Hooded (Post-Apocalyptic Fairy Tales #3)

Chapter 1

I’m not in the mood to fuck anyone tonight.

I got away with an excuse earlier this week because of my period—most paying customers don’t want a bloody mess—but it’s been six days, and Nell is going to know I’m stalling.

Fucking three guys a week is part of my job.

It’s all fine. It’s better than starving.

Better than setting adrift all alone in the violent chaos after the asteroid hit, with no home and no protection.

Here at Nell’s bar and brothel—known throughout the region as the Pub—I have my own small room, reasonable rations, and as much protection as any other woman in the area.

Nell rules the roost with an iron fist, and any man who hurts one of her servers will get a beatdown from Trevor or Rick and never be allowed back.

The Pub is the only surviving establishment in central Virginia with access to quality beer and hard liquor. No one wants to risk being banished.

So it’s safe here for me. As safe as anywhere left in the shithole the world has become.

I lived alone before Impact. I’d lost the only real family I ever had, and my friends were barely more than acquaintances. I worked as an accountant. I minded my business. I had no useful skills to offer after civilization collapsed.

So I do this now. I serve drinks and smile at customers and do my best to dodge stray slaps on the ass. And I fuck three guys a week. It’s all… whatever.

I just don’t feel like it tonight.

It doesn’t help that the main room is packed this evening.

It’s a wide space with a large wooden bar lined with rickety stools, a few dozen tables of various sizes, and empty bottles displayed on shelves on every wall.

Only one side has any windows, so we have to light the room with a motley assortment of lanterns run on batteries that are supposed to last forever.

The uneven light casts weird reflections and leaves some corners darker than others.

The first thing I see, tying off my braid as I come out from the kitchen at the beginning of my shift, in the farthest, darkest corner of the room, is Cade.

He’s been a semiregular for a few months, showing up at least once a week. He always orders a beer, a shot of whiskey, and a bowl of stew with bread, and then he eats and drinks, sitting alone at a small table without saying a word to anyone.

I only know his name because Nell told me. The man has never said a word to me.

Perking up at the sight of him, I catch his eye and gesture that I’ll be over to him in a minute. I need to put on my apron and check with Pete about what’s in stock tonight.

As I tie my apron around my waist, I give myself a quick glance in the mirror. I have long dark hair I wear in one thick braid, dark eyes, tan skin, and a tall, slim body. I’m wearing a short red dress and expensive black boots I bought on a whim before Impact.

I turned twenty-seven a few weeks ago.

The woman I was two years ago, months before news of the asteroid’s impending approach was first announced and the world began to crumble, wouldn’t know who that girl in the mirror is.

It’s a random flicker of thought. The kind that sinks like a weight into your gut and then must be swept back into a dark corner of your mind. I can’t survive through the day if I indulge every gloomy reflection.

The world sucks.

But maybe it always has.

Shaking off the thought, I turn toward Pete, who is lining up glasses for beer.

“Hey, Jill. Trevor shot a deer, so the stew is venison. For the plates, we got ham, potatoes, and carrots. And we’re out of tequila.

” Pete is gray and balding and used to be a college professor.

He strolls through life like nothing ever troubles him.

I’ve seen him block punches without spilling a drop of beer, and once he tipped an obnoxious drunk all the way off his stool with nothing but his thumb and two fingers.

“Okay. Thanks.”

When I turn back around, Poppy is sashaying across the room toward Cade.

Shit.

She’s trying to nab him.

I whirl around and tell Pete, “Beer and a whiskey.” Then I call out in my friendliest (fakest) tone, “I got him, Poppy! But I sure appreciate you covering!”

When Poppy turns to give me an annoyed look, I smile and smile and smile. Then gesture toward Pete, who is pouring out the drinks.

“I’m already here,” she says, preening her shiny hair and pouty lips and deep, exposed cleavage.

“I’ve already got his drinks. You’re so nice to try to help me out though.” I’m still smiling at her like my life depends on it as I slide the tray off the bar where Pete set the drinks.

She sniffs. “Oh.”

That little sneak. Thought she could snag my best customer.

Cade is sitting in my section, so she should know better. But she’s new. She’s been working here less than a month.

I should cut her some slack, but I don’t feel like it.

