Dead South Rising (Book 2): Death Row (33 page)

“My guns?”

“Outside.”
 

The outlaw wannabe finished shrugging into his duster, then placed his hat gingerly on his head. After pulling in a sharp breath through clenched teeth, he said, “I dare say that young lady did quite the number on my noggin.” He pressed his fingers against the gauze glued to his head, winced, then pulled them away, expecting to see blood. Dried crimson stained the white bandage, but did not come off on his skin. Glancing at his hand, he shrugged. “Tylenol?”

Teeth grinding, David returned to the nurses’ station, pilfered the pain reliever, then tossed the bottle to Doc.

Doc immediately tossed it back, the noise like a baby rattle. “Open it.”

“It’s not childproof.”

Doc arched his brow, the pistol’s barrel rising slightly.

David popped the cap with little effort, then held the bottle to his captor.

His upturned palm to David, he said, “Four.”

David raised his brow this time.

“I have a headache.”

You
are
a headache. And a pain in my ass.
 

Again, David obliged. Doc swallowed them with no water, then cast curious glances down the hallway. “Back door?”

David motioned with his head toward the east wing. No point in lying, no matter how practiced he was at it.

“After you,” Doc prompted.

They proceeded down the hall, and an eerie, desperate feeling shivered through David. One he’d never experienced before. One he was sure others had encountered, but never lived to share.

I’m fucking walking death row right now. Deadman walking, here. I can estimate how many breaths I have left. How many heartbeats. How many blinks. How many steps. Maybe even how many tears.

A new hopelessness filled him, weighed him down. His cinderblock feet were having a hell of a time dragging his anchor of an ass. He felt like he was freezing up, suddenly unsure how to walk, how to put one foot in front of the other. How to balance, stay upright.
 

A steaming pot boiled in his gut, the sick surging, the fumes tickling his throat. Preparing it for the inevitable. He didn’t want to retch. Didn’t want to go out like that. He wasn’t sure he had enough inside him to throw up, anyway.

Within seconds, they’d traversed the south wing, and were turning left onto the east wing. Maybe thirty feet to go. They’d already passed the Janitor’s quarters, as well as Taneesha’s, where Bryan was sleeping. So caught up in feeling sorry for himself, he hadn’t even realized it. Ahead, the double doors to the warehouse. These, he noticed immediately.

“How much farther?” Doc’s whispers seemed to rattle the walls.
 

David could barely lift his arm to point. When he slowed, Doc prodded him with the pistol’s barrel.

The doors floated in front of him, then rushed him like football defensive ends. David flinched.

Standing before the double doors, Doc said, “They locked?”

The doors weren’t, but David’s lungs were. Swiveling his head back and forth, he mouthed,
no.

“Proceed.”

His eyes fluttered, mimicking his heart that now played a drumroll on his ears. He suddenly wanted to turn, to run back to Jess and Randy. Promise them he’d do better, be better. Tell them he was sorry for failing them. He didn’t even want to think about Bryan, how they’d tell him.

The metal handle was numb in David’s clumsy grip. On silent hinges, the heavy door swung partly open. He pressed awkwardly through, the edge catching his shoulder before closing on him like a giant lazy sideways mousetrap. Pain streaked through his torso and arm, fizzling in his fingertips. The pressure disappeared as Doc pulled the handle, freeing him.

“Move.”

David did as he was told, rubbing his shoulder as they stepped into the warehouse. The anemic lights high above barely lit the large space, boxes and supplies mere silhouettes surrounding the two men. It would take a moment for his eyes to adjust. He licked his lips, the taste of decay stronger. Their footsteps echoed, got louder as they neared the dock door.

Anticipating the command, David reached for the crash bar, holding his breath in anticipation of the olfactory assault.

“Stop,” Doc said. His voice sounded small inside the huge space.

David didn’t turn to face him, stayed nose-to-nose with the door, his breath bouncing back at him. He half expected Doc to clock him with the pistol, and drag him the rest of the way. But that would mean more work, something that Doc was surely averse to.

“Smoke?”

