Time of Zombies (Book 2): The Zombie Hunter's Wife (14 page)

Rule #11   
Karma is a bitch.
Don’t tempt her. Don’t tease her. She will hit you upside the head every time.

The stench of burning flesh would
never leave her lungs. Teddy’s bellows had petered out to whimpers and then
silence as he passed out. At least, she prayed he’d passed out. His body lay
limp and unmoving on the mattress as Ran continued to bring the metal strips
and Shannon continued to cauterize the wounds, with a hiss of burning skin and
a moan from the man on the bed.

“Check him,” Shannon ordered.

With a shaking hand, Michelle lifted
his eyelids and gazed at his deep, dark eyes. No lines. No milky film. She
looked up at the doctor and shook her head. The woman nodded and went back to
work.

Teddy mumbled as they untied him,
turned him over, and branded the exit wound on his thigh. The man was past any
movement. Michelle ran a hand over his scalp and wiped away the clammy sweat on
his skin.

His body began to shake with
tremors.

“He’s going into convulsions,”
Shannon yelled. “Get him on his side. Michelle, keep away from his teeth. Don’t
let him bite you.”

“He’s not turning, damn it,” she
cried back. She grunted as they got him on his side. His eyes flew open and his
mouth moved but no sound emerged.

Tears flowed down her face and
dampened her shirt as Teddy’s shakes slowed and stopped. Her heart raced with
dread. She stared at his chest for seconds that seemed like minutes or hours
until she could see the shallow ins and outs of his breathing.

“Get the cushions from the couch.
We’ll keep him on his side so I can check the wounds tonight,” Shannon ordered.

Ran left to get the cushions and
Michelle stared at Shannon. “I’m not going anywhere.”

The woman pulled her long hair back
in order and put it into a ponytail. “I’d enjoy the company. I’m afraid it’s
going to be a long night.” She yawned. “I haven’t been this tired since my
residency.”

Michelle fell back onto the stool.
“I’m sorry. You can order me out of here if you want to. I don’t know what I
was thinking, telling you what to do in your space.”

Shannon sat on the edge of the bed
and grabbed her hand between her own. “You were thinking that you almost lost
the man you love. That you still could.”

Her mouth gaped open and she slammed
it shut. “I—We—There’s been no talk of love.”

“I’ve seen you two together. I know
love when I see it.”

“But all we do is fight and argue,
and he has no respect for me. That isn’t love. I loved my husband. He was sweet
and kind and gentle.”

Shannon laughed. “Love is whatever
you decide it is. Every couple has its own way of expressing themselves. I
would see couples fighting and arguing in my ER all the time. But by the time
they were done being treated they were there for each other. Their fear was
making them say things they wouldn’t have said if they’d been calmer. Blaming
each other for the son getting hurt on his bike. Accusing each other of not
watching the little girl who fell and got a concussion. And I’m sure whatever
you think Teddy did was fear getting in the way too.”

“But he ...”

“No, don’t tell me. That’s between
you two. Life is precious, now more than ever,” Shannon said, pointing at
Teddy’s injuries. “Too precious to waste on misunderstandings and things that
could be solved with a plain old discussion.”

Michelle looked at the doctor. “You
aren’t old enough to be such a wise woman.”

Shannon stood, stretched, and
grimaced as her back cracked. “Medicine makes you old before your time.”

She put a hand on Michelle’s
shoulder. “I’m going to get cleaned up. Just check his eyes from time to time,
make sure he isn’t burning up, and I’ll be right back.”

The clang of metal dropping into the
sink sent shudders up her spine. The burnt flesh smell lingered in the closed
room. Michelle moved around, opening windows and closing the curtains to keep
the sun out.

Ran came in with a basin of water
and some rags. “Shannon said to give you this.” The young girl set it on the
dresser and left again.

She took a rag and dipped it into
the cool, clear water. The doctor’s patients must be higher on the list of
needs, along with cooking to get the good stuff, not the cloudy with bleach the
rest of them were using. Wringing out the towel, she slowly swiped it across
Teddy’s head and sweaty face. He moaned in his sleep and Michelle dropped the
rag onto the bed in a panic.

