3. Taryn
CHAPTER THREE
TARYN
Iawoke with my bladder aching, and the sky still dark.
Turning, I saw Lila wasn’t in her sleeping bag and that Max was gone too.
Getting up quickly, I grabbed my bat. “I’m going to kill that girl.”
I hated how important she’d become to me. I’d lost so much that I couldn’t fathom losing Lila, too.
Cautiously opening the door, I made my way around the building, quietly calling her name. “Lila? Where are you?”
I heard a rustling, and Max bounded out of the trees with a rabbit held tightly in his mouth, Lila right behind him.
“Look what we caught!” She pumped her fist and jumped in the air. “Breakfast is served!”
I stifled the urge to laugh at her unusual exuberance. “And just how do you propose we cook it without alerting anyone to our presence? We’re probably only a couple of miles from the town.”
Her excitement fell instantly. “Crap, I hadn’t thought about that.”
“Looks like Max found a solution," I said with a smile as he tore into the rabbit. Fur and blood clung to his snout. “Energy bars? Or would you like to join him?”
“Gross.” She grimaced. “I’m not that hungry yet.”
I laughed, went into the woods to relieve myself, and then into the shack to get our breakfast. Today, I was going to forage for some berries and get a little more rest. Tonight, I’d go check out the town and see if I could find any signs of Adrian or Beck.
I went back outside, handed Lila one of the breakfast bars, then joined her on the old log she was sitting on.
“How about after we eat, we see if we can find some berries to supplement our food supply?” I took a bite of my bar.
Lila unwrapped hers and frowned. “Yeah, that sounds good. I hate these things now.” She took a reluctant bite. “They get old when you eat them for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”
We both gave Max an irritated look when he let out a doggie belch, clearly satisfied with his meal.
“I’m going to check things out after it gets fully dark. If I’m lucky, maybe I’ll spot Beck and Adrian, and we can get the hell out of here.” I didn’t think it’d be that simple, but hey, a girl can dream.
“God, I hope so.” Lila finished her bar and took a drink from the water bottle I’d handed her. “I’m sure Ethan has a lecture ready for the moment I get back.”
“How’s everything going with you two?” I waggled my eyebrows. “Other than the ass-pounding, I mean.”
The pair had grown closer while we were at my house before everything went to shit, but they only started sleeping together in the past few weeks.
She blushed. “It’s great. He’s good to me, and you know I’ve been in love with him forever.”
I knew that, and I’d been part of the reason they never got together. I still wasn’t Ethan’s biggest fan, but I hoped the apocalypse had changed him for the better.
“What’re you going to do about the two men fighting over you?” Lila grinned.
“Adrian has a lot to make up for.” I shrugged. “Beck has been with me since this whole shitshow started, and I owe him my loyalty.”
“I don’t think Adrian sees it like that.” She poked me in the side with her elbow. “He thinks he has dibs since he had you first.”
“He didn’t have shit.” I rolled my eyes. “After he left to live with his dad, I barely saw him.”
“You may not have seen him, but according to Lucas, he saw you,” Lila smirked.
“Don’t you think that’s creepy as shit? Spying on his stepsister?” I sneered.
There was no way I’d admit it, but knowing he’d been watching me was a turn-on. That proved what I’d suspected all along… the further we went into the apocalypse, the more insane I became.
“Maybe, but he’s so good-looking that it doesn’t matter.” Lila stood. “I’m going to pee, and then we can go look for berries. Just thinking about eating them’s got my mouth watering.”
I nodded in agreement and went inside to grab my pack. I’d have to figure something out with Adrian and Beck.
Beck didn't appear convinced when I said I wasn't interested in Adrian… and my body clearly didn’t buy it either.
Darkness settled differently now.
Before the world ended, night was never completely quiet, and I always felt safe. Now, there were no planes overhead or cell phones lighting up, and safety wasn’t even a possibility.
I crouched low behind the remains of an overturned truck near the edge of town, studying the settlement spread out below us as a chilly wind slid through the trees behind me.
Small town.
Maybe a few hundred people before everything went to hell.
Now crude fencing surrounded the entire perimeter, built from welded scrap metal, and abandoned vehicles shoved together tightly enough to force a bottleneck at the entrance.
Floodlights swept slowly across the outer roads while generators hummed somewhere deeper inside the town, loud enough that I could feel the faint vibration through the ground beneath me.
The noise should’ve been drawing infected nonstop, which meant one of two things. Either these people were stupid, or they’d found a way to deal with them.
Movement near the fence answered that question quickly.
A group of armed men moved along the outer perimeter with practiced precision, taking down infected as soon as they wandered too close.
Gunfire cracked sharply through the dark before another man stepped forward and drove a blade through the twitching body’s skull, as if he’d done it a thousand times.
No hesitation or panic. Just a routine that he’d established so long ago that he didn’t feel the danger anymore. That kind of efficiency came from experience. And experience usually came with a body count.
Beside me, Max stood perfectly still, ears forward and body tense enough that I could feel the low vibration of his growl through the dirt beneath us.
