Last Pandemic (Book 2): Escape The City Page 7

  Jacob was never an outright criminal. It wasn’t his style and the cost-benefit analysis never seemed to be in favor of going the all-out illegal route.

  No, Jacob liked to play it safe. He liked to get what he wanted. But he found joy in doing it in a way that no one could fault him for. He enjoyed gaming the system, worming his way through the Byzantine legalese that he seemed to have an innate knack for.

  Once the virus had hit, Jacob hadn’t waited long. He’d quickly realized what the infection would do to civilization and quickly made some projections about what this part of the country would look like in a year.

  Jacob had made his sizable fortune as a disaster investor. That meant that when a hurricane or earthquake wiped out an area, Jacob swooped in and bought up the stocks of the various destroyed companies.

  So he knew a good bit about disasters and what happened after them. He figured that the Santa Fe area at large would go through a calamitous period, not unlike what happens when a tsunami wipes out an area.

  The difference with the virus, though, was that, in general, all the buildings and infrastructure would remain intact.

  Sure, there would be some damage as the buildings were left unused.

  But, a year from now, when the humans susceptible to the virus had generally died out, the buildings would still be there, standing, waiting to be bought and then sold for a tidy profit.

  Jacob didn’t think that humanity would be wiped out. Far from it. He estimated that there would be a loss of about 60 percent of the population.

  And he was fine with that.

  It meant more slices of the pie for him. And his wife.

  “Here he is again,” said Marigold. “You think he’ll put up a fight?”

  “He acts tough,” said Jacob. “But in the end, he’ll cave.”

  “You sure this is going to work?”

  “Of course it’s going to work,” said Jacob. “Legally, we have every right to claim this land.”

  “I’m not talking about the legalese. I’m talking about whether he’ll leave or not.”

  “You mean will he want to leave?”

  “I mean, will he put up a fight?”

  Jacob shrugged. “I guess that’s his problem.”

  She gave him a little smirk. “You kind of want him to put up a fight, don’t you?”

  “You know me,” he said, that wicked smile appearing on the edges of his mouth. “Sometimes I like things when they’re more difficult.”

  She slapped his ass. Hard.

  He laughed.

  His eyes surveyed the scene.

  He’d gathered employees from his various businesses. People who’d do anything for money. People who could be trusted. People who were the backbone of his various organizations.

  He’d made sure that they hadn’t gotten infected.

  He’d collected them at his house immediately upon hearing the news of the virus. He’d quarantined them there, making sure that they had no contact with anyone who was potentially contaminated.

  And it had worked so far.

  They’d have to keep taking these precautions until things settled down and people really started dying off.

  “Here he comes. He’s driving toward us.”

  “Don’t worry. He won’t do anything. There are too many of us.”

  Jacob didn’t move an inch as the pickup drove toward them. His men and women gathered around, holding their guns. They wouldn’t act unless he gave the signal, or unless things got obviously out of hand.

  But Jacob didn’t they think they would. In business, he’d learned that often all a situation requires is a display of force. Rarely, was force actually required.

  The old rusted-out pickup stopped about twenty feet from the SUV. The door didn’t open. No one stepped out.

  “You didn’t leave my property,” called out the driver, Joe.

  “No,” called out Jacob. “No, I didn’t.”

  “You’ve got until the count of five. Get back in your fancy vehicle and get the hell out of here. I didn’t accept your offer then to go work for you and I’m not going to accept it now.”

  “It wasn’t a real offer,” said Jacob, matter-of-factly.

  A shotgun appeared out the window of the pickup truck. “I’m not afraid to use this.”

  “You’re grossly outnumbered. You’ll get one of us and then get blown to bits.”

  Jacob could see in Joe’s eyes that he knew it was true.

  The real question was, would he care?

  Most men would.

  But there were outliers who wouldn’t. And Jacob was smart enough to always account for the outliers. He wouldn’t have gotten far in the business world if he hadn’t.

  “He might be one of the crazy ones,” hissed his wife, in a whisper that only he could hear.

  He gave her a slight nod.

  His hand didn’t go for his gun.

  He knew that he wasn’t going to win this with firepower. Not personally, at least.

  This was a war of words. A war of strategy. As all good business wars were.

  “There’s a special provision,” called out Jacob. “That allows for a business to reclaim personal property in the event of a disaster.”

  “What does that have to do with you and me? This is my property.”

  “I filed the paperwork yesterday. Did it all online.”

  Jacob had been smart. He hadn’t wanted to expose himself to too many people yesterday. He’d known that it was only a matter of numbers and statistics, a matter of time before he got infected, if he got up close and personal during every business transition. Plus, online was easier these days.

  “You can’t just claim this for yourself.”

  “I can. And I already did.”

  “It’s all legitimate,” called out his wife, as sweetly as one can call out. He saw her moving her hips a little, shifting her weight, sticking her bust out. She had a good figure. Good, tight curves. And she knew how to use her body to get what she wanted. Sometimes, just showing it off a little could soften the verbal blow a little.

