“Fuck,” I muttered and swiped at the beads of sweat that had accumulated on my brow. “Fuck,” I said again because I hated this shit.
The boy was foolish to have kept her alive for this long. Not only was he risking contracting the virus himself, but the woman was only days away from her Last Gasp. That was when the body, fully suffused with the disease, became strong again, when the virulent parasite took full control of their central nervous system, and they woke up starving and willing to eat anything in their path, including their own beloved son’s pretty face. Because of their diminished brain functioning, Rabids tended to meet their own demise fairly early due to some stupid shit like falling out of a window or gnawing off their own arm, but by then, the virus had found a new host.
I could walk away, pretend I was never here, and let the boy continue to nurse his corpse of a mother, knowing she might resurrect at any moment and attack him, infect him with the virus or, at the very least, mutilate him in a verynotcool way.
Or I could do the right thing and put this woman out of her misery.
I went over to the window and pulled back the curtain. The woman groaned and turned her head away from the light, further evidence that she was beyond saving. The boy was now clipping various herbs for his carrot stew, merrily going about his chores. Damn him for fucking up my day, royally. I turned up the volume on my two-way and said quietly to my crew, “I have a situation at 232 Shady Oaks Drive. A teenage boy with no signs of the fever and a woman who is very near Rabid stage.”
There was a lengthy pause while they interpreted the message, what was said as well as what was not.
“What are we going to do about it?” Artemis asked, because of all the options, doing nothing wasn’t one of them.
I gritted my teeth and huffed with displeasure. “I’ll subdue him. Meet me here as backup but stay out of sight.”
I holstered the two-way, turning down the volume again. The woman gasped wetly and groaned in misery. I tried not to think of my mother or father or the many others I’d watched succumb to this wretched disease. I definitely didn’t think about what I’d had to do to survive it.
I drew a deep breath, inhaling the putrid stench of death and despair, and cursed the world that had made me, at the tender age of nineteen, the Grim Reaper.
TWO
KITTEN
“Hello, Kitten.”
I startled and spun around to find a strange guy draped against my kitchen door frame. He was tall and lanky with crow-black hair and eyes like soot. Behind him was the front door, which I knew was locked, so where the hell did he come from?
“Who are you?” I asked, trying to keep the tremor out of my voice. I hadn’t seen anyone around here in months, not since before my brother left to get medicine for our mother.
“I’m from the neighborhood HOA. Your yard needs trimming.”
I stared at him, confused until I realized he was messing with me. The butcher knife was already in my hand, so I gripped it tighter, fist clenching around the handle until my knuckles paled. The guy’s beetle-black eyes subtly assessed the knife before returning to my face.
“What are you going to do with that, Kitten?” His voice was a low purr, and he managed to look both amused and bored at the same time. He was strapped all over with weapons—several knives, a gun holster slung around his slim waist with a piece in it, a hatchet on his hip, and a belt strapped across his chest that probably carried a much larger blade at his back. His hands were empty, but I sensed they were quick and nimble.
“I don’t have any ration cards, but I have food, and you can take whatever you want from the house.” My eyes flickered to the stairwell behind him, which led upstairs to my mother’s bedroom.
He moved like water, silent and graceful, to join me at the kitchen sink. Arms crossed, he leaned with his back against the counter as if this were a casual conversation. My knife was between us, pointed at his gut. No use in pretending we were friends.
“What’s up there, pet?” he asked and nodded at the stairs.
“Nothing worth stealing.”
“Is that so?” He leaned over my soup pot and peered inside. “That’s a lot of carrot stew you’re making. Are you expecting company?”
“No,” I said, then realized my mistake. If he knew I was alone, there was no telling what he might do to me. I shouldn’t have been outdoors. I should have waited until nightfall, but I’d been so excited to harvest the potatoes. I’d been impatient and reckless, and now I was going to pay for it.
“Have you ever killed someone before, Kitten?” he asked.
Suddenly, he was in front of me, with my knifepoint pressed against the soft part of his stomach, only his faded green t-shirt between my blade and his belly. My hand trembled so bad that the handle slipped in my grasp. He was tempting me to stab him, but I couldn’t make myself do it.
“Didn’t think so,” he said, then swooped in and grabbed my free hand, twirling me around the way my mother used to when I was little. Crossing my arms in front of me, he trapped me from behind, containing me within the cage of his sinewy arms and torso. He squeezed my wrist so tightly that I was forced to drop the knife, and it landed on the wood floor with a clatter. My gut followed, a sinking sensation that told me I was doomed.
“Please, don’t hurt me.” I’d beg for my life if that’s what it took.
“Shhhh,” he soothed, his warm breath ghosting over my good ear. “I’m not going to hurt you, but we need to talk about the elephant in the room, or rather, the Rabid upstairs.”
Anger flooded me as I twisted in his arms, unable to free myself but trying my hardest. He clamped down tighter, restricting my movement, and pulled me upward so that my feet barely touched the ground.
