Love and Decay, Volume Eight (Episodes 9-12, Season Three) (33 page)

I would not.

“Page, he’s not hunting us anymore,” Tyler
said gently. “There’s no reason to go after him again.”

Page slid forward until she perched at the
edge of the couch, “He’s a monster, Tyler. He’s going to keep
killing and keep killing until we finally kill him.”

I willed myself not to cry from frustration.
My favorite nine-year-old was right. Damn it, she was right.

“Not without a cure,” Hendrix said after long
minutes of silence. “We don’t go back without a cure or a vaccine
or something to fight those goddamn Feeders with.”

“On that scale… Hendrix, we’re not going to
be able to take a cure to an entire country of Feeders. And what
about everything between here and there? You’re talking… I mean
that is years down the road.” Haley threw up her hands in defeat.
“We won’t be ready for years. Maybe decades.”

Hendrix looked at Page, then at Lennon and
finally my stomach where he rested his hand. “I’m okay with
that.”

“We can’t do nothing!” Page whined. “We can’t
let him win.”

Hendrix squared his shoulders and captured
Page’s full attention. “We’re not doing nothing, Page. We’re
fighting him every day we live and breathe and continue to solve
this infection. Every day we put into eradicating this plague, we
fight the very thing he’s using to keep his victims imprisoned. He
would be nothing without the threat of Zombies. There would be no
reason to fear him if lives weren’t daily in danger. We do this
first, we fight him here first,
then
we decide what to do.
Yeah?”

“You’re scared,” she sniffed at him. “You’re
afraid that he’ll kill one of us.”

Without apology or regret, Hendrix answered,
“You’re damn right I’m scared he’ll kill one of us. I’m scared
he’ll kill all of us. That thought haunts me every day of my life.
I will not let it happen, understand? I’ll do
anything
to
keep from losing someone else.”

Page’s chin tipped up with defiance, “That’s
the safe thing.”

“Yeah,” Hendrix growled. “It’s the safe
thing.”

She met him glare for glare when she
declared, “Well, I’d rather do the best thing than the safe thing.
And saving those people is the best thing I could ever do with my
life.”

Hendrix stood up and towered over her. With a
jab of his finger he finished the argument, “Then grow up first,
little girl. Because right now I’m in charge and until you’re old
enough to argue differently, you’ll wait until I’m ready to
go.”

Page didn’t say anything else. Hendrix had
made his point, but I could see the defiance flashing over her
usually sweet face.

I felt uneasy with her strong opinion. She
had never behaved this way before. She had always trusted her
brothers to do the right thing.

What changed now?

Conversation evened out as we discussed more
peaceful matters and what to say to Andy in a return letter. Haley
took the lead and wrote out our thoughts and positions. We would do
what Andy asked and find a cure first or a vaccine or something
that would help the human cause.

We would tackle that major problem first.
Until then, we planned to live out our days here tranquilly and
worry about the Colony when we were forced to think about them
again.

Nelson made the point that Matthias might not
live for much longer if his health was really that bad. Andy’s army
would surely grow between now and then too. They would gain more
sympathy. People would realize how wrong Matthias was and decide
they couldn’t live under the Colony’s thumb anymore.

I believed that things would change for the
better. We were on the cusp of innovation. Oliver and Fang talked
about it every day. We were so close.

This world we lived in wouldn’t be desolate
forever. We wouldn’t live in decay forever.

We were the solution now. We were the beacon
on a hill, the light in the darkness. We would stay here and do
whatever it took until this world was filled with life instead of
death, love instead of hate.

We would not give up.

Hendrix took my hand after long hours of
conversation. We stood up silently and said goodnight to our
friends.

We walked hand-in-hand down dim corridors
until we came to our room. He opened the door for me and I walked
into the space that had become ours.

I didn’t get far before he grabbed my waist
and pulled me back against his chest. We stood there, with his arms
wrapped around me and my back pressed to his heartbeat, and
breathed.

“I need to worry about my sister, don’t I?”
he whispered eventually. “She thinks she can save the world.”

“I wonder where she gets that from?” I teased
gently.

“Not from me.” His trailed kisses from the
nape of my neck to my earlobe. “I’ve only ever wanted to save my
family and this girl I found wandering around a department store in
search of makeup. My list stops there.”

I wondered if that was true… if Page’s fire
and determination had come from somewhere else.

“But there is this girl I know,” he
continued. “She thinks she can save everything. She’s never let a
problem like Zombies or warlords stand in her way. She takes on the
giant and laughs.”

“Are you talking about me?” I was surprised
to find myself choked up.

He nodded against the curve of my neck.
“You’re her hero for a very good reason, Reagan. I don’t think she
could have chosen better.”

I turned around in his embrace and threw my
arms around his neck. “I’ll stop,” I promised him. Fear for Page’s
life and her future decisions drove me to examine every single
decision I had ever made… and regret them. “I’ll show her that it’s
okay to be safe and secure. We’ll make a good life here and she’ll
forget all about her superhero dreams.”

Hendrix pulled back so that he could capture
my gaze. His blue eyes were tender, but firm. “It’s too late, I’m
afraid. The damage is done. But we’ll deal with it, Reagan. We’ll
cross that bridge when we come to it.”

“You’re okay with letting her go?”

“I’ll never let her go,” he said immediately.
“But I’ll do whatever it takes to keep this family together. If
that means we have war in our future, so be it.”

