The Becoming (22 page)

“All clear?” Brandt asked. He pushed the Jeep’s back door closed as quietly as he could manage. It fell closed with a reasonably soft whump.

“Yeah, I don’t see anything,” Cade confirmed. She looked down at Gray, who hovered by the driver’s-side door, an old battered hunting rifle in his hands. “You?”

“Nothing,” Gray said. “It’s practically dead out here.”

“Horrible choice of words, Gray,” Cade said, barely suppressing a laugh. Even Brandt had to crack a smile at that.

A thump at the front of the house drew Brandt’s attention. Ethan and Theo came out of the house and pulled the door shut behind them. As Brandt watched, Ethan took a can of bright orange spray paint out of his bag and aimed it toward the front door. When he was done, the word “SAFE” was scrawled across the wood, and he and Theo walked across the yard to join the rest of the group at the Jeep.

“What’s with the spray paint?” Brandt asked.

“We left some food and water on the coffee table, in case someone who is uninfected comes by and needs a safe house to stay in for a few days,” Ethan explained. He shoved the paint can back into his bag, looking sheepish. The expression confused Brandt. “We figured it may come in handy for someone who might need it, you know?”

Brandt nodded understandingly. Ethan had been a reticent bastard in the past month, reluctant to share supplies or weapons with anyone else. His assistance to potential unknown survivors, however minor, was a major concession on his part. Perhaps Cade’s angry words in the kitchen had actually made an impact.

Cade’s words hadn’t changed Ethan’s mind about setting out on his own, though. The evening before, Ethan had snuck out and, after a two-block journey in the dark, had managed to locate a motorcycle in good condition that he planned to drive back to Memphis. After that revelation, Cade had been reduced to giving Ethan the silent treatment, and no matter how hard Brandt had tried to convince her to talk to Ethan, she had refused to the last.

As Ethan approached the motorcycle parked at the end of the driveway, Brandt thought it was worth it to try again. He moved around the side of the Jeep and reached up to tap Cade on the leg. She broke her careful, pointed study of the street to give Brandt an unreadable expression.

“What?”

Brandt nodded toward Ethan and tried to shake off the uncomfortable feeling the feigned indifference on Cade’s face gave him. “You really should go and talk to him.”

Cade shifted her eyes away as soon as the words left Brandt’s mouth. “Why?”

“Because he’s your best friend and because he’s leaving,” Brandt answered. He rolled his eyes, exasperation creeping over him. He still couldn’t believe that Cade and Ethan were behaving this way. They were
adults
, not teenagers having a tiff. “I’m sure he’d appreciate it if you said goodbye to him, maybe if you wished him luck.”

“I don’t really care what he would appreciate,” Cade said, letting out a huff of breath.

“Cade,” he said firmly, and he didn’t continue until she looked at him. “Don’t be a bitch. You know there’s a chance he might not make it back.”

Cade’s head jerked up at Brandt’s words, and the look in her eyes was hard and cold and frightening. For just a moment, Brandt couldn’t see Cade. All he could see was the hardened soldier, the dead-eyed machine. The unsettled feeling it stirred in his gut made him swallow hard and step back from the Jeep.

“Don’t you say that,” Cade snarled. Her eyes burned with anger; she clenched her fists and nearly stood up on the roof of the vehicle. “Don’t you fucking say that!”

Brandt squared his shoulders and forced himself forward again. “Why not?” he demanded. “It’s true, isn’t it? There’s always the chance that he won’t come back!”

To Brandt’s surprise, Cade dropped down from the roof of the Jeep. She landed on the driveway in the narrow space between him and the vehicle, her boots crunching on the gravel. Brandt took another involuntary step back to make some space between them. Cade’s eyes were still hard as they locked onto Brandt’s, and her rifle was in her hands in a white-knuckled grip. In that moment more than any other in the previous month, he truly believed that she was capable of killing him.

“Say it again. I dare you,” Cade said. Her tone was steady and cold and dangerously low.

“I said, there’s always the chance that he won’t come back,” Brandt repeated. He did his best to keep his voice steady, but a faint tremor snuck in.

Cade stepped forward toward Brandt, studying his face with her icy eyes. Brandt’s shoulders relaxed as she simply stood there. Maybe she wasn’t going to do anything to him after all.

