Safe In Your Arms (7 page)

This wasn’t the first time she’d thought it, either. Life hadn’t seemed fair before Z-Day. It wasn’t fair that Callie was the center of her father’s world, or that their mother expected her to look after her little sister because she was older by thirteen months. She’d been selfish and stupid, thinking the world was out to get her just because she wasn’t Daddy’s little girl.

It was time to grow up, she decided as she moved toward the sliding glass doors. Handprints and dust covered the glass. She placed a hand over one of the prints and wondered if it belonged to him. It was certainly big enough. He had big and surprisingly sensual hands that had done more than simply touched her. They’d played her body like a favorite instrument. She wouldn’t mind letting them touch her again, if her temper let him live that long.

This house was relatively new and hadn’t rung any bells for her. Ten years away had changed a lot in the area. She wondered what changes she would find in her parent’s summer house. The sunken living room reminded her of her father’s den with the big television and all the plush couches. Yep, these people had money, plenty of it, by the looks of the paintings on the walls. Noises from above startled her as she moved to the fireplace mantle to look at the pictures. He was upstairs. What if he was with another girl? Perhaps the one he’d been dreaming of when she woke him up? There was only one way to find out.

Moving as quietly as she could, Mina walked through the living room and found the staircase. She was halfway up the stairs when she heard a female cry of pain. Icy fear ran down her spine as she froze with her hand on the railing. A voice, low and muffled by doors, had her moving back down the stairs and through a hallway. She found herself in an immaculate kitchen with stainless steel appliances and green marbled counters. The knife block, full of black-handled knives, drew her like a match.

When she was fully armed with a knife in each hand, Mina moved back up the stairs, not pausing at the grunts and groans coming from the left hallway. Keeping her body turned so her back was to the wall, she was careful to step lightly. Boards and tools lay on the floor before the very last doorway. A foul stench of rotting flesh and feces had her grimacing and placing her shirt back over her nose. What the hell was going on? It almost smelled like...

Terror gripped her as she realized there was probably a zombie in the room only a door away. Mina took a shallow breath and prepared herself to fight. There was no survival with a Z on the island with them. Panic hit her like a pain in the chest as she realized the Z might be eating Gabe behind that door, while she was cowering in the hallway. Arm raised, a massive butcher knife in her hand, Mina kicked the door in and stood there in shock at the crazy sight before her.

Sitting in a rocking chair with a colorful afghan covering her lap was a young girl. Her long brown hair was tied back in a braid with bangs covering her forehead. She was wearing a clean, white peasant top with red flowers embroidered into the collar covering her breasts. All this would have been quite normal, but the rotting sores and long fingernails gripping the chair’s arms weren’t. The girl sniffed loudly and her head snapped up fast enough to cause Mina to jump back.

Drool hung from chapped and pale lips. Flesh was peeling on her cheeks and chin, revealing blackened areas of rotting meat. Mina’s stomach pitched violently as she met the female zombie’s hungry gaze. Lifeless eyes, blue in the center, seemed to be looking right at her. A growl came from the girl’s mouth as her damaged lips pulled up in a show of yellow, rotting teeth and blackened gums. In a heartbeat she came up out of the rocking chair, slamming it back against the wall loudly. Mina braced herself for the attack to come, startled when the girl came to an abrupt halt several feet from her. A howl of rage and despair echoed around her as the girl struggled futilely against the chains on her arms and legs.

“Mina!” She turned her head from the animal in human clothing to see Gabe coming toward her with a bowl full of raw meat. He was wearing a torn leather jacket and jeans, with his expression angry and dangerous.

Mina immediately knew that whatever was going on wasn’t good and there was no way she was going to be the next victim to go into that bowl. Adrenaline filled her as she attacked him. The bowl clanged against the wall as Gabe used it to defend against her wild swing with the butcher knife.

“What the hell!” He dodged her next swipe, catching her wrist in a painful hold, but he missed her fist as it hit him in the jaw.

“You sick bastard!” Mina kicked out, her foot glancing off his shin as he yanked her off-balance and shoved her hard up against the wall. He slammed her wrists up above her head, her fingers barely able to hold onto the knives, as she tried to twist away from him. His rock hard body pressed her back, leaving no room for her to wiggle away from him. “I’ll kill you!”

