“Something puzzles me,” I say, trying to ignore the shivers now shaking my shoulders. “You country people and all this camo. What exactly are you hiding from?”
His eyebrows shoot up. “Um. Zombies, I reckon. And bears.”
I actually laugh. “Zombies and bears. Yeah, I guess that’s true.”
“Hey, I thought you didn’t use that word—the zombie word,” Cole teases.
I laugh again. “Last night, with the Beavers, I suddenly realized it doesn’t matter what I call them, they’re still going to try to kill me.”
He nods. “Yeah, a bunch of brain-dead cannibals don’t care whether you use the PC term to describe their affliction.”
I try to laugh once more, but this time it sounds numb. Almost as numb as my toes. I’m getting really cold, really fast. I’m amazed how quickly my legs have turned to lifeless stumps. My waterlogged pants billow around my knees, weighing me down.
“Damn,” Cole swears. “I’m colder than a witch’s left butt cheek. I bet the temp’s dipped into the twenties.” He checks the sky. “And the sun won’t burn it off this afternoon. You can feel it in the air pressure. See it in the clouds.”
Maybe he can, but I sure can’t. When it comes to weather predictions, all I can do is tap the Weather Channel app on my phone. Presto! A weather forecast.
Cole keeps talking—about the texture of the sky and how we might get snow tomorrow, but I’m losing the ability to focus. All that matters are my Popsicle feet. My legs have lost connection to my brain. I’m dying to get out of this water.
You can’t quit. Cole will call you a wimp. He won’t ever smile at you like that again. And it’ll just take longer to reach Mom and Dad.
I force myself to take one more step. And another. My vision tunnels on the murky river. Nothing exists beyond my ability to put one foot in front of another.
My legs aren’t stumps. They’re logs. I have to drag them along the riverbed to take a simple step.
“I can’t do this anymore,” Cole says. “Let’s get out. Before we lose toes.”
Bliss. His words are bliss.
“Well, if you need to,” I say, trying to sound casual. “I’m fine if you want to keep going.”
“Girl, you are so full of crap,” he snickers.
I half walk, half stumble behind him toward shore. Fifteen feet away, the muddy trail looks like heaven. My legs sputter into motion, knowing it’s only seconds until we’re back on dry land.
“Whoa, whoa,” Cole says beside me, “slow down or you’ll end up—”
But I miss the last of his warning. My foot skims a boulder, green with moss. And then I’m completely underwater.
Chapter Seven
I resurface, coughing and spluttering, pinwheeling my arms, now weighted with my mom’s sodden jacket. Heavy, gray sky looms above me, tilting as I fight to regain my balance. One word cycles through my brain: hypothermia.
I scrabble up the bank on all fours, my fingernails digging dirt and frost.
Cole rushes up beside me. “Take off your jacket. Before it freezes to your skin.”
Freezes to my skin?
I yank off the coat as the wind kicks up. A million small knives slice my chilled arms.
He searches the ground. “Nothing but dadgum pine needles.”
I have no idea what he’s talking about. My brain struggles to latch on to his words, but I’m so cold. Beyond cold. Icebound.
“Over here.” He jerks me away from the river, rushing me to a small stand of birches. White trunks shimmer like ghosts against the dark pines. “Sit.”
I practically collapse to the forest floor and pull my knees to my chest, searching for warmth. Cole starts piling leaves on top of me. It takes only seconds to realize the leaves are dry and block the wind.
“I’m sorry,” I chatter through rattling teeth. “I shouldn’t have rushed up the bank like that.”
“Just concentrate on staying under these leaves.” Cole is all business. “Take off your clothes so I can wring out the water.”
I can’t even summon the energy to tease Cole about getting me naked.
He hurries to collect armloads of leaves, piling them high around me. I don’t complain about the dirt and grit, or that I’ll have pieces of leaf stuck to me for the next three days. And even more surprisingly, I don’t worry about what sorts of bugs might be lurking in the leaves. Right now, the only thing that matters is getting warm.
Struggling out of my pants and tee, I shiver, half naked in my bra and underwear, and try desperately to breathe around the enormous lump forming in my throat.
I can’t believe I fell in the water. I’m such an idiot.
What did Cole say? A talent for screwing things up.
Sudden tears spill down my cheeks, warm against my chilled skin. All the fear and frustration of the last twenty-four hours threatens to boil over. “I’m a c-complete liability,” I sputter, wiping the tears before he sees them. “You should have left me at my house. You should leave me now. I’m only slowing you down.”
“I ain’t leaving you, so shut up.” Cole has successfully buried me in leaves to my neck.
