Graham's Resolution Trilogy Bundle: Books 1-3 (61 page)

In the quarantine building, Dalton approached Clarisse from behind; knowing they were alone, he embraced her. She responded and turned around to face him. He kissed her. “I’ve missed you,” he said holding her.

“We’ve both been busy,” Clarisse admitted.

He purposely did this first, knowing he wouldn’t get a chance after he broached the subject. “Clarisse, I need to talk to Lucy. She’s the only one who’s lived to give us information she may not even know she has,” Dalton pleaded.

Clarisse stepped away from him. “Fine, Dalton, but she is very fragile right now. She nearly killed a man because she’s still flashing back, and . . .”

“We’re all going to be fragile or dead soon if we don’t get an edge on whatever information’s available to us,” Dalton interrupted, raising his voice at her. He knew it was a mistake; Clarisse didn’t do intimidation.

She pointed to the door but wouldn’t look at him again. “
Go.
I’ll bring her to you in half an hour.”

“Clarisse, I’m sor—”

“Out!”

Dalton left the quarantine building knowing he couldn’t say more. As he walked back, he heard the rumble of Dutch’s army truck rolling into camp. He was either on his way in or out of town.

Dalton picked up his pace and walked into the clearing, where Dutch stepped out of his truck, looking around after the guards let him through the gates.

“Hey, Dutch,” Rick said, extending his hand in greeting.

Dalton saw that Rick was at least vertical this morning and back to his normal self, even though he sported a leg bandage. Rick was pissed when he learned he wasn’t going on the scouting mission with them, but the injury would just slow them down. Plus, they still needed him for communications.

“Hey, Dutch,” said Dalton. Not worried about niceties, he continued, “You heading out? Can I convince you to stay a few days till we get back?”

“I’ve thought about it, and yes, I’ll stay until you guys get back. I want to make sure Lucy is getting along all right and that you guys heed my warning,” Dutch said.

“We’re scouting in the morning,” Dalton said. You want to tag along? One last mission?”

“You’re still on that? You can’t just take my word for it, man?” Dutch asked.

Dalton put his hands on his hips. He stared at the ground, thought about the consequences, and then looked squarely at Dutch. “No. I don’t intend to just let them take our country. I’m not going to let them just have it. If it
is
them, and this is it, I’ll send them all to hell or die trying. I don’t know how I’m going to do that yet, but I need to make sure, and I could use your help.”

He watched Dutch mull over the invitation. The cool spring air held a nip, but the sun shone in bright beams and Dalton thought it shouldn’t be that way. It should be gray and misty, the kind of fog you could get lost in. Dutch’s dark brown hair ran a little long. He was the same height as Dalton, but had a more muscular build, which Dalton guessed was due to farm work. He was the kind of vet who you knew, from the look in his eyes, had seen some grizzly times but had accepted that as his job to bear. Dutch was the kind you never worried about, the kind who watched your back, and Dalton hoped he’d stay with them for the battle.

“I hear you,” Dutch said, and nothing more was needed to make him understand the way Dalton felt. “When I first came across your message, I thought you guys were just a bunch of lucky civilians who just happen to have an old HAM operator playing on the waves. I didn’t know you were a tiny army.” He took a deep breath and faced the sun’s rays for a second before looking back at Dalton. “Hell, if you’re willing to take the risk, I’ll tag along. I’ll do it for Lucy, and the last infidels.”

Dalton chuckled at the reference. “That’s what we are, aren’t we? The last infidels. Those bastards . . .” He picked up the seriousness of his gesture and tipped his head at Dutch. “Sounds fine to me. Glad you’re with us.” Dalton shook the man’s hand again, this time with brotherly respect.

“For now I’d like to check in on Lucy and then I need to find my damn dogs,” Dutch said.

“They’re still missing?” Dalton asked.

“Yep. They’re well trained; this isn’t like them,” Dutch said.

“Well, Sheriff over at Graham’s camp was out all night, but just showed up this morning. He’d never done that before either. I’m sure they’ll turn up.”

“Great. Well, that’s the least of our problems right now,” Dutch said, then asked Dalton, “We leave at sunrise?”

“You know it.” Dalton looked past their gate and saw Clarisse heading in his direction with Lucy in tow. He knew Clarisse well enough to see she was still madder than hell.

“Hey, guys, Clarisse is here with Lucy.”

“Hey Sport, how you getting along?” Dutch asked Lucy.

