The Gates of Byzantium (Purge of Babylon, Book 2) (73 page)

“Oh, shut up,” she said. “This is exactly the right time and place. We could die in a few hours. Or tomorrow. After Josh and Carly… I want to make the most of every minute and every hour with you, Will. Don’t deny me that, please?”

He nodded. “Okay.”

She kissed him again, and he slipped his hands under the warm cotton fabric of her shirt. She sighed when he cupped her breasts. She wasn’t wearing a bra, and she felt soft against his rough palms, her nipples hardening instantly. It never ceased to amaze him how sensitive she was there.

She had already unbuckled his belt and was slipping her hand into his pants when he heard the soft, familiar sound in the distance.

It came almost lazily, wafting through the night air, like something out of a dream. He wasn’t even sure how he managed to hear it with his chest pumping and other parts of him enflamed with Lara’s mouth and breasts and heated body pressed up against him.

He didn’t think Lara had heard it because she was about to pull his pants off when he put his hands on her shoulders and stopped her. “Wait.”

Lara was out of breath and flustered. “Are you kidding me?”

“No, I hear something.”

She lifted her head and listened. “I don’t hear anything.”

“You don’t hear that?”

“No.” She gave him a wry look. “Is this your way of saying you’d rather not have sex with me on the beach?”

“No. God, no.”

“Good answer.”

She climbed off him and he scanned the sky. There wasn’t enough light to really see anything beyond the halos of the lampposts around the island.

He pressed his radio’s PTT. “Danny, do you hear that?”

“I hear it,” Danny said through his right ear.

“Hear what?” Lara asked.

“I don’t hear anything,” Blaine said through the radio.

“Me neither,” Maddie added.

Will snatched up his rifle and went into a crouch. He looked southeast, toward the marina.

There.

He could hear it again, getting louder. The gradual but familiar
whup-whup
that was such a constant during his tours of duty in Afghanistan. It was so common that the only days he had felt something was wrong, that something wasn’t quite right with the world, was when he
didn’t
hear it.

Whup-whup-whup-whup.

Lara was frantically shoving her shirt back into her pants next to him. “Will, I don’t hear anything.”

“There,” he said, pointing.

She squinted her eyes at the dark skies. “What is it?”

“You don’t see it?”

“No, I—” She stopped, and he saw her mouth open slightly. “Holy shit.”

“You see it?” Will said into his mic.

“I see it,” Blaine said.

“Fuck me,” Maddie whispered.

The helicopter came in low, gliding at a smooth, unhurried pace. It had a spotlight in front, under its cockpit, and the light skipped along the water’s surface and flashed across the beach, lighting up the piers and the boats tied to them.

“Danny, do you have a shot?” Will said into his throat mic.

“I have a shot,” Danny said.

“What do you see?”

“Squat. Spotlight’s doing its job. I can’t even make out if it’s military or civilian.”

“Any guns on the side? Armaments?”

“None. But like I said, it’s like staring into the sun. I can put some holes in it, but forget about details.”

“Hold your shot.”

“Ah, you’re no fun.”

“They could be friendlies.”

“Now who’s Captain Optimism?”

They watched the helicopter keep going, swooping high above them, running its light over the woods, before raking the side of the Tower. Then it was gone, passing over the island’s eastern section.

For a moment, Will thought it would keep going, but then the helicopter began to turn, coming back for a second pass…

JOSH

Pros and cons:
What were they?

Pros: He was alive!

Cons: He had no idea where he was or why he wasn’t dead. His body hurt. His arms hurt. His left leg was numb, but not so much he didn’t notice the sudden surge of electricity shooting from it every time he tried to move even a little bit. His head felt heavy, and each time he breathed, he thought it was going to explode.

Conclusion:
I’m alive!

He had woken up in a bedroom, lying on a small bed under sheets covered in Transformers characters. It took him a while before he realized the bed was in the shape of a racing car, and it was at least half a foot too short for him. His legs were draped over the end, which didn’t help the pain in his left leg any.

Josh pulled his legs back until he was almost curled on the bed. It was cold. Very cold. Which didn’t make sense because it was hot outside, rays of sunlight flitting in through white blinds over the window to his right.

Josh pulled his head off the fluffy pillow and tried to sit up. It hurt, so he decided the smart thing to do was lie back down to catch his breath.

I’m alive!

He didn’t know how that was possible. He remembered standing up (
That was stupid
), then getting shot (
Served me right for doing something so stupid during a gun battle)
, then falling. He remembered Will reaching for him, but Will must not have been fast enough, because soon Josh was in the water. Josh had never been a good swimmer, so he didn’t fool himself into thinking he had swum back to the island on his own and just didn’t remember it.

So how did he get here? Wherever “here” was?

Wet clothes clung to his body. Someone had slashed open his left pant leg and wrapped bandages around where he had been shot. That was nice of them. He saw blood on the bandages, but not as much as he thought being shot would have produced.

Josh tried to sit up again. Slowly, this time, without any sudden movements. He managed to stay upright and looked around him. Transformers posters on the walls. Toys scattered about the floor. Transformers action figures. Fluffy dinosaurs. A plastic baseball bat and a small football designed for a kid’s hands.

There was a sudden spark from his temple, and Josh lifted his hand to touch the wound. He felt gauze tape instead. Jesus. He remembered getting shot in the head. Okay, not really
in
the head, but close. It was just a crease. Still, it hurt like a bastard, so he stopped touching it.

