The Becoming (Book 4): Under Siege (6 page)

Downstairs was much darker than the second
floor, he noticed as he tried to get his first look at the medical
house’s living room. His eyes flickered to the windows; the ones
that he could see from the bottom of the staircase were boarded
over, secured against invasion. He raised an eyebrow and glanced at
Kimberly, who stood beside him with her hand resting lightly
against his elbow. “What’s with the windows?” he asked. “I thought
you said Woodside was secure.”

“It is secure,” Kimberly said. “We’re just
taking precautions. Nothing to worry about. The infected haven’t
gotten past the walls yet.”

“Yeah, well, it’s the ‘yet’ that has me
always worried, no matter the situation.” He ran his fingers
through his blond and newly trimmed hair before using the banister
to push himself away from the staircase. His knees wobbled, but he
managed to keep his footing and motioned to the front door. “Maybe
you can show me around the community, give me the grand tour?” he
suggested.

“I think that can be arranged,” Kimberly
agreed. She slipped her hand into his. He glanced down, maneuvered
his hand, and laced his fingers through hers, grateful for that
little bit of additional assurance and support. She led him out the
front door.

“You are in for a serious treat,” Kimberly
informed him. “I’ll show you the wall and all the different
security features we’ve been working on, and if he’s not busy, I’ll
introduce you to Keith Fenton. He’s the Captain of the Watch, which
is the group of guys who patrol the perimeter to make sure none of
the infected get in. He’s doing a great job; I’m really impressed
with how he’s stepped up to the plate.”

Ethan felt a pang of jealousy at the way she
talked about the man, but he didn’t address those feelings. He put
a hand up to shield his watery eyes against the bright sunlight. He
blinked as they adjusted and tilted his head back toward the darker
interior of the medical house. Kimberly’s breath caught, and she
made a concerned noise.

“I’m okay,” he assured her. “It’s just
brighter out here than I expected.”

“I probably should have brought you out
later in the evening when the sun was setting,” she said, a note of
regret in her voice.

“No, no, it’s fine,” Ethan said. “I just
needed a minute to get used to it, that’s all.” He blinked and
smiled at her. Then he looked out toward the rest of the community,
scanning his surroundings with curiosity. Across the street, the
front yards of a few houses had been commandeered for agriculture
and were tilled up into rows. Several men and women were tending to
the small sprouts that were edging up out of the dirt. A few
children chased each other down the road toward a courtyard near
the center of the community, where more children played around a
couple rows of vehicles. Uninfected people were everywhere; the
scene was so close to what had existed before that he felt
tightness in his chest and a surge of emotion well in his throat.
He swallowed it down and squeezed Kimberly’s hand again. “Come on,
let’s go,” he said. She smiled at him and led him slowly to the end
of the porch and down the stairs.

“The main house is right next door,” she
said, pointing to the house in question. It was almost cookie
cutter, so similar to the medical house he was leaving that he
wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference if he’d just arrived
in Woodside. A quick scan of the other houses around them showed
reasonably uniform buildings, mostly brick two-story affairs with a
few white-painted ones. “Across the street are our experiments with
growing fruits and vegetables. We’re still trying to figure out
what will grow around here. The people who volunteered to handle
the growing live in the houses that the gardens are in front of.
Most everyone else is divided into the rest of the houses in small
groups, except for Dominic. He’s got his own house way out away
from everyone else, somewhere off that way.” She pointed into the
distance.

Ethan couldn’t see the house in question
from where he stood.

“I haven’t been out there. No idea what he
does when he’s there, but I figure that whatever it is, it’s his
business.”

“Maybe someday soon, I’ll be strong enough
to go out there and see him,” Ethan speculated. They continued
across the grass to the house next door, their steps slow but
steady. “I still haven’t thanked him for everything he did in
Atlanta to help us.”

“I don’t think anybody has,” Kimberly said.
“But I also don’t think Isaac’s people realize how much of a hand
he had in helping everyone get here. He’s on his own most of the
time. He hasn’t made much of an effort to get to know anyone,
either, but they haven’t returned that favor. I think it’s a mutual
dislike.” She paused and glanced at him with a slight smile and a
raised eyebrow. “Are you hungry?”

