The McClane Apocalypse Book Five (51 page)

“Should I unpack the food now?” Paige asks
with uncertainty. She’s never been on a run with him or even her
brother. She has no idea what to expect or how they operate.

“Sure,” he answers
with
an easy
manner.

Paige watches as he ignites the dry wood with
a bit of fabric and paper and his Zippo lighter. It doesn’t take
long before the wood is crackling softly, and the room is
illuminated with a soft orange glow. She steps closer and rubs her
hands together.

“I’ll go get another load of wood so we make
it through the night. But don’t worry, I’ll be back in a few
minutes. See if you can get the food set on the fire to warm up
while I’m gone.”

She doesn’t even get
in
an answer because he’s right back out the
door.

“Ok, sure,” she says, being sarcastic. “No
problem. I’ll get right on that, dear.”

She unpacks the jars and packages of
food and places them on the stone hearth. Paige pushes the canning
jars of food closer to the open fire, not sure what else she can do
to warm them. She stands and looks around the room now that she can
see better. The bedroom is
relatively
large in size, but everything is covered in dust. This is
just like all the times she and her friends stayed in abandoned
homes over the years. This one is just a bit fancier. If this were
another time and the circumstances different, she would’ve loved
going through the mansion during the day for its architectural
significance. Now she’s just happy to have its ancient slate roof
over her head for the night.

The idea of sleeping on the bed is infinitely
more appealing to sleeping on the hardwood floor. Unfortunately,
their sleeping bags are in the Suburban with Simon and Sam. She
crosses the room and removes the pillow cases from the pillows.
Then she goes to an adjacent bedroom. There are four on this floor
including the one they are going to be staying in. They all
connect, as did most old homes from this time period. Paige takes
the linens and a yellowing quilt from the mahogany wardrobe there.
She gives them a hard shake, leaving the dust in that room. She
brings them back to the room where they’ll sleep and switches the
dusty bedding out with the cleaner articles. It’s not perfect. They
aren’t freshly laundered, but at least they aren’t coated with
years of dust and dander that could make her sick with a sinus
infection, which has happened in the past while on the road with
her friends. She finds another room with bedding and does the same
for Cory, bringing it back to their room. It’s the least she can do
freshening up some blankets for him.

He returns a few minutes later with another
load of firewood. She has no idea where he’s getting it. She also
isn’t going to question his source since the room has already
starting warming.

“Aren’t you worried that someone will see the
smoke from the fireplace?” Paige asks him.

“No, are you?” he asks with a grin.

“Well, yeah. Of course I’m worried. People
could see the smoke and the light in here and come after us.”

Cory smirks and says, “I’m gonna hang some
blankets on the windows in this room to block the light. But with
this storm, I don’t think anyone’s coming out tonight. Besides, if
they do come sniffin’ around, I’ll take care of them. You can be
sure of that.”

Paige’s eyes widen, but she nods just the
same. She’s quite sure he’ll handle anyone that comes to this
mansion tonight. The thought makes her inwardly cringe.

“I believe you,” she says and lowers her
gaze.

He leaves again and returns with three
quilts, which he arranges over the curtain rods after he has also
drawn the dusty velvet draperies.

“I put the food on like you asked.”

He crosses the room and locks the door.

“Great,” Cory responds. “I’m going to
change.”

“Here? In here?” Paige asks quickly.

He unzips his jacket and tosses it to the
floor. “Unless you don’t want me to.”

“Uh… no, what do you think I am, a prude or
something? You get undressed at the cabin in front of me all the
time. What’s the difference?” Paige questions uncomfortably, trying
desperately to seem casually nonchalant like him.

“That’s kind of what I was thinking, too,” he
agrees but gives her a strange look.

