N87 Virus | Book 1 | After the Outbreak Kadin, Karri (booksvooks TXT) 📖

a grid pattern. They searched section by section making sure not to miss an area. Allison would interview all the newcomers, showing them Morgan’s picture from Matt’s wallet, asking if they had seen her on their travels. There was no sign of her. Matt grew stronger by the day, physically and in spirit. He loved learning medical skills and grew quite the crush on Gabby.

Being with Gabby again made Allison feel like a new and improved version of her old self and she liked the feeling. The four of them—Gabby, Allison, Trevor, and Matt—seemed to fit together so perfectly, as if they had known each other all their lives. This added to her guilt about Morgan. She shouldn’t feel happy with Morgan missing.

Every evening they would eat dinner together and then play board games in the living room. Sometimes they would sit around the fire pit outside and simply talk about everything that crossed their minds. They felt like family.

Gabby was not the same woman she was before. She was still bubbly, cheerful, and an absolute genius. But sometimes she would disappear for a few hours with no explanation or appear to be deep in thought, but when Allison would ask what she was thinking Gabby would plaster her beautiful smile on her face and simply change the subject.

If Allison could interrogate Gabby, she could make her confess what she was up to, but she stopped herself from doing so. Forcing Gabby to come clean about whatever secret she was hiding would be hypocritical considering Allison still had not told Gabby about Dr. Neff or her freaky rage strength. Once she told her, Allison would no longer be able to pretend like everything was the same as it was before. The thought of Gabby looking at her differently made her stomach twist. Accepting that Allison was once an Infected was one thing, but having to accept that Allison was a permanent monster with unnatural strength and a scary temper was another.

The boys cornered her one morning after Gabby left. Allison was getting ready to leave to go to the schoolhouse.

“You have to tell her,” Trevor said, concern creasing his face.

“He’s right. You have to tell her. She needs to know,” Matt agreed.

“I can’t deal with that right now. I just got her back. I want to be happy.”

Trevor crossed his arms and furrowed his brow. “Coming from people who love you, people who you already made the mistake of keeping this secret from, I’m telling you to not make the same mistake again.”

“Honesty is the best policy,” Matt said with a sympathetic smirk. “We understood. So will she.”

“Look what happened with Morgan. I can’t lose Gabby too.” Allison frowned. “I’ll see you tonight. I have to go.” She walked out the door leaving Trevor and Matt alone in the house.

Matt recovered from his injuries quickly once he was able to rest instead of walking miles a day. Being in a town with a real doctor helped as well. He really enjoyed his EMT class and tolerated his maintenance assignment. He checked with Gabby in the reunification office every day after searching the woods with Trevor hoping for news on Morgan, but always left disappointed.

Trevor began giving self-defense classes along with his security duties. The security chief quickly took notice of his natural teaching ability and made the class Trevor’s primary duty. Trevor created lessons suitable for every resident in town. He even visited Allison at the schoolhouse and showed the children how to escape from holds. Trevor and Allison had not spent much time alone together since arriving at Wellspring but each day they grew closer. They had even managed an almost date night.

“Close your eyes,” Trevor said. Allison closed her eyes and Trevor raised a wooden spoon to her lips. “Taste this.” Allison sipped up the warm liquid from the spoon.

“Oh my god that’s amazing! Where did you learn to cook like that?” she asked.

“Food Network,” Trevor laughed. “Making a tomato-based spaghetti sauce is actually pretty easy, just time-consuming. Since the garden has fresh tomatoes and basil, and you brought back a box of pasta from the community store, I figured it was fate saying we needed an Italian dinner.”

“How time-consuming is it?” she asked as she leaned into him.

“Like all day if you’re doing it right.” Trevor placed the spoon on the counter and wrapped his arms around her.

“Aww, you cooked all day for me?” Allison slipped her arms around his waist, pulling him toward her.

“I’d do anything for you,” Trevor said as he leaned in, his face inching closer to hers. She closed her eyes, her heart racing, bracing herself for the touch of his lips on hers.

“Hey what is everyone doi—” Matt stopped in the door of the kitchen. Allison pulled away. “Sorry!” he said. “I didn’t . . . Were you guys . . . ? Uhhh . . . I’ll go.”

“No, no, no. It’s fine, Matt,” Allison said. She waved Matt in and half smiled at Trevor.

“Yeah, it’s cool, man. You’re here, so eat with us,” Trevor said.

“Just one thing first.” Allison grabbed Trevor by the collar and pressed her lips to his. He wrapped his arms around her waist and she could feel the smile on his lips as he kissed her back.

Allison loved her job at the school, which shocked her. She loved playing with the kids outside, teaching them games she learned on the playground growing up like red rover and freeze tag. She would watch them, in awe of their resilience and quietly mourning the lives they could have had. They will never know what it was like before. They will never have that. Even if the disease was eradicated from the world these kids would grow up knowing it is always possible for another disaster to strike and ruin the world as they know it. Life was never going to be what it was.

Allison took many of Trevor’s classes. He would practice with her one-on-one as well, trying to