Mountain Man - 01 (8 page)

There would be no mistakes this time, he thought while arming himself with shots of Crown Royal. The freak-out from before was an isolated incident. Or so he hoped.

Gus drove down the highway toward Annapolis. The late morning sun glowed in a cloudless sky, but its heat didn’t reach the city. He drove through the outskirts, spotting a gimp every now and again, and thinking it strange to see so much activity. Their movements on the whole struck him as tidal, being in one area one day, and drifting to another en masse, driven by whatever mystery animated them in the first place. Smells and sounds attracted them, but sight couldn’t be possible. Not with some of the undead he’d seen with their faces chewed off. Whatever the reason, more of them were wandering the streets of Annapolis than before, and that made him nervous.

Perhaps there was someone alive there. Someone who had shot at his van.

He proceeded at a speed of forty and kept his visor up to see better. He found the turnoff for the subdivision he had almost died in two days ago and slowed to thirty, looking for signs of the living.

What he saw made his jaw drop.

The zombies he’d put down were gone, all gone. Whatever fluids had remained in their husks stained and marked the places where the creatures died, but the bodies had disappeared. A feeling of unease swelled within him. He exhaled in wary amazement, feeling his breath reflect off his helmet and heat his face. Where had they gone? He eased his foot onto the brake and stopped the van, taking in the sight before him. The door of the house he had visited remained open. He stretched to see, making the leather seat creak, then sat back and just listened. There was no sound but the dull buzz of silence. He lowered the window and stuck out his head. The area seemed clear, and the fresh air chilled his face.

Raising the window, Gus mulled things over. He backed up to the open door of the house. Loaded shotgun in hand, he opened the rear door and jumped to the porch. Cautiously, with his shotgun held firmly against his shoulder, he entered the house. He paused on the threshold, listening, but heard nothing. Fear began to take hold, and for a moment, he wished he had a bottle of something to drive it away. He struggled with going back into the house or simply bolting back to his fortress, forever leaving the seemingly haunted place. Perhaps the dead had become able to get up and move around without heads? That thought made his jaw drop. If that was possible, what other way was there to stop the things? Dismemberment? Fire?

Taking a breath, Gus flexed his fingers on the pump of his weapon and proceeded down the stairs, focusing on the corners just ahead. He moved right, then left, swinging the shotgun in each direction. He quickly established the basement area as clear and went upstairs, waiting to hear a
thump
of something moving. A squeaky floorboard, something dragging along the floor, or
something
.

Gus snaked into the living room, his shotgun sashaying from side to side. He sized up the room though the sights of the weapon, then crept into the kitchen. Clearing that, he moved into the bedrooms, all the while waiting for a gimp or some other unknown fright to pounce. He expected the worst, and even when he inspected the closets of the house, not finding anything did nothing to release his tension in the least. And Christ, did he want a drink.

He retreated back to the van, still wary. The thought of how soldiers in combat situations ever coped with the constant alertness, of being ever aware of their surroundings in the field, was beyond him. All he wanted to do was get home and do shots.
Many
shots.

With a sense of relief, he boarded his van and got behind the driver’s seat. The road, houses, light poles, and fire hydrants were all forlorn-looking in the growing sun. Gus sensed the not-rightness of the scene, and it bothered him, bothered him enough for him to want to get the hell out of there and back to his bat cave. He pulled out of the driveway and turned back the way he had come. In the distance, a zombie pulled across a front lawn, the dark body leaving a crease in the tall yellow grass. Behind that one, three others emerged from around the corner of the house.

Gus picked up speed. The zombie crawling along the lawn moved quickly, like an energized snail, dragging one leg that appeared broken. Only four of them, Gus thought, and decided to crush the nearest one under the front tires of the van.

Gus pushed on the gas.

The gimp crawling on the ground looked up and clawed at the air.

And Gus’s eyes widened.

Four Days Earlier

“You ready?” Teddy looked at them, squinting because of the sunlight coming in through the windshield.

“Yeah,” Lea answered from the passenger’s seat, strangling her aluminum bat with both hands. Her eyes were wide and eager, like a bungee jumper about to take the plunge.

Scott nodded with a souped-up kind of jerk that spoke of nerves and adrenalin. He held his shotgun with the barrel pointed to the ceiling of the minivan.

Teddy grinned at him. “You look like you’re about to shit yourself.”

“Yeah.” Scott’s eyes flicked to the window. His scruffy face hitched up on one side in a sinus-clearing snort.

“Remember to breathe out there, okay?”

“Fuck off, Teddy.”

Teddy grinned again and held up his hardwood nightstick to inspect the surface. Bats and clubs were better than shotguns in his opinion. The only thing you had to worry about with them was getting in close enough to use it. A shotgun was fine when you had ammo, but Teddy knew Scott only had two shots left in that boomstick of his. Then Scott would have to use his medieval-looking, spiked horseman’s pick that he had gotten from the museum. Teddy didn’t like the pick. Originally a cavalry weapon, the thing was heavy, made of metal, and had a hammer head on one side and a single, slightly curved spike on the other. Teddy thought it was great for puncturing skulls, but after that, Scott really had to wrench hard to free it for another swing. The guy still held onto the century-old weapon, finding comfort in the weight of the thing. Teddy thought it was simply too slow. Give him a bat any day… if he didn’t have a gun on hand, that is.

“Awright.” Teddy put his hand on the door handle. “Get it done.”

He burst from the side of the blue Dodge minivan, while the others jumped out of their own doors. They ran for a large green two-story house, only twenty feet away. The three of them wore plain clothes under puffy winter coats. Lea’s ponytail flopped as she zigzagged, and Teddy had the image of her bouncing up and down on top of him. Those thoughts always seemed to happen in the morning and whenever he saw her without her coat. It hadn’t happened yet, but it would soon. She didn’t seem too hot on Scott, who was something of a bruiser, which made Teddy the only ride left in town.

