Melt (Book 8): Hold

by Pike, JJ

  She had nothing else to say to him. She had to move on.

  “We have to talk about Jo.” Michael was shouting but Alice had things to do. If he needed her, he’d find her.

  Aggie was back. Blink. In the trees. Blinkblink brainfritz blink.

  Alice wasn’t aware of having sought her daughter out. Or going into the woods. Or untethering Helen and Claire. Maybe Aggie could see she wasn’t right in the head and had come to help?

  “Hello, my darling daughter. What can I do for you?”

  Helen and Claire were babbling about Alistair. Alice didn’t track. How did they know Alistair?

  “These are the girls who robbed us, Mom. Hannah and Chloe robbed us.”

  Helen and Claire had been at Jo’s place, but Aggie seemed to be suggesting they were to blame for the depletion of their stocks, too. Hannah and Chloe. She’d called them Hannah and Chloe. H/C. They were the same girls.

  Oh, no! They’d been looking for silver. Barb had said she’d buried Charlotte where the silver had been. Past tense. Had they found it? Damn. That was a low blow. She’d meant to use that to send the family west. Or south. Yes, south might be good. It was heresy to even think it, but they could head for Guatemala.

  “Mom. Are you listening? Hannah and Chloe robbed us. They tied Reggie up and abandoned him and then they kidnapped me.”

  That snapped Alice out of her reverie. “Kidnapped you?”

  “It’s not a big deal.” Aggie was petting Reggie who was trying to get Maggie-loo to play. “They didn’t hurt me. Alistair said the Council would go easy on me because they knew you.”

  “Alistair released you?”

  “He doesn’t release anyone,” said Helen. Maybe she was Hannah, maybe Chloe. What did it matter? She was one of Alistair’s Wolfjaw crazies.

  “You work for Alistair?” said Alice.

  The girls nodded in perfect unison. “He made us do it. You don’t know what he’s like. If you don’t do as he says he’ll hurt someone you love.”

  Alice didn’t doubt it. She’d brokered an agreement with him precisely because of his dictatorial tendencies. She didn’t want him coming after her people if the SHTF. He was a madman, a crazy, a loon. He thought he was one thing when his actions said he was quite another.

  “Alistair let you go?” It was a serious matter. If his minions had kidnapped her daughter it was one thing. If he’d authorized it, it was quite another. Everything hung on Aggie’s answer. If he’d let her go—released back to her people because of their agreement—then Jo stood a chance of being released herself. Amazing how adrenaline brings you back into your body, makes things clear, shows you all the pieces of the puzzle at one time.

  “No. I escaped,” said Aggie. “Alistair didn’t lift a finger to help me.”

  Alice was on the move. Ready to raise an army. It wasn’t revenge she was after. It was justice. Alistair had broken their agreement, harmed her daughter, and would kill Jo if he hadn’t already. She had to get herself to Wolfjaw and liberate Jo before it was too late.

  Saving Jo Morgan from a monster was the least she could do. For once, she could be the avenging angel.

  They would go. They would fight. They would win. This time the girl—the woman, the neighbor, the friend—wouldn’t die at the hands of a madman. Alice Everlee wasn’t about to let that happen.

  I am become death, destroyer of worlds. Me he convertido en la muerte, destructor de mundos.

  But in this instance, it meant something else. It meant something good.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Just as Alistair had predicted, Josephine Morgan was led to the stocks, hands and feet secured, then pelted with balled-up socks, old t-shirts, and a range of clothing he didn’t care to identify.

  When the sun dipped behind the trees, Alistair pulled a deck chair behind the stocks and sat where he wasn’t in the line of fire, but she could hear him. “I trusted you.”

  She hadn’t spoken for a long time. Not since she’d told her proxy-lawyer not to offer any kind of defense. Now that she was being bombarded with clothing there was little chance she’d speak.

  That didn’t matter. Alistair wanted to be heard, not hear excuses. “I thought you might eventually come around to our way of thinking. Your way of life—out in the country, growing some of your own food, depending on your neighbors for help and succor—seemed so close to ours. But it was all a lie. A down and dirty, no good lie.”