A quick look at his eyes proved her
panic as unnecessary. His soaked T-shirt clung to his chest and abdomen. She
needed help to get his jeans off, but she could do something about the filthy
shirt.

Grabbing the scissors Shannon had
left on the dresser, she cut the gray shirt off Teddy’s body. It came off in
pieces as she cut along his arms and by his neck. The shreds of gray material
floated to the carpet. She dipped the rag into the water again, wrung it out,
and swept the towel across his chest and abdomen. His ebony skin glistened with
wetness. Her mouth grew dry. He was so beautiful, even if men hated the idea of
being called beautiful. She could think it in her mind. He was like a priceless
sculpture in a museum. Her mind floated to their love-making. He was also very
much a man of flesh and blood.

When he shivered slightly, Michelle
put the towel back in the water and got a sheet to pull over him. His face
calmed and he sighed. She placed her hand on his face and leaned in.

“I’m so sorry you got hurt. I would take
it away if I could.”

Voices. Voices came from the other
side of the house.

A woman’s cry. A man’s angry
baritone.

The sound of flesh hitting flesh.

Teddy wallowed in a deep fog. His
thoughts scrambled between here and there, now and before. Flashes of light
pierced his eyeballs and cleaved his head in two. Pain shot through his legs
and slammed into his stomach.

Something cool covered his face. A
calm voice led him out of the darkness. His eyelids were heavy. Heavier than
lifting a dead body into a pile. Finally, they pried open and Michelle’s face
came into view. His breath came rough and hard from his throat as if he’d run miles
to escape the undead.

“Teddy,” she whispered with a smile
on her face.

“Michelle.” His voice cracked and
his throat ached.

“Don’t move. You were hurt.” She put
her hand on his shoulder to hold him down.

As if that small hand could keep him
in place, he struggled to sit up. His body refused to obey his command. Hurt?
He couldn’t remember being hurt.

A bottle of water appeared in front
of his eyes. Michelle held his head up and helped him drink a few sips. He
would have guzzled the whole thing but she pulled it away.

“Dr. Shannon said just a few sips
until we see if you keep it down.”

He struggled to remember why he
would need to see Dr. Shannon and be in bed. Vague wisps of sights and sounds
filtered through the fog in his brain.

Voices.

Crying and yelling.

The sound of a slap, echoing in the
still air.

The explosion of a gunshot.

Agony and pain.

“Teddy,” she said, wiping the cool
rag over his face and head. “Do you remember what happened? The men said they
didn’t see anything but you on the ground by a skinbag, with a gunshot wound in
your leg.”

“It’s all fuzzy. Like I should know,
but I don’t.”

“It’s okay. Once you’ve rested, I’m
sure you’ll remember.”

He didn’t have Michelle’s
confidence. In the back of his mind laid a worm of thought, telling him he had
to remember. That it was very important.

He shook his head. Maybe if he put
his mind elsewhere, it would come to him. Not as if he didn’t have enough going
on to think about. Like the pain in his leg, the scent of burned flesh in the
room, and Michelle at his side, taking care of him. The last thought was the
most pleasant one to keep his mind on.

“You’re here. With me.”

She put a damp hand on his face and
stared into his eyes. “Where else would I be?”

He smiled. “Well, lately it’s been
anywhere but where I am.”

Her smile fell. “I’m so sorry,
Teddy. I’ve been acting like a teenage girl having a hissy fit. Something I’ve
had several people nice enough to point out.”

Not missing the sarcasm in her
voice, Teddy laughed slightly. “Well, you have the body of a teenage girl, so
why not the attitude too?”

“Teddy Ridgewood, don’t make me
angry with you again.” Her voice dwindled to nothing and tears filled her eyes
before running down her dusty face.

He refused to look down his body and
it hurt to look at her face with the tears filling those beautiful eyes.
Grabbing her hand, he closed his eyes.

“Tell me the truth now. Did the
doctor have to take my leg? Is that why everything hurts? Why I can’t move? Why
you’re crying all over me?”

Her breath caught on a hiccup and
hitched. “Teddy, open your eyes. Your leg is fine and attached. Well, mostly
okay. She did have to cut some around the wound and we had to burn it some to
protect you, the same as Miranda did for Seth and his hand.”

