“Fuck!” I punched the windshield, a large crack spider webbing across its face. My knuckles stung, and when I glanced down at them, I saw that they were bleeding. I gripped the steering wheel tightly. The pain felt good.
“Can you see through that?” Blake asked calmly. I don’t know how he could deal with this shit. He was acting all laid back like this was just some normal night, some normal patrol. He had broken down after I had called out Clara and threatened her life.
Yeah, that got him all hot in the ass, but now he was all cool and calm…and he claimed he loved Lex,
fucking bastard.
I picked up the shotgun next to me and smashed the rest of the windshield out. The destruction and the sound of breaking glass felt good.
“Now I can.” I put the SUV into gear and did a quick turn heading back to the compound.
“We’ll find her,” Blake said quietly.
“This is all your fucking fault!” I yelled, unable to hold it in anymore. I knew it was unfair the moment it was out of my mouth, but I had to blame someone and Blake was convenient. I looked over and he was looking down at the Glock he had in his hand. He wouldn’t look at me.
“It is. I shouldn’t have left in the first place. I know that shit, but I couldn’t–I just couldn’t…and I think the people I picked up are good people. We’ve become close, almost family. I didn’t realize Clara was this fucked up. I should have realized it, but I didn’t. I regret not being more aware of what she was doing. I’ll take the blame for that, Zach. Let me have it. I thought if I ignored her she would move on.
I would never have thought she would do this, though.” He still wouldn’t look up from his piece.
“Crazy bitch,” I muttered.
But I got it.
I
should have known there was a threat within our walls.
I
should have seen that Clara was unstable. But
Blake
should have known that Clara would take crazy to a whole new level.
Why didn't he see it? Why didn’t we both see it?
“Who do you think grabbed them?” he asked.
“My bets are on the Pearl River group, those fucking rednecks. They had to be scouting the area, looking for movement, any sign of our base. The gunshot and the sound of the crash must have led them right to the women.”
“Yeah, there is no one else in the area, it’s gotta be them,” he agreed.
“I don’t know what their intentions are, hold them for ransom, or maybe for their own uses. It’s driving me crazy. All I know is someone took her. She wouldn’t have left on her own.”
“Well, whoever took her, it’s going to be the last thing they do,” Blake growled, finally showing some emotion.
“They have no idea what they’ve started,” I said under my breath.
“It’s been awhile since we kicked in doors together, brother." Blake finally looked at me and I recognized that look.
I hadn't seen it in a long time.
It was hungry, not for food, or sex, or even power, but blood.
“I have a feeling this time it’s gonna be a lot more satisfying,” I laughed and knew I was sporting the same look.
BLAKE
Zach began rounding up the troops the moment we got back to the compound. Martinez had repaired the gate, and the grunts were mingling in the cafeteria waiting for orders. I forgot how good it was to have loyal team members ready and willing to go to bat for you. My badly thought out adventure to Houston had been an eye-opener as I paired up with civilians to get it done. They were good in their own way, but this group of highly trained soldiers couldn’t be stopped if they put their minds to it.
I grabbed a map from a box we had in the corner and laid it out on one of the tables.
“We’ve spotted them here and here.” I pointed to two spots on the map. “Where was the road block, Ito?” Vance stepped up and pointed to a location on the map. They were all within one mile of each other. The only thing in that area that was habitable was the marina and a bait shop. From canvassing in the area, I knew there were maybe four to five camps along the road, a handful more down a backroad. They could be in any of those structures, but it made sense that they would set up in the marina. It had a small restaurant and bait shop and most likely had a lot of supplies for fishermen, which would be very useful.
“They have to be holed up in the marina or one of the camps that line this area.” I circled an area near the Rigolets. “So far we’ve seen five of them, four men, and one woman. We’ll head out before dawn and do recon. I want to get a fix on their location and then go in hard. I want everyone to look intimidating, fully armed, armor and coms on all of us. Ito, Peters, y’all stay back and guard the compound, I don’t want to leave us vulnerable. This is where we hit first.” I pointed to the marina on the map where we first spotted the three people that ran out into the road after that first Pearlington run.
“Get some sleep in the barracks, revelry is in five hours.” Zach marched off without even a backward glance. I assumed he was going to bunk in his office. Clara had been staying in mine.
I wasn’t going there.
I trudged upstairs and grabbed an empty bunk in the co-ed dorm, threw a blanket down, and lay on the thin mattress fully dressed. I knew there was blood on me; I knew I should probably take my boots off, but I couldn’t force myself to do anything else.
It wasn’t like I was going to sleep. My mind kept fixating on Alexis and what she might be going through. Sleep was a luxury that I couldn’t succumb to, not when my mind wouldn’t turn off the horrors of what could be happening.
I would stop at nothing to get Lex back.
But when we got her back, would she be the same?
I felt like an asshole even thinking this.
She was Lex, she was tough, there was nothing we could throw at her that gave her pause.
She was amazing. During our initial escape out of the city, she had blown my mind. Even when she was at the point of breaking, she had kept going, pushing through it. She always kept moving forward.
She would do it again; she wouldn’t let this shit get her down. She was the strongest person I knew.
Now I just had to find her.
ALEXIS
Bright light shot across my vision.
Whack.
Sharp pain brought me to consciousness.
The smell of body odor and piss had me coughing and jerking away from the sharp sting across my face. I tried to push my body away, but I was held in place, my body heavy, my arms forced to my sides, my back rigid.
