The Last Peak (Book 2): The Darwin Collapse (11 page)

"What?" he managed to squeak out.

"You keeping your eyes open. If you ask me, it's a little creepy."

Her words finally filtered through the chemical haze.

He forced a laugh that sounded ten times more ridiculous than it should’ve. "No, sorry. I was just surprised."

"Good surprised or bad surprised?"

He leaned forward a fraction of an inch, closed his eyes, and returned a kiss that communicated a small part of the clawing need in his chest.

After a deep kiss, he pulled away and opened his eyes to see her reaction. Her eyes were still closed and her lips still waiting for his.

He realized at that moment that he wanted to be with Theresa forever. That he was meant to be with her forever. Like two halves of a whole. Two puzzle pieces shaped only for each other. He wanted to devote the rest of his life to taking care of her.

Only, he had responsibilities that required his attention first.

His mother.

Her welfare was always in his thoughts. How could it not?

Theresa opened her eyes and watched him. Her brows lowered and pinched together. "What are you thinking about?"

"Nothing."

"That's not true. Tell me."

Elio leaned back to vertical and turned to stare at the floor.

"Please, I want to know."

"My mother. She’s all alone out there."

Theresa wrapped her arm around him and pulled him into her soft warmth.

"I have to get home to check on her. I'm her only hope."

"I understand."

"I know your dad doesn't want anyone leaving, especially not after what happened tonight. But I don't have a choice. I won't be able to live with myself if it turns out I could've helped but didn't."

"How far is it to your apartment?"

"I don't know. Seven miles maybe."

"How are you going to get there?"

"Steal a car I guess."

"I'll go with you," she said.

"I can't let you do that, Theresa. It's too dangerous."

"You're still healing, Elio. And even at a hundred percent, you're not some badass Rambo type."

"You mean like your dad?"

"Something like that."

"It doesn't matter. I have to do it. You don’t."

"Elio Lopez, this is not a discussion." The words came out hard and unassailable. "You will agree to my helping you or I will walk into my parents’ room right this second and tell my dad what you're planning to do.”

He had no doubt she would do exactly that. The tone of her voice offered no concession.

"Are we agreed?" she asked.

As much as he wanted to say no, two things made him say yes. One, he had to find his mother. And two, he never wanted to be apart from Theresa again.

A figure appeared in the doorway. “You’re not on the injured reserve list anymore, Romeo,” Mason said. “Back to the couch for you. And no middle of the night meetings either because I’ll be watching all night.”

“Dad, we’re not doing anything.”

“Good. I showed up in time then.”

“Dad! You’re embarrassing me!”

“Better that than grounding you, am I right?”

Elio rose still holding Theresa’s hand. He squeezed it. “Yes,” he said as he left the room under Mason’s watchful eye.

He landed on the couch floating on air. It may as well have been a cloud. His lips tingled where hers had touched them. She liked him. She really liked him.

Right?

They kissed. People didn’t kiss if they didn’t like each other. A tiny voice tried to ask him why she would ever like him in a million years.
 

She kissed him. First!

His palm was still warm from her touch. He’d agreed to let her go with him. It was crazy. He was crazy for allowing it. Maybe she’d change her mind. Be too afraid to go back out and potentially run into more of those crazy people. He wouldn’t blame her. For her sake, he hoped it turned out like that.

But whatever she ended up deciding, he knew one thing for certain.

He had to leave tomorrow.

MASON
rolled onto his side and winced at the stabbing ache in his back. He forced an eyelid open and saw dim light slipping in around the edges of the heavy curtain covering the bedroom window. Beth was already up. He didn’t have to look over to verify her absence. If she was still in bed, her warm body would be glued to his backside. He cracked open the other eye and stared at the ceiling. He’d had better mornings. His body complained from a hundred places at once. He pinched his eyes shut and rubbed life into the puffy lids. How long had he been asleep?

Not long enough.

He glanced at the digital clock on the bedside table. It hadn’t had power in days but the habit of checking it yet remained. He checked his watch.
 

Half past six in the morning.
 

