He wondered where his father was now-a man in his sixties dating twenty-year-olds. Howie had an uncle somewhere, too, whom he hadn’t seen in over a decade. The last time he’d seen him, his uncle was leaving on a world cruise and had asked Howie to come with him. He’d asked him not to be confined to one city, ever. Howie wanted to go so badly that he hadn’t been able to sleep the night before his uncle was going to leave for his first stop: Florence. But he couldn’t go. One face kept appearing to him every time he made up his mind to go and abandon everything. Jessica. But she was gone, and he was alone.
When Howie woke up the temperature was hotter than he remembered it being before. Sweat rolled off him as though he were in a sauna, and his clothes were drenched. His collar was also damp with blood. He started to peel his shirt off and then stopped. Death would probably come quicker if he allowed himself to dehydrate. He had no intention of dragging this out.
And then he heard something coming from another room, possibly next door, where the light was coming from, that made his heartbeat hammer in his ears-a piercing scream. He would have recognized that voice no matter where he was.
Jessica.
50
Duncan Adams waited for a long time outside the hospital. He spent most of that time walking around. He went across the street to a convenience store to get a drink. The cashier, who was reading a magazine, looked up.
“Hi.”
“Hi,” Duncan said.
“Just so you know, the credit card machine is down.”
“I’ve got cash, thanks.”
He went to the fridge, picked out a chocolate milk, and went to the cash register. He laid the cash on the counter. As the cashier counted out Duncan’s change, he picked up the phone, put it to his ear, and then placed it back down.
“Can I ask you something?” the cashier asked. “Is your phone working?”
“No. No one’s is.”
He shook his head. “So weird.”
Duncan went back to the hospital entrance and sat at the curb, drinking his milk. He checked his watch, and almost an hour had passed. He threw the empty bottle in a trash bin and went inside.
The hospital wasn’t extremely busy, and two staff were talking about how bizarre it was that they hadn’t seen any stabbings or shootings that night. But they had treated a lot of people with the flu. He told them that anyone with flu-like symptoms should be quarantined, and they stared at him as if he were a crazy person off the streets. He decided he had to find Sam. Maybe she could help convince them.
As he walked around a corner, he stepped around something on the floor, slowly realizing it was blood. Cautiously, he followed the small trail around a desk.
A nurse with a hole in her head was lying on top of a police officer. He bent down to check their pulses but then didn’t. Their eyes already had the grayness of death. They had been gone for a while.
He stood up to go notify the staff, thinking they needed the police or more guardsmen at the hospital. Suddenly, another thought hit him, and he nearly lost his breath. Sam.
He ran to the elevator and took it to the quarantine floor. He dashed into Jane’s room. The door hit someone and knocked them forward as Duncan saw the man standing next to the bed, with a pistol in his hand.
Without a thought, he ran at him.
The man fired the pistol, and the bullet grazed his shoulder as Duncan leapt on the man, who twisted him around and flung him into the wall. Duncan ran at him again, and at the last moment, he ducked and grabbed the man’s legs, taking him down.
“Run, Sam!”
Samantha was screaming something, but he couldn’t hear it because the man had slapped both his ears. The intense pain and the ringing told him that his eardrums had been ruptured. But he still had both hands on the man’s firing arm. Samantha picked up a chair, ran over, and struck the stranger with it.
He reached up the arm to the pistol. The stranger was clearly too strong, and Duncan couldn’t wrestle the pistol away. Instead, he stuck his finger over the trigger and fired. Four shots went off, four quiet spits that went into the ceiling. And the gun clicked empty.
The man punched him in the face and then savagely elbowed him multiple times. Duncan’s grip loosened as Sam ran over with something else.
“Run, now!” he shouting at her as the man was getting to his feet. He wrapped both hands around Duncan’s jaw, and the last thing he heard was Samantha’s scream-and the crunch of his own spine.
Samantha screamed and ran out of the room, fear overtaking her. She was sobbing as she ran down the hall to the elevator and pushed the button. The stranger came out of the room and sprinted toward her. She kept pushing the button, refusing to acknowledge him, but she knew she wouldn’t make it onto the elevator.
She backed up against the glass as he ran at her. He wasn’t slowing down, and right before impact, she wrapped her arms around him and pushed back with her legs. His momentum went forward and hers went back, sending them crashing through the thin window.
A sensation of flying hit her, and she twisted to the side before they both slammed into the lawn from thirty feet up.
51
Howie shouted for his daughter but didn’t get a response. She apparently couldn’t hear anything else over her own screaming and crying.
He tried shaking the box, but nothing happened. The door on the outside was locked with a padlock that he could hear clink every time he pushed on the door. He pressed on the backside of the box. Leaning into it, he thrust back with his leg, and the metal gave a little. The box wasn’t against the wall as he had originally thought.
Howie kicked again and again, and the metal caved a little each time. He kicked at least five more times before the corners of the box bent and gave way. After a final kick, the side was bent enough that he could push it off. It crashed to the floor, and he crawled out, his head spinning and the blood draining out of his nose.
He climbed off the counter the box was sitting on, then ran to the door where the screaming was coming from and opened it.
A guardsman, the only one in the room, was trying to tear Jessica’s clothing off. Red handprints marked her face, and she was fighting as hard as she could. The guardsman heard the door open and turned as Howie sprinted at him.
The blow knocked the wind out of both of them, and Howie landed on top of him. Howie had his hands around the guard’s throat, and some of his blood dripped into the other man’s opened mouth and eyes. The guard screamed, trying to wipe away the blood.
Howie got a good grip on the man’s throat, and his eyes bulged when Howie’s grip tightened. He wasn’t trying to get the blood off himself anymore, but, making hoarse, guttural sounds, he was scrambling to pull Howie’s fingers away. Howie didn’t let go, his arms straining like serpents wrapped around their next meal, until the man’s body went limp beneath him.
He stood and turned to his daughter, who was crying and holding torn clothing to her body. Holding his head away, he put his arms around her, and she cried for a long time. He wasn’t sure how long because he was drifting in and out of consciousness.
“We need to go,” he said.
He took the guard’s rifle, which was propped against the wall, and put the strap around himself as they opened another door that led to a dark hallway. He walked slowly to make as little noise as possible but couldn’t hear anyone else. As they rounded a corner, he heard laughter coming from another room.
He motioned for Jessica to wait in the hall and then glanced in. Four guardsmen playing poker were drinking and laughing, their rifles stacked neatly on a table across the room. He lifted the strap of the rifle off himself and walked calmly into the room, pointing the barrel at the first guardsman’s head.