Heckel Casey (14 page)

"Fine. Why?"

I looked at her with questioning eyes and a slight grin.

"I'm not pregnant, Heckel. I think I would know," Sela said with a hint of annoyance. "And if I were, trust me, you'd be the first to know."

I hugged her.

After a few moments, she asked softly, " Do you wish I were…um…pregnant?"

Gulp. I was stunned. I had no idea how to answer that. Words formed in my head, but they were all mixed up like on that Jumble game. Stammering and spluttering, I finally said, "Well, good question. Hmm…um…yes and no."

She turned and looked me straight in the eyes, as though waiting for my explanation. Her face clearly expressed hurt.

"Sela, I would love to have a family with you, but this isn't exactly the best time. Bringing a baby into the midst of some supernatural, epic battle of good versus evil is not my idea of—"

"I know. It's just that…well, I love you and if I were pregnant, it would be the most beautiful child ever."

My insides did that flip-flop thing again and I hugged Sela harder. "I agree. With your supermodel looks and kick-ass demeanor, our child would be…awesome."

She leaned her head up and kissed me.

"Maybe once this is over, we can have that family," I whispered softly into her ear.

The
Welcome to McKinney
sign had a good half-dozen bullet holes peppered through it. Please, don't let that be a bad omen. A raven slowly landed on top of the sign. It didn't look like one of Madeline's creepy scouts.

As we rode into McKinney, I noticed several large towers circling the town. I looked to see if anyone was perched in them and couldn't see anything. Sela slowed Tempest to a walk and dropped alongside of me.

"What do you think?"

I shrugged.

A slow rumble made us turn around to look down the road we just traveled. The roar got louder. "It can't be. That sounds like motorcycles," I said. Jerky was draped over my shoulder. She jumped off, hit the ground, turned and hissed.

"It does. But that's impossible. There hasn't been any gas around for a long time," Sela offered as the sound increased in volume.

The sound intensified further and the first sign of a group of motorcycles appeared on the horizon.

"I've got a bad feeling about this. I don't think that it's a bunch of old guys coming back from the Sturgis bike rally," I said as Hope knelt for Jerky to jump up to me.

"No…more like Hells Angels, and I don't mean the California club. I'm thinking real Hells Angels. Let's get going," Sela said as she kicked Tempest to gallop.

The sound was deafening as the motorcycles raced toward us. As we got closer to the edge of town, people popped up in the towers. I could see they were holding an assortment of weapons, including rifles, bow and arrows, shotguns and spears. There were even some older kids with slingshots. One individual had his hand up in the air as if ready to give a signal. We pushed the horses faster past the first tower.

I turned around once to see a few of the lead motorcycles only about fifty yards behind us. Suddenly, I heard a shout and the tower attackers let loose a deadly barrage. The bikers closest to us were thrown from their bikes. Some got up, kicked their bike back into life and continued to chase us.

"Yup, more of Madeline's forces. No doubt about it," I yelled to Sela.

As we entered the main street of town, a group of men came out in front of us.

"Quick, down this alley," one of them said to us, motioning.

The bikers kept getting knocked down, only to get back up. They had that same dull-red glare in their eyes. Right after the last barrage from the towers, I heard a roar from a crowd. Before I took Hope down the alley, I looked out at the edge of town and a small force armed with baseball bats, guns, pitchforks, big shovels—you name it—converged upon the bikers. I almost giggled because it reminded me of that scene in Frankenstein when the villagers assembled to go after the monster.

As we neared the end of the alley, two men took the horse's bridles and led us into a large warehouse. It was dark inside. My heart pounded in my chest. Jerky was on my neck. She licked my ear. Her scratchy tongue for some reason seemed to comfort me and made me feel at ease. Maybe she sensed my fear. I reached up and petted her head.

"Are you all right?" I asked Sela.

"Fine," she said panting. "Just a little shaken up."

"Don't blame you folks. I'd be too." A tall, elderly gentleman emerged from the shadows. "Welcome to McKinney."

"Thanks for the welcoming committee," I said, extending my hand. "And I
really
mean that."

"We like to be prepared for anything. We saw you coming down the road and we waited to see if you were friend or foe. It was obvious that you were being chased and those bikers didn't look like they were exactly in your escort."

"That's for sure," Sela commented as she dismounted from Tempest. She extended her hand and introduced the two of us.

"And this is Jerky," I said getting down from Hope. The cat purred as the man petted her head.

"Please to meet you folks. My name is Jack, Jack Hawkins. At one time, I was the mayor of the fine town of McKinney. Now it's more like governor, I guess. People wanted me to stay in charge."

"I've been traveling for over a year now. This is the first town I've come to that actually has people in it that aren't…um…either dead or psychotic," I said.

The sounds of Madeline's possessed growling bikers mixed with shouts from the McKinney protectors intensified. Jack had us move farther into the warehouse. He explained that after the initial months of the collapse took a firm root in the country, a small group of people bound together to support each other and learned to survive. "For some reason, we didn't seem to have the maniacal urge to kill each other like what was going on across the rest of the planet. We built up our defenses, a little of which you saw coming into town."

"Impressive," I said, turning my head to hear the roar of a motorcycle approaching. I looked at the door and saw it beginning to slide open. That weird sensation in my stomach began to seethe and twist. I could feel the sense of power building in my arms. Sela glanced over at me and flashed me a look of concern. Jack kept talking and started to walk toward the door. I was about to lift my arm to unleash that unexplainable power inside me when suddenly the commotion outside the warehouse ceased. Seconds later, the loud, unearthly roar of Madeline's badass bikers faded away.

