The McClane Apocalypse Book 4 (76 page)

Simon snorts and says, “No kidding.
Our mom used to say it was from her hair color. I don’t know about
that. I’ve got the same hair. I think it’s just a woman
thing.”

“You’re smarter than you look,
Professor,” Kelly jabs playfully.

“Not when it comes to
women. All I know is to stay as far away from the ones on this farm
as I can,” Simon says
on
a chuckle of his own.

“
Well,
I’m an old dinosaur and I
still don’t understand them most of the time. So good luck,” Herb
joins in.

Kelly chuckles and grabs a carafe of
milk from the fridge, pouring himself a glass before they
leave.

“Don’t forget your
sacks
,” Herb tells
them.

“Right,” Kelly says and snatches his
brown bag from the counter containing food that Hannah has packed
them. “Don’t wanna’ piss off the wife.”

“Smart man,” Herb replies. “You’ll do
well to take notes from this man, Simon.”

Simon blushes and grins uncomfortably
before replying, “Don’t think I need to worry about that,
sir.”

“Oh, you will someday, bro,” Kelly
teases.

The coffee starts
percolating,
the
smell teasing Herb’s senses in a comforting manner. Kelly reaches
under the ceramic lid of the cake saver and snags a few of Hannah’s
shortbread cookies.

“Tell Hannah I had a healthy
breakfast,” he says with a wicked smile.

Simon takes a proffered
travel mug of coffee from Herb, although he usually prefers
tea.
Herb figures the caffeine is
good for him, will help him be more alert and on edge for whatever
they will walk into this morning.

Herb replies to Kelly’s
request for conspiring with him, “Don’t get me involved. She
probably,
asleep
,
knows you are eating poorly.”

Kelly actually looks nervous and
hesitates for a moment before stuffing the rest of the thick cookie
into his mouth. “I’ll take that risk.”

Samantha comes into the kitchen, half
asleep and still fresh faced and pretty as ever. She’s wearing gray
sweatpants and a black t-shirt that comes to her knees.

“Good morning, Miss Samantha,” Herb
greets her.

“Sam, what are you doing up so early?”
Simon asks with worry creeping into his voice. “Are you
ok?”

Herb smiles gently. Sam’s
self-appointed guardian looks distraught at her being awake in the
middle of the night.

“What’s going on? I just came down for
some milk,” she says and then looks at her feet.

“We’re heading out,” Simon answers
her.

“Couldn’t sleep, kiddo?” Kelly
asks.

“I was… worried you were down here
eating the rest of the cookies,” she razzes Kelly, who ruffles her
already tousled hair with a grin before stealing another cookie.
“Where? Where are you guys going?”

Herb notes that Samantha does not
attempt to pour herself milk or reach for the cookies.

“Not far,” Simon says, calming her
fears. “We’ll be back in a few hours for morning
chores.”

Samantha crosses the
kitchen and slides her slim arms around Simon’s trim waist. He is
the only one in the family with whom she behaves in this manner.
He’d
thought
perhaps they should correct her when she does things like
that, but his Maryanne had told him that it was fine. These two
kids have been through the trenches of hell and back together. Who
are they to dictate how they should behave?

The little waif says, “Be careful,
Simon.”

Simon reacts as he normally
does where Samantha
is
concerned
. He frowns and sets her away from
him with a grimace.

“We will,” he answers stoically. “You
should go back to bed. You need your rest. We have a long day ahead
of us. Clinic day, remember?”

She nods and turns away
from him. She waves to Kelly before leaving. Herb worries about
her. He’s seen her fall into moods that she tries to hide from the
rest of the family. He is certainly not a clinical psychologist,
although
at times
he wishes he was if for no other reason than to
help his
own
family. Samantha has never spoken to anyone in the family that
he is aware of about her past. Maryanne never told him that she
spoke to her about it other than that she missed her family. Time
doesn’t heal all wounds. He knows this to be true. But sometimes if
you’re lucky with the passage of time the wounds can be skim-coated
over with a thin plaster of loving hearts, kind
hands
and good
memories.

Kelly was right. The coffee
tastes like tar. He’ll take his mug to the front porch
in
a short while
and watch the sun rise like he used to with his Maryanne. Sometimes
Hannah joins him now, but he knows how difficult the past year has
been on his tender Hannah. Herb just hopes the devotion and love of
her daughter and Kelly will help to break the spell of gloom that
life has cast upon her with the loss of her grandmother and then
Emma.

“We’re good to go,” Kelly says,
breaking Herb’s train of thought. “See you in a few hours,
Herb.”

He nods and gives them a salute,
“Watch your backs out there, boys.”

“Derek’s outside on patrols while John
sleeps, so you’re covered,” Kelly tells him as he goes out the back
door.

