The McClane Apocalypse Book Five (44 page)

“Are you hurt? Did you get hurt or dislocate
anything? Did I hurt you when I pulled you up?” Cory asks in quick
succession, concerned about his best friend’s sister. “I pulled you
too hard.”

“I
’m
fine
. I’m not dead, so I’d say I’m better than that
guy,” she says after a moment. “Jesus, you killed him. I mean… so
fast… whoa.”

“Sorry,” he apologizes as she thinks about
what her eyes have just witnessed. He hopes she has short-term
memory loss from her traumatic near-death experience.

“Oh my God, did he stab you? It looked
like he
stabbed
you!” Paige
exclaims hysterically.

“Nah, just a scratch. I’m good,” he reassures
her.

“Let me see,” she says, prying at the black
t-shirt that is tucked into his pants.

Cory stays her hand and says,
“I
’m fine
. We’ll check it out
later.”

“I wanted to shoot him, to help you, but I
wasn’t sure if I’d hit you instead,” she says with nerves in her
voice.

“I didn’t need your help,” Cory reassures
her. “If anything like that ever happens again, just stay out of my
way.”

She hasn’t looked at him. Her face is
still buried in his chest. She’s scared out of her mind. He doesn’t
blame her. He probably would be if he’d almost fallen four stories,
too. Plus the man’s threats against her have likely shaken Paige.
The thought of getting Simon’s sister killed on his watch makes
Cory feel nauseous. She could’ve died. She almost did. He could’ve
been
killed
by Roid Rage, and she
would’ve been taken and raped. Bile rises in his throat.

“I will,” she says, interrupting his
thoughts. “I’ll stay out of the way. My first instinct was to run
like I used to, but I didn’t want to leave you behind.”

Cory tries not to let her words mean
too much. He’s sure she just means because he’s Simon’s friend and
that leaving him to possibly be killed would upset her brother.
They stand there; her against his chest, him stroking her back more
soothingly this time. His hand comes to rest on the back of her
small skull. He can just imagine it cracking open if she’d fallen
to the marble floor below them. She feels
smaller
in his arms than he would’ve
thought.

“We should move,” he says and steps away.
Paige looks up at him with tears running down her cheeks and nods.
“That was a trap. I don’t know if he set it or if he was with a
group of similar assholes, but let’s not stick around and find
out.”

“Yes, that was a trap. Definitely,” she says
as she wipes at her damp cheeks with the sleeve of her jacket.

Cory retrieves his .45 from the floor,
reholsters it and snaps the closure. He grabs Paige surely by the
hand and leads her safely out of the room. At the end of the long
hallway, he takes a moment to look out the window facing the
street.

“We’ve got more company on the way and I
don’t think these fucks are comin’ for tea,” he informs her,
pointing to the small crowd of people. “Looks like our friend had
some friends of his own.”

There are four men this time, all armed and
coming toward the building. He’s pretty sure it’s the same men he
spied earlier milling around the campus. They resemble their dead
friend in their clean-cut appearances and manner of dress. What the
fuck? Are they some sort of former college fraternity turned
nefarious post-apocalyptic gang? Kappa Pi Thug? Three of them have
rifles. Time to go.

“We need to get your dropped weapon,” he
says. “But first, we need a diversion. Wait right here.”

Her eyes seem troubled, so he squeezes her
shoulder firmly and says, “I’ll be right back.”

Cory takes a homemade smoke grenade from his
pack. He and the other men make these for this exact reason. These
little suckers make a great diversionary weapon. When he gets to
the study room again, he ignites five books with his Zippo lighter
and sets them near the broken window to ensure the smoke will plume
out of it and draw the attention of the frat boys. Next, he ignites
the string coming out of the smoke grenade and within a few
seconds, purple smoke is also wafting in giant puffs through the
window. Then he sprints back down the hall, collects Paige and
makes his exit through a semi-darkened stairwell at the rear of the
building. There are skylights high above them that permit a small
bit of gray light into the narrow space. They move cautiously but
quickly down to the first floor again. Before he opens the door,
Cory waits and listens a moment.

“Here, Paige,” he says and takes her pistol
out of her hip holster. “Carry this. Safety’s off, so finger off
the trigger.”

“Got it,” she says firmly but quietly.

When they cross the threshold into the first
floor area, Cory hooks a right which should lead them to the dead
man and her rifle. He’s not willing to leave it behind, even if it
means they will be seen by those men. He’d hate to do it, but if
need be he’ll kill them all in front of her.

“Come,” he instructs as he slinks
around a corner. Paige follows softly in his wake.
This time,
she is much closer than
before. Not having her rifle out in front of her probably isn’t
making her feel safe.

A shuffling of noisy people assaults his
ears, causing him to stop, turn back and grab her arm to pull her
around the corner with him again. She’s apparently heard it, too,
because she is frozen in place with fear. He presses his index
finger to his lips and gets a nod of compliance from her.

A door slams at the other end of the
hall, so Cory furtively pokes his head around the corner. It’s all
clear. Apparently they haven’t seen their dead comrade in the other
room. They seem
panicked
as if
they are trying to get to the source of the smoke upstairs to
inspect it. Cory steps into the corridor with Paige and crosses to
the next area, which looks like a student lounge space. He presses
her against the wall and sprints over to the dead man, who is lying
on Paige’s fallen rifle. Within a few seconds, he is able to
dislodge it from underneath the man’s body.

“Hey!” a shout from above rains down upon
Cory. He looks up in time to see the other men glaring down through
the trap hole at him. They’ve realized the fire was a diversion set
by him. They’ve also seen their dead comrade on the floor where
Cory stands beside him. One man manages to get off a shot from his
handgun. Not needing encouragement, Cory barks off about six rounds
from her rifle up at them, which causes them to jump back and
scatter. He races back to Paige and smiles widely.

