The City Series (Book 1): Mordacious (52 page)

We only have to get it into a house—any one of our safe houses will do—and then we can pick up our dry food later or tomorrow. If we leave it out here the flour might be ruined, or stolen, and this flour could be what keeps us alive in the not so distant future.

But the next side street has zombies and our house is only a zombie-free block away. At the rate we’re going, the last block feels more like a last mile, and that’s with Eric taking the brunt of the weight. Nine zombies spill from a bakery’s recessed entrance. Paul and Jorge pull ahead, carts rattling on the concrete. Eric lowers his end and jogs to help while Grace and I watch the corner we passed. The Lexers are wet, but they definitely saw us and must be on their way. In no time at all, the bakery zombies are dead.

“Should we have helped with that?” Grace asks.

“We’ll bake them cupcakes,” I say, and she snorts.

Eric returns for our load. The rain turns to a deluge once again. Grace catches up to Jorge, who holds his thumb in the air at the corner to convey that our block is safe. Around the bend and we’ll be home. They wait for us to cover the half block, but Eric waves them on. After a moment’s hesitation, they disappear from sight. No one wants to chance wet, ruined flour.

Rain pelts my head and runs down my back. I turn to look behind us. A single Lexer has rounded the corner. The others can’t be far behind.

“Forget it,” I say.

“What?” Eric yells over the rain.

“Let’s leave it in the bakery,” I yell back.

Eric looks over my shoulder, where three more have joined the first, and nods. He doesn’t look worried—maybe a little concerned, but not nervous. He turns into the bakery entrance and stops short. The front of the cart drops with a crash and the handle slams into my gut hard enough that I gasp.

“Don’t do it!” a voice shouts. A teenager no more than sixteen stands in the open doorway, dull black pistol in his hand. He’s dressed to the nines in new sneakers, a leather coat and perfect cornrows in his hair. His round cheeks still have baby fat and he has round eyes to match. He doesn’t look tough, but his gun does.

Blood roars through my arteries, filling my brain with a steady
thunk
louder than the rain. Eric’s hand drops. Another kid steps out from behind the first and pulls Eric’s gun from his holster. This one has a pale skinny face, spiky dark hair, two gold chains and a colorful tracksuit. He couldn’t be more Brooklyn Italian if he took a time machine back to the 1990s. If his name isn’t Vinnie, I’ll eat my wet sneakers.

“Bring it in here,” he says in a heavy Brooklyn accent, and opens the plate glass door.

Eric is expressionless except for very pissed off eyes, and he motions that we do as they say. We carry our load into the bakery followed by the two kids. The glass cases have been smashed, the shelves behind them picked clean. All that remains are the plaster models of tiered wedding cakes for order, although one has been sawed into pieces, possibly by someone so hungry they thought it worth a try.

We set down the cart. Any minute now Paul or Jorge will come to see what’s taking so long, and, when they do, these kids will be sorry. I console myself with that thought until the Italian kid says, “Take it in back.”

Eric lifts his end with a calm nod in my direction. I think he’s telling me to bide our time. We walk through the raised section of counter and into a kitchen with enormous mixers and ovens. The floor is tracked with the dirty, pasty remains of flour and sugar, but otherwise empty of food. Once in, Baby Fat lets the door close and stands in front of it with his gun.

Paul and Jorge call from outside. They might hear if I scream, but Eric wraps his hand around my wrist until my fingers go numb. Their voices are frantic over the drumbeat of rain.

“Don’t make no noise,” Italy says. I swear his voice cracks.

With the two windows of frosted glass on the back wall, there’s enough light to see Italy and Baby Fat exchange a look of delight when they inspect the cart’s contents. This is our food, and they think it’s theirs. I suppose the guns make that the case, but we earned this food, not them. I’m covered in pieces of rotten intestine and gristle. We’ve spent weeks clearing out houses and working for the acquisition of this broken-down metal cart.

“Why don’t you just take our food and let us go?” I ask.

It kills me to say it. If they didn’t have guns, I’d scratch their eyes out. I had no patience for bullies and thieves before zombies, and I have even less now. I don’t care if these kids are both that—kids. If they want to play with guns and rob people, they’ll be tried as adults.

“Girl, what don’t you understand about
don’t make no noise
?” Baby Fat asks, cheeks puffing.

