Fuel (Best Laid Plans Book 1) (34 page)

It was hard to be gentle as he pushed her away. “Are you crazy? What are you doing?” he demanded.

The blond woman backed away, giving him a bright, false smile that did nothing to hide the anger smoldering in her eyes. “Welcoming you back. I've been longing to see you again so I could take care of you properly.” She paused, just for a moment, and although her tone didn't change somehow the intent behind it did. “And so you can take care of
me
like you promised.”

Trev glanced towards the others, only to find that Matt's family were retreating to the porch. Even as he watched they disappeared into the house and swiftly closed the door behind them. He still lowered his voice, although he did nothing to hide his anger. “You've been telling everyone I made you have sex with me to get into town?”

Mandy's fake smile remained. “Of course. It's the truth, isn't it?” Trev gave her a hard look, and finally after almost a minute of frosty silence her mouth thinned to a straight line. “It's the truth I needed,” she snapped. “You were going to send me off to Price with a meal and your best wishes, where I'd be packed in with tens of thousands of other refugees and end up starving to death. If I wasn't raped and murdered first.”

As she'd been talking her expression and tone grew more and more cold, until she was practically spitting venom. “But you didn't bother to tell anyone my visit was just a one night stopover before moving on, did you? Thanks to that I got to stay in the one town that has its head on straight and is looking out for itself. I've been able to eat decently every day while you rushed off to play hero and couldn't tell anyone the truth. And now that you're back it's too late because I've already told everyone my own truth and not even your friends will believe you.”

Unfortunately she seemed to be right on that count. “Just what “truth” are you telling them, specifically?”

“That I'm the victim of a predatory monster who offered me food and shelter in return for being his virtual sex slave. Thanks to that I'm offered sympathy instead of resentment, and even the people I'm a burden on like the Larsons get mad at you instead of me.” She curled her lip in contempt. “I don't regret doing what I had to do to survive.”

Even after hearing her admit it outright Trev still found it hard to believe she'd actually done what she claimed. It was all he could do to control his rage as he considered the implications. “You're going to go back to the refugees,” he said through clenched teeth. “And I don't want to see you near me or any of my friends.”

The woman gave him a look with such venom that even after everything Trev was still shocked by it. “No, you're going to take me to this shelter of yours where I'll be your guest for as long as I want, no strings attached. Otherwise I'll go to FETF about how you've exploited me. Even with everything that's happened soliciting prostitution is still illegal in the United States of America.”

Trev couldn't believe Mandy's gall, but everything else flew out the window as his mind snagged on one word. “FETF? What are you talking about?”

She laughed. “They sent an administrator to take over Aspen Hill yesterday, along with a dozen soldiers to make sure the town does what he says. All you greedy townies refusing food to starving people are about to get your comeuppance.”

All thoughts of Mandy and her attempts at character assassination immediately faded to the background as the implications of this set in. “You do what you want,” he said. Without waiting for a response he turned and sprinted towards the shelter.

Behind him Mandy laughed mockingly. “I will! No matter what happens in this world people are people, and people will always rush to the aid of a damsel in distress. You really shouldn't have crossed me.”

You mean I really shouldn't have helped you?
But Trev was already out of earshot and didn't care enough to reply. He had more important things to worry about than Amanda Townsend: for good or evil he was done with her, and he hoped he never had to see her again.

But somehow, deep down, he had a feeling that he was only at the beginning of the trouble her lies would cause. Even after he'd helped her she seemed determined to do everything she could to ruin his life, and if enough people believed her she'd probably succeed.

Chapter Seventeen

Evicted

When Trev arrived at the shelter he found Lewis hauling two buckets out the door, and was relieved that his cousin had realized the implications of FETF's arrival too.

“I hope you're doing what I think you're doing,” he said, hurrying to kick a rock out of his cousin's path. If Lewis was relieved or even surprised to see him he didn't show it, so urgent in his task that he barely paused to nod Trev's way. He seemed to be heading directly east towards the second, higher hill that partially hid their buried shed. Beyond it was a fairly mild stretch of low hills to where the foothills began, then the mountains of the Manti-La Sal range beyond them.

Lewis grimaced, setting down the buckets and rotating his shoulders. He looked as if he'd been at work for a while. At that point finally he paused to grab Trev's shoulder and pull him into a quick hug. “Glad to see you made it back safely, even if you stink even worse than before.”

His cousin motioned to the buckets as he continued. “And if what you think I'm doing is caching our stuff then yes, I am. FETF is in town. It's only a matter of time before they bring “aid” to the area by rounding up any extra food to redistribute to the refugees. We need to hide as much of this as we can before they come around trying to get their hands on it. Our guns, too.” He quickly filled Trev in on Ferris's arrival, tearing down the roadblocks, dismantling the town's defenses, and taking over the storehouse.

When he was done Trev nodded grimly. “April's family got a firsthand look at how they operate up in Midvale, so I'm not surprised they're doing the same here.” He grimaced, glancing towards town. “I was hoping Aspen Hill would refuse to let them in. We've already voted to turn away refugees, after all, so FETF has no business here. But it looks like as soon as the first petty bureaucrat showed up everyone changed their minds.”