He went completely still when he heard the door across the room open. A lone figure entered and stood in the doorway, but there was too much shadow and Josh couldn’t make out a face or very many details. The figure looked in at him, as if trying to figure him out. Josh stared back, unsure about what to do.

He was stuck here. In this room. This house. He could barely walk, much less run. And where was he going to go? Plus, he had to keep reminding himself that someone had saved him from the lake, so it didn’t make sense for them to hurt him now. Unless, of course, they had saved him only because they intended to do something unimaginable to him. He had seen plenty of movies like that.

The figure walked over to the window and flipped the blinds all the way open. Josh saw the outline of a woman. She was looking out at a group of men gathered in the front yard of the house. The view outside looked familiar, but Josh couldn’t quite place it. There had to be two, maybe three dozen men out there, milling around a half-dozen trucks. The
click-clack-snap
of weapons being loaded, even though he couldn’t quite tell what they were arming themselves with from his angle.

“Thirty men,” the woman said, looking over at him. “In case you were wondering. There are thirty men out there, waiting to kill your friends.”

The voice sounded familiar. Josh tried to focus on the face, half-hidden in the shadows.

Karen.

He was in the two-story house, the one across from the marina. In one of the rooms along the first floor. The house looked different from the inside; it was darker, more cramped, and less inviting. Even with sunlight flooding through the window, it was too dark in here.

“You’re alive,” he said. “How is that possible?”

Karen gave him an amused look. “The tunnel underneath the island comes out on the cove. They were going to run a rail system to ferry supplies and vacationers back and forth, like a nature drive underneath the lake. You should see some of the blueprints. They were going to turn Song Island into a real attraction for the rich and spoiled. Not so much now.”

So Will was right after all. The tunnel underneath the power station really did run all the way back to shore, and that was how the ghouls got on the island last night. He wondered how many of them were there now, hiding underneath the lake, waiting for their chance to come up again.

Gaby. Gaby’s still on the island…

“Josh, right?” Karen said. “I thought you looked familiar.”

“You saved me?”

“You sound surprised.”

You tried to kill me last night.

“A little,” he said instead.

“Information is power. End of the world, post-end of the world. Still the same. Information is still king.”

“Information about what?”

“The island. More specifically, the people currently inhabiting it. The new ones that just showed up. Everything.”

“I don’t know anything.”

“Of course you don’t,” she said, with that same amused expression that told him she was two, three steps ahead of him every time he opened his mouth. “Your girlfriend. What’s her name. Gaby?”

“What about her?” He didn’t like the way Karen said Gaby’s name.

“I’ll let her live,” Karen said.

Gaby…

“I don’t understand,” Josh said.

“The island, Josh. It’s mine. I want it back. It’s been good to me, and I don’t like the idea of losing it. Call me a sore loser. Do you see those guys out there, the thirty men with assault rifles?”

“You’re going to attack the island again?”

“Again? No.” She almost laughed. “The first time wasn’t my idea. A couple of idiots thought they could just ride their boats over and Will would just let them land on the beach. That didn’t work out too well. I’ve convinced them to try it my way this time. The smarter way. It’s what I do well. I solve problems, Josh.”

Gaby’s still on the island…

“It’s going to cost me half those guys out there,” Karen continued. “Maybe more. But hey, you can’t make omelettes without breaking eggs.” She looked back outside at the men standing around the yard. “It’s going to work, too. The question is, when it does work, is Gaby going to be one of the people I have to kill in order to retake the island? Or one of the people I hand over to the creatures after it’s all over?”

“No,” he blurted out, instantly regretting it.

“So tell me what I need to know.”

I can’t…

“And save Gaby’s life.”

Gaby…

“You love her, don’t you?”

“Yes,” he answered quickly.

“You don’t think she wants to live?”

“Of course she wants to live.”

“So why are you hesitating? You have to actually think about saving her life?”

“What about me?”

“What about you?”

“If I tell you, and you spare Gaby, what happens to me?”

“I don’t care about you. You and Gaby both. You’re just kids. Will and Danny are the ones I’m worried about. They’re the ones
she
wants.”

“She?”

“The rest?” Karen continued. “Neither one of us could care less about what happens to them. I just want the island back, and she just wants the soldiers. As for you and Gaby?” She shrugged indifferently. “You could stay on the island with us, or go on your merry way and see how long you last out there. I really don’t care. And neither does she. One or two more won’t make a whole lot of difference to them. They have bigger fish to fry, and they apparently need—want—Will and Danny for that.”

He looked past her, at the men milling outside.

Thirty heavily armed men…

That was a lot. Will and Danny were soldiers. Great soldiers, from what he had seen. But could they really fight thirty heavily armed men? That was a lot to ask of them. Even with Blaine and his two friends there. That was what, five people total?

Thirty against five…

He liked Will and Danny. He liked Carly, Lara, even the girls. But he liked Gaby more. No, he didn’t like Gaby, he
loved
her. He had known her for most of his life. Worshipped her from across the street. And now, after all this time, she felt the same way about him. It was more than he could have hoped for, and it was real. It was tangible. She had proved it last night when they made love.

Thirty against five…

Who were Will and Danny and the others, anyway? He only knew them for a few days. It wasn’t like he grew up with them, the way he grew up with Gaby. He liked them, but he didn’t
love
them, the way he loved Gaby.

I have to protect Gaby…

*

She asked him
what happened to Tom.

“Will killed him,” Josh said. “That night.”

She nodded. He wasn’t sure if he detected sadness or just acceptance. Maybe indifference. It was hard to read Karen, especially since she stood next to the window and was somehow still mostly hidden in shadows.