He just continues removing clothing and
dropping it. Paige turns her back and decides to set up their
dinner instead of standing there gawking at him. She clears off a
delicate side table with a gray marble top and carved legs, moves
one of the candles to it, and starts placing the food from their
packs there. She also uses a crocheted doily to remove the hot jars
from the fireplace and sets them on the small table. The two
rickety, feminine chairs upholstered in tufted red velvet near the
window she carries over to the table. She notices in her peripheral
vision that Cory has changed into dry jeans with many tatters and
rips in them, no socks and no shirt. His jeans slip slightly down
over one hip, exposing his bare buttock. And apparently, no boxers,
either. Isn’t he freezing? She still is.

“Oh my goodness,” she exclaims when he turns
around to face her. “You’re bleeding!”

Cory just looks down at his stomach as
if it’s no big deal and shrugs. “It’ll be
fine
till we get back to the farm.”

“Are you crazy? We need to at least clean it,
Cory! It could get infected,” she cries softly and approaches him.
He backs up a step.

“I don’t need your mothering,” he comments
snidely and places his hand over his wound.

“Don’t be a baby,” Paige scolds. “Let me take
a look at it.”

She grabs his hand and, after a couple hard
tugs, leads him over to the table. Paige sits and has him stand in
front of her, which gives her a better close-up view of his cut.
She reaches down and takes a rag out of her pack along with her
bottled water.

“This isn’t necessary,” he says tightly.

She ignores his complaining and
pries
gently at the duct tape he’d
slapped over the pad earlier. She tries to peel it a tiny bit at a
time. This has to hurt.

“Let me,” Cory says and just rips the whole
strip off.

“Ouch!” she says for him. When she glances up
at him, he’s smirking as if he finds her funny. “All right, I’m
gonna clean it now. Then we’ll cover it again.”

“It doesn’t need to be covered. I’ll just let
it dry and scab up in the air.”

Paige grimaces as she
blots
the wound with her rag. It doesn’t
seem as bad as she’d first thought. The blood on the padding
must’ve been from earlier. It’s not bleeding now, but it is about
five inches long. Lucky for him, it’s shallow and hasn’t gone deep
enough to damage anything. It seems superficial and likely won’t
need stitches. She still wishes she had some kind of disinfectant
or
antibacterial
cream.

“Are you almost done?
I
’m kind of hungry
here,” he
states.

Paige glares up at him, letting Cory know of
her irritation. He just smirks again.

“I had to haul some
bony-
assed
girl out of a hole
today. I need food, woman,” he orders, takes her hands in his and
presses her gently away from him.

“See?” he asks. “Good as new.”

“What’s that one from?” she asks and touches
a scar on his side, trying not to notice the rippling of his
chiseled stomach or the way his muscles jump when she presses her
cold fingers to him.

“Nothing. And don’t bring it up in front of
the family, either. Nobody but you has noticed it.”

“If you don’t want me to
tattle
, then you’d better fess up,”
Paige says with more courage than she feels as she sits dwarfed
under his huge shadow. She decides standing would be
better.

“Blackmail, beanpole?” he asks with a cocky
grin once she’s standing in front of him.

“I’m not above it, no,” she admits. “I grew
up with a younger brother, might I remind you.”

Cory reaches toward her, which causes her to
flinch. His fingers sift into the hair at her temple. He pulls a
small twig the size of a match from her long strands and flicks it
away.

“Same sort of situation we got ourselves into
today.”

Paige’s mouth parts with surprise.

“Only it was three dudes that time. I didn’t
get as lucky, but I was able to… work it out.”

“What do you mean?” she asks.

Cory smirks and says, “We came to a mutual
understanding.”

She frowns, her shoulders drop at his
sarcasm, and she says, “You mean you killed them, don’t you?”

Cory’s eyebrows rise and he says with
confidence, “Maybe.”

Paige shakes her head
in
disbelief and says, “But how did you
treat it? Did you give yourself stitches or duct tape it or
something?”

His dark eyes regard her warily. She cocks
her head slightly to the side waiting for him to respond. His gaze
slips from her face to her chest and then slowly back up. She’s not
sure if he’s doing it on purpose to put her off or if he is
actually checking her out.

