Cruel World (19 page)

His thoughts were broken by the sound of Alice bringing Ty to the sitting room, and he left the woman to her slumber, descending the stairs noiselessly. When he entered the small room near the front of the house, Alice was tucking Ty in beneath a heavy blanket on the loveseat. He hovered in the doorway, setting his rifle down in the hall.

“Goodnight, sweetheart,” Alice said, smoothing Ty’s dark hair back from his brow. “Sleep good, okay?”

“But I’m not—” Ty paused as an enormous yawn cut his words off. “—tired,” he finished.

“No, not at all. Quinn’s going to say goodnight then you get some sleep. We’ve got a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”

“Okay mom.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

Alice kissed him on the forehead before moving past Quinn out of the room. She gave him a glance he couldn’t read and disappeared down the hall into the kitchen.

“Hey, buddy, you all tucked in?” Quinn asked, crouching down beside the loveseat.

“Yeah. Thanks for teaching me with the magnets. Do you think I could keep them?”

The image of the three marbles lying dormant beneath the chair in the kitchen buffeted his mind.

“I don’t see why not,” Quinn said. “You’ll have to double check it with your mom, though.”

“Okay.” Ty wriggled deeper beneath the blanket, and his eyes drifted partially shut. His breathing became even, and Quinn was about to rise when the boy spoke again. “Are you going to leave us?”

“No, I’m not going to leave you. Not if I can help it.”

Ty seemed to consider this. “Mom doesn’t want you to leave either, not really.”

“Well, we just have to take one day at a time. My dad always told me that.” Tears rose to his eyes without warning.

“Where is your dad?”

“He’s…he’s gone.”

“My dad is too. I never met him though. Mom said maybe someday. Do you miss your dad?”

Quinn swallowed the burning lump in his throat. “Every day.”

“You’ll see him again, right?”

“I’m sure I will.”

Ty yawned again, his eyelids fluttering. “Will you stay with me until I fall asleep?”

“Of course.”

“You’ll watch for the monsters.”

It wasn’t a question. A wave of gooseflesh washed across his skin.

Quinn was going to reply, but Ty was already sleeping. He glanced at the windows, but the yard was lost to him in the darkness. He made his way to the kitchen after re-checking the front door’s lock.

Alice stood at the sink cleaning dishes with a blue rag, ebony hair pulled back in a ponytail. She didn’t look away from the task when he leaned his back against the cabinets beside her.

“He’s sleeping.”

“Good.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re washing their dishes.”

“I know. It felt like it was the least we could do for staying here.”

He moved to the fridge, pulling it open. There were a half-dozen cold beers on its top shelf. He took two of them and popped the tops off, setting one at Alice’s elbow before taking a seat at the table. She glanced at the bottle twice before drawing her hands from the sudsy water to dry them off. Quinn sipped at the beer. It was ice cold, and the carbonation burned his throat, cutting away a thirst he hadn’t known was there. Alice tipped her bottle up, chugging the drink, her slender throat bobbing. She set the mostly empty beer down and stifled a long belch behind her hand.

“Now I know where Ty gets it,” Quinn said. Alice wiped her lips and merely looked at him. “Sorry, that was an attempt at a joke.”

“I know.”

The silence spooled out between them, Alice’s eyes never leaving his face, his cheeks flush and burning. He looked around the room and then met her gaze again.

“What?”

“He’s getting attached to you.”

“He’s a great kid.”

“I don’t want him getting hurt.”

“I understand.”

“Do you?”

“Yes.” She stared at him a moment longer and then came to the table, sitting down opposite him. She turned her beer bottle in circles, her delicate fingers moving gracefully. “You said you trusted me.”

“What?”

“In the Tahoe before I rammed the truck, I asked you if you trusted me and you said yes,” Quinn said, sitting forward.

“That was in the heat of the moment.”

“So do you?”

She regarded him for a long time before spinning her bottle again.

“I guess I have to.”

He settled back in his chair and finished his beer. The room continued to darken until all he could see of her was the white skin of her face and arms.

“I thought we were all dead back there,” Alice said just as he was about to stand and leave the room for the first watch.

“I did too.”

“You know what was overwhelming, even more than the fear?” He shook his head. “All the regrets I have came rushing back in a split second, and I thought I’d never be able to fix any of them.” She laughed in her sad way. “And now I’m ashamed of it.”

“Why? Because you have regrets or that they overshadowed your fear?”

She sighed. “Both.”

“Everyone has regrets, and as far as I’m concerned, they’re the scariest thing in the world.”

“What are yours?”

He stumbled on his answer. Licking his lips, he saw her looking at him through the dim distance between them, her eyes the brightest thing in the room.

