The Gates of Byzantium (The Babylon Series, Book 2) Read online

  He was on his feet and pushing forward before he lifted his head and saw Betts, who, sensing movement, turned suddenly in his direction. Josh saw the whites of Betts’s eyes as they widened in surprise, and Josh thought, Suck it!

  He intended to barrel straight into Betts and knock the man off balance and drive him into the floor. Instead, Josh just barely clipped Betts’s shoulder, because Betts was standing up, moving much faster than Josh had expected—how could someone that tall move that fast?—and twisting at the very last second. Josh did manage to get a piece of Betts, and the bigger man spun a bit and lost his balance, even as Josh flew past him and landed in a pile, grimacing with pain as his body slammed into the hard floor, the carpeting providing almost no cushion at all.

  No!

  Josh was still on the floor, trying to get up, when he heard Betts grunting and felt the flailing of feet and legs and God knew what else behind him, because the entire cage suddenly exploded with violence.

  It was Gaby. She was fighting with Betts. Josh was still trying to come to grips with his utter failure and Gaby’s attempts to save herself and him, when he saw a pair of feet rushing past him and knew the woman was joining the fray.

  Oh, thank you, God.

  After what seemed like minutes—though it was more like milliseconds—he finally found his footing and turned and saw Gaby, on her feet, whaling on Betts’s face, while the woman was on top of him, riding his back like he was a horse. The woman had her legs wrapped tightly around Betts’s waist and was raining blows down on his head. She was relentless with her attack, delivering a torrent of fists, her face twisted in unleashed fury. Not that Betts looked like he even felt them. If anything, he looked annoyed, and was trying to shake off the woman while blocking Gaby’s fists as she flailed at him from the front.

  Josh gathered himself, took a breath, and raced back across the small space of the cage with everything he had. He picked up speed as he went, and crashed into Betts. This time he got all of Betts from the side, and they went spilling—Betts, Josh, and the woman, who was dislodged by the impact and went flying through the air. Josh didn’t see where she landed, but he heard the sound of the cage’s bars rattling, and he thought, Oh, God, I hope I didn’t just kill her. Please, don’t be dead, because I think I’m going to need you for the next few seconds.

  Josh was on the floor again and trying to get back up for the second time, but he never got the chance. Betts was suddenly on top of him and Josh felt hands—and long fingers, such damn long fingers—going around his throat. He felt stabbing, intense pain, the likes of which he had never experienced in his life—and wouldn’t have thought was even possible—shooting through his entire body. Betts’s face, hovering over him. Up close, the scar looked more terrifying somehow, and Josh couldn’t help but wonder how he had gotten it, and if it had hurt. Maybe it had even hurt as much as Josh’s neck was hurting at the moment as Betts applied pressure and tried to choke the life out of him.

  Then Betts seemed to loosen his grip, and it took Josh a few seconds to realize he wasn’t doing it on purpose. Gaby was standing behind Betts, hitting him repeatedly in the back of the neck, and each time Gaby pulled her hand back to strike again, it was covered with blood that got redder and darker with each stroke. Something shiny was glinting in Gaby’s fingers, and Josh recognized the key to the cage. Gaby wasn’t hitting Betts, she was stabbing him in the back of the neck repeatedly with the key.

  Josh saw Betts’s eyes start to roll in their sockets and felt his fingers lose strength. Finally, Josh was able to break free. He scrambled to his feet as Gaby staggered back, her right hand covered in thick gobs of blood, the key gripped between two of her fingers with the point sticking out like a weapon. She met Josh’s eyes, and for a moment he wasn’t sure if she was afraid or horrified or indifferent. He wanted to reach out and comfort her, but there was no time for that.

  Instead, Josh turned back to Betts, who was kneeling on the floor slightly slumped over, blood gushing out of four—five—holes in the back of his neck. He was in shock and didn’t seemed to be moving, but Josh could hear him moaning. Josh gathered as much strength as he could and lifted his right leg and brought it forward into the side of Betts’s head. The man’s entire body careened over sideways to the cage floor, where he lay shaking, staring accusingly up at Josh and Gaby.

