Battle Lines (The Survivalist Book 5) (30 page)

“I might have been better off if you’d have left me with them,” he grumbled.

She ignored him and turned back to look out over the field.

“I think our motorcycle is that way,” she said, pointing to the north. “I’m pretty sure I can see the road.”

“How long has it been since you shot them?”

“Maybe twenty minutes. Why?”

“Because they’ll come looking for us, and the bike will be the first place they check.”

“Then we’d better hurry. All our food is in your backpack.”

“You don’t have anything to eat in your pack?”

She patted the small knapsack hanging across her back.

“No. You always carry the food.”

“Why is that exactly?”

She made a face like she couldn’t believe that he even had to ask the question.

“Are you kidding?”

“What?”

“Look at you? You eat, like, ten times more than me.”

“Ten times? Really?” he said, furrowing his brow. “You think that’s accurate?”

She shrugged. “No, but I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.”

“Not funny,” he said with a playful scowl.

“Besides,” she said, “my rifle is in the sidecar, and your shotgun is on the handlebars.”

“You’ve got a new rifle,” he said, gesturing toward the AR15 hanging across her back.

“I want my other one back. This one hurts my shoulder.” She pulled it over her head and held it out to him. “Here, you can have it.”

Tanner quickly checked the rifle. An AR15 wasn’t his weapon of choice, but it was a hell of a lot better than empty hands.

“All right,” he said. “Let’s go get our stuff, but we’d better travel on foot from here.”

She nodded. “Good idea. This truck sounds a lot like you when you’re snoring.”

“What are you talking about? I don’t snore.”

“Either you snore or we have a warthog traveling with us.”

He laughed. “Now
that’s
funny.”

“I thought so too,” she said, hopping down from the truck.

Tanner took one last look at the braided metal cable stretched across the small clearing. While it hadn’t been the smoothest ride he had ever been on, it had saved his life.

“Do me a favor, will you?”

“What’s that?” she asked.

“Next time you need to drag me with a winch, stop and check on me every couple of minutes.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because, darlin’, I was awake for most of the ride.”

Samantha had been right about the road being only a few hundred yards away. Unfortunately, when they stepped from the cornfield, their motorcycle was nowhere in sight.

“Where is it?” she asked, looking left and right.

“Either we’ve already gone past it, or it’s still up the road a piece. Hard to say which one.”

“In other words, we’ve got a fifty-fifty chance.”

“More or less.”

She furrowed her brow. “No, I’m pretty sure it’s exactly fifty-fifty. See, there are two choices, and we only get to pick one. Now if there had been three choices—”

Tanner raised his hands in surrender.

“I stand corrected.”

“Math was my best class.”

“Obviously.”

She studied the two directions for a moment.

“I think it’s this way,” she said, turning to the right.

Tanner said nothing, figuring that one way was as good as the other. They walked along the edge of the field, ready to duck behind thick rows of corn at a moment’s notice. After hiking a good quarter-mile, there was still no sign of the motorcycle. So much for fifty-fifty chances. Tanner was about to suggest that they turn around and head in the opposite direction when he heard the unmistakable whine of a motorcycle engine.

Samantha turned to him with a worried look.

“They’re stealing our motorcycle.”

“I don’t think so. Listen.”

They stood still for a moment and listened. The sound was actually coming from several engines, all of them higher-pitched than the old BMW.

“They’re out looking for us,” he said, pulling her a few yards into the cornfield.

“What do we do now?”

Tanner thought for a moment.

“We need to get one of those bikes and drive away from this god-awful place.”

“Without your backpack? We’ll starve.”

“We’ll do all right. Besides, it’s not that far to the cabin. We could be there before dark.”

“Okay, but how do we get one of their bikes?”

He smiled. “We’re going to teach them to play ‘Chase the Rabbit.’”

Samantha listened to the sound of motorcycle engines that seemed to be coming from every direction. The closest was approaching from the highway directly in front of her. She stood in the center of the road, legs bent and heart pounding, like a runner waiting for the gun to sound.

As soon as the motorcycle rounded the curve, she broke for the cornfield. Even running flat out, her lead shrank from a hundred yards down to thirty by the time she disappeared into the dense rows of corn. Once the rider entered the cornfield, however, his pace slowed considerably as he was forced to slog through the soft dirt.

When Samantha reached the small clearing, Tanner was already in position, kneeling behind a big pile of cornstalks. He held the AR15 in both hands, fully prepared to use it as a rifle or a club, depending on what the situation demanded.

A few seconds later, a single rider plowed through the final row of corn and skidded to a stop. He was a young man, maybe in his late teens, with long wavy hair. He rode a neon-green Kawasaki 450F motocross bike, equipped with oversized brakes, air shocks, and thick knobby tires. It took him a moment to realize that he had ridden into a trap, and by the time he did, Tanner was already rushing toward him with the rifle raised.

“Hands!” he shouted.

On a straight stretch of road, the man might have stood a chance of getting away. Buried in six inches of soft dirt, he knew better than to try. He shut off the motorcycle and lifted both hands into the air. They were shaking.

“Get off the bike.”

He climbed off the motorcycle without saying a word.

Tanner motioned to a small-caliber revolver hanging at his side.

