Angel Crawford #2: Even White Trash Zombies Get the Blues (26 page)

Nothing but the shuffling of my dad’s feet over the
grass. It seemed to take forever, but he finally made it across the field to me. I seized him in a hug. God, he felt so frail.

“You okay?” I asked, releasing him and raking my gaze over him.

He nodded, swallowed harshly. “Yeah. I’m fine. Now let’s get out of here, baby.”

“No, you have to keep walking,” I said, gesturing to the other end of the field. “A friend of mine is going to pick you up, and y’all have to get the hell away from here. Understand?” I could hear Ed’s truck rev as he began to ease toward the pick-up point.

He scowled. “I ain’t leaving you. You fuckin’ kidding? I’m your dad, goddammit.”

“Yeah, and I’m your daughter who needs to kick some ass but has to know you’re safe first, okay?” I gave him a hard look. He hesitated, and I knew he was remembering the time it was
his
ass I had to kick—or threaten to kick, at least.

“Please, Dad, you have to go,” I said urgently. “I have to know you’re all right.”

He hesitated, clearly agonized. He wanted to be there for me, help save the day. He’d dropped the ball too many times to count in the last few years, but he’d been there for me when it had counted most, when he had to make the choice between his wife and me.

“It’s okay,” I whispered. “You have to go. It’s the right thing. I can’t…do what I have to do if you’re here.”

Swallowing hard, he pulled me into another fierce hug. “Love you, Angelkins. I’m so proud of you.” He let me go, gave a nod. “You go kick whatever ass needs kicking.”

“I will,” I said with a shaky smile. “Now please, go get to safety.”

It had to have been the hardest thing he’d ever done, but he did it—kept walking and left me there in the middle of that field. I watched as Ed pulled up right by the gate and my dad climbed into the truck. I braced myself, and as soon Ed gunned the engine to get the hell out of there I broke into a sprint.

I knew I was fast, but the snipers must have been damn good. I felt two hits in my lower back, but I simply peeled my lips back in a feral smile and kept running. Sure, two shots would slow me down some, but…

I stumbled and went to my knees. My legs didn’t want to work properly.
What the hell?
I was so high on brains that should’ve barely caused a hitch in my stride. I fumbled to reach the bag in the side pocket of my pants, but my arms didn’t want to work either. Fear slammed through me as I slumped heavily onto my side. Numbness swept through me, but it wasn’t anything like the other times I’d been shot.

Not shot—tranqued
, I realized in horror as I watched a white van speed across the field and stop in front of me. I had no choice but to watch since I couldn’t move or turn my head.
If I’ve been drugged the parasite will take care of it
, I tried to reassure myself. But I knew, with a growing sense of horror, that it wouldn’t be quickly enough. My senses were fading, and I felt the first stirrings of hunger, but that was probably my parasite doing its best to simply keep me alive. Why should it care if I couldn’t move right now?

McKinney and another man exited the van and approached. McKinney crouched in my line of sight while
the other moved behind me. I could feel the second guy putting handcuffs on me or something similar. It was tough to be sure, since I had a Novocaine-type numbness throughout most of my body.

“Hello, sweetie,” McKinney said with a grin. “See? I kept my end of the bargain. And now you’re pumped full of enough animal tranquilizer to kill an elephant. I had a feeling that would be more effective—and so much less messy—than shooting you. My new partners are bringing a great deal to the table.” He gave a nod toward the other man and then gestured to—I assumed—the two snipers.

I couldn’t even blink, but apparently I was still able to glare daggers at him because he chuckled. “Fun times ahead, Angel. Fun times.”

Once I was safely handcuffed and leg-shackled, they made a fairly thorough search of my person. If I’d been able to curse—or even breathe deeply—I would have when they located the bag of brains in my side pocket. Instead I was absolutely shrieking in terror on the inside.

“Jesus,” I heard one of them mutter. “Is that…?”

“Brains?” McKinney answered. “Yes. And it’s the last thing we need to let her have right now.”

“That’s disgusting,” the first one said.

McKinney’s response was a bark of laughter. “Well, you’d better get used to it fast.”

