Chosen by Christine Pope (best romantic novels in english .TXT) 📖

and cooking oil, and enough spices that I could probably bake something different every day for the next year and still not use everything up. In fact, the basement was so extensive that I got the impression it was actually bigger than the house itself, spreading beyond the walls of the structure directly above it.

The greenhouse was set up on a drip system, one supplied by the same well that gave the house its water. I found a good deal of produce that was at its peak or even just past it, so I harvested that as best I could, eating what needed to be consumed right away and putting the rest in the refrigerator. On the bookshelves in the office, there were a number of reference books on all sorts of topics of interest to the homesteader or survivalist — home canning, sewing, weaving, butchering…even how to make your own bullets. In fact, I found the molds for that very activity down in the basement, along with a quantity of black powder and other supplies. I had to hope none of it would explode and send Dutchie and me sky-high one day.

Although having every conceivable supply on hand should have made me feel better, in truth it only depressed me. I thought of being here so long that I would have to start canning food or sewing my own clothes, of having to go out in the ATV to hunt deer or elk. Even though my father had taken me hunting a few times, I’d never had the heart to pull the trigger. Maybe if I were starving I’d feel differently about the whole thing, but until then I couldn’t conceive of killing something so beautiful.

The one thing the compound didn’t have was dog food. I wasn’t sure what to make of that; maybe Mr. Real Estate Developer wasn’t a dog person, although you’d think he would’ve factored dogs into his survival plan, just because they were good to have around in case things got dicey. Whatever the reason, I was down to about a day’s worth of dry food left for Dutchie, which meant I needed to go foraging.

For some reason, the voice had been fairly scarce the past couple of days. I wondered at its absence, thinking that maybe it believed its work was done, since it had gotten me here safely. All the same, I thought I’d better telegraph my plans, let it know I was leaving the compound for a few hours.

“Dutchie’s almost out of food,” I said as I got the shotgun out of the gun safe. I already wore a gleaming Ruger in a holster on my hip, said armament courtesy of the trove I’d found within that safe. Possibly it would have made better sense to take along a gun I was more familiar with, but I couldn’t resist the chrome-plated allure of that Ruger. My father would have known how much it cost, but I didn’t have a clue. A lot, that’s for sure.

Silence met my announcement, so I went on, “I’m going down into Santa Fe for a few hours. Can I assume the coast is clear?”

Nothing again, and I frowned. But since I’d seen more clouds massing up to the northeast, I didn’t want to dilly-dally. Maybe twenty minutes in and twenty minutes out; I’d actually seen a PetSmart down a side street as I was making my way along Cerrillos Road when I came into town, so at least I wouldn’t have to waste a lot of time looking for a pet store. Having no cell service and no way to look anything up on the Internet definitely made what should have been easy tasks a lot more difficult.

With a shrug, I closed the safe and locked it, then headed out to the kitchen. I really didn’t need anything else in the way of supplies, although the chilliness of the nights even now, in early October, told me that the cold-weather gear I’d brought along might not be sufficient for a full-blown Santa Fe winter. Well, if I had time to poke around, I’d see if I could find something.

As I was getting ready, I debated whether to bring Dutchie along, and then decided against it. She was safe here, and I knew I’d move faster if I didn’t have her along. Besides, I needed someplace to stow the shotgun. I wasn’t sure if she’d take kindly to being relegated to the back seat so the shotgun could…ride shotgun.

I patted her head, got her some fresh water, and then told her I’d be going out but would be back soon. Since she’d gotten used to me coming and going between the house and the garage or the kitchen and the greenhouse, she took this announcement in stride, lapping up some of the water I’d just poured before she settled down on the rug in front of the oven. That was one of her new favorite spots, which made things sort of difficult when I was trying to cook.

Smiling, I went out the back door and made my way along the flagstone walk to the garage. In my explorations, I’d found the remotes for the garage and the front gate, so technically I didn’t need the voice to let me in and out. Still, I couldn’t help wondering where he’d gotten to.

