Badlands Trilogy (Book 2): Beyond the Badlands (19 page)

Deeper and deeper they penetrated into the Missouri countryside. They saw no one along the way. No survivors, no infected. Rabbits and squirrels abounded, their populations exploding after the virus all but wiped out man, the formerly dominant species of the world.

They spotted fox and dozens of deer along the way. Turkey and grouse fluttered in the brush while chipmunks scampered out of sight. At night, coyote howled in the distance, their ominous calls piercing the darkness like a scene right out of a movie.

The days passed and became a week. Their sore muscles became stronger. Their blisters became callouses. The backpacks grew lighter as they burned through their canned and dried foods.

Six days into their travels Max landed a lucky shot with Zach’s pistol, bringing down a large buck. After field dressing the deer, they cooked a portion of the meat over a campfire that night, smoking the rest into jerky.

More days stacked up. The countryside remained painfully ubiquitous, alternating farmland and forest for mile upon mile.

But the miles didn’t provide Trish with the sense of camaraderie she’d hoped for. As the days and the miles passed she repeatedly found herself wishing Max had stayed behind. The idea shamed her, but she found it to be a sentiment that she couldn’t seem to shake.

And as the time passed she suspected Max began to feel similarly. Now three weeks into their travels, a once-talkative Max spoke very little. He became increasingly more withdrawn, eyeing Trish and the boys suspiciously if they excluded him from even the most mundane tasks.

It was under these conditions that the group encountered a train trestle spanning a thirty-foot ravine. A roof covered the trestle, while a small maintenance shack sat near the platform, just off from the tracks.

They approached the trestle with no plans other than to simply cross it, when a woman appeared from behind the maintenance shed.

Everyone froze. Trish fumbled for the pistol, retrieved it and pointed it toward the woman.

“Stop!” she commanded.

The woman halted and held up her hands. “Whoa. Don’t shoot. I don’t have a gun.”

“What do you want?”

“Nothing.”

“Then why would you jump out at us like that?”

“I didn’t. I just haven’t seen anybody else for so long. Thought I’d say ‘hi’.”

“Are you alone?” Max asked.

“No. I got a couple others with me.”

Trish kept the pistol pointed at the girl. “Where are they?”

“Out of sight. They didn’t think it was a good idea approaching people. I told ’em I don’t care anymore. I gotta talk to somebody besides them. They drive me batty sometimes.”

“Tell them to come out where we can see them.”

The girl yelled for her companions. Moments later two men walked out of the forest, hands in the air. They stopped when they got to her.

“Where are you headed?” Trish asked.

“Just walking the track.”

“Sounds suspicious.”

“What the hell else are we gonna do? In case you didn’t notice, the world’s gone. It ain’t like we got a schedule to keep.”

Trish didn’t reply.

“Can we at least put out hands down?” the girl asked.

“Yeah. But keep them where I can see them.”

The group lowered their hands slowly.

“What’s your name?” Trish asked.

The woman smiled at her. “I’m Beth, and this is Ryan and Danny. We’re glad to meet you.”

For reasons unknown to Ryan, Beth never gave the signal. Not after she’d talked both the woman and the man down, not even after they’d sat by the campfire, engaged in small talk.

He waited, because Beth masterminded their kills. She warmed them up and got them cozy before he and Danny came in and took them out. It wasn’t as if their new targets would be much of a threat; with one gun between them and a couple of kids weighing them down, he and Danny would’ve made short work of them.

But the signal never came. Beth seemed content to chuckle away, edging closer and closer to the woman, Trish, without any regard for their plans.

The more he thought about it, Trish was the monkey wrench in the whole plan. The one thing he hadn’t expected.

And the more he thought about it, the more sure he was that he should have seen it coming. The first time had been a chance encounter, back before the virus. He and Beth met a girl at a bar, and after a few drinks and some sweet-talking she joined them for a wild romp. They had their fun and then parted ways.

Or so he’d thought.

He found the text messages on Beth’s phone a couple of weeks later. Dozens of them.

Beth dyking it out in front of him was one thing. Her seeing a one-night-stand bitch behind his back was another thing altogether.