  “Come on, we have to go,” Josh said, and grabbed Gaby’s left hand, the one without all the blood (he wondered if he had done that on purpose?) and led her through the open cage door.

  But then Josh stopped and hurried back inside, rushing over to the other woman. She was slowly pushing herself up from the floor, and he could tell she was hurt and dizzy from the blow she had taken when she flew into the cage bars.

  “Come on,” Josh said, holding out his hand to her.

  She stared at his hand, then at him, and he could see her mind reeling, trying to decide if she could trust him, trust Gaby, trust someone other than herself right now. She finally made up her mind and grabbed his hand, and he pulled her up. She was a lot heavier than she looked.

  They rushed through the cage door. Gaby was waiting outside. She had dropped the key and was clutching her arms around her chest, trembling noticeably.

  “Come on,” Josh said, and started through the semitrailer.

  “Wait,” the woman said, and Josh turned around and saw her heading for the gun rack. She grabbed a handgun off a hook—it looked like one of those black plastic guns that Folger had used to hit him—and snatched up a couple of magazines.

  Good idea.

  He hurried over. The rack was filled with an obscene amount of weapons, from the kind Folger carried to big rifles that looked like they probably weighed more than he did. Josh had never seen weapons like that in person, only in the movies, and they looked almost as difficult to use as they probably were to lift.

  Then he saw it—Matt’s silver chrome revolver. And nearby, Matt’s backpack. Josh grabbed both items, shoving the gun into the backpack, then grabbed a couple more guns nearby, including as many magazines as he could scoop up with one hand. He didn’t even know if they would fit the guns, but they were the same color and, well, he could find out later.

  He saw Betts’s radio, sitting on the box of clothes. Josh grabbed it, too, and when he looked back, he saw the woman was walking toward the cage, toward Betts, and knew what she was going to do.

  “No,” Josh said.

  She looked back at him, bloodlust in her eyes. She wanted to kill Betts. She was going to kill Betts.

  “No,” Josh said again. “The gunshot. They’ll hear it. We need all the head start we can get.”

  She was probably expecting a different argument, but what he said took her by surprise and, to his relief, she nodded back.

  Josh picked up the key Gaby had dropped. It was still covered in blood and clumps of flesh and hair, and it made him a little queasy just to touch it. He hurried over and locked the cage. Betts was lying on his side on the floor, probably dead. It didn’t look like he was moving at all, and there was a big puddle of blood underneath him.

  “Let’s go,” Josh said, moving through the semitrailer.

  The damn thing seemed to go on forever. When they finally reached the opening, Josh stopped and held back his hand toward the women. They both stopped short and waited as he stepped down the ramp, just far enough to lean around the corner. He expected to see Folger or maybe Manley standing outside. God, he hoped Manley wasn’t out there—the guy scared the shit out of him. They all did, but Manley was the worst, with his reptile eyes.

  But there was no one out there.

  The semitrailer and the big rig that pulled it sat inside a wide and mostly empty parking lot under the baking sun. He recalled the layout of Lancing from the last two weeks he and Matt had spent looking for supplies. The parking lot was part of the city’s municipal area, with a courthouse, a city hall building, and a public library behind him. The street out front led toward North Main Street, where the ci
ty’s business area resided. That was probably where Folger and the rest were at the moment.

  “Okay,” Josh said, and the women hurried down the ramp after him.

  They weren’t that far from the house he, Gaby, and Matt had stayed in, and where Folger had caught them. It was about a block down to their right. The same house where a turned Matt probably still haunted. Or maybe Folger had gone down to the basement to kill Matt (again). If you could even kill them once they turned.

  “Where are we going?” Gaby asked, when they were all in the parking lot.

