The Stones of Angkor (Purge of Babylon, Book 3) (46 page)

When more hazmat suits started emerging out of the tent flaps, Will fired a shot into the ground in front of the first man. He quickly retreated, tangling up with the man trying to come through behind him. It was almost comical. They disappeared back into the tent, but he didn’t think that was going to last for very long, either.

“Where are we going?” Gaby shouted from behind him.

He couldn’t see Gaby or the direction she was heading. He only knew when to go straight, to turn left or right when Nate tugged on his M4A1, as if he were a seeing eye dog leading his blind master. It was a crude form of stacking, but there were no other ways for him to keep an eye behind them while still moving the entire time.

“One of the vehicles outside the fence,” Will said.

“Where are the keys?” Gaby asked. The question wasn’t directed at him.

“In the cars,” Josh said.

“You leave the keys in the cars?”

“No one’s going to steal them. I told you, they
want
to stay here. Why can’t you understand that?”

“Less chatter, more walking,” Will said.

They began moving faster through the camp, and Will struggled to keep Zoe upright in front of him. He wasn’t sure if she was moving slowly on purpose, or if she was just terrified and her legs were locking up under her.

People were scrambling out of their path, and by now the hazmat suits had emerged out of the blue tent, with more appearing along their flanks. He didn’t have a clue what they were doing; he only knew that they weren’t shooting, which confirmed his belief that Kate had made it perfectly clear Josh was her avatar in the daylight.

An eighteen-year-old kid, Kate? You could have done better.

He fired a shot into the air and the hazmat suits darted for cover.

Temporarily, anyway.

Soon they were back out and following them again.

Will pulled Zoe tighter against him, heard her grunt a bit.

“Gaby, how we doing?” Will shouted.

“Almost there!” she shouted back.

More men in hazmat suits were converging on them now. He counted a total of ten, then eleven—and those were just the ones he could see trailing them and moving in on his left and right. He glimpsed a man taking careful aim with a bolt-action rifle.

Will shifted Zoe over so she was directly between him and the would-be shooter. “Sorry, doc.”

“What?” she said, even more alarmed than she already was.

The man with the rifle pulled his eye away from the scope and lowered his weapon slightly, though not completely.

“Gaby, give me a sitrep!” Will shouted.

“Gate!” she shouted back.

Nate tugged on the M4A1 and Will moved right and found himself backpedaling through one of the unlocked gates. He risked a quick glance over his shoulder at a row of vehicles—the five-ton transports, Jeeps, and too many trucks to count. The ground under the vehicles was wet, and mud clung to the undercarriages, especially those of the five-tons.

He felt Nate let go of the rifle. Will waited at the gate, his gun pressed into the side of Zoe’s neck where it had been for the last few minutes during their trek through the camp. The hazmat suits had gathered in front of them now, spreading out along the other side of the fence. They weren’t engaging in anything resembling tactical maneuvers that he could see, but they looked fidgety and anxious, which was never a good sign with people armed with assault rifles.

Now or never…

“Will!” Gaby shouted behind him. “You coming or what?”

Will slipped his head behind Zoe’s, then looked back at the others. Nate was behind the wheel of a white Ford F-150 and Gaby was pushing Josh into the backseats.

“Come on, doc,” Will said, dragging her toward the open front passenger side door.

The men in hazmat suits looked conflicted, unsure whether to follow, shoot, or let them go. He could see them exchanging looks, talking to each other. A lot of head shaking, a couple of the men trying to take control, but most of them looking unsure.

Thank God for amateurs.

“Jesus, you’re trying to get me killed,” Zoe said, gasping against him.

“Let’s hope that doesn’t happen,” he said.

Will finally reached the truck. He glanced in at Nate, settling in behind the steering wheel. “You good?”

“Good enough,” Nate said.

“In you go, doc.”

Will shoved her into the open back door with Gaby and Josh, slammed the door closed, then dived into the front seat.

Almost instantly, he heard rifle fire and the front windshield spiderwebbed as Nate slammed his foot down on the gas. The F-150 skidded, fighting for purchase against the muddy ground.

It finally got enough traction to back up, Nate spinning the wheel as if he were some Hollywood stunt driver. Will had absolutely no idea how the kid managed it with just one good arm.

