Graham's Resolution Trilogy Bundle: Books 1-3 (50 page)

This was turning out to be another long day for McCann. He hoped he would locate this kid named Bang and the man named Sam fast. Then he planned to get back to their cabin and find a quiet spot somewhere so he could get some decent sleep.

The day became dreary and overcast. The hue of the snow only a shade or two lighter than the horizon, contrasted to the dark, monotone of the trees. Unlike the other seasons, when the shades of different tree species stood out, in the dead of the winter they only revealed one predominant color, a damp charcoal black. The ride to the river involved trekking through trees, dodging low-hanging branches, and watching for holes that could trip the horse.

McCann heard the river before he saw it. At this point, with much of it frozen, it was little more than a trickle from the north as it meandered its way through the rock maze. It sounded like lazy chimes rather than the rushing resonance of meltwater that would come in the spring. As he neared it he searched for the easiest path to cross without being seen by these prepper people hell-bent on killing friends who put one toe over the line. It was one thing to track a person; it was a completely different thing to track a person when you knew unfriendlies were out and about to get you.

McCann stopped and waited, looking both ways before crossing the stream. Seeing no foe—animal or otherwise—he guided the mare slowly through the waters to the other side. She barely made a sound.

McCann reasoned that if he stuck to the tree line and headed west, he had to come to the bend in the river and find the boy. The search took no more than ten minutes, and there the boy hid behind a small pine, kneeling beside a man who lay much too still on the frozen earth.

He had a bad feeling about that, but before anything had time to fully register, the dog roared toward him, barking ferociously. So much for stealth.

“Call him off,” McCann said as the kid just gaped at him and his horse in dazed silence. “Hey, kid. Call off the dog,” McCann said again.

Finally Bang jumped to his feet and called Sheriff, got hold of his collar, and made him sit, murmuring calm into ears that still pricked alertly.

McCann dismounted and stood still, letting the dog get a good look at him, but Sheriff stood his ground with a low growl. McCann reached into his saddle bag and ripped off a hunk of beef jerky. Crouching low, he tossed bits of the treat to Sheriff. In order for this to work he needed to befriend the dog quickly.

“I’m McCann,” he said to Bang. “From the radio, remember? Macy told you I was coming.” He continued to toss little pieces of jerky ever closer to where he kneeled; Sheriff inhaled one piece after the other without even tasting them.

“Yeah, she said you would come on a horse,” Bang said. “We don’t have horses around here.” His eyes fixed admiringly on the mare. McCann liked the kid already.

“So, how’s he doing?” McCann asked Bang, pointing to Sam.

Bang raised his shoulder and dropped it. “His heart beats, but he’s not awake, and he’s cold.”

By this time Sheriff took jerky out of McCann’s hand, and he reached carefully to let the dog sniff him. “Why don’t you come over here and show him we’re friends.”

Bang came to McCann, who stretched out his hand for him to shake. “Pleasure to meet you, Bang.” Sheriff showed no more aggression, and again McCann reached over carefully with slow ease to let the dog smell him, then reached under his muzzle for a scratch. McCann slowly rose to his feet and led the mare to where Sam lay. The guy had a pulse, but it was weak. The injuries to his head and face were ghastly. “What the hell happened to you, man?” he asked rhetorically and then straightened Sam’s arms at his side and prepared to lift him up and over the horse’s saddle.

“We need to hurry. There are preppers around here,” Bang warned again.

“When’s the last time you saw one?”

“Um, a while ago.”

McCann nodded. This was a lot to ask of a five-year-old; could a kid that age even tell time? “Okay, let’s hurry up, but if they show up, you take the dog and run across the river and don’t look back. I’ll handle the preppers.”

McCann hoisted Sam’s body up and over the saddle so that he hung evenly from side to side. The head injuries were pretty bad, and McCann had an inkling the guy might not make the trip if they didn’t get out of there soon. He probably suffered from hypothermia after spending the night out in the freezing temperatures. McCann wrapped a blanket around his body in a feeble attempt to warm him.

“All right, Mae,” he said to the horse. “Let’s get this guy back to camp.” He’d just patted her rump to get her moving when an angry yell rang out, and an armed man came out of the tree line, stopping a good distance away.

“What the hell are you doing here?” the man demanded. “Put your hands up where I can see them.”