“Calm down.” His jaw clenched as his blue gaze blazed down at her. “You don’t know what is going on here.”

“I can damn well guess,” she snapped at him. Fear and disgust filled her as he looked toward the bedroom where the zombie girl was growling and grunting. Chains clanged noisily as she tried to get free.

“I know this looks...” He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against the wall beside her shoulder. Mina felt the slight shaking of his body. “Please, let me explain before you run away. I need to...” He huffed out an irritated breath as the rocking chair crashed into the door. “I have to calm her down. Are you calm enough for me to let you go? I don’t relish a knife in my back before I can explain myself to you.”

Mina tried to catch her own breath by inhaling, but the stench coming off him and the room behind him made her gag. She nodded her head, intent on getting as far away from the disgusting scenario behind him as she could. He considered her a second before leaning his forehead against hers. She froze.

“I know you’re going to run as far from me as you can. Please let me explain and I’ll take you to your summer house right after. It isn’t safe for you to go alone. Do you understand?” Mina nodded. She only wanted his stinky hands off her as soon as possible. “All right. Don’t stab me, please.” He smiled wryly before moving back enough to keep himself out of striking distance. She dropped her arms to step forward hesitantly. He bent to pick up the bowl and she backed up against the wall, fear instinctively making her raise the sharp knives up to ward him off. He stopped and heaved a heavy breath. “I shouldn’t have expected you to follow my directions. Mina Brady, meet my sister, Isabella Landing.”

“Your sister...” She stared at him as he nodded his head.

“Your scent is upsetting her. Go downstairs. I’ll be down to explain as soon as I feed her.” His words directed her attention back to the bowl of meat he was holding. His sister eased up on her struggles with the chains; her head lifted and her nostrils flared as she inhaled.

Mina found it surreal as he stepped past her and entered the room. The girl... His sister hung her head as if she was waiting for him. Then her head swung in Mina’s direction and she again lunged for her. Gabe turned to look at her over his shoulder. “I’m sorry, Mina.” He slammed the door shut, blocking her out.

Chapter Eight

Feeling sick to her stomach, Mina ran down the stairs, nearly tripping her way down the last few steps as she held back vomit and her horror. A bathroom to her right caught her eye and she raced to collapse in front of the toilet.

“This is crazy!” Mina whispered when she finished being sick. She reached for the handle to flush before she thought about it. Immediately, she swore at her mistake, but watched in absolute fascination as the water swirled down the drain. “This house has running water?” She turned to look at the shower, noticing the towels hung up beside it.

“Oh, I am so going to kill him. And then, I’m going to take a shower. Hot, cold, it doesn’t matter, but I’m going to stay in there forever.” Standing, she went to the sink and turned on the cold tap. Splashing her face with cold water that hadn’t come from a puddle or the river, felt wonderful.

Gabriel Landing had a lot of explaining to do. If she didn’t like what she heard... Bending down, she retrieved her butcher knives. One look in the mirror had her grimacing as she stood there holding the weapons. Hell, she was a mess! Gone was the college student whose only concerns were grades and what she was going to wear to class the next day. Now, she was more worried about having slept with a psychopath. She should run. Any woman with half a brain would be nothing but a trail of dust by now. Staring at her messy hair, tied back from a pale face that was scratched up and without a drop of make-up on, Mina realized she wasn’t the same silly little chit who thought the world revolved around her.

The pleading look on his face when he asked her to stay and let him explain wouldn’t let her run. Damn. Hearing him out wouldn’t take long and she did know how to defend herself, though against him, she’d yet to come out on top. Except for while they were having sex. Her breath hissed through her teeth as she clutched the knives. At least she’d try to make an escape a possibility. But she had to move quickly. Z’s didn’t take long to eat.

Mina was sitting on a bench just before the opened front door, waiting for him, when he came back down the stairs with the empty bowl in his hand. The stink of the beast upstairs followed him, making her want to vomit once more. Disgust must have shown on her face, for he stopped at the foot of the stairs and shrugged out of the leather jacket to toss it back to the top of the staircase. The smell seemed to dissipate at his action.