He leaned down and kissed me before I could
ask any more questions. He swept me away with the press of his lips
and the taste of his mouth. I got lost in my desire for this man…
this man that had loved me before I deserved his love and stayed
with me long after he should have left.

When he pulled back I felt warm all over. I
felt safe again. I felt peace.

“Besides,” he murmured. “I have the only
thing that I’ll ever need to survive.”

“What’s that?” I asked breathlessly.

“You,” he promised. “By my side.”

Nine Years Later…

Page

My dagger plunged into the skull of a
gruesome Feeder. Black, coagulated blood leaked from the wound,
coating my knife. His red eyes dimmed into sightless holes in his
ugly head.

He was dead. At my hands.

“You were supposed to bag him, Page! Not kill
him!” My brother, Harrison, shouted from a distance. A Feeder lay
at his feet unmoving.

I shook my head, laughing at him. “And what
about yours? I’m sure our instructions were to bring one back. It
didn’t have to be mine!”

“Mine was mean!” he hollered back.

“Mine was too nice,” I teased. “He was a
disgrace to Zombie-kind everywhere.”

“You’re such a smartass,” I heard him mutter.
He walked toward me while I cleaned my blade on my pants.

“And you are going to be in trouble with
Hendrix. He’s going to blame you for this.”

Harrison groaned. “He’s such a sexist! You’re
so special because you’re just a weak little girl. It’s depressing
really. I feel sorry for you.”

I punched him in the arm and jumped out of
reach when he tried to return the favor. “You’re just mad because
I’m better at this than you.” I waved my hand at the rubble of our
city.

“You’re not half bad,” he argued “But you
will never be better than me.”

“We’ll see,” I mumbled. “The real test is
coming.”

He glanced at me out of the corner of his
eye. I felt his hesitation from here. I felt the way he looked at
me with frustration and disappointment. “You could change your
mind,” he suggested. “We don’t have to go.”

I stared straight ahead at the setting sun.
“Going is the one thing we have to do.”

My city glistened in the orange light,
telling the story of the last nine years of my life. A lot had
happened in those years. I had grown from a child into an adult,
from a little girl into a capable woman.

But our time in the safety of this city and
the isolation of our station had come to an end.

Because my city was safe, but this world was
not.

I lived in a world of death and decay, built
on the bones of humans and Zombies alike, ruled by the most evil of
men.

I had been born with a gift… with rare blood…
with the will to tear down tyranny and give the people a freedom I
had never known.

My world was decay, but my future was
freedom.

Thank you for reading Season Three of Love
and Decay!

I have loved being in Reagan’s head for the
last three seasons. She is one of my favorite heroines. But as the
series moves forward, she will hand over the narration to Page
Parker.

Look for Season Four, from Page’s
perspective, coming December 4
^th
, 2015

About the Author

Rachel Higginson was born and raised in
Nebraska, but spent her college years traveling the world. She fell
in love with Eastern Europe, Paris, Indian Food and the beautiful
beaches of Sri Lanka, but came back home to marry her high school
sweetheart. Now she spends her days raising their growing family.
She is obsessed with bad reality TV and any and all Young Adult
Fiction.

Look for more from Rachel in 2015.

Other books by Rachel to be released early
2015 are The Heart, the third and final installment of The Siren
Series, Every Wrong Reason, an Adult Contemporary Romance and Bet
on Me, an NA contemporary romance.

Other Books Out Now by Rachel Higginson:

Love and Decay, Season One

Love and Decay, Volume One (Episodes One-Six,
Season One)

Love and Decay, Volume Two (Episodes
Seven-Twelve, Season One)

Love and Decay, Season Two

Love and Decay, Volume Three (Episodes
One-Four, Season Two)

Love and Decay, Volume Four (Episodes
Five-Eight, Season Two)

Love and Decay, Volume Five (Episodes
Nine-Twelve, Season Two)

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode One

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode Two

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode
Three

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode
Four

Love and Decay, Volume Six (Episodes
One-Four, Season Three)

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode
Five

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode Six

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode
Seven

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode
Eight

Love and Decay, Volume Seven (Episodes
Five-Eight, Season Three)

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode
Nine

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode Ten

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode
Eleven

Love and Decay, Season Three, Episode
Twelve

Love and Decay, Volume Eight (Episodes
Nine-Twelve, Season Three)

Reckless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book
1)

Hopeless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book
2)

Fearless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book
3)

Endless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book
4)

The Reluctant King (The Star-Crossed Series,
Book 5)

The Relentless Warrior (The Star-Crossed
Series, Book 6)

Breathless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series,
Book 6.5)

Fateful Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book
6.75)

The Redeemable Prince (The Star-Crossed
Series, Book 7)

Heir of Skies (The Starbright Series, Book
1)

Heir of Darkness (The Starbright Series, Book
2)

Heir of Secrets (The Starbright Series, Book
3)

The Rush (The Siren Series, Book 1)

The Fall (The Siren Series, Book 2)

The Heart (The Siren Series, Book 3) coming
2015

Bet on Us (An NA Contemporary Romance)

Bet on Me (An NA Contemporary Romance) coming
2015

The Five Stages of Falling in Love, an Adult Contemporary
Romance

Follow Rachel on her blog at:

http://www.rachelhigginson.com/

Or on Twitter:

@mywritesdntbite

Or on her Facebook page:

Rachel
Higginson

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