White Wasteland by Jeff Kirkham (best color ebook reader .txt) 📕

“Clear,” Evan radioed to his team. “Rally on me.” His team filtered into the pawn shop with Jake hanging back to post watch on the street.

“Hi, I’m Evan Hafer.” He let his rifle hang and reached out his hand. He’d just run his hands over her body without permission. She hesitated. Evan reminded himself that it wasn’t every day in America when someone pushed you up against a wall, patted you down and then cleared your house at gunpoint.

“We’re here to help,” he repeated, his hand still hanging in the air. The woman returned the handshake. “May I ask your name?” Evan added. He wondered if he’d been overly rude. This wasn’t Iraq and these people weren’t ISIS. He’d have to remind himself of it.

“My name’s Tanya. My little girl’s name is Berkeley and the baby is Eddie.”

“Very nice to meet you.” Evan said, adding a half-wave to the cowering girl. Politely raiding a home was going to require some practice.

His men stepped forward and shook Tanya’s hand, introducing themselves.

“We observed two men shadowing your daughter when she went for water. They know where you live now and I’m guessing that they’ll hit you tonight.”

“Oh no,” Tanya covered her mouth. “We ran out of water. I should’ve gone myself, but I didn’t want to leave the baby alone. What if they’d taken her? Oh my God. I should never have let her go.” Her eyes darted back and forth between the armed men, and she wept.

“Where’s your husband, ma’am?” Evan asked.

“He’s a police officer. Caleb McNulty. He hasn’t come home. He was on duty and never made it back. That was eleven weeks ago. We own this pawn shop. My father left it to us.”

Evan peeled back the newspaper and looked out the window, scanning the street and checking on his security element while he weighed the situation.

“We’re going to handle the men who followed your daughter here. How are you set for food?”

“We have plenty of canned food that my husband stored in the back, but our bottled water ran out three days ago. We had cases and cases of water, but it just wasn’t enough. Are you going to evacuate us?”

“No. We’re not evacuating people. There are no refugee camps. There’s nowhere to go.”

The woman looked confused. “You said you were from the military. What’s your plan, then?”

Evan avoided the question. “We were at the car dealership and saw the men tailing your daughter. We interdicted them. Tonight, we’ll take them out and you’ll be safe again.”

The woman thought about that for a moment. “If you take them out, won’t more men come? I’m not going to let her go outside again, but I’ll have to take the baby with me next time to get water. Eventually, they’re going to catch us.”

Evan hadn’t really thought about it from the perspective of a local.

“We’ve been rolling up criminal gangs through this entire corridor. It should make it safer for families like yours.”

“Thank you,” she replied, hesitation in her voice. “We appreciate the risks you’re taking. All of you.” Tanya looked at each man, emphasizing her gratitude with eye contact. As worn-down as she appeared, she was a cop’s wife. She must know the cost of security. “Instead of rolling the criminals up, would you consider helping us move somewhere safer?”

Evan hated it when an op grew hair.

“Ma’am, our mission is to clear a safe corridor to the south end of the valley,” By habit, he wouldn’t tell a stranger the whole reason they were there.

Tanya seemed to accept that as a no. “I understand. Thank you. If you happen to notice a barrel we can use—that we can fill up with water so we don't have to go outside—that would be very helpful. If we had water, you probably wouldn’t need to risk a confrontation with those men. We could stay locked inside. The security here is very good.”

Evan looked around again. Even in the light of morning, dark shadows occupied every corner of the shop. The newspaper taped over the windows blotted out all but the slightest chinks of light. But the shop had been kept tidy and there was no smell of human waste. The sewer system must be working. Other than the snow his team had tracked inside, the place looked squared away. The pawn shop wasn’t a bad place to hole up. The cop and his wife could’ve done worse. If nothing else, there was a shit-ton of trade goods here, if the zombies didn’t kill them and steal it all.

“Do you have a gun?” Evan asked, eyeing the wall full of locked rifles.

“I have handguns.” Tanya replied, “Caleb took the key to the rifles with him when he left.”

“Show me your handguns, please.”

Tanya pulled a Beretta 92 from between several magazines, within easy reach of where Evan had frisked her. It was cocked and in-battery.

Clever girl.

Evan reached his hand out and she passed him the Beretta. He cleared and safed the gun and examined the full magazine. “You have nine millimeter?”

“We sold most of our ammo on the day of the collapse, but Caleb kept a few boxes of 9mm and .223. The ARs are locked to the wall.”

“Do you know how to shoot an assault rifle?” Evan gave her a sideways glance. He figured her for Latin American or Native American. In the dim light, he couldn’t get a gauge on skin tone, but if he had to guess, the little boy’s name was “Eduardo” not “Eddy.” Her thick, dark hair had weathered the privations of collapse well, like the families’ good personal hygiene. She looked tired, but didn’t appear to have given up. Not by a long shot.

One thing Evan knew for sure; her cop husband wasn’t coming back. If he hadn’t returned by now, three months into the collapse, something had happened to make his return impossible. No cop would abandon his family, not to mention a smoking-hot wife, unless he was dead.

“I