Stolen Melody (Snow and Ash #2) (8 page)

The toilet has no lid. No seat either. It’s squat and pee or nothing. I unzip my pants and do my best to aim straight.

The vanity is on its side, exposing broken pipes where once there was a sink. Paint peels off the wall by the door, and for the first time I notice the rusty trail of dried blood on the wall in front of me. Someone like me must have died that day.

This is the world I live in.

“Oh yeah. Now that’s what I’m talking about.”

That long-haired blond guy launches through the door and yanks me to my feet. I pee right on my boot.

My heart bashes my ribs, and I give a yelp. He claps his hand over my mouth and pulls me to his chest. “Pants down and waiting. You’re such a good little slut, Melody.”

Despair punches me in the gut. How many others know too? It’s hard to kick when your pants are down around your knees, and he’s got an arm anchored up under my boobs. He drags me to the next room. I scream into his hand, but yeah, not much sound comes out.

“Shut your fucking mouth,” he says, and his lips almost touch my ear.

I shudder.

“If you promise not to scream, I’ll take my hand away from your mouth.”

If I could see behind me, I’d look at him like the idiot he was.

“You don’t want to bring Axel now, do you? I’d have to tell him who you really are, piano girl.”

Hope flutters in my stomach. If I can scream loud enough, Axel will hear me. He’ll come. He’ll protect me. He said so, right?

I pretend defeat and sag against him.

He tightens his grip around my body. “You scream and I’ll kill you. Then I’ll kill your boyfriend.”

This guy’s half a head taller than Axel and a little bulkier too. If Axel takes him on, he could die. Maybe I’ve grown used to Axel. I don’t know. But the thought of him fighting for me and dying…well, it makes my gut feel like it’s filled with puss-oozing sores.

The long-haired dude lowers his hand to my crotch and gives it a rub.

That’s all it takes. “I won’t scream,” I say into his hand.

“Feels good, doesn’t it?” He gives me another rub, and it’s really hard not to shrink away.

I nod and lean into him.

“That’s about what I thought.” There’s triumph in his voice.

The second he removes his hand from my mouth, I scream. I give it all I’ve got. Loud and strong and like I’m being mauled by rabid pit bulls.

“Goddamn it!” His hand tangles in my pubic hair before he yanks free.

I try to pull away from him, but he has me in an awkward grip. Then he flings me away, and before I can catch my balance, he belts me right in the jaw.

I go down like a broken test-drive dummy. I’m too shocked to scream again, but I get to my knees just in time for him to grab a handful of my hair and yank my head back. He pulls his fist for another blow, and then—

Axel’s behind him, catching the guy’s fist in his own. I go cold at the look on his face. Teeth bared, feral look in his eyes—Axel looks about as savage as a man can get. I’m talking Viking-berserker scary. He came for me. The tangle of emotions this brings leaves me teary-eyed and frozen.

I need to get up and put my clothes straight. I’m shaking hard, and my arms and legs feel weak as strings. I guess it’s that crash that comes after an adrenaline rush. That or the fact that I almost got raped.

The blond guy has Axel by the neck and up against the wall until Axel jabs him in the eyes with his thumbs. The guy screams and staggers back.

If he wins and Axel dies…

“Kill him, Axel. Kill him!” I think I’m shouting at first, but my voice is just as weak as the rest of me.

I curl up like roadkill. I hear roars and I hear threats, followed by more grunts and the sounds of flesh hitting flesh and I squeeze my eyes so tight they hurt. It’s inconceivable to me that I live in a world where savages kill people and nail their hands to a fence. I don’t want to live in a time when a girl can’t even pee in safety, and men think they can grab you by the neck, throw you to the floor, and stick their dicks in you until you’re properly enslaved.
 
Right now a piece of me—a large piece—wishes I’d been in Denver when the Ash buried the city three feet deep and crushed half the buildings. I’d have died of starvation or silicosis, but I’d never have to feel the horror of life after the Ash.
 