But then out of the corner of his eye, Brandt caught a glimpse of a fist swinging toward his face. Before he could dodge, it connected firmly with his jaw, and he staggered backwards in surprise. Theo lunged forward and dove between Cade and Brandt to push them apart.

“Don’t you fucking say that!” Cade shouted. She tried to get around Theo to reach Brandt, throwing herself against his arm. Brandt held both hands up, trying to warn her off, even as pain throbbed through his jaw, radiating to the entire side of his face. Ethan abandoned his motorcycle to sprint over to the commotion, and he grabbed Cade from behind. He wrapped his arm around Cade to trap her arms against her sides, and he hauled her backwards away from Brandt. He pinned her against his chest as she struggled to break free. “Don’t you ever fucking say that!” she yelled again, trying to jerk away from Ethan.

“Cade!” Ethan said sternly. His grip on Cade tightened, and he twisted, hauling her farther away from Brandt and turning her to face the Jeep. He shoved her against the vehicle, pinning her there, and barked out, “Keep your voice down before you bring the damned infected down on all of us.”

The woman sobered up at Ethan’s words. Cade’s shoulders slumped, and her head dipped as she looked down. Ethan let her go, and she stepped away from the Jeep, slinging her rifle over her shoulder with a short nod. “Yeah,” she said, her voice hoarse. “Sorry.”

“Brandt.
Brandt,
” a voice said to Brandt’s left. Brandt realized that Theo was looking at him in concern. He blinked stupidly at the other man and flinched as Theo grabbed him by the head and turned it to get a look at Brandt’s jaw. “You’re going to have a serious bruise there,” Theo observed. He prodded the spot, and Brandt swatted at Theo’s hand as a sharp jab of pain shot through his jaw. “Does it hurt?”

“Fuck no. Just like getting brushed by the wings of a fucking butterfly,” Brandt snapped with a roll of his eyes. “Cut it out. I’m fine.” Brandt gingerly poked at his own jaw, wiggling and shifting it uncomfortably, and glanced in Cade’s direction again. She and Ethan still hovered by the Jeep, engaged in a low, intense conversation. Cade still appeared upset, as expected, which meant that she was attempting to change Ethan’s mind again and he was resisting. “Damn, that woman can hit,” Brandt marveled. “Don’t ever get on her bad side.”

“Oh, believe me, I don’t plan to,” Theo said. He picked up his blue medical bag from the driveway and slung it over his shoulder again. Brandt hadn’t even realized that Theo had dropped it. “You should have seen it from an outside perspective. Definitely one of the coolest punches I’ve ever seen. That was the kind of shit you only see in action movies.” Brandt gave Theo a dirty look, and Theo put his hands up defensively. “No offense, man. Just an observation.”

“Observe this,” Brandt said, and he raised his middle finger at Theo with a smirk. Theo stifled a laugh, clapping a hand over his mouth, but before he could retaliate, Gray spoke up from his position on the other side of the Jeep.

“Uh, guys?” Gray said.

Brandt turned on his heel as he registered the note of urgency in Gray’s voice. Gray pointed his rifle down the street in the direction from which he and Theo had come the day before.

“They’re coming,” Gray finished. He yanked the driver’s door open and nearly dove into the Jeep. Moments later, the engine ground to a start; the sound drew Ethan and Cade from their conversation.

“What is it? What’s going on?” Ethan asked as he stepped away from Cade. Brandt didn’t answer. Instead, he moved to the back end of the vehicle to look down the street.

A heart-stopping moment passed before Brandt realized exactly what he was looking at. The distance was almost too great, the early morning sun not quite reaching the street level below the trees yet. The lack of light made Brandt wonder if what he was seeing was actually what he was seeing.

It was the infected. Dozens of them. Brandt couldn’t make out the finer details, but he had no doubt that it was the infected. They lurched down the street at varying speeds. Some shuffled as if they didn’t have enough control of their limbs to do anything but pitch themselves forward in an effort to keep up with the others. The ones in the lead moved more quickly, nearly running as they made their way steadily toward Brandt’s position.

