Suckers Read online

  Again, I'd shut Nick right up. Again, though, just temporarily.

  However, when he spoke again, his deep voice held a little less sternness and steel than it had before. "Blaine and I have never been unable to take care of ourselves. And I want to repeat one final time, when he or I give an order, you follow it. Am I clear?"

  He was, but I didn't like what he was being so crystal clear about. I was used to following my orders and my orders only. I was used to keeping my own self safe. Although, I had to admit, I'd done a pretty miserable job at doing that, not once, but twice that day.

  I hadn't kept myself safe by cutting across the open grassland, and I hadn't kept myself safe by emerging from the truck, even though I'd done it for what I thought was a pretty good reason.

  Twice I might have been injured or killed that day if it hadn't been for Nick and Blaine. As much as I hated to admit that, even to myself.

  In response to Nick's question asking if he'd made himself clear, I dipped my head in a fraction of a nod. "Crystal."

  Seemingly satisfied, he continued driving without another word, at least not for a few minutes, when smoke began billowing from the battered truck's dented hood, which was white, in contrast with the truck's tan-and-rust-colored body.

  "Damn. Looks like the engine's going to need some of your attention, GM."

  "I thought my new nickname was Mud Bucket."

  I whipped my face toward Blaine, surprised that he'd actually made a little joke, and so soon after Nick had finished bitching me out, for lack of a better way to put it.

  Blaine was already rifling through the glove box, though, not even looking at me. "Where the hell are all my tools?"

  I told him that I'd dropped a lot of them on the floor while I'd been searching for a weapon. "I had to grab a knife, because I normally have a screwdriver that I use, but I don't know what happened to it. Did either of you happen to pick it up in the grasslands today?"

  While Nick pulled the truck over to the side of the road, Blaine shut the glove box, shaking his head. "No. Grabbed your bags, though. Don't know how you were walking with that big one packed so full...the little one, too. I think one of those big-ass glass jars of grapefruit is probably what you knocked yourself out on, if being clothes-lined alone didn't do it."

  Oh, I thought. So, that's what it was. I'd felt like the back of my head had been slammed into a brick or something.

  "You're lucky Nick and I were taking a little break from our supply run to do a little scouting expedition on foot today. Things might have not gone so well for you if we hadn't been about to cut across that grassland when we did."

  Blaine was right. I was lucky. Maybe some of the dust from Chris' four leaf clover had remained in my pocket, even though he'd given me the clover over a year-and-a-half earlier, and even though I'd washed that particular pair of jeans so many times since then they were nearly threadbare.

  After quietly conceding to Blaine that I was lucky, I had a sudden thought that made me narrow my eyes at him. "Hey...how did you know that a glass jar of grapefruit was even in my backpack? Did the two of you go through my things or something?"

  Blaine, who was leaning over, picking up tools off the floor mat, didn't even hesitate. "Yeah. We had a look. Not sorry about it. Needed to see if we could find any obvious evidence that you'd come from Borderline, or any of the other communities."

  Folding my arms across my chest, I snorted. "And you didn't find any, and yet you still accused me."

  "Not sorry about that, either. Wanted to see your reaction."

  "Well, by now do you believe me that I'm not a spy?"

  Nick had long since stopped the smoking truck, and Blaine transferred his tools to the crook of his left arm, opened the door with his right hand, and spoke in a quiet voice.

  "Gettin' there."

  I just snorted faintly in response.

  It turned out that the truck wasn't fixable. Among other major problems, Blaine said that the transmission was "hanging by a thread." I didn't know if he meant that literally or metaphorically, but he said he couldn't fix it out on the road. He'd need his other tools "back in Helena," wherever the hell "Helena" was.

  Nick tried to drive the truck again, but the engine died almost immediately. Getting his greasy, grimy hands even greasier and grimier, Blaine messed around under the hood some more. Nick tried to drive the truck yet again, but this time, it wouldn't even start.

  Finally, he got out and thumped a fist on the hood, swearing under his breath. He then leaned against the side of the truck with a sigh and spoke to Blaine. "The others are up the road probably only two or three miles, so we can walk the rest of the way with Evangeline easily enough; but we'll have to send one of the other trucks back later for the supplies...if someone else doesn't stumble along them within the next day or so."

  The supplies that Nick was speaking of were numerous crates filled with food in the bed of the truck. Several of them had Peaches, GA printed on the side, and others said Green Beans, TN. Through the wooden slats of the crates, I could see glass jars. Several open plastic bins in the truck bed were filled with what looked like bags of rice or grain or something. The remaining early evening light was fading so quickly I really couldn't tell.