Then again, silicosis is a terrible way to go.

Axel makes a sound something between a roar and a grunt, and a gagging noise follows. A shudder sweeps through me like a shot of cyanide. I hear a body hit the floor, and that’s it. That’s when despair wins.

Axel appears beside me. It’s his hands brushing the hair back from my face. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you?” His eyes fix on the bruise that’s already growing on my jaw, and that berserker look returns.

Instead of answering, I sob hysterically like the sheep that I am. I’m not much use at all as he pulls up my pants and zips them for me.

“I just had to go to the bathroom.”

“Motherfucker.” His nostrils flare and his jaw clenches, and those hard, cold eyes of his tell me that right now he’s dangerous. The tender way he smooths my hair tells me I have nothing to fear from him. It’s all too much, and I bury myself in his chest.

He’s stiff for a second, but then his arms go around me and he clutches me to him like he means it. He rests his head on mine, enveloping me in his warmth.

“Don’t let me go,” I plead like I’m some five-year-old waking from a dream. “Please.”

It’s when he tightens his grip on me that I realize he, too, is shaking.

“What happened to this place?” It looks like a town that got hit by a tornado, and this is what’s left after they’ve cleaned up the debris. Here and there a wall still stands, a pile of rubble that marks the grave of what used to be a building. The whole place is pitted with deep holes where foundations once were.

“Building materials,” the redheaded guy supplies. He’s been walking to my right for hours now. Sandwiched between him and Axel, I shouldn’t feel at all afraid. I do, though.

The lower half of my face is swollen and it aches. Actually, no. It pulses and burns, and I’m not sure I’ll chew food for at least a week. If I concentrate on the pain, I can almost block out everything else. “Who did this?”

“We did.” Red Beard’s steps are springy, like this gets him excited.

“I don’t understand. Why?”

“You see a Lowe’s around here? We took everything apart and used the pieces to build the new place.”

New place. If they hauled everything without trucks, it can’t be that far away, right?

“Are you tired? Do you want me to carry you?” Axel’s brow furrows as he waits for my reply. Yeah, this from the guy who beat my behind when I wouldn’t lick his…unit.

“I just thought, you know, after…” He clears his throat.

It’s been hours since the attack. Dark-fall will be here soon, and he hasn’t let go of my hand for even a second. I’m not complaining. I’m pretty messed up, both inside and out, and I don’t care how sick it is, I need him.

I blush. “I’m okay.”

It’s a lie and we both know it. I can’t even maintain eye contact. Haven’t been able to since that man tried to rape me. I’m not embarrassed. I’m ashamed, and I feel responsible for this whole mess—me getting attacked and Axel having to kill a man, all because I walked off like that. Axel had just finished telling me how horrible people are, how women need to be protected, and I ignored him. I know what that guy did wasn’t my fault, but it never would have happened if I hadn’t gotten so pissy at hearing the truth.

After another half hour I catch sight of a long gray structure on top of a ridge. It’s at least a mile off, but it looks the size of like five Walmarts, at least.

Red Beard points. “See that?”

“Mmhm.”

“That’s home.” He’s grinning so huge it’s like looking at a jack-o’-lantern. He stares at me like he’s expecting an enthusiastic response, but to me it looks like a prison.

“Don’t mind Bill. He’s one of those construction-type engineers.” Axel bites a hangnail. “I know it’s not much on the outside. Inside it’s a lot nicer.”

“Is that a building, or is that a wall?” We had a wall around Sadie’s Bend. We’d ringed the town with useless vehicles and stretches of log fencing, but all it did was make the sheep feel safe.

“Wall. Keeps out the barbarian horde.” Axel rubs his hand up my back and looks at me like I’m a bunny and he wants to give me a cuddle.

WTF.

He blushes and glances away.