She flashed him a smile and then it was gone, but Dalton thought that was probably a great achievement for Lucy. Then he realized Clarisse was burrowing her eyes into him.

“I told Lucy you needed to question her. Where do you want to do this? I’ll give you ten minutes, and I’ll be present,” Clarisse said.

Dalton nodded and put up both of his hands. “That’s fine, Clarisse. Let’s go into the communications tent. Can Sam attend? He always has a different perspective on these things.”

Clarisse looked like she wanted to explode at him and sever a few important body parts; she was only barely holding it together. She blew out a frustrated breath, turned to Lucy, and held onto her arm gently.

“Lucy, it’s important they get the advantage of all the details of what you witnessed. You’ll have two or three people asking you questions, but I’ll be there for you. Can you do this for us?” Clarisse asked.

“I’ll be there too, Lucy,” Dutch said in his low raspy voice.

Dalton knew he cared for the girl more than he let on. She looked terrified to Dalton, and ready to flee. He wouldn’t blame her if she did.

Lucy looked at him with her light-green eyes; her lips trembled. Dalton was about to call it off when she nodded her quivering chin and tears spilled over and ran down her cheeks.

He reached to comfort her, but Clarisse and intervened. He should have known it was stupid to try. He needed to be careful with her, but
damn the animals that did this to her
.

Clarisse hugged her briefly and then turned her toward the communications tent. Dalton and the others followed, but before they entered, Clarisse turned to face them with a glare.

“I’m warning you, go easy,” she said as she guided Lucy inside the tent and left the rest to ponder her warning. “She always like this?” Dutch asked.

“Clarisse? No. Actually, she can be your best friend. Or your worst nightmare; seems I’ve crossed the line here lately,” Dalton admitted.

“My kind of lady,” Dutch said as he passed Dalton into the tent.

“Great,” Dalton mumbled as he waited for Sam to join them.

“Do you have everything?” Tala asked McCann.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said as he pulled the strings taut on his pack.

“What about your med kit?” Marcy asked him.

“Got it.”

“McCann, you got the extra magazine?” Graham called from the dining room.

“Sure do,” he exclaimed. Their questions were starting to drive him a little crazy. “You guys, I need to travel light. I’ll probably be back by tomorrow night or the next morning. Don’t worry.”

“Plan for the worst, hope for the best,” Graham said, remembering what his father always used to say.

“Yeah,
my
dad said that, too.”

“Where are you going?” Bang asked. He’d come in the door without making a sound and, though they weren’t hiding the fact that McCann was going on a dangerous scouting mission with the preppers, they hadn’t told him or the rest of the group yet.

McCann looked at Tala, and Tala looked at Graham as if someone else might have the answer.

“He’s leaving in the morning to go with the preppers on a scouting trip. He should be back in a day or two. We’re trying to make sure he has all the stuff he might need,” Graham said.

“When were you going to tell me?” Macy said from the doorway, not yet visible to the others. Everyone looked from Macy to McCann.

“Macy, it’s not a big deal. I thought you heard about it this morning,” McCann explained.

“Why can’t I go too?” she asked.

“Macy,” Graham answered before anyone else could, “this isn’t one of those times where you’re being kept out because you’re a girl; he’s going because I can’t go.”

“Okay. Still, why can’t I go, too?” she asked.

“There isn’t room in the Jeep for more than five, Macy, and I need you here to take care of the horses. You’re the only one they’re not too skittish around,” McCann said.

Mark was about to protest that assessment when McCann widened his eyes at him to get him to clam up.

“Yeah,” Mark shook his head. “Mosey kicked me last time I mucked out the stalls,” he said, staring at the floor.

“That’s because Macy talks to them when she’s in there alone. I’ve heard her,” Bang said.

“I do not!” Macy said, leaving the room.

McCann let out a frustrated breath and thought it was getting a little too stuffy in the cabin. They were seldom all indoors during the day at the same time anymore since the weather had warmed up. Even Sheriff was still lollygagging on the wood floor of the bunkroom, sleeping off his adventures of the night before.

McCann would miss them all, but it was a just a little trip. But it also happened to be the longest trip he’d be taking since he rode into town, and potentially more dangerous than he could fathom. No story ever foretold such calamities so close to home. No one ever predicted this kind of hell. It was one thing to imagine independence as a teenager, to long for it even, but it was something else to survive everyone you ever knew and be expected to go on day after day. Just when McCann thought that might even be possible, the story had now changed.