I couldn’t move.
My back was up against a wall or the back of a chair and I was being held tightly in place. I tried to move my hands, but they were bound.
The pain flaring from my wrists clued me in that they were bound too tight. Pins and needles popped up all over my body and I sucked in a large breath of air as if I had been under water. It was hard to take a deep breath and when I pushed my chest forward, I felt tight restraints across me.
The pain came again, hard against my cheek. Words followed, but they were muffled.
I could barely make them out. My ears buzzed and my brain was foggy, slow to function.
I blinked, my eyes fluttering, trying to make out the blurry shapes in front of me. Wherever I was, it was dim.
I could smell the acrid scent of wood smoke and candle wicks, and a rank smell underneath of dirty humans.
“The bitch is finally awake,” a gruff voice said. This time I could make out the words.
My eyes focused on a shape in front of me. It was a man.
He was much older than me and I thought he looked familiar.
The man from the truck we ran off.
My brain finally connected the shapes and faces with the memory.
“Morning, sunshine,” he said, smiling and revealing rotten, yellow teeth. I had seen better grills on a zombie.
“Fuck you.” I spat whatever was in my mouth at him, either mucous or blood.
I couldn’t tell, but it worked.
The crack of his hand across my face was almost worth it.
It threw my head back violently and I saw stars again, my vision going back to blurry.
“She’s a spitfire, not like the other one,” a woman’s voice said. “This is the one that killed Henry?”
A woman came into view; she was just as fugly as the man.
Her words registered.
I had killed the man I stabbed.
I couldn’t help myself, I laughed. It sounded insane even to my own ears.
“Whatcha laughing at, bitch?” the man asked. I just glared at him. I could feel something dripping from my mouth.
He must have split my lip. I wanted to spit it in his face again, but he would probably just hit me harder. There was nowhere I could go, a slight tug at my restraints and I knew they would hold. I glanced around the room.
It was some kind of store.
There were shelves along the wall, all empty, and I could just make out a counter toward the back of the room.
The darkness flickered from the candlelight and I was unsure if there were more people around me that I couldn’t see. Candles lined the shelves, little tea candles that had fire hazard written all over them. I saw one man hanging out to the side. He hadn’t spoken, and when I glanced in his direction, he leered at me. He had to be at least six feet tall, but his weight and general out of shape appearance didn’t intimidate me. He was just some fat pervy fuck.
“Gimme some ‘lone time with her, she won’t be no spitfire after I have a few minutes on top of her.” The man spit on the floor to emphasize his classiness and leered at me again.
“Shut your nasty mouth, Frank,” the woman hissed back. “I ain’t gonna be no party to that kind of shit in my house. Plus, these girls are worth some really good bartering.
You heard what that biker said, you bring ‘em pretty girls, he’ll give us food, a lot of food. I don’t know ‘bout you, but I ain’t had a good meal in a long time. I’d be more worried about my belly than my dick if I was you. You rape this one, they gonna know.
They said no spoiled goods.”
“We gotta go all the way into Lakeview for that.
We don’t even have the gas for a trip around the corner. Let’s trade ‘em back to their men for some food or something and then we can rough ‘em up a bit,” Leery McPerv argued.
“You ain’t there, you ain’t seen their guns, they was like a fuckin’ army,” Nasty Teeth shot back. “They gonna be pissed to lose their women. They won’t trade with us, they’ll just come in and kill us. We got maybe two shotguns each.
I saw them holding shit the military has. Fuck that shit. We can siphon enough to get a full tank for the truck and get the fuck out of here. I ain’t hanging around for those men to come get us. We done with this area, for sure.”
“He’s right. I’ll handle the gas.
I sent Phil to round us up some. We need to get these girls gone and fast. Those men are gonna be looking for them and I don’t want to be anywhere near these girls when they come to find ‘em. In fact, I think it’s about time we move on from this place completely.
We should be moving north up near Mississippi,” the woman said. She turned to me and her hard eyes squinted at me.
“Your men gonna come for you, girl, or were you running from them?”
I didn’t answer, let them sweat.
“You speak English, girl?
Are ‘ya one of those illegals, you look kinda Mexican or are you a Muslim? Y’all all look the same.” She kicked at my leg. I spit the blood that was pooling in my mouth at her, my aim was getting better. I thought she would hit me, like the man had, but she didn’t.
She just stood up straight and smiled down at me.
“Frank, ‘ya gonna clean up this little spitfire here, get her nice and scrubbed so she’ll be fancy for those Lakeview boys. No rutting though.” She pointed a finger at him and then grabbed Nasty Teeth and both of them walked out of the room without a glance behind them. When they opened the door a blast of dim outside light came pouring in, confirming that was the way out, and it was still night. I had to get through that door.
Pervy, also known as Frank, leaned over me, the smell of his rank breath and body odor caused me to breathe through my mouth and turn my head away from him. He reached around me and untied the restraints that held me to the chair. I could finally take a deep breath, but it also allowed me to breathe in his stink better. I couldn’t help it; I gagged and almost vomited, managing to pull it together at the last second. The ropes dropped away from my chest and he squeezed my breast hard through my thick shirt and giggled like a school kid. The first tit he’s probably touched that he didn’t have to pay for in a long time.
I wish I would have vomited all over his rank ass.