The Gates of Byzantium (Purge of Babylon, Book 2) (23 page)

“How have you guys been avoiding the ghouls?” Lara asked.

“By hiding, mostly,” Gaby said.

Josh added, “If we find a good hiding place in a town with enough food and supplies, we’ll stay for a while. It’s only until those things run out that we move on. It’s worked for us so far. Until a few days ago, anyway.”

“You’re both from Dallas?” Lara asked.

“Ridley, Texas,” Gaby said. “It’s close to Dallas.”

“Close enough that we get most of their TV,” Josh said. “That’s how I learned about what was happening. Reports coming out of Dallas, even before it hit Ridley.”

“What about your parents?” Lara asked them.

“I don’t know about mine,” Josh said. “They went out on one of their date nights and never came back.”

“My family didn’t make it,” Gaby said.

“I’m sorry,” Lara said.

The teenage girl nodded, then turned to look out the window. Josh reached over and put his hand over Gaby’s.

Lara sat back in her seat, clearly regretting having ever brought up the topic.

“Where were you when it happened?”

“How did you survive?”

Those were the questions on everyone’s mind when they met someone new. As if knowing how someone else had survived added to the information wall about the how, why, and when of the current world.

It was human nature. The need to
know.

*

It was
5:16 
p.m.
by the time they got everything transferred from the trucks and into the First Assembly of the Lord’s basement. There were no nearby garages and no real good choices to hide the trucks but the parking lot, so they decided to bring everything in rather than risk losing anything during the night. Thankfully, they had two additional pairs of hands in Josh and Gaby, so the transfer went much faster than usual.

While the others adjusted the supply crates along the walls and made room for eight people, Will and Danny left to visit a local hardware store a few blocks away. There, they loaded the Ranger with lumber—more than they needed, but Will didn’t feel like making a return trip if they fell short.

They didn’t bother with the stained glass windows or doors in the church. If the ghouls found them, they were coming in regardless. Instead, they reinforced the twin basement doors on the outside, then barricaded the interior side with two layers of lumber before sticking support beams under them in case of a prolonged assault. Through trial and error, they had found that basements were always the easiest to defend. Once you reinforced the doors, they were essentially impregnable.

When they were done, Danny turned to the others. “Bathroom’s through that door in the back. It’s a little icky—okay, I wouldn’t want to use it with a twenty-foot pole—but if you gotta go, you gotta go.”

They had crates full of the small 16.9-ounce water bottles, along with a couple of the five-gallon variety, the kind used for water coolers. The rest of the supplies were spread out, occupying nearly half the basement space. Bedrolls had been laid out, and Vera and Elise were already working on coloring books Danny had found for them during their stay in Grime a week earlier. Will wasn’t surprised to see Josh and Gaby sticking close together.

Kids in love in the apocalypse,
he thought with a slight smile. That would make a great title for a book. Or maybe a TV show. Something on the CW, of course.

He glanced at his watch: 7:41 
p.m.

*

Nightfall, and he
waited for them to attack.

But they didn’t.

An hour after nightfall, he was still waiting.

And they still didn’t attack.

Around ten at night, Will sat very still at the foot of the metal stairs, his back to the basement doors, and listened. He heard snoring around him, but the four oscillating fans, all set on low, dominated the room with their quiet, soothing whirring. They had turned off most of the LED lamps except for the one that sat next to his feet. The lamp was on its lowest setting, providing just enough light for Will to make out the sleeping forms in the basement.

Eleven o’clock came and went, and still no attack.

After midnight, Danny untangled himself from Carly, slipped on his assault vest and picked up his weapons, then walked over soundlessly. He sat down on the steps with a can of fruit. He pulled the tab and tossed the aluminum lid into a nearby heavy-duty trash bag hanging off the stairs, then poked at a pair of pineapple slices with a plastic spork.

“Anything?” Danny asked, keeping his voice low.

“Not a squeak.”

“Nothing at all?”

“Nope.”

“That doesn’t sound right. We lost them in Grime, but they must have picked up our scent by now.”

“Must have.”

“Maybe we’re just really, really that good.”

“Yeah, that’s the ticket.”

“Spooky.”

“Yeah.” Will picked up the Remington and stood. “Wake me when you get scared of the dark.”

“Sure thing, pa.”

Will walked over to Lara, asleep on top of her bedroll, rather than inside, because of the heat. She lay on her left side, slightly curled up with her back to him. He watched the fan nearby playing with her hair and smiled. She looked beautiful asleep.

He laid down the Remington and stripped off his vest and gun belt, then lowered himself next to her. Even asleep, she seemed to sense his presence and rolled over to her other side, her head coming to rest against his shoulder, while her right hand somehow ended up on his chest.