“Something,” he answers noncommittally and
says, “Let’s eat. You can’t afford to miss a meal, and I tend to
get a little grouchy if I do.”

She smiles openly at his humor, which seems
to catch him off guard. He grins in return.

Cory joins her at the table and sits in one
of the antique chairs. Paige is concerned that it’s not going to
hold his weight. It actually squeaks just like all the floors in
this home. The chance of someone being able to sneak up on them is
pretty slim.

She shivers after her first bite of the hot
food, “Good grief, I miss Arizona. The weather on this side of the
country sucks.”

“Yeah, it doesn’t bother me. I’m used to it,”
Cory tells her as he hands her a package of sliced bread.

“I’ve been on the east coast for a few years
now, but I didn’t sign on for all this. I went to Georgia Tech. At
least it was warm down there. Not as nice as Arizona, mind you, but
warm, very humid.”

“Your dad was the governor or something,
right?” Cory asks.

“No, he was a senator. But he wasn’t always
in government. He started out as a lawyer, then he was the public
prosecutor for our county. Then it just built from there.”

“Sounds like he was pretty smart,” Cory
remarks.

Paige tries not to stare at his bare
chest. There seems to be a lot of dark hair in the center. He’s
still holding onto his tan from summer so his torso is a dark
bronze since he never wears a shirt back
at
the farm when he’s working outdoors. She peeks
at his wound again. At least it isn’t bleeding. That’s a relief,
but she wants Simon to look at it tomorrow since he brought his
medical bag.

“Yes, he was smart. You would’ve liked
him. When he was still just a lawyer, he liked putting away
bad-guys
.”

“I like putting down
bad-guys
, too,” Cory says with a grin.

Paige laughs, almost chokes on her
food, and corrects him, “I didn’t say putting them down like
killing them. That’s what you do. He put them away as
in put
them away in prison when he was a
prosecutor.”

“He sounds
cool
. I’m sure I would’ve like him. Locking them
up, putting them down like rabid dogs. Same thing. Gets them off
the streets. Doesn’t really matter how it gets done anymore,” Cory
says with all seriousness as he tears a chunk of bread off of his
small loaf.

Paige thinks about his comment for a moment
before saying, “Yeah, I guess you’re right. They just free roam
around hurting and robbing people with no consequence now. There
isn’t a police force left, so the scum just do whatever they
want.”

“Not all of them get away with it, though,”
Cory reminds her.

“Not when you’re in town,” Paige comments. A
lopsided grin spreads on his face, his big dimple peeking out of
his stubble.

Cory lets go a chuckle and shakes his head,
“No, not when I’m in town.”

His damp hair hangs almost to his
shoulders and
drips
tiny water
droplets down his chest. He doesn’t seem to notice. He hasn’t been
shaving lately, and his face is starting to become covered with a
shadowy, short beard again.

Paige searches for the right words to express
herself, but the simplest route seems to make the most sense,
“Thanks for saving my life today. If you hadn’t been there, I
would’ve fallen. There’s no way I was going to pull myself up. I
have almost no discernable upper body strength.”

Paige flexes, showing her wimpy bicep muscle.
Cory reaches across the table and pinches it between two
fingers.

“That is a sad little thing,” he admits with
a nod.

She just grins and shrugs. “I know.”

“You don’t have to thank me, but you’re
welcome,” Cory says, making direct eye contact with her. “And you
aren’t supposed to have upper body strength to do things like that.
You shouldn’t have to. That’s my job, taking care of you, I mean. I
shouldn’t have let that happen in the first place. That was a
stupid mistake on my part.”

Paige shakes her head and says, “No, there’s
no way you could’ve known. That guy set a trap, a sneaky one, and I
fell into it- literally.”

Cory manages a grin but she can tell that it
still bothers him that it all happened on his watch.

“Simon will be glad that I’m returning you in
one piece. I don’t think I’d want to piss off the sniper in the
family,” Cory jokes.