They clustered around the front door of the home. Lea got a hand on the knob while Scott stood behind her with his back to the house, keeping a lookout with his pump shotgun and his horseman’s pick slung across his back with a loop of rope. The door opened without any problem.

“Go, go!” Teddy urged, pushing Lea on her lower back and urging her inside. He went in right behind her. Scott followed and closed the door a moment later, pulling a curtain aside to keep an eye on the minivan.

Teddy held up a hand, and they listened for movement. After a moment, Teddy rapped the wall twice. To the right lay a hallway and open living room. To the left was a kitchen and a pair of sliding doors leading to the backyard. A set of bare wooden stairs in the living room ran up to the second floor and down into a basement level.

Teddy rapped the wall a second time. “Nothing,” he finally said.

“Could be downstairs,” Lea suggested.

“Could be,” Teddy agreed, wondering how her breasts would feel in his bare hands. Shaking the image out of his head, he moved ahead of her and peered down. He rapped the wall there and stood poised for action. When none came, he edged around and looked up toward the second floor. “Nothing here. They would’ve come running if there were. I’ll check downstairs.”

He descended and checked around. He went back up minutes later.

“What’s down there?” Lea asked.

“Den, laundry, and extra bedroom. Anything move up here?”

“No.”

“Scott?” Teddy asked.

“All clear,” Scott said from where he waited on the porch.

“Okay, let’s check upstairs,” Teddy said, holding his nightstick in one hand. “Watch my back.”

They moved up the stairs cautiously and stepped into a reading area with a large wooden shelving unit pressed against the wall. Paperbacks and hard covers filled the five shelves, and a cozy reading chair and foot rest stood nearby.

“Looks good,” Teddy commented. “Love to read.”

“Me too. Wonder what’s there?”

“Go ahead, I’ll check the bedroom.”

“I’ll come with you,” Lea said, and Teddy hoped she would. Often.

They slipped inside the master bedroom. A dark blue comforter with matching pillows covered a king-sized bed. A fan hung motionless overhead. A chest of drawers rested against one wall, and a flat-screen TV on a dresser faced the bed. To the right lay the open door to a bathroom.

Teddy looked in. “They have a big tub.”

Lea moved into the doorway, close enough that he could smell her. He didn’t know how she did it, but she always managed to smell fresh.

“It is a big one,” Lea said, eyeing the creamy white tiling.

“Almost big enough for two,” Teddy threw out there and got a funny look from her. He seized up, bracing for whatever reaction might come. They had been together for a month, the three of them having met, oddly enough, on the same day in the business section of city, but it was the first time he had dared crossed the line.

To his shocked relief, Lea smiled. “We’ll have to try it to see.”

Teddy could only nod like a dummy.

“Hey.” Lea pointed to the window. “Look over there.”

Teddy gazed out of the window toward a neighboring house. He went to the window and looked out across the fenced backyard, complete with a swing set. On the other side stood the house facing the next road over. Teddy never liked city planning, didn’t like the way houses crowded in on a person from all sides. Looking over the fence, they were at an angle to see straight into the other house’s living room through a curtained sliding door.

“What?”

“That curtain just got shoved back. I saw it just now.” Lea stood beside him, closer than before.

“Just now?”

“Yes, just now.”

“Hmm.” Teddy kept his eyes on the curtain, but it didn’t move. “Want to check it out?”

Lea seemed to mull that over. “Couldn’t be a zombie. They don’t care about curtains.”

“Agreed. So what do you want to do?”

“Let’s check it out.”

Teddy studied the backyard. A fixed gate in the fence separated the two houses. The owners had probably been good friends or even family. They moved back downstairs and went to the sliding door.

“Scotty,” Ted called from the kitchen area.

The man appeared with shotgun at the ready.

“Lea spotted something in the next house over, so we’re going to check it out.”

“Spotted what?”

“Something pulled a curtain across the window.”

“A curtain?” Scotty’s face screwed up in disbelief.

“Yeah, you coming?” Lea asked, standing at the sliding door.

“I guess,” Scotty said, not sounding confident in the least. It didn’t bother Teddy. Scotty worried about everything.

“All right. Let’s go. Ready?”

Scotty lumbered over to where he and Lea poised to bolt. Lea nodded, and Teddy unlocked the door and slid it open.

“Go,” Teddy whispered and launched himself out of the doorway, staying hunched over. All three bunched up at the gate in the fence, and Teddy opened it without a squeak. Inside the other backyard, they quietly and quickly gained the steps to the new house’s deck and paused at the sliding window.

“Where to?” Lea asked.

Teddy tried the door. It opened easily with a hushed rumble. He pulled back the curtain and went in, the others following in turn. They entered a dining room with a modern kitchen to the right. Just past the table was an open living room, complete with a brown sofa, matching chairs, a fireplace, and a widescreen TV. An open stairway led up and down, in the same fashion as the previous home. They spread out in the kitchen, and Teddy strained to listen, but heard nothing.

He looked at Lea and shook his head. Lea shook her head back. Scotty pulled the sliding door closed and stood ready with his shotgun. Hooking the curtain with a finger, Scotty peeked outside.

“You stay here,” Teddy ordered Scott before motioning for Lea to follow him. They moved to the right and found an empty bathroom and bedroom for a teenage boy.

“Nothing,” Lea whispered.

Upstairs, something creaked.

They both froze. Teddy pointed to the ceiling, and Lea nodded. He listened, but the sound didn’t repeat. From the sliding door, Scott stared at both of them with a look of unease. Teddy shrugged, and a
clump
sounded overhead, the sound of a heavy boot coming down on the floor.