The McClane Apocalypse Book Five (66 page)

“I can go with you to your medical clinic,”
she offers.

Cory says, “That’d be great. We always need
help.”

She looks so relieved to be getting a pass
out of here that her eyes fill with tears before she looks
away.

One of the bigger soldiers carries a
young woman over to Simon and the
medic
. She is bleeding from her forehead and barely
cognizant. She is perhaps twenty years old.

“What happened to her?” Dave asks with
urgency as he comes upon them.

The huge soldier with the deep voice lies her
gently on the ground and says, “I cornered the prick who had her.
He clubbed her to the side of her head with something and tried to
run. Lucky or Simon got him for me.”

Simon mutters something under his breath.
Cory is quite sure it isn’t a pleasant comment. He’s probably the
one who killed her abuser. The girl is missing her pants. Her
breath comes out in silvery plumes against the cold night air, and
blood has dried in a long streak on her soft cheek. The soldier
quickly pulls off his coat and covers her. She moans groggily as if
she is still in pain but doesn’t open her eyes.

“Sir, what are we supposed to do with the
rest of them?” the big guy asks of the men they’ve rounded up.

“Take them to the other side of the
wall where the women and…
children
can’t see,” Dave derides with a cool stare. “Do a quick
questioning. I don’t wanna’ be here with our asses hanging out for
long. Get what you can from them. We’ll come back tomorrow to take
what we can and deal with the stragglers. Finish it. We’re movin’
in twenty.”

“Yes, sir,” the other soldier says and jogs
away to gather help.

Cory stays with Simon as he aids the injured
people. Three of Dave’s men have been brought forward for medical
care. Two have been shot, and one has been stabbed. The stabbing
victim is nearly passed out from blood loss. His wound is close to
his heart or lungs. The others aren’t in good shape, either.

Dave pulls him to the side and says, “We need
to get these people medical care. I called in for back-up. They’ll
be here soon to do an evac. And we need to get these women the fuck
outta’ here. There could be other fuckers in the area that will
regroup tonight. We don’t need to lose any more men.”

“Right,” Cory agrees.

“I’m gonna have my men take the women to our
town. But we need the McClane family’s help with the injured. We
don’t have any doctors, just my medic and a dentist. I’ve got no
way to treat them,” Dave requests with a hand on his slim hip.

“Got it,” Cory agrees and immediately gets on
the radio.

They split up, corralling the women and
young girls as shots are being fired on the other side of the fence
just a short distance away. The execution of the remaining creeps
is being carried out. Within a half hour, they are moving
collectively down the street. Cory is
carrying
one of Dave’s men over his shoulder who
has been critically injured. He’s not too confident that the man
will make it. They are met by some of the other men from Dave’s
village who have stopped at the Blues restaurant to pick up their
other vehicle. They’ve also brought the deuce-and-a-half. They get
the injured loaded first into the truck and then the women loaded
into the deuce. They are going to be transported to Hendersonville
where Dave’s community will be welcoming them in.

Annie calls to him from her place near the
back of the truck, so he goes to her.

“Hey,” she says weakly.

Cory isn’t sure what drugs Simon has run
through her IV. She seems groggy.

“Thanks for watchin’ my ass out there,” Cory
tells her gently and lays a hand on her arm.

“Thanks for saving mine,” she says with a
grin.

Cory smiles and says, “My pleasure,
ma’am.”

“Look me up the next to time you come to Hick
Town,” she jokes about her village in Hendersonville.

There is definitely an invitation in
her glazed-over eyes. It was
important
enough to her to get this message clearly through to him or
she else wouldn’t have called him over.

“Will do, ma’am,” Cory agrees and squeezes
her arm before turning away. He has no intention of visiting
Hendersonville to see her. He wouldn’t want to lead her on like
that. Even though Annie is an attractive woman, his mind has been
fixated on another.

