The Stones of Angkor (Purge of Babylon, Book 3) (32 page)

Why had he stopped? Had he spotted something?

She waited for him to look back at her, to give her some kind of signal. But he remained fixed on the man on the auto body rooftop.

“What—” Benny started to say beside her.

“Shhh!” she snapped before he could get another word out.

They waited for what seemed like hours, though it was probably only a few seconds, before the guy finally shouted back, “What do you want?”

“Just passing through!” Will shouted. “We’re trying to get home!”

“Where’s home?”

“South!”

“There’s not much down south!”

“There is if you know where to look! We’re just passing through! You don’t try to shoot us, and we won’t shoot you. Deal?”

The guy hesitated for a moment, then shouted back, “Deal!”

Will looked back at Gaby and nodded.

She relaxed her grip on the rifle and stood up. Benny struggled back up to his feet next to her, groaning like an old woman who had sat down for too long.

*

His name was
Nate and he had short blond hair, though it was hard to tell the color since he had almost completely shaved it off, leaving behind just a small, ridiculous looking Mohawk in the center. He was armed with a gun belt and a bolt-action hunting rifle.

“We heard the helicopter coming from a distance,” Nate said. “You guys flew right over us. Then there was a loud boom, but by the time we came outside, we could only see fire and smoke. We thought about coming to help, but you know how it is. We didn’t want to get in the middle of whatever was going on between you and the other guys. We only checked it out this morning, when it was safer.”

“You went to the wreck?” Will asked.

“For supplies, yeah. We picked up some things, lots of pill bottles. Since it’s yours, we’ll give it back.”

“We have everything we need. You can keep them.”

Nate nodded gratefully. “You were in the Army?”

“Yeah. You?”

“I was in ROTC at Lafayette University.”

“Good. That means you haven’t been tainted by Officer Candidate School yet.”

Nate grinned. “That’s one way to put it.”

He finally looked over at her. Like Benny, she had kept quiet as Nate and Will talked. Now, facing his pale blue eyes, she was suddenly very self-conscious about her appearance. The gash in her forehead, not to mention the cuts and bruises along every inch of her face and neck. She wanted to shrink away and hide, but willed herself to stand perfectly still and stare back at him instead.

“I’m Nate,” he said, extending a hand to her.

“I heard,” Gaby said, shaking his hand. “This is Benny.”

“Hey,” Benny said, offering up a half-wave.

“Hey,” Nate said, before looking back at her. “That’s a pretty wicked gash.”

“I ran into a door,” she said.

“Must have been a pretty big ass door.”

“It was oak.”

“Ouch.” Nate looked back at Will. “So what’s down south?”

“You know where Song Island is?” Will asked.

“Never heard of it. What’s so special about Song Island?”

“That depends.”

“On?”

“What kind of transportation you have, and whether you’re useful to me or not.”

Nate didn’t look fazed. “The answer to those two questions depends on two things. One, what’s so special about this Song Island, and two, what are the chances you’ll take us with you?”

*

“Us” was Nate
and five others. They were staying in the basement of a house half a block from the feeder road where they had met Nate. The house was just one of many in a neighborhood with fallen-down picket fences, overgrown lawns, weed-covered gardens, and dirt-strewn streets. Curtains covering broken windows blew in the breeze around them, with a museum of cars frozen along curbs and driveways.

All five of Nate’s people had come outside to meet them. Nate had called ahead on a radio, proving to be more tactically sound than Mike, who had been a former Army officer. Nate reminded her of Will; they were about the same height and build. Except for the silly Mohawk on top of Nate’s head, the two of them could almost pass for brothers.

They gathered in the driveway while Nate introduced everyone.

Kendra was a black woman in her thirties. She had a son, Dwayne, who looked all of twelve, though the kid was already as tall as his mom. Gaby guessed he was going to sprout like a beanstalk by the time he hit puberty in a few years. Like Nate, Dwayne was carrying a hunting rifle that looked almost as big as him. His mother looked tired, as if she hadn’t slept in a while.

The other two were a Hispanic couple, Stan and Liza. Stan looked at least twenty years older than Liza, who was about Lara’s age. Liza could only speak Spanish, so Stan translated everything for her.

The fifth member of Nate’s group was a teenage girl named Mary, who had possibly the largest eyes Gaby had ever seen on someone who wasn’t a cartoon character. Mary stood silently next to Nate, clinging to his arm with both hands.

“What’s your transportation look like?” Will asked.

“It’s not much to look at, but she’ll run,” Nate said.

He led them to a beat-up black Dodge Caravan parked nearby. He was right; it didn’t look like much at all. It was long, with four doors—two front doors and two rear ones that slid backward. The backseats could be folded down to accommodate more people.

“Gas?” Will asked.

“Stan topped her off three days ago when we settled down here,” Nate said.

“She’s not exactly a speed demon, but she’s comfortable,” Stan said. “Well, for six people, anyway. I don’t know about all of us. Might be a bit of a tight squeeze.”