“It still works!” he says excitedly about her
rifle.

Her answer is a disbelieving and slightly
sarcastic, “Great.”

She runs to the hole opening before he can
stop her and rapid fires from her pistol about five times. A loud
thudding sound from above followed by screams of pain rain down
through the hole. Cory grasps her about the waist and hauls her
away.

He’s having a hard time not laughing, “I
think you got one.”

“Good!” Paige says testily and shrugs free of
him.

He flicks her safety back on, tugs her hand
gently and jogs toward another exit. They know they are down here.
He can’t take a risk of being caught in a firefight with her. If he
was alone, he’d flank and kill them. They are the kind of men who
would rape her no doubt, as their friend had implied. Since he’s
pretty sure she shot one of them, they’d kill her, too. Those men
don’t deserve to live. This time, they’ve gotten themselves a free
pass.

“Through here,” he says as he leads her
down a narrower pass and into a commercial kitchen area. Through
another door and they are out
to
the fading sun again. “We need to pick up the pace. Let me
know when you need a rest.”

“’
Kay,” she says hoarsely. “This is the
part I’m usually good at. Don’t worry about me.”

He flashes her a grin which she returns as
they fast walk and transition to jogging.

“You sure shooting people isn’t the thing
you’re good at?”

She just shrugs and says, “They pissed me
off.”

They jog through the campus heading
southwest, running faster from time to time and slower when she
needs to. They periodically stop to listen and look for the Kappa
club. Cory takes them farther away from the college and toward a
more residential, smaller neighborhood. After a while it is
apparent that they are no longer being followed, and he feels safe
to stop with her.

He pulls her into an old stone church
and says, “I know the downtown district is a
no-fly
zone. Same goes for anywhere near the river.
We don’t go there, either.”

“What river? What do you mean?” she asks, her
pale gray eyes still frightened. She is also panting lightly.

“The Cumberland River,” he explains while
looking out a few of the windows, or what’s left of them, on the
sly. “It’s a dangerous area. Lot of tent cities set up over there.
Some of the groups might not be too bad, but we’ve never stuck
around to find out. As long as they seem harmless, we leave them
alone. If they seem like they are thugs, then… well, you get the
gist. When we come, we only go to the places that we know for sure
are safe. This area was safe the last time we came. I don’t know
where those idiots came from. We’ve never actually raided on the
campus grounds before, but the surrounding area used to be
clear.”

Paige inches closer to him until her arm is
literally pressed against his side. Cory looks behind them deeper
into the church to ascertain they are still alone. It seems to have
been looted down to some of the pews. Even the holy water bowl is
gone.

“The river itself is dangerous, too. It
swells now without being controlled. It can get very unpredictable,
but people live near it so that they have a source of water,” Cory
tells her.

Paige is standing with her back to the wall.
Her posture is tense, her eyes still frightened.

Cory takes her chin in his hand and turns her
head toward him, “Hey, we’re fine. That was just a bump in the
road. I won’t let that happen again. They’re long gone. All
right?”

She nods her head, sending a strand of loose
red hair over her right eye. Cory pushes it back behind her
ear.

“I promised your brother I’d return you in
one piece and I will.”

A lopsided grin forms on her full mouth
as
a low
rumble of thunder
threatens to break up their sunny day.

“We didn’t even get anything at the college,”
she says. “Should we go back and check it out?”

“No, not with just the two of us. Depending
on what Simon and Sam find, we may be able to go back there
tomorrow before we leave town. Unless we end up having to stay a
second night. There are plenty of other places to loot around here.
That was just one idea. The Kappa boys can have it.”

Paige
chuckles
, “I never knew any fraternity kids like
that.”

“I think they belonged to a new kind,”
Cory
jokes
, trying to lighten her
despair.

She drops to her knees in front of him and
digs in her backpack.

“Let me see your knife wound from that jerk,”
she demands.

“I
’m
fine,
” he says.

“I’m not asking, Cory,” Paige says with
forceful intent.

He lets out a soft groan and untucks his
shirt, pulling it up a few inches.

“Damn, Cory. This is kind of
bad
,” she squints and bites her lower
lip.

“No, it’s just a scratch,” he informs her and
tries to lower his shirt again.

Paige’s stops him, her hand closing
over the back of his own. She whips out a small pink package from
her bag. Then she removes the sanitary napkin from the
package
and presses it against
him.

“I don’t have anything to disinfect it, but
this is sterile and should help until we meet up with Simon,” Paige
tells him from her squatted position.

He’d like for her to stop touching his bare
stomach, even if she is trying to help. Her warm fingers against
his skin is proving a bit much.

“Good enough,” he says, grabbing for
her thin, bony hand. “I’ve got a medic pack in my bag. We’ll
tend
to this later.”

Paige swats him away and continues blotting
the blood with gentle dabs. He wishes she’d get to her feet. Seeing
her knelt before him and the feel of her warm breath hitting his
skin is entirely too much. She’s about to learn just how much he
really doesn’t need Viagara.

“I wish Simon was here now. I don’t
know too much about this kind of stuff. He’d
know if you need
stitches,” she laments.

“I don’t,” Cory says tightly.

“I’m not sure. I don’t think so, either, but
what do I know? He’d probably want to put some kind of stinky,
herbal poultice on it or something. Then he’d have you drink some
gross tea that tastes like the cow barn smells and you’d sleep for
three days,” Paige tells him with a wrinkle of her freckled nose at
the mention of the cows.

He can barely even offer a pained grin
and a single huff when she glances up at him. Cory jerks his bag
free and unzips it, quickly finding the duct tape. He rips off a
few small pieces and
pats
them
down on the edges of the pad. Then he grabs her slim shoulders and
hauls her to her feet.