Ethan hadn’t even realized his stomach was
growling until she asked. The thought of food set it off again, and
he rubbed at it idly as he admitted, “I’m famished. Tell me there’s
food around here.”

“There’s food around here,” Kimberly said,
tugging his hand. “Come with me. We’ll go into the main house. Cade
almost always has some food around.”

A sparse few moments later, they were in the
shady interior of the main house. Ethan closed his eyes and
breathed in deeply. Unlike the medical house, which smelled musty
and closed-up, the main house smelled like oranges and lemons, like
someone was doing their damnedest to keep everything fresh and
airy. He heard Cade’s and Brandt’s voices nearby, fussing at each
other like an old married couple. He felt a pang of wistfulness and
disappointment; thanks to his prolonged illness, he’d missed the
small wedding that had been held in the center of Woodside soon
after they’d arrived at the community, and Cade’s description of
the ceremony hadn’t come close to doing it justice. Cade was like
his sister, and the thought of missing her wedding—something he’d
always hoped to see, even before the current state of the world,
when he’d been convinced that she’d end up married to her boyfriend
Andrew sooner rather than later—filled him with regret.

Kimberly steered him toward the kitchen
doorway, a grin on her face as she stepped inside and announced,
“Lady and gentleman, may I present His Awesomeness, Sir Ethan
Bennett!”

Ethan rolled his eyes and laughed as he
slipped into the kitchen, slowly making his way to the counter
where Cade and Brandt stood.

Cade had a large cutting board in front of
her and a knife in her hand. Several more knives were lined up on
the counter just left of the board. On the board itself was the
half-boned and disjointed carcass of a rabbit. Beside that was a
large plate and a clipboard. She looked up as he leaned against the
counter and gave him a bright smile. Then she dropped her knife and
wiped her hands on a towel before circling around to greet him.
“Eth! You’re up!” she exclaimed, hugging him. He returned the
embrace with a wide smile.

“I got sick of sitting around in my room,”
he admitted. “And Kim said there was food here, so I was more than
willing to come over.”

Brandt stepped forward and lightly clapped
him on the shoulder, before squeezing it tightly. “Glad to see you
up and moving,” he said. “How are you feeling?”

“Surprisingly…good,” he said. “I can’t
complain. I don’t even feel like I’ve been sick. Well, except for
the whole malnourished problem Dr. Rivers said we’ve got to figure
out how to deal with.” His eyes flickered down to the raw, bloody
meat on the cutting board in front of Cade, seemingly of their own
accord; the scent of blood filled his nose, and saliva flooded his
mouth at the scent.

“Glad to hear it,” Brandt said. “Maybe you
can talk some sense into Cade for me while I’m out, yeah?”

“Some sense?” Ethan repeated, raising an
eyebrow. “And where are you going?”

“I need to run to the rec center for a few
things,” Brandt explained. “We’re going to have a meeting this
evening and are hoping to get something cooked up to feed the
committee while we’re there.” He gave Cade a quick kiss, even
though she was scowling at him, and then he asked, “Kimberly, do
you mind giving me a hand?”

Cade squinted at the clipboard even as she
cut the rabbit. “Don’t forget the peas,” she commented.

Brandt let out a huff of exasperation.
“Would you stop eyeing that thing before you cut your fingers off?”
he said. “You’ve given me the list a dozen times already. I think
I’ve got it.”

Ethan forced his eyes away from the meat
Cade was cutting up as Brandt and Kimberly left the room. Confused
by his attraction to the uncooked meat and struggling to find
something else to focus on, he asked, “So how are
you
feeling?”

“I feel fine,” she said. “Except for
his
constant hovering.” She jabbed the knife she held in the
direction of the living room. “He’s constantly pestering me about
how I’m feeling, how the baby’s doing, about what I’m doing and why
I shouldn’t be doing it. It’s driving me insane. It wouldn’t be so
bad if it weren’t so
constant,
but he acts like I’m
incapable of taking care of myself.” She stabbed at the meat in
front of her, slicing some from the bone. Ethan clenched his teeth
and struggled to look away. Cleary, she’d been holding this in for
a while; he figured it was good to let her gripe.