We listen to Jorge call for another twenty seconds before there’s a shout and then silence. The zombies from the side street have arrived.

“Now what?” Italy asks Baby Fat. Baby Fat shrugs.

“How about now you let us go?” I ask.

Baby Fat lifts the gun. “Shut
up
.”

“Did you hear that? That was our friends looking for us. Did you hear why they left? Zombies. If you shoot, the zombies will come in and then we’re all dead.”

I’m scared of the gun, but the way these geniuses take my advice under serious consideration makes it clear they have no plan. Eric raises his gloved hands as if he’s the most sensible person in the world, or the room, which very well may be the case.

“How about you take it all and let us go,” he says. “You guys disappear, we disappear. No hard feelings.”

His jaw is as square as Paul’s. It must be taking all his willpower to stay calm—willpower I’m sorely lacking. I open my mouth, but Eric shuts me up with a low grumble. Baby Fat and Italy almost look relieved someone’s told them what to do. The fact they’re still alive must prove the existence of a benevolent God.

“Sit,” Italy says.

I move until my back is against an oven and lower myself to the floury floor. Eric follows me down, hands dangling from his bent knees and looking unperturbed as can be, but his hand is only inches from where he keeps that knife in his boot. I hope he has it today. They didn’t think to take my chisel, but it’s a useless piece of equipment at the moment. Eric may be right that I should learn to use a gun. Or maybe not, because right now I’m so angry I’d start shooting and get us blown to Kingdom Come.

“Lemme check.” Italy goes through the kitchen door and is back in less than a minute. “There’s a lot of them outside. We’ll go when they’re gone.”

Eric nods. I nod. Baby Fat nods. And then we wait.

Chapter 67

Eric

Thirty minutes after Sylvie and I take a seat on the floor, the chubby kid tires of rocking foot to foot and sits against the wall across from us, gun in his lap but aimed our way. The Italian kid finds an old dishrag and carefully wipes a spot before he joins him. The longer I sit here, the more I’m convinced they don’t know their asses from their elbows.

“Where do you live?” the Italian kid asks.

“Around,” I answer.

He looks at Sylvie, who’s turning out to be as brave as I could’ve hoped and a bit nuttier than I’d like, at least in these circumstances. “You heard the boss, Italy,” she says. “Around.”

I cough to cover my laugh. Italy plays with the chain around his neck, unsure if it was an insult. “It looks like you have a lot of people,” he says.

“Why, how many do you have?” I ask.

“Seven,” the chubby kid says.

Italy smacks his head. “What the fuck, Jayden? Why’d you tell them that?”

The kid, Jayden, mumbles, “I don’t know.”

We revert to silence. I could reach the knife in my boot. But bringing a knife to a gunfight is a bad idea, as they say, especially with two kids this nervous. It could go either way: I get close enough that they give up, or they impulsively shoot us with every last bullet they have. Or
I
have—and I am not getting shot with my own weapon. But, if I can get them talking, maybe they’ll let down their guard.

“What were you guys doing in here?” I ask.

“Looking for food,” Jayden says.

“Why just the two of you?”

Jayden starts to speak, but Italy cuts him off with, “Shut the fuck up, Jayden.”

My ass hurts from the tile floor. I shift a little and raise my hands when they both start. “Just getting comfortable. This floor is hard.”

Sylvie sits quietly as though all the fight’s left her, but her eyes comb the room. I’ve covered it five times with my own—there’s nothing that will help us. I think they’ll let us go. If not, I’ll figure something out. This situation could be much worse, and I want to keep it at this level for now. What pisses me off most is that we killed the zombies that had them trapped in here, and then, to top it off, hand-delivered them a cart full of food.

“Sorry,” I murmur to Sylvie.

“For what?”

“I should’ve known the Lexers were outside because someone was in here. It was stupid.”

“None of us thought of it.”

“
I
should’ve.”

She leans her head against the oven. “I know you’re Golden Boy and all, but that’s ridiculous. You aren’t responsible. I’m the one who wouldn’t leave the cart.”

“Okay, so it’s your fault.”

Sylvie laughs; Rachel would’ve punched me. She draws her knees to her chest and wraps her arms around her legs. Her lips are pale. I was warm from exertion, but now the damp has descended to my bones. The temperature is in the forties or low fifties, but she’s wet and that can be dangerous. We don’t always get enough calories versus our activity level, and there’s not a lot of extra padding left on her, if there ever was.