“Toss the pistol away, real easy like.”

The boy used two fingers to gently lift the pistol by its grip, but his hands were shaking so badly that he dropped the gun in front of his feet.

“I’m sorry—” he blurted, reaching down for it.

“Don’t!” Tanner tightened his grip on the rifle.

The boy hastily stood back up, a wet stain forming on the crotch of his blue jeans.

Tanner struggled with what to do with him. They needed a head start, and that meant the boy had to be put out of commission. With a little rope, they could have just tied him up.  Without it, however, options were more limited. He was about to surrender to the necessity of violence when Samantha stepped forward.

“I don’t think you need to hurt him.”

“No?”

She turned to the young man.

“What’s your name?”

“Christopher.”

She smiled. “You’re not a bad person, are you Christopher?”

He shook his head. “No, ma’am, I go to church and everything.”

“That’s nice. Despite what you may have heard, we’re not bad people either.” She looked over at Tanner. “To be honest, he’s kind of bad. But I’m not bad at all.”

“Okay,” Christopher said, obviously unsure of where this was going.

A squawk sounded, and Christopher spun to look at the bike. A two-way radio had been duct-taped to the top of the gas tank.

Christopher, come in, over.

“They’re calling me,” he said. “If I don’t answer, they’ll know something’s up.”

Tanner stepped closer and brought the butt of his rifle back, preparing to put the boy down. Christopher closed his eyes, and his whole body stiffened.

“Tanner!” pleaded Samantha.

When he looked over, she was shaking her head.

“There’s got to be another way.”

Tanner thought for a moment.

“Maybe there is,” he said, eyeing the radio.

Christopher opened his eyes. “There is. I can just ride out of here and tell them I never saw you. I swear—”

“No, that doesn’t work for me,” said Tanner. “But you can get on the radio and tell them that you saw us down to the south. Tell them that you’re chasing us and need their help right away.”

“Sure thing, mister. Anything.” He turned and took a step back toward the bike. He stopped with his hand hovering over the radio. “Is it okay?”

“Go ahead, but if you double-cross me, I’ll give you twice as much as I was going to. We clear?”

He nodded. “Yes, sir.”

Christopher pulled the radio free and pressed the talk button.

“Charlie, I’m here, over. I spotted both of them about a mile south of the compound. I’m in pursuit. Come quick.”

There was a brief pause.

Roger. Just stay with them. Don’t engage until we get there. We’re on our way.

“Okay, but hurry.” He held the radio out to Tanner. “Was that good?”

“Real good,” Tanner said, taking the radio.

They heard the whine of engines as the other motorcycles turned south. As the noise slowly died out in the distance, Tanner turned back to Christopher.

“Move away from the bike and drop to your knees.”

“Why?” The young man’s voice was shaking again. “I did what you asked.”

Samantha put her hand on Tanner’s arm.

“You said you wouldn’t hurt him.”

“I never said any such thing. All I said was that there might be another way. Him kneeling is another way. Shorter distance to fall.”

Samantha shook her head. “You’re awful.”

“Maybe so, but I wasn’t the one who started this fight.”

She sighed. “That’s true.”

“And we can’t very well leave him here to go running after his buddies. A simple bump on the head is all I’m proposing.”

Samantha struggled to find a better way. She didn’t want to see Christopher seriously hurt, and she knew from experience that when Tanner hit someone, it was never a simple bump.

“Wait, wait,” she said, digging in her pocket. “I’ve got it.” She pulled out the canister of Mean Green pepper spray. “We could use this instead.”

Tanner’s expression grew long and pained.

“Ouch. Really?”

She turned to Christopher.

“It’s better than him hitting you in the head, right?”

Christopher nodded. “Definitely.”

“See,” she said to Tanner, “and it won’t hurt him permanently. No broken bones. No split lips. Plus, he won’t be able to see which way we go. It’s perfect.”

Tanner smiled. “Obviously, neither of you have ever been pepper-sprayed. But if that’s what you want, I’m good with it. You want to do the honors?”

“Yeah, I’ll do it.” She turned back to Christopher. “It’s probably best if you move away from the motorcycle.”

“Right,” he said, sidestepping over to the center of the clearing.

“I’ll just give you a quick spray across the face.”

“It’ll wear off pretty quick, right?”

“An hour or two. After that, you’ll be as good as new.” She looked back at Tanner. “He will be, right?”

“Oh, he’ll be fine,” Tanner said with a grin. “Next time, though, he might choose a rifle butt to the head.”

Samantha raised the canister.

“Are you ready?”

Christopher held his breath and nodded.

Like she had done before, Samantha pushed the lever, and a cone of green vapor sprayed across his face.

“You okay?”

With both eyes pressed tightly closed, he said, “Yeah. I’m okay.”

She turned to Tanner. “Problem solved, quick and painless. If you didn’t always resort to—”

Christopher suddenly grunted.

She turned to find him frantically rubbing his face with the front of his t-shirt. The grunt quickly became a series of moans. A few seconds later, the fight or flight instinct kicked in, and he bolted blindly into the cornfield, screaming like he was being chased by a swarm of killer bees.

“Yep,” Tanner said, swinging a leg over the Kawasaki. “That was definitely the way to go. Quick and painless.”