The McClane Apocalypse Book 4 (36 page)

Reagan feels a sense of dread.

“Sure I do. Tim Lafferty,”
Grandpa
acknowledges as he puffs on his pipe. “Why do you want to know
about him?”

“He’s the one who told that group about the
clinic, about our women, about the center having drugs,” John
clarifies.

“Great,” Derek says with sarcasm. “Sounds like
a real dickhead.”

Kelly sighs loudly and then says, “You guys
figure this out. I’ll get our gear.”

And with that, Kelly leaves the
room, which leaves Reagan feeling
profoundly
unsettled. Her heart starts
racing. The idea of
them
going tonight to deal with Lafferty because he
squealed to scumbags about their helpful medical clinic makes her
queasy. She feels overly hot in Grandpa’s office, and a coughing
fit takes her. John rubs her back soothingly, and she shoots him a
smile.

Grandpa proceeds to draw out directions to Tim
Lafferty’s cabin on the other side of town. There isn’t much out
his way, just other hunting cabins, rural farms and a few homes
peppered here and there. It’s mostly forest.

“Wait a minute,” Reagan interjects. “What if
he’s not alone? What if he’s holed up with a bunch of people like
the ones who shot up the clinic today?”

Her body is starting to give in to the extreme
fatigue she’s been fighting all day.

“Then we’ll assess the situation when we get
there and do some recon, babe,” John says and rubs her shoulder
gently. “Don’t worry. We’ve got this.”

Less than an hour later, she watches with
nerves in her stomach as John and Kelly leave with Simon in the
pick-up truck on the oil well road. Derek stays behind, as does
Gavin and Grandpa. A short while later she overhears Gavin talking
quietly with Derek about the possibility of him going tomorrow with
the men on the raid.

She paces for an hour. Then she
falls asleep in a chair near the fireplace, which Derek had lit
before the cold evening air permeated the walls of the old house.
When she awakens, she tries to busy herself with getting Jacob
ready for bed in his shared room in the basement with Ari, Justin,
Huntley and the new tyke, Maddie. The bunk beds will be full for
the next few nights since
Sue
and the kids will be staying in the
big house instead of out in the woods in their cabin while the men
are gone. It’s just safer that way. She and their three children
sleep in the house sometimes when the Rangers go on a night
run.

Talia offers to go to bed in her
room next to the children’s in case one of them needs her. Everyone
else ends up in the music room together either pacing or trying to
make small talk
to distract
themselves. Samantha and Paige pair off together
in the corner to chat. Simon’s sister is
clearly
worried about
him,
and no
wonder. She just found him again. Reagan’s positive that Sam is
reassuring Paige that he’ll be
fine
. He’s damn near a Ranger himself
now. Grandpa tries his best to engage Reagan with a discussion
about a different animal virus they’ve been seeing more frequently
at some of the local dairy farms, which are still miraculously in
production. And Hannah sits in a rocker with her daughter, who is
asleep in her arms.

“It’ll be ok, sis,” Sue says a while later as
she comes to stand next to Reagan at the window.

“I know,” Reagan says, although she doesn’t
really feel it.

“You ok? Derek said you weren’t feeling well
again,” Sue asks.

“I’m
fine
. Just sort of feeling run down
still, not used to working all day yet,” Reagan answers
distractedly. “Don’t worry about me.”

Sue rubs her back soothingly, so
Reagan wraps her arm around her sister’s back and lays her
head
against
her arm.

“Sleep in tomorrow, sis,” Sue practically
orders. “I’ll take care of Jacob.”

Paige walks to the next window over
from them, biting her
thumbnail
and staring out into the
darkness with worried eyes.

“He’ll be fine, Paige,” Reagan
offers.

The other woman with the wavy red hair doesn’t
nod or agree. She looks pissed and confused and scared.

Headlights on the horizon startle them out of
their trance of staring out the window incessantly, and they alert
the rest of the family. Reagan scans the vehicle before they all
even exit. Then she exhales through her mouth. Everyone does. They
are all back and safe. Derek is outside at the truck in a flash.
The men talk a moment before coming inside.

“They found him,” Derek says as they gather in
the kitchen.

Reagan knows what the outcome of that would’ve
been. She doesn’t need to ask what the men did to the
snitch.

“He had two other men with him,” John
says.

“And a woman,” Simon says with downcast blue
eyes.

“She didn’t exactly wanna’ be there,” John
explains. “They had her out in a shed.”

Her husband’s voice lowers in register. She can
tell that he doesn’t even like telling this part of their eventful
evening.

Grandpa immediately asks, “Where is
she?”

“We dropped her over at the Reynolds with Wayne
and Chet,” Derek says. “I figured they could take her in. Right
now, I don’t think we should add any more people to our group. No
offense.”

“None
taken
,” Gavin agrees with
embarrassment.

“She’s not very old, maybe twenty. Besides,
they were happy to take her in,” John says to alleviate Gavin’s
awkward and sudden discomfort.

“Good, that’s good,” Grandpa says. “Simon, you
should come with us, too, son. Reagan and I should shoot over there
and give her a thorough examination.”

“Agreed,” Kelly says. “I’ll take you. She’s in
pretty bad shape, docs. There wasn’t a heater in that shed,
either.”

“Let us get our bags,” Grandpa says. “Reagan,
you should pack some extra supplies. We don’t know what all she’ll
need.”

“Yes, sir,” Reagan says to her
grandfather.

“Why don’t you stay here, babe?” John suggests.
“You’re exhausted.”

