Hell's Fortress (24 page)

He cast a backward glance. “Sorry, but these pants have got to come off. I’m filthy and they’re going to rot clean through if I don’t get washed up.”

“Then I should probably look away.”

He waggled his eyebrows. “It’s up to you.”

Nevertheless, he turned his back as he stripped out of his pants and underwear. Eliza didn’t look away. He ran his head under the water, then let it run through the sweat and dirt along his back.

Steve was more slender than he’d been, but the muscles still rippled along his back and shoulders. She dragged her eyes down his sides to his lean waist, his naked buttocks. Butterflies rose in her stomach.

I’m almost twenty-five and still a virgin.

He was only a few feet away. Would it be the end of the world (so to speak) if she put her hands on him? She could reach around and let her fingernails trail across his chest. Let her hands drift to his stomach and the fine hair that spread from his navel down to his . . .

She flushed, her heart pounding, a warm feeling spreading through her body. He turned and met her gaze.

“You don’t know how many times I’ve regretted waiting,” she said.

The words came out before she could consider their potential double meaning. Did she mean waiting to get married, and then it was too late because he’d disappeared in California? Or waiting to be intimate until they were married? The rule in the church was absolute about chastity before marriage. But oh, how her body ached for his touch. Even now, as thin and dirty as he was. As dirty as she herself was.

“Eliza.” His voice was husky.

“Steve, I—I—”

“I want you so badly.”

She leaned toward him.

“No,” he said with visible effort. He held out his hands to stop her. “It’s not what you want.”

“It
is
what I want.”

“Not here, not like this. Soon, I swear to God. We’ll get back to Blister Creek. And your brother will say the words. Then we can do it.”

“What if we don’t make it back?”

“We will.”

“Just in case. I don’t want to die like this. I want to be your wife. Then we’ll be together in the next world. Grover has the priesthood. He could marry us.”

“You said we needed to be married in the temple,” Steve said. He sounded so calm, but his breath was shallow and he put his hands down to cover his crotch, like there was something happening down there that he didn’t want her to see.

Eliza was not
that
naïve. She understood.

She nodded. “To be married in the next world, yes. We need a temple marriage.”

“And you believe that?” he asked, bending for his shirt, which he then held in front of him.

She watched his every move, not even trying to keep from staring. “I don’t know. Yeah, I guess so. I
hope
so, anyway. Do you?”

“Mostly, no. I think if two people love each other they’ll find a way to be together in the next world.”

“My father used to say that men were animals,” Eliza said. “That girls needed to protect our virtue. Walk down the street underdressed and unescorted and a barbarian is likely to sweep down from the hills, carry you off, and ravage you.”

“That sort of bullshit is an excuse for men to control women,” Steve said.

“You sound like Jacob. Well, except for the swearing part.”

“Sorry. I’ve fallen into old habits while I was away. I might have to confess to your brother about a few spare cigarettes that came into my hands as well.”

Eliza took a deep breath and turned her gaze. “Okay, now that my brother came up, I’ve suddenly rediscovered my self-control. Better than a cold shower.”

Steve laughed. “I always imagine my aunt Hilda when I start to lose control. I accidentally saw her naked when I was twelve. Wrinkles and everything.” He grabbed his underwear and pulled it on, then reached for his pants. “But I swear to you that we’re driving out of here tonight. And when we get back, I will collar your brother for a shotgun marriage, only I’ll be the one with the gun to make sure it happens.”

“Oh, yeah? Then what?”

He buttoned his pants. “Then I will carry you off, barbarian-style, for some good old-fashioned ravaging.”

“I will hold you to that, Mister Big Shot FBI Agent. Either you ravage me or you will turn in your badge and gun. Got it?”

As they made their way back inside, an unfamiliar emotion stirred in Eliza’s breast. For the moment she forgot everything: the drone attack, Trost and the bloody hole in his head, their capture at the hands of Sergeant Ludlow and his men, the horrific escape from the hotel, Fayer’s cholera. She wasn’t even troubled by the thought of a final, deadly flight from the city.

