The Becoming (Book 4): Under Siege (14 page)

“Good enough for me,” Cade said, settling
onto the new task. “I sent Ethan back to the house with
Kimberly.”

“Is that where those two kids went?” Brandt
asked, starting down the street in the vague direction of Dominic’s
house.

“They were hardly kids,” Cade replied as she
followed him.

“They looked younger than Remy, so that
qualifies them as kids in my eyes,” Brandt said. “Speaking of Remy,
that’s second on my list.”

“What is?”

“I’m going to find out how the hell she and
Dominic got out of the community,” he said with determination.
“Because while we were on that platform, Keith said he didn’t let
them out the front gates. Clearly, they got out somehow, and I want
to know how.”

Ethan sat at the dining table in the main house, his
hands folded on top of the table, watching as Sadie and Jude
devoured every scrap of food he and Kimberly had put in front of
them. The two kids ate the bowls of instant oatmeal with the
zealousness of people who hadn’t had enough to eat in quite a
while, which was why Kimberly was still digging around the kitchen,
searching for more food that she could fix quickly. The twins—or
rather, Sadie—had already recapped everything that had happened on
their trip to Woodside, and now he watched them closely, stewing
over the woman’s revelations as they ate.

Ethan turned his eyes to Derek, who lurked
in the doorway between the living room and kitchen, his arms
crossed over his chest, his left shoulder resting against the
doorframe as he too watched the new arrivals. Once Sadie pushed her
bowl away, Derek straightened and stepped fully into the kitchen,
his eyes searching the twins’ faces. “If you don’t mind, I’d like
to talk to the O’Dells privately,” he said, directing his words to
Ethan.

Ethan nodded and rose to his feet, beckoning
to Kimberly. “Come on, let’s go wait on the porch,” he said, trying
to ignore the wobble in his knees from over-exertion. The wobble
wasn’t as bad as it had been when he’d first gotten out of bed; he
was getting stronger with every passing hour, and it couldn’t have
come at a better time.

Kimberly followed him toward the door. When
Ethan stepped onto the porch, he realized that she wasn’t behind
him; he glanced back to see her in the doorway, fidgeting as she
scanned the yard. He gave her a curious look. “You okay?”

“You
do
know we’re on lockdown,
right?” Kimberly said as she stepped onto the porch, but she didn’t
move closer to him right away. “We’re not supposed to be out
here.”

Ethan waved his hand dismissively and leaned
against the porch railing. “I’m not worried about that,” he said.
“I’ve got my Glock. That’s all I need. If something happens and
it’s not enough, then I deserve whatever I get.”

Kimberly leaned against the railing across
from him, mimicking his stance. “I’m not sure I like your
attitude,” she said. “It smacks of recklessness.”

“No, recklessness is something Remy likes to
indulge in,” Ethan replied. As soon as he said her name, he wished
he hadn’t. It made him remember the stricken look she’d given him
near the gates, the first time he’d seen her in months. He shoved
it aside and continued. “Mine is more like confidence.”

“Sometimes the two aren’t mutually
exclusive,” Kimberly pointed out.

Ethan didn’t respond, just patiently waited
her out.

“You aren’t worried that something will pop
out of the woodwork and kill you?” she asked, tilting her head to
look at him.

He tried to imagine what she saw when she
looked at him: his blonde hair still too long despite the haircut
she’d given him; his eyes tired as he stared across the street to
the house beyond; his thinness—
too
thin—and the beard he’d
trimmed into something resembling a goatee but hadn’t completely
shaved off. She probably thought he was hideous.

She didn’t like him, not like he liked her.
She blamed him, in part, for her sister Avi’s death. But he had to
keep struggling to remember that fact. No, she couldn’t want
him.

But oh, how he wanted her to.

“I’ve stopped worrying about the things that
go bump in the night. When you come as close to death as I have, it
tends to not scare you as much anymore. I’m not worried.” He
shrugged and glanced at her before looking away and confessing in a
low voice, “At least, not for my sake.”