“That I didn’t see more of the world before it was gone.”

“It’s still out there.”

“But not what makes it special.”

Alice huffed another laugh. “People aren’t special. They never were. We’re the biggest mistake in the universe. You don’t think for a second this plague was natural, do you? We did this.” She gestured to the quiet house. “We did all this. We’re the disease, not the virus that took us out.”

Quinn waited a long moment and then stood, placing his bottle in the trash near the doorway before facing her again.

“The people I knew were special, and all I can do is hope there’s others like them somewhere out there. But I guess that’s what separates you and I.”

He turned away, snagging his rifle as he went to start the first watch.

~

The night passed in an onyx haze. He sat outside on the front stoop with his back against the door. The sky continued to cloud over, clamping down the darkness like a lid being put on the world. The wind picked up and tossed leaves into the air, their passage heard and felt but not seen. He retrieved a jacket from the Tahoe and shrugged himself into it, the burn on his shoulder still flaring up whenever he moved too drastically. When the time came for him to switch with Alice, he remained where he was, stolid and unmoving, senses seeking anything besides the stirring wind.

Hours later, dawn crept across the horizon like smoke from a fire that was beginning to burn there. The clouds were lower, and as the first drops of rain began to fall, he made his way inside, locking the door behind him.

Alice lay on her side next to the loveseat, one arm stretched up, her fingers holding onto Ty’s small hand. He watched them sleep for a moment before continuing down the hall to the kitchen. In the pantry, he found some ground coffee and a filter for the coffeemaker on the counter. As the machine began its quiet chuckling, a thump came from overhead, and he tipped his face to the ceiling.

The woman was moving upstairs.

He waited, ready to spring to the stairs if there was further commotion, but soon her movements slowed and then ceased. A dream or nightmare. Nothing more. He refocused on the dark liquid rising in the pot and poured a steaming cup when the coffeemaker had finished its work. The smell that filled the room was so redolent of the mornings at home, his throat closed when he tried to take a sip of coffee. His father sitting at his desk going over paperwork, Graham and Foster bickering at one another in the kitchen, Mallory reading the paper before she began her cleaning for the day, and Teresa, standing at the eastern windows of the solarium watching the ocean.

“You didn’t wake me.”

Quinn flinched as if coming out of a dream and slopped some coffee over the rim of his cup. Alice stood in the doorway, her hair curled at the ends from sleep, face puffy but somehow alluring.

“No. I couldn’t have slept.” She looked down at the floor, tracing a design in the linoleum with one toe. “Do you want some coffee?” he asked.

“God yes.”

She sat at the table, and he brought a cup to her, the steam rising in white tendrils. The rain abandoned its pattering and began to pound the roof. Thunder grumbled somewhere to the west. The woods around the house blurred behind silver sheets of water.

“I don’t want him getting attached to you,” Alice said.

“I know.”

“But it’s not right to deny him someone to care about.”

“He’s amazing. I’ve never met anyone like him.”

“I see a lot of parallels between you two.”

His eyes widened. “You do?”

“Yes. You both deal with things that you never asked for and people judge you before they know you.” She fingered the handle of her cup. “Myself included.”

“I understand why you’d be hesitant, I mean,” he gestured at his face. “Believe me.”

She shook her head. “No, that’s not it, I—”

Her words were cut off by a succession of thumps and then a hard bang from overhead. They both raised their heads. A trail of dust filtered down to the floor in a thin line.

“Something’s wrong,” Alice said, standing up.

They hurried down the hallway, and Quinn threw a glance into the sitting room. Ty slept on beneath the blanket. They mounted the steps and were halfway up them when there was another bang and the tinkling of glass. Quinn doubled his pace and fumbled for an excruciating second with the lock before shoving the door inward.

Rain dribbled off the broken glass hanging from the window. The bedframe was flipped on its side and a full-length mirror was in pieces on the floor. The sleeping bag and blankets were a tangled mess.

The woman was gone.

“What the hell?” Alice said, coming in behind him. She crossed to the window and looked down. “She’s gone.”

Quinn knelt beside the bedding and inhaled. The stink was low, ventilated by the fresh air and rain, but there. The blankets were wet, the floor around them slick with fluid. His heart began to hammer. He raised his eyes to meet Alice’s.

“What?” she said.

Glass broke downstairs.

Ty screamed.

Chapter 17

The Hollow Hope

Ty’s scream fell and then rose again, a klaxon of terror.

