Only The Dead Don't Die | Book 4 | Finding Home Popovich, A.D. (any book recommendations txt) 📖

of reality. That was about to burst. What would they do when the food ran out . . . or when Zac didn’t find them?

Scarlett had gone over a rather rudimentary Merkaba visualization with the guys. Even if they hadn’t quite grasped the concept, their combined energy added to the shielding’s effectiveness. It had to be the only reason the house hadn’t been invaded by the restless hordes pleading for Twila’s healing in Scarlett’s distressing dreams.

Twila had definitely opened a Pandora’s Box with her attempts to heal Katy. Which brought up a perplexing issue. Ella’s tea had healed Katy somewhat. From what she had noted before leaving their prior safehouse, the creeper-child had appeared healthier than the others: its skin pigmentation closer to normal along with better coordination. With enough of the monatomic powder, would creepers return to normal?

A knock on the sliding glass door behind her made her drop the spoon into the pot.

“Scarlett, mind if we have a chat?” Twila and Dean joined her on the balcony. “Twila, Luther’s in need of company,” Dean said gently.

Twila flashed a silly cross-eyed grimace. “What you mean is you want to talk to Mommy. Alone.”

Dean didn’t bother denying it.

“Tell Uncle Luther I’ll start the rice.” Scarlett kissed her forehead and tried not to notice the boyish-butchered haircut Twila had punished herself with.

“Beans and rice again? Boring.” Twila moped into the house.

“How’s Ella today?” Dean asked.

“Still not talking.” Scarlett measured out the dry rice. “Mateo’s succumbing to the virus.” According to Shari, no newborns had survived as if humanity was cursed.

Dean rubbed his chest. “I was afraid of that.” He lifted the cast-iron pot’s lid. He took a long whiff of the pintos and stirred the pot. “Scarlett, I know it’s still eating at you. Nonetheless, you aren’t responsible for Twila’s actions. Lord knows that youngin’ has a mind of her own.”

She wondered why Dean always made excuses for Twila’s strong-willed personality. “Twila knew what she was doing,” Scarlett rebuffed, unable to let go of her anger.

Dean gave her a reproachful look. “As the saying goes, kids will be kids. They don’t have the foresight to anticipate the consequences of their actions. Besides, it doesn’t change the tragic fact. The tea, monatomic powder—whatever you want to call it, was going to run out sooner or later. If it’s the only thing keeping the baby alive, then as god-awful as it is to accept, the baby’s been living on borrowed time from the get-go.”

Dean had a way of putting even the most despairing situations into perspective. He pulled up a rattan chair next to her, and they scanned the backyards in silence.

He cleared his throat. Here it comes. Whatever it was he came to say. “Since we’ve doubled-down on guard duty, I’ve been chatting one-on-one with the group to get their feedback on our—precarious situation.”

Tuning him out, she leaned forward and pretended to check on the simmering water. They’re giving up on Zac! Her worst fear. No, her worse fear was that she would never see Zac again. The cruel universe seemed adamant on denying her one last embrace in his arms.

Since Zac had left, her inner vision kept failing her. The Silver Lady had failed her. Twila had failed her. And she above all, had failed the Grand Plan to Save Hu-manity by letting her heartstrings impede her judgment. What had she been thinking? There was no time for love in the apocalypse.

Honestly, she had only been fooling herself, ignoring the cosmic whisperings in the back of her mind. Time to face reality. Scarlett stared into the pot of water and urgently willed an answer to mystically appear. Her astral body abruptly drifted away. She didn’t resist, hungry for any tidbits of information lucid states often revealed.

When she returned to her mundane reality, the pot’s mesmerizing bubbles roiled to the surface at a full boil. She looked at Dean with a quivering frown.

“Did you get one of those flashes of insight?” Dean asked without any skepticism in his voice.

Struggling for composure, Scarlett poured in three cups of rice, covered the pot with the lid, and then set the vintage wind-up timer for twenty minutes. “Zac’s still having legal issues,” she finally answered after she was sure she could hold back the threatening tears. The courtroom image had been vague. But the man with the brassy-orange goatee seemed to see through space and time, directly into her mind. She turned up her shielding.

Dean slapped his knee. “Hell’s bells. I knew something was going on. The fella would never leave us in a lurch. Especially, you. If it’s any consolation, he loves you more than any man could possibly ever love a woman.”

It almost made her smile until an anonymous voice invaded her thoughts and sniggered, “You’ll never see Zac again!”

Chapter 13

Luther Jones crashed to the floor with an ear-splitting boom, banging his head on the nightstand. “Good God Almighty, what was that?” One minute he had been blissfully sailing the cosmos, the next minute he was rubbing the protruding knot on his head. Vexed, he tried recalling the lucid thrill-ride that had escalated into a deadly chase.

He definitely wanted Scarlett’s take on the incident. He was familiar with astral projection, enjoying it often as a boy. Although, no one had believed him except his crazy Aunt Matilda. Supposedly, she had even protected him with a Voodoo spell, warning not all spirits in the outer realms had one’s best interest at heart.

Aunt Matilda’s face suddenly popped into his head. “Boy, get yo hiney here ’fo dey finds ya.”

Hold on a minute. She had been in his dream. Protecting him. A coincidence? Luther couldn’t dress fast enough. Still dazed, he hobbled around the room on one foot, trying to put on his jeans.

A knock at the bedroom door nearly sent him kissing the floor again. Dean