Ethan pushed away from the counter,
determined to get away from the smell of blood, if only for a
moment. The scent was forcing sudden, strange feelings to the
surface, and he wasn’t sure how to handle them. There was a cooler
on the end of the counter; he flipped it open and found bottles of
warm water inside. He grabbed one and unscrewed the cap, trying to
give himself something to focus on other than an increasing desire
to tear his teeth into the meat Cade was prepping.

“I wish I could say I know how he feels but,
you know, I kind of don’t,” he admitted. “Anna and I never had
kids. But you already knew that, considering you used to nag us
about it all the time.”

“Yeah, and that reminds me.” Cade set the
knife on the edge of the cutting board and studied him across the
counter. “How come you never told me you were sterile?” she
asked.

Ethan looked at her, startled, as she
continued.

“I had to find out from
Remy
. You
told
her
and not
me?
I thought you told me
everything, Eth. If I’d known, hell, I wouldn’t have been nagging
you like I was. Knowing what I know now, the nagging made me look
like a royal bitch. I thought I was your best friend, and best
friends usually tell each other things like this.”

“You were. I mean, you
are,
” Ethan
replied, setting his bottle down. “I just…I don’t know. Anna and I
only found out right before Memphis fell. And we were still trying
to cope with it ourselves. I hadn’t gotten to the point of talking
about it. And then things went to Hell in a hand basket, and it
never came up in conversation with you.”

“But…with Remy?”

Ethan shook his head. “Just a matter of
circumstance. It wasn’t a slight against you or anything. I told
her after we’d had sex the first time. She freaked out because we
didn’t use any protection, and I had to tell her to calm her down.
She didn’t want kids, said she didn’t see the rightness of bringing
children into this world.” He put a hand up before Cade could
protest. “No offense, of course. It’s just her opinion and choice,
and I don’t think it means she’s critical of yours.”

“Oh, I don’t take it personally,” Cade said.
She picked up her knife and resumed cutting the meat. “I mean, I
didn’t exactly
choose
this.” She motioned to her belly with
her free hand. “To say it was an accident is probably an
understatement of
epic
proportions.”

Ethan raised an eyebrow, intrigued at the
suggestion of an unwanted pregnancy. “So what are you saying? That
you regret it?”

“Not necessarily.” Cade scooped up some of
the already cut meat and dropped it onto the plate to make room on
the cutting board. “It was just…unexpected. And I worry that it
prompted Brandt to move things along faster than he really wanted
to. I mean, hell, he knocks me up and then feels the need to
propose just over a month later. And not long after
that,
we
get married. It just feels insanely fast.”

“Do you regret that?” he asked.

Cade shrugged. “No, not really. I love him,
you know? I figure the whole marriage thing was inevitable. It just
got here sooner than expected.” She looked down at the clipboard
and then swore, slamming the knife down beside the cutting board.
“Shit, I’ll be right back, okay? I left something off the list that
I gave Brandt, and I need to catch him before he leaves the rec
center.” She grabbed her towel and wiped her hands again. “Can you
pack this meat up for me while I’m gone? I shouldn’t be long.” Once
he nodded, she slipped out of the kitchen, letting the door swing
shut behind her.

The meat lay on the cutting board in a small
pool of blood, taunting him. Ethan swallowed and circled the
counter, stopping in front of the meat to study it carefully. He
scooped up the knife that still rested beside the cutting board and
gently prodded at the lump of meat. As he examined the meat, his
stomach let out another rumble, and he pressed a hand to it as if
to quiet it. Ever since he’d awakened, he’d eaten like he hadn’t
eaten in a year—four, five, sometimes six meals a day—but none of
it had even remotely satisfied him; he had yet to actually be
not
hungry. He drew in another deep breath, and the scent of
blood assaulted him again, setting his stomach off into another
loud round of hysterics.

“Fuck,” Ethan breathed out as the temptation
became too much. He set the knife gingerly back on the counter, his
eyes riveted on the meat. With one last cautious glance around the
room, before he even realized he’d done it, Ethan picked up a
somewhat large chunk of raw, bloody meat and shoved it into his
mouth.