Alice shouted something, but he was already moving, vaulting over the railing, air shrieking past him as he landed ten stairs down, tripping and falling the rest of the way. Quinn rolled to his feet, his ankle and shoulder burning but he barely noticed. He jerked the XDM from its holster and pelted down the hallway before bursting into the sitting room.

A stilt was leaning through the broken window that faced the front yard. A thin arm outstretched and beginning to retract, its grotesque hand gripping Ty around both legs. The boy held tight to the back of the loveseat, which was almost tipping over. The monster’s eyes, so human they were startling, found him in the doorway, and a snarl split its lips revealing gray teeth.

Quinn centered the handgun on its face and pulled the trigger as it yanked hard on Ty’s legs.

The shot cut the air where the thing’s head had been, tearing out a chunk of window trim in a spray of splinters. The bullfrog sound gurgled from its throat but still it kept its hold on Ty’s legs as it dragged him across the room toward the window. Quinn leapt forward and caught hold of the stilt’s wrist, shoving the barrel against its forearm. He yanked the trigger again.

The bullet tore through the pale flesh and buried itself into the floor. An inhuman cry ripped from the stilt’s throat, and it released Ty before smashing a fist the size of an ice-cream pail into Quinn’s shoulder. The blow knocked him off balance and he fell, bits of glass sinking into his palm. Then Alice was there, scooping Ty up from where he lay whimpering on the floor and racing out of the room. Quinn gained his feet and peered through the open window, arms outstretched, gun shaking in bloodied hands.

The rain fell on the empty yard.

It was gone.

The air in Quinn’s lungs was acid, burning with each breath. His eyes flitted between the Tahoe and the trees, then to the other side of the yard. He moved into the hallway and jerked the front door open, leading with the XDM.

Rain soaked the top of his head and then his shoulders as he stepped outside. It was cold and he shivered, turning toward the nearest corner of the house. Nothing. Sweeping back the other way, he stepped down from the stoop, blinking against the water running in his eyes. Below the shattered window was a pool of blood that led away around the far side of the house. Quinn followed it, its path beginning to run pink in the onslaught of rain. Thunder shook the air as he lunged around the corner, finger tight on the trigger, and nearly fired at a solitary birch tree, its narrow arms outstretched toward him. He swung the pistol left, then right, moving forward, his eyes darting down to the blood trail. A scratching sound came from the rear of the house and he broke into a run.

It was trying to get inside again.

Trying to get at Alice and Ty.

He rounded the corner and slid to a stop. The rain coated the yard in a wet sheen, muddying the little dirt path that led to the back door, which was shut. Quinn glanced down, finding the dollops of red, almost black in the dim light. He followed it around the next corner where it ended in a small pool. There was no blood trail continuing on. It simply ended. He turned back the way he’d come, panning the tree line. Where had it gone? It couldn’t have gotten by him, not without him seeing it. He spun in a circle, glancing down at the pool near his feet, its crimson depths popping with each raindrop falling from above.

Above.

A cold, twisting fist clutched within his stomach, and the hairs on the back of his neck stiffened.

He pivoted and brought the XDM up as the stilt dropped down at him from the rooftop. The gun boomed as the creature’s weight slammed into him. His shoulders connected with the earth, and it felt as if he’d fallen from a much greater height. The XDM’s blood-slicked grip sprung from his hand. The stilt had fallen forward when it landed and was rolling to its feet when he lifted his head. It screamed again, its voice deep with hard edges that made his eardrums quiver.

Quinn slid backwards, hand scrabbling for the gun. The stilt rose to its full height, skeletal length unfurling. Blood dropped from its ruined arm as it lunged forward, ragged fingernails tearing through his shirt and into his skin. Quinn cried out and stretched for the gun, but the monster’s long fingers closed over his throat, easily encircling his neck with one hand.

It drew him up toward its waiting mouth.

The world dimmed at the edges as his feet left the ground, his hands gripping its bony wrist. He swung a foot up, connecting with the thing’s face as it pulled him closer. He kicked again, this time hitting its eye. The pressure on his throat diminished, and he fell, landing hard, knees buckling as the stilt batted him with the back of its good hand. He left the ground and crumpled into a heap when he skidded to a stop, every bone crying out inside him. The gun was somewhere to the left, but he couldn’t see it. The monster loomed above, dropping toward him. He found the knife on his belt, fumbled with the strap, yanked it free as he tasted the stink of its breath.

He slashed with the blade, a last, swinging movement, his strength gone.

The stilt hovered above him, its good arm planted in the ground beside his head, eyes bulging.

Its throat was a bloody grin.

It toppled forward, more gore flowing from its neck, dropping on him like boiling rain.