“I’m not sure where to start.” He shoved a hand through his hair and stepped toward her. Mina was up in a second, two blades crossed in front of her in a clear stance of defense. She wasn’t about to let him get within grabbing distance. He stopped and set the bowl down on the steps as he shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans.

“How about starting at why the hell you have a fucking zombie chained upstairs? Let’s start there.”

“Okay. Isabella is my little sister. I couldn’t go back to my unit because I’d promised my father that I wouldn’t leave her. He wanted us to stay here where we’d be safer—fewer people, less danger of being infected. He was wrong.” He heaved a ragged breath and sat down on the steps. His look was one of complete surrender. “When it became clear that the disease was starting to move north, I decided to head across the border into Canada.”

“The borders were closed as soon as word got out that we had an epidemic.”

“I know. I tried anyways, but there were heavily armed guards shooting anything that moved on the water. That’s when we landed here. I knew the doctor who owned this island. He and his family were friends of my father’s since they used his company for several upgrades and repairs.” He looked up the stairs as he spoke. “I failed her. Mrs. Faucher was here with her son, Michael. He was ten years old and a sweet boy. When Michael came at us, Isabella didn’t run. She went to say hello to him. Izzy always had to be so damn friendly. I was barely able to pull him off her...” Pain flashed in his blue gaze as he stared at her. His hands clenched on his jean-covered knees.

“I’m sorry, Gabe.” Her sympathy came naturally, but Mina shoved down the urge to go to him as she gripped the handles of the knives. She couldn’t afford to be so soft, not when he was harboring one of
them
in the master bedroom. The look of guilt and torment in his expression when he looked at her had her dropping her hands a couple inches. He was torn by what he’d done, struggling to deal with the repercussions.

“Long story short, I took care of Mrs. Faucher and her son. I put my sister in that room and watched her die. Then I watched her come back in the form of a zombie.” He stood up to pace the small foyer. “I couldn’t...” He shoved a hand in his hair and pulled hard.

“You couldn’t kill her.” She wanted to go to him when he looked at her. There was something so wrong about a big strong male looking vulnerable and destroyed. The soft woman within wanted to hold him until the pain eased, but the hard survivor side of her knew better. She might have felt safe in his arms last night, but knowing what he’d done betrayed that trust.

“No, I can’t. She’s still my sister.”

“She’s a zombie!” Anger had her gripping the knives.

“She’s infected with a disease, but she still looks like my sister.”

“It doesn’t matter what you want to call them. They have one objective—to feed. And guess what, they aren’t too picky about what they eat. I’m surprised she hasn’t already taken a bite out of you.”

“She won’t bite me. That’s the other reason I kept her here. A soldier must learn his enemy in order to fight him. I use her scent to mask mine. The jacket is sprayed with her blood.”

“They don’t have blood. Zombies don’t bleed, Gabe.”

“Whatever you want to call it, the black goo they drip is like a masking scent. You can blend right in with them, as long as you can handle the stench.” He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans with a shrug. Mina caught the way the white T-shirt hugged his muscular chest and flat stomach. Her mouth watered as she remembered the way he felt beneath her hands.
Get a grip, girl. He’s a crazy zombie keeper.

“That’s why they didn’t smell you that night on the beach?”

“Yeah, I was wearing the jacket. The leather absorbs the scent much better than regular cloth. You must think I’m pretty fucked up.”

“This whole thing is fucked up.” She took a breath as he nodded with a grimace. “I don’t really want to know, but I
have
to know. What the hell were you feeding her?”

“Beautiful, nosy women with too much courage and no sense.” He grinned as she gave him a warning look as her wrists rotated the knives dangerously. “All right, relax dutchess. I’m only yanking your chain. I catch fish, mash them up with some of the rotted meat from the Fauchers’ freezer, and feed that to her. It isn’t exactly what she needs, but it keeps the hunger at bay.”

***

“I’ll get your clothes and weapons. There’s a boat we can use to get you to the summer house.” He stopped at the hallway leading back to the kitchen. “Mina, I didn’t want you to know about Isabella because I knew you’d never understand.”