He swallowed the knot in his throat
and his gaze followed her hand to where it rested on his bare leg. The flesh
was red and ugly, but his leg was still there. He took a deep breath and
wiggled his toes and moved his foot. The pain had him gulping in air and
cursing under his breath, but it was worth it to see his leg there and in
working order.

A knock came at the door and it
opened with Shannon sticking her head inside. “How’s the patient doing?”

Michelle jumped up from her seat.
“He’s awake and moving his toes.”

The doctor stepped into the room and
Michelle moved back against the door. Shannon pressed and prodded with more
cursing from Teddy, but his eyes stayed on Michelle the whole time.

“I’m going to give you some sleeping
pills.”

Teddy started to grumble, but the
doctor held her hand up.

“No arguing with me. It is going to
get worse before it gets better. But there is no leakage and best of all, no
black lines.”

He stared at his leg. “Not to piss
off Karma or the fates or whoever, but, would you be able to see black lines on
my skin?”

Michelle laughed and Shannon joined
in. “I’ve seen enough dark-skinned and African-American undead to recognize the
signs,” the doctor said. “Actually, with your skin tone I would expect the
lines to be lighter, maybe even a beige color. I saw some in the hospital that
were blood red against black skin.”

She handed the pills in a blister
pack to Michelle. “Make sure he takes these. Once he falls asleep, I’ll take
over.”

“But I want to stay.”

“No arguing from you either. You’ve
been here all day with no food and no breaks. Your boys have been asking for
you. Get some food. Get some sleep. I’m sure Teddy will be fighting me to get up
and out of this bed by tomorrow.”

“Fine,” Michelle mumbled.

Shannon laughed as she left the room
and shut the door behind her.

Michelle handed the pills to Teddy
and got the bottle of water. With some fumbling of getting the medication and
water into him, they managed to spill on the bed, but finally the pills were
down and going to work.

“I’m sorry,” they intoned in unison.

“I’m sorry I treated you like you
had no brain. I’m glad my momma can’t see me now. She always told me a woman
was your better half. She would be there to have your back and to be by your
side. The best ones would die for you and you’d be willing to die for them.”

She jumped up from the bed and
started pacing the floor. Teddy lay silent as tears flooded those beautiful
dark eyes. Pain radiated from them as her gaze hit him.

“I love you, Michelle.”

Stopping mid step, her face paled to
white and her eyes widened. “I can’t do this. I thought I could, but I can’t. I
was a cop’s wife and I can’t be a zombie hunter’s mistress or girlfriend or whatever
this is. I can’t sit here day after day and wonder if you’ll come home hurt or
not come home at all. Been there, done that. I can’t do it anymore.”

He raised himself up on his elbow
and met her eyes. “Come out there with me.”

Her fist came to her chest as if her
heart was going to burst out of it. “I can’t do that. I can’t.”

She turned and yanked the door open
and ran out. The outer door slammed shut before he could call her back.

Rule #12   
Don’t ask anyone to do
something you aren’t willing to do yourself. In other words, grow a pair. If
there was ever a time to pull up the big girl panties, the zombie apocalypse
would be it.

Michelle sat alone in her motor home,
rocking in a chair, staring at the gold shag carpet. The day gave way to
twilight and still she sat in the dark, thankfully no longer able to see the old,
matted carpet. Her mind swirled in a million directions at once. Images of
Mitch coming up their sidewalk bombarded her. They superimposed themselves on
Teddy being carried to the makeshift hospital.

She cried. She laughed and stopped
herself when it rang out in hysterics. She wanted to go to sleep and hide from
the world. She wanted to be brave enough to not hide at all. She’d been hiding
for over a year and nothing had changed. The undead still walked the Earth and
humans were still an endangered species, at least the living ones. Because
there were more than enough of the undead ones.

Pushing against her knees, Michelle
got out of the chair like an arthritic old woman. Her stomach growled to remind
her she hadn’t eaten all day. She stood at the sink and turned the cold water
knob. A few drops fell and plunked in the empty sink.

