The Lair (23 page)

This wouldn’t be the first time I’d kicked a Collab’s ass. But in a world where humans were an endangered species, I had to psych myself up for it. I had to remind myself that whatever I dished out, they deserved. I wasn’t planning on killing anyone, but in a fight with someone who’d betrayed the human race, I couldn’t be the one to hesitate.

So while Zeke worked on setting up the antenna for the sat phone, I studied the bodies outside the fence. In the mid-afternoon light I couldn’t tell exactly how many there were. At least a couple that were fairly fresh if the stench in the air was any indication, but there were other, older bodies around, too, their white bones stark against the black asphalt. Turkey buzzards roost in the nearby trees, their bodies fat enough to bend branches.

We’d driven down from Utah in five cars of five. The plan was simple. Sort of. There were two cars along with Tech Taylor, and that group was going to find whatever power source was feeding the Farm and try to secure it. Most of the Farms had more than one source powering the fences, a solar grid, and wind turbines, as well as a generator. The other cars were out working on the backup plan. If we couldn’t keep the electricity online, we’d need some way to keep the Ticks away.

The car Zeke and I had driven down in had dropped the two of us right at the fence line. Our goal was simple: get the antenna set up and then walk in through the front gates. Hopefully, by morning, we’d either have subdued the other Collabs or won them over to our side. If Zeke was right, the Dean was long gone.

If Zeke wasn’t right . . . well, then I had bigger problems to worry about. I didn’t want anyone else inside the fence until we’d secured the Farm.

Beside me, Zeke straightened and asked, “That good?”

I looked down at the antenna. “Yeah, basically. Just make sure it has a clean shot at the sky and we should be set.” I handed him the sat phone. “You’ll want to do a test call to make sure it’s working.”

He called the second car, whose antenna was installed on the car itself. A minute later he ended the call. Instead of handing the phone back, he slid it into the pocket of his jacket.

I felt a weird little trickle of apprehension work down my spine. I held out my hand. “My phone?”

He gave a nonchalant shrug. “I’ve got it.”

“No offense, but if I’m going to waltz into a Farm, I’d be a lot more comfortable with my phone where I can reach it.”

Zeke narrowed his gaze at me. “Yeah, about that.” Before I could reach for my own weapon, Zeke whipped out his gun and had it aimed at my throat. “I’ve got a better plan.”

My hand dropped to the Glock at the back of my jeans.

“I took the clip out already,” Zeke said quickly. “But you’re welcome to check it to verify if you want.”

I pulled the Glock out and instantly realized he was right. My previous full clip had been replaced by an empty one. I hadn’t even noticed the difference in weight. Jesus. How effing stupid did I feel?

“Down on your belly.” Zeke gestured with the point of his gun. “Hands behind your back. Nice and slow.”

Yeah, I could have charged him. It’s true what they say, that most people, even trained marksmen, can’t shoot a moving target, but it’s usually true of targets moving away from the shooter, not right at it. I didn’t want to risk it.

“You’re making a mistake,” I said as I laid down, trying to smother my panic so I could think. Okay, Zeke was clearly still working for the Dean. He’d betrayed us all. Had Ely known what Zeke was when he’d brought him in?

No. I couldn’t believe it of Ely. He wouldn’t betray me. Besides, it didn’t make sense. If his goal had been to lure me down here and turn me in to the Dean, then he wouldn’t have volunteered to take Lily to Canada. He would have stayed with Zeke to make sure the job got done.

“Trust me, Carter, this is much better.” As soon as I was down on the ground, he planted his booted foot in the center of my back and reached for my hands. “They were never going to believe—”

As he leaned over, I reared back and reached up with my hands, grabbing whatever I could. I caught a handful of arm in one hand and scratched the underside of his chin with the other. My upward momentum knocked him off balance. I rolled with the motion and scrambled up, but he was faster. He plowed into my chest, knocking me back a few steps, right into the tangle of the prickly brush. I tripped on the antenna and went over backward. He came toward me again. I scrambled away, but not fast enough.

I couldn’t find purchase under my feet and the branches of the bush clawed at my skin. I transferred my momentum into a sideways roll to free myself from the bush but when I came up, I was no longer facing just Zeke and his weapon. Suddenly, there were ten guns—ten tranq rifles.