He radioed John to let them know that
six injured people are coming to Pleasant View for emergency
medical care while Simon prepared the people for transport. Cory’s
mentor was already awake and on watch duty back at the farm. John
assured him that he’d awaken and
transport
Reagan and Doc to the clinic in town in
time to meet Dave’s caravan.

Cory stops the Mechanic before they leave,
“Are you sure you don’t want us to come with you to our town?”

“Nah, we got this. You guys get back to your
women,” Dave says, knowing that Sam and Paige are waiting out in
the woods somewhere for them. “We’ll meet up again soon.”

Cory punches his fist to his new
friend’s
. Dave the Mechanic is a
hardcore badass with a lot of mileage on him, but he’s also a good
man at heart who is going to acclimate over forty women into his
community without batting an eye. He’s a hyperactive, fidgety and
intense dude, a cusser that could give Reagan a run for her money,
but he is steady and calm in the thick of it. Cory is glad for this
new alliance.

“Thanks for the help,” Cory says.

Dave shakes his head and says, “No, man.
Thank you guys for finding this fuckin’ hovel. I’m glad we could
help.”

“We owe ya,’” Cory acknowledges as he shakes
Dave’s hand.

Simon comes over and does the same.

“Ready?” Cory asks his friend.

“Let’s roll,” Simon says with an anxious
nod.

Dave jumps into the driver’s seat of the
truck that will head to Pleasant View and to Doc’s clinic. He gives
a single wave and a curt nod and drives away.

“We still have work to do,” Simon says as he
turns to leave.

Cory follows and says, “You got enough
ammo?”

“Yes, of course,” his friend says. “I don’t
just go recklessly blasting away like I have no control.”

Cory punches his shoulder.

Simon asks, “You?”

“I use more rounds ‘cuz I’m in the shit, not
perched on top of a building from afar like you, nerd. But I’m
still good to go,” Cory teases him.

Simon laughs and says, “Shut the fuck
up.”

Cory gives him a ‘tsk-tsk’ for the swear. He
gets a return punch to his own shoulder.

They jog west toward Vanderbilt University
and their Kappa Phi Asshole friends. Cory consults his watch, notes
the time of oh-one-thirty. They still have a long night ahead of
them before they return to the girls. Cory hopes that Paige stays
diligent and safe.

Chapter Twenty-seven

Paige

After the sun goes down and the guys
are long gone, Paige finally talks Sam into going inside. She’d
insisted on standing watch with her own gun alongside Paige. She
hadn’t spoken, and they hadn’t felt the need for conversation but,
instead, kept to keen observation and alertness. They were both too
jumpy to
simply
sit in the cabin
complacently doing nothing until the men return. They stood near
the front of the small cabin, sat on the small porch and returned
to standing watch until the last bits of the sun’s pink streaks
faded from the darkening sky.

She starts heating water on the wood-burning
stove that she first pumps into a metal bucket at the kitchen sink.
The fire inside which still crackles and pops, provides warmth,
heating the small cabin to toasty comfort. She also places jars of
food on top of the little stove to start them heating. She carries
more bucketsful than she can count to the small bathroom where she
pours them into the tub. She has to make sure Sam gets as clean as
possible and removes that man’s blood from her body. She worries
that her friend will get some kind of disgusting infection from
that vile human.

“Sam?” she asks, jarring the other girl out
of her trance. “Come with me and get washed up, dear.”

Sam just gives her the
thousand-yard
stare, so Paige takes her
arms and pulls her gently to her feet from her position on the bed.
She doesn’t want to put too much pressure on her hands because they
are cut and likely hurt.

“Come on, honey,” Paige orders softly.

She helps Sam get out of her clothing, mostly
doing the work on her own as Sam just stands there. Then she
assists her getting into the half full tub. There is a white
ceramic pitcher on the floor next to the tub that Paige uses to
douse Sam’s long hair with warm water. She washes it for her,
lathering it twice to remove the blood and mud. Sam reaches for the
simple bar of homemade soap on the ledge of the tub and begins
scrubbing at the skin on her face and forearms. Paige notices that
she scrubs much too vigorously.

