Dead Soil: A Zombie Series (29 page)

“Shut the door,” he called out to the shadowed man.

Christine’s heart raced as the young man walked in and shut the door quietly behind him. It would be that much harder to wake Jerry up with her screams. How long would it be before anyone realized she was dead? Would anyone besides Liam even care?

“I don’t know, Lonnie,” the kid who entered said. “We should get out of here.”

“Would you stop being Mitch the little bitch,” the man named Lonnie said with a sigh and turned to look at the guy he deemed Mitch the bitch.

“We don’t have much left, but you can take whatever you want,” Christine said with a shaky, unrecognizable voice. She tried to steady herself, but her muscles were weak with fear.

“Oh, we’ll take what we want. We’re going to take the whole world back.” The sturdy man said as he smiled maniacally upward, his face turned to the unmoving ceiling fan.

Now was her chance.

Christine sprang up from the floor and threw herself at the kitchen counter. She frantically patted for the knife she’d placed next to the radio. Her hands pawed for something, anything to grab. Lonnie was on her before her shaky fingers could wrap around anything useful and grabbed her hard enough to deeply bruise her porcelain skin. She grunted and kicked as he forced her back with his thick hands wrapped around her upper arms.

“Watch out!” he yelled at Mitch as Christine kicked her legs wildly through the air. “This one’s a fighter!” He threw her down hard like a sack of spoiled potatoes.

Christine gasped for the air that had been knocked out of her lungs. She continued in her attempts to kick Lonnie, but he rolled her onto her back and pinned them down with both hands. His muscular, burnt arms gripped her calves tightly, the fingers pressing all the way down to the bone. She felt like the weight was going to snap them in two.

Tears rolled down her face as she pleaded. “Please, don’t do this! Please, don’t. Please, don’t.” The urgency of her pleas faded away as Lonnie tightened his grip. She continued in pained whispers.

“Get her arms,” he ordered to the shadowed man cowering in the corner of the room.

The dark figure name Mitch shook his head. “No,” he said with an air of defiance.

“How ‘bout this? You hold her arms down or I shoot you in the face?” Lonnie clicked back the hammer of the pistol and pointed it at his partner’s face.

Mitchell Barnes stared at the two figures on the ground. The young woman’s face was turned away. All he could see of her was a river of golden-blonde hair. His eyes darted back and forth as he bit his lip. What were the chances that Lonnie would actually shoot him if he ran? He’d seen Lonnie attempt to take down a large buck before with his rifle. A buck was much larger than Mitchell and not a single bullet had hit it. Lonnie had blamed the sun in his eyes. That was bullshit. The ex-jarhead simply couldn’t shoot.

Mitchell eyed the distance between Lonnie and the door. He came to the conclusion that even a terrible shot with a nine-millimeter like Lonnie had could hit him square in the back from such a close range. “Fine,” he said softly.

He swung his shotgun over his shoulder and knelt down on his knees beside the sobbing woman’s head. He placed his hands on her wrists and held them over her head. His eyes stung and the corners twitched as tears welled up. He had to look away.

“What a li’l bitch,” Lonnie laughed.

He wasn’t sure if Lonnie was talking about him or the poor woman they were holding down against her will. He didn’t care if it was him. He let the tears fall as he tried to wipe them on the shoulder of his hoodie.

The woman finally turned her head to look up into his blotchy face. She blinked rapidly when one of his tears fell close to her red rimmed eyes. He didn’t want to look at her, but he was compelled to. Slowly, he moved his head down until his chin was against his chest and his soft brown eyes met her wet blue ones.

“Mitchell? Mitchell Barnes?” Christine said, her face screwed up to stare at the curly-haired teenage boy in utter disbelief.

The muscles in her body released ever so slightly at the sight of his familiar face, which stared down at her wide-eyed and jaw clenched. She wanted to reach out and wipe the tears from his well-defined face, but his long, thin fingers were still secured around her wrists.

“Mitchell? Do you remember me? Christine. Liam’s fiancé,” she said, hopeful, as her eyes cleared enough for her to see him clearly.

There was a sharp twist on her ankle that shot a searing pain up through her leg. “You two know each other?” the blonde man holding her down below the waist growled, his eyes locked on Mitchell.

Christine flinched. How could she be so stupid? She should have kept her mouth shut.

“How do you two know each other?” he demanded through his small, yellowed teeth.

Mitchell sat petrified with his face frozen in panic. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He involuntarily loosened his grip around Christine’s arms.

Things were escalating quickly. Christine lifted her head off the carpet to look at the man by her feet. “Not well at all, we barely know each other, I swear,” she lied. “He worked at GameStop and I saw him there a couple times. That’s it. If it wasn’t for his tag I wouldn’t even know his name.”

The man’s face tightened together. His eyes flickered over to Mitchell and back to her.

Christine’s pupils dilated and her heart sped up like a racehorse at the track. She’d seen Mitchell so many times in the last two years since she met him, it was sad for a woman who didn’t even play video games. They engaged in small chit-chat at his work while she browsed new games for Liam, they laughed over stories of college life while everyone else played Dungeons and Dragons at Zack’s game night in the comic books store, they even shared Mitchell’s first beer together there. The last time she’d seen him was awkward, but it would never top the discomfort she felt around him now.

V.

Christine walked into GameStop with a smile on her face, Allison Murphy at her heels. “Hey, Mitchell,” she said to the young man working the counter. “You still have any left?”

              Mitchell Barnes looked up from the magazine he thumbed through and into Christine’s grand sapphire eyes. He dropped the last issue of
Game Pro
from his lap. When he bent down to pick it up his head banged on the underneath of the counter.

Christine tightened her lips and tried not to laugh.

“Yeah I have one more left. I put it in the back in case you came in,” he said. “I figured Liam would want this one.”

