Hunter Of The Dead (2 page)

“Alejandro?”

Damn it, was she really so transparent? Eden shrugged, trying to look nonchalant. “Like I said, nothing you can help me with. Guys and all that.” Of course her sister wouldn’t pick up on the other half of Eden’s issues. Even if she had, they didn’t talk about Dad. Ever.

A ghost of a smile appeared on Jordan’s face. “Even so. You can tell me about it.”

Yeah right. Eden could just imagine the conversation.
Oh, hey, Jordan. You know how you thought Alejandro was such a good team member? Well, in between killing infected, he made me fall for him. Then I propositioned him, we had hot monkey sex, and then he took off without saying goodbye
. She’d never get her sister’s respect back after sharing that little tidbit. As far as Jordan was concerned, Eden was a blushing virgin, and she sure as hell wouldn’t be the one to disillusion her. As pissed as she was at Alejandro, she didn’t want him dead. And he would be if Jordan found out what they’d done. “Maybe some other time.” Like never.

For a long moment, Eden thought her sister would pursue it, but she just sighed. “Okay. But you know you can talk to me, right?”

“Sure.” But not about this and not about Dad. Jordan might be the only family she had left, but there were some boundaries even she couldn’t cross. Eden forced a smile. “Thanks.”

“Yeah.” Jordan grabbed her hand, giving it a quick squeeze. “Try to get some sleep tonight, okay?”

Eden nodded and watched her sister go back into the bar. It was six hours until sunrise, but she couldn’t sleep now. Instead she walked to the edge of the town and began doing patrols. One of the Aoki twins would find her when they were finished, and then she’d let herself sleep. But not before, not with her memories riding her so hard tonight.

Chapter Two

Eden pulled her
bolo
from its sheath and went through a series of moves as she made her way around the perimeter. Obsessing over Alejandro wasn’t a good sign. She’d hoped she was over him, had got to the point where she only thought about him once a week—if that. Now it was three times in a single evening...and she was still thinking about him.

She ducked imaginary infected and brought her
bolo
up, twisting around and stabbing at the shadows behind her. Sitting on top of that hill all day hadn’t done anything for her restlessness. But Jordan wouldn’t let her be down in the thick of things. On a rational level, Eden recognized that her sister was right; she was much more useful to their team as a sniper than just another man on the lines. Hell, she probably wouldn’t be doing even this much now if Dad was still alive. No, she’d be stuck on the sidelines until it was time for clean-up. Knowing this didn’t stifle the surge of resentment. It wasn’t only her sniping skills that kept her out of the ground team; Jordan was babying her. Her big sister didn’t believe she could handle herself on the ground, didn’t have faith in Eden’s non-shooting skills. She was as overprotective as Dad in her own way, not that Eden would ever tell her so.

Frustrated all over again, she sheathed her
bolo
and started to run. The village wasn’t huge but it was large enough that she was breathing hard by her second lap. By her fifth, her steps began to drag and she slowed drastically. Eden finally stopped on her seventh, bending over and panting. She was sweaty and exhausted, but at least now her mind was clear. After the cramp in her left side unfurled itself, she stood and began walking slowly toward their rooms. She might actually sleep for a few hours before they headed out.

Back to civilization. Damn it. She loved being out here where there were no rules beyond survival of the fittest, where it seemed like she might turn around and see Dad, have him correct her shooting stance or give one of his many sayings, like,
Your team is everything. If you can’t trust them, you might as well lie down and die now because you won’t survive
. In the jungles—or mountains, or deserts, or wherever their assignments took them—she didn’t have to worry about school or the mundane crap plaguing most teenagers.

Jordan wanted her to go to college. Dad would never have tried to force that on her. Eden shook her head as she slipped into her room and undressed without turning on the light. What was she supposed to learn in college? It wasn’t only that, though. She knew what kind of monsters stalked the world, knew they weren’t just things in horror movies, knew the truth. There was no way she could surround herself with normal people, living their lives in ignorance of the dangers that stalked the less-populated areas of the world.

Jordan wanted her out of this business, wanted her to have a normal—safe—life. The kind of life Jordan herself wanted: to settle down with a nice man and have a family. As if Eden would ever be happy teaching kindergarteners the alphabet or working nine to five in an office. No, this was her life and she loved it.

She lay down and stared up into the darkness, letting the still air cool the sweat on her skin. The worst part was she couldn’t even be pissed at her sister for trying to push her into a normal life. Jordan only wanted the best for her, only wanted her to be safe. But Eden gave up safe at five years old, when their mother was infected, died and then tried to eat her.

