The Deepest Red (49 page)

“How do you know?”

“He was there before they knocked me out, walking around, talking freely to soldiers as if they were all best friends,” I reply.

An expression I don’t recognize passed briefly across his features.

“We’ve got to hurry. If Lonnie is alive he needs to know.”

A knock sounds at the door. My eyes dart around the room searching for anywhere to hide those lying on the floor, but there isn’t time.

“Ma’am, I have her clothes,” Thomas announces from behind the thick door, his voice the sound of obedience and servitude.
Crap.
I stand staring wide at Jay for a long moment.

I’m made aware of how I’m dressed with the chill that swirls inside the room. Understanding lights Jay’s features as he races to the door, positioning himself so the opened door will conceal his presence. I interpret the glare he gives as he motions toward the shut door. Mustering up the most coldest and sternest voice I can- the closest to my mother’s, I speak.

“Finally,” I say in a decent impression. “Come in.”

My words sounding curt enough that I hope the heavy door between us muffles any differences between Katlin’s and my voice. The rattle of the door tightens my fingers around the knife’s hilt I had forgotten I was grasping. I tense when the knob turns completely.

The skinny man enters, focused on his task. He quickly turns his back to us and places my clothing on the night stand. My worn pair of jeans, long sleeve shirt and underwear lay perfectly folded. The jacket I had taken from Tom’s old home lays in a heap on the floor.

“Would there be anything else?” he questions as Jay silently closes Thomas’s only escape.

The clicking of the lock finally draws the servant’s attention.
Too late.
I rush him holding my mother’s knife to the delicate skin of his throat.

“Tell us how to get out of here,” I hiss and press the blade closer.

I watch as shock and fear registers on his features. He may be used to seeing violence but from the shake in his hands, he isn’t used to being a part of it.

“I- I don’t,” he stutters.

“This isn’t the time to play dumb,” I remark, digging my blade just enough into his neck that a small drop of blood surfaces. He flinches at the sting.

“Haven’t enough people died these last few days?” he whispers.

“Yes, but I only killed in self defence,” I state flatly.

Although Katlin had appeared healthy, on a closer examination, Thomas doesn’t fair the same. His skin is stretched tightly across his cheeks, the point of his nose a little too sharp and his eyes a little too sunken.

“Please. I really don’t want to hurt you, but I will in order to get home.”

“Do you want me to believe you kill but are not a murderer?” He manages to say with my blade still at his throat.

“I do what I must to survive when attacked but I’m not a murderer, unlike the woman you serve. She would let you die.”

“So you’re like Bryan, then?” he ask.

I hiss at his name.

“We are nothing like him.”

I tighten my grip on the knife, drawing another dot of blood.

“We don’t have time for this,” Jay says. “Help us or die. Your choice.”

The knob of his throat bobs with a hard swallow as awareness settles in. He braves a glance to the bodies lying motionless on the ground. A tiny smirk gleams on the edge of his mouth.

“Ben is due up here any minute,” he begins, “Go right out the door and take the hallway to the back.” I loosen my grip on the knife. “This building is an old public library. There is an old fire escape, last room on the right.” Thomas pauses. “You should be able to get to the ground without being seen but you’re on your own at the perimeter. There are patrols that encircle the camp- groups of three.”

I release my hold on him, pushing him away.

“Thank you,” I say, feeling a little off balanced.

“Let's go Millie,” Jay says, impatiently. 

Thomas widens the distance between us.

“Why help us?” I ask, blinking my eyes rapidly to focus.

He straightens and glances behind me.

“Because where you are not a murderer, he is.” He points to Jay. “I’ve lived with enough of them to recognize one when I see him.” Thomas walks to the nightstand and produces a thin scrap of fabric. He wraps the remaining vegetables. “Knock me out cold so they won’t guess I helped you.” He hands me the wrapped veggies and leans forward speaking quietly. “You don’t have much time,” he says in a manner as if he knows a secret.

