Dead South Rising (Book 2): Death Row (9 page)

The high-noon sun wasn’t doing any of them any favors, anyway, handicapping their sight with salty sweat. Randy pulled his handkerchief from his back pocket, cleared the blur behind his glasses, then tucked it away.

The Janitor nodded and the three men started back toward the building, their unhurried gaits as varied as their ages and backgrounds.

Randy said, “What about those other three? The, uh…” and he dipped his chin toward the main fence surrounding Alamo Assisted Living.

The Janitor said, “The igits?”

Randy gave a nod. “Right.”

“TJ the one that shot that rattler back there, you say, Lenny?”

“Yes, sir. I told him no shooting. He went and done it, anyway. I knew you wasn’t gonna be happy ‘bout it, and I knows them Infirmary folks gonna be even more mad about it.” Lenny’s hand fell to his hatchet sheathed on his hip, fingers curling nervously, like he had something more to say, but wasn’t sure how to. “Janitor, I know we disagree ‘bout them three new folks.”

“Igits,” Randy said, small smile peeking from his beard.

Gabe glanced at him with a squinty eye, his own smile slipping out from beneath his mustache.

Lenny continued, “But I’m afraid they’s gonna get someone hurt… or worse. Left they post while’s we was in that meeting.” He looked at the Janitor, who was now paying close attention to where he was stepping. “Anyways, I ain’t the kind to go blabbing other folks’ business, but that little boy, Bryan? He done slipped outside during they watch. And I caught ‘em, smoking the wacky weed in the warehouse. I just… well… if we gonna be safe… we gotta count on each other, you know?”

The Janitor stopped, eyes still to the ground, hand hooked to his chin again. “Think we should cut ‘em loose?”

Leonard exhaled another deep breath, scanned the field, eyes stopping on the mass of rattlers behind the chain link. “I know we ain’t never turned nobody away, but ain’t been nobody like them. They’s… not the responsible kind. They’s the dangerous kind.”

“So you think we should cut ‘em loose?” This time, the Janitor made eye contact.

After hesitating a moment, Lenny nodded small, tight nods.

“Alright. Ain’t no need to chew the cud anymore on that one. We send ‘em packing. Even give ‘em a going away gift… some peanut butter and jelly and crackers or something. Ain’t that what stoners do? Smoke and eat? Then they get to hoofing it.”

A look of relief crossed Lenny’s face. “I guess they do.” And the men started toward the building again.

The lightened mood lasted only as long as the conversation. As they approached the Alamo, the sound of shoes scraping incessantly on distant concrete coupled with the moaning and groaning of the caged undead. His gaze uneasy, Randy looked over at the imprisoned mob behind the tennis court fences. He still couldn’t believe it, couldn’t fathom, that he and several other men had wrangled the dead like cattle and sheep and hogs, then herded them into the tennis courts and swimming pool. It had been one hell of a job, an all day event. And a dangerous one. Amazingly, no one had been injured—neither bitten nor scratched. He’d deemed the whole experience worse than just putting the dead down with a bullet or a blade, and he’d never forget that day.

He was just about to ask the Janitor how long they could get away with keeping the rattlers penned up when a scream from up near the building interrupted him.

Lenny’s eyes went wide. “Taneesha!” He practically bowled over the Janitor and Randy, his NFL physique in full form as though he’d never stopped playing, and rushed toward the Alamo’s iron fence, toward his sister.

The two remaining men immediately started toward the source of the screams.

Randy caught only a glimpse of Taneesha before she dashed back inside the building, disappearing from view. She looked as though she was crying, upset. She didn’t appear hurt. He hoped he was right.

But it was what she was screaming about that disturbed him more than her hysterics.
 

“Did she say…?” the Janitor asked, but of course, Randy had no definitive answers, hearing as much as the old man had heard.

But younger ears had an advantage over older ones.
 

“She said something like, ‘he killed them, he killed them.’”

The Janitor’s eyes widened, and he forced his seventy-year-old legs to go even faster. The men hurried to the gate, still sitting open thanks to Lenny, and rushed in through the back dock door.

* * *

“I’m not coming in there as long as you have a weapon.” Dr. Gonzalez watched David closely, reluctant to enter Roy’s room.

“I’m trying to tell you that he turned. He was bitten. Christ, you can see his arm from all the way over there. Look…” David started toward her, and she moved back farther into the hall.

“Don’t. Stay away from me.” She held her palms to him. “Now… please, put the gun down.”