He pivoted around and dropped his feet to the floor. Feeling more like rising from the dead than getting out of bed, Mason levered himself up to a standing position.

Clyde broke into a hacking, coughing fit from somewhere in the house. The little Bili chimp sounded almost human. Beth was supposed to have slept last night while Mason took the first, and longest, watch but she was awake fussing over Clyde every time he came in and checked.

Mason slowly rotated each arm, feeling out the various aches to see if any required immediate attention. He did the same with his legs and torso. There was plenty of hurt, but nothing torn or broken.

The faint smell of roasted coffee tickled his nose. His body demanded he either fall back into bed and pass out or go investigate the scent. He lumbered into the kitchen and found Beth seated at the breakfast table holding Clyde in her arms. The cute, little ball of black fur snuggled deeper into her arms. He glanced over at Mason with large, brown eyes, and then broke into a silly, toothless grin.
 

“He likes you,” Beth said.
 

Clyde reached out with tiny, slender fingers and then drew back quickly as another coughing spell hit him.

Beth turned to Mason with a worried look on her face. “Coffee should still be hot.”

A camp stove hooked up to a five gallon propane tank was one of their emergency cooking methods. The other was the solar oven but it didn’t work until the sun climbed high into the sky.

It was an old survival maxim. Two was one and one was none. And the important part of that credo was that the two duplicated capability, not SKU codes, meaning they had two different methods to achieve the same result.

He poured himself a steaming cup and took a slow, deep breath. The aroma alone reminded him the world wasn’t a complete disaster. He took a sip and liquid heat poured into his belly. Yes, maybe today wouldn’t be such a terrible day after all. “Did you sleep?”

Beth twisted her mouth up. “Not really.”

“How’s the little guy?”

“Worse.” Her bottom lip trembled and she turned back to her week-old patient. She was a fierce mama bear. And, being the Chief Veterinarian at the LA Zoo, she was that way with every animal in her care. Mason wondered at the seemingly endless wellspring of love in her heart. She always had more to give. More care. More compassion. More space to love.

He wasn’t the typical fifties father—the type that bottled up his feelings and then keeled over a week after a retirement party that earned him a gold-plated Timex. His emotional intelligence was more modern than that. Heck, he’d even read a book on how to raise a happy toddler way back to give him insight for Theresa.

That said, he wasn’t on the same level as his wife.

“Mason, he needs antibiotics. The respiratory infection has progressed. His lungs are bubbling with fluid.”

“We checked three different places and there was next to nothing. Totally cleaned out. Actually, we found something at Fernando’s. Let me get it.”

Mason retrieved the brown prescription bottle from his backpack and read the label. “Sildenafil citrate. That something that might help?”

Beth laughed. It was short and tight, and contained only shadows of the usual mirth. “To help you maintain an erection? Yes. To clear up an acute respiratory infection? No.”

“It’s Viagra?”

Iridia stumbled into the kitchen looking like this might’ve been the earliest she’d ever risen in her entire life. “Viagra? My old boyfriend took stuff to get bigger muscles but it did a number on his Johnson. Total wet noodle. He got on Viagra and whoa! Let me tell you.”

She raised her arm straight into the air. “I’m talking Man of Steel. Hours and hours of pleasure. A real human dildo.”

Beth’s jaw dropped open.

“Good to know,” Mason said. “Thanks for the personal history.”

Iridia looked between him and Beth. She frowned. “Oh no! Are you two having a problem with Little Willy?”

Mason nearly blushed. “His name is not
Little Willy
.”

“Little Jimmy?”

“He’s not little! Why Little? He’s not little.”

“I saw you naked.”

“What?” Beth said.

“After finding the neighbors.” She trailed off and a distant look crept across her face.

“Oh, right,” Beth said.

“You can’t count that,” Mason said. “That water was freezing cold!”

Iridia seemed to accept the excuse.

Not that it was an excuse. It was a reason. A biologically proven one. Why did he have to explain it?

“So what’s the problem down there?” Iridia asked.

“There’s no problem down there!” Mason replied.
 

“Oh, why are you taking Viagra then?”