It took only a single visit in the middle of the night to persuade Beth’s little girlfriend to cut things off. Finding her had been easy, getting into her apartment even easier. Once he started he’d nearly lost control when he saw blood, but he reeled himself in before he killed her. Though it would have been gratifying to cut the bitch’s throat and watch her eyes fade as she bled out, he couldn’t afford going to prison and losing Beth forever.

Now the prisons were gone. Same as the cops and the judges and all the rules.

On and on Beth talked around the fire, well into the night. Useless, silly shit. Giggling. Ryan sat, mostly silent, itching for the signal. As they talked, the man from the targeted group eyed him suspiciously. Ryan could almost read his mind. Just like all the others in the straight world, he recognized Ryan as a different species. Strong and capable of anything. A threat.

The kids were kids. Snot-nosed, latched on and leaching. They wouldn’t put up much fight. Probably run away if they got the chance. They wouldn’t even be worth chasing.

The minutes passed slowly, stacking up into an hour and then two. Darkness fell. Eventually Ryan found himself camped a short distance away from the shared fire. He sent Danny out of earshot for guard duty, mostly to get him out of their hair. The one thing he liked most about Danny was that he did what he was told.

With Danny sitting near the edge of the woods and the target group setting up camp an equal distance away, Ryan lay with Beth on a blanket covering the ground, whispering into her ear.

“What happened to the signal?”

Beth laid a hand on his chest, her touch like electric. His tension diminished as his cock began to stiffen.

“Shhhhh,” she cooed, touching a finger to his lips. “Trust me.”

He opened his mouth to protest, but she kissed him. He kissed her back. She ran her hand down his chest, eventually resting it on his crotch.

“You trust me, don’t you?” she whispered in his ear.
 

“But the girl-”

Beth slipped her hand beneath his waistband, grasping his cock and squeezing hard. “I like her. Don’t you like her?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“We could have some fun, right? The three of us?”

“Not with that asshole around. And those fucking kids.”

“Be patient,” she whispered, her hand moving up and down in his pants. She squeezed harder. “You want me to be happy, don’t you?”

“You know I do,” he whispered back, breathless.

She unbuckled and unzipped his pants. “When I’m happy,” she said, her breath hot in his ear, “you’ll be
really
happy.”

* * *

Trish woke to a dewy and cool morning. Jeremy and Zach lay asleep beside her while Max sat a few feet away, staring at the new arrivals.

Trish followed Max’s stare. A short distance away, Beth and her boyfriend lay asleep on a blanket. The other man, their third wheel, sat awake, staring back at them. He lifted a hand in a light wave. Trish sat up, halfheartedly lifting her hand in return. The man’s expression didn’t change.

“Morning,” Max said.

“Morning,” she replied.

She shook Jeremy gently. His eyes opened slowly. “Morning, buddy. How’d you sleep?”

“Okay.”

She smiled. “Good. Get yourself packed up now, okay?”

The boy nodded.

“I don’t like this,” Max said, briefly taking his eyes off the three new arrivals. “Something’s not right.”

“What do you propose we do?”

“We should part ways. Let them go their way while we go ours.”

“You sure?”

Max shrugged. “A hundred percent? No. But a gut feeling is a gut feeling. Best not to ignore it.” He paused, staring again. “Oh, look, the love birds are up.”

Trish ran her hands through her hair, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. “Let’s get some breakfast. Better to break the news over some food.”

* * *

“Thanks for the grub,” Beth said as she sat on the railroad track, shoveling tepid creamed corn into her mouth.

“Don’t mention it,” Trish replied. They’d been putting off eating the creamed corn, but Beth seemed to have no problem with it at all.

Beth swallowed a huge mouthful of corn. “Funny running into you guys. Both of us going to Kansas City and all.”

“I thought you guys were just walking the tracks,” Max said. “All revved up and no place to go, right?”

“Yeah. I mean, we’re not going specifically to KC, just passing through, you know?”

“Passing through to where?” Max asked.

“You ask a lot of questions,” Ryan said, breaking an all morning long silence.

Max paused, his brow wrinkling. “Do I?”

“He’s just curious,” Beth said to Ryan with a weak smile. “We’re going to see the ocean.”
 

Trish heard nerves beneath the surface of Beth’s voice. Her own skin began to tingle with the mounting tension.

“I’m just saying,” Beth continued, “that it’s nice to see some real people. I’m so tired of looking at those fuckin’ walkers.”

“How long have you three been on the road?” Max asked.