Then they were moving forward, slashing along the hurricane fencing to their left, men in hazmat suits running and firing after them. He heard the
ping ping ping!
of bullets going into the sides of the vehicle. Then Nate slammed down on the brake and spun the steering wheel again, and they were suddenly back on the dirt road with trees everywhere.

Will turned around and looked into the backseat, at a horrified Zoe sitting behind him in the middle. Josh sat against the window to Zoe’s left, while Gaby caught her breath to the doctor’s right. Gaby had her Glock in her lap, aimed at Zoe and Josh.

“We good?” Will asked.

Gaby nodded. “No bullet holes.”

Will looked over at Josh, but the kid’s face was turned against the window. “Josh—”

Before Will could finish, Josh jerked on the door handle, flinging open the door and disappearing outside in a rush of wind. Gaby screamed his name and Nate slammed on the brakes. The F-150 skidded to a reckless, sliding stop.

“Holy shit,” Nate said. “Did he just jump out of a moving car?”

Will threw his door open and climbed out. Josh was picking himself up from the road thirty meters back. He looked to be in one piece, but was cradling his left arm. Josh stared back at him, almost daring Will to come get him.

Kid’s got balls.

“Should we go back?” Nate asked, leaning over the front seats.

Will shook his head and climbed back into the truck. “Let’s go.”

Nate put the truck back in gear and stepped on the gas. As they shot up the road, Will looked at his side mirror and saw two trucks, men in hazmat suits mounted on the backs, appear behind Josh. They slowed down when they saw him, and he calmly, almost leisurely, walked over to one of the vehicles.

Then Nate made a turn and Will couldn’t see them anymore. Will thought about telling the kid to slow down, but he seemed to be handling both the truck and his own pain well enough.

He looked back at Gaby instead, saw the unasked question in her eyes. “He’s alive,” Will said. “Hurt, but alive.”

“Are they chasing us?” she asked.

“I don’t think so.”

“Why aren’t they?” Nate said.

“Maybe he doesn’t think there’s a point.”

“Who? The kid?”

“Yeah,” Will said. “The kid.”

“Nate shouldn’t be driving,” Gaby said.

“I’m fine,” Nate said.

“The hell you are. You could barely walk an hour ago.”

“That was an hour ago. The doc gave me some really good pills back there. Right, doc?”

Zoe didn’t answer. She stared forward in silence, looking dazed.

“Anyway, I’ll let you know when I can’t drive anymore,” Nate continued. “But I’m good for now.”

Will turned his attention to Zoe. “You okay, doc? Any bullet holes?”

She seemed to remember where she was and glared back at him, just before lunging forward and slapping him across the face with surprising speed. Gaby grabbed her and pulled her back, but Zoe never took her eyes away from him. If she could, he imagined she would drill lasers through his eyeballs.

“Go to hell, Givens,” Zoe said.

“My name’s not Givens,” Will said.

“You can still go to hell, whatever your name is.”

Will sat back in his seat, trying to shake off the stinging in his cheek. She was a hell of a lot stronger than she looked.

“That was fun,” Nate said, grinningly crookedly at him. “Let’s not do it again anytime soon, huh?”

GABY

About ten minutes
after they exited Sandwhite Wildlife State Park, Will pulled off the hazmat suit and got behind the wheel of the Ford F-150. In the backseat, Zoe cleaned up Nate’s open shoulder wound—which had begun bleeding again—and applied a fresh bandage, tossing the blood-soaked one out the window.

Gaby had been reluctant to let Zoe even touch Nate, but she finally relented when the older woman gave her a firm look and said, “I know you don’t trust me, but I’m a doctor, and I’m not going to let your friend bleed to death if I can help it.”

Zoe kept her promise, cleaning Nate’s wound, then dressing it back up with the supplies from Will’s pack. When she was done, they propped Nate up between them so he could lean his head against Gaby’s shoulder. She slipped an arm around his waist just to make sure he didn’t fall down.

When they finally reached the town of Harvest, Gaby half expected to see Harris, Kellerson’s sniper, lying in wait for them again. She listened for gunshots that never came.