Now not only had there been a massive pandemic that had wiped out humankind, but someone had done it on purpose and that someone was now here on their own land, in America, and boasting about it, proud of it.

“You know, McCann . . .” Graham said, interrupting McCann’s thoughts and causing him to look up from packing. He noticed that everyone was gone except Graham.

“When I taught math at the University of Washington, my attitude about war and fighting was very different from how it is now; life has a way of teaching you out of your best intentions. I didn’t believe in patriotism; I only believed in humanity, and that we should embrace our enemies. The only problem with that way of thinking is that, while you’re embracing your enemies, they’re flying our own planes into buildings, killing thousands of innocent people. They’re developing evil plans to corrupt a religion and declare jihad on anyone who denounces them.” He pounded his cane out of frustration to the floor. “Dammit, I was wrong. It wasn’t us; it was them. They were plotting genocide while I was trying to embrace them. Everything I tried to stand for, every argument I won, was nothing more than blind faith in humanity where evil will remain a component.

“I once was blind, McCann. Now I see, and if there is any way we can stop them, we will. You come back to us in one piece. We’re going to need you.” He reached out for a handshake and then pulled McCann in.

“Will do, Graham.” McCann was thankful for Graham’s concern, but then added, in a worried voice, “Make damn sure Macy doesn’t follow us.”

Graham looked serious. “I’ll tie her up somewhere.”

“Good luck with that,” McCann said jokingly, though in fact he was completely serious.

Lucy sat down in a metal folding chair inside the media tent, amid a hum of electronics. Her pale slender hands were like icicles, and she pushed them down between her thighs for warmth. Clarisse had given her fatigues and a pair of hiking boots to wear. She was thankful to finally wear clothing that actually fit her instead of having to adjust Dutch’s much-too-large apparel. They weren’t fashionable by any means, but at least they were hers, and now she felt more secure.

Sam pointed a space heater toward her to warm up her legs. She’d met him the night before at dinner along with several other people. She also met with Rick and cried when she apologized to him, fearing he would be angry with her. He wasn’t, of course, but she knew he didn’t trust her either.

“Lucy,” Clarisse said, “tell us what you remember. Just start from the beginning and know that we might stop you briefly to ask you questions along the way. Please just answer the best you can. We can stop anytime you need to. This is a safe place, and we are your friends. No one is going to harm you here.”

“Okay. I . . . lived near Spokane in a little town called Liberty Lake.” She looked up and saw several people nod, acknowledging that they knew where the place was; the town was the last stop in Washington along Interstate 90 before the Idaho border.

She shook her head. “I thought I was the only one left there. It’s really just a big suburban neighborhood. I lived with my parents in a house on Settler Road and worked at the Safeway grocery store there right in the middle of town. I was going to school at Eastern Washington University, and when the virus broke out, they shut the school down.” She stared into her lap. “My parents . . . they died. My little brothers, too.” Her tears fell to her lap, making darker pooling stains of green on the camo fabric of her pants. Clarisse handed her a clean cloth, and Sam wrapped a wool army blanket around her shoulders.

Lucy swallowed and smiled once she blotted the tears away. “It all happened so fast. At first the city council coordinated burials of the dead in Pavilion Park, near where I lived. Then, a few weeks later, there were just too many, and my father told me to keep inside and to lock the doors. To pretend we weren’t home or that all of us were dead. I never got sick. I never came down with the virus; I just watched as my mother and brothers passed. My dad and I buried them all in the backyard. Then my father came down with it, and I sat with him when he died. I was alone then; winter came, and I buried my father. It was cold and the ground was hard; it took me two days to do it. I survived by rationing what food I could get from the neighbors’ empty houses and whatever canned food was left at the grocery stores. He wanted me to kill myself,” she said, breaking into more tears. “He didn’t want me to be alone, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t . . .” she looked to them for approval.

Dalton leaned forward, but again Clarisse pulled him back. “I’m okay,” Lucy said. She wiped away more tears and took a deep breath.

“I did what he said; I stayed inside and pretended that there was no one home. At first, there were sounds like raiders searching homes, and I was terrified someone would break in and discover me, and then there were no sounds at all. You could always hear the highway from our home late at night when you went to sleep. I grew up with that sound as a young girl. But now it was silent. Too quiet; I couldn’t sleep. There were no cars going anywhere, no neighbors shouting or kids playing basketball on the road out front. Nothing.