Jessica said, “Luz, David’s not a killer. He’s never killed anyone in his life. He had to have a good reason—”

“We don’t know that yet,” the doctor snapped.

Jess eyed her curiously, visibly bristling at the insinuation. “What? Don’t know what yet? That David’s not a—?”

“That people ‘turn’ or actually truly die from this. We don’t know that yet.”

“Oh, come on,” David said. “You, of all people, should be able to see it. Scotty was dead. Long dead. Roy started acting strange—fever, sweating really bad, slurred speech. Then he collapsed and died. Then started moving again—”

“Please… the gun.”

David sighed heavily despite the strain on his bruised torso, and holstered El Jefe. He held his hand to her, fingers splayed.
 

“How do you know he didn’t just pass out and wake up?” the doctor asked. “People can pass out for a few seconds, David. Just because he passed out doesn’t mean he died.”

“Then come in here and examine him. I’m sure—”

“Well of course he’s going to be dead now.
You
shot him.” Doctor Gonzalez took another step back, turned to another person in the hall. “Go see if Taneesha found Gabriel. This has to be addressed immediately. Hurry.” Scowling at David, she added, “We can’t have a killer on the loose.”

Jessica said, “Luz, listen to yourself. David’s not a killer. He was defending himself.” She shot a pleading glance at her cousin. “Right, David?”

He looked at her as if he shouldn’t have to even answer. “Of course.”

Luz crossed her arms. “I watched you, David. You were beyond angry when you left your room. You were planning to kill him. You’re not in your right mind.” She pointed to his side. “You’re still holding your dead wife’s hand.”

He looked at it, realizing he hadn’t let it go since he’d gone to get his gun. And even then, it was only long enough to buckle the belt and pull on his boots. He actually considered for a moment that maybe Dr. Gonzalez was right, that he was indeed losing his mind, that the events of the last few days—the last month—had irreparably altered his psyche, his character. The whole of
him
.

He started to move toward her, to where she stood in the hallway.

Luz held a palm to him again, and took yet another step backward, her own back now against the hallway wall. “No. Stay right there. Gabriel needs to see this. See you for what you are.”

David gave another exasperated sigh, his patience balanced precariously between slim and none.

The pistol remained holstered, but he refused to set down his wife’s hand. “Bring him in. He’ll see that I’m right.”

Dr. Gonzalez turned her gaze down the hall.

David guessed that word had already made it to the Janitor. He heard voices, hurried footsteps. Taneesha’s frantic voice. Then the Janitor’s calming tone, encouraging her to relax. He felt a mix of relief and anxiety. Surely Gabe would see it his way. They’d talked, he and Gabe, the day David had arrived at the Alamo. And Gabe understood, realized what was happening in the world, saw it sooner than most. He had to side with David. He just had to.

Taneesha slid beside Dr. Gonzalez, her hands pressed together and to her lips, prayer-pose, her brother beside her. Moments later, Gabriel
 
and Randy appeared, the old man’s thick mustache bristling, one squinty eye aimed askance at David.

“Dave.”

“Gabe.”

The Janitor studied the scene a moment. “Looks like you’ve been a might busy.”

“Only taking care of what needed taking care of.”

Gabriel brought his hand to his chin. “That right?”

David nodded.

“Hmm. Why don’t you come on outta there and let’s—”

“He turned.”

Hesitation, then, “Turned?”

David pointed to Scotty, his gaze not leaving Gabriel’s. “Scotty bit him. On the arm. Don’t know when, but when I got here, he—”

Doctor Gonzalez said, “He killed him. That’s what he did when he
 
got here. Gabe, there’s no proof Roy turned or whatever this man claims to—”

“Hang on. Everyone just calm down a minute.”

“He’s a killer, Gabe. He—”

“Luz, please.” The Janitor held up his hand, signaling quiet and cooperation. “What’s Scotty doing in there?” Gabriel trained his gaze back to the doctor. “Luz? Did you know about this?”

She shook her head. David wasn’t quite convinced; her sincerity seemed lacking.

“Anyone else know about this?” The Janitor asked, glancing around without actually looking at anyone. “No? Y’all sure?” He waited, expecting no one to answer, and got what he expected. “This ain’t what we agreed to, folks.” A father’s disappointment touched his tone.

“Gabriel, Scotty isn’t the issue,” Dr. Gonzalez said, then raised an accusatory finger at David. “He is.”

