The zombies between us and the park immediately started toward the explosion. Whatever he exploded was burning, giving off a thick black smoke. It would be a while before that fire wentout, not that it mattered much with Operation Night Night on its way. New York City was lost; if it burned, so be it.
“Come on,” Nico said when the street had cleared, and the horde had gotten far enough away that they wouldn’t notice us.
He helped me off the truck, and we ran across the street to the park and the first pedicab stand. There were more throughout the park, but luckily, we wouldn’t need to find them. This one had plenty of pedicabs to choose from. I inspected the first one I came to and immediately pushed it aside. The tires were cracked and on their last legs. The last thing we wanted was a flat tire.
“This one looks good,” Nico said, pointing at the one beside it. I studied the pedicab in question and noticed the handlebars were slightly crooked—another not-so-good option.
“You know how we all have our strengths?” I asked Nico as I checked out another bike and deemed it worthy.
“Yeah?”
“Well, this one is mine. I know bikes and how to identify their wear and tear. You watch our backs and keep an eye out for Miguel.”
“You’re the boss.”
I smirked to myself as I continued looking over the bikes. Damn right I was the boss.
Chapter eighteen
Miguel
Ileft Emery with Nico at the fire truck and cut through the alleys, coming out several blocks away. I only ran into a couple of zombies along the way, which was good. That meant my little distraction wouldn’t cause a bigger problem for us later by bringing more zombies to the area than were already here. I scoped out the street, looking for a good place to set up my firecrackers, when I spotted something that made me grin like a kid on Christmas morning. I don’t know why it was here to begin with. The Army may have brought it in to fuel their generators and abandoned it when they evacuated. Whatever the reason, the small fuel truck was mine now—and I was going to blow it up.
I took out the two zombies near the tank and circled it. How hard could it be? Gasoline wanted to burn, right? I opened the valve, standing to the side so that I didn’t get it all over me, and let the fuel spill to the ground. Once it had spread far enough away that I could make an easy escape, I took out my firecrackers and duct tape. I taped a bunch of them together, stealing the fuses from some extras, to twist them together andgive me a little more wiggle room. When I finished, I placed my makeshift firecracker bomb down on the street where some of the gas had spread.
Now came the tricky part. I knew the gas fumes were quite flammable, so I needed to get the fuse lit without setting the air around me on fire. I was eighty percent certain that I wasn’t about to blow myself up. I ignited the lighter and held my breath as I put the flame to the fuse. As soon as I saw a spark, I took off down the street. I was halfway down the block when I stopped and looked back. Nothing had happened. I didn’t know how long these things were supposed to take, but I hadn’t even heard the firecrackers go off yet.
I turned and took a step back toward the truck when a loud whoosh sounded. Seconds later, the truck exploded, shaking the ground around us and sending me to my knees. I laughed in glee as I climbed back to my feet. There was no way the zombies didn’t notice that! I took off running for two more blocks before I cut back toward the park. I encountered more zombies on my way, but they were easy to dodge since their primary focus was the big cloud of black smoke rising over the city.
It wasn’t until I entered the park that I realized the error in my plan. I hadn’t considered the park might be full of zombies. And that I’d have to run through them to get back to Emery and Nico. I pulled out my knife and made a wider arc around the moving horde, praying that Nico and Emery noticed them coming before the zombies noticed them. While I had fewer zombies to deal with, I still had a fight on my hands, opting to run past as many as I could and only pausing to take down the ones who drew too close.
Needing to catch my breath, I paused in a thicket of shrubbery. Zombies continued to pass me, none the wiser of my presence. At least until one tripped and nearly fell on top of me. I plunged my knife into its brain, but the damage had already been done.I was exposed, and another zombie stumbled onto us, trying to bite my face off. Zombies all around began to take notice of the scuffle and, on instinct, came over to get in on the perceived feast. I stabbed the second zombie through the eye and crawled from beneath the bodies.
By sheer will alone, I managed to evade the other zombies and kept running. No more breaks for me until I got back to Emery. I made her a promise, and I didn’t intend to break it. Eventually, the zombies thinned out, and I finally spotted the pedicab stand. My heart pounded in my chest as I approached. I didn’t see Emery or Nico anywhere. Refusing even to consider the worst, I scanned the area to see where they might have gone. They would have stayed within view of the stand, knowing that was where I would meet them.
As I circled the bikes, I heard a zipper. I turned in time to see the flap of one of the carriages open, revealing Emery and Nico hiding within. “Oh, thank fuck,” I whispered.
“When we saw all the zombies coming from the park, we started to worry you might not make it through,” Emery said. She climbed out of the carriage and jumped into my waiting arms.
“I told you I’d always come back to you, Sweetheart,” I assured her.
“So you didn’t run into any trouble?”
“None at all.” I looked at Nico, and he rolled his eyes at me, clearly seeing through my lie.
“Glad you’re back, brother. Now, how about we get back to the others and get the fuck off of this island?” Emery directed me toward a bike, and we started pedaling back to Luis and her parents. “What the hell did you blow up?” Nico asked with a lopsided grin.
“Wasn’t that amazing?” I asked. “I found a gas truck and couldn’t resist.”
“I’m a little jealous I didn’t go instead,” Nico replied with a laugh.
“You could have been hurt,” Emery lectured.
“Yeah, but, Babe, did you see the size of the explosion! That was some epic shit.”
“Oh, I saw,” she replied, shaking her head. “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.”
“It worked, didn’t it?” I asked. I loved that she was worried about me. “Plus, it looks like it was pretty effective at cleaning up the streets. We haven’t seen a single zombie yet.”