I shove my bundle of muddy clothes through the pile. “You’ll get to Glenview faster on your own. Send some of those soldiers back for me.”
For a full ten seconds, I think he’s going to agree. Take me up on my offer and dash into the woods, never to be seen again. There’s nothing to keep him here—he doesn’t know me, doesn’t owe me anything.
Cole opens his mouth, clamps it shut again, and gives his head a quick, terse shake. I understand without words. He’d like nothing more than to be rid of me, but he’s not that type of person. He’ll see this through. It’s got nothing to do with me, and everything to do with his personal
code of honor
or some crap like that.
An explosion of shudders racks my body. “I w-wish we had a fire,” I stammer, fighting back more tears.
“If only we had some matches.” It’s the same line I used yesterday, but there’s no sarcasm today. Only panic.
His alarm cuts through my pity party.
Should I be worried? Is hypothermia a real possibility?
He wrings out my yoga pants, twisting them into a giant cord, then moves to drape them over a branch.
“No, just give them back,” I sputter through my chattering teeth. “I’ll wear the wet clothes while we walk. We can’t linger. We’ll lose our lead.”
He thrusts a hand through his dark hair. “I know, I know. But I reckon it’s twenty-five degrees out here. Less with the wind chill. You can’t walk around in wet clothes.”
“I have to.”
I wriggle into my pants, trying to stay covered as I move. I slide socks and shoes on my iced feet. Still no feeling in my toes. Fear bubbles up again. Can I walk on frozen feet? Am I going to lose my toes?
Pull yourself together, Ava.
I wipe tears away with a gritty hand, hoping Cole will think river water is dripping from my hair to my face.
Cole tosses my jacket on the leaf pile and starts wringing out my tee.
To our left, behind the pines, a branch snaps with loud clarity. My head swivels toward it.
“Probably a squirrel,” Cole says, but his voice stays low.
“It sounded heavier. Maybe a deer?” I try to ignore the spike in my heart rate.
“Squirrels make more noise than deer. Deer are quiet.” He keeps his eyes fixed on the pines.
Another branch snaps, closer this time. And in the opposite direction—between us and the river.
I gesture frantically for my shirt. If something’s going down, I don’t want to face it undressed. “Hurry.”
“Shhh.” Cole turns to the woods behind me.
At that instant, noise everywhere. Breaking branches. Voices. Footsteps.
I burst from the leaf pile, scrambling for my shoes, my jacket—no longer caring if I have to run half naked all the way to Glenview.
That’s when we hear it. “Rawr.”
Another voice joins in. Closer. Upriver. “Rawwr.”
A chorus, echoing all around us. “Rawrrrrr.”
My eyes scan the pines, searching. My ears are filled with groans. There’s nowhere to run.
“No, no, no,” I moan, moving close to Cole.
Pine trees rustle and shift. The infected appear in every direction—ringing us in, surrounding us completely.
…
Instinctively, I try to push Ava behind me. But she’s having none of it. She bats my hands away and stands beside me.
At that moment, I get a better glimpse of the zombies.
Dangit. Dangit all to freaking hell.
These ain’t zombies from the country club. Or random hikers. These are kids I recognize. Kids from school. From church. Kids I’ve known my whole life.
A sudden choked noise escapes my throat.
Jarrod Bass, my best friend from fourth grade, stumbles closer. His eyes are white as eggshells—the pupils rolled back in the sockets.
Oh, Jesus. My friends. My friends are zombies.
Jarrod sniffs the air once and grabs for Ava.
“Aaaagh!” she screeches and kicks him in the nuts.
Which doesn’t do crap. He just lunges again, oblivious to pain.
“Help me, Cole!” Ava screams, and I realize I’ve been standing motionless, staring at my monster-cized friends. No, not my friends. These things are no longer my friends.
“Get off her, Jarrod!” I slam him with my shoulder, bowling him sideways into the dirt. My fingers fumble in my pocket, bringing out my knife.
I might’ve bought a few seconds with Jarrod, but not the others. They keep coming. Step by step. Closer.
Ava presses her bare back against my chest.
I hold out the pocketknife. The two of us clutch each other as the ring tightens.
“Ohmygod,” she mutters.
“Please don’t start that
ohmygod
crap again. It ain’t helpful.”
“I’m sorry, but I’m a little freaked. One itty-bitty pocketknife is all that stands between me and zombification.”
“If you’d stop yammering, I might could think of a way out of this mess.”
“There is no way out of this mess!”
Girl’s got a point. It ain’t looking good. At least thirty infected kids surround us, their skin pale and bruised—lips curling away from their teeth. They shamble closer. Jarrod curls his fingers like talons, inches from my arm.
