The Becoming (Book 4): Under Siege (20 page)

“He went to get someone named Peter,” Sadie
finally said, after what felt to Cade like an eternity. “He’s okay.
He’s not hurt or anything.”

Cade could have sworn she felt her soul
slump over in relief. “Oh thank God,” she breathed, sagging against
the foyer’s wall and dropping her head against it. The sound of the
twins’ footsteps started up the stairs again, now that the news of
Brandt’s okayness had been delivered. She glanced up at Derek; he’d
opened the front door about six inches and stared out into the
community. Then he stepped back, and Cade looked up expectantly to
see Brandt stepping inside, sweaty and smeared with old blood and
dirt but alive. The relief she felt was palpable. “What in the hell
is going on out there?”

“Nothing good,” Brandt said. He stepped
closer to her and pressed a quick kiss to her cheek, though he kept
his distance since he was filthy. “Are you okay? You didn’t go out
there, did you?”

Derek gave Cade a pointed look over Brandt’s
shoulder, and it took everything in her to fight back a scowl. “No,
I didn’t go out there,” she said, answering Brandt’s question with
only a little irritation slipping through. “Though, believe me, I
really wanted to. I’m sick of being stuck in this house away from
all the fun.”

“I’m not sure I’d consider it fun, but
you’ve always had a strange definition of that,” Brandt said.

“So what’s going on out there?” Derek asked.
“And for that matter, where’s my brother?”

“Isaac’s outside, and yes, he’s fine,”
Brandt said, heading off the question that even Cade could see on
the tip of the doctor’s tongue. “He’s helping Peter out with
something. He’ll be coming back here as soon as he’s done.

“As for what’s going on out there, simply
put, the infected are getting in.”

“What?” both Derek and Cade gasped, and Cade
added, “How? Are the gates coming down?”

“No, no, the gates are still holding,”
Brandt said quickly. “For now, anyway. No, they’re coming up
over
the gates. They’re just climbing over each other and
coming over the top. They staged a diversion at the front gates,
had me and Keith occupied there, and then they came over at the
side over there.” He pointed in the general direction of the area
across the street, where the wall lay behind a row of houses.
“Isaac, Sadie, Jude, and I managed to kill off what got over the
wall, and we’ve got Peter on the roof of the house across the
street playing sniper for anything that comes over. I got a few
other men on the roofs too, watching the different sides of the
community.”

“So what are we going to do?” Cade asked,
stepping past him to go into the living room. There was a towel on
the back of the couch; she grabbed it and brought it to him so he
could start cleaning up.

“We’ve got to get these people out of here
as fast as we can,” Brandt said as he swiped halfheartedly at his
face with the corner of the towel. “If they’re not going to come
through the gates, then they’re going to come over them, and I
think it’s going to be really soon. Where are the twins?”

Cade was almost thrown off by the sudden
change of topic. “They went upstairs to clean up,” she said.

“And that’s exactly where you need to go,
Brandt,” Derek spoke up, pointing at the stairs. “You need to get
that blood off of you. Go decon.”

Cade didn’t hesitate to add, “I’ll go with
you. We should start hashing out a plan.”

He nodded and rubbed at his face again as he
started up the stairs with the slow, weary trudge of the
perpetually exhausted. Cade followed, her step feeling only a
little lighter than Brandt’s looked.

It was only when the door was firmly shut
behind them and the lantern they kept on the sink was turned on
that Cade spoke.

“Brandt, what are we going to do?” she
asked, even as she internally swore at how weak her voice sounded.
She set her rifle against the wall and slipped past Brandt,
plugging the sink and grabbing a gallon jug of water. She’d started
to pour it into the sink before she realized Brandt had yet to
answer. She glanced over her shoulder as the water glugged into the
sink. He stared at her with a somewhat vacant expression on his
face. “Brandt?”

Brandt shook his head slightly and blinked
as if he were coming out of a trance. He nudged his way to the sink
and grabbed a washcloth from the shelf nearby, dunking it into the
lukewarm water. “I have some ideas, but you’re probably not going
to like one of them,” he said, taking a second to strip his t-shirt
off and dropping it onto the floor. Cade raised an eyebrow,
prompting him to continue, but he didn’t say anything as he scooped
the wet washcloth from the sink and started vigorously scrubbing
his face and neck and arms, sloshing water down his stomach. Cade
watched for a minute, then nudged his bicep.