Jay strolls across the room, nightstick in hand.

“No problem,” he replies not having heard Thomas’ last words.

I’m unable to comment or voice any concerns because with a single strike, Thomas collapses to the floor- hitting his head hard on the ground. I wince at the sound.

“Let’s go,” Jay says curtly.

“Wait.”

I reach for my folded clothes and thin leather jacket and deliberate over Thomas’s words as I swiftly change. Anxiety rushes through me as I ignore the fact that I’m undressing in front of Jay. I don’t have time to be shy. After I hurriedly lace up my boots, I turn to find Jay facing the window.

“Ready?” he asks when he no longer hears my scurrying to dress.

“Yeah,” I say, picking up Tom’s pocket knife off the side table.

A burden settles back into place as I clip the hidden blade onto my jeans. Jay is behind me in an instant frowning at the keepsake.

“I can’t knowingly leave it behind,” I comment, responding to his silence.

“We need to leave now.” 

The hall is silent except for voices coming from the floor below. We make our way vigilantly down the hall and into the room Thomas had spoken of. The fire escape is easy to find but it takes both of us to lift the old window. The exertion causes my already stumbling body to falter.

“What’s wrong?”

Jay presses a hand to my shoulder, steadying me.  When I glance to him I discover the expression of camaraderie returning into his eyes.

“Nothing,” I reply, determined that if I can’t survive through the perimeter then at least I would sacrifice myself so he could.

Jay gives me a troubled look which I disregard and study the surrounding area. I know now what Thomas had meant by not being seen. The old metal stairs descend into an empty parking lot in the back of the building. The cracking asphalt gives way to patches of weeds and stout bushes that stand distantly from each other. There is an old rusted car on one side of the lot and a large metal container on the other. In front of us, stands the familiar trees which failed to hide me from danger in the past. They greet me with beckoning limbs, swaying in the breeze.

None of the soldier’s tents have been erected in the shadow of this massive structure. The wind rushes behind the building resulting in a shiver to flutter over me.

“I wish I could’ve had a chance to at least see the library,” I whisper as I join Jay behind one of the large bushes located right in front of the extended stairs.

Another wave of dizziness swept over me. I grip the stairs’ metal guard rail for support.

“We had salvaged most of the books last summer. You aren't missing anything.”

Jay gives me an uneasy grin, then stares out into the tall weeds. I notice his hair is still crusted with blood from the night before. He didn’t get the benefit of waking up clean. Fresh blood soaks one side of his chest. I gasp in alarm.

“Jay, your chest,” I say.

“It isn’t mine.”

“Thank God.”

Even clean, I wonder how horrible I look- the bruises on my face probably having ripened in color. I shake my head and scold myself for my irrational vanity.

“Get down,” he says, briskly.

I obey, squatting down so as not to be seen. I fumble a little, righting myself before I fall.

“There’s a small patrol,” Jay says. I lean forward to peep from my hiding spot. I view one guard bending over to peer into a man made trench.

“Who would have thought infected live after being impaled so many times?” the man says, standing and throwing a rock into the large hole.

A low moan follows his action. Another voice of a younger man responds to his question.

“They’re unnatural. Just cover the hole with a tarp and be done with it.”

I watch as the soldier unstraps a rolled up green tarp attached to his supply bag. The tarp isn’t only green. A design of dirt and leaves are painted onto the plastic material giving an appearance like Connor’s camouflage pants he had worn during our practices.

“What about the ugly girl?” the man asks as he unrolls the plastic and nods toward the deep hole.

“Leave it,” an older man says, “I don’t feel like climbing down just to kill one infected.”

Another man steps into view. The third soldier to their group. He’s a little older than the other soldier with a voice that reminds me of cracked leather.

“I don’t think anyone would care.” he comments while reaching for the camouflage tarp.

I lean forward making an effort to get a clearer view of the younger man whose voice I heard earlier but Jay puts a hand on my shoulder to stop my advance.

