Home Coming (The Survivalist Book 10) A. American (read after .txt) 📖

reacted quickly, “No, no, no, Fred. Everything is fine. I just wanted to let you know that Aric is staying out overnight. We have to secure the site until the morning and he stayed behind.”

Her face changed, and she wiped a tear from her eye. “You scared me. I thought,” she paused, “I don’t know what I thought.”

I felt bad, then had to evaluate her response to my appearance. Does everyone think of me as the angel of death? I mean, I get it, but shit, I hope not. “Well, don’t worry. He’s not there alone and everything will be fine. He’ll be back tomorrow. I just didn’t want you sitting up all night waiting on him.”

She smiled. “Thank you for that.”

“You need anything?”

Fred looked back over her shoulder, then back at me. “No. I’m good. Jess and Kay were here a little while ago. I guess I’ll go to bed. I was sitting up waiting on Aric.”

“Alright. If you need anything, just let me know. You have the radio, right?” We’d given Aric a radio to keep at his house. He lived the farthest away from everyone else and we wanted him to have a way to call for help should the need arise.

She held it up. “Right here. I’ll be fine. I’m going to bed.”

“Alright then. Good night.” I replied and waved as I stepped off the porch and headed home.

When I arrived at the house, all was dark. I was expecting Mel to be sitting up waiting on me but was happy when I saw she wasn’t. It meant she’d gone to bed and hadn’t sat up all night worrying. I came in quietly and closed the door behind me. Using my flashlight, I made my way to the bedroom and went into the bathroom to take a shower. I didn’t want her to see me in my current state. I may have changed clothes, but I was still a mess. The water was cold but felt good. I lingered for a bit, watching as red water swirled around the drain before finally disappearing. I scrubbed my hands and fingers clean, getting dried blood out from under my fingernails.

With the shower done, I got out and toweled off. Slipping into the bedroom, I got into bed, thinking Mel was asleep. But she reached over and grabbed my arm.

“How’d it go?” She asked softly.

“It’s done. We’ll go back tomorrow to collect the gear so no one else gets their hands on it. There’s a lot of military hardware there and it could be bad if the wrong folks got a hold of it.”

“Anyone hurt?”

I patted her hand, “No. The bombers did all the work.”

She yawned and replied, “Good.”

CHAPTER 4

I woke up early the next morning, knowing the old man would probably want to get started as soon as possible. I slipped out of the bedroom, trying not to wake Mel. I wanted a little time to have a glass of tea and sit and collect my thoughts. I went into the fridge for some ice, what’s tea without ice, and found the partial can of Cope there. What the hell, I thought and took it out. Cracking the lid, I saw it was almost full. This was the last can I’d ever see and thought I’d share it.

Taking my glass with me, I headed over to Danny’s. He was already up, his usual way, and sitting on the porch. He waved when he saw me, and I stepped up onto the porch and dropped into a rocker beside him.

“What’s the word?” He asked by way of greeting.

I took a deep breath of the warm moist morning air. It was going to be a hot day. “I guess we’ll go back over there today and take all the dangerous shit out.”

“How’d that go yesterday?”

“It was nothing. Those bombers really did a number on them. Most of them were too shocked to do anything more than try and run. They just died trying.”

“How many were there? Still alive I mean.”

Rocking my head from side to side trying to do some math, I replied, “Little more than two dozen maybe. Lots of wounded though.”

Danny looked out across the yard, watching the chickens as they pecked for their breakfast in the pine needles, and he thought for a minute. “Maybe this will be the end of it all.”

Reaching into my pocket, I took out the can and opened it. Danny’s eyes were immediately on it. I took a pinch and passed the can to him. “Where the hell did this come from?” He asked. Then, feeling the cold still in the can, he added, “How long has this been in your freezer?”

“Since we got back from that trip I guess. I’d forgot about it, found it this morning. I thought you’d like a pinch.”

He took a pinch and put it in. “Man, that’s good. Damn, I miss this.”

I was looking at his hand. He was holding the can in his injured hand. It looked odd, missing the fingers. But he looked like he was adapting to it. “How’s the claw?” I asked jokingly.

He held the disfigured hand up and looked at it. “Not bad, actually. It’s not quite the handicap I thought it was going to be. Kind of funny really, my hand just adapted to it pretty quickly.” He replied as he dropped the can into his shirt pocket.

“That’s good; now give me the can back.” He laughed and handed it over. “You got anything you can put some of this in?”

“Oh yeah,” he said as he got up and headed into the house. He returned with an empty can and handed it to me.

“You saving these for sentimental reasons? Or your hoarding mind just not letting you throw them away?”

As I was splitting the can between the two, he replied, “Both I guess,” and laughed.

Capping his can, I handed it back. “That’s what I thought,” I said with a smile.

We sat on the porch