Will closed his eyes and thought about staying awake for a few more minutes. He couldn’t chase away the nagging feeling that the ghouls were planning an attack very soon. It didn’t make a damn lick of sense that there were no ghouls in Lancing, Texas. What the hell was going on out there? What were they
waiting
for?

But the attack never came, and soon Will drifted off to sleep.

And for the first time in a long time, he saw Kate.

BLAINE

He left Lancing
with plenty of sunlight to spare. The Toyota was in good working shape, with plenty of gas in the tank when its owner had abandoned it eight months ago. The car battery hadn’t worked when he had found it, but Will and Danny carried spares in the back of their trucks, along with solar-powered chargers that delivered trickle charges to keep them filled until they were needed.

It was a pretty smart setup, and it didn’t surprise Blaine that a pair of Army Rangers would think of something like that. Back when Blaine was traveling with Deeks and Sandra, they had simply swapped car batteries. Not exactly Boy Scout always-be-prepared, but then again, he was just some guy from the bad part of Dallas, so what the hell did he know about preparedness?

Blaine had the map spread out in the front passenger seat, not that he really needed it. From Lancing, it was a straight shot up US 287/Route 69 back to Grime. If Sandra was headed back there—back to where he was shot—she might end up in Grime again after not finding him on the road.

He drove as fast as he could, which was about forty miles per hour. When he didn’t see anything looming on the road up ahead, he gunned it up to fifty, but even that was pushing it. Going fast was the reason he was separated from Sandra in the first place, a fact that weighed him down like a devil on his shoulder.

For some reason, he hadn’t been shocked when the girl had told him Sandra was gone. That was his Sandra—spirited, full of passion and independence and fire. Suddenly free of the clutches of Folger, the first thing she would do was go back for him. Even if she thought he was dead. It made perfect sense only if you knew Sandra the way he did.

After a while he drove past the familiar two-story house from last night. It looked bigger, more isolated than he remembered. Blaine made a mental note of the house’s location. You never knew when you would need a house for the night…

He glanced at his watch: 3:26 
p.m.

Blaine began to slow down as he approached the old Jeep sitting in the middle of the road. Folger’s Jeep. Exactly where Folger had left it. There were no other vehicles and no signs of Sandra.

He felt deflated and shot all over again. For some reason he had been almost certain she would be here, waiting for him, as if she knew he would be coming for her.

God, what was he
thinking
?

*

He drove slowly
through Grime. He had no idea what kind of car she was driving. The girl had been too afraid to come out of the basement when Sandra had driven off. And the kid, Josh, had never bothered to check the garage, so he didn’t know what car was in there, either.

Grime wasn’t a particularly big town, but it did cover about four square miles, according to the map. That meant too many stores, buildings, and houses that weren’t connected to Pine Street, the main road through town.

Blaine drove as slowly as he could, honking his horn as he went. If she was here, she would hear him. Probably. Or maybe she would think it was some crazy person and stay exactly where she was—hidden. After Folger, he wouldn’t blame her.

It all added up to the same thing—finding her was going to be next to impossible.

But what choice did he have? Sandra was out here, somewhere, and he had to find her. Losing her to Folger and his men was like a knife through his gut, more painful than the bullet that had gone through his side or in his shoulder or thigh. No painkiller was going to dull that sensation. And to have been so close earlier today, only to lose her again…

It was
maddening
.

It took a while, but eventually he reached the end of Grime and stopped in the middle of the road. Blaine sat still for a moment, looking at the rearview mirror, back at the town behind him.

Would Sandra keep driving? No, that didn’t make any sense. Why would she go backward, in the direction they had come? There was nothing back there. Dallas, maybe, farther back. But why would she go back to Dallas? The city, with its massive population, was more dangerous than out here, where the people were spread out and the buildings weren’t thick with the monsters—or
ghouls,
as Will called them.

No, Sandra wouldn’t go all the way back to Dallas. So where would she go next? He didn’t think she would leave Grime just yet. The closest big city farther down US 287 was Woodville, which was too far away to make in the daylight left. Sandra wasn’t stupid, so she would stay in Grime at least until tomorrow. He was almost certain of it.

Blaine put the truck in reverse and headed back into town. Except this time, instead of sticking to Pine Street, he started taking smaller roads, still honking his horn, looking for signs of survivors. Any damn sign at all.

He drove along dirt roads, passing homes that had been here for decades, possibly longer. A church that looked more like someone’s house and a long building with a bright red roof. A Family Dollar store advertising a sale, a Chevron gas station at the corner of a busy four-way intersection.

Blaine slowed down and glanced at the truck’s gas gauge. He was almost down to a quarter tank. Jesus, how long had he been driving?

He glanced down at his watch: 5:16 
p.m.