  The shouts from the Ridgers venting their spleen weren’t as pleasing to Alistair as he had hoped they might be. A part of him felt sorry for her. She’d failed. She had to be miserable in this moment. His own shame, though, was far more pressing. He didn’t feel one hundred percent culpable, but neither did he feel exonerated by the discoveries of the last hour. That she’d been taking notes, making reports, blathering behind their backs was galling. But it transpired that she’d been far worse than he feared, a possible killer, no less. What other horrors were secreted in her closet?

  Dear God. Had she bugged Wolfjaw? He’d been careful—some had even said paranoid—about securing their electronic data, making sure conversations were only undertaken in safe spaces that had been swept for bugs, only allowing certain information to be shared to select people he’d trusted. But she’d been in any number of their protected spaces. She would have seen, studied even! their security measures and might very well have taken countermeasures of her own. When he was done interrogating her he was going to get Jacinta and her team to do a sweep of Wolfjaw Down. What an unbelievable idiot he’d been to take her down there.

  Note to self: let not your pride bring about your downfall.

  She cleared her throat and spat. That was more likely a commentary on the dirt coming her way than a response to what he was saying.

  The shouts were getting louder. He’d thought they’d be done by now, but it seemed the Ridgers were gathering more steam, not less. It gave him cover. He could talk freely, knowing no one but Josephine Morgan would hear him.

  “You weren’t the only one with secrets, you know. For example, you didn’t know Alice had been to see me.” It made him feel slightly better that the two neighbors hadn’t compared notes. Not a lot better, but a little. He’d learned his lesson. Don’t trust outsiders. They will always let you down. Don’t look to them, depend on them, ask them for anything. The only person you can depend on is yourself.

  He took out his pocketknife and quartered his apple, carefully putting the core by so one of the gardeners could harvest the seeds.

  “You didn’t even guess that we’d built an underground city.” He took a bite, savoring the tartness of the homegrown fruit. “But that’s neither here nor there. My triumphs are mine to enjoy; your failings yours to endure. What I want to know is: why were you coming here? What was—your phrase, not mine—what was the ‘end game?’ Were you compiling a dossier on us? Does our way of life offend you? Are we doing any harm?”

  Josephine mumbled.

  “Sorry?” Alistair stepped up and leaned closer to the stocks. “You might as well talk to me. You’re never getting out of here. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I said screw you.”

  Alistair laughed. There was to be no heart-to-heart. No revelation. He was to be left to his own imagination. An FBI agent had been part of their lives but, as Mandy had pointed out, the agency hadn’t so much as visited them. So be it. The FBI had been wiped off the map or, if not the map, out of New York. Soon he and his people would be safe in their underground city with no one to bother them. Ever.

  “If you didn’t know I was FBI until today…” Wow, she was talking. “Imagine what else you missed.”

  Well, shit. He didn’t need that in his head. He stood and walked back towards the Council chamber. Leave Josephine to her mind games and the screams and cries of the outraged Ridgers. He had bigger fish to fry.

  “Imagine what else you missed. Imagine…Imagine…” He couldn’t get it out of his head no matter which ear-worm cleanser he tried. “Don
’t allow it to taunt you,” he thought. “Turn it into a teachable moment. What can you learn from this?”

  The Ridgers were going ballistic, yelling and screaming and letting Jo have it. Herb had stayed close by. He wouldn’t let it get out of hand. The law mattered, never more so than now when her life hung in the balance. He could leave Herb to it and continue with his cogitations.

  “What might you have missed?” Think, man, think.

  The MagPie contingent had been routed. According to the scouts they’d dispersed and wouldn’t be back any time soon.

  Alice and Bill Everlee had not returned to their home. There was no danger of Alice finding out he’d broken their agreement and raided their supplies. He was safe on that score. He’d already given it some thought. Alice was absent. If she had returned he and his people would have been at loggerheads. As it was, he’d be underground shortly. Who did that leave? The Everlee children. She couldn’t have told them of the agreement or they’d have mounted an attack on Wolfjaw by now.

  He stopped midstride.