“Close your eyes,” I tell Ava. “Don’t watch it happen.”
She turns to bury her face in my chest. I clutch her tight and then—
A voice from the trees. “Stop!”
My eyes fly open. Every zombie in the ring jerks to a halt, like dogs reaching the end of an invisible chain.
A girl walks through the crowd. Sunshine-gold hair spills from her camo cap. A crossbow hangs low on her back. Dead squirrels dangle from her belt—one on each hip.
I’d recognize those hips anywhere.
“Well, what in tarnation do we have here?” she laughs, moving close. “Cole Greer? As I live and breathe. Did I actually catch you off guard?”
“Bethany?” I gulp, releasing Ava.
Bethany beams, showing two rows of bright, even teeth. And then she eases herself in front of Ava and tackle-hugs me.
Ava shudders beside us. “Who are you?” Her question comes out in a panicked half scream.
Bethany turns to eye Ava. “I might ask the same. Whatcha’ got here, Cole? A half-nekkid Yankee girl?”
Ava’s eyes widen with alarm. She doesn’t know where to look—at Bethany, or the gang of monsters, shuffling in place a few feet away, clearly waiting to eat us for supper.
“Uh, well,” I stammer, “Bethany, this is Ava.”
Bethany steps back to get a better view of Ava, still visibly shivering and clutching her wet shirt. Bethany slings her crossbow off her shoulder and gives Ava a megawatt smile. “Well, Yankee-girl, I’m Bethany. And I’m Cole’s girlfriend.”
Chapter Eight
Cole, Bethany, and I huddle around a fire in the birch woods as snow clouds hang over the ring of zombies. I lean forward on the log, bending toward the warmth of the flames, wondering if my mom’s jacket has finally dried.
Cole glances over one shoulder, then the other. “If you can control the infected,” he says to Bethany, “why don’t you send them back a few paces? They’re making me nervous.”
Bethany shrugs. Tosses a squirrel bone in the fire. “They like to stick close to me.”
Cole twists and tears a miniature chunk of squirrel—a little haunch, maybe—from a stick hovering over the fire, and brings it to his lips. Grease coats his fingers.
“More?” he asks me, holding up the teeny leg.
“No.” I almost choke on my last bite of stringy meat. “I’m good.”
My mind skips back to the morning I met Cole—how he told me I’d “eat the pretty deer” if I got hungry enough. Turns out he was right. Deer, squirrel, whatever—at this point I’m too ravenous to care.
I’ve lost track of how long we’ve been sitting here. I only know that it took ages to finally stop shuddering from the spine-deep cold. Cole’s barely spoken to me since we met Bethany—though I did catch him sneaking a couple of peeks in my direction from under his eyelashes.
I’ve got to be honest: so far, the only thing I like about Bethany is the Bic lighter stashed in her pocket. She’s super loud, super bossy, and super proficient at all this outdoor, nature-y stuff. The kind of girl Cole
should
be traveling with instead of me. She built the fire effortlessly—stacking wood, blowing the flames, feeding the branches one by one. Cole worked alongside her like they’d started a fire together a million times before.
“Sit here!” she’d ordered, once the flames were popping and crackling. “Don’t move!” “Stay on that log!” “Quit looking at my zombies.” “Quit looking at Cole.”
My butt’s gone numb from sitting motionless and staring straight ahead, but at least she’s left me alone for the past ten minutes.
I should be glad she’s here. She seems to have some bizarre, creepy control over the infected, and maybe that’ll help our expedition to Glenview. But I don’t like the way she talks down to me. And I don’t like the way she keeps ordering me around. And I sure as hell don’t like being close to all these zombies. I can tell Cole feels the same—at least, about the zombies.
He lifts his eyes to study the infected; they stare right back, ravenous hunger clouding their milky pupils. That kid I kicked in the nuts keeps drooling all over his own bloodstained shirt.
Cole shifts his gaze to the girl on the log beside him. “You need to tell me what’s going on, Bethany.”
She scoots closer, snakes an arm around his waist. “Did you miss me, baby?”
For some reason, Cole’s eyes shoot toward me. I glance away, studying the fire like it’s the most fascinating thing I’ve ever seen.
He puts an arm around her. “Of course I did.”
Something hot flares in my stomach.
Bethany shoots me a gloating look and snuggles closer to Cole. How can this chick act like everything is…
normal
?
“Go on now, Bethany,” Cole urges. “Tell me what happened. How’d this start? How’d my friends get infected? And how come they ain’t biting you?”