Christine smiled at him warmly. “Thanks. You’re the best.”

Mitchell exhaled a breath of laughter through his nostrils before he went to the back to retrieve the Xbox game for Christine.

Allison Murphy’s eyes followed him until he disappeared behind a set of double doors. “He’s not bad for a nerd,” she said, still looking for when he came back out. “How come I’ve never seen him before?”

“Ew, he’s nineteen,” Christine said with a scrunched face. “And you’re married.”

Allison turned back to her friend and rolled her eyes. “I’m just looking,” she said, exasperated. “Besides, his curly, brown hair and sharp features remind me of my husband when he was a teenager…so long ago.”

              “It wasn’t
that
long,” Christine said absently as she browsed the shelves.

“Twelve years is a long time, Christine. Just wait till you’ve been married for over a decade. You’ll be looking at all the cute young boys, too.” Allison craned her neck again to see if the young man reminiscent of her husband in better days was headed back yet.

Mitchell Barnes came through the doors and handed Christine the brand new game still wrapped in cellophane. Their fingers touched and his cheeks flushed a bright red. Eyes burned on the back of his neck.

He turned to see Christine’s older friend staring at him with what he deemed hungry eyes. He’d never gotten that look from a woman before, but he’d seen it often enough in the horny teenagers throughout high school and his first year at DeVry.

His smooth cheeks burned even brighter and he turned away. Why couldn’t Christine ever look at him that way? He glanced at her friend from the corner of his eye and decided she wasn’t bad looking for someone twice his age. Her dark hair was meticulously styled in a short, highlighted bob that made her look older, but sophisticated. Her blunt bangs sat on her arched brows and cut them off at the top.

Allison caught Mitchell eyeing her and she gave him a flirty smile. He immediately turned away and walked back behind the counter, stumbling over his own feet. Christine couldn’t help laughing softly to herself. Mitchell had a crush. It was cute.

“A bit odd, though, isn’t he?” Allison whispered to Christine as they stood close together, as women did when they gossiped.

“Yeah, but he’s a good kid,” Christine whispered back. “And I think he likes you!”

Allison’s brown eyes lit up. She looked over her shoulder at the wiry kid standing behind the counter and gave him her best smoldering, sexy eyes.

“Bye, Mitchell!” Christine called as they left the store. She looked back with her expansive blue eyes and saw Mitchell take a sharp breath of air when they met his.

“Bye, Christine,” he said just above a whisper.

VI.

“Mitchell, please don’t do this, please,” Christine begged softly. Her voice was steady now, but desperate.

Mitchell looked down at her. His vision blurred as more tears collected and then spilled over the brim. He, too, remembered perfectly the last time he saw Christine. She’d looked so pretty that day in her suit, nothing like the tear-streaked woman on the floor. His grip loosened on her wrists again, but he didn’t let go. If they did, Lonnie would shoot him. There was no doubt in his mind.

His stomach tightened as a wave of sickness washed over him. Why had he gone with Lonnie? Why didn’t he just stay behind with the others, like Gretchen told him to? His grip involuntarily loosened more. Why would he ever go anywhere with a psychopath like him? He should have known it would only lead to something horrible. He never imagined anything like this.

“Please, Mitchell. You don’t want to do this. You can walk away still. You can.”

Mitchell’s hands sprang open. His breathing was ragged as he sat up straight, away from Christine.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Lonnie barked. His gun was tucked away into the back of his pants so his hands were free to hold Christine’s legs down.

“I can’t,” Mitchell whispered as he raised his hands further away from her. “I can’t do this. It’s not right.”

An arrow flew from the darkness of the doorway and pierced Mitchell between the eyes. Christine screamed.  She lay still on the floor in shock. Tears spilled from the sides of her eyes and ran down onto the carpet.

She felt the grip on her legs loosen while she watched Mitchell’s body slumped back against the couch. The other man was dead, too. Strong, rough hands reached down to force her up by her shoulders.

Liam had her pressed against him before she realized what was happening. Her faced turned to stare into Mitchell’s lifeless honey eyes, a few freshly formed tears running down his pale cheeks. She was only able to take in sharp, shallow breaths. Liam killed Mitchell. He must not have known it was him, otherwise he never would have done it. Liam loved Mitchell like a younger brother. Some distant part of her expected Mitchell to rise up as if nothing happened, but he would never rise again as himself or anything else. Her entire body shook in Liam’s arms.

“It’s all right,” Liam said as he stroked the back of her head. He didn’t take a single glance at the men as they lay dead on the floor at his feet. “It’s all right. They won’t hurt you. They can’t hurt you anymore.”

Christine sobbed harder. She would go through it all again—the fear, the pain, the humiliation, all of it—if she could save Mitchell.

VII.

“Look,” Christine said. Her eyes settled on the teenager’s motionless body, slumped back against the couch with an arrow sticking out from his forehead. Bright red blood poured from the wound. Her shaking had subsided, but the sickness in her stomach grew more overwhelming. “It’s Mitchell.”

“What?” Liam said as he released her and whipped himself around. He wiped at his mouth as he felt saliva gather inside. “God,” he said over and over again. “Oh, God!” He paced back and forth in front of the body. He groaned and grabbed his shaggy ginger hair, clutching it in his hands and pulling. “What have I done?” He heaved great breaths as his feet carried him aimlessly around the living room. “What have I done?” His eyes flickered over Mitchell’s face, the kid’s mouth open in shock or maybe even betrayal.

              Christine saw that Liam was dangerously close to crossing over into a full-on panic attack. “Liam, Liam!” she said, stepping into his view so he’d look at her instead of the dead bodies slumped over on the floor. “Honey, it’s OK.” She stroked his arms hoping the repetitive motion would soothe his racking nerves.