Zeke was back a little ways, panting. “Hold your fire! Hold your fire!” he called out a couple of times. “He’s unarmed.”

One of the Collabs—the guy with both a rifle and a tranq gun—said, “Where the hell have you been, Zeke?”

Zeke straightened. “I’ve been to Utah and back.” He put up his hands so they could see the gun he held before he slowly tucked it away in the holster at his side. “I brought us a nice little bargaining chip. Just don’t tranq him. He’s not alone and I want him awake until we know for sure where the rest of them are.”

From my spot on the ground, I could see a few of the Collabs starting to lower their weapons. But the one in the middle, a big guy with dark hair and a scowl that made him look like a pit bull, didn’t relax at all.

Zeke nodded toward that guy. “Is the Dean here?”

“No,” the pit bull answered. “Haven’t seen him since right before you disappeared.”

“Well, good. Then we can use his office to question the prisoner.” Zeke nudged me in the ribs with the toe of his shoe. “Hands behind your head. No tricks this time.” He gave me a kick.

The blow stung my pride more than my ribs. Somehow that only pissed me off more. If he was going to beat me up, he could at least put a little effort into it.

“I’ll fucking kill you, you bastard,” I growled just low enough for Zeke to hear. But with ten tranq rifles pinned on me, what could I do except put my hands behind my head like a good little POW?

I felt cold metal snap around my wrists, and smiled.

Handcuffs. The idiot had bound me with handcuffs? Zip ties are not impossible to get out of, but you need a knife or something to cut with. And you need the right leverage. Cuffs are so easy to pick, it’s a wonder he even bothered. Not that that made me any less pissed at him.

As Zeke hauled me to my feet, he muttered, “See? Told you this was better than the other plan.”

The arrogant grin on his face churned the anger in my gut.

So this was who he really was: a Collab through and through. A liar. A self-serving bastard.

I’d trusted the wrong guy and it had come back to bite me in the ass. And now I was caught. Half the Elites were down here with me, as well as Dawn and Darren. Sometime in the next twenty-four hours, they would be done scouring the area for cars and gas and they’d come back here, expecting Zeke and I to let them in. And I’d failed.

My hands had been behind my neck when Zeke had cuffed me. I raised them over my head and pulled them down in front of me as Zeke dragged me forward by the arm.

There was a path big enough for a delivery truck cleared right up to the gate. The trash there was sparser, but there was enough of it in the road to make me think the Farm hadn’t had a delivery of any kind in at least a few days.

The pit bull sent half the guys out to patrol the perimeter, looking for the rest of my crew. If my guys were where they were supposed to be, they wouldn’t be anywhere near here—at least not for a couple of hours. But it wouldn’t be long before they started to check in. And then, one by one, they would be caught.

Lily had been right: the entire human rebellion was a house of cards. This one betrayal had brought it all down.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Lily

Once they got in the car, time seemed weirdly disjointed. Lily didn’t pay any attention to Ely’s driving but focused solely on McKenna, who had abandoned the passenger seat and was stretched out in the back. Lily could tell every time a contraction hit. She could see it clearly in the rippling muscles of McKenna’s stomach.

Sure, she had learned about involuntary muscles in biology, but this was just freaky. This baby inside, this thing, it wanted out.

Soon.

They were long past Albuquerque when Lily leaned across the console and whispered to Ely, “We gotta get her out of here.”

He glanced at her and then over his shoulder at McKenna. “Great idea. I’ll just pull a hospital out of my ass.”

“Well, regardless of what you have up your ass, she’s having this baby. Soon. We’ve got to find somewhere that’s not a car to do it.”

Ely seemed to be gritting his teeth, but thankfully he swallowed whatever comment he wanted to make. He kept his gaze straight ahead. She pretended he wasn’t looking at the clock, but he probably was. They were four, maybe five hours from sunset.

“Pulling over now isn’t a great idea.”

“It doesn’t matter. As nice as this Cayenne is, there’s not enough room in the back to deliver a baby. Besides, we can’t drive through the night. Even with what we got from the airport, we don’t have the gas for it. Not to drive straight through the night.”

Because as panic-inducing as looking at the clock was, looking at the gas gauge was that much worse.

“Fine. Where do you want to pull over?”