David furrowed his brow, the curious offer compelling him to turn around, after all. Despite standing right in front of him, Doc was just another shadow among shadows. Especially with the wide-brimmed hat denying his face the light.

He watched the gunslinger tug a pack of cigarettes from inside his coat. Maybe smoking would provide some relief, a mask, something to taste and smell other than the awful stink and decay clawing at the door. Perhaps it’d be wise to partake.

He nodded.

Doc shook the pack until a filter popped through the foil, then held it to his prisoner.
 

David eyed him warily, suspecting a trick, was surprised when none came. It didn’t matter, though. Doc was going to do what Doc was going to do, whether he did it then or later.
 

After tucking tobacco into his own lips, Doc flicked his thumbnail against a match head, lit their cigarettes.

The hit on David’s lungs was amazing, and he understood now why a simple cigarette was often a walking dead man’s last request. It loosened his lungs and calmed his stomach. Forced him to slow down, to relax. Well, relax in a relative sense, given his current predicament. And as he anticipated, it was effectively killing the acrid air.

“It’s funny,” Doc said, gazing at the coiling smoke. “Can’t even quit when the world’s ending.”

David said nothing. Had no idea this was one of the last lines Doc had spoken to Mitch, just before shooting him in the face. David wasn’t in the mood for small talk, had no words for the murderous, psycho bastard. None that wouldn’t expedite his execution.

If you can’t say anything nice…

Besides, he was busy savoring the temporary reprieve from his death march. But Doc would not allow him to enjoy it for long.

“Gasoline?” Doc asked.

David wondered which vehicle Doc planned on absconding with, or if his own was nearby. He wasn’t looking forward to lugging a gas can if the latter was the case.

“Outside, on the dock.” David wasn’t one-hundred percent sure, but he recalled seeing the red cans on the loading dock, near the door.

“Be a daisy and grab one.”

David hadn’t even smoked half his cigarette yet, but he didn’t want to chance a fire or explosion. Dropping it to the floor, he snuffed it out with his boot.

Doc clucked his tongue. “Waste not, want not,” he said, taking another drag off of his own. The cherry glowed bright red, lighting his face beneath the brim of his hat. With his wispy, handle-bar mustache and pointy soul-patch, David swore he was staring straight at the devil himself, right there in downtown Hell.

The vision disconcerted David so much, he stammered through his question. “Which… vehicle…? The Dodge is… is diesel…”

“It’s not for the Dodge.”

David paused, then said, “Then… for which vehicle?”

Doc sucked in more flame, his face again alight in the fiery glow. “None.”

“None,” David repeated. “Then…”

Despite the warm glow lighting Doc’s face, David saw the ice in his eyes. And he immediately understood what Doc intended to do.

A fighting chance. I won’t kill them directly. Because the fire and smoke will…

“Oh god…” David whispered.

Doc’s sinister smile spread as he tapped ash to the floor.
 

No begging. No pleading. That’s what David vowed. He’d die like a man, with as much honor as he could muster. But didn’t real honor lie in saving others?

“Look… please… don’t do this.”

“Are you reneging on our agreement? Shall I stroll back in there and shove the barrel of
your
weapon into their mouths and feed them the bullets? Or perhaps line them up and run them down, as you did to my wife?”

The tremble practically took David’s legs. “You said they’d have a fighting chance. They’re locked in there. There’s… there’s no fighting chance in that…”

Doc stole another drag off his cigarette, relishing the hit on his lungs, and the hit on David’s heart. He exhaled deeply, blowing the heated cloud in David’s face. “Says the wife killer.”

“Please, just—it’s me you want, and you got me, so just—”

“The terms are not open for discussion, Mr. Morris. Now… the gasoline. I will not ask again.”

David now wished he’d not extinguished his cigarette on the floor so he could mash it into Doc’s eye instead.

Spilled milk and all that.

His mind and emotions raced. He tried to recall the layout, who resided in the interior rooms, who resided in the exterior ones. Doc had locked Jess and Randy in the infirmary, an outer room with a window, albeit a smaller one. Jess could squeeze through rather easily. Randy, on the other hand…

David swayed on his feet, hesitating.