She shrugs. “Dunno. We were at the rec center. Pickup game of basketball. You remember Old Man Saunders, the custodian? He busted through the gym door, screaming his fool head off. Said something just bit him. Jessica Fields ran to check his arm—you know she volunteers at the hospital and figures that makes her a nurse. By the time she walked ten steps to Old Man Saunders, he’d changed. Bit Jessica on her neck—like something outta one of them vampire movies.
“Rec center went nuts after that. People biting people. Everybody trying to get outside. I finally fought my way to the door and what do you think happened?” She points at Jarrod. “This big, dumb A-hole sinks his teeth in me.
Well, Bethany,
I says,
this is it. Time to cash in your chips.
But nothing happened. I was just a-sitting there. Watching people die. Watching people get eat up. And Old Man Saunders comes in my direction, baring his teeth and acting all scary. Moaning and groaning. I said,
No way, Saunders. You just stop, ya hear?
I said it right out loud.
”
Bethany gives Cole a wide smile, her lips shiny with squirrel grease. “And what do you know? He did stop. And so’d the rest of ’em. They was all listening to me. If I said go left, they went left. If I said go right, they went right. I said do the hokey pokey, and by golly, they did the hokey pokey.”
She rips another piece of squirrel meat from the bone and talks through her food. “By that point, only a few kids hadn’t got bit. You know that redhead girl on the basketball team? I ain’t never liked her. So I told Jarrod to bite her.”
Bethany swallows and smiles wide. “And he did.”
“Wait.” Cole’s face is a mask of shock. “You told zombies to bite people? To infect them?”
“Yup. Like I told ya, they do whatever I say. No questions asked. No back talk. It’s like I got my own personal army or something.”
Bethany’s words chill me more than the icy river. She ordered a zombie to infect someone—just because she didn’t like her? If that’s true, then one word from Bethany and these zombies are free to move forward? To act on all that ravenous hunger in their eyes? I shiver.
Cole notices. “Are you still cold?”
I nod. “A little.”
Bethany shoots me the stink-eye. “So that’s enough about me. Let’s talk about you, Yankee Girl. Where were y’all heading before I rescued you? And how exactly do you know Cole?”
Cole picks up a handful of long branches, lays them carefully on the fire.
I don’t want to talk to Bethany, but that’s not smart. Cole’s girlfriend might be crazypants, but right now, she holds all the power.
I try to smile, but it feels more like a grimace. “I’m Cole’s neighbor.” I want her to know there’s nothing romantic going on here—that I’m not trying to horn in on her territory. “He was clearing my yard when some infected people came over the hill. So we took off in the woods. We’ve walked all yesterday and this morning. Now we’re going to—”
Cole cuts me off. “We’re going to Highland.”
Highland? What the frig is Cole talking about?
Highland is ten miles southeast of Glenview. We’d have to veer off in a totally different direction to get there.
I open my mouth to tell Cole that I don’t know what
his
plans are, but
I
am not going to Highland.
“Her parents are there,” Cole says, catching my eye. A strange, pleading expression crosses his face. Bethany is busy watching me. I close my mouth. Something is up.
Why would Cole hide our destination from his girlfriend? Doesn’t he trust her? The thought gives me a rush of hope. Maybe he’s not going to let her feed me to the zombies.
I swallow hard, trying to regain my composure. “Yeah, Highland,” I say. “To…uh, meet my parents.”
“Awwww,” Bethany drawls, putting her head on Cole’s shoulder. “And you’re being her knight in shining armor—helping her get there. Well, ain’t that sweet?”
He nods shortly, doesn’t correct her. Doesn’t mention he’s also searching for his dad and brother.
My heart pounds. I study Cole through my lashes. Why is he lying? There’s only one plausible answer: we’re in danger here. This girl who tells zombies to bite other humans, who talks about armies—she’s a threat to us.
Or maybe just to me.
She gives me an appraising glance, her face twisting into something cold and hard. She throws her last squirrel bone in the fire, wipes her fingers on her jeans, and stands.
“You know what?” She smiles down at Cole who’s still messing with those long sticks in the fire. “I reckon Yankee Girl ain’t gonna make it to Highland.”
“I know it’s a long shot,” Cole says, focusing on the flames, “but we gotta try.”
“That ain’t what I mean.” Her tone is sugar-sweet, but it doesn’t match the hard glint in her eyes. “You and me, Cole Greer. That’s the way it’s s’posed to be. We could own this whole forest.” She sweeps one hand toward the zombies. “Hell, we could own the whole world, now that I got my army. We don’t need no tagalong cramping our style.”
He avoids my gaze. “Well, I hear ya, but we can’t just leave her in the middle of the woods.”
Cole’s words freeze me to the core. What if he bails? Can I make it to Glenview on my own?
