Shortage (Best Laid Plans Book 2) (21 page)

The teenager hesitated. “Are you sure? What if she shoots you?”

“Then I suppose you'll have to arrest her. But I think it'll be okay.” Matt smiled grimly. “Anyone who takes down four of Razor's former thugs is all right in my book.”

He made his way down slowly, noticing that the refugees remained back a safe distance in spite of his assurances. The redhead kept her gun drawn as she made her way over to him, but considering she nearly fell once Matt was more worried
for
her than about her. He stopped to let her come the rest of the way if she wanted, but she stopped as well. “I'm Matt Larson. I'm in charge of the town's defense.”

“Jane Mathers,” she replied, still sounding cautious. “I'm in charge of this group.” She abruptly slumped to the ground.

Matt rushed forward to fall to his knees beside her. Her eyes were drooping but still open and alert, but her strength had obviously given out. “We can worry about introductions later,” he said. “We need to do something about that shoulder.”

“It's not so bad,” she mumbled. “Mostly just fatigue and hunger. Got dizzy for a second.”

Matt rolled up his pant leg enough to get to the bandage wrapped above his knee, the cleanest cloth he had available. He unrolled it and cut off the end that had been in direct contact with his wound, then bunched the rest up and pressed it to the woman's shoulder. She sucked in a sharp breath when he did, hunching slightly. That gave Matt a look at her back and he saw that there was a larger wound there.

A through and through. That could be more serious than a bullet lodged in the body, or less, but it meant they wouldn't have to dig anything out and risk doing more damage. Matt shifted the bandage to press against the larger wound, drawing another agonized breath from Jane. He saw her eyes start to roll back in her head.

He knew it was important to keep patients conscious for some injuries, but he wasn't sure if gunshots were included in that. Was it anyone who was in shock, or just head injuries? Either way it was probably good to get her talking to distract her. “I'm guessing Razor's men ambushed you. That body at the end is Simons, the last of his lieutenants. You must be good with that pistol.”

With some effort she focused and looked up at him. “Dad taught me. He was always a gun nut. Seemed like more than just a hobby after the world ended.”

Matt heard a soft crunch of gravel and looked up to see the older man approaching. “Only one of the attackers had a gun,” he said, pulling out a handkerchief and offering it to Matt, who took it to press against the front of Jane's shoulder. “That fellow you call Simons. He was hiding while his friends jumped out at us, so he got a shot off before we even knew he was there. I managed to shoot him before he could shoot again, then kept shooting until he stopped moving.”

The refugee modestly patted the stock of the rifle he held, a .22 Matt thought. “Jane got the rest. She downed two of them before they even got close, then even after getting shot managed to get the third one while she was flat on her back on the ground.” He held out his hand. “I'm Tom Harding.”

In his arms Jane went limp, and Matt grit his teeth. His hands were a bit full at the moment so a handshake wasn't happening. “Nice to meet you, Tom, but we can get your story once we're all back safe in town and she's been seen to. Rick!” He said that last in a shout. “How far is Terry?”

“You'll let us into town?” Tom asked hopefully. “Do you have food?”

That was always the question, wasn't it? Matt bit back a sigh, still doing his best to keep pressure on Jane's wounds. Then an unsettling thought struck him. What if they were from Price and their bedraggled state was from more than just hunger and exhaustion? “Our town's borders are open. Which direction did you come from?”

“Over the mountains from Fairview,” the older man answered. “We were following Highway 31.”

Matt fought a surge of uneasiness. “31 takes you to Huntington, well to the south of here.”

“We nearly got robbed near Candland Mountain on Halloween and decided it would be safer to take side roads the rest of the way.” Tom gave him a somewhat indignant look. “What, do you think I'm lying?”

“Of course not,” Matt said, and he didn't. “Still, Candland isn't too far away and Halloween was almost three weeks ago.”