Kimberly raised an eyebrow, and he wanted to
slap himself. Did he just admit to being worried about her? She
probably thought it was because he felt he owed her a debt due to
Avi’s death under his watch. He didn’t want her to think that.

“So what did you drag me out here for,
anyway?” she asked. “I know it wasn’t just to give the twins some
privacy with Doc, and I
know
it wasn’t to wax poetical about
death.”

“I wanted to talk to you about what you saw
out there.” Ethan motioned toward the wall.

“What do you need to know?”

“How many were there?” Ethan asked. “I know
Cade said it was a literal shit-ton, but that doesn’t give me much
of a picture of what we’re dealing with.”

Kimberly stayed silent for several moments,
tapping her fingers against the railing. “Five, maybe six hundred?
Could be more, though.”

Ethan’s eyes widened. A surge of horror
mixed with surprise rolled through him. “Six
hundred?
” he
repeated. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen that many in one place
before, not even when the outbreak first started.” He paused,
stewing over Kimberly’s news. “First or second stage?” he asked,
thinking about the different stages of the virus and how some of
the infected were reanimated dead and others weren’t. They’d taken
to calling them “first stage,” for the infected who were still
alive, and “second stage” for the ones that weren’t.

“A mix,” Kimberly answered. “Mostly second,
at about a sixty-forty split, at varying stages of
decomposition.”

“Shit,” Ethan muttered. “Anything else?”

Kimberly bit her lip and hesitated. “There
were more on the way, coming down the highway toward the
community.”

He muttered another swear, finally
understanding why Cade had seemed so angry about the situation.

“Eth, there’s no way we can take on that
many. There aren’t enough of us. I’m not even sure there are that
many bullets in the entire community, including the ones that Cade
spent all that time making.”

“Believe me, you’re not telling me anything
I hadn’t already suspected,” Ethan admitted. He ran a hand through
his hair before slamming his hand onto the porch railing. “Fuck,
what are we going to do?”

“I’m sure everything is going to be okay,”
Kimberly said. “Everyone is doing the lockdown procedures that
Brandt and Cade developed and taught them, and at least one person
in each house has a firearm, and
everyone
has melee weapons.
So long as the gates hold, I think we’ll be fine.”

“No, we won’t be,” Ethan countered. He
turned to face her, leaning his hip against the railing for support
and crossing his arms over his chest. “Tell me, Kim. Have you ever
heard of siege warfare?”

“Vaguely, but I’m not sure what it is,” she
said.

“It’s when an invading force weakens its
enemy by trapping them in their city or town or whatever,” Ethan
explained. “They surround the place and cut them off from their
supply lines. Then they just wait until the folks trapped in the
city start running out of basic necessities, and then they go in
and take them out while they’re at their weakest.” Ethan pressed
the palms of both hands against his eyes, rubbing them before
continuing. “The infected are the perfect siege weapon. They never
get tired, they never get hungry, and once they’re aware that there
are people in a particular location, they never give up. We are in
a siege situation now, and I don’t think it’s one that we’re all
going to survive.”

Ethan regretted his words again as
Kimberly’s eyes widened in horror.

“We’re not going to panic,” he said, moving
toward her and catching her wrists in his hands.

Kimberly looked up at him, brown eyes wide,
as she tried to gain control of herself. “What’s the plan? What are
we going to do?”

“You’ll have to ask Brandt those questions,”
Ethan said, shaking his head. “I’m not in charge here. I haven’t
been in charge since I stepped foot into Atlanta earlier this year.
This show is Brandt’s now. I’m following his lead.”

“I didn’t mean the group,” Kimberly said,
pulling her wrists away from Ethan. She resumed her position
against the porch railing, and he watched her closely, wondering
what was on her mind. “I mean us. Me and you. What are we going to
do?”

Ethan was at a loss. What did she mean? He
looked away from her, toward the medical house next door. He could
feel her eyes on him as she waited for him to respond. One wrong
step, he knew, would lead to heartache and disappointment.

“Ethan?” she said again, her voice gentle.
She touched his forearm, and he jerked his arm away. He hated
himself for his response, and he cringed, digging his fingernails
into the soft wood of the porch railing.

