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Somebody had to drop their gun first. And it was far more likely to be Parker since it was three against one. But he wasn’t going to drop it. He was going to get himself and possibly everybody else killed. So Kyle walked up to Parker and snatched the pistol out of his hands.
Parker gasped. Bobby just chuckled.
Kyle was surprised at how easy it was. And he was just as surprised that he did it. He didn’t plan on grabbing the gun. Didn’t think about it at all. He just reacted and suddenly found himself with Parker’s Beretta. He took a few steps back so Parker couldn’t grab it again, then set it down on the floor.
“You’re a real stupid sonofabitch, you know that?” Parker said and raised his hands in surrender.
“Okay,” said the tall man. “Everybody just take it easy. Bobby, Roland, put your guns away.” The two men holstered their weapons. “Now I’m putting mine away too.” He then tucked the pistol into the front of his pants.
“Kyle,” Parker said and shook his head. He looked like he was about to say something else, but then he paused. He seemed to remember something, and Kyle thought he knew what it was. Parker had two more cleaned and oiled pistols next to the cash register in the checkout aisle. They weren’t visible from the door. Parker wanted to go for them. Kyle could sense it. And Kyle wouldn’t let him. He wasn’t about to tell the three strangers that there were guns over there, but he also didn’t want Parker picking one up and starting a shootout. So Kyle slowly moved to the checkout aisle himself and blocked the path to the register.
Parker sighed. He knew what Kyle was up to.
But Kyle was right to do it. The tension in the room had just been defused. He could understand why the three strangers came in with guns drawn. They had no idea who or what they might find in the store. The law had gone silent. There were no patrol cars out there, no sheriff’s deputies, no detectives, no jails, no judges, no justice. Everything and everybody was dangerous, including other survivors.
Thanks to Kyle now, though, everybody’s gun was tucked away or at least on the floor. They could talk.
“I’m Kyle,” he said, and stuck out his hand for the tall man. The tall man shook his hand and relaxed slightly.
“Lane,” he said. “This here’s Bobby and Roland.”
Bobby nodded curtly. Roland just stood there.
“I’m Frank,” Frank said. “The big guy is Hughes.”
Hughes eyed Frank sideways and nodded—suspiciously, Kyle thought—at Lane and his boys.
“I’m Annie,” Annie said. “I’d say it’s nice to meet you, but—”
“You’re covered in blood,” Lane said.
“I’m not infected.”
“You sure about that?”
“She’s not,” Kyle said. He sure hoped he was right.
Lane nodded, though a bit warily. He had no idea that the rest of them didn’t know Annie, that she was a stranger to all of them and had arrived for the first time just moments before.
“Sorry for coming in here like this,” Lane said. “But it’s dangerous out there. I’m a police officer. You wouldn’t believe the things I had to deal with when everything was coming apart.” Then he checked himself. “Well, maybe you would.”
“You were a cop?” Hughes said and tipped his head back.
“Up in Seattle.”
“Which precinct?” Hughes said he’d been a bail bondsman up there, so it stood to reason that he’d know some cops.
“Fifty-seventh,” Lane said.
“What do you think of Chief Berenson?” Hughes said.
“The police chief?”
Hughes said nothing.
Lane shrugged. “He’s okay. Or he was anyway.”
Everybody got quiet. Bobby and Roland’s body posture shifted an iota or two. They looked at each other. They looked at Parker. They looked back at Lane.
Shit, Kyle thought.
Lane nodded to Bobby.
Bobby unholstered his weapon and pistol-whipped Parker. The gunmetal hit the side of Parker’s head with a hard and wet smack.
Roland drew down on Hughes.
Kyle took several steps back. Away from the hammer at his feet. Away from the Beretta he’d taken from Parker.
Annie backed up too and covered her mouth with her hands.
Frank said, “Sonofabitch.”
Parker woke and found himself crammed in a corner just past the cereal aisle with his wrists and ankles bound together with duct tape. Above him loomed a refrigerator stocked with warm cans of Red Bull. His head hurt like a bastard where—what was his name? Bobby?—cracked him upside the skull with the butt of his pistol.
And his beard itched. He hadn’t shaved once since he escaped Seattle. He couldn’t be bothered. The hell did it matter what he looked like? Everyone looked like shit now. But the beard itched and his hands were tied so he couldn’t scratch it.
That Lane character crouched next to him while lazily pointing his gun at the floor. “Morning.”
Parker tried not to wince from the pain in his head.
“We’ve been waiting for you to wake up,” Lane said. “I have an announcement to make. But I should first tell you we swept through the place and confiscated all of your weapons.”
“We would have shared,” Parker said.
“I didn’t exactly get that impression.” Lane stood. “Not from you, anyway.” He turned around and raised his voice. “Listen up, people.” He then left Parker behind in the back and joined everyone else at the front. “Your friend back there is with us again, so I’m going to tell you what’s what and I’m going to make it real simple.”
Parker could hear Lane just fine from the back of the store. It’s not like there was any other noise in the world to drown out his voice.
“This store is ours now,” Lane said.
Parker heard a panicky no out of Carol.
“We’ve taken your guns. We’ve taken the keys to the Chevy. And you’re all evicted.”
“Can’t let you do that,” Hughes said. Parker couldn’t see Hughes from his place on the floor, but he could imagine the look on Hughes’ face.
“I’m only going to say this once,” Lane said. A hush fell over the store. Parker wanted to rip the man’s guts out. “If you decide you aren’t going quietly, we’ll shoot you. Bobby and Roland both think we should shoot you right now either way, but I told them no. It’s unnecessary if you cooperate. And I don’t want to waste ammunition. You can fend for yourselves out there. You’ve survived this long. Find somewhere else and we will not bother you. But if you resist, we’ll dump your corpses out in the intersection.”
No way was Lane a cop like he’d said. Parker didn’t believe it. He wasn’t the world’s biggest fan of cops, but even the dirty ones were better than this guy.
“I have a suggestion,” Kyle said.
Parker groaned.
“Did you not hear what I just said?” Lane said.
“I actually think you’re going to like my suggestion,” Kyle said.
Parker was going to have a long talk with Kyle if they ever got out of this. A long talk.
“What?” Lane said.
“We have a plan,” Kyle said. “We weren’t going to stay here much longer anyway.”
“What’s your plan?”
“We’re on our way up to Olympia. To the marina. We’re going to pick out a boat and sail to the San Juan Islands.”
You motherfucker, Parker thought.
Lane said nothing.
“You could come with us,” Kyle said.
Parker promised himself he’d kick Kyle’s ass. Promised.
Lane said nothing again for a moment, then replied, “It’s an intriguing idea. But why would we go with you?”
“Because I know how to sail. I’m not an expert or anything, and I don’t own a boat, but I used to go up there with a buddy of mine. I helped him out with his sails. I know how they work, and I can get us there as long as the wind isn’t coming down from the north.”
Lane said nothing.
“Do you know how to sail?” Kyle said. “Any of you?”
Nobody said anything.
“That’s a fine idea,” Lane said. “And no, I don’t know how to sail. But there are plenty of islands and plenty of powerboats up in Olympia.”
“You have keys to one of those boats? Or know how to hotwire one? I don’t imagine they taught you how to hotwire a pleasure boat at the police academy.”
Lane said nothing.
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