The teenaged refugee and only other man in the group, who looked a lot like Tom and was probably his son, had led the other refugees along the road to stand close by. At this he interrupted angrily. “Do we look like we're in any shape to set traveling records? We didn't know those smaller roads at all and kept getting lost and finding ourselves going the wrong way, forcing us to backtrack or trailblaze. Then a week after we left Highway 31 a storm hit and we were snowed in for days. We lost two people to the cold before the weather cleared enough to travel. We've been going slow, gathering firewood and searching for food as we went, and every day we've had a bit less strength to put one foot in front of another. It's a miracle no one else has died since the storm.”

“Take it easy,” Matt said calmly. The kid had claimed the gun Razor's thug had shot Jane with, a larger caliber bolt action rifle, and Matt had no interest in being shot himself over a temper tantrum. “I believe you, I was just being cautious. We've had news of a flu outbreak in the Price refugee camp and want to keep it out of Aspen Hill, that's all.”

Tom shot his son a stern look. “It's all right, Alvin.” He turned back to Matt. “I can give you my word we haven't been through Price. We came to Sanpete through Nephi along I-15, making our way east to Ephraim. They'd set up a refugee camp at the college there, but the situation wasn't good. They had no supplies and some of our people were attacked, so we decided to move on. South didn't seem like an option, neither did north or west, so we made our way up to Fairview and tried 31. Folks in Fairview warned us the mountains would be dangerous and the land was drier and more barren to the east of them, but we didn't see much choice. Now we're here, and that's everywhere we've been since the Gulf refineries attack.”

Matt nodded. “Now you're here. We'll find you shelter, and you'll have the opportunity to join our hunting parties and forage for anything you can find. I'm afraid the town doesn't have much to offer in the way of food, but we have weapons you can borrow for hunting and we'll do whatever else we can to help.”

“What about Jane?” the older man demanded. “She could hunt, but she's in no condition to fend for herself now!”

Matt hesitated. “You took down a threat to the town,” he offered, “that deserves something. We'll do our best to take care of her until she can get back on her feet.” Glancing over his shoulder he saw Terry and half a dozen men coming down the hill towards them, Rick in the lead. “Good, our doctor's here.”

* * * * *

To Matt's relief after a quick inspection Terry reported that Jane's wound wasn't life threatening. Although serious, it probably wouldn't have caused her to pass out so quickly either if the blood loss hadn't come on top of exhaustion and hunger. Terry taped the two holes with patches until he could get her back to the storehouse, then had Matt help him lift her onto one of the four stretchers his group had brought with him.

It was slow going, with Jane on a stretcher and the ten other emaciated refugees having trouble putting one foot in front of the other, but they finally reached the storehouse and set Jane on the cot set aside for surgeries while Terry got to work on her. It was a simple procedure, he was quick to assure Tom when the older man worriedly questioned him, but he needed to concentrate and also keep the area as sterile as possible so he closed curtains around himself and April as they worked.

Sam had been waiting at the storehouse, and as soon as Matt set the redheaded woman down and backed away to let Terry work she threw her arms around him. Then, to his embarrassment, she insisted on checking his leg to make sure the cut hadn't reopened. It hadn't, thankfully, although it had seeped a little and needed to be cleaned and bandaged again.

Catherine was also there when they arrived, and while Sam worked on his leg she stood beside his cot to have him go over what had happened. The Mayor had already formally welcomed the new group and offered them cots to rest on, and although there wasn't much to spare she announced that they'd already contributed to the town by taking out four of Razor's thugs and insisted they each be given a bowl of soup.

It was humble fare, made by boiling bones, a few root vegetables, and a pile of other edible plant matter that needed softening with some herbs and spices to try to mask the somewhat bitter taste. The bones had then been cracked open and the marrow inside scraped out and added to the broth: they couldn't afford to waste anything they could possibly eat at this point. Matt wasn't a particular fan of the soup, but the refugees made no complaints as they ravenously emptied their bowls.