She must have fallen asleep at some point because the next thing she knew, she was shaken roughly awake.

“Come on, Eden, get up. And put some goddamn clothes on.”

Eden opened her eyes, instantly awake. “What’s going on?”

Jordan flew around the room, a virtual whirlwind of effectiveness. She had her own bag packed before Eden found underwear. “We got a call.”

Eden froze, her panties around her thighs. “Another one?” She blurred into motion, yanking on the first clothes she found—a pair of jeans and a white tank top. Getting calls so close to one another was unheard of. Sheer joy enveloped her, adding a bounce to her movements. They weren’t going back to the States yet. It was a damn good day, even if it signified the world was going to hell in a hand basket.

“Yeah. This one’s fresh, barely two days since the first infection. If we get there fast enough, we can stop it before it spreads.”

“Where?” Eden sat on the bed and pulled on her boots.

“Peru. We’re flying into Iquitos and driving the rest of the way.”

More rainforest. Fantastic. It was the hardest terrain for Eden because it was nearly impossible to shoot over long distances since she couldn’t
see
long distances. Still, it was an assignment and she sure as hell wasn’t going to complain.

“Are Kaede and Taro back yet?” She yanked her hair into a ponytail and started stuffing her clothes into her bag. How had she managed to make such a mess when they’d only been here forty-eight hours?

“They got back an hour ago. Oz is already packed and getting the Humvee ready. Hurry up.” The last words were tossed over her shoulder as Jordan flew out of the room.

Eden went back to her frantic packing. No matter what her sister thought, the chances of them getting there in time were slim. The infection spread too fast once the first person died, especially when the people were unprepared. And they always were. Because, really, who expected their dead loved ones to come to life and go for your throat? Plus, the average person didn’t know how to kill the infected. Even if they were prepared to fight, they normally went for body shots because that slowed down a human. Not so with the infected. The only way to kill them was to cut off their head or destroy their brain. She had a name for normal people when the infection hit: meat.

But she didn’t say anything as she threw her bag over her shoulder and grabbed Bernice’s case. Jordan would think the best because that was what Jordan did. Eden refused to dim her sister’s optimism, even if it was unrealistic. Their father used to ridicule her for it, but it was part of what made Jordan the great leader she was, part of what made everyone so damn loyal to her.

She threw her bag in the back of the Humvee, followed—carefully—by Bernice, and climbed into the back seat. Taro was already there, looking just as delicious and untouchable as always. It was such a shame he was gay. She still couldn’t believe his family reacted the way they had, banishing him and cutting out his tongue so he couldn’t tell their secrets. Eden hadn’t even known people still got banished, let alone having secrets worth maiming for. Thank God Kaede got there before they started on his hands.

She offered him a half smile. He’d been on the team long enough that he could convey whole sentences in a single look. This one merely said he wasn’t in the mood for chatter. Figured. Kaede appeared as if out of thin air and pushed Eden into the middle. Even this close, the Japanese man felt a million miles away. But that was Taro. He didn’t let anyone but Kaede in.

“Oz, drive,” Jordan said from the front seat.

They drove.

The less said about the trip, the better. It was a rough, sweaty ride—not the good kind—followed by a too-long flight in a cramped plane. As usual, they had no problems getting in and out of airport security, a fact that always made Eden wonder exactly who their mysterious employer was. No one knew the identity of the company who made the calls, not even Jordan, and they were each paid small fortunes to do the assignments with no questions asked. From what Eden understood, it had been this way for twenty years, ever since Dad got out of the Rangers and started going on assignments, towing his family along behind him.

It was always the same: Jordan got a call, contacted the team wherever they were scattered, and they went. There was always a Humvee waiting outside the airport with a map and directions to the infection sight. It was packed with all sorts of goodies—tracking devices, earpiece radios, and food and water for two weeks.

All told, the trip to Iquitos took over twenty-four hours—plenty of time for the infection to run rampant. The invisible clock in Eden’s head ticked down the seconds since the first bite. Even now it was spreading, the reanimated biting the living, passing the sickness from person to person. With every delay before their team showed up, more lives were lost. Men, women, children—all falling victim to people they loved. Tension wound through her body, tighter and tighter as the plane landed and they made their way through security. Eden stretched her neck, trying to ease it, but the movement only made it worse. They should be tearing through the airport, sprinting to the Humvee. Instead, they were damn near strolling.

As they walked out of the airport and into the sticky, all-consuming heat of the late morning, Jordan said, “Eden, you and Kaede will be going in first and scouting.”