Her head swum. The tanks of the
motor home had been full last week. A different fear gnawed at her. Humans
needed water. They could go days without food, but they needed water. Clean,
potable water. She grabbed the pot on the nearby stove and headed outside.
Silence filled the yard as she came down the steps. A small group sat by the
fire pit, but the rest of the area was empty of people. Her ears hummed with
nothing but the repel sound. Loud and echoing without the hum of people going
about life.

She walked up to the group and
spotted Seth.

“How’s Emily doing?” Her friend was
back on bed rest, doctor’s orders, as her due date approached. As her stomach
expanded, her breathing had become labored and Shannon ordered Emily to stay in
bed. Another worry to add to the long list in her head.

Seth looked up. “She’s cranky as
hell. Staying in bed is not her idea of a fun time.”

She laughed. “I can imagine. Her
idea of fun is out hunting zombies.”

“How’s Teddy doing?”

“Shannon says he’ll be fine. I’m
sure he will be. Nothing fazes the King of Pittsburg.” Her voice caught at her
undertone of bitter sarcasm.

“That’s true,” Seth replied,
obviously missing her tone altogether.

“Where is everyone?” she said,
trying to change the subject to something less volatile than Teddy and their
now nonexistent relationship. There weren’t many places to go after a man said
‘I love you’ and you ran away instead of returning the sentiment.

Seth threw a log on the fire and
turned to her. “Well, there was an explosion and fire earlier to the north, so
Jack and Paul took a group to make sure it was an accident and not a diversion
or something.”

“You don’t think it’s an attack, do
you?” Her breath caught. Would they never be safe?

“Jack didn’t think so. He radioed a
while ago to say it looked like a propane tank at the hotel over there. But
they are checking the area to be sure.”

She sighed. “What about everyone
else? They didn’t take everyone, did they?”

“No,” Seth said, running a hand
through his long hair. “A lot of folks are sick.”

“Sick,” she whispered. “Not from the
virus. It can’t be. Not again.”

He ran a hand over his face.
“Shannon isn’t sure yet. It came on right after dinner. But Jim is sick, along
with Joseph and Robert Jones. She quarantined them to one trailer. Maggie and
her friends are sick too. The doctor put them together in another trailer. So
far, the kids and the younger people seem okay. Josh and Suz put them in the
office building for safety.”

He didn’t need to say what safety.
He meant if the sick ones died and turned, the kids would be behind cement
walls. Her head spun. While she’d been having a pity party for one, the camp
had fallen apart. Her boys must be going out of their minds. They’d needed her
and she’d been so wrapped up in herself she’d ignored her responsibilities.

“I have to check on the kids,” she
announced.

Seth nodded. “I saw them earlier,
but I’m sure the Rogue Vantage would like to see their mom.”

She smiled weakly. “I’m sure I’d
like to see them too.”

Berating herself all the way to the
office building, she strode as quickly as possible, her heart racing in time
with her steps. Miranda and Cody sat on chairs at the doorway. Ran sat sharpening
the large machete she carried everywhere and the young man flipped pages in an
old magazine, the pages frayed and falling out. Another casualty of the end of
the world as we know it. Michelle sighed, thinking of the last book she’d read,
a wonderful, rich and lavish, historical romance by her favorite author. Back
before everything went to hell she’d been savoring it, a chapter at a time at
bedtime. The book was wasted space in her one allowable duffel bag and probably
still lay on her nightstand in the house in San Francisco, with a turned down
page to mark where she’d stopped reading the night before she’d left. She
shivered at the vision of millions of homes in stasis. A world full of Pompeii
circa 79 A D or Roanoke Island 1590, with civilization forever frozen in the
Pre-Z virus time.

Shaking her head, she walked up to
Cody and Ran. “Came to check on the boys and the other kids too. How is
everyone doing?”

Cody closed the magazine, something
with surfboards on the cover. “We fed them a while ago, and then Beth was going
to do some reading and writing lessons and Jed was going to teach them how to
work the ham radio. I think he said something about talking with the capital
yesterday and maybe contacting Los Angeles tonight.”

“The boys will like that, I’m sure,”
she murmured, pushing open the door.

The ham radio sat unattended on the
desk in the front office, low static filling the room, interrupted by random
voices. She gave it a glance and headed to the storeroom in the back. Finding
the door locked, she knocked and called out to the kids to let them know it was
okay to let her in.