McCann thought about complying, but he was tired, and Macy had already warned him of the dangers here. With the horse between them and the guy with the gun, McCann had a small window to act before things got out of control. “
Run
, kid,” he said quietly to Bang, and, at the same time, pulled out his long rifle and pointed the weapon up the hill.

McCann watched the guy, daring him to so much as aim at the kid and the dog running away. He’d have had no remorse over blowing a hole through the prepper’s plastic suit. Unfortunately for Sam, he remained unconscious and precariously balanced between the pointed firearms.

“Hold on! I only came to get this guy. He’s badly wounded. We’re headed right back to our side now. So put your goddamn gun down, man.” McCann tried to reason with him like he’d told Macy he would, but he’d also let him know, in no uncertain terms, that he would defend himself if he had to.

“We have rules here. You’ve broken them,” Reuben said.

McCann interrupted him. “Hey, man, I’m new here. I came to pick up this guy. I’ve been warned. I’ll be on my way now,” he said and nudged the horse to take a few steps when White Suit shot a warning round into the air causing McCann to stop midstride.

“You don’t get off that easy!” the guy shouted. “Someone set fire to our camp last night, and you people have a guy on our side. Not only that, we’re missing a little girl. I think you know a lot more than you’re letting on!”

McCann was about to shout back that he wasn’t responsible for little girls, and they should keep better track of them themselves, when another person in a plastic suit showed up.

“Reuben! What are you doing?” This one was a woman. She huffed and puffed, obviously out of breath after running up through the woods toward the other prepper. “I didn’t find her. Only her footprints in the mud between boulders. Why did you shoot?”

“I think this guy might have information for us. I caught him down there with Bang, but the boy took off. I’ll take care of this, Clarisse. You keep looking for Addy.”

The woman named Clarisse stared at Sam draped over the horse. “Did you shoot him?”

“No! I fired a warning shot. He already had the wounded guy over the horse,” Reuben explained.

“Sam! Reuben, I think that’s Sam! Is it?” she demanded, taking one step more down the hill toward the river. The man she’d called Reuben hauled her back.

“Yes, ma’am,” McCann said. He was confused by this turn of events but, if the woman could get the rude guy off his back, then that would be fine with him.

“He’s got some pretty serious-looking head injuries, and he’s probably hypothermic. I need to get him back to camp, but this moron keeps getting in the way!” McCann pointed his rifle at Reuben.

“Who are you?” Clarisse asked.

“Name’s McCann. Graham asked me to come up to his camp when I was ready. I got in a few days ago.” He shivered because the cold wind had begun to pick up and now made its way through his jacket. “Look, I really need to get this guy back to Graham’s camp.”

“Graham was missing. Have you seen him?” Clarisse’s voice rose over the wind.

“Yeah, he was attacked by some wild dogs. He’s back at camp now. He’ll be fine after he recovers. I would have brought him back sooner, but I didn’t know exactly where the camp was.”

Clarisse kept looking back and forth between Reuben and McCann, and McCann inferred they were trying to decide his fate. Perhaps they were trying to make sure his story washed with the current events, or perhaps they were wagering on who would get to kill him first.

To try to speed things along, McCann offered more of an explanation. He yelled, “Then Macy came looking for Graham, and on our way back to camp, someone named Tala radioed to say the kid, Bang, had sneaked off looking for this guy.” He pointed to Sam’s body. Still there was no reply from the two preppers, who were engaged in their own discussion. “Hey, I don’t have time for this, and neither does he. He’s getting colder by the second.” He began to take a few steps, muttering to himself about the fact that he was tired and didn’t have time for this crap, when Reuben broke free of the argument he was having with Clarisse.

“Wait a goddamn minute,” Reuben demanded angrily, while Clarisse continued to try and reason with him, attempting to push his rifle barrel down toward the ground.

“No, you look, asshole. I’m trying to save this guy’s life. I didn’t come all this way to have a girl shoot at me and some fucking Teletubby threatening me. I’ll tell you what, I’ll be at Graham’s if and when you guys make a decision to shoot me or hold a trial, but be prepared for a fight.

“In the meantime, I suggest you stop screwing around and find that little girl. It’s cold out here.” He led Mae into the river, even though this wasn’t the best place to cross. He wanted them to understand he was doing exactly as he said he would. Before long, they had cleared the river, and McCann welcomed the dark forest.