Will pulled off the main highway and drove west along the small streets for about thirty minutes, heading deeper and deeper into the main center of town where they could become lost among the buildings. He finally stopped, then guided the truck toward a two-door auto body garage called Fredo’s. They drove past a sign featuring a cartoon character holding a wrench, and the promise of “Mechanic on Duty.” Fredo’s was squeezed in between a combination Phillips 66 gas station and Burger King, and an empty building with a “For Rent” sign in the window.

Will parked the F-150 and climbed out with his rifle. He entered the office next to the garage, then came out of a side door and went around the back. Gaby waited with Zoe, still holding the Glock she had taken from Josh, just in case.

“He called you Gaby?” Zoe said.

“Yeah, that’s my name.”

“I figured that.”

“So why’d you ask?”

“I’m just trying to be friendly.”

“You can stop now.”

The older woman sighed. “When are you going to let me go?”

“You’ll have to talk to Will about that. I don’t even know why he brought you along. If it was up to me, I’d just shoot you.”

Zoe went quiet.

Will returned, pulled up one of the garage doors and went inside.

“Would you really do that?” Zoe asked after a while.

“Do what?” She knew what Zoe was referring to, but the mischievous side of Gaby felt like hearing the other woman say it anyway.

“Would you really shoot me in cold blood?”

“Who says it would be in cold blood?”

“I don’t have a weapon. I’m harmless.”

“I don’t see that.”

“No, I don’t have a weapon,” she insisted.

“Not that. The second part.”

“That I’m harmless?”

“Yeah.”

“You may be younger than me, but you’re clearly more adept with those weapons than I am. Besides, I don’t think I could take you in a fight.”

Gaby almost laughed. “I wish you’d try. I’d crush your throat. That is, if I don’t break your nose and shove the loose bones into your brain first.”

She heard Zoe swallow audibly on the other side of Nate. Gaby smiled to herself.

“What you were doing back there,” Gaby said, “with the pregnant girls. That makes you dangerous.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You’re working for them. The ghouls. The bloodsuckers. Whatever you want to call them. That makes you dangerous. Add in your medical training, and that
really
makes you dangerous. I would shoot you just to keep you out of their hands, so you can’t do any more harm.”

Zoe didn’t answer.

Will climbed back into the truck. He noticed the silence, and there must have been something about Zoe’s face that gave away their conversation.

“What’s going on, ladies?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Zoe said.

“Just girl talk,” Gaby said.

“Uh huh,” Will said, not believing a single word of it.

He reversed the truck, then turned a full 180 degrees in the driveway before backing up into one of the two empty garage ports.

Gaby climbed out of the truck and walked outside to pull security with the AR-15 she had snatched up during their escape. The weapon felt wrong in her hands, and she longed to have her old M4 back. The barrel on the AR-15 was too long, and she was even slightly annoyed by the ugly tan color. But at least whoever owned it before her had converted it to full-auto, so there was that.

Sunlight was fading in the horizon, and she could barely make out the gray stones of the highway from this distance. Will had chosen a good spot to lay low for the night.

Zoe climbed out, and when Gaby looked back, she saw the other woman doing everything possible to avoid her gaze.

“We’ll stay here for the night,” Will said.

“Then what?” Zoe asked, arms wrapped tightly around her chest. “What happens to me?”

“I need you to keep an eye on Nate, make sure he survives the night.”

“And then?”

“We’ll revisit that question tomorrow.”

She sighed, frustrated. “Do you have any painkillers? He’s going to need them.”

Will pulled out his pack, took out a bottle, and handed it to her.

“Generic Vicodin,” Zoe said, reading the label. “It’ll do.”

“Gaby,” Will said.

She walked into the garage and they pulled one steel door down, then the other. There were no ways to lock the doors except for a latch that could be easily flicked open. The room was suddenly bathed in darkness, until Gaby heard a soft crackling sound and Will’s face lit up, illuminated by a soft green glow stick. He put it on the dashboard and climbed back in behind the steering wheel.

She squeezed into the back with Nate, lifting his head and resting it in her lap. She stroked his hair, matted with sweat, and looked down at his calm, almost contented face. His lips even looked as if they were curling up into a smile, as though he knew she was doting on him.