She scanned the horizon, looking for anything that might be suitable. The next mile marker said the town of Emmet was three miles off. “There,” she pointed to the sign. “They’ll have a Wal-Mart. A grocery store. Something.”

Except Emmet was a one-stop town, without even a stoplight. They passed the cotton gin and the Tractor Supply, but no Wal-Mart.

“You got any other bright ideas?” he asked.

Three minutes after turning on to Main Street, they left town. Lily counted the passing time by McKenna’s contractions.

“I got nothing,” she muttered. Ely was about to turn the car around when she spotted a white shape looming on the horizon. “Wait. What’s that?”

Ely squinted in the direction she was pointing. “The set of a horror movie?” he asked dryly.

“No, it’s a house.”

At my direction Ely slowed the car and turned off into the driveway. A minute later, we stopped, maybe a hundred yards from the house. Okay, so it did have a sort of gothic-creepy vibe. It was a classic American farmhouse. Two stories, wide, wrap-around porches. Waist-high weeds in the yard. No vehicles except for a beat-up old truck, which looked like it hadn’t run even in the Before.

Ely looked at her. “Seriously, you want to stop here? ’Cause there was a Gas-n-Sip back in town. There’s at least a beer cooler.”

“And that would be better?”

“Wouldn’t be worse.”

“Look, it’s two stories. There’s nothing else around it. That means anything comes at us, we’ll see it first.”

“Oh, yay. Because that’s what makes the Ticks so damn hard to kill: my bad vision.”

“Come on, in this case the isolation is a tactical advantage. Plus, there’s a fireplace.”

“What? Did you want to roast marshmallows?”

She gritted her teeth at his comment. “Actually, I was thinking we could at least start a fire and boil water.”

“Boil water?” Ely inched the car farther up the weed-strewn gravel drive.

“That’s what people always do in the movies, right? Maybe they do it to . . . I don’t know, sterilize stuff.”

“Well, this isn’t a movie.” But despite his tone, he pulled to a stop behind the abandoned truck.

The house looked less creepy up close. Clearly, no one had lived here since the Before, but it had been cared for and it had fared pretty well since then. The windows were intact. The door was still on the hinges.

Ely stopped close to the steps and drummed his thumbs on the steering wheel for a few seconds before blowing out a loud breath. “Damn, I wish I still had my dog.”

Lily nodded, unsure what else to say. Because, yeah, in circumstances like this, she could see how a dog could make the difference between life and death.

Finally, Ely reached for the door handle. “Okay, I’ll go check it out.”

“Just don’t red shirt yourself, okay?”

He slanted her a grin. “Don’t worry. I’m still in the game.”

“No, it’s a—” Then she broke off. It probably wasn’t the time to explain the allusion to
Star Trek
. “Just be safe.”

There weren’t enough humans left that anyone was expendable.

“Try to get in without breaking a window. Might as well make it hard for them to smell us in case we need to stay the night.”

He nodded, but said, “Let’s not count on staying the night.”

McKenna’s eyes flickered open. “Where’s he going?”

“He’ll be right back. We found a place for you to have the baby.”

“We’re in Mexico already?” She looked out the window, her brow furrowing even though her gaze was unfocused.

“No, we found a house. Someplace safe.” Lily’s heart fluttered anxiously at the lie, but McKenna didn’t need anything else to worry about.

Lily kept talking, murmuring more lies, making more promises she couldn’t keep. Until Ely rapped the glass with his knuckle to get her attention. She thrust the door open and clambered out. “Did you find a way in?”

He smirked. “Yeah. No broken windows, either. Help McKenna in. All the way up to the second floor, if she can make it. I’m going out to the barn to see if I can find something to barricade the windows.”

Ely had left the front door ajar. The foyer opened to living areas on either side and a massive staircase straight ahead. The house smelled musty from being closed up so long. The furniture was worn and aging, though well preserved. They took it slow, pausing every four or five steps when McKenna was hit with a contraction. By the time they made it all the way up, Lily was as out of breath and as sweaty as McKenna. Lily’s shoulder—which had been feeling pretty good—was aching from supporting her friend’s weight.

Lily guided her into the first bedroom they found. It was pink and frilly with a four-poster bed. She tried not to think about whoever had lived here in the Before, but she sent up a silent hope that wherever they were, they would understand that McKenna needed this bed more than they did. Lily could only guess that this was going to get messy.