I had enough food. My dad had made sure I would, but I just couldn’t stand it anymore. I waited for it to get dark, and at first I walked down to the end of our road. I went and checked the mail, thinking that maybe someone might still deliver it and . . . I don’t know why I did it.” She looked confused, shaking her head and questioning her own logic.

“I kept doing it each evening, checking the empty mailbox and walking to the end of the street just to see . . . something . . . anything or anyone. Then winter came again, and the snow kept me inside because I didn’t want to have my footprints showing; my dad had warned me about that. So, I played my piano during the day quietly, worked out in the afternoon, and read a lot. I kept myself on a schedule to keep from going crazy. Our power was out, but the gas fireplace still worked, so I stayed warm enough.

“Finally the snow melted and no more came. I was out of books to read and thought if I could only break into the library, I might be able to keep from going insane. It was the farthest I’d ventured from home since my father passed away. Only about half a mile. When I got there, I saw that someone had already torn it to shreds.” She shook her head, trying to fathom the unfathomable. “I don’t know who would do that. It scared me. So I ran, and then a dog chased me; I only barely made it back into my house and shut the door. Then more dogs came, and they growled at me. I felt trapped, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to get out again. By this time I was down to a few weeks of food left. I’d planned to go to the nearby grocery store to see if I could find anything there that might be left over, but after finding the library in bad shape, I didn’t think the grocery stores would be any better and the dogs might get me.”

She took a deep breath. “Then one day, I thought I was dreaming because I was asleep early one morning and I heard the rumble of vehicles on the highway again. Later I heard shooting and I thought that maybe the military had come to help. Maybe other survivors I didn’t know about were with them, and I was afraid I might be left behind. So I got up and took a baseball bat with me in case I needed it for the feral dogs, and I ran into town.

“A dog came after me, and I was trying to fight it off when I heard gunfire, and the dog dropped dead. I turned around and . . . it wasn’t the military. They didn’t look like any of us. They wore cloths over their face like the terrorists I’ve seen on TV. It was them.”

“Did they speak English?” Dalton asked her.

“Um, one of them did . . . kind of. The one that shot the dog grabbed me by my hair and pushed me to the ground. I tried to run, but I couldn’t. He spoke some other language and yelled for someone else. He pointed his gun at me, so I stayed right where I was. Then this other guy came, and he was even meaner. He jerked me up and screamed at me in another language. He made me kneel down in front of him. Then he demanded in English to know if I could say one word in Arabic. I don’t know any Arabic. He kept screaming at me and I shook my head no. He said again that if I knew one word in Arabic, I would live; if not, I would die. So, I shut my eyes and started crying. I didn’t want to see him shoot me. I just hoped it would be over soon.”

“Lucy, what kind of weapons were they carrying?” Sam’s soft voice broke the awful tension of remembering again.

She sniffed and wiped her face. “Um, they were rifles. I don’t know what they’re called. They would pull the trigger and it would fire several bullets at a time. They were black. They also had knives, and one even had a whip. Some of them would point the rifles in the sky and fire them over and over while screaming, like it was some kind of celebration,” she said, as though trying to make sense of it all.

Sam nodded in understanding. Then Clarisse said, “So the second man had you and asked you to speak in Arabic, then what happened?”

“Then he pulled me to my feet and tied my hands behind my back and other men clawed at me and pulled my hair as he dragged me through a crowd. Then I saw at least twenty people standing with black hoods on and they were leashed with ropes to an army truck. I couldn’t believe what was happening. Some of them were crying, and then I realized they were only girls; I could tell by their voices. One of them tried to sit on the ground, and one of the other men beat her with a stick over and over until she stood up. The guy who had me was waiting for someone else. He stood there talking to someone. I couldn’t understand what he was staying. I said to him, ‘Please let me go.’ And he pushed me to the ground and kicked me, then pulled me back up. Finally, another man came and I think he was the boss. He took out a knife. It was curved . . . about twelve inches long . . . and he held it to my neck. He asked me again if I knew even one word in Arabic, but I didn’t. Then . . .” she looked up at them.

“It’s okay, Lucy. Just say it,” Clarisse encouraged her. “There is nothing these men haven’t seen the brutality of. It’s okay.”