“Keeping out the barbarians is good,” I tell them. “As long as you can promise me that, you won’t hear me complain.” Especially if the barbarians are anything like that man earlier today. I don’t know his name, and I hope I never learn it.

At my words, relief flashes over Axel’s face. Then he lifts his chin, like he’s mad, bad, and dangerous to know.

I read that phrase once. I don’t remember where.

There’s still a decent ways to go before we get to the structure—a pain in the ass of a hill to climb, surrounded by a densely packed wooded area. My stomach sinks to find that even the pine trees are bare. It’s a forest of dead trees—skeletal gray reminders that the earth is dying, and so are we.
 
It’s only a half hour march, but by the time we reach the fortress I feel ten times older and heavier.

The gate stands wide open. Now that we’re here, I see that the wall rises a good twenty feet high. It’s gray, made of concrete block, and it’s topped with barbed wire, just like a prison. All I need is an orange jumpsuit.

Without warning, Axel sweeps me up into his arms and carries me through the gate.

My cheeks flame up. “That’s not necessary.”

“Yes,” he says in an odd voice. “It is.”

“Put me down!”

He ignores me.

Guards stand atop the wall at various intervals, and several of them whoop when they catch sight of us.

“Axel! You dog!”

“’Bout time you got you some!”

“All right, Axel!”

These are just some of the things I hear, and my face feels like a nuclear reactor on meltdown. Axel, though, he looks pleased. No, that’s not it. His head is high, his chin is out, and there’s this look in his eye. I’m not sure what he’s thinking.

“You can put me down anytime.” I feel so stupid.

Axel sets me on my feet. He rubs his hands up and down my arms, brushes the hair out of my face, and takes my hand again.

I feel, well, I don’t know how I feel. Odd.

Now that I’m on my feet, I take in my surroundings. The wall we just passed through is at least three feet thick. Inside it’s a lot bigger than I thought it’d be, and it’s a combination of man-inspired starkness and efficiently laid out paths.

“It looks like a military base.”

Axel coughs into his fist. I wonder if he was expecting me to say
homey
.

I feel bad, so I add, “Definitely safe from the barbarians.”

His eyes sparkle, and he proceeds to point out various sites, like the men’s barracks, the armory, the leader’s quarters, as he guides me toward a three-story structure. “You’ll be needing some stuff, I guess,” he says as he pushes open the door. “Get some new boots. Pick out whatever you need and tell them it’s on me.”

I’d told him how I peed all over myself when that guy yanked me off the toilet.

He nods, indicating an approaching figure. “Stay with Mia until I get back. I gotta go do some stuff.”

I turn to get a look, and if my jaw wasn’t practically swollen shut, it’d hit the floor.

“Imogen Barrow!” Mia Lavely practically drops her clipboard. “What are you doing here?”

“What am I doing here? What are you doing here?”

She scowls. “Buncha fellas were watching the town while your friend was inside, checking the place out. They harassed me for a bit, but after a while I think they felt sorry for me. You know, middle-aged lady kicked out into the snowy woods.”

“Really?” I’m so relieved.

She nods. “Thanks for the scraps, by the way.”

I blink.

“Did you really think a basket of bread was going to make it all better?”

“I had nothing to do with you getting kicked out, Mia.”

“You didn’t stand up for me, either, did you?”

I bite my lip. She’s right.

She sighs. “Anyway, I got a room here, and they set me up with a job.” She waves her hand, indicating our surroundings. To me it looks like a combination old country store and military surplus outlet. “I’m not gonna lie to you. These are rough men, but they didn’t throw me out into the snow, unlike some civilized people I know.”

“Oh, Mia. I’m so sorry!”

She grimaces. “Sorry’s for losers. What happened to your face?”

I look away. “I went off to pee, and some guy attacked me.”

She grunts. “You all right?”

“Yeah. I mean it’s just a bruise. Axel…” I look at the door like he’s standing there, which, of course, he isn’t.