  But it didn’t seem to work on this guy. Not on Joe. He scowled from his pickup, his face partially hidden behind his shotgun.

  “You might have to take action,” hissed his wife. “This isn’t working.”

  “I don’t want to have a murder on my hands,” hissed Jacob. “You know I don’t like to play that dirty. It’s just not a good strategic move.”

  “So many people are going to die, you think they’re going to miss this one guy and his friend?”

  “If I’m the official property owner, it’d look pretty suspicious. Even after the worst natural disasters, like in New Orleans, people were tried for murders.”

  “You’re sexy when you look that far ahead. You’re always strategizing.”

  Jacob shot his wife a little smirk.

  “One last chance,” shouted Joe from the pickup.

  He didn’t wait long after that.

  With his shotgun, he shot above their heads. The shot rang out, loudly.

  A warning shot.

  Well, Jacob would issue his own warning shots.

  Jacob glanced over at his men and women. “Take out their tires,” he called out. “And the engine!”

  He moved his hand swiftly through the air and his men and women obeyed.

  He and his wife looked on in awe of what their employees could accomplish with a little direction.

  Gunshots rang out. A lot of them.

  It was a deafening sound. Incredibly loud.

  The four tires of Joe’s pickup burst, almost in unison, and the truck sank lower to the ground.

  Next, bullet holes began appearing by the engine. Dozens of rounds were pumped through the engine block. Hisses of steam issued forth from the truck.

  Jacob held up his hand, high above his head.

  The shooting stopped.

  “You can see we’ve got the advantage of firepower,” he called out. “You’d be wise to leave before you
get ripped to bits by bullets.”

  There was silence. Silence in the truck. It seemed that Joe, red in the face with anger, was listening and consulting with his partner.

  Hopefully, the partner had more sense than Joe did.

  “If he shoots one of us, we’ll kill him,” whispered Jacob. “The law will understand that.”

  “He already shot above our heads. Why not just shoot him now? It’d be easier. Much easier.” His wife was sticking her bust out in his direction. But he knew that trick. It wouldn’t work on him.

  “Shooting above our head isn’t enough. Not in the courts.”

  “It’ll be our word against whose? Who’s going to prosecute this? Think of the thousands of dead? Who’s going to be left to judge us?”

  “Society will recover,” said Jacob resolutely. “And there’s always a leak. Always. We’ve got to play this one by the book.”

  “If you say so.”

  She was itching to kill the men in the truck. And so was Jacob.

  But he was always strict with himself. He always played by his own rules. It just wasn’t fun any other way. Sure, he could have become a despotic criminal, a complete sociopathic personality, a criminal mastermind. But where was the fun in that?

  “Look,” hissed his wife. “They’re actually leaving.”

  She moved over to him and sidled up next to him, putting her arm lovingly around him. “You were right,” she whispered.

  Together, they watched as Joe and his friend slunk off their own land, their metaphorical tails between their legs.

  There were at least a dozen guns trained on them. At least a dozen guns ready to shoot them dead on the slightest legal provocation.

  “And don’t come back,” shouted his wife, cupping her hands together.

  Joe turned once, as he approached the road, shooting a look of hatred back at them.

  But he said nothing and soon he and his friend were out of view.

  “You think they’ll be back?”

  “No,” said Jacob. “They’re too humiliated. This is ours now. Now let’s get started on the construction.”

  Jacob wasn’t going to sit idly by and wait until society rebuilt itself.

  It was only, what, a couple days into the disaster and he was already getting ready to build something new, something greater. Everyone else in the country would be busy dying, busy trying to survive.

  And Jacob? He was at least a year ahead of the curve once again. He was already building. In two decades, when the population was doubling, he’d be the one with the properties. He’d be the one with the land and the cute little adobe houses, just ready for people understandably interested in self-sufficient living.

  “All right, people,” called out Jacob. “Let’s get to work. We don’t have all day. Gather around.”

  His men and women gathered around him. Their eyes followed him and his gestures as he spoke, as he explained the basic building principles that they’d be following.

  They trusted him. They’d seen him win time and time again.

  This time would be no different.

  11

  Will

  He didn’t even know her. But all he wanted to do was save her.

  “Come on,” he said. “Don’t die on me now. Not after what I went through to get here. You can’t do this to me.”

  Maybe it was selfish. Maybe it was altruistic. It didn’t really matter.

  He grabbed her by the shoulders, shook her roughly.

  No response.

  He grabbed her head. Her long hair was soaked with blood. Slight curl to it. He slapped her hard on the cheek.

  She stirred, her eyes opening ever so slightly.

  “You’re alive. Answer me! Why’d you do this? Why? Why?” Before he knew it, he’d lost control and he was yelling at her, screaming in her face.

  It was useless. Completely pointless.

  She didn’t seem to hear him. Her eyes rolled back in her head and her eyes drifted closed.

  She was going in for the long sleep. She was closing in on death.

