Apokalypsis | Book 6 | Apokalypsis 6 Morris, Kate (cheapest way to read ebooks TXT) 📖

result. There are a lot of bad people out there right now, opportunists,” she said, thinking of her perverted boss at the hospital who’d groped her. “We aren’t trying to control you. We just want to keep you safe. We’ll watch the news again later tonight and see if they’re giving any new names on the lists. If they post her name as someone in one of the nearby quarantine facilities, then we’ll drive you there first thing. If the internet comes up, we can check on there again, too, okay? They have everyone’s names listed that are being taken in.”

Bianca plowed into Avery, wrapping her arms around her waist and hugging on tightly. Avery just returned it. These three girls had been through so much. They just needed a little reassurance and love. Avery had enough of that to go around, but they also wanted their own families, this girl, in particular.

To reaffirm that thought, Bianca whispered brokenly, “I just want my mom.”

“I know, honey,” Avery said and smoothed her hair on the back of her head in a soothing manner, or what she hoped was. Her mother had done that to her a million times since she was a little girl, and it always made Avery feel immeasurably better. Avery also wanted her own mother back. She wanted to feel her mother’s hand stroking her hair, to feel her warm embrace, smell her softly perfumed skin, see her smile, bask in that smile.

On a nearby counter, her phone buzzed.

“What the…?” Renee questioned and rushed into the room as Avery picked it up. “Was that your phone?”

Avery nodded, checked the caller identification, and answered, “Abraham?”

“Yeah, it’s me. Glad I finally got you. I’ve called you and Tristan about ten times but couldn’t get through.”

“What’s going on, Abraham?” she asked quickly as she felt pressure building in her stomach.

“Ave, this state plow truck drove by. You know, the kind that plow the roads? The big white ones?”

“Yes.”

“Well, he wasn’t plowing, just driving really slowly. There were two pickup trucks behind him. I don’t know what’s going on. It feels bad. I don’t think it’s the state plowing the roads. They haven’t done that once this year. We just finished boarding up their house when I noticed them. Kaia was upstairs and said she’d seen them go past twice already.”

“So they’ve been past the house three times?”

“Yeah, three…” he said before the connection got sketchy.

“Abraham?” she blurted too loudly.

He broke in to say, “Yeah, I’m here. Can you hear me?”

“Yes, don’t leave! Don’t go outside!”

“No, I’m not. We’re staying here for now. That was just weird, ya’ know? Or am I blowing this out…”

The phone became staticky again. “Abraham?”

Their call dropped, and Avery wanted to scream with frustration. Then it rang again, and her brother was there.

“Anyway,” he said without preamble. “We’re gonna stay here a while longer. I don’t know if that meant anything, but I don’t want to get hijacked coming home, either.”

“No, and I’ll send Tristan…”

“Wait!” he shouted. “Crap, here they come again.”

Then the call dropped again, and she scream-groaned with frustration and also fear this time.

Without pause, she dialed him back four times and got busy signals as if the line was down, all while explaining the situation to the growing crowd around her.

“What do we do?” she asked Renee.

“Let me get Spencer,” her friend announced and hurried out the front door without her coat. Her little brother, Ephraim, was in the barn organizing supplies with Spencer since he was still recovering from his broken arm.

Avery kept dialing her brother and then Tristan, who also didn’t pick up. Why was a state snow plow truck driving past the Miller’s farm? It made no sense. It made less sense that others were following it. Sometimes, when the roads were especially bad during a snowstorm, people would do that- follow closely behind the state plow trucks to see their way on the roads better since they were salting and plowing the snow off as fast as it came down, which gave the followers a clear path before them. She’d seen it many times, had done it a few times herself, but this was different. And to have it be followed by the same two pickup trucks back and forth made less sense. State trucks didn’t handle the township roads, either. It felt ominous, but she chided herself for thinking everything was ominous. Then again, everything was now. She’d foolishly believed the looting and rioting would be centralized to bigger cities. Those kinds of people were being run out by the military and were seemingly pushing into more rural areas.

Before she even realized what she was doing, Avery was already pulling on an extra pair of warmer socks and tugging the hem of a warm wool sweater down over her cotton turtleneck.

When she returned to the foyer again, Spencer was stomping his boots on the rug as Renee explained what was going on. Alex had also joined them.

“Sounds like they could be in trouble,” Spencer immediately surmised.

“What should we do? Go over there? What if something happens? I can’t get ahold of Tristan,” she blasted away in rapid-fire at him.

“We’re close. They’re only a few miles from here, right?”

“Yes, I’m pretty sure I know where it is,” she said. “Tristan kind of explained it. I think we should go there.”

Her phone interrupted Spencer from replying, and she instantly hit “accept” on the call button.

“Angel?” Tristan said. “What’s going on? Everything okay?”

Their connection was possibly worse than her connection with Abraham, but she did her best to convey the situation and the potential urgency.

“We’re coming,” he said a second before the line went dead.

She told Spencer that she couldn’t wait for Tristan. He could’ve been a half-hour or more away from home. She couldn’t wait for Spencer to make the call, either. Avery knew she had to act. It wasn’t something she could explain. She just knew if she didn’t do something to help her brother and sister out of this