Brandt sighed, dropped the cloth back into
the sink with a splash, and turned to look at her, leaning against
the sink with both hands braced against it. “I want you to leave
Woodside,” he said.

Cade opened her mouth to protest, but he
touched her arm, lightly, and she closed it again. The dark,
serious look in his eyes unsettled her and made her more willing to
hear him out. He dropped his arm back to the edge of the sink and
looked away from her.

“Things are about to get ugly,
really
ugly. And I’m not saying that you’re incapable of defending
yourself, because you are, but with you being pregnant…I’m just not
sure I’m willing to risk you being put at such high risk. I think
I’d prefer getting you out of here before things get so bad that
we’re not given an option.”

Cade pressed her lips together, giving him
the courtesy of at least appearing to think his request over before
objecting. He was clearly concerned, and she couldn’t fault him for
that: the situation was bad and was bound to get worse, and she
was, naturally, at higher risk than most because of her larger
belly. But she didn’t like the idea of leaving her husband behind
while she bailed to hide out in a safer location like a coward.
“Brandt, I…” She trailed off, unsure of what to say.

“I know it’s not what you want to do,”
Brandt said, clearly reading what she was thinking. “In fact, I’m
pretty willing to bet that you’re getting ready to object to the
whole idea all together. And I really can’t stop you if you decide
to stay, because even though I’m your husband, I’m not your lord
and master, and you can do as you wish. I’m just putting forward my
thoughts on the matter, so I can say that I’ve spoken them, and
because I hope you’ll at least take them into consideration when
making your own decision.”

Cade pushed a lock of her hair behind her
ear, sighing. She studied Brandt, who avoided looking right at her,
trying to read his mind like he always seemed to be able to read
hers. There was a stain of blood on the side of his neck that he’d
missed while he’d been cleaning up. She stepped forward, scooping
the cloth out of the sink and squeezing it out. She pressed it to
the side of Brandt’s neck. “You missed a spot,” she explained,
washing it off gently with slow circles. As she wiped the blood
away, Brandt’s arms slid around her, pulling her closer, and she
dropped the cloth onto the edge of the sink. “And you’re right,”
she murmured, resting her head against his shoulder. “I’m not going
to go. Not while you’re still here. If you would go with me, I
would drop everything and go in a heartbeat.”

“But I can’t go yet,” Brandt said. He took
her hands in his, pressing them together and holding them tightly.
“I have a responsibility to the people here. They’re a priority,
but you’re an even higher priority.” He pressed his nose into her
hair and whispered, “I can’t lose you.”

“You won’t,” Cade murmured back, feeling a
lump in her throat. “I promise.”

His hands trailed slowly down, resting
against the small of her back, and one hand shifted to rest against
her side. Below the fabric of her shirt was a nasty-looking scar
from when she’d been shot in Atlanta. It had been a close call for
her—not because of the wound, which hadn’t been that bad, but
because of the infection that had spread during her recuperation.
She’d nearly died, and if it weren’t for Brandt, Remy, and their
deceased friend Gray, she would most certainly have.

“We have some time,” he said, his voice
partially muffled by her hair. She didn’t have to ask for
elaboration; the low, husky tone of his voice was enough to allude
to what he meant. “Not much, but enough.”

Cade tilted her head to look up at him and
smiled. “I’ll go lock the door,” she murmured.

Kimberly leaned over the dining table, her palms
braced against the edge of it, as she studied the large map. A thin
yellow legal pad rested nearby, a ballpoint pen on top of it. The
first page of the pad was still blank. A lot like her mind, which
was in a contradictory maelstrom of blankness and chaos. She was
supposed to be making some plans on where to take the samples—it
had been her idea to take them out, and it was her responsibility
to figure out her own plans for the journey.

Her nerves were officially shot. Every time
she thought about the impending trip, it felt like they would crawl
right through her skin. She had no idea where to start. So far,
she’d only drawn a dot over the rough location of Woodside, a
bloody red color that stood out from the rest of the map.