After that, they put me in some sort of large metal box or container. It had plenty of air holes, though, so apparently they were easing up on me in that they weren’t going to let me suffocate. I lost track of time, but it didn’t seem to take long before a lesser sort of numbness began to take over my limbs, and I could wiggle my fingers and toes
again. But as the paralysis faded the hunger grew. Whatever I’d been drugged with had clearly forced my parasite to use up a lot of resources, and now it wanted to be fed. Badly. The hunger clawed at me, telling me to break the chains and get out of the box by any means necessary. The air holes allowed me to detect two people with lovely, edible brains in the back of the van with me. I wanted them both. I could take them—I knew that.

I clenched my teeth, breath hissing as I fought the urges. Even if I could break the chain on the handcuffs and shackles, I doubted that I could get through the metal of this box. It looked like the kind of container used to transport dangerous animals, like tigers and stuff. In fact, it probably was, now that I thought about it with the few brain cells still under my control. And if this thing could hold a six-hundred-pound tiger, there was no way my barely one hundred pounds would be able to break free, even with a zombie parasite on my side. I’d only damage myself more.

On the other hand, I had the advantage of being a scrawny little thing, and adequately limber enough to wiggle around and get the handcuffs in front of me. The air holes didn’t let in much light but there was enough for me to see that the skin of my wrists beneath the handcuffs was torn and I could see through to the bone. I’d lost a few fingernails as well, but I was used to that. My breath came in slow, rasping gurgles, and I made no effort to control it. Might as well see if I could freak out the men with me in the back of the van. It was insanely tempting to say something like, “I want to eat you,” but I didn’t want to risk them shooting or tranquing me again. I was in a bad enough state as it was.

Instead I curled up into a ball in the corner of the container, squeezing my eyes shut while I tried to focus on anything except how insanely hungry I was. When that didn’t work, I shifted my thoughts to what I would do when they opened the container. That would be my chance.

But if I break free, won’t they just come after me—or my dad—again?

My lips curled back in a silent snarl. Right now I was willing to take that chance. And if the hunger got any worse, I wouldn’t be able to control what I did when that door opened up.

But it did get worse. It was all I could think about. My entire existence narrowed down to an excruciating need to find brains. I had no idea how much time passed as we drove. I thought it was probably longer than half an hour, but beyond that I couldn’t be sure. I could barely hold onto rational thought, much less keep track of the passage of time. After a while I was aware of a low huffing growl, then realized it was coming from me. Not long after that, I was aware only of the hunger and the need to reach the two who were just out of my reach.

And then, brains. The scent filled the container, and I dove onto the chunks that dropped through one of the air holes, cramming them into my mouth one-handed as fast as I could. There was something wrong with my other hand, but I couldn’t figure out what just yet. Whining, I scrabbled at the hole and was rewarded with several more gobbets, dimly aware of conversation outside the box as I gulped them down.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“You were at the briefing. We went through what would happen.”

“Yeah, but—”

“But nothing. Give it another couple of minutes, then it’ll be safe to take her out.”

Shuddering, I pulled myself into a crouch as the warmth spread through me, so painful in its intensity that a gravelly wail escaped me. I wasn’t handcuffed anymore, or rather, the handcuffs now dangled from only my right wrist. My left wrist and hand were a mangled mess of bone and shredded skin, though they slowly pulled back together as I watched. I didn’t remember yanking my hand out of the cuff, but it was pretty obvious I’d done exactly that.

I took a deep breath—still a little raspy, but much improved. “I need more,” I croaked. “Please,” I added. “I’m…damaged, and still really hungry. I…I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

I heard a snort, wasn’t sure if it was contempt or disbelief, but a few more chunks dropped through the hole. I snarled silently as I scraped up everything I could from the floor of the container, but the snarl had nothing do with my more animal instincts and everything to do with the fact that I officially hated these motherfuckers with every fiber of my being for essentially making me eat off the goddamn floor and for doing all of this to me, and by fucking god I was going to make them pay somehow.

I took a deep breath and fought for calm. The one silver lining of going into total “monster mode” with the hunger was that I’d forgotten about the ace in the hole Ed had come up with. Good thing, because I wanted to save that for when I knew I could take maximum advantage of it.

And I could already tell that now was not that time.

I tried to see what I could through the air holes and realized with a start that I wasn’t in the van anymore. Couldn’t see much—just enough to let me know that I’d been moved while I was still out of my head. Some white walls. Several black-fatigued men who I assumed were my guards now. Four, maybe five. I couldn’t be sure.