  Lancing was a decent-sized city with about 12,000 people. Homes were spread out, intermingled with businesses. Across the street in front of them was a row of private homes. More, mostly older ones, were spread out to their right, and he remembered a subdivision of newer models about a mile north.

  “Josh?” Gaby said, sounding anxious when he didn’t answer right away. “Where are we going?”

  “The business district’s that way,” Josh said, pointing to his left. “Folger and the others are probably there now. That’s where I’d be if I was raiding for supplies. We’ll go in the opposite direction. There are lots of new houses there. We can hide out in one of them.”

  Josh began jogging up the street and the two women followed. He glanced at his watch: 6:25 P.M.

  “What about a car?” the woman said. She was keeping up with him just fine. In fact, she wasn’t breathing hard at all, while Josh and Gaby were already out of breath. “We can use it to get out of here.”

  “It’ll be dark soon,” Josh said. “We’re better off staying here until morning.”

  “But won’t they find us again?” Gaby asked.

  “There are hundreds of homes here. The area we’re headed to has about a hundred of those in a thousand-foot square block. They’re not going to search all of them, not before nightfall. We can figure out what to do in the morning.”

  That seemed to reassure them enough that neither Gaby nor the woman argued.

  After a few minutes of walking, Josh led them across the street and through a wooded area where they couldn’t be spotted from the roads. He kept them on a straight path until they emerged into an open spot with two sprawling lodges to their right. Josh remembered debating with Matt about whether to try their luck inside the buildings just a few days ago.

  Sorry, Matt.

  They crossed the lodges’ big yard, brushing their way through its overgrown grass, and finally arrived at the subdivision. Homes were spread out from one end to the other, like identical toy buildings. He led them farther inside, passing two-story houses with dry concrete swimming pools in backyards and unmowed lawns that reminded him of jungles instead of a neighborhood.

  “Look for a house with a basement,” Josh said.

  It took them thirty-five minutes of running from home to home, peering through windows for signs there were creatures inside, all the while keeping an eye on the sky for nightfall and their ears open for any pursuing cars. Eventually, they found a home that met their needs. It had a basement they could access through the kitchen, and Josh saw solar panels winking on the roof.

  He led the women into the house through the back door, their guns out. During their long walk over, Josh had discovered that Matt did have a box of bullets in the backpack, and he had reloaded the revolver. They entered the kitchen and almost jumped for joy when they reached the basement and he discovered the door wasn’t locked.

  Josh pushed opened the door and peered inside. He did his best to keep his hands from shaking, though it was incredibly difficult. The lightbulbs were dead, of course, but there was enough light coming in from a window the size of a shoebox along the back wall that he could see about half of the basement.

  “Stay here for a moment,” Josh said.

  “Be careful,” Gaby said.

  Josh went down the stairs slowly, the gun in front of him. Suddenly he remembered how many bullets he had shot Matt with and how Matt had just kept coming, and the gun didn’t feel so good in his hand anymore. He sucked it up, though. Gaby and the woman were watching him. But especially Gaby. He had led them here; now he had to make sure it was safe, even if he had to use himself as bait.

  I’m the guy, and this is my job.

  I’m the guy…

  He reached the bottom of the stairs, then walked to the center of the room and…waited.

  He didn’t speak or move, but looked around him at the dark patches where sunlight couldn’t reach.

  There was nothing. No movement. No sound.

  God, please don’t let there be anything in here…

  After about two minutes, Josh breathed a sigh of relief and looked back up at the women. “Okay, I think it’s safe.”

  Gaby hurried down first while the woman closed the basement door and locked it. They used the light from the small window to navigate around the room, looking for things they could eat. Josh found an old case of bottled water covered in a thick coat of dust near the back. He tore the plastic wrapping and handed bottles out.

  “Keep hydrated,” Josh said. “It’s fine now, but it’s going to get really hot down here when the sun comes back out tomorrow.”

  The woman took the proffered bottle. “Sandra,” she said. “My name’s Sandra.”

  “I’m Josh, and that’s Gaby.”