“Ok, Kelly. We’ll be just fine. Don’t
worry about us here,” Herb tells him to allay his fears. He knows
how much Kelly worries about Hannah and little Mary. He gets a firm
nod from the big man before he and Simon leave.

Herb turns off the light in the
kitchen and carries his mug back toward his office where he sleeps
most nights on the leather sofa there. He’s been working on
compounding a new antibiotic. With their supplies being depleted
every week, he needs to work harder on making penicillin and
antibiotics from scratch.

As he turns the corner in
the dark house, he catches the slim shadow of Samantha tiptoeing
from his study. She sprints across the hall and up the long
staircase that leads back to her room. Her
behav
ior in the kitchen and now
this piques his curiosity. What was she doing in his office? Why
had she lied in the kitchen about wanting milk in the middle of the
night only to not pour herself a glass?

Once he is in his office,
Herb closes the door and turns on
a
low
wattage light on his desk where he
places his mug of strong coffee. He looks around the familiar room.
Nothing seems out of sorts, misplaced or missing. Her behavior was
peculiar, though.

He opens a window to let in
a breeze, sits behind his desk and gets to work, forgetting
Samantha and her odd nocturnal roaming. After making notes for a
short while, Herb finally realizes what’s wrong. The constant
humming static of the radio behind him on the shelf has ceased. The
silence and absence of the white noise
have
triggered the answer to his
question. She’d come in
for
the radio.

Herb swivels in his office chair,
rolling over to the back shelf. He turns on the old radio again,
not wanting to miss that report from the President if it should run
more clearly on a repeated loop. But nothing happens. No sound
emits from the speakers, not even static. Upon further inspection,
Herb finds the cut wires behind the square box. She’d come into his
office and cut the wires to the radio. Why would she do such a
thing? He sits back and lights his pipe.

Whatever Samantha had
heard
before
the rest of them had arrived in the office has caused her to
react in an uncharacteristically deceitful manner. His first
instinct is to confront her later when she wakes for the day at
her
normal
time. Then, after more thought and consideration, Herb sips at
his coffee sludge as he stares at the broken radio. He should’ve
added some cream to his
tar
coffee. Maryanne would’ve thought to do so. He
hadn’t realized until she’d passed just how much he’d come to rely
on her for little things like that.

Perhaps young Samantha has done them
all a favor. Perhaps whatever she’d heard had been so detrimental
that she’s trying to protect them.

After a while, Herb goes
back to his studies, making notes,
studying
the compounding of herbs and
purposely not thinking about the radio and what would’ve caused her
to do such a thing. He turns back to the radio, lifts it from its
shelf. There is now a clean spot with no dust in the unmistakable
shape of the obviously missing radio. Herb places it in a cupboard
where it won’t be seen again. He
re-lights
his pipe, hums a ditty that
his Maryanne used to favor and resumes his research.

Character Sheet:

The McClane Family

• Herb McClane, “Doc” to his patients and
  grandfather to the kids
  

• Maryanne McClane, Doc’s
  wife
  and
  grandmother to the kids
  

• Sue (McClane) Harrison, married to Derek and
  the oldest of the three granddaughters
  

• Reagan (McClane) Harrison, married to John and
  the middle child of the granddaughters
  

• Hannah (McClane) Alexander, married
  to Kelly, and the youngest of the three
  granddaughters
  , also she is
  blind
  

• John Harrison, Special Forces, married to
  Reagan and brother to Derek
  

• Derek Harrison, Special Forces and highest
  ranking soldier on the farm, older brother of John and married to
  Sue
  

• Kelly Alexander, Special Forces, married to
  Hannah
  

Kids on the farm:

-Mary Alexander,
2-year-old
daughter of Kelly and Hannah

-Sue and Derek’s kids: Justin,
Arianna, Isaac

-Jacob
Harrison,
adopted son of John
and Reagan

-Huntley, orphan taken in by the
McClane family who lost his twin brother to sickness

• Simon Murphy, orphan
  teen
  taken in by
  the McClane family
  

• Samantha Patterson, “Sam,” orphan taken in by
  the McClane family when she was 15
  

• Paige Murphy, sister of Simon who makes first
  appearance in book 4
  

Paige’s travel mates: Gavin, Talia
Jones and Maddie (little girl)

Reynolds Family, neighbors and allies
to the McClanes

• Wayne, oldest brother and patriarch of his
  family
  

• Chet, Wayne’s younger brother,
  unmarried
  

• Bertie, wife of Wayne and has a daughter named
  Sarah
  

Johnson Family, neighbors and allies
to the McClanes

• Ryan, father and grandfather to his clan,
  Doc’s age
  

• Zach, son of Ryan,
  middle-aged,
  has
  children and a wife
  

• Evie, daughter of Ryan, widowed