I spared him a glance and found him caught up in his own battle, downing one of the easier infected before he shifted his attention to the bearded giant. His movements were quick and confident. He didn’t appear fazed at all—but things could change quickly without warning. “I’m fine. Be careful!”
“Always,querida.”
Keh-ree-duh.I made a mental note to ask him what the word meant when we were alone again. For now, I focused on the task in front of me and moved on to the next apartment. No hands reached out for me this time around, and I didn’t waste time checking to see if someone was inside. I pulled the door shut and continued on my way.
The noise Cruz and I were making brought out more of the infected from the next unit. An elderly man and a younger woman shuffled toward me, reaching with withered arms as they stumbled and bumped against each other. I used to say hello to the man in passing, but I didn't recognise the woman. Both were dressed in blood-stained pyjamas and robes, with dirty, tangled hair and blank eyes. They’d been dead for a while which made dealing with them easier, but it was still a case of two-on-one.
I switched into battle mode and strode toward them, eyes focused on the target. Grabbing the old man first, I slammed my blade through his ear and shoved him hard against the woman. The force threw her off balance and knocked her to the floor, where she immediately tried to rise again. With my heart racing and my knife at the ready, I bent over her and gripped her matted hair, killing her with a strike through the eye. While her gunk and blood spread across the carpet like a Rorschach inkblot, I heard a low whistle coming from the other end of the corridor.
Now the immediate danger had passed, I looked up to find Cruz standing over three dead bodies. He’d taken down the big guy without even breaking a sweat, and he was impressed with me.“Nice work,” he said.
“Thanks.” I smiled and stepped over the dead woman, shutting the door they'd come through in case there were more inside. “You, too.”
What a strange world we lived in now, where it was considered a compliment to tell someone they were skilled at killing people who were already dead.
I stood silently and listened, hearing nothing but my breath and the blood pounding in my ears.
All the doors were closed, the hallway clear of movement. It looked like we were good to go. Cruz apparently shared my view because he headed straight for me. “Let’s go take care of your friend,” he said as he passed by.
Dread settled inside me as I followed him back to my apartment, where Haruto lay waiting to be taken to his final resting place.
Five
Cruz
Liv unlocked Haruto’s apartment, and the smell of someone long dead drifted out into the hall. She’d already given me the heads up that his wife was in there, so I carried his frail, lifeless body inside and arranged him beside her in the bedroom. Laying him to rest turned out to be a macabre task, as if we'd just opened a tomb to add another body, but I'd seen worse during my years on the job, and it hadn't gotten any better since the pandemic took over.
When I had him settled on the mattress, Liv covered him with a blanket that reached up to his chin, and it almost looked like they were sleeping side by side.
I stepped back while she said a few words over their bodies, giving her space to verbalise her feelings for a man who'd clearly meant the world to her. Her voice trembled with emotion, and I glanced around the room at the traditional Japanese furniture, wishing I hadn't just met her that morning. If I'd known her better, I could have hugged her without crossing an invisible line.
I felt her loss, in the air, in my bones; I'd been through the same thing myself not that long ago and it fucking hurt. Whenever someone you loved died, they took a piece of you with them, and you were never completely whole again.
Minutes passed by, and when she was done, Liv breathed a sigh and met my eyes. “This was a good idea,” she said, sounding relieved. “I feel better knowing they’re together again.” She went back to looking at their bodies, and the silence stretched on for a while before she spoke again. “Haruto sent me out this morning to find you," she said, crossing her arms over her chest as she faced me. "He was so pushy about it, I should have known he was up to something.”
I kept my eyes on her, watching the different emotions play across her face. She wanted to find a way to blame herself, but Haruto would have been gone soon one way or another. For him, there must have been some satisfaction in taking control of his life while he was still physically and mentally capable of making that choice. “You had no way of knowing what he was planning—or if there was a plan at all. Sometimes people make spur-of-the-moment decisions like this because the conditions are just right… or wrong.”
She gave me a half smile. “I knew, I just didn't realise it at the time. I remember not wanting to leave him because something didn’t feel right. I should have listened to my gut.”
Speaking of gut, my own chose that moment to rumble long and loud in the quiet room. I would have shut the fucking thing off if I could, but I hadn't eaten anything substantial since the room-temperature soup I scarfed down straight from the can last night, and there was no stopping it once it got started.
Liv seemed to appreciate the distraction. A glimmer of humour filled her eyes and the heaviness in the room lifted. “Someone's hungry. Should I feed you or would you rather keep sucking Skittles and pinging them in a bucket like bullets?”
The mention of bullets reminded me of the gun I had in my backpack, but I wouldn't bring that up until we knew each other better. In a country where most people hadn't owned firearms before the pandemic, seeing or hearing about one now could cause her unnecessary concern. I'd never be a threat to her. “I'd rather you feed me.”
Liv slid one more glance toward her friends, then stepped away from the bed. “Let's go get some breakfast.”
~ * ~
I sat on one of the barstools at the kitchen island, and Liv grabbed a tub from what looked to be a fairly well-stocked pantry, despite what she'd said about running low. Before she closed the door, I caught sight of powdered mashed potatoes, soup sachets and dried fruit. Rice, jars of honey, bottles of multivitamins. The thought of eating something real with another living person had my stomach rumbling again.
She peeled off the lid and slid the tub across the counter. “This is the breakfast bucket,” she said. “If you pick something out, I’ll mix it up for you.”
I sifted through the contents, finding names like Strawberry Granola, Apple Cinnamon Crunch, and three or four others that had me eager to work my way through all of them. I looked up at her as I handed over the apple-cinnamon sachet. “You’ve been eating these since the beginning?”
“Almost." She took the packet from me. "We started out with standard cereal boxes then moved on to these. There were six tubs originally, and this is our last one. They taste pretty good," she said with a shrug in her voice, "and they’re hugely preferable to starving.”
I lifted my brows in surprise. Six buckets filled to the brim with specially prepared long-life food. “They would have cost you a fortune on top of all the other supplies.”