  Was that why Agatha Everlee had come to Wolfjaw? Was she the forward guard? Were they going to try the impossible? It all hinged on what they knew. If Alice had shared the details of their accord—the Everlees and Wolfjaw would leave one another alone, should the SHTF—the children would know he’d broken that agreement and would definitely be on their way; revenge in their hearts, pillaging on their minds.

  He turned in time to see Herb racing towards him. Why was the man always blotchy and sweaty?

  “They’re coming!” he shrieked. “Move! Move! Move! They’re coming.”

  Alistair didn’t wait. He ran as fast as his legs would carry him towards Wolfjaw Down. If they were being invaded, and it certainly sounded that way, he needed to protect the crown jewel of their compound.

  Jacinta was already at the door to Down, ushering the new recruits towards the stairs. She’d saved the train car for him. He couldn’t climb in just yet. He had to make sure his people were safe.

  “Do we know who it is?” she asked.

  “No clue. Herb said ‘they’ were coming, nothing more.” He cast his mind back. The noises the Ridgers had been making when they were punishing Josephine: might those have been the sounds of battle? Had he been sitting, jawing, when the enemy was at the gate? Didn’t matter. What mattered was protecting what they had.

  “Think about what you might have missed.”

  “Did anyone tell the Council?”

  “They’re already down there.” Jacinta was counting people off as they passed her.

  “Think. What have you missed?” He didn’t plan to fetch Josephine. She’d already been dealt a death sentence. If she went down in the fight, so be it. What else? Where else were the Ridgers? Most had been at the coals, so they’d have been easy to round up. Jacinta had made sure the elders were secured. The soldiers. He’d convinced them to come all this way with the promise of a better life. He couldn’t abandon them. “Did you get the kids out of the isolation tank?”

  Jacinta’s face fell. “Shoot. I didn’t. I’ll go and…”

  “No.” He wanted to thank her. Tell her what an incredible job she’d done. Just in case.

  “Just in case you missed THE THING that makes all the difference, you mean?”

  “I’ll go. You stay and make sure everyone gets below ground. If I’m not back before the invaders get within a thousand feet of our entrance, you’re to close and lock the hatch. Do you understand?”

  Jacinta nodded, her face grave.

  He patted her shoulder and sprinted away. She knew what he felt. It didn’t need to be put into words.

  The sounds emanating from the main square were heaving, grunting, thumping sounds, not soft-lobbed laundry and insults. Why was there no gunfire? His people, surely, would know they were allowed to use bullets to repel boarders in this instance?

  Alistair slid behind the Watson’s house, raced across the gap between their place and the Abuha’s, then on to the huge vegetable patch round back of the Jensen’s place. They’d taken down their deer fencing. How weird. They were fanatical about protecting their produce. He dropped to his belly and squirmed through the runner beans and summer squash and sunflower stalks. They’d planned to harvest all of this and bring it to Down with them, but they might be denied that pleasure if they were chased below ground for more than a day or so. When Hurricane Erin turned inland they wouldn’t be allowed to leave Down.

  There was a gap of 300 feet between the edge of the vegetable garden and the stairs to the isolation tank’s control center. That wasn’t where he needed to go. There was no door opener. He was going to need to climb up the front steps and open the doors manually. That would leave him exposed to the invaders.

  A shot echoed across the compound. Just his luck. Someone had decided to ratchet up the aggression right as he was most vulnerable. It was like one of those appalling geometry puzzles that Josephine insisted were good for the brain. What angle? What speed? What were his odds?

  The drop button. Yes. Another air-punch moment for Alistair Lewk. He could slip into the control room and hit the drop button and his new recruits would fall to safety.

  He stayed on his belly. He had no cover from either side, but he was less visible if he remained horizontal.

  The foot landing in the small of his back came as a surprise.

  “Slowly.” It was Herb. What in the world? “Hands behind your head.”

  “Herb? It’s me.”

  “Hands behind your head.”

  Alistair felt the cold muzzle of a gun touch the back of his neck. It sent shivers down his spine and back up again. One wrong move and he’d be dead. He shuffled his hands forward, palms flat so that the traitor could see he wasn’t armed and laced his fingers together behind his head.

  Herb had the effrontery to cuff his wrists together.