“We’ve got to go!” he called out. He hit the Jeep’s back door with his fist in frustration before he skirted around to the front passenger door and threw it open. He was pissed. There was no other word for it. He’d hoped they’d be able to find a place to stay for more than a handful of days, but the arrival of the two men he’d been so determined to save had sent the entire group into a tailspin once again. He put a foot onto the edge of the door to haul himself in, but when he glimpsed Cade, he stopped short.

Cade stood halfway between the Jeep and Ethan’s motorcycle, her eyes wide and her rifle once more in her hands as she shook her head at Ethan. Her mouth moved as she said something that Brandt couldn’t hear, but Ethan didn’t reply to whatever it was she had said. Instead, he grabbed her by the upper arm and gave her a rough shove toward the Jeep.

“Get in the car, Cade,” Ethan ordered. His voice was hard and stern over the growing shouts and cries coming from down the street. Brandt stood up on the edge of the door to look, and he was surprised to see how much ground the infected had gained in the short amount of time the group had delayed. Ethan noticed this as well, and he added in a near-shout, “We don’t have time for this! Get in!”

Cade still hesitated, torn between going with Ethan and going with Brandt and the other men. Ethan caught Brandt’s eyes over her head. “Brandt,” he said simply. The one word said everything that Brandt needed to hear. He hopped down from his vantage point on the doorframe and went to Cade; he grabbed her firmly by the arms and pulled her back toward the Jeep.

“Come on, we’ve got to go,” he said gently. “There’s no time for this, unless you want us all to die.” Brandt managed to wrestle Cade to the back passenger door, fighting against her resistance the entire way, and with Theo’s help, he hauled her into the back seat. He slammed the door behind her, hoping that Theo would be able to keep her from jumping right back out, and then he looked back at Ethan once more. The older man mounted his motorcycle and fastened the helmet he’d found in the bike’s saddlebag firmly onto his head. He glanced back at Brandt and gave him a short nod.

“Good luck,” Brandt called out to Ethan before he swung himself into the Jeep. As Gray backed out of the driveway, Brandt watched in the side mirror as Ethan revved the motorcycle’s engine and gunned it, tires spinning and spraying gravel as he sped off into the street, away from the house and away from his fellow survivors.

Heaven knew that Ethan could use all the luck he could get.

The motorcycle’s engine thrummed between Ethan’s thighs as he raced the black-and-red bike toward the end of the block. The chilly early March air cut through his woefully inadequate jacket and stung his eyes and cheeks. Ethan didn’t dare look behind him, where he knew that dozens of infected surged toward the house in which he, Cade, and Brandt had managed to spend less than a week. He knew without looking that the infected had continued to merge onto their position, regardless of their prey’s preparations to take flight.

Ethan couldn’t look back to make sure that his friends had made it safely away from the house. He had to trust that Gray had gotten the four of them clear and into the side streets heading south. For now, Ethan had to focus on driving, watching his surroundings as he darted and wove between crookedly parked cars and emptied trash cans that lay scattered throughout the street.

As Ethan took the turn at the end of the block, he let out a steadying breath. He hadn’t driven a motorcycle in years, but it seemed to be coming back to him easily. He’d sold the bike he’d owned throughout his college years to help pay for his and Anna’s honeymoon. Anna hadn’t wanted him to sell it, but he had thought that the trip was more important than the bike. Ethan had been right; their week in the mountains was an experience he wouldn’t have traded for all the motorcycles in the world.

Ethan swallowed hard as his thoughts lingered on Anna, and he forced his mind away from his wife. Contrary to Cade’s insistence, Ethan wasn’t fooling himself about what he would find when he returned to Memphis. He was well aware that the chances he would find his wife alive were slim. But it was that slim chance, that slim hope, that pushed him to go back, to return to her last known location, to try to find her. He couldn’t give up on Anna until he knew for sure whether or not she still breathed.

It took Ethan over an hour to make it to Tupelo’s northernmost city limits. By then, the sun was shining high in the sky, lighting his way more brightly than before. Ethan shivered almost violently. He slowed the motorcycle to a stop in the middle of the highway and braced his feet on the ground as he examined his hands. His knuckles were an angry shade of red from the wind buffeting his skin, and his fingers felt stiff when he flexed them. He rubbed his hands together to help restore the circulation as he looked around cautiously.