In The End Box Set | Books 1-3 Stevens, GJ (story books to read TXT) 📖

“We’re going,” I said. “Grab food and go on your way, but you’re much safer with us than you are alone out there.”

The rattle of the shutters stopped and I scooped up the knife, wrapping it in my red jacket still damp at the edges. Out of the corner of my eye I watched Alex move away from the girl, the woman. I couldn’t quite decide her age as she stood, her head bent low as she peered around the room through a tangled mop of brown hair.

“You thought I’d left you?” Alex said as she picked up one of the cases in one hand and lifting the camera still connected to the tripod in the other.

I looked sideways at her, but didn’t answer.

“I would have left you the key,” she said, flinching her survey back to the stranger.

Guilt at my thoughts when I’d woken with her missing kept my words from coming. All I could manage was a grateful smile in her direction.

“Just friends,” she said, shooting me a grin, the smile falling as she turned back to the stranger.

I followed her look as she stood with the hair brushed from her face, her gaze roving over the rows of shelves, but flinching to me every other moment.

“Take what you need,” I said. “It’s yours.”

The stranger didn’t reply, instead turning on the spot with her hair trailing behind as she twisted to face the corridor, wide-eyed.

We knew what she saw and swapping the bundle of clothes to rest on my other arm, I walked beside the young stranger and pulled the knife from between my clothes to offer the handle out with Alex shouting at my back.

“No.”

93

The young woman’s eyes were wider than I imagined Alex’s were at my back. The stranger’s surprise greater than Alex’s when I returned the long knife. Although the pause between us felt like an age, the creatures moving through the doorway had barely taken a step before she'd made her decision.

Surging toward the opening, the stranger blocked my view with her wide coat. Her arms dove up and down, the movement silent except for the slash of the knife as it connected to bone and the heavy fall of the bodies as they went down in quick succession.

Alex stood at my side and we shared the view. She’d had no time to put the equipment down. No time to grab the gun from the bed before it was over and watched with me as the stranger stood, beckoning us through the corridor as thick blood dripped from the knife.

This wasn’t the first time she’d had to defend herself from those things.

With the gun in my hand, I followed with Alex laden behind. We found the stranger outside, scouring the side of the building for threats. She nodded towards the van and my gaze fell on the dark blood dripping down the side by the driver’s door and the wide hole in the metal.

I climbed in the back, Alex insisting I go first as she took the driver’s seat. She didn’t start the engine, instead looking to me for the answer as we watched the stranger, the girl who we still didn’t know, slip back in through the open door of the building.

“Wait,” I said, when I saw Alex go to turn the key.

In silence, my gaze drifted to the skyline. Columns of smoke lined the horizon.

As my heart slowed, I could taste the thickness in the air while watching the rainbow of depressing colour flowing from black to white across the spectrum. The green fields were void of life as they rolled out to disappear where they met the dirty, cloudless sky. The road seemed to sleep, empty of traffic as it travelled relentless left and right.

The image had a certain perfection and I looked towards Alex, about to prompt her to set up the camera, but the girl, the woman, rushed from the building, her arms laden with bags bulging at the edges. She stopped as she spotted us in the van, surprise turning her head to the side, her smile dropping from the corners of her mouth.

She’d thought we would have left her and with the raise of her eyebrows, I was sure I could see her eyes glinting with hope as she stared in our direction. The sight broke my heart. Had it only taken a few days, a week at the most, to strip this girl, this woman, of her faith in humanity?

Her features hardened and she let her hair drop back to cover her face while she moved past the van, striding away. I ran through the back, regretting my enthusiasm as I jumped out of the doors, jarring my hand, but sucked down the pain as I called after her, not holding back my voice.

“Come with us.”

She turned with her lips curled down. What I could see of her face had twisted feral, but she didn’t linger on mine for long, snapping her head around the view.

I shouted again and watched the anger rise in her stride. I forced down a smile as I saw movement from around the front of the building, but instead of focusing on the chef whose uniform no one could call whites, I shouted again and jumped back in the van, not lingering on the crowd gathering at the chef’s back.

“Start the engine,” I said, and Alex did as I asked, the grumble of the mechanics coming to life only spurred on the middle-aged man with a rend in his great belly and his followers not wanting to be late to the feast.

The girl, the woman, scowled at me through the glass, but she ran to the back and slammed the doors closed after she jumped in, her reluctance obvious in her scowl.

Alex pulled us in a wide arc