“We don’t have to go back to the medical
house, if that’s what you’re thinking,” she said after a short
silence, misreading his reaction. “I’m sure the others won’t mind
if you stay here.”

He glanced at Kimberly. “Are there even any
free bedrooms in there?” He bobbed his head toward the house.

“A couple,” Kimberly said.

She sounded evasive, just enough to stir up
old police interrogation instincts that had long lain dormant. He
turned to face her, and a tiny smile quirked at the corner of her
mouth. “You think…maybe you could just…use my room?”

“
Your
room,” Ethan repeated. He took
an almost unconscious step forward, as if an invisible string had
tugged him toward her. “And where, exactly, do you plan to
sleep?”

“In my room,” she answered. “Unless, of
course, you’d prefer otherwise…”

Despite his instincts screaming that it was
a bad idea, Ethan reached for her. His fingertips followed the
curve of her cheek almost of their own volition. He marveled at the
contrast of her soft skin against the rough calluses on his own
fingers, and he nearly pulled his hand away, not wanting to mar
her.

As he’d caressed her face, Kimberly’s brown
eyes closed. When he pulled his hand away, her eyes flew open, and
she grabbed his wrist. He could read her intent in the way she
traced her tongue over her bottom lip.

She pressed her body against his, her lips
to his. His knees weakened with desire. Her fingers slid into his
hair, and he tangled his own hands into her short blonde bob,
pulling her deeper into the kiss. His body moved by instinct, and
he pinned her against the porch rail.

His hands dropped from her to her hair to
her shoulders; his fingers ran down her upper arms. She pulled away
from the kiss, panting slightly. He leaned toward her again, but
she pressed her fingers to his lips to block his advance.

“We shouldn’t do this,” Kimberly
murmured.

“A little late for that, Kim,” Ethan
replied. “You’re the one who invited me to share a room while on
lockdown.” He gave her elbow a gentle squeeze but didn’t step back
from her. “That has ‘bad idea’ written all over it.”

“So you think I’m a bad idea?

Ethan nuzzled his nose against hers, burning
to kiss her again. “I think you’re a
dangerous
idea,” he
whispered. He brushed his fingers against her cheek one last time,
turned, and slipped into the house without another word.

Remy was fuming as she stormed away from the gates
and toward the medical house, heedless of anyone or anything that
may have been in her path. She could hear someone following her,
but she ignored it in favor of snarling at herself and everyone she
knew in her head. Her fury was overwhelming, and it wasn’t long
before the snarling switched to words.

“How
dare
she?” Remy asked out loud.
The person behind her continued walking in time with her steps.
“How
dare
she blame me for this mess? Those things were
going to find us anyway.
This isn’t my fault!
” When the
person who was following her remained silent, she wrinkled her nose
and demanded, “Well? Aren’t you going to
say something?
”

“What’s there to say?” Dominic’s voice was
hoarse but quiet. “You’ve made your feelings known. I just wish
you’d stayed around to make that clearer to Cade instead of
storming off in a huff.”

“I did
not
storm off in a huff,” Remy
snapped. She spun around to glare at Dominic. He only stood there
with his eyebrow raised. He remained silent for so long that Remy
couldn’t help but explode. “
What?
” she demanded.

Dominic rubbed at one of his eyes and shook
his head. “You need to calm down, Miss Angellette,” he said, much
to Remy’s irritation. “You’re too emotional, and when you get that
way, you can’t think clearly.”

“I’m not too emotional!” But even as Remy
spoke, she realized Dominic was right. She
was
getting too
emotional, letting her feelings control her. She had repeatedly
told herself to not get crazy with her emotions, but no matter what
she did and no matter how hard she fought, she couldn’t seem to
rein them in.

Seeing Ethan hadn’t helped, either. The
whole scene back at the wall made her want to pull her bolo knife
from its sheath and go on the attack. It was instinctual, she knew,
but partly in reaction to the man who had wormed his way into her
mind: she recalled his grasping hands and the feel of his fingers
curling into her shirt. She remembered him taking her down to the
floor. She just didn’t trust his return to normalcy.