Trekking through the snow in a sterile suit, armed and carrying a backpack with supplies she hoped she would not need, became harder for Clarisse with each step. Every few minutes she called out for Addy in hopes she would say “Here I am!” and be found safe and sound. The day had started to cloud over, and more cold weather was bound to be on the way, yet still no sign of the girl presented itself.

Clarisse had tracked Addy’s small boot prints to the river spot, but with no further luck. Peering around the forest edges for any clue that Addy had found refuge near the river, she turned up no trace. Beginning to despair, Clarisse muttered in frustration, “She didn’t vanish!” In an attempt to reason logically with herself, she whispered out loud, “She’s got to be somewhere nearby.” As she was about to admit Rick’s desire to inject tracking devices into all of them might have been less foolish than she’d originally thought, her nerves were further shattered by a sudden gunshot. That blast, coming from the east, drove all further thoughts from her mind beyond the imperative:
run
.

Clarisse crushed down fear that the gunshot might have ended Addy’s life, running so hard the landscape became a blur in her peripheral vision. No. More likely, Sam’s life had just ended. Someone must have found him. Reuben was searching for Addy as well, by now, and if he’d found Sam here, she had little doubt he’d shoot to kill. Sam’s presence—any carrier’s presence—was a threat to them all. Reuben would not listen to claims of good intention from a man determined to save his daughter. Reuben would see only a threat to the safety of the prepper domain.

When she rounded the bend above the river, Clarisse saw a man draped over a horse. Was he dead? Another man, one she’d never seen before, stood with the horse between himself and Reuben. She thought she was hallucinating.
A horse?
She hadn’t expected this, but on the bank well above them, out of likely infection range, Reuben, outfitted in a suit just like hers, pointed his gun at the man. “Don’t shoot them, Reuben,” she begged. She feared she had little time to convince him. He shook his head at her as if she didn’t understand the situation.

“Don’t interfere, Clarisse,” he advised.

“You’re making a mistake, Reuben,” she countered as she quickly made her way to him. She recognized the color of Sam’s hair, the shape of his head. “I think that’s Sam!” she shouted. “Is it?”

The stranger said it was, and spoke of Sam’s serious injuries.

Clarisse closed the distance between herself and Reuben. “I need to help him. He’s injured.”

“No! You’re not going anywhere near them, Clarisse. There is no way Dalton would allow you close to them, and I won’t either.”

She glared at him. As if the threat of Dalton would stop her.

“Look, Reuben, Sam knew his daughter went missing last night. He had injuries already when he started searching for her. I need to make sure he’s all right.”

“No, Clarisse, I mean it. You take one step toward them, and I’ll shoot. We can’t lose you to the virus.”

“Then let them go.” She said it calmly; she knew she had won, could see it in Reuben’s eyes. She slowly pushed the business end of his rifle down while Reuben continued to send verbal threats over to the invader.

Whoever this stranger was, he led the horse away across the river, waving good-bye while she continued to try and distract Reuben. He faded into the forest without another glance back.

“What the hell is going on here?” Dalton asked. He had spoken briefly to Rick and Steven after his little boys had fallen asleep, worn out from the nightmare of losing their mother. When he learned of Addy’s disappearance during the chaos of the fire, and that Clarisse and Reuben were out now searching for the girl, he pulled his sorry, grief-stricken ass together and went to where he thought the child might be—the bend in the river where she often went to talk to her daddy. He jumped, then froze momentarily as the gunshot rang out.

When he found Reuben and Clarisse arguing, he got right to the point: what was the shooting about? He had already concluded they hadn’t found the girl yet.

“Dalton, I stumbled onto this guy with a horse who was over here picking up Sam,” Reuben explained. “Sam was injured and unconscious on our side. The young boy, Bang, and his dog were here too. The shot you heard was a warning.”

“Was the guy Mark?”

“No,” answered Clarisse. “I think the guy might be the boy from Carnation that Graham talked about before. The one he’s been checking the post office for. He came to retrieve Sam.” She glared at Reuben. “That’s all he was doing, and he wasn’t close enough to harm any of us.”

“We don’t know how the fire started last night,” Reuben shot back. “Arson at the hands of the carriers might explain it, for all we know.”