The emotion was a lifting, rising optimism. It was hope.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Jacob tried to think like a general as he prepared for the fight. This wasn’t another drive-by shooting like their first attack on the squatters. The camp had doubled in size, then doubled again. It had suffered one attack; ultimatums had been traded, lines drawn in the sand. Jacob had no illusions; the fighting would start the moment the forces from Blister Creek arrived at the reservoir. It would be a real war.

And so he spent the day after the failed meeting with the Women’s Council laying the logistics for the battle to come. He ordered David, Stephen Paul, and a dozen men to the switchbacks to fortify their rear guard positions. Then he loaded a truck with ammunition and weapons and drove up to meet them.

A series of retaining walls protected the switchbacks descending into the valley, and Blister Creek had built concrete bunkers at three of them earlier in the spring. The uppermost one was now a beehive of activity, with men coming and going, while others excavated a series of trenches. They loaded dirt into wheelbarrows, and hauled it across the road to form a dirt berm. David was directing the work and looked up when Jacob parked the truck.

David was already peeling back the tarp from the cargo when Jacob came around. He ran his finger over the barrel of the Browning .50-caliber machine gun that lay beneath.

“I thought you were sending the spare gun to the south bunkers. Did you change your mind? Or did you manage to salvage the one from the drone attack?”

“This isn’t that gun,” Jacob said. “I swiped this one from the Teancum checkpoint. If there’s any part of the valley that’s safe, it’s the east side.”

The two brothers stood aside for men to haul out the crates of ammunition, which they carried toward the trenches.

“We have a machine gun here already,” David said with a nod toward the bunker. “Are you sure we need a second?”

“I’m not sure of anything. But I want it here just in case.”

Stephen Paul made his way over, a shovel propped over his shoulder. Sweat streaked the dirt at his temples. “I heard what you said. I say we take this gun and mount it on one of the pickups. We could use the extra firepower in the battle.”

“We can lose the battle and still recover,” Jacob told him, “but if we lose the road to the valley floor we’re doomed. If we’re forced to retreat, this is where we’ll make our stand.”

“Have faith, brother,” Stephen Paul said. “The Lord of Hosts guides our army. There will be no retreat.”

“We could win the larger war,” Jacob said, “and still have a rough slog of it in the battle. It might last longer than we think, and if it does, we’ll need a strong position for resupplying our forces.”

“I guess so,” Stephen Paul said, still sounding unconvinced. “We do have the gun mounted on the Humvee. That should be enough.”

“How many rounds have you brought me?” David asked.

“For the .50-cal? Ten thousand.”

David frowned. “For two guns? That won’t last long. I was thinking thirty.”

“If I leave thirty thousand rounds, thirty thousand will be fired.”

“How many rounds will the women have at the Moroni checkpoint?” David asked.

“Twenty.”

“So, more. Is that because the women asked for it, or because you’re expecting trouble on the south end of the valley?” David frowned. “Wait, you’re not preparing to lose, are you?”

“What do you mean?” Stephen Paul asked, his voice sharp.

“I think he is,” David said. “He’s preparing to flee. In case we’re routed, he’ll need to hold the south end of the valley long enough for us to evacuate.”

“It’s only a contingency,” Jacob said. “I’m not planning to lose.”

“Stop worrying,” Stephen Paul said. “We have the initiative. We have the organization. We have the Lord on our side. Now, if you ask me, both the gun and the ammo from Moroni would be better used up here. In the battle itself.”

“You’re sounding like Elder Smoot,” Jacob said. “Both of you.”

Stephen Paul carried his shovel back to the trench works. David directed two of the Johnson boys to haul away the machine gun. He watched them go with a scowl, no doubt still wishing he could use it in the upcoming battle instead of here, guarding against an unlikely retreat.