The fact that her husband is
contradicting her grandfather is a rare thing, indeed. He is
genuinely
worried
about her health.

Grandpa immediately jumps in to say, “John’s
right, honey. Let me just take Simon. You wait here. In fact, go to
bed, young lady. This will be good for Simon.”

She’s certainly not going to argue
tonight.
She’s
beat
, dead on her feet.

“Ok, I’ll stay. Let me go and get the supplies
for you guys, though.”

“Wait a sec,” Derek says.

Her beloved brother-in-law looks to
her husband, his brother.
Sometimes
Reagan thinks they can read each other’s minds they are so
close.
And the same goes for
Kelly.

“Our friend from earlier today was
apparently
lying,
after all,” John says with a downturned set of his
mouth.

“What do you mean?” Sue asks
nervously.

“There aren’t a few dozen men over there holed
up in the Target,” Kelly says and looks at John.

“There’s more like fifty,” her husband
says.

John regards her with uncertainty
in his eyes. He’s never had this look in his blue eyes
before,
and it
scares the hell out of her.

Chapter Seventeen

Simon

The planning starts at dawn. John,
Kelly and Derek are in the armory room of
the med
shed taking stock and
loading magazines. This will likely be the most dangerous mission
they’ve ever been on. They’ve never
taken
on a group of this size. Some of
them could be killed and may never return to the farm again. His
sister has been pleading with him all morning already which mimics
the begging that went on until after one a.m. last night. She
doesn’t want him to go with the team.

He’d
helped
her move last night into the
cabin that he
normally
shares with Cory. It hadn’t taken long. She hardly
owns anything; one backpack and a small duffle bag full of her
precious articles. She sleeps in Cory’s bedroom, which isn’t really
a room. They share a one room cabin. There are drapes that they
draw which serve the purpose of being wall-like room dividers. It
hadn’t ever mattered before. It was just him and Cory. The only
room is the bathroom, which is just big enough for the commode and
sink. There is a wood-burning stove with a flat cooktop where they
sometimes heat up food that was usually prepared in the big house
first. Other times they’ll cook wild game on it that they’ve
caught. But most of the meals are communal and shared in Doc’s
house with the rest of the family.

“I’m going,” Simon tells his sister as they
walk together to the house. Chores are finished, of which she’d
helped, and it’s time to sit in on a meeting after
breakfast.

“I don’t want you to,” she complains
again.

She’s wearing a blue bandanna around
her head, holding her hair back from her face with it. Her baggy
jeans are being secured with a belt as usual. She’s still too
skinny. Her sweatshirt is borrowed from him and hangs like a burlap
sack on her. It is dark navy blue and stitched on the front with
bright yellow lettering that reads
Nashville
. He’s never visited there
as a tourist, however. He and Cory did a run last year for supplies
and had hit a huge, trucker’s rest stop and gas station off of the
freeway where such shirts, mugs, bumper stickers and hoodies were
once sold to promote tourism. The entire family has plenty of
clothing to loan Paige and her friends. Unfortunately, most of it
doesn’t fit her too well. The pants are always too short, the
shirts too big. She never once complains, though. As a matter of
fact, she always says how great everything is and how they smell
clean. On
runs
that he and the others have done over the years, there has
always been plenty of clothing still left in stores,
malls
and
second-hand shops. He’d like to make a run and find her a few pairs
of jeans that might actually fit. Simon can’t imagine that his
sister is very comfortable wearing clothing that doesn’t at all fit
her.

She’s still in full-blown nag mode,
“We could just leave, Simon. Me and my friends and you. We don’t
have to stay here
…
”

“What?” Simon asks angrily. He’d like to shake
his sister until her teeth rattle but refrains from doing so. She’s
so skinny she might just rattle all the way apart. “Don’t even
suggest anything like that. These people are my family. Just like
you’re my family, Paige. You know they took me and Sam and Huntley
in. Why would you even suggest anything so ridiculous?”

She nods and bites her lower
lip just like she used to when they were younger and she was
worried about something.

“I know,” she admits. “I just don’t
want anything to happen to you. I just got you back,
Simon.”

“It’s ok,” Simon tells her
and pulls her in for a hug. When he draws
back,
there are tears in his
sister’s eyes. “Hey, don’t do that. I’ll be
fine
. This isn’t my first raid,
Paige.”

She squints her eyes as if she doubts
him.

“Trust me, I’m not the Simon you used
to know. I have acquired a few new valuable skill sets thanks to
the guys,” he says trying to quell her fears. He also runs his hand
tenderly over her cheek and kisses her forehead.

“I’ve noticed,” she admits and frowns
at him.

“Come on,” he says and tugs her hand
to get her to walk with him once more. “You can sit in on the
strategic planning meeting. You’ll feel better if you hear the way
we plan things out.”

Paige nods but goes back to the lip
biting. He bumps her shoulder playfully.

“You know you kind of sounded like Mom
back there with all the nagging,” he chides. He receives a light
punch to the shoulder. He just laughs at her distress.

“Shut up,” she orders softly but has
finally smiled.

As they enter the kitchen, the usual chaos is
occurring. The younger kids are already eating
at
the island, Sue is holding Hannah’s daughter while her
sister finishes something at the stove, and Reagan is carrying
trays of breakfast food into the dining room. She also seems
stressed out.

“Here, Hannah,” Paige says. “I can do that if
you need to do something else.”

“Thanks, Paige. That’s very helpful,” Hannah
returns so gently and touches his sister’s arm.