“They did more than change their minds, they bent over backwards.” Lewis also glared towards town, as if he could see Ferris taking over the storehouse across the mile and a half of distance. “The townspeople are sheep. They don't care that Washington DC burned. They don't care that the Federal government is at best in exile, at worst struggling to keep from imploding. They don't care that the nation is on the rocks and we're on our own and nobody is coming to save us.”

His cousin took a deep breath. “When Ferris came they didn't see a “petty bureaucrat” with two trucks and a dozen soldiers. They saw an extension of the vast and infinitely powerful Federal government that doesn't exist anymore. In their minds he's the lifeline to the help that's going to solve everyone's problems. So if Ferris tells them to give up all their food so it can be redistributed to refugees they'll do it, expecting that more FETF trucks full of food will be coming in the future.”

“And they won't,” Trev said, but in spite of his experience with the FETF up north there was the slightest question in his voice.

Lewis had been leaning down to pick up his buckets again, but at that he paused to stare at him. “You've still got the barest flicker of hope about that?” He took a breath, then lowered his voice even though nobody could hear them. “Trev, it's on the radio. More FETF help isn't going to be coming from up north because the FETF doesn't exist up there anymore. The Antelope Island refugee camp rioted after a food shortage led to rations being severely cut.”

Trev stiffened in shock. “Antelope Island? I was just there!”

“Then you're lucky you left. Thousands of refugees went on a violent rampage. The fuel, food, and munitions depots were all seized, FETF soldiers ran for their lives before their own weapons could be turned against them, and over a hundred thousand people flooded back out into the ruins of Salt Lake City. The area has erupted into chaos again, and this time I don't think anything's going to stop it.” His cousin finally picked up the buckets and started for the hill again.

After a few moments standing stunned at the news Trev hurried to follow. “Does anyone in Aspen Hill know?”

His cousin shrugged slightly, not pausing. “They've got their radio. But even knowing it won't matter to them because they can't put two and two together. Ferris is Federal, which means he's authority, and even if now he's as much a refugee as anyone and his authority extends exactly as far as the fuel in his trucks can take him everyone will still mindlessly obey his orders. Because that's what people do.”

A long, uncomfortable silence settled, and then Trev took a deep breath. “Okay, what do you need me to do?”

“Help me move things.” Lewis pointed up the hill with his shoulder. “I've finally got the woodpile moved and the cache hole dug where it was. Took me most of yesterday with this rocky soil, and by the time I had it big enough I was too exhausted to start moving buckets. I've been hard at work all morning but it's taking me longer than I expected. Hauling a hundred pounds more than a hundred yards, a good chunk of it uphill, is a lot different than walking for hours. My muscles just aren't used to it.”

Trev grimaced. “I'm pretty wiped out myself but I'll do what I can.” As Lewis continued up the hill he headed back to the shelter to grab some buckets of his own. With his cousin's secretive nature he might've hoped that it would take FETF a while to learn about their place, but after Mandy's threat he had no idea how long they had to get this done so he was in a hurry.

Speaking of which, he should probably give some warning about her. As he carried two of his own wheat buckets towards the cache he met Lewis coming back the other way and followed his cousin back inside to fill him in on his confrontation with the blond refugee, then back out and they carried their buckets towards the cache together talking as they went.

Trev was even more outraged when he learned that the reason Mandy knew about the shelter was because the Larsons had sent her out to get some of his food to “keep his promise”, and had a few choice words to say about it.

“I don't think she started out as a bad person,” Lewis offered once he'd let off some steam. “I'm sure the experience of being a refugee made her desperate enough to do what she wouldn't otherwise do.”

Trev shook his head, hefting his pair of heavy pails and quickening his pace a bit. “That's a reason, maybe, not an excuse. I'm sure people who'd want to kill us and steal our supplies have good reasons too.”

“It's just an attack on your reputation, though. In the end it's not the worst thing she could've done to you.”

It actually kind of annoyed him that his cousin was trying to defend Mandy.
He
wasn't the one getting smeared by her lies. “We're in a close-knit town where we have to depend on each other for our lives. Reputation can make all the difference. Also don't forget she plans to rat me out to Ferris. She'll probably tell him about our shelter.”

“Yeah, that's a much bigger problem,” Lewis agreed grimly. They reached the peak of the hill and Trev got to see the fruit of his cousin's efforts.

True to Lewis's words Trev saw that his cousin hadn't been carrying things for long. His effort since FETF arrived yesterday had produced a good sized, tarp-lined hole where the woodpile had been, with that entire massive stack of wood scattered everywhere to clear the space beneath. That made sense since the area around here was all sparse grass and the occasional shrub, and a cache anywhere else would be immediately noticeable. Especially one as big as the one Lewis was working on. For this one once it was filled they could move the woodpile back over to hide it.