Mason flung the bottle to the kitchen counter like it was a venomous snake. “I’m not taking Viagra. And can we please stop talking—“

“I’m not the one that brought it up,” Iridia said.

Clyde broke into a desperate coughing spell and the topic thankfully died. Beth wiped the snot and saliva dripping from his nose and mouth. She turned back to Mason when the spell subsided. “We have to get antibiotics today.
Today
.”

“I understand. But how? I don’t think we’re going to find a pharmacy that isn’t cleaned out.”

A muscle in Beth’s jaw rippled. “I have an idea, but you’re not going to like it.”

That wasn’t the most reassuring way to pitch an idea. Mason didn’t know whether to stop listening now or wait for her to actually say it and then stop listening.

“What?” he asked.

“The zoo,” Beth replied.

“The Los Angeles Zoo?”

“No, the San Diego Zoo. Of course, the Los Angeles Zoo.”

Iridia poured herself a cup of coffee. “I love the San Diego Zoo. We did a shoot there once. Have you ever had a fourteen foot snake wrapped around your shoulders?”

Mason and Beth ignored her hoping she might take the hint and enjoy her morning joe somewhere else.

She wasn’t good with hints.

“No? Well, it’s scary as shit. My nipples were rock hard the entire time!” She took a sip of coffee and stared off into a past that only she cared anything about.

“Why the zoo?” Mason asked.

Iridia’s brows knotted together in confusion. “Well, where else are you going to find a gigantic snake?”

Mason squeezed his eyes shut. “I’m talking to Beth.”

“My lab,” Beth said. “The medical wing is behind locked metal doors that only a few people have the keys for. And the medicine itself is locked in a security cabinet that only I have the key for. It’s the one place that’s guaranteed to still be stocked.”

From the sound of it, she was probably right. There probably were antibiotics right where she said they’d be.

“Absolutely not,” Mason said.

“Don’t ‘absolutely not’ me,” Beth said.

“It’s too far. Too dangerous. No.”

Beth raised an eyebrow at him. She wasn’t the type that surrendered a position by force. It just made her dig in harder, even if she wouldn’t have otherwise cared. He loved that about her, but it was also exasperating at times.

Mason held up a hand for parley. “Look, think about what you’re saying. Theresa and I went less than two miles last night and ran into serious trouble. You’re talking going all the way over to the east side. That’s twenty miles!”

“Twenty-five miles. I rode it every day, each way.”

“That’s insane.”

Iridia waved her hand in the air as she parted the space between them and headed for the dining room. “Your vibes are killing my morning cup. And it’s bad enough already.” She swept out of the room with vague annoyance, like royalty leaving behind squabbling commoners.

“Listen to me, Mason.” Beth’s tone softened. “I know it’s dangerous. I know. But Clyde is going to die without antibiotics.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “I can’t let that happen. I promised Jane I’d protect him. Keep him safe.”

Mason didn’t want him to die either. And he knew how much Jane, Clyde’s mother, had meant to both Beth and Theresa. But knowing that didn’t equate to him agreeing with her ridiculous plan. Before he could reply, she continued.

“And it’s not just about Clyde. It’s about our family too. All of us. Elio will take the last of his round today. That’s it. What happens the next time one of us gets an infected cut or scrape?”

Mason didn’t know how to respond.

“We’ve done our best, but general hygiene is slipping. And that’s saying nothing about the contaminants in the outside world. Sooner or later, and probably sooner, one of us is going to need them too.”

Mason remembered the conditions he’d endured in Fallujah. Where the environment was so filled with poison that every single nick got infected in no time. The only reason any of them didn’t instantly succumb was because they each took a massive daily dose of antibiotics as a matter of course. Even with the chemical assistance, some sores took weeks to heal.

“I’ll go,” he said.

“You can’t go,” she said. “I’m not being a martyr here. You’re beat up. You limped in here this morning.”

“I did?”

“Yes. Your calf is still healing. And after last night, you’ve got new bruises on top of old bruises.”

She wasn’t wrong about that.

“I can still do it,” he said.

“I have no doubt you could, but you already have an urgent job to do.”