  “Nice to meet you guys,” Sandra said.

  They settled down on the floor with their bottles of water. Gaby sat down next to him and struggled to lift the bottle to her dried lips. Her hand, the one still covered in Betts’s dried blood, was shaking badly. After a while, she managed it, but some water splashed on her shirt, which was already peppered with specks of blood.

  They couldn’t find a single thing to eat, not even to nibble on, and their stomachs began growling. No one said a word as the light outside faded and the basement turned pitch black. After a while, Josh couldn’t even see his own hands, much less Gaby sitting next to him. He couldn’t locate Sandra across the basement from them anymore, though he heard her breathing.

  Sometime in the night, Josh felt a hand touch his in the darkness. The contact came out of nowhere and momentarily alarmed him, until he remembered she was sitting right next to him. Gaby twined her fingers with his and squeezed, and Josh felt his heart skip a beat.

  “Josh,” she whispered.

  “Yeah?” he whispered back.

  “You did really good back there.”

  “You, too.”

  “You’re the guy.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  He smiled in the darkness. Gaby’s hand, in his, felt good. More than that, it felt right.

  I’m the guy…

  CHAPTER 7

  BLAINE

  HE OPENED HIS eyes to sunlight, with cool air blowing in his face. He was grateful he could still breathe and, more importantly, that he was somehow still alive, even after those people had found him on the road bleeding like a stuck pig. He assumed he probably looked like a stuck pig. A stuck Mexican (half-Mexican) pig, anyway. It was probably not the prettiest sight they had ever seen, and it was a miracle they didn’t just get back in their cars and drive off. In his experience, guys like him didn’t get picked up at the side of the road, especially when they were bleeding from three bullet holes.

  He was lying on a bed—a soft, cushy bed that was too short—and he could feel the heels of his feet pressing against the wooden footboard. A fan rested on a dresser, blowing mercifully cool air against him, and for an instant, just an instant, Blaine thought he had woken up from a nightmare, that none of the last eight months had been real. But then he couldn’t find the fan’s electrical cord, and realized it was a battery-powered portable fan.

  Sandra would love one of those.

  He heard sounds to his right and turned his head. The doctor lady was rifling through a big black bag. For some reason, she looked much younger today than when he had first seen her. She was probably in her twenties, which made him wonder if she really was a doctor.
She had shoulder-length blonde hair, and from the back she could almost pass for Sandra. When she turned around, he saw crystal-blue eyes instead of green.

  Sandra!

  Blaine sat up quickly and regretted it right away. His entire body protested, like someone had shot him all over again. He let out an audible grunt and suddenly the woman was there, pushing him back down on the bed.

  “Stop it, stop, you’re going to open your stitches,” she said, sounding almost annoyed with him. “If that happens, you’re going to start bleeding all over again, and this time I’m not sewing you back up, do you understand?”

  Blaine sighed and lay back down. He didn’t have the strength to fight her. Instead, he stared up at the ceiling at a poster of Nolan Ryan in his prime, prepping for a pitch on the mound in a Texas Rangers uniform. His father used to love the Rangers, though for some reason he was never entirely sold on the Cowboys.

  “I’m not dead,” he said. His voice was hoarse and his mouth dry.

  “No, you’re not.” She looked amused. “What’s your name, by the way?”

  “Blaine.”

  “Do you remember my name?”

  Blaine tried to remember. “I don’t know. Sorry.”

  “You were in and out all day, makes sense you wouldn’t remember much of it. It’s Lara.”

  “Where am I, Lara?”

  “A house. We made camp here yesterday so I could take the bullet out of your shoulder. Why didn’t they kill you?”

  “What?”

  “The men who shot you. You said there were more than five of them.”

  “I think so, yes.”

  “Why didn’t they kill you? Why did they just leave you on the road like that?”

  Blaine remembered the man with the white hair, Folger, telling the others, “What’s the point? Look at him. He’s not going anywhere. If he makes it to tonight, then what?”