He tried rolling to the side, his body full of lead, skin numb with cold. A weight fell on him, pinning him to the ground, and he gasped, heaving in a mouthful of water.

The day darkened further and then became full night as he closed his eyes.

~

Quinn came to on the loveseat in the sitting room. It was dark. A thick blanket hung over the broken window blocking out the day beyond. He sat up, wincing at the highways of pain running across his body. His head was a drum being beat from the inside with a rusty claw hammer. He put a hand to his forehead, more or less to keep it from falling apart.

“You gonna make it?”

He turned his head to where Alice sat in the corner of the room, her legs crossed, an index finger marking a page in a paperback.

“I think so.”

“I’m guessing you’ve got a concussion. And if you tear out the stitches on your thigh again, you’re just going to have to bleed. There’s nothing left to stitch to.”

Quinn exhaled, the teeter-totter of nausea in his stomach slowly stilling.

“How long was I out?”

“About three hours, give or take. I never wore a watch and my phone died.”

“Ty?” he asked, the fog of the morning’s events drawing away.

“Fine. Shook up but okay. He’s eating in the kitchen.”

“God.” Quinn leaned back into the pillows and stared at the ceiling.

“What the hell happened, Quinn?”

“I don’t know. She must’ve been…must’ve been—”

“Must’ve been what? That bitch turned into one of them and almost ate my son.”

“She must’ve been sheltered. Couldn’t have been exposed to the disease. She caught it here, from what was left of the bodies.” His head spun, and he swallowed bile.

“Sheltered? Like hidden from the outside world.” Alice stood and approached the loveseat. “Just like you, right?” Her voice was diamond-hard. Cutting. “Because of your fucking righteousness, my son almost died! We all almost died!”

He closed his eyes, letting her words lash at him. “I know.”

“No, you don’t. No, you don’t,” Alice said, coming closer. She loomed over him now just as the stilt had, hatred to match. “Your naïve view of the world is equal to poison now. Were you raised by nuns? Was that a convent we found you at?”

“No.”

“Then how are you so fucking stupid?”

“I’d never left there, okay!” he burst out. His voice was too loud in his ears. “The day we drove away was the first time I’d ever been outside those grounds.”

Alice stared at him, her mouth partially open, eyes prodding, probing.

“You’re shitting me.”

“I’m not.”

“How?”

“My father was James Kelly.”

She laughed. “The movie star?”

“Yes.”

She laughed again and then sobered when she saw the look on his face.

“You’re kidding.”

“I was born like this. And instead of raising me in the limelight, he hid me away.”

“Why?”

“Because he was weak!” Quinn blinked, surprised by the way his voice resounded in the small room. Blood pulsed in his ears. “He couldn’t bear to see me ridiculed, so he receded from public life. He kept me shielded there, away from everyone, from everything. It was the only place I’d ever known.”

Alice stepped back until her knees hit the chair she’d been sitting on and she fell into it. She looked at him for a long time and then shook her head.

“This is all unbelievable. The one fucking house I pick to overnight in.”

“Well, I’m sorry you found me.”

“That makes two of us.”

“Momma?”

Ty stood outlined in the doorway, one hand clutching his dowel.

“Go finish eating, Ty.”

“But—”

“Now.”

Ty turned and retreated down the hall, the dowel tapping the floor softly.

Quinn closed his eyes and took a shuddering breath. “I’m sorry I brought her here, but I couldn’t leave her like that. I had no way of knowing she was still vulnerable to the plague.”

Alice stared at the wall, the muscles in her jaw clenching then relaxing beneath the smooth skin of her cheek.

“You need to get some rest,” she finally said, and left him alone in the quiet room.

~

He awoke the second time to the same gray light filtering in around the makeshift curtain. Rain still fell but with much less force than before. It could’ve been minutes since Alice left the room, but he knew it wasn’t. He’d tried to stay awake, waiting for the moment when she would return or pass by the open doorway, but the fatigue was a ten-ton anchor, pulling him deep into the trenches of sleep.

Quinn sat up, the pain in his head turned down from the blaring level of before. He stood and tested his balance, then took a step. When he didn’t fall to his face, he moved into the hallway and glanced toward the kitchen. There was a light on there, and he went that way.

The kitchen was empty. A few dirty dishes soaking in dishwater. Two empty beer bottles on the table. An MRE wrapper in the garbage. He went to the sink and dipped his fingers in. The water was lukewarm.

“Alice? Ty?”

No answer.

He hurried back the way he’d come, stopping by the stairs to listen. Silence. He continued to the front door, a brick of tension expanding in his stomach. Knowing what he’d see, hating it just the same.

He opened the door.

The Tahoe was gone.

And so were they.