“Mr. Morris, you continue to try my patience…”

A thought occurred to David as he started to press through the door to the dock. He could pull the fire alarm. Just reach right out and yank the damn thing. Chances were very good—guaranteed, in fact—that Doc would shoot him, but at least the others would have that fighting chance.
 

Unless of course, the alarm wasn’t yet operational. Gabriel had alluded to as much during David’s initial tour of the Alamo. Something about labor disagreements, contract disputes, or the like.

Already halfway out the door, he had to make a split-second decision.

What do I do? What do I do? What do I—

His fingers hooked the red pull-lever, and jerked.

Fuck.

May as well have just yelled
fire.
The only racket the goddamned thing made came from the wimpy click of the plastic handle dislodging.

Instantly, between his shoulder blades, a fresh flame of pain flared, Doc having brought the butt of David’s own handgun down directly on his spine. The blow was so fierce, it lodged in his throat, as if something caught there, and he crashed to his hands and knees.

“Oh, David. David, David, David,” Doc said, stepping onto the loading dock. “What
am
I going to do with you? Oh, I know. I’m going to kill you.”

David rubbed at his back and neck, coughed.

“Now, grab that gas can, and go back inside. Another foolish stunt, and I will personally go to every room and execute every person while you watch.”

David glared at him.

A fighting chance. They deserve a fighting chance, no matter how slim.

“This
is
a timed event, David. And said time is
not
on your side.”

He elected to obey, reasoned that torching Alamo Assisted Living and Retirement did, indeed, provide residents more of a fighting chance than a psychotic Doc striding through the halls, blasting bullets through their skulls.

* * *

Inside, Doc leaned casually against the warehouse wall beside the dock door, Camel drooping on his lips, pistol aimed from the hip at David. “You know what to do.”

David’s back was to him, the gasoline can in his hands. An acidic pain coursed through his back where Doc had struck him with the handgun. He was desperately trying to convince himself it was over, that Doc had won.
 

Resistance is futile.

Perhaps the guilt of this wicked deed would be short-lived, since Doc intended to kill him. Or maybe he’d keel over of a heart attack from the emotional strain of it all. Either way, David Morris laid out a welcome mat for death.

Doc snapped back the handgun’s hammer, his impatience and annoyance clear. David abandoned his musing and went to work, dousing boxes in gasoline.

“Drench them nice and good.”

As luck would have it, the gas can was almost completely full with plenty of fluid to go around. The overpowering fumes quickly conquered the fetor of decay that had let itself in.
 

The strong, distinctive redolence reminded David of his daughter’s first driving lesson. She was fifteen, and had bugged him for weeks to take her. Driver’s education was just around the corner, and she wanted to be ready. More than ready. She intended to go in like a pro, pass with flying colors. And of course there was that small matter of a new car if she got all ‘A’s.

Her first lesson that afternoon: how to fill the car with gas. She’d done it numerous times before, so it should have been a no-brainer. A gimmee. She did everything right, but the pump lever was faulty, and failed to shut off automatically. When gas started overflowing out of the tank, she yanked out the hose, and ended up spraying herself and David and everything within a ten-foot radius. They smelled like gasoline for days. As did the car. And the house.
 

“Over there,” Doc ordered, pointing. “Give the walls a good dousing, too. And the hallway doors.”

Fucking Doc. Was leaving nothing to chance.

Within just a couple of minutes, the can was empty, and the warehouse reeked.

“Care to do the honors?” Doc asked.

David launched a glare that could have ignited the place.

“I thought not.” Doc’s Camel was smoked almost to the filter. Had maybe one last good puff left in it. Plucking it from his mouth, he flicked it into a large stack of boxes. Almost immediately, the stack flared like a struck match. “I’d make for the door if I were you.”

David considered for a moment just standing there, letting the flames consume him. Or saving them the trouble and jumping right in. Why not? He was going to die, anyway. And with his track record, he was surely headed someplace hot. Why delay the inevitable?

The blaze was spreading in a hurry, the heat becoming uncomfortable. David glanced at the ceiling, spying the silver sprinklers hanging at attention. But they were on strike, and released no water.