“Let me help you remove your bandages,” Paige
offers and takes the soap from her before she hurts herself.

She unwraps the gauze bandages and
discards them along with the bloody pads
on
the floor beside her. She’ll wash them later.
She tries not to cringe when Sam
winces
at the stinging pain from the cuts. This may have felt a bit
uncomfortable such a short time ago helping her nude friend take a
bath, but Paige is mostly just concerned about her.

“I’ll wash your back for you,” she says to
which Sam nods.

Paige lathers her hands and
swipes
the soapy suds over Sam’s smooth
skin. Sam draws her knees up and hugs them.

“I shouldn’t have gone over there to
pee,” Sam
mutters
.

Paige pauses a moment in lathering her hands
again. She’s glad that Sam is finally talking. Maybe her state of
shock is wearing off.

“I should’ve listened to you,” Sam
admits.

She just squeezes her friend’s shoulder
gently and reassures her, “It was just a mistake. We didn’t know
anything like that would happen. If there is one thing I’ve
learned, Sam, it’s that we all make mistakes from time to time. You
survived it. That’s all that matters. I’m just glad that nothing
worse happened to you.”

Sam nods and allows Paige to help cleanse her
hands. Before long, she is clean, but Paige sees the remnants of
the damage that man did to her. Sam’s face has a purplish bruise on
the crest of her right cheekbone. Her upper lip is cut but not
bleeding anymore. There is a reddish-purple bruise on her left
shoulder and another smaller one lower on her back. She put up such
a fight. And thank God for her tenacity and spirit. That man
could’ve killed her. If they hadn’t got to her when they did, the
other bastard that Cory took out most certainly would have abused
and then killed Sam for stabbing his friend to death. Although,
Paige suspects he might not have come out on the winning end now
that she’s seen how lethal her little friend can be.

She helps Sam dry off and then redress in
clean clothing. Paige is surprised when she rolls her soiled
clothing into a ball and stuffs them into the wood-burning stove.
She obviously doesn’t want to take them back to the farm to be
laundered. Paige doesn’t blame her. They have plenty of clothing
they took today from the sporting good’s store that she can wear
tomorrow. Together they manage to get her hands wrapped in the
gauze that Simon has left them. She doesn’t do as good a job as her
brother, but she does apply the antibiotic salve, pads and
wrappings as best as she can.

“Sam, the food’s ready. Wanna’ eat some?”
Paige asks cautiously, hoping that whatever she does or says
doesn’t send her back into a state of silence and staring.

She gets a nod from her friend, so she
quickly digs bowls and silverware out of the cupboards. Whatever is
waiting for them in the hot jars of food seems like it has some
liquid in it, so they’ll need the bowls instead of plates. She
wipes the dishes off with a towel from the bathroom because they
are coated in dust. One of the cups had a dead bug in the bottom of
it. Simon told her it’s been a while since they’ve been to this
cabin.

Paige tries to be optimistic and says
brightly as she places the jars of food on the table, “Mm, this
smells great. Wonder what it is?”

“Bean soup,” Sam answers flatly. “They
always pack soups or stews. It’s the easiest to transport. Hannah
and Sue make Grams’s bean soup recipe just like she used to and can
it like her, too. It’s
really
tasty
.”

“I don’t know if I’ve had it since I came to
live on the farm. Smells good enough, though,” Paige says as she
uses a towel to lift and pour some of the soup into both bowls.

She then unpacks bread from the box of
supplies Cory carried up to the cabin. She finds
very small
baby-food jars in the bottom and pulls
those out, too.

“What do ya’ think this is?” she asks Sam
since she seems to have this all down pat.

“Probably some sort of fruit dessert,”
she replies. “Hannah always tries to pack us sweets. She says it’s
because the sugars have carbohydrates that our bodies need, but I
know it’s just because she wants us to have
good
food that reminds us of home.”

“Think she’s worried we’ll run away?” Paige
jests as she takes a seat next to Sam.

She actually grins weakly and says, “No, I
don’t think so.”