Eden should have kept her mouth shut, but this was too much on top of everything else. “Don’t tell me how to do my job.” It wasn’t fair and she regretted the words as soon as they escaped. She opened her mouth to apologize, but Oz didn’t give her the chance.

He grabbed Eden’s upper arm and gave her a little shake. “Don’t talk to your sister like that, little lady.” His cowboy hat dipped low over his crooked nose, concealing most of his dark eyes.

“Little lady?” Kaede snorted, her cropped black hair swinging wildly as she shook her head. “She’s only a year younger than you, cowboy.”

Eden might feel bad about talking back to her sister, but she’d be damned before she let some new guy tell her what to do, especially one she disliked so intensely. She grabbed his wrist, using the pressure points to make him let go. His dark face went gray with pain. “Don’t fucking touch me. You’re less than nothing, barely a step above meat. Do you know what happened to the last driver we had?”

Jordan’s hand on her shoulder stopped her. “Eden.”

Instantly, Eden loosened her hold. Jordan was their team leader, and Eden never defied her when they were on assignments, even if she couldn’t always control her mouth. When they were out in the field they had to function as one unit. That meant no disobedience. Jungles only made everything more complicated. There was little worse than chasing—or being chased by—zombies in the jungle. And that wasn’t even bringing up the
other
predators.

“Eden.” Jordan’s voice was a balm to her irritation. “Let him go.” She’d always been able to do that, to calm people down with a few words. It was a skill she’d learned living with their father and honed dealing with survivors of zombie attacks.

Eden let go of Oz. He stepped back quickly, obviously trying not to rub his wrist. Jordan shot her an exasperated look, but didn’t say anything. The only person who grabbed Eden was Jordan and they all knew it. If Oz was too stupid to notice...he was expendable. Eden wasn’t. Or at least that was what she liked to think.

When she turned around, Eden caught a look from Taro telling her she was being an ass and he was disappointed. Oh well. He could join the club. Jordan would probably be printing t-shirts before the year was out. Or maybe not. That was more something Eden would do, rather than her always-in-control sister.

In the Humvee there were all the usual goodies, including a packet of information and a map. Jordan skimmed through it before giving Oz directions. South towards Nauta and then west. The roads were little more than a cleared space between the trees, but the Humvee gamely tore through them. Eden kept bouncing into Taro’s lap and, after the seventh time, she stopped giving him apologizing looks. It wasn’t like she could control it, and she got tired of him cringing every time they touched.

Jordan read through the whole trip, finally closing the packet several hours later. “Okay, people, here’s the deal: the infection site we’re headed to is in the middle of nowhere. The only thing close is a village.”

“As if we hadn’t figured that out,” Eden muttered under her breath, earning a sharp look from Kaede.

“There’s roughly two hundred people there, so it’s not on the small side like we’d hoped. As of six hours ago, there were fifteen infected.”

It was a number that could have easily tripled in the intervening time. And two hundred people? That was a bigger population than they’d ever dealt with. Actually, now that she thought about it, the whole thing was sort of odd. Zombies went to food, which meant they always found their way to the nearest town, village, whatever, but their team had always dealt with the infected before that type of thing became a danger. Normally the infected appeared out in the middle of nowhere or near small settlements. The most they’d seen at one time was two years ago when a small village was turned. That had been the most insane mission of Eden’s life. They’d barely gotten out alive, wouldn’t have if it hadn’t been for Alejandro’s quick thinking with the fire.

Damn it, there she went again. She forced her mind back on track.

Jordan continued speaking, oblivious to her worries. “We’re doing this just like always.” She turned around enough to meet Eden’s eyes. “The village is in the middle of a deep valley, surrounded by cliffs. There’s only two ways out—the road in or climbing.”

Jordan’s words made the hairs on the back of Eden’s neck stand up. There was no reason for her odd reaction, especially since they’d never had a problem before. Plus, the geography made the worst-case-scenario not too shabby. If they got overwhelmed, they could retreat to the mouth of the valley and pick off the zombies as they came through after them. Still, she couldn’t shake the feeling something was about to go terribly wrong.

“Eden and Kaede are going in to scout the village to see what the situation is. I need you to move fast and not engage unless you have to. Find a good spot for us to do our thing and then set up shop. At dawn tomorrow morning, we’ll drive in to the agreed upon spot and get this started.” Jordan met each of their gazes in turn. “We’ll do what we can for the survivors, but only after all the infected are taken care of. I don’t like it any more than you do, but we can’t protect the living if we have a pack of zombies on our heels. Agreed?”