“Are we leaving?” Mary asked anxiously.

“Maybe,” Nate said. “It depends on what they have to say. Apparently they have an island.”

“An island?” Dwayne said. “Seriously?”

They stayed outside in the sun as Will told them about Song Island.

“It sounds wonderful,” Mary said enthusiastically. “We’re going there, aren’t we, Nate?”

“I don’t know,” Nate said. “That depends on what Will decides.”

“There’s plenty of room on the island,” Will said. “All we need is a second vehicle.”

“It’ll be tight, but we could probably fit everyone into the minivan.”

“I don’t like having that many people in one vehicle. We need a second one, just in case. Battery’s still good?”

“Definitely. I turn on the engine at least once a day even if we’re not going anywhere, just to keep it running.”

“Spare gas?”

“Two extra cans for emergencies.”

“Smart.”

“We weren’t always this smart, but we learned as we went.”

“You wouldn’t happen to have a ham radio on you, would you?”

“No. You need one?”

“I need to contact Song Island. Let them know we’re coming back.”

“I know where you can get one. There’s a pawnshop about two blocks up the street. I saw a shelf full of them on the counter when I was window-scouting earlier yesterday.”

Will looked over at her. “Gaby, find a vehicle that we can use. A truck, preferably, while Nate takes me to go get the radio.”

“I should go instead,” she said. Then added quickly, “You could use the rest.”

“I’m fine.”

“Bullshit. Your leg’s killing you, and you barely slept last night because you didn’t wake me up like you promised. Besides, it’s a radio, Will. I can go get a damn radio.”

He sighed. “All right. Be careful.”

*

“Silver?” Nate said.

“Yeah, silver,” Gaby said.

“Didn’t know that.”

“No one does. We wouldn’t even know about it if not for Will and Danny.”

“Silver crosses, too?”

“Yeah.”

“That has to be some kind of a sign, right?”

“Will doesn’t believe in signs. He thinks it’s all coincidence.”

“I have to admit, I’m not religious either, but that was before these things crawled out of the pits of Hell and tried to eat me.”

Nate walked quietly beside her. Despite the fact that he wore thick combat boots just like her, he barely made any noise. He had a smooth walking motion that was not quite swagger, but came dangerously close. She also noticed the way he kept looking around them. It wasn’t paranoia, it was alertness of his surroundings. Will did that, too.

They had been walking for close to thirty minutes before they finally reached their destination. The strip mall didn’t look like much as they walked across its parking lot.

“So you were in the Army?” she asked.

“Sort of. I was still in ROTC in college. Reserve Officers’ Training Corp.”

“Then you were supposed to go into the Army?”

“Uh huh. I was supposed to get a commission as a second lieutenant and go to the branch of my choice. That’s the idea, anyway. They say, though, that mostly you go wherever they need you.”

“Where were you going to go?”

“I always wanted to become a Ranger.”

“Will was a Ranger.”

“No shit?”

“Yeah.”

“He didn’t mention that.”

“He wouldn’t.”

“I can dig it. Badass guys don’t need to tell people how badass they are.”

She smiled to herself, deciding that she liked the way he put things in perspective without making a big deal out of it. It was too bad about the Mohawk, though. What the hell was that about?

“Where’s this pawnshop?” she asked.

“There,” he said, pointing to a place called Leroy’s Stuff, squeezed between a Subway sandwich shop and an AT&T outlet store.

There were bigger stores in the strip mall, but Leroy’s managed to stand out because of its burglar bars over its glass wall and front door.

“See them?” Nate said, pointing at a shelf behind the counter inside the store.

Gaby saw a large selection of radios and recognized a couple that looked like the ham radio they had back in the Tower on Song Island.

“How are we going to get inside?” she asked, looking at the burglar bars. “Can you squeeze through?”

“Are you serious? I’m bigger than you.”

“You’re taller, but you’re not bigger.”

“I’m at least fifty pounds heavier. What are you, a hundred soaking wet?”

“In your dreams.”

“I could probably bend the bars back far enough to slide under.”

She put a hand on his right bicep and squeezed. “With what? This little thing?”

He snickered. “That’s a challenge if I ever heard one. Step back.”

He crouched and used the butt of his rifle to break the glass window near the bottom. He then used the barrel to knock loose the glass shards still sticking along the frame.

“Why a bolt-action rifle?” she asked. It had been on her mind ever since she saw it.

“I don’t know, really, I grabbed it when all of this was happening. I never thought much about trading up. Why the M4?”

“I learned to shoot with it.”

“Yeah? You good with that thing?”

“I could probably shoot a target from eighty yards.”

“That’s not bad for a civilian.”

“Gee, thanks.”

He chuckled, then cracked his knuckles. “Moment of truth.”

“Fair warning: if you hurt yourself, I’m heading back without you.”

He gave her a wry look. “You don’t have to be such a bitch, Gaby. I’m just trying to impress you here.”