My heart thudded as I locked eyes with Cruz, and he gave just the slightest shake of his head. I thought my movements had been undetected up to this point, but they knew me. They'd seen me. The routine I assumed had kept me safe all this time had only made me delusional; dumb luck was the only thing that stopped me from getting caught.
No one else spoke, and the silence that followed turned out to be more concerning than the conversation itself. I imagined them using hand gestures because they’d figured out we were hiding nearby, and they were now making plans we had no chance of preparing for. Our only advantage was remaining still and listening for the direction of their movements.
Footsteps stopped outside our door and someone tried the handle. I pulled in a breath and let it out slowly, watching Cruz as his thumb swept back and forth in the same relaxed, repeated manner over my shoulder. His eyes stayed on mine, comforting me and giving me the confidence I needed to keep it together.
The men moved on to try the other doors down the hall, striking up a casual conversation as they went. My tension crept up a notch and long seconds went by where nothing at all happened. The waiting and wondering turned out to be equally as stressful as the running. Eventually, their footsteps headed back in the direction they'd come from, and I breathed a sigh. It looked like we were going to be all right. For now.
I gazed up at Cruz and whispered, “What do we do?"
“We wait until they’regonegone. If they’re out the front and see us moving around in here, we're in trouble.”
Their booted feet left the foyer and continued out onto the street. It sounded like some of the men had been searching the buildings on either side of this one, and everyone had reconvened at the broken entry doors to discuss their next move.
Cruz and I stared at each other and waited. I desperately wanted to move to use up some of the excess energy, but the thought of Jackson setting eyes on me kept me still. Neither of us knew what they were doing out there, but whatever it was generated a series of whoops and laughter that rang up and down the street. The sounds bounced off the empty buildings and echoed in the early morning air, the ruckus going on for twenty minutes or more before their car doors finally slammed.
Two engines started up and both vehicles drove away.
When Cruz's features relaxed, I knew we were good to go.
He unlocked the door, and I kept my ears trained for unusual noises. He stepped out into the corridor first, and I followed, matching his stride as we walked toward the foyer. There were no men standing nearby waiting for us to reappear, and when we approached the entrance, nothing looked to be lurking out there either. It didn't matter, though. I'd probably be on edge now until we were driving along the highway with the city in the rearview mirror.
The sun had begun its ascent and the street was now bathed in grey light, making it easier for us to see what they'd been up to while we were hiding. My attention shot to the car, and as expected, the men had taken all our provisions—but at least we were safe. We’d be fine. All we needed to do was finish changing the tyre and continue on our mission.
Except for one thing.
Cruz locked onto that tiny detail at the same time as me. He swore under his breath and looked like he wanted to punch something. “Thosependejosslashed our tyres.”
My stomach dropped. Not only that, but they’d smashed the rear window of the car and taken the remaining items from the back seat, too. I closed my eyes and released a long breath, trying my best to keep it together. I knew next to nothing about cars, and I had no idea if this had the potential to ruin our plans. “Can we drive slowly like that while we look for another car?”
He scrubbed his hand down his face. “Maybe, but we won’t get far—and I don’t know how much noise we’ll make driving on rims.”
Meaning we could attract unwanted attention and put ourselves in danger again. I imagined orange sparks and the screech of grinding metal, and I stared up and down the street in search of a better option.
Vehicles were parked bumper-to-bumper on both sides, and a delivery truck sat smack in the middle with its barn doors hanging open. A few of the dead were stumbling around near an ambulance off in the distance, but they were at least a hundred metres away. “Why don’t we take one side each and do a quick check of the block to see if any cars have keys in them?”
Cruz shifted his gaze from our trashed car to the street in either direction. The way his lips pressed together suggested he thought it would be a pointless exercise, but we needed to eliminate every option since our current vehicle wouldn’t get us very far. “I’m betting those pricks have already been through and done that, but we can take a look. Stay alert. They could still be around somewhere.”
"I'll be careful."
We took off down the street to try our luck with the parked cars, but each time I ducked to search through a side window for keys, I noticed slashed tyres as well. On every vehicle.
I breathed a frustrated sigh.Thatwas what they’d found so entertaining while we were hiding.
Neither of us had done anything to hurt them or impact their lives in any way, but they'd gone out of their way to ruin ours.
After coming up empty on my side, I ran over to meet Cruz. “You were right,” I said. “It was a dead end. They’ve slashed all the tyres, but there were no keys anyway.”
“They would have spent the past two years grabbing every working vehicle around here,” he said. “We’ll just have to take our time limping out of the city on rims, and when we get to the outskirts, we'll start breaking into houses for keys and food.”
I stowed my sword and repositioned the straps on my backpack, mentally preparing for a slower journey than the one we’d originally planned.
But in our new world, if you couldn't adapt, you couldn't survive. “I guess we should get moving then.”
Eight
Cruz
Liv and I had been travelling in full daylight for a few hours, keeping to the side streets and cruising at a crawl in our beaten-down car. We'd seen countless corpses on the roads and lurking around buildings, but neither of us had set eyes on the gang. We could only drive around built-up areas for so long without running into them, though—and I couldn't keep driving in general. Not in this car. The sound of rubber flapping against bitumen had become fucking annoying.