Someone slapped their hand down on top of the container, and I let out a startled yelp.

“All right, sweetheart,” McKinney said, crouching down so that I could sort of see his face. “Here’s how it’s going to work. I open the container, you come out all nice and easy, I remove the shackles, then you get some time alone to clean up.” I saw his mouth spread into a hard smile. “If you do absolutely anything that looks like an attack or resistance, your guards will shoot you—with bullets and tranquilizers, and this time I’ll make you wait until you’re a rotted pile of bones before I give you what you need. Do you understand?”

I swallowed to work moisture into my mouth. “Yes,” I said, voice shaking slightly to make it sound like I was scared.

Oh, who the hell was I kidding? I
was
scared. Terrified out of my goddamn wits and second-guessing every decision that had led to this point.

Metal squealed as the front of the container swung open. I blinked as light flooded in, then shivered at the sight of the bloody streaks along the walls where I’d obviously tried to claw my way out. I crawled out as quickly as I could with my legs still shackled, but I stood too quickly and had to grab at the container as a brief surge of dizziness sent me swaying. I could feel the tension in
the room go up a notch, and I was suddenly hideously aware that each man had a weapon trained on me.

I wanted to laugh. I weighed less than a hundred pounds, and they were acting like I really was a six-hundred-pound tiger.

The dangling handcuff slapped against my leg and my humor vanished. No, they were reacting with exactly the right amount of caution. I straightened as the dizziness passed, took stock of where I was.
A public bathroom?
At least it probably had been at one time. White room with tiled floor, an overhead fluorescent light that buzzed annoyingly, and an odd mixture of smells—fresh paint and old mildew. Along the walls and floor were ghostly outlines of plumbing that had apparently been ripped out and spackled or tiled over. One toilet and sink were left, as well as one stall partition and a lone shower stall with a curtain so new it still had that fresh plastic smell. Against one wall was a narrow bed, looking utterly out of place in the bathroom setting. As a holding cell, it made a certain amount of sense. No windows, a heavy door, and even a drain in the floor in case…

I shuddered and yanked my thoughts into a different direction. At any rate, this wasn’t quite the “secret lab” I’d been expecting.

McKinney approached with latex-gloved hands. I stood absolutely motionless as he removed the handcuff and shackles. After he straightened he placed them on the top of the container, but kept his gloves on.

“Now take your clothes off,” he ordered.

“The fuck I will,” I shot back.

He narrowed his eyes in a sneer. “No necrophiliacs
here. No one here is going to rape you. But you will be searched.”

Necrophiliacs? The fuck?
I made a quick scan of the other guards. All wore equal expressions of mild disgust and disdain. It threw me briefly for a loop—not because I wasn’t used to being regarded that way, but because I
was
. Yet this time it was for something that I had no control over, not for the way I acted or dressed or because of anything I’d done. It was weird and awful and humiliating, yet at the same time a sick relief coiled through me at the realization that, out of all the horrible shit that could possibly happen to me here, at least rape wasn’t something I had to fear. At least not right now.

But my hands still shook as I lifted them to my shirt. Whether they looked at me with disgust or not, this was still a bunch of strange men who were going to see me naked.

“Don’t you have any women guards?” I asked, hating that my voice had a quaver in it. “Please.”

“No,” McKinney said flatly. “Take your fucking clothes off or I’ll shoot you and leave you starving.”

I stared at him for a couple of seconds, but it was clear he meant every word. I yanked my shirt off, trying to be angry and fierce about the whole thing, but it didn’t work. Not one bit. I couldn’t even turn away from the guards. They were all around me so I kept my head down and didn’t look at any of their faces ’cause I knew that if I saw anything other than disgust or disdain I’d fucking lose it. I pulled my bra off then kicked my shoes off and shoved my pants and undies down, kicked it all away and stood there naked with my arms clamped down by my sides ’cause I didn’t want to do that pathetic thing of trying
to cover my chest and privates and all. And I tried my fucking damnedest to stay angry, and even thought about how much I hated Clive, and hated the fucker who’d drugged me and was gonna date rape me, and how much I fucking hated McKinney and these others.