“I’m eyeing a
few
issues, Luz.”

She bristled at his comment, folded her arms.

“If y’all wouldn’t mind, I’d like a word with Dave, in private.”
 

Eyes darted, feet shifted. Slowly, reluctantly, the group started to scatter.
 

“That means you, too, Luz.”

“Gabe, listen to me—”

“Luz.”

She huffed, slapping her thighs, and followed the others.

Gabriel entered the room, closed the door behind him. He walked to the window, peered out, then crossed to the center of the room to scrutinize the entire scene. He slid his hands into the pockets of his jumpsuit, jingled his keyring, and stared for what seemed like minutes on end.

Finally, “We didn’t find him.”

Brows scrunched, David said, “Holliday?”

Gabriel nodded. “Yeah. One of them three stoners, TJ, I think, downed a rattler. No one alive.”

Another few awkward moments drifted by before the Janitor added, “No clues. No trackers in the group. I figure best we could do is set up more sentries. More eyes, more guns. If he gets close again…”

“He’ll be back,” David said. “Guy’s got a vendetta.” He paused, reluctant to reveal more. “Supposedly I… killed his wife. He’s out for blood. My blood.”

“Killed his wife?”

David dipped his chin. He didn’t like the look on the Janitor’s face, prompting an explanation. “The night we left our old place, the trailer. A shuffler, or at least I
thought
it was a shuffler, stepped out in front of the truck. I tried to stop. I did, Gabe. I really tried. Stood on the brake.” David rubbed his thumb on his wife’s hand, squeezed, as though she were right there in the room, promising her everything would be okay. “But it wasn’t enough. I… I ran down whoever it was. Whatever it was.”

“Were they alive?”

An unsure head shake. “Not sure. Just… not sure. Couldn’t risk stopping. Dangerous men behind us. I was trying to keep the group safe.”

“Killing another man’s wife… intentional or not… I imagine that’d light quite a fire under a grieving man, fill his heart with hate.” His eyes looked as though he spoke from experience.

David felt that familiar, invaded sensation, like Gabriel was inside his head, his heart, observing from within. Every feeling, every thought—violated. Known. Prying with his crowbar where he wasn’t welcome.

He experienced this during their first meeting, and here it was again. He gazed at the old man, studied his long, silver hair, the push broom mustache, his lanky frame. But the outside revealed very little, other than he’d experienced a full life. It was his eyes—those gray, soulful lakes of reason and understanding and influence—that picked at David’s emotional lock. He swore the man was a spiritual locksmith.

“So what now, Gabe?”

The old man did not answer right away, his eyes no longer poking and prodding at David’s exposed emotional tumblers, instead sadly and wearily rolling over the bodies of a friend and his son.
 

Finally, a heavy sigh. “It’s not up to me, Dave.”

“Not up to you?”

Gabriel shook his head. “The council. They’ll decide.”

“Decide? Decide what?”

“What happens next.”

“With me?”

The Janitor nodded.

“But… you run this place—”

“No, Dave. I explained to you before. There’s a council—”

“Come on, Gabriel. You’re the power behind the throne. I haven’t been here long, but I see it. These people look up to you. They listen to you. You even told me yourself, that you didn’t ask to be the leader, that it just happened naturally. You have influence and—”

Gabriel waved him off. “The Infirmaries outnumber us now. Been fighting a losing battle with ‘em these last few days, while you’ve been recovering. Ever since Scotty wandered up to that fence out there a week ago, got Roy riled up, changing folks’ minds.” He shook his head. “Somehow, that dead man gave people a false hope. Like goddamned Jesus Christ himself had strolled up to the gate, walking on water pushing a wheel barrow full of wine and bread and fish.”

“Infirmaries?”

“The folks who believe the dead are just sick. They even got Luz—a medical doctor, mind you—buying their snake oil, believing their bullshit.”

“How can they not see it, Gabe?”

The Janitor motioned to Natalee’s dismembered hand, still clutched tightly at David’s side. “Doesn’t look like you’re quite convinced yourself, Dave.”

And the final tumbler dropped, the Janitor figuring out the combination to David’s psychological lock. More tempestuous feelings flooded him, ravaging his fragile, overworked heart. But he didn’t blame the Janitor. The man seemed to have a bubble of armor around him, impenetrable to anything of evil, ill-intentioned consequence. Even if David had slung his anger at the Janitor, it would have simply bounced off the old man and ricocheted back at David.