It’s still early in the evening, so we’re not very busy yet. Besides Cade, I only have one other table waiting. Four militiamen. I’d know who they are even without recognizing their faces.

Militiamen all have the same look.

“Hi,” I say as I set the glasses down at Cade’s small table. “We have venison stew tonight. Or ham, potatoes, and carrots if you’d prefer a plate.”

Every evening, we serve two dinner options. The plate is more expensive than the stew.

Cade is big with unkempt brown hair and a beard.

His eyes are a striking silver green. He’s dressed like a lot of the men who’ve been scrabbling out a life in the woods on their own or with their family—worn jeans, a faded flannel shirt, and a hunting knife on his belt.

He carries a shotgun, but he had to leave it at the door like everyone else when Nell let him in.

He eyes me soberly and shakes his head.

“Stew then. I’ll have it out in just a minute. I need to get drinks for them first, or they’ll make a fuss.”

I nod toward the table of militiamen with the slightest gesture of my head, but he knows what I mean. I can see it on his face. Everyone knows how pushy and entitled members of the militia have become since they took over this region.

He nods intentionally, as if to say no hurry, and wraps his fingers around his glass of beer.

“Thanks.” I smile at him again before I brace myself for the other table.

We always had a militia group in this area, but it used to be small and isolated—just a bunch of weirdos living in their compound in the hills.

But even before Impact, scared of the chaos breaking out around the world, a lot of people started to join them.

Soon they’d grown large enough to swallow up the nearest town.

Eight months ago, they made synchronized moves on all the other towns in the county.

No one was prepared, and the small community leaders folded one after another.

So now the militia is in control of the region.

Even Nell, whose power has been uncontestable since Impact, has to give a certain number of their members free entry to the Pub each month.

I hate them.

But I hate most men and a lot of women nowadays.

“Howdy, boys,” I tell the table of militiamen with my best fake smile. “What can I get you this evening?”

Because cash currency has been worthless for more than a year, the price of entry into the Pub is paid in food, supplies, or provisions.

Nell herself sits on a stool near the door, flanked by Rick and Trevor, and negotiates a fair price for spending an evening in the pub, which includes a meal (either stew or a pricier plate) and two drinks.

A fuck requires more payment to the house plus a tip for the server.

Most people in the area can’t afford a visit to the Pub more than twice a year, but every single night, there’s a line waiting to get in.

Two of the militiamen in my section have paid for a fuck—they have the tag folded into their pocket displaying they paid extra. I could do both and get double the tips. I’ve done it before (one after the other, not at the same time), but that makes for a particularly hard night.

I’ve been doing fine lately with tips. I don’t need extra.

Besides, Cade is still here, nursing his last two swallows of whiskey. His eyes follow me everywhere. I can feel them even when my back is turned. So I can’t help but wonder if maybe he wants to be my fuck tonight.

He doesn’t have a tag, so he’s clearly not planning on it. But maybe…

I have no way of knowing what he’s like in bed, but he’s always been generous with tips, and he’s never demeaned me like so many others.

Last month, after the third time I had to tell a guy he wasn’t allowed to rub up against me unless he pays for a fuck, Cade stopped on his way out to punch the guy so hard it knocked him out.

Doing this kind of job, you learn quick to tell the good ones from the bad ones, and I have a good feeling about Cade.

I don’t think he’d treat me bad in bed.

And I’d much rather fuck him than another militiaman.

Surely he likes me. Why would he watch me constantly if he didn’t?

More militia members arrive as the evening progresses—mostly men but also some women—and they all sit in my section. So I have to get through an obstacle course of groping hands, obnoxious comments, and bossy demands.

All the talk tonight is about another attack by the Silver Wolf. He hit another shipment the militia was transporting yesterday, stealing crates of supplies and killing a handful of men in the process.

For the past year, the Silver Wolf has been public enemy number one in this area.

He functions as a highwayman of old, he and his group hiding out, wearing masks, and striking targets on the road at random with skill and undeniably clever strategy.

The militia has been after him all this time but can’t seem to identify or capture him or any of his group.

As I remove empty plates and wipe down tables, I listen to them talk about a trap they’re setting for the Silver Wolf next week. They go on and on about it, but it’s not of much interest to me.