The Mayor insisted Matt and the others who'd gone out to the canyon, as well as Sam, all have a bowl too, so they settled in for a meal. While they were eating Ben came in to introduce himself to the new arrivals, starting a discussion with Catherine and Tom about finding them a place to stay.

Over the meal Matt overheard the new arrivals talking again about the near robbery along Highway 31 on Halloween, and out of curiosity asked a few questions about it. He pretty quickly came to the conclusion that it wasn't likely Razor's gang had been the perpetrators, but what surprised him was that he recognized the stretch of highway they described where the ambush had been planned.

It wasn't far from Lewis and Trev's hideout, and he couldn't help but wonder if one or both of his friends were the “Spirit of Huntington River” that the refugees had taken to calling their benefactor. When they mentioned that whoever had taken out the bandits might have been wounded in the fight Matt became even more concerned for his friends. Hopefully they were all right.

Another thing he learned was that Jane's dad had been killed by those same bandits a few days before the attempted ambush, and she had taken over leading the group even while grieving his death. If Matt hadn't had reason to respect her after seeing how she'd protected her group at the mouth of the canyon, he certainly would've started after hearing how the refugees talked about her.

He hoped she pulled through.

To his relief just after he finished his meal there was a commotion behind the curtains where Terry was working on Jane, suggesting that the redheaded woman was awake and still had some fighting spirit left in her. A few moments later April emerged. “She insisted on talking to you, Matt.”

With a glance at Catherine, who nodded, Matt followed his sister back into the impromptu operating room.

Jane was propped up on the cot, one that had been designed to allow for reclining, with her shoulder bandaged and her arm bound to her chest in a sling. “What's going on?” she demanded.

Matt came to stand beside her. “We brought you to Aspen Hill. There's a bowl of soup waiting for you, and you're welcome to rest here until you're strong enough to join your group in whatever lodgings we find for them. I'm not sure if we'll be able to find you a house you can have to yourselves, but we should be able to find enough people willing to take in one or two of you to accommodate the group. Ben, the refugees' informal leader, has been doing a good job-”

Jane shook her head and cut in firmly. “No. We'll camp out if we have to but we're not splitting up. And we're not staying with refugees, either.”

Matt supposed he couldn't completely blame her for her suspicion. “The refugees have become regular citizens since moving into town. You'll be safe with them, I promise.”

“I don't care, we'll stay together.”

“All right.” Matt hesitated. There was something he'd been considering since Razor's attack, especially after the refugee camp north of town was abandoned. He hadn't talked to his family about it yet or even made up his mind, but it might provide a solution. Still, he couldn't make any promises until he'd explored the option further. “I'll talk to our Mayor, Catherine Tillman, about letting you all stay here in the storehouse until we figure something out. We'll do our best to find a solution everyone can live with.”

Jane hesitated, then seemed to relax a bit. “I suppose beggars can't be choosers. Thank you for helping us, by the way.” She turned to Terry. “And thank you. We would've had a lot of trouble dealing with a gunshot wound and you probably saved my life. Sorry for snapping at you earlier.”

“I'll go get you that bowl of soup,” Matt said, ducking through the curtains. He also wanted to talk to Catherine about his idea.

But when he entered the larger room he saw Catherine already busy speaking excitedly into her radio. Matt heard a confirmation through it, the continuation of a conversation he must've missed while talking to Jane, and the Mayor turned to give him an excited look.

“Matt! That was Pete and Evan, still patrolling the western border. They've spotted your father!”

Matt stopped dead, almost unable to think as a surge of stunned surprise, happiness, and overwhelming relief poured through him. He was still processing the news when Sam barreled into him and threw her arms around his chest, grinning up at him joyfully. Matt clutched her to him as he stared at the radio that had brought this news. “He made it? He's okay?”

Catherine nodded, still beaming. “Tired but unhurt as far as Evan could see. And he's got a loaded wagon with him.” The Mayor came over and rested a hand on his shoulder. “Looks like you've got a lot to be grateful for tomorrow. Happy Thanksgiving.”