Dalton held a hand up to silently stifle the accusation. When Reuben simmered down, Dalton said, “No, I’m pretty sure the fire started because of the faulty heaters in the greenhouse. Tammy”—Dalton’s voice cracked at the mention of her name—“had trouble with them. I’m an idiot for not insisting on checking them out. She thought the smell was from paint burn-off. What the hell was I thinking?”

Clarisse tried to soothe him. “The fire was no more your fault, Dalton, than it was arson by the carriers. It was an accident,” she insisted, flinging another glare at Reuben, who suddenly looked ashamed.

“Yeah, Dalton. Come on, man, you can’t do that to yourself,” Reuben said, “and I shouldn’t have been mouthing off about the carriers. I know one of them’s family to you.”

Dalton pressed his fingers to his eyes, then looked up. “Our first priority is to find Addy now. Anyone tried to radio the carriers? We need to find out what is going on with them. They know better than to come over here, so they must have had a damn good reason for crossing into our territory. Reuben, don’t shoot at them again. Not even warning shots. We’ve had enough accidents lately, and we can’t afford to make enemies of them now. We’ve lost all of our spring starts and seeds. We might need their help soon.”

Reuben didn’t argue. With a chastised nod, he acquiesced to Dalton’s logic and leadership.

Leadership. Yes. Dalton saw that fact acknowledged in Reuben’s face. No matter what, he had to continue leading these people.

“Clarisse, you need to get back to camp,” he ordered. They need you in the infirmary. I’ll keep looking for Addy.”

“No,” she protested with a rapid shake of her head. “Dalton, once I find her, I’ll go back to camp, but not a moment sooner. Not until she’s safe. She’s been out here since midnight.” Clarisse pleaded further with her eyes.

He’d expected this reaction, and truly, he didn’t blame her. She had become the girl’s mother and held the honor like no other.

“All right. Reuben, you go back to camp. Whoever’s not injured needs to get supplies together and retrieve the station’s four supply trucks. Get the extra tents. Set another crew to sort through the debris, and ask Rick to place a call into Graham’s camp for their status and let them know we’re still missing Addy. Make sure they understand that if they find her they are not to approach her,” Dalton said.

Reuben nodded and began to turn away. Then Dalton added, “Oh, and Reuben. Make sure Rick reiterates that they
cannot
cross the river again.
Any
of them. All they have to do is call us, and we can work our side. We don’t want any mishaps.”

“You got it, boss.” Reuben hesitated a moment before turning away. “Uh, Clarisse? Thanks for intervening. I really didn’t want to shoot the young man, but with the fire and the threat of the virus, I was afraid I might have to. I wouldn’t want to have to live with that.”

Dalton returned his attention to Clarisse. “Where would Addy go, other than the river rendezvous spot?” Right now, this was the only conversation he could have with her.

Clarisse shook her head. “I tracked her to the river, and then, nothing but footprints. She just vanished. She left during the commotion last night. She was scared, I wasn’t available, and she ran. She took her coat and wore her boots. I know she came this way, but her tracks ended there by the river. Most of the river is ice, so I don’t think she fell in. Oh, God, do you think she crossed and went to the carriers in search of Sam?”

Dalton had already thought of that. “It’s sure possible. That’s why I want the carriers warned not to go near her if they see her.”

He took up his radio. “Rick, Reuben’s on his way back. Hey, we’re pretty sure Addy has crossed the river to Graham’s camp. Call in there immediately. Tell them again to stay away from her if she shows up and to let us know ASAP. Also, someone needs to recheck the cameras in their direction. She might be hiding somewhere over there,” Dalton said.

“Got it. I’ll call in now,” Rick said and added, “Hey, boss, we need Clarisse here. We’re trying to move people around, and some of them are still pretty injured. We think Reuben’s youngest is still going to need surgery to remove dead tissue that Steven couldn’t treat.”

Dalton surveyed Clarisse’s conflicted expression as she listened to Rick. He knew she would do the right thing. “We’ll be back in a few minutes,” he said, staring at her and letting the reality sink in. “Dalton out.”

“There’s nothing more we can do for Addy right now,” Dalton said to Clarisse. She’ll show up, and we’ll take care of things then. Look, I have to get these people moving in the right direction. I need to be able to depend on you, Clarisse. I can’t deal with everything all by myself right now.”

After a long moment, she looked up at him and let him take her by the arm and guide her back to camp.