“Danny’s just a dumbass with a gun.”
“Hey,” Danny said. He was sitting on the big mattress behind them, cleaning his rifle. “Leave me out of this.”
Will ignored him and said into the mic, “We’ll be back tomorrow. Gaby, Danny, and me. And some other people, too.”
“You keep picking up strays,” she said. “Looks like we have that in common.”
He smiled. “I guess we just can’t help ourselves.”
He looked outside at the falling night again, at the soldiers milling about on both sides of the highway. The trucks had turned on their headlights. Waiting, just waiting, because they had all the time in the world.
They do, but we don’t.
And it seems to get shorter every day…
Will turned back to the radio. “It’s getting dark, and we both have a long night ahead of us.”
“Be careful,” Lara said. “You too, Gaby. I don’t want to lose you guys again.”
“What am I, chopped liver?” Danny said behind them.
Will held the mic toward Gaby, who said into it, “Get a glass of cold water ready for me, Lara. I also wouldn’t mind if someone went into my room and made the bed. I might have left it a little messy.”
Lara laughed. “Your highness’s wishes are my command.”
Gaby nodded at Will, then stood up and walked over to where Danny was, her way of giving Will some privacy with the radio.
“We’ll be home tomorrow,” he said into the mic. “Wait for me, okay?”
“Someone recently told me that home isn’t where I’m staying, but where the person I love is,” Lara said. “Come back to me, Will.”
“Tomorrow…”
“Tomorrow,” she repeated.
31
Keo
“You think it worked?” Blaine asked. “Earlier today?”
“I don’t know,” Keo said. “Maybe.”
“We should have blown up that house. Or taken out one of those docks and the boats. Maybe if we’d stayed longer instead of running so quickly…”
“Then all three of us would be dead right now.” Keo shrugged. “We did what we could. If they’re smart, they’ll accept today’s losses and regroup.”
“And if they’re not that smart?”
“Look around you, Blaine. These people took over the planet. I’m not talking about the human puppets. I’m talking about the ones pulling the strings. The creatures that Lara called ghouls. They’re not stupid.”
Blaine nodded. “You’re right. Anyway, if they want this island, they’re going to have to take it over our dead bodies.”
That’s what I’m afraid of, Keo thought, but said instead, “That seems to be the consensus with everyone here.”
“Lara’s a smart woman. She’ll get us through this.”
Keo didn’t doubt that the blonde was smart, but sometimes it took more than smarts to survive an unwinnable situation. Sometimes you just have to accept that you can’t win and move on. Or run. He had done plenty of both in his life.
And that’s what I should have done earlier today, too. Run the hell away from here and these people as fast as I could.
So why the hell am I playing guard duty?
Isn’t it obvious? Because you’re the dumbest man alive.
Keo sighed to himself.
From up here, he had a view of every inch of the island with the exception of the forested western half. He could see why Lara had someone up here twenty-four seven. It was a hell of an overwatch. Armed with the ACOG-mounted M4, a good shooter could pick off targets on the beach or boaters coming from the shorelines almost at will. Not him, of course. His skills were more close and personal-based.
“I was here when the island came under attack the first time,” Blaine was saying. “It was a hell of a night. Bullets everywhere. People dying.”
“They attacked the place before?”
“Over three months ago. Will and Danny were here that time.”
“You guys made it through okay, apparently.”
“Barely.” He lowered the binoculars and glanced up at the skylight above them. “They almost took down the Tower with one of those grenade launchers you used back at the staging area.”
Keo peered up at the full moon. It was a cloudless night, which was good for them because it extended their coverage of the surrounding lake.
He looked down at his watch: 8:16 p.m.
“Are you staying?” Blaine asked after a while.
“No,” Keo said. “I’ll help out as much as I can until I leave tomorrow.”
“Thanks for that.”
Keo chuckled. “Don’t get the wrong idea, Blaine. I’m stuck here for now, so if they attack, my ass is on the line, too.”
“Hunh. Good point.”
They didn’t say much after that, and Keo was glad Blaine wasn’t the type who felt the need to fill every second with noise. Shorty had been one of those.
The silence was finally broken by their radios squawking, and they heard Lara’s voice. “Keo, Blaine.”
Blaine answered his radio first. “What’s up?”
“Anything?” Lara asked.
“Nothing yet.” He glanced over at Keo for confirmation. Keo shook his head. “All quiet up here.”
“If you see anything, I want to hear about it. Anything at all.”
“Roger that.”
Keo moved to the south window and looked off at the stretch of white sands along the beach. There was a figure standing guard on top of the boat shack. Either Bonnie or Roy, though Keo hadn’t completely memorized their guard shift yet. A second figure walked in and out of the dozen or so halos along one of the piers. Tall and slender, so that was probably Bonnie. He turned a bit to the right and looked over the roof of the hotel and spotted two more figures, one crouching, the other standing. There were supposed to be three people up there tonight.
“Doesn’t she ever sleep?” Keo asked. “Lara.”
“A few hours here and there since Will left the island,” Blaine said. “I don’t know how she does it. She must drink two or three cups of coffee every morning.”
“Where do you guys get coffee anyway?”
“We got stacks of the stuff in freeze dried form. Sarah says those things last anywhere from two to twenty years in the pantry, and indefinitely in the freezer. You don’t know how much you miss coffee until you’ve smelled it in the morning.”
A flicker of movement against the moonlight caught his attention just before their radios squawked again. This time it was an excited female voice. Not Bonnie, but one of the other women. Maybe the short one?
“I see something on the water! I think it’s coming toward us!”
Keo adjusted his binoculars and picked up multiple white lights skirting across the lake at a snail’s pace, moving gradually in their direction. The object was too far away and too hidden by darkness to make out any details, but Keo had seen enough of them to know what the lights belonged to.
“I see it,” Keo said into his radio. “It’s a boat.”
“What kind of boat?” Lara said through the radio. Her voice was shaky and she was breathing hard.
Keo turned the binoculars downward and saw a figure racing toward the beach. Damn. How’d she gotten out of the hotel so fast? The woman really didn’t sleep.
“It’s still too far away to tell,” Keo said. “But it’s moving slow, which means it’s big.”
“Or it could be trying to sneak up on us,” Carly said through the radio.
“No. It’s got its lights on.”
“Keo,” Lara said, “I need you on the beach with me. Maddie, head to the Tower and take his place.”
“I’m on my way,” Maddie said.