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He told Kyle and Parker to unload the supplies Hughes and Frank had picked up at the sporting-goods store.
“I’m sorry,” Kyle whispered to Parker while they unpacked the large backpack, “for taking your gun.”
Kyle didn’t actually think he’d made a mistake when he disarmed Parker. He very well may have saved Parker’s life, along with everyone else’s. Parker didn’t see it that way and was still upset about it, and Kyle was ultimately on his side.
Lane stood near the front door like he was guarding it, with Bobby and Roland armed at his side. Annie was washing up in the bathroom. Carol was hanging back in the walk-in cooler as usual. She seemed to like having a second door between herself and the outside. Hughes and Frank sat on the floor next to the beverage aisle in back.
Parker didn’t respond to Kyle’s apology. He just removed what appeared to be night-vision goggles from the pack and set them down on the floor.
“Well, what do we have here?” Lane said when he saw the night vision. “That is some fine-looking equipment.” He seemed to know what he was looking at.
Kyle pulled the extra socks, gloves, fleece pullovers, and hats out of the bag and held them up. “Where do you want all this stuff?”
“Leave it up here by the door,” Lane said. “All the equipment and guns will be kept here from now on. This area is off-limits to everybody but me, Bobby, and Roland. Got it?”
“Oh, believe me, we got it,” Parker said.
When they finished unloading the gear, Lane said, “Good work, boys.”
Parker grunted and headed back toward the bathrooms. Kyle followed him into the gloom.
“We need to get our guns back,” Parker said. They didn’t have to whisper now. They just had to talk quietly.
“We can’t shoot them,” Kyle said. “It will be noisy. We’ll draw a hundred of those things down on our heads.”
“Lane is our number-one problem right now.”
“We can wait until—”
“No. We’re not going with them on your boat.”
Parker shuffled off farther into the back of the store. Kyle went with him.
They could have just fled out the back, but Roland and Bobby had blockaded that door from the outside with a Dumpster. Supposedly they removed the wheels so it couldn’t be moved again, at least not from inside the store.
“The old rules are off,” Parker said. “These people aren’t civilized. And frankly neither are we. Not anymore. If we don’t kill them—and I mean as soon as fucking possible—they’re going to kill us eventually.”
“Lane says he was a cop.”
“You actually believe that?”
“Not really, no. But disasters change people. Were you like this before?”
Parker said nothing.
Kyle figured Lane would settle down once he realized the others weren’t a threat—as long as he could convince Parker to settle down and stop looking like a threat waiting to happen all over again. And it was possible that Lane was a cop. Everyone left alive in this world was wandering around in some kind of trauma. Parker was right that the old rules were off, so why should he expect Lane to abide by them any more than anyone else? So yeah, it was entirely possible that Lane once was a cop. Kyle sure hoped so. If Lane had been a cop, everything would be fine.
Hughes didn’t like or trust cops at all. But Lane was no kind of a cop. Hughes had asked what Lane thought of Chief Berenson, but there was no Chief Berenson. The police chief’s name was Anderson. As a bail bondsman, Hughes knew that.
Lane was a liar. A thief. He took hostages. He’d probably killed people. And he was no kind of cop.
That was for damn sure.
Lane wasn’t a cop, nor was he sure anyone believed he was ever a cop, but he didn’t care because he was in charge.
Bobby and Roland did what he told them to do when he told them to do it, but the truth was that Lane would be lost without them. He had a crew of six until a couple of days earlier. They were robbed at gunpoint of everything they had—their food, their water, their gear, their guns, everything. Then they were torn to pieces by a pack of hunters. They were unarmed and defenseless and scavenging for food in an abandoned house when a pack of them swarmed inside the front door and ripped apart four of his companions. The pack would have been no big deal if they still had their guns, but everything but their clothes had been stolen. The only reason Lane, Bobby, and Roland were still alive was because they managed to slip out the back while the shrieking screams of his friends and the hate-filled screams of those hunters faded away in the background.
Not two hours later they came upon a massacre site. A small group of men had been overwhelmed by another pack—no, a horde—so large their guns couldn’t save them.
But those guns saved Lane, Bobby, and Roland. They felt no compunction whatever in stealing guns or anything else from the dead. Nor did they feel much compunction about taking guns or anything else from the living. Not anymore. Better to steal than have your stuff stolen.
Never again, Lane swore to himself, would he let anyone take his weapons away. There were new rules afoot. Rob or be robbed. Kill or be killed. Rule or be ruled. And don’t be a sucker.
Lane wasn’t a cop and he wasn’t a sucker.
He summoned Kyle to his place near the front door with a wave of his hand. Annie followed even though he hadn’t summoned her.
“So how are we getting to this fabled boat of yours?” Lane said to Kyle. “We can’t go in a vehicle. The roads heading north are too jammed.”
Kyle opened his mouth to say something, but Annie interjected.
“Can I make a suggestion?” she said.
“I didn’t ask you,” Lane said. “But what? But what’s your suggestion?”
That girl gave Lane the creeps. He still couldn’t remember how he recognized her, but a feeling rose in his gut that told him she was dangerous. The threat-detection radar in the lizard part of his brain wouldn’t shut up about it. She didn’t look dangerous. Not at all. She seemed smart and capable. Maybe that was part of the problem.
“I think we should take bicycles,” she said.
“Bicycles,” Lane said.
“Yes,” she said. “Bicycles. We can weave around abandoned cars and ride faster than anything that tries to chase us.”
“That’s exactly what I was thinking,” Kyle said, smiling. “It’s a good idea.”
“I didn’t ask you,” Lane said.
“Actually, you did just ask me,” Kyle said.
It made sense, and Lane had considered the same thing himself, but there was a problem. “We won’t be able to carry as many supplies.”
“We can carry enough,” Kyle said. “We make another run at the outdoor store up the road, get a few more huge backpacks, load ’em all up, and ride off to Olympia. Shouldn’t take more than a couple of hours. But I think we should wait until dark and ride up there by moonlight. We can get more night-vision devices when we pick up the backpacks.”
Lane nodded. “I’ll send some of you up there on a supply run. And I’ll send Roland with you so you’ll have protection in case you’re attacked.”
Lane still wasn’t sure what to do with all these people once they got to an island. That Parker character would have to be dealt with, of course, and maybe the big black guy too. The others were on probation. Kyle might turn out okay. He wasn’t stupid and he seemed okay with following orders. Frank wasn’t outstanding material, but he probably wouldn’t cause trouble. Probably.
But something was up with Annie, and Lane wouldn’t know what to do with her until he knew exactly what it was. Why did he know her face? And why did she give him the creeps? He didn’t get the feeling he knew her from the distant past. He felt like he’d seen her somewhere in the past couple of days. But he’d hardly seen anyone the past couple of days. How was that possible?
“Annie,” he said. “You and Kyle are on bicycle duty. Go out and find one for everyone. Bobby will go with you for protection.”
“You want us to go now?” she said.
“Yes, now.”
“Isn’t someone taking the truck to the outdoor store?”
“You don’t need the truck. Go on foot, find three bicycles, ride them
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