“Ruhig,” I whispered, the German command for quiet, pressing a hand lightly against Max’s neck.
His ripped ear twitched briefly before he settled down next to me, his muscles tense beneath the red-and-white fur.
“Good boy.” I praised him under my breath.
Another infected stumbled from between two abandoned cars near the road, its movements jerky and uneven as it wandered toward the fencing. Long blond hair hung in dirty knots around her face as the remains of a pink sweatshirt blew off her chest in the light breeze.
“Look at the tits on that one! I bet she was something else before the shit hit the fan.” One man near the perimeter said, then drew his rifle and fired.
“You’re disgusting, Andy.” Another man spoke, grabbing the body by the ankle and dragging it toward a smoking trench burning somewhere beyond the road. “The lack of female company is getting to you.”
“Not for much longer.” The first man growled. “I’m scheduled to fight in a few days.”
“Isn’t this the third time?” the body dragger asked. “I’d think you’d be tired of getting your ass kicked by now.”
“Fuck off, George.”
My nose wrinkled at the smell of the burning bodies.
I gagged, and my eyes watered. Right now, I didn't appreciate my heightened senses.
Using my shirt, I dabbed my eyes and focused back on the town. They seemed to have adapted well to the threat of infected.
“I wonder how they’re feeding this many people,” I muttered under my breath.
A shadow shifted behind me, and I turned instantly. My knife was already half drawn before I registered Lila’s scent.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I hissed.
She froze mid-step. “You’ve been gone for hours. You said you were checking it out, not moving in permanently.”
I stared at her in disbelief. “You were supposed to stay hidden.”
Things had really changed with her. My words used to be law. Now she treated them as suggestions.
“And you were supposed to come back an hour ago,” she said sarcastically.
Fair.
But it didn’t mean she should’ve followed me.
“Fine.” I pulled her down beside me, exhaled slowly, and looked back toward the settlement.
Something wasn’t right, and I couldn’t put my finger on it. I studied everything more closely for a few moments.
“I don’t see any women,” Lila whispered.
Shit! That was it.
Every person I could see moving through the streets was male.
Men on the walls.
Men near the gates.
Men dragging infected bodies toward the burn pit.
Not a single woman in sight.
Not even any children that I could see.
My grip tightened around GG, resting across my knees.
Most of the infected outside the fence were women, with a few men and children interspersed among them.
The floodlights swept across the road again, briefly illuminating more of the settlement.
Clean streets and organized patrol routes. There was smoke rising from chimneys.
Maybe the women were inside? Everything looked functional and calm. I didn’t trust it.
“They look…” Lila trailed off quietly beside me.
“Fed?” I finished.
She nodded slowly.
And they did.
Clean clothes and lots of weapons. Everyone standing guard looked well taken care of.
Something was setting off warning bells in my head, and I’d learned early on to heed them.
I stared at the fence for a few minutes before realizing what was wrong. The barbed wire curved inward toward the town. The fence wasn’t just built to keep the infected out. It looked like it was also meant to keep something in.
I didn’t like that.
My pulse slowed instead of quickening. Danger always made everything inside me colder now.
Movement near the center of town suddenly caught my attention. Two men dragged someone between buildings, too quickly for me to make out details before they disappeared from view.
Not infected.
Human.
My stomach tightened harder.
“I don’t like this place,” Lila whispered.
“Neither do I.”
Max suddenly lifted his head sharply. Then he moved.
Fast.
“Max,” I whispered harshly. “Hier.”
He ignored my command to come and disappeared into the darkness beyond the truck before I could grab him.
“Shit.”
“What’s wrong with him?” Lila whispered urgently. “He always obeys you, doesn’t he?”
“Usually.” But then a thought hit me, and my pulse quickened. “Beck,” I muttered.
Apart from me, there was only one other person he’d run to.
Moving before I could think too hard about it, I slipped lower as I crossed through the trees toward the fencing.
“Taryn,” Lila hissed behind me.
“Stay here.” I murmured, crossing my fingers she’d actually listen.
Voices drifted through the dark.
Male laughter.
Boots scraping pavement.
Another distant gunshot echoed, accompanied by the sound of an infected body being dragged toward the trench.
All of a sudden, a bark came from somewhere inside the perimeter.
Short.
Sharp.
Max.
Relief hit so fast it almost hurt.
They were alive. I knew it as well as I knew the sun rose in the east. But before I could move toward the sound, metal suddenly rattled loudly somewhere behind me.
I whipped around instantly.
Lila stood frozen near a stack of old fencing, one loose piece still swaying beside her.
“Run,” I snapped immediately.
Too late.
A floodlight slammed across the trees hard enough to blind me for half a second.
“Well, well,” a male voice called near the gate. “Looks like we found ourselves more strays.”
Every muscle in my body tightened.
“Let Gideon know we’ve found more females.” Another man said, his voice holding authority.
I saw a pistol held to Lila’s temple. Shit! If it were just me, I’d fight, but there was no way I’d take that kind of risk with her life.
I raised my hands in surrender. I guess this was one way to make contact with the two idiots… just not the one I’d have chosen.