. Make an example of her.
A few more agonizing limps.
What would they do to her, especially if they found out she was the niece of the commander in charge? They’d torture her. The resistance’s first hostage. It might even be enough to help the rebellion, to give them the edge to win.
He should let it go. Forget everything—forget her. Isabel was the enemy. They wouldn’t let him live if he turned around. He should go home, see Carrie, and live his mom’s last days with her. Be free. He should leave while he still could.
Only…
…he couldn’t.
Closing his eyes, Greg wondered which side he was on anymore.
Maybe just humanity’s.
Turning, he started back for the camp.
* * * * *
Carrie eyed Terrell’s rifle as they crouched in a patch of woods west of the Watercrest neighborhood. She really wished he wouldn’t bring guns on these explorations. They were here to find friends and people to trade with, not to start a war.
The second they had approached the outskirts of the subdivision, Carrie could tell things were different. She couldn’t even put a finger on why. The area just felt more…alive. Terrell and Richard looked nervous, which in turn made her nervous.
“What next?” Richard said, crouched low.
“If they post guards,” Terrell whispered, “which they’d have to do without Oliver, they’ve already spotted us. Check for movement on the rooftops.”
As one, they scanned the houses. Watercrest was larger than Logan Pond, spanning several streets. There was no way to know anything for sure from their position.
Citizens of Logan Pond Box Set Page 69