“I’m going to put my arm around her shoulders,” I say to Italy and Jayden. “She’s cold.”

“How do you know I want your arm around me?” Sylvie asks through chattering teeth.

“What girl wouldn’t?” She snickers and edges closer. I take an arm out of my coat and pull her against me, then wrap my coat and arm around her. “Better?”

She nods and, after a few minutes, stops shivering. I’m not glad that we’re being held hostage in a bakery or that we may be on the verge of hypothermia, but Sylvie’s body is warm, and soft where it should be soft. She smells terrible from the zombie that landed on her, but if I move my face to within an inch of the top of her head, I can smell
her
. I know there’s some biological or chemical reason why women smell so good, but that doesn’t make me enjoy it any less.

The next two hours take about three days to pass. Jayden hums under his breath until Italy tells him to stop. I entertain myself with thoughts of which of the two kids I would punch first. Sylvie gets tenser and tenser, until she feels like a bowstring ready to snap. Finally, Italy speaks. “You have a lot of food?”

I’m silent. He points my gun with his upper lip curled and bony face even sharper. He now officially looks crazy enough to use it. “I asked you a question.”

Sylvie sits up. I throw my arm in front of her like Mom would in the car. God only knows what she’ll say. “No, we don’t have a lot of food,” I say. “And if your next question is about where we live, you might as well go ahead and shoot.”

Italy and I are now embroiled in a staring match, but I can outlast him. Something moves outside the door. I slide the knife from my boot as we all jump to our feet.

“Yo, Jayden,” a voice says. “You in here?”

Jayden opens the door. “Yeah.”

A guy enters. My height and around my age, with flawless brown skin. I know a good-looking man when I see one, and this one’s cheekbones and dark eyes probably make women swoon. He looks relieved until he spots me and Sylvie, then he drops his head. “What is this?”

“We got their food, Eli,” Italy says. He rubs his chin with a jittery hand. I step in front of Sylvie because his gun hand is just as jittery.

“Yeah, I see that. I also see you got
them
.”

“Are there any zombies outside?” I ask.

Eli shakes his head. “I got rid of them.”

“We made a deal. You take our food and we go home. But I want my gun. You can keep the ammo.”

Eli looks from me to Sylvie and then turns to the kids. “We have to bring them back.”

Sylvie sucks in her breath. I take her hand. They’ll have to lead us there at gunpoint. “We’re leaving.”

She matches my first few steps, and then we halt at the gun Eli produces with an almost apologetic grimace. “I’m going to have to insist you come with me.”

Chapter 68

Eli is an agreeable jailer as he follows behind me and Jayden, who carry the cart in the drizzle. Sylvie walks beside us, eyes straight ahead and arms crossed. Eli took her chisel, and she almost flipped out when he did, but she could be made of stone with all the emotion she shows now. There are times when a poker face comes in handy—you don’t let them know whether you’re scared or about to go apeshit on them. I wish I knew which Sylvie is because if it’s the latter, I’ll have to intercept if at all possible. I get the sense that once you’ve pushed Sylvie too far, all patience goes out the window, and we need to wait for the right moment.

Eli takes out the two Lexers we come upon with a grace heretofore unseen. He reminds me of a ballet dancer or boxer with the way his long knife glides in and the way his feet move quietly on the concrete. You can now add perfectly conditioned to the perfect face I’d like to smash with my fist.

Italy unlocks the door to an apartment building and holds it open until we’re through. Eli orders us to drop the cart in the lobby. I stand next to Sylvie and wait for our next instructions. I’m thinking the right moment will be here soon, maybe when we’re herded to wherever he plans to take us and before we’re separated.

Eli stands in front of the glass doors, gun aimed in our direction. “Are you the ones who fucked with my boys?”

Sylvie turns to me, two angry spots of red rising on her cheeks. I’m as confused as she is, but I can only imagine what will come out of her mouth if I don’t speak first. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say. “Pretty sure
you’re
the ones fucking with
us
.”

His eyes skate between me and Sylvie, then, finally, he nods. “I believe you. We’ve run into some unfriendly people, and I wanted to make sure you weren’t them.”