I continue to observe the two men covering their trap with light amounts of leaves and pine straw from the surrounding trees. My eyes begin to blur and my heart to race as I squat beside Jay. Any minute Ben will walk into my holding room and find the others unconscious. He will sound the alarm and we will no longer be able to escape. I swallow my nerves groggily as the soldiers walk away from us having finished their task.

“Follow me,” Jay whispers moving away from the stairs.

We hurry our pace across the ancient parking lot, hiding behind portly bushes as we come across them. I catch sight of another guard walking away. In his hand, he carries a dog leash. My vision blurs again and I’m left with a dazed self awareness. I reach out for Jay to warn him of this man but my hand comes back empty. Confused, I forget the soldier and step toward the soft fluttering sound of the leaves.

My feet are too heavy when I cross over onto the soft dirt of the ground. Another wave of dizziness assaults me as I lurch forward.

“Millie?” I hear Jay’s voice in the distance but I can’t focus enough to respond.

Fingers dig into my wrist, pulling me toward the treeline. My mind clears enough to find Jay’s worried face glancing my way.

“Stay with me, Millie,” he says, digging his fingers deeper into my muscles.

“You don’t have much time.” Thomas’s words skeeter across my mind. I’ve been drugged. Thomas had drugged me.

“They put something in my water,” I mumble, trying to apologize and not stumble on my own feet.

An arm circles my waist as curses follow from Jay’s mouth.

“Leave me. I’ll distract them,” I say as the pressure around my waist increases.

“If you don’t return, do you really think he would let me live?”

His question is strange and it takes longer to process the meaning but the image of Connor surfaces in my foggy mind. At that moment, I can’t feel my muscles adequately enough to know if I’m smiling. 

“Stop! Stop right there!”

A man wearing full camouflage rushes toward us with a bow and arrow poised. He is not as skilled as Jay with his aim. The first arrow flies between our heads barely missing my ear. I drop into the tall grass knowing I’m in no condition to fight and preferring not to be an easy target. Light swirls from the sudden drop, joining my surroundings into one giant blur. I can’t comprehend the world around me. The sounds of fighting seeming too far away to be any real dangerous concern.

As my mind struggles to recall why I’m laying on the ground, the memories of the past few months begin to fade. The constant reel playing my friends’ deaths, the anguish I experienced and the horrible faces of the infected, slows to a stop. The idea of not caring what happens to me anymore, floods into my brain giving me a rare moment of peace. Dissimilar to the darkness that blanketed me when I’ve been struck unconscious before, this drugged bliss holds loneliness and despair at the edges of it’s peace. I feel them keeping at bay but only because I still contain enough sense to recognize their threatening presence. The recent thought of Connor gives my scattered brain something to focus onto.
I have to get back. I want to see him and my father one last time if only to warn them.

I can’t distinguish how much time has past since I fell- a moment, minutes? My brain clears briefly enough to hear someone or something’s breathing. The sound is hurried and close to my face.
Sniffing?
Sticky wetness touches my cheek and then again. A colder wet sensation covers my forehead. I open my eyes I don’t even remember closing. I process the noises of fists slamming into bodies and the distinct sound of a blade slicing through skin. I give a painful sneeze when something tickles my nose. I force myself to focus through the foggy haze. Raising my head as much as I can from the dirt, I glimpse into a pair of clever eyes, one blue and one brown.

“Chevy?”

I hear his soft whine as I attempt to reach out to him with my heavy arm. The motion feels as if I’m encased in invisible water. I give up on the notion and realize that my arm never moved to begin with. He nudges me again with his nose as my eyelids begin to shut- the effort to stay awake becoming one of the hardest things to accomplish. The world of numb awareness beckons to me with it’s promises of forgetfulness. Chevy’s ears perk up as he glances around like a mother protecting her cub. A low growl begins to hum inside him as his hackles raise.