Beth shrugged. “Hard to remember for sure. A good while now.”

Max nodded. “The beach, huh?”

“She wants to see the ocean,” Ryan said, his tone flat.

“That’s going to be a long walk,” Trish said.

Ryan stared, his eyes black and cold. “So what?”

“I wish we could drive,” Beth continued, “but the cars won’t start anymore. Batteries are dead. And the gas is probably bad. Least that’s what Ryan says.”

“Is that what you say, Ryan?” Max asked.

Ryan stare turned into a scowl. His eyes…something about them. Trish had seen that look before, that same terrible depth.

Ryder.

Things were escalating too fast. Trish stood up. “I think we’re just going to take it from here on our own,” she said, taking a step back toward Zach and Jeremy. “Boys-”

Suddenly Ryan jumped, tackling Max. Both men toppled over, Max landing on his back, Ryan growling and straddling Max’s chest. Ryan drew back a fist and let it fly as Max turned his head. Ryan’s fist smashed into the hard ground. He howled with pain, clutching his wrist to his chest.

Seizing his chance, Max used his size advantage to push Ryan off. Ryan tumbled to the ground, still clutching his injured wrist. Max drew back his arm and drove his large fist into Ryan’s jaw. The smaller man’s head snapped viciously to the side.
 

Zach scrambled to his feet and drew his pistol. The signal clear now, Danny rose, knife in hand, and charged toward Zach. Max leapt to his feet and snatched the pistol from Zach’s grasp before pushing the boy out of the way. He pointed the pistol toward an oncoming Danny and pulled the trigger. Danny dropped hard, only feet away, blood leaking onto gravel.

With Danny down, Max swooped in and snatched up Beth, wrapping a meaty arm around her thin neck. She screamed. Max squeezed hard, cutting off her protests. He placed Zach’s gun to her head.

Trish sprinted toward Zach. She made it only two steps before a hand around her ankle brought her down. She hit the ground hard, knocking the wind out of her. Unable to breathe, she put up little resistance when Ryan yanked her to her feet and wrapped his own arm around her neck. Her chest convulsed as she struggled to expand her diaphragm. Ryan retrieved his knife and held it in front of her face.

Now on their feet, Zach and Jeremy looked frantically toward Trish.

“Run!” Trish croaked, still struggling to breath.

Ryan yanked her violently, holding the knife closer. “You fuckers stay where you are or I’ll cut this bitch’s throat!”
 

Zach and Jeremy froze.

“Ryan,” Max said. The two men stood less than a dozen yards apart. “Let’s talk.”

“There’s nothing to talk about, asshole! You let my girl go!”

“Give me Trish and the boys and I’ll send your little girlfriend back to you, safe and sound. Promise.”

Ryan didn’t reply.

“Ryan, you can walk away from this with your girl. Or not. It’s your choice.”

“Let her go, or I swear I’ll fucking kill you.”

“Says the guy without the gun.”

“You don’t know me. You don’t know what I’ll do to you.”

“I spent twelve years dealing with shitbags like you. You’re nothing special.” Max pushed the pistol deeper into Beth’s temple. “And neither is she. I swear to you, I will fucking put her down, you understand me?”

“You some kind of cop or something?”

“Don’t you worry about it.”

Ryan brandished the knife. “In case you forgot, I got your girl too, you know. You got nothing, man. Let her go.”

“Maybe I’ll just shoot you instead,” Max said.

Ryan ducked his head behind Trish’s, peeking out. “Go ahead.”

Max hesitated.

“Can’t do it, huh? C’mon, take the shot. Maybe you’ll get lucky. Or maybe I’ll have enough time to open up one of your boys here.”

Max’s eyes narrowed. “Let’s work out a deal.”

“The deal is you let Beth go.”

“I’m fine with that, but on one condition. Send the boys over first. Both of them.”

“Fuck that.”

“A show of good faith on your part.”

“No way, man.”

“That’s the deal.”

Ryan paused, thinking. “I’ll send one.”

“You heard me the first time. Both of them. That’s the deal.”

Ryan hesitated again. His eyes darted back and forth between Zach and Jeremy and Beth. “Don’t fuck with me.”

“Nobody’s fucking with you. The deal is the deal. Keep up your end and I let your girl go. Ball’s in your court.”