Of course Jacob wished he had more heavy weapons. The Browning machine guns were m
ore or less the same weapon that had killed hundreds of thousands of men in the First World War, and the gun’s killing power was little changed in the century since.

But more than that, he needed additional ammunition for the four he already owned.

Smaller weapons were less of a problem. The valley was awash in small arms—hunting rifles, pistols, AK-47s, AR-15s, shotguns—but the heavier stuff came courtesy of the occupation forces of the previous summer. First had come armed men under Chip Malloy, when the USDA set up a military administration. Later came the army. When Jacob’s cousin Alfred killed General Lacroix in a horrific suicide attack, the army had pulled out. They had failed to secure the USDA’s abandoned arsenal before their retreat. None of the equipment would fight off a military offensive, but it would be murderous against bandits, refugees, and other small-scale threats.

At first. In the long run, Jacob doubted they could repel a sustained siege. A valley-wide survey counted more than nine million (declared) rounds of everything from .22 rounds to shotgun shells. Small arms could hold out for years. But for the machine guns, Jacob only had sixty thousand rounds. It sounded like a lot, but with a .50-cal capable of firing six hundred rounds per minute, four guns could blow through that ammo in a hurry. Grenades and mines were in even shorter supply.

Destroy this threat and you won’t need to fight again. Everyone will know. Approach Blister Creek and you will die.

Was that true? Or would the refugees keep coming even then, thousands upon thousands? Drawn by starvation and illness to the one remaining source of food, electricity, and civilization for hundreds of miles in any direction. They would come. Year after bloody year as the world tore itself apart. As millions, then billions died. For the huddled remnant in Blister Creek, it would be like waiting out a sandstorm or a plague of locusts that never ended.

He looked up from his thoughts to see his brother studying him. “What are you thinking about?” David asked.

“What else?” Jacob said. “The end of the world.”

“I thought maybe Fernie and the women.”

“No, not this time. I’m trying not to worry about them.”

“You should go to her. Tonight, before the battle.”

Jacob sighed. “I wouldn’t know what to say. She’s angry. I’m angry. We’re on opposite sides of a position with no possible compromise.”

“You need to say
something.
You never know when—” David stopped, seemed to reconsider his words.

“You never know when you might die? Do you think I’ll take a bullet tonight?”

“No, no, I wouldn’t say that. Of course not. You’re the prophet.”

“That didn’t save Father.”

“All I mean is that the future is uncertain,” David said. “I keep thinking about what I would have told Miriam if I’d known she was going to disappear. Last night I was holding the baby, giving her a bottle and thinking how she should be at her mother’s breast.”

“How is Diego?” Jacob asked.

“He has been crying himself to sleep at night. He’s terrified of losing his mother. Can’t say I blame him.”

“I’ll bet having Lillian around helps.”

“It does. She’s a comfort to all of us. But Lillian didn’t come home last night. She stayed up late with Fernie and Rebecca, then spent the night at your place. I don’t think she’s angry, just busy. I miss her too, you know. Now that Miriam is gone”—his voice caught—“she’s all I have.”

Jacob threw his arm around David’s shoulder. “They’ll be okay.”

“I keep telling myself that. But the world is dying out there. I’m worried.”

“Come on. It’s Eliza and Miriam. They can survive anything.”

David nodded. “You’re right. But I’m going to talk to Lillian tonight anyway. Bring her closer instead of push her away. And you need to talk to Fernie.”

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Who usually ends the fights, you or her?”

“What fights?”

“I’m serious.”

“So am I. We’ve never fought before.”

David drew back with a raised eyebrow. “Oh, come on.”

“Really. We’ve squabbled, we’ve disagreed. Of course we have. But we don’t fight. We never have.” Jacob smiled. “I think we’re what you call soul mates.”

“Five generations of polygamists just rolled over in the Blister Creek graveyard and groaned in perfect harmony.”