When he'd first arrived here after being gone so long for school Trev had wondered why the woodpile was so far from their shelter, all the way on the other side of the hill. Lewis had answered that he'd needed the flat space directly in front of the shelter for driving while loading supplies, and over the hill was the next closest flat spot off the dirt road. His cousin had also mentioned that if an enemy set the wood on fire the farther it was from their front door the better, which seemed a bit paranoid to Trev.

Either way here it was, and that was good because it meant the cache would be farther away from the shelter, and possibly harder to discover since it was out of sight behind the hill.

They carefully arranged their buckets in the hole to efficiently fill the most space possible.“You did a good job with this hole,” Trev offered. “But there's a lot of stuff in the shelter. How much can we cache?”

“Not even close to all of it, that's for sure, but as much as we can.” Lewis grunted in annoyance as the bucket he was trying to lower into the hole tipped over and he was forced to hop in to right it. “Just remember that every bucket you take out is around a month's worth of meals, and that's just for the wheat at about 1400 calories per pound, which is near the lowest CPP out of all the food we've stored. Those are meals you'll be glad you have this winter, or next summer, or even the winter after this one depending on how much we can save.”

Fair enough.

On the way back to the shelter Lewis paused at the top of the hill to scan the perimeter with a small pair of binoculars he carried on his belt. That reminded Trev and he told his cousin about Razor and his bandits robbing them. Not too far away from here, in fact.

“Yeah, we've been having trouble with them since even before Ferris showed up,” Lewis said grimly. “I've been keeping a close eye on the horizon, but although I've seen them a few times they haven't come close enough to worry about. That might change now that FETF is disarming the town. You're carrying your 1911, right?”

Trev shook his head. “Taken at a police roadblock.” His cousin gave him an incredulous look and he felt a surge of embarrassment. “I'll tell you about my trip when we've got the time. For the moment, though, I have this.” He pulled out the revolver they'd taken from the would-be mugger.

Lewis took it and looked it over. “Model 65. Pretty nice. Needs cleaning, though.”

“You have any .357 rounds on you?” Trev asked hopefully.

His cousin shook his head. “Sorry, just .308, .45, 12 gauge, and .22. I only tried to stock up on ammo for the guns I own.” He handed it back. “We'll have to see if we can find you some before FETF makes anything gun related disappear.”

Trev put the useless gun back in his underarm holster. “I guess I'll carry my Mini-14 for now. Hopefully it won't be too much of a pain while moving stuff. I don't want to get caught with my pants down around Razor again.”

Once back in the shelter Trev retrieved his rifle and slung it securely on his back so it wouldn't jostle or get bumped while moving buckets. Then he and his cousin got down to serious work emptying their food storage into the cache.

A couple hours later they finished filling the hole, not just with buckets but with all their ammunition and Lewis's G3, pump action shotgun, and .22 rifle, all in waterproof containers. With his cousin wearing his 1911 that was all their firearms accounted for.

True to Lewis's predictions the cache fit barely a third of their supplies, and his cousin looked unsatisfied as they made some final adjustments so the buckets protected the more delicate stuff in a hollow, then covered everything with a sheet of plywood that could hopefully hold the weight of all the dirt and the woodpile itself. Once Lewis was satisfied with the job they covered everything up with more tarps and arranged them so any water would be redirected around the cache. Then they filled up the hole, using proper shovels much to Trev's relief, and got to work stacking the wood back into a pile over the disturbed earth.

They finished the job in the early afternoon and took a break sitting on the hilltop eating cold chili from cans. Lewis brought up getting started on another cache once the meal was done and they began discussing possible locations that were near enough to carry the supplies by hand or in their wagons, could be easily concealed once the cache was complete, and wouldn't put them under the guns of Razor's roaming thugs.

It turned out to be a moot point, because just as they were cleaning up after their meal and getting ready to get started again Trev caught sight of a distant group of people approaching from the direction of Aspen Hill.

He jostled Lewis's shoulder, pointing, and his cousin quickly took out his binoculars to check. After a long, tense silence he saw Lewis's shoulders visibly sag. “Looks like the FETF is sending an official party. Ferris, Turner, and half a dozen soldiers.” He suddenly stiffened. “And there's Mandy! Guess you were right about her ratting us out.” His knuckles whitened around the small binoculars. “Unbelievable . . . she's the one person who never should've known about this place. It's hard to be mad at the Larsons but seriously, what were they thinking?”

Trev squinted at the distant group, catching sight of a hint of green at the back of the group. Mandy had been wearing a green shirt. “Don't blame them, she's my fault. I should never have let her into town.”

“Hindsight.” In spite of his cousin's even tone he looked pissed as he put away his binoculars.

Trev supposed it didn't matter now. “So what do we do? Fight?”

“Against half a dozen soldiers in body armor?” Lewis asked incredulously. “Besides, we don't want to get on the wrong side of government agents no matter how questionable their actions.” His cousin abruptly pulled them both back behind the cover of the hill and removed his underarm holster with its 1911 to hand over to Trev. “I'm glad we got the ammo and my other guns out to the new cache already,” he said, tone urgent. “Listen, take these and hide them there too, then hurry back. I'm going to go lock up the shelter.”