A bloody-faced teenager carrying a large axe slid open the cumbersome wooden warehouse door and yelled, "We got 'em runnin'."

"Good one, Tommy," Jack yelled. "Will you excuse me? I need to go survey the damage and help clean up."

"What can we do to help? You did save our lives," Sela asked.

"Nothing. You just get yourselves settled. There's some water over at the faucet and a bucket. I'm sure your horses would love a drink. I'll be back later."

As he left the warehouse, Sela thanked him again. Turning to me, she asked, "What do you think?"

"I'd like to think that for once we've run into some good luck. However, on the other hand, I don't know. There's a little voice in my head that says don't trust anyone. Then again…maybe that's Madeline's fear creeping out of the crevices of my mind."

"Yeah, I know what you mean. Fear has a way of messing with us, but these people just fought Madeline's evil assholes for us."

"I know that says a lot about them right there. How can you not trust people who put their lives on the line for you?" I said grinning as I took the saddle off Hope. Sela already had a bucket of water filled for Tempest. We had all our gear in a pile. Jerky was prowling the warehouse in full hunting mode.

A young woman, perhaps in her mid-twenties, came walking toward us from the other end of the warehouse. "Welcome. My name is Missy. Are you folks hungry?" Sela glanced at me with a slight grin. Before I could give my standard reply, she put her hand over my mouth and said, "We don't want to impose."

"Not at all. We'd love to have some company and hear some news from outside our little town. Follow me."

I looked around, concerned about our belongings as well as the horses. Missy saw my concern and assured me that everything would be safe. She also mentioned that a friend was bringing some oats and hay for the horses.

"Such hospitality. What a rare thing indeed," I muttered as we followed Missy. Sela put her arm around my waist. I glanced around to see Jerky follow us.

As we left the warehouse and walked out of the alley, I looked out toward the edge of town where the biker battle took place. A large fire, spewing black smoke, filled the sky. I stopped to stare at the scene.

"How many people did you lose?" I asked softly.

"None," Missy said proudly. "We have the best protectors ever. They stopped the evil."

The way Missy said that made me shudder. Sela hugged me tighter.

"For now, maybe, but…"

Before I could finish, my stomach grumbled, giving Sela a chance to change the subject.

"Dinner should be shortly. I'm sure I can find you a snack or something to tide you over. Come on. My house is just over there," Missy said pointing.

Questions filled my head to the point of popping it. I kept glancing back at the burning pyre. What was burning? I hoped it wasn't any of the townsfolk. Must be Madeline's losses. And how did those motorcycles have any fuel? She must have fuel stockpiled somewhere.

"Earth to Heckel," Sela whispered under her breath. "Come back."

"Just deep in thought," I said into her ear.

"Here we are," Missy said pointing to her house. As we approached the front door, Jack came walking up from behind us.

"Everything all right?" I asked.

"Yuppers. Right as rain. Did you get your horses settled?"

"Yes, they were pretty thirsty," Sela said. "And hungry. Thanks for the oats. I'm sure they're happy."

"Great. I'm glad." Jack said holding the front door.

"Your generosity is…um…" I said, stuttering.

"Simply a common courtesy. We are happy to help out," Jack said proudly.

Sela and I, with wide eyes and a big grin, slowly nodded our heads.

"We have pot roast for tonight. How does that sound?" Jack offered as we walked past him.

"Like I've died and gone to heaven," I said.

Sela poked me in the ribs and whispered, "Bad choice of words, dear."

"Well, it's not heaven, but I can honestly say that my wife makes the best darn tasting pot roast this side of Dallas."

A short woman with slightly graying hair set in a long braid came out of the kitchen. A clean, flowery apron was wrapped around her waist. She looked like she could have been on an old 1950s sitcom like
Leave It To Beaver.
Yeah, June Cleaver! The smell of cooked food followed her out of the kitchen. My salivary glands suddenly burst as if they had been dammed up and the smell of the pot roast broke the levee. My mouth was watering so much that I could hardly talk.

"Hello, you must be Sela and Heckel," the woman said, extending her hand. "I'm Vonnie."

Shaking her hand energetically, I said, "It's a pleasure to meet you, Vonnie."

"You have a very nice home," Sela said, shaking our host's hand.

"Thank you. Are you folks hungry?"

This time it was Sela who eagerly expressed our combined hunger. "Vonnie, the smell of that pot roast is divine. We haven't had a real cooked meal except for an occasional rabbit in a long time."

"Don't forget the mac and cheese we had the other night," I said.

Sela frowned as she remembered the nearly burned dinner because of the talking skeleton. "Like I said, we haven't had a real cooked meal while sitting at a table in a very long time."

"Well, it's almost done. Take a seat in the living room and I'll call when dinner's ready," Vonnie said as she walked back toward the kitchen. "Oh Missy, would you please set the table?"

"My pleasure," Missy said, following her mother into the kitchen.

"Come over here and have a seat. Tell me where you've come from?" Jack asked.

From the kitchen, Vonnie shouted that she didn't want to miss any of our conversation.

"Okay. We'll talk about stuff you already know," Jack yelled back to his wife. He rolled his eyes at us. "As you can tell, we are a little starved for news."

"I'm afraid we don't have much of that to report," Sela said, sending me a glance that was cautious. Changing the subject, Sela asked Jack how many people were in the town.

"I guess there's a couple of hundred. We get new people joining us all the time. The last time we checked, it seems to me we were close to that number."

"Where do they come from?" I asked.

"All over. Some as far away as Canada," Jack said looking over at Missy setting the table.

"What do you do for food? How did you get the meat for this pot roast? Do you grow your own vegetables?" The questions flooded out of my mouth in record pace.