“Some people are wired for polygamy. I am not. Fernie is the only woman I ever wanted. Even when she was married to Elder Kimball, I knew she was the one for me.”

“I still call baloney on the never fighting, but if it’s true, it’s all the more reason you need to go home tonight and see her.”

“And talk about what? She’s stubborn, I’m stubborn. Neither of us will change our minds about the battle. The moment we start talking, we’ll argue, and then the fight will be all the worse.”

“Then don’t talk. Go home and crawl into bed without saying anything. Put your arm around her and tell her you’re sorry and you love her.”

“But I haven’t changed my mind.”

“It’s not sorry you made a mistake, it’s just sorry. Sorry that you’re fighting, that you got angry. That this thing came between you.”

“You think that would work?” Jacob asked.

“Maybe. It’s hard to say what Fernie will think, but I guarantee
you’ll
feel a lot better. I don’t care who you are or how many wives you’ve got, there’s nothing more soothing than falling asleep with a warm breast cupped in your hand.”

The truck was going to be used for the dawn attack, so Jacob left it at the switchback instead of burning more fuel returning to the valley. Instead, he rode home on a borrowed horse. He passed men on horseback, who tipped their hats, or called “Brother Jacob” in gruff voices.

A wagon of women was pulling onto the ranch road at Yellow Flats as he approached. They called to him and he pulled alongside as a woman stopped the team of horses. The driver was Charity Kimball, her hair pulled into a gray bun, with her daughters Helen Pratt and Jessie Lyn Smoot sitting in the back.

They carried a disassembled loom, which Charity had found in a dusty corner of a barn on the Kimball ranch. Charity said she remembered how to operate the loom, if someone could figure out how to put it back together.

Spinning, weaving, candling—the women were reviving old industries. If they could only survive, they had the means to thrive, to reintroduce the old ways to the surrounding communities. Assuming there
were
any surviving communities.

“Do you think Sister Rebecca could figure it out?” Charity asked.

“Probably. And I’ll send my brother to help too,” Jacob said. “If it’s mechanical, David can put it together.”

“Thank you, Brother Jacob,” Jessie Lyn said, “but we didn’t call you over to show you the loom. We would like to pray with you, if you’ll let us.”

They looked at him with shining eyes and worried expressions.

“Yes, of course,” he said. “May I choose someone to say the prayer? Charity, would you please?”

“Thank you,” she said in a soft voice. “I would like that.”

Charity Kimball was the wife and mother of murderers, her sister wives scattered to other families. Everything she’d known, destroyed. The poor woman lived in fear of being thrown out of Blister Creek, but it was an unnecessary worry. Jacob had no intention of punishing her for the sins of the Kimball men.

Charity’s voice was thin and cracked with age and emotion. Her prayer was simple and unadorned, but achingly earnest. Jacob listened, overcome with sorrow that he couldn’t share in her faith. These women burned in their convictions, trusted him to lead. At one point he’d dismissed this single-minded devotion as naïve, even dangerous. Like believing in witches or alchemy. Now, faith—whether supported by fact or myth—seemed like a survival mechanism perfectly tailored to outlast the present upheaval. Was that the origin of religion, nothing more than a way to cement group cohesion in the face of existential threats?

The prayer had ended. Belatedly, he opened his eyes to see the women watching him.

“Amen!” he said, as if the delay had been caused by the profundity of his spiritual feelings, and not his distracted mind.

He left the women to their business and continued the long ride through town and to home. When he arrived, his daughter, Leah, stood on the porch ringing the dinner bell. She came running as he slid down from the horse and handed the reins to one of his younger brothers. He swept Leah into his arms and nibbled her neck, making her squeal. When he came inside, a dozen children—his own, his youngest siblings, even cousins being raised in the Christianson compound—came running to greet him. The older children gave him solemn nods and greetings. The younger ones didn’t seem to have quite as solid an understanding of the stakes, but they were jumpy and hyper. They must have heard something, felt it even.