“He asked me if I was a—a virgin.” She cried at the humiliation. “By then, I knew who they were. I said I wasn’t. I knew then that he would kill me, and the only thing I could think as the time slowed was that I’d rather be shot than have my throat slit. Is that—selfish?”

“No, Lucy, that’s human,” Dutch said.

Tears streamed down Lucy’s cheeks and she nodded her head, as if the riddle to that dilemma had passed. It was okay to fear death, in any way it might be delivered.

“How many men do you think there were, Lucy?” Dalton asked.

She shook her head. “I don’t know. From what I could see at that time, there were at least twenty trucks all lined up going east toward Idaho. There were several parked on the main street, but mostly I could see several more on the highway from the main street. I want to say I saw at least three hundred men, but there could have been many more than that. I just don’t know, because after that he pulled me up to him like he was deciding something. He grabbed my hair and then shoved me back at the second guy and said something in Arabic. That guy pulled a black robe over me and then put a black hood over my head. He then tied me up with the other girls. We were there for another hour. I tried to see through my hood, but the guard would beat us if we moved. We didn’t dare talk to one another. The others cried; many sounded even younger than me.” She shook her head in sorrow.

“Then they were shouting, and all of a sudden, truck engines started, and the one I was tied to began to move. We were pulled and made to walk behind it. Every now and then I got a glimpse of where we were going. We went back to the highway and, in the right lane, trucks went much slower with prisoners tied to the back, walking, while in the other lane army trucks went much faster, flying by us. Some of the girls would push toward the outer lane and someone with a whip would cut us across the legs to stay to the right.”

“Did you ever get to speak to any of the other prisoners?” Dalton asked.

“No,” she said.

“Did you hear their voices at all? Did they sound American, or did you detect any other accent?”

“No, there was nothing but the wailing of young girls. I swear they were no more than fifteen,” Lucy said, shaking her head.

“Okay, how long ago was this? Do you remember?” Sam asked.

“Two to three weeks ago,” she said.

“This might sound like a strange question,” Sam interjected, “but did the robe and hood smell like? Did it have an odor?”

“It smelled like sweat and iron. It was damp and dirty.”

“So, other than them questioning you, you didn’t hear any English?” Dalton asked.

“No, not then.”

“Okay, Lucy, keep going. You’re almost there,” Clarisse said, and Dalton suddenly didn’t want to hear anymore. He wanted her to stop there because he could guess what happened next. He’d seen the aftermath, what these animals had done, but he needed to find out how she got away. That was the mystery to him.

After another deep breath, Lucy continued. “So we stopped, near Post Falls, Idaho. I kept tripping and almost fell over. I was so thankful when we stopped. It was night, and some of the girls started weeping even more, like they knew what was next. I didn’t, but I was really scared. I heard someone come for one of the girls, she fought whoever was trying to take her, and then he beat her. She finally screamed, ‘Kill me!’ Then there was a gunshot. Those were the only words of English I heard spoken by the others:
Kill me
.

“I huddled in my spot. I didn’t look, I didn’t know what would happen. Then someone pulled off my hood and then pulled it back on, as if checking to see which one I was. He untied me from the rope line and I caught a glance of a hotel with rooms from the outside. I remembered seeing this place, years ago, when we’d pass by it on the highway. That’s how I knew we were near Post Falls. He shoved me through a door and then into the bathroom of the room and locked me in there. He said something in Arabic that I didn’t understand.

“I took off the hood. I washed my hands. I braided my hair and looked around for a weapon, anything I could fight back with. I drank a lot of water from the faucet. There was no window to escape from. Then, I heard someone at the door. I’d looped a shower curtain hook into my hair, hoping to use it to fight with if I could. But I didn’t get that chance. The door opened and the man who liked my hair shoved me into the main room.” She looked at Clarisse, and her voice could no longer form the words.

“Did he tell you his name, Lucy?” Dutch asked her, hoping to speed her past the worst part.

She shook her head, because she couldn’t speak with the lump in her throat.

“Was he their leader?” Sam asked.

“I don’t know. I think he might have been, since the others seemed to look to him for answers.”

Dalton took in a breath. “Lucy, did he rape you?”

“No,” she answered, her eyes wide with tears streaming down her cheeks. “I shot him before he could”

It wasn’t what Dalton expected to hear. She’d somehow gotten away. He drew a hand down his face and sighed in relief. “Thank God, Lucy. You’re a fighter. Good girl! How did you get away?” Dalton asked.