  He grabbed her hands, her blood covering his own hands and arms.

  Her wrists had been slit open lengthwise, exposing the tendons and muscle tissue beneath. The blood didn’t slow down.

  She’d lost too much blood.

  He needed to do something. He needed to at least try something. If not, what was the point in even being alive? Strangely, she was the reason that he’d found the will to live again.

  She was just a stranger. Should she have meant so much to him?

  Frantically, he searched the kitchen for something, anything, that could stop the bleeding.

  Nothing. Just the bloodied knife on the floor. Just cups, plates, and bowls.

  Next to the kitchen, there was a room full of junk. Some paint cans. Some large trash bags. It was a storage room, shaped like a narrow hallway. A washer and dryer were somehow jammed in there.

  There was an old cardboard box that seemed to be used as a toolbox. There were screwdrivers and a hammer inside it.

  There had to be something in there. Something to help. Some tape. Anything.

  “This’ll have to work,” he muttered to himself, as he found a staple gun and pulled it out from the junk, from the utility knives and ratty old extension cords.

  He pulled the handles together, activating the mechanism that shot a staple out at a high speed.

  It looked like a decent staple gun. Enough power.

  It would have to work.

  He dashed back in the kitchen, grabbed one of her wrists, and pressed the staple gun to it.

  It was tough to get her skin together, especially with the blood still coming out.

  He pulled the handles together, and the staple shot into her.

  She didn’t so much as flinch. Or open her eyes.

  The staple had dug itself into her flesh, but it hadn’t done what he’d wanted it to. It hadn’t sewn her up, working like a stitch.

  Would it work?

  He tried again.

  Nothing.

  And again.

  Nothing.

  “Shit!” he shouted, throwing the staple gun across the room.

  There was still blood gushing out of her.

  He hadn’t done anything but shoot little metal staples into her flesh.

  Back into the storage room, he was throwing things around in anger, shoving this and kicking that, desperately searching for something.

  Then he found it.

  He’d smashed his fist into a stack of boxes. Just pure junk. Nothing but cardboard stuffed with useless odds and ends.

  And that’s when the duct tape had fallen down. Hit him in the head.

  He grabbed it from the floor, greedily started pulling off a huge piece.

  Back in the kitchen, he grabbed her arms once again, started wrapping the tape around her.

  He didn’t stop until he’d used about half the roll on just one arm. He wound it tightly. Very tightly. It seemed to be doing something. It might actually work.

  By the time he’d finished with the second wrist, the first wrist was looking a lot better.

  Finally done, he slumped back against the kitchen cupboards.

  The floor was slick with blood.

  He was covered in blood.

  “Shit,” he muttered to himself.

  Her eyes were still closed.

  He didn’t know what more he could do. He doubted there was anything that would help.

  He just had to wait.

  Wait to see whether she’d regain consciousness.

  He lay there, somehow dozing off despite the chaos and the stress. It felt like forever since he’d slept.

  And so he slept there in that house with many bodies. A family had died together there, from a virus that would surely wipe out many thousands more.

  His dreams were horrible. Black and white nightmares, monsters that hadn’t appeared in his dreams since he was a little kid. Monsters with mouths that stretched to infinity and
swallowed him up.

  He woke up suddenly.

  Someone was shaking him.

  It was dark.

  His eyes were blurry. At first, he couldn’t see anything.

  “Who’s there?” he said.

  Was it his wife? What was going on? For some reason, he had the idea that he’d fallen asleep while waiting for the plumber to come. Maybe his wife was about to admonish him.

  Then, as the seconds ticked passed in the blurry darkness, he remembered it all. He remembered the virus. He remembered his wife’s violent death.

  “Are you alive?”

  It was a woman’s voice.

  “Sara?” he said.

  “It’s me,” she said.

  “You’re alive?” he said, completely startled, as the memories of the duct tape and the slit wrists came back to him.

  “I’m alive,” she said simply.

  “Is anyone else?”

  “I don’t think so. Not here, at least.”

  No discussion of her slit wrists. No discussion of the duct tape, which, as his vision became crisper, he saw was still there, caked in dried blood.

  “We’ve got to get out of here,” she said.

  “Yeah,” he said. “That’d be good. But where do we go?”

  “I don’t know. But I can’t stay here among the corpses of my mom and sister and...it’s just too horrible.”

  “Did you go look at them again?”

  “I couldn’t bear it. I couldn’t go.”

  “Good. You shouldn’t have to see that.” He thought of his wife. Her face. The blood.

  He shuddered.

  “We’ll go somewhere else,” he said. “We’ll go to some other house. We don’t have to worry about the virus. We’re immune, apparently. For what that’s worth.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “What?”

  “That expression. For what it’s worth.”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. “It’s just something people say. Or said. I guess a lot of them are dead now.”

  “Was that really you on the walkie-talkie?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “And I know it was you. I recognize your voice. I thought I was going to just wait to die there among the bodies.”