“It’s Michelle. I’m not sick. Let me
in.”

Loud whispering echoed from behind
the door. She raised her hand to knock again, but the sound of a lock being
turned clinked and the door opened. Bryant’s dark face filled the slim opening.

“Don’t be mad,” he cried, tears
running down his face.

She sighed. How many times had she
said that to her mom, just before she said something guaranteed to anger the
woman? Placing her hand on the wood, she pushed the door open.

Her gaze swept a room that was
nowhere crowded enough for how many people should be inside. Not to mention Jed
and Beth were nowhere in sight. Bryant and Aiden were the tallest people in the
room.

“I’m not mad,” she said in the
calmest voice she could manage. “Where are Beth and Jed? They’re supposed to be
babysit—I mean, supervising you.”

Aiden stepped up beside his friend.
“They went to kill Reverend Bennett.”

The blood left her head and pooled
in her gut. She was going to vomit. She’d thought—they’d all thought, Beth was
over her obsession with the church’s teachings. Wait ...

“What do you mean,
they
went
to kill him? Don’t you mean, Beth went and Jed went after her?”

Bryant shook his head. “No, they
planned it. Me and Aidan heard them talking.”

“Aidan and I,” she corrected on
autopilot.

“Whatev,” he continued. “They
weren’t crazy-like or anything. Beth said it was the perfect time with most
everyone gone and the rest sick and Jed agreed and pointed out that the
northeast corner wasn’t covered tonight. Not enough people for patrol or
something like that.”

Her mind splintered with too many
thoughts at once. The young man and woman were outside the compound in the dark
on a suicide mission. Not enough people to guard the walls. The leaders not
available for help. The rest sick in bed. Who did that leave?

Shannon was their only doctor and
needed here with the ill.

Teddy was in bed and injured.

Seth had to stay and watch over
Emily.

That left Cody, Miranda, and her.

She took a deep breath. That left
Cody, Miranda, and her.
Time to shit or get off the pot, girl.
This was
the zombie apocalypse and everyone did their part. She’d been coasting for too
long, thinking she was contributing by washing clothes and walking patrol on
the walls, protected by the constant repel sound. A nice safe princess in a
castle.

Her stomach twisted into knots and
bile rose in her throat. She’d sat back and let others do what she could have
done, if only she’d been brave enough to do it. If she wanted safety and
security, she would have to get it for herself.

“Ryde,” Bryant said.

“What?” Michelle asked as the boys’
conversation finally filtered through her churning thoughts.

“Ryde. R. y. d. e,” Bryant repeated.
“Commander Jack was talking to Mr. Seth. He said he sent some guys to check it
out and they radioed back to Jed that the recon, recon—something or other was
good to go. Then Commander Jack told Mr. Seth that if the explosion was a decoy
and something happened with the sickies that we were all going to meet in
Ryde.”

“Where in the hell is Ryde? Is that
the name of a town?”

“It’s down the river,” Miranda piped
up from the doorway. “Biggest thing there is a hotel. Population something like
two hundred pre-Z. Right on the Sacramento River.”

“Dudes, where’s Beth and Radio Man?”
Cody added.

“They took off to kill Bennett,”
Michelle said. “We’re going after them.”

“Yay,” Aiden, Bryant, Connor, and
Dylan cheered with the five-year-old Madison twins yelling along with them.

She put her hand up and the hubbub
died down. “Ran, Cody, and I are going after them. You are all staying here.
Aiden can open and shut the gate, and then he’s coming right back here. I want
you to lock yourselves in. Don’t come out for anything.”

Her boys surrounded her and hugged
her. Their tears wet her shirt and her tears wet her face.

“I’ll be back,” she intoned in her
best imitation of a famous and popular movie.

Their smiles were all the reward she
needed for finally pulling up her Big Girl panties and facing the world they
now lived in.

She turned to Ran and Cody as she shut
the door and slung her arm over Aiden’s shoulder. “Okay, five minutes. Get any
weapons you want to take. Don’t tell anyone. We will get Jed and Beth back or
those sick fucks will die. I’ve had enough of their toxic church”