“Son of a bitch, what do I do?” she mumbled,
just loud enough that it carried across the table.

A soft tap on the doorframe drew her
attention away from her map, and Kimberly turned to see Sadie
O’Dell standing in the doorway, looking into the dining room
cautiously. She looked different than she had earlier in the day
when they’d dragged the two siblings over the wall and into the
community, and it took Kimberly a moment to realize why: she was
seeing the teenager with hardly any weapons, and without her
Kevlar, for the first time since they’d met. Sadie wore only a
pistol on her hip, with a spare magazine of ammunition in its own
holster alongside it. She was thinner than Kimberly had realized,
her prior appearance supplemented by the body armor. Her dark hair
was no longer pulled back in the severe French braid it’d been in
earlier; now, it hung in loose waves to just past her shoulders,
softening features that Kimberly had thought looked too harsh.

“Hi,” Sadie greeted, sounding a bit awkward.
“I was just looking for something to do, and I couldn’t find
anybody to ask because they’re all busy with stuff.”

Kimberly’s mood lightened as she looked the
thin girl over. She beckoned her toward the table. Sadie had been
out in the greater world more recently than she had and was more
familiar with the surrounding areas; maybe she could get some
assistance from Sadie, even if it was just the odd suggestion.
Something
had to get her brain out of its paralysis, and
Sadie seemed to be just the ticket.

“Maybe you can help me with something,”
Kimberly said.

Sadie stood beside her now, looking down at
the map with thinly veiled curiosity. “What can I do?”

“I’m planning a trip,” Kimberly explained.
“We’ve got sensitive materials here that I need to get out of the
community before the infected get in. I have to get these materials
in the hands they need to be in before all is lost. You’ve been out
and about more than I have. I was hoping you could maybe give me
some information on the surrounding area so I can figure out the
best route to take.”

Sadie nodded and leaned close to the map,
finding Hollywood, South Carolina, and touching a fingertip to it.
“Which way were you thinking about heading?” she asked as she
traced first one thin line that represented a highway and then
another.

“North,” Kimberly answered. “Or at least
northish. I was hoping to make it to D.C. or someplace similar
where I might have a good chance of finding someone who will know
what to do with the materials we’ve got.”

Sadie nodded and tapped her fingernails
lightly against the map, leaning forward to study it more closely.
A soft hum escaped her throat, and Kimberly watched her, curious
about the girl she didn’t know much about.

“Got a pen?” Sadie asked, holding her hand
out. Kimberly slapped one into her palm, and she hunched over the
map, tracing a path along several county roads and highways. “I’m
drawing you a route that will get you as far as North Charleston. I
don’t know much about any of the rest of the area, but I do know
that you should try to avoid the major highways and interstates.
Last time I was near one, it was a royal mess.” She shrugged.
“Well, except for Highway 17, since it’s been cleared, but I
wouldn’t recommend taking it all the way into Charleston unless you
want to run a higher risk of getting eaten by zombies. Charleston
is
full
of them.”

“You say that like you know from
experience,” Kimberly said, leaning against the table and watching
as Sadie shaded in the route she’d suggested.

Sadie peered at her through a ragged fringe
of dark hair. “You have
no
idea,” she said, a look of hard
seriousness on her face. “There were a few times when Jude and I
got too close to Charleston while hunting for supplies, and we
almost didn’t make it back out.”

Kimberly nodded in understanding. “Yeah, I
can imagine. I came out of Atlanta.”

“Ouch.”

“Exactly.” She paused, studying the map
again for a moment, and then asked, as tactfully as she could, “So,
Jude. Has he always been that way?”

“What way? Mute?”

“Yeah.”

Sadie shook her head. “No, he wasn’t born
that way. There was an accident when we were eight. He was lighting
an oil lamp during a power outage, and there was blowback. It
flashed into his face and he inhaled some of it. He was in the
hospital for forever, and when he got out, he couldn’t talk anymore
because of the scar tissue on his vocal cords. He can make some
sounds and stuff, but talking causes him excruciating pain, so he
doesn’t do it.”