  “Slowly. No sudden moves. Roll over and get onto your knees.”

  Alistair did as he was instructed, though it took longer than he’d hoped and lacked dignity. Rolling over and getting up with your hands cuffed behind your head turned out to be more demanding than he had imagined. “What are you doing, Herb?”

  “You’re under arrest.”

  “You can’t arrest me.”

  “Just did.” Herb’s manner had changed. He was more confident, less jittery. “Walk in front of me.” He used his weapon as a pointer.

  Alistair looked towards the sensory deprivation tank. “You need to get them out of there. Hypothermia can set in if they’re left too long.”

  “That’s already been seen to,” said Herb. “Keep moving.”

  They marched towards the central square. There’d still only been one shot fired. Alistair was itching to know what was going on. With luck, Jacinta had realized there was some kind of bloodless coup going on and had already shut the doors to Wolfjaw Down.

  When they finally rounded the last house and walked into the square, Alistair found his perimeter guard kneeling in the dirt in three, neat rows, their hands similarly tied behind their heads.

  They were surrounded by the armed intruders. He couldn’t see any faces. The intruders wore bandanas. They didn’t want to be identified. As if that mattered any more. There was no “law enforcement” left and his people had put down their arms. The point now was to survive. They only fought if their lives were in danger. Just hours before they were to decamp to their underground nirvana they’d been taken down by a bunch of thugs.

  “Join them.” Herb didn’t use his rifle as a prod or a stick. He merely gave the order as an order.

  Alistair knelt in the dirt. There were 14 men and 3 women with him on the ground. The perimeter guard, it seemed, had been disarmed. He didn’t know the duty roster by heart, but the numbers made sense. Only a tiny handful of non-guards had been rounded up. With any luck that meant most of his people had made it to safety. That was a comfort. All that remained was to get these 17 people below ground where they belonged.

  He co
uldn’t decide who was the invaders’ leader, so he addressed Herb. Though the man was a turncoat he was a known entity. He had a legalistic turn of mind. He’d listen to reason. “These people have done nothing to you. Let them go. I’m the one you want.”

  “You didn’t work out what you’d missed, I see?” Josephine Morgan rubbed her wrists as she made her way from the stocks to the square.

  “So you were coming for us all along.” It was a shock. No question. He’d been sure—sure, sure, absolutely sure—that the FBI was an organization in shambles, just like the government, but here they were, rounding up his men, and freeing Josephine.

  “Not me,” said Josephine.

  One of the invaders stepped to Josephine’s side and lowered her bandana. “Me. I was the one coming for you.”

  Alice Everlee. Not just that, Alice Everlee with a pitbull by her side.

  Alistair dropped from his kneeling position onto his butt. You could have knocked him down with the lightest puff of air.

  “How are you doing?” Alice embraced Josephine. “We came as soon as we realized you were in trouble.”

  “I take it that’s Agatha?” She pointed to the young woman standing closest to Alistair as she ripped off her bandana. Josephine had been correct. It was Agatha Everlee. Damn. If anyone was going to have their revenge it was her.

  Josephine went around the circle, thanking the Everlees and their friends. Alistair had only ever heard the children’s names, but he didn’t hear them all called out. Agatha was there, but no Petra and no Paul. The youngest was too young for a raid, so no surprises there. There was a Hedwig, a Sean, a Michael, one Christine Baxter, and General Hoyt, whom he’d met down on the road. He never should have let them go. He’d been too soft. If he’d thought like a general, instead of giving those soldiers a choice, anyone who hadn’t elected to come to Wolfjaw would have been executed, thereby preventing this sorry state of affairs. As it was, the general had scurried back to Alice Everlee and drummed up a miniature invading force.

  Something flicked in the corner of his vision. Over by the gate. There was a ramshackle huddle of khaki-clad people. They didn’t have the bearing or confidence of soldiers, but they were in uniform. He squinted. It couldn’t be. There was a shred of something hanging out of a sleeve. Even staring as hard as he could it wasn’t clear what he was looking at. No. It wasn’t them. He was imagining things. Jacinta said she’d shot them out by the birch trees.