With a shrug, I opened the garage door, then climbed into the Cherokee. I leaned the shotgun against the passenger seat, checked the fuel gauge, and backed out, glad that I wouldn’t have to worry about getting more gas anytime soon. This place felt like it was out in the middle of nowhere — and it was — but I doubted it was more than five miles one way from here to the city center. I could go back and forth at least twenty more times before I had to bother with fueling up.

The dirt track hadn’t improved any since the last time I’d driven over it, and I gritted my teeth as I bounced and jounced along at a steady twenty miles an hour. It was a relief to hit the actual road, even though it wasn’t in the greatest shape, either. But at least here I could increase my speed to thirty, slowing occasionally to go around an abandoned truck or car.

Nothing had changed. I wasn’t sure why I’d expected it to, except I supposed that was a normal, human thing to think — the world around us had never been static, people and cars coming and going, shifting their positions. Here, though, there were no more people left to change anything. Or rather, so few of them probably remained that it would take some doing to run into any of them. I was a little hazy on the population of Santa Fe before the Heat laid everything waste, but I had a feeling there couldn’t be more than a hundred or so people left in the general area, if even that much.

Eventually, I backtracked my way to Cerrillos, then drove some distance down the street before I spotted the PetSmart off to my left. I turned — going wide to avoid a Ford Explorer sitting right in the middle of the intersection — and pulled into the store parking lot. There weren’t that many vehicles here, most likely because people had been thinking about other things than feeding their pets when the doomsday disease swept through town.

When I went inside, my father’s heavy police-issue flashlight in one hand, I was relieved to see that all the live small animals — the rats and mice and gerbils, the birds and lizards and snakes — had apparently flown the coop. How they’d gotten out, I had no idea, unless this was another example of “being taken care of,” as the voice had assured me back in Albuquerque. There was evidence of the food being tampered with, but although anything within reach of a large dog’s muzzle seemed to be either gone or half-eaten, there were still bags and bags on the upper shelves. I got a shopping cart and loaded it up, took it to the Cherokee, and dumped the bags there, then repeated the process until my arms ached and I wouldn’t be able to see out the back window if I kept it up any longer. That would be enough to see Dutchie through the winter, and after that — well, I’d just come foraging again.

I also grabbed a miscellany of dog treats and dog toys from the displays at the front of the store, and wedged those in and around the big twenty-pound bags of dog food. Dutchie was definitely going to be one spoiled doggie, but I thought she deserved it.

During this whole process, which I estimated took me about twenty minutes or so, I didn’t see any evidence of anyone else being around. True, a pet store probably wasn’t the sort of place where survivors hung out, but I felt myself relax a little. Maybe this was why the voice had let me alone — it had known I had nothing to fear on this particular trip.

Humming to myself, I got back in the SUV and pointed it northward, back along the way I’d come. When I got to the intersection where I should have turned on Alameda to head back up into the hills, though, I found myself slowing down, and then cutting left so I could drive up Don Gaspar.

Almost at once, I heard the voice in my head. Jessica, what are you doing?

Relief flooded through me. So I hadn’t been completely abandoned. “I want to see.”

See what?

“The center of town. I want to see if it’s all right.”

Why should that matter?

“Because it matters,” I said, an edge of irritation in my voice. “It was a cultural center. Lots of museums, historical sites. What can it hurt to look?”

Silence for a few seconds. You may not like what you see.

Ice etched its way down my spine, but I attempted to ignore it, instead asking, “So where the hell have you been, anyway? The Bahamas?”

He didn’t answer directly, but said, You missed me?

Did I want to admit that I had? Probably not. Hedging, I replied, “Well, I love Dutchie, but she’s not the world’s greatest conversationalist.”

I heard one of those low chuckles. You may be right in that.

Despite what he’d just said about my not liking what I would see, I couldn’t help smiling. That smile faded abruptly, though, as I came around the corner to Santa Fe’s famous plaza. In good weather — and even not-so-good weather — the plaza was usually full of people, whether tourists, musicians, vendors, or locals out to