Bethany gives me a pitying stare. “No, of course we can’t just leave her in the woods. I got other plans for her.” Her voice stays light and upbeat, but a chill seems to emanate from her.
Cole’s head jerks up.
“I’m going to bite her and infect her.”
“What?”
“I can do it, you know. Just like they can.” She jerks a head toward the zombies. “I’ve already experimented a time or two. I can add this Floridiot to my collection.”
“No,” Cole says, the word loud and firm.
She rounds on him. “No?” Her smile is suspicious. Malicious. “Well, there’s another option,” she says casually.
Bethany takes several steps back, away from the fire, like she’s trying to put as much distance as possible between my body and hers. Her eyes glint in the firelight. “These guys here are hungry.” She turns to the zombies—
her
zombies—and points a greasy finger in my direction. “Eat her.”
…
The dead surge forward, ready to feed. Skeletal teeth grind in their half-rotten faces. I understand why Bethany moved out of the way—it’s like a slo-mo cattle stampede. She might’ve gotten crushed in the mad rush for human flesh.
My human flesh.
This is it. I’m gonna be devoured by zombies. Killed at the hands of some crazy redneck bitch.
In one smooth motion, Cole leaps to his feet. Long sticks blaze in his hands. The zombies recoil, growling like wounded animals.
“Grab the other torches,” he orders. “Hurry.”
Trembling, I snatch two sticks from the flames.
“Put your back against mine,” Cole says.
We stand near the fire, facing opposite sides of the ring of attackers, waving our torches to keep the monsters away. I try to breathe, but my lungs have turned to ice.
Bethany shouldn’t have stepped back before she gave the order to kill. Now she’s outside the circle, blocked by a row of infected.
“Outta my way!” she yells, but the monsters are busy trying to reach us.
The zombie faces blur into a blank sea of shadows. Everything fades except Cole and the bright circle of firelight emanating from our torches.
“Move fast,” Cole mutters. “Before she breaks through.”
“Which way?”
He whispers low—so only I can hear him over the crazed howls. “Left. Your left.”
Time shifts into slow motion. Backs together, we take five steps toward the weakest part of the circle. Two zombies block our escape—Jarrod and a hillbilly woman with neon-pink fingernails and teased hair. Cole feints toward her, then doubles back, setting Jarrod’s shirt on fire.
“Rawwwwrrr!” Jarrod bellows, flapping his hands wildly, like he can fan out the flames. Apparently zombies don’t know “stop, drop, and roll.”
He staggers a few paces, leaving a gap. I dash toward the opening, but the woman swipes her long fingernails, raking my forearm.
“Aaaagh!” I jab with my stick, but it hits her shoulder and falls useless to the ground.
Cole swears and yanks me back toward him. “Never, never, drop your weapon!”
“Sorry!” I switch my remaining torch to my right hand. On the other side of the circle, between a couple of rotting heads, Bethany tries to shove her way through the crowd.
Crazy-hair woman makes another grab at me. God, she must use an entire can of Aqua Net in her—
Wait…hairspray…flammable…
I stab my lit stick in her beehive of hair. This time, my fingers keep a death lock around the torch.
“Eeeeeeeeee!” she screeches as her bouffant goes up in a whiff of green smoke.
At that moment, Bethany breaks through the mass of walking dead. She plants one foot, then the other, and stands frozen in place like General Lee preparing to command the Confederate Army.
“Cole?” Her mouth gapes. “Why you helping this Yankee girl?”
Cole doesn’t answer, just hurls his torches at the closest zombies.
“Fine,” Bethany yells. “I’ll infect her myself. I’m sick of this little Florida skank.”
Fear flares in every cell of my body. Cole is frozen in the flickering light. Adrenaline surges and I lunge, hurtling myself through the break in the ring—where the bouffant woman is still distracted, trying to beat out the flames on her skull. I don’t even realize I’ve brought Cole along for the ride until we are outside the horde, careening through the beech woods clutching each other’s hands. We dive into the thickest part of the pine forest, thrashing our way through the murky half-light.
Zing!
An arrow sails past, dangerously close. Great—Bethany’s obviously loaded her crossbow.
“Lose your torch!” Cole screams.
“You said not to drop my weapon!”
“Lose the damn torch. You’re a lit target!”
Oh.
My branch falls to the dirt. Now, I feel
completely
exposed and vulnerable. Any instant an arrow will pierce my skin, my heart, my brain. The only solid thing is Cole’s hand in mine.
Zing!
Something thunks into a tree trunk ahead of us. Another arrow, another near miss.
“Keep hold of my hand!” Cole yells. “She can’t hit you when she’s trying to miss me.”