  Wiping his hands on a greasy rag, Blaine just grunted in response to what Nick had said, and I studied him in the dim twilight. For all his grease and grime, he really wasn't half-bad looking. A few inches over six feet, with slim hips and broad shoulders, his physique was undeniably attractive.

  And although his jaw wasn't quite as square, and his face not as classically handsome as Nick's, I couldn't deny that his overall look was undeniably attractive as well. His whole way of being kind of was, too, even though at the same time, it was somehow irritating. I was beginning to feel a bit confused. Or hopelessly thrown off-balance. Something.

  To distract myself, I had a look up the road, where Nick had said "the others" were, whoever the heck they were. And it was only then, despite all the time I'd spent with Nick and Blaine in the truck that it really registered in my brain that we had been heading north the entire time. North, when the direction I needed to be going was south. The direction I'd been going for nearly two years.

  Pushing myself upright from a lean against the truck, I spoke without really even thinking of what to say. "This is all...this is all completely wrong. The two of you have to let me go. I'm trying to get somewhere. I need to start heading south again. Right this second."

  I felt sure of what I needed to do, yet somehow simultaneously fuzzy-brained. Yet, I wasn't so fuzzy-brained that I didn't realize that it wouldn't be wise to reveal my ultimate destination. I'd said that I needed to start heading "down south" instead of specifically saying Nashville, lest Nick and Blaine try to follow me down there by taking a direct route.

  And really, I knew in my gut that they wouldn't be following me. They'd be chasing me, because the only way I was going to be able to continue south was if I escaped from them. They weren't just going to let me go. They'd be chasing me whenever I was able to make an escape attempt, which I knew I would eventually do. I was going to get to my sisters, come hell, high water, or death.

  Before I even finished speaking, I started lifting my backpack out of the bed of the truck, intending to grab my duffel bag, too, even though I knew Nick and Blaine weren't just going to let me go on my merry way. Nonetheless, even though it might have been silly, I was just going to see what they'd do if I grabbed my bags. I just wanted to see what they'd do and say if I started heading down the road southward with both of my bags in tow, like I was calling the shots.

  However, Nick prevented me from even lifting my backpack out of the truck by placing a firm hand against it while I was lifting. "No. Sorry, Evangeline, but you're not going anywhere. You're staying right here...and Blaine and I are going to get to know you a little better right now."

  CHAPTER FIVE

  For a split-second, what Nick had said made my stomach lurch with fear. But then he co
ntinued speaking, and it became clear that he had something other than attacking me on his mind.

  "We're going to have dinner. We're going to talk. If you want, you can tell us some about your journey so far."

  I let go of my backpack strap, knowing that he wasn't going to let me lift it out of the truck bed and waltz on down the road with it. "Fine."

  "Also, how does your head feel? I know you must have whacked it pretty good to fall unconscious."

  I looked at Nick, realizing that the pain at the back of my head had completely subsided. "Honestly, my head feels fine now. I guess I am a little hungry, though."

  I really was. And truthfully, I was so hungry I felt like I could probably eat two dinners.

  Across from me and Nick, on the other side of the truck, Blaine lifted some kind of a sack out of the truck bed. "I'll start cookin'."

  The sack appeared to have some kind of dark liquid leaking from it, though in the very dim light of full evening, I couldn't quite tell if I was seeing things right.

  Frowning, I peered at what Blaine was holding. "Blaine, what's in that sack? And is it leaking something?"

  He just grunted in response to me at first, then glanced at me over his shoulder while walking away from the truck. "I thought my name was Mud Bucket."

  After watching Blaine go, Nick turned his gaze back to me. "We'll be having rabbit for dinner. It's high in protein, and easy to catch while we're in our shifter forms. We eat in our shifter forms, too, sometimes, but we also have to eat while in our human forms, just like all other humans, so-"

  "Oh, hell no!"

  Before the word no had passed my lips, I was already tearing away from the truck, charging after Blaine. The thought of eating rabbit had absolutely horrified me. It had chilled me. I'd kept numerous rabbits as pets growing up, and I'd been about to adopt one to keep in my apartment when the Bloodsucker apocalypse had hit. To me, eating rabbit was essentially the same as eating dog or cat. Pets weren't to be eaten. You just didn't do it. At least, I just didn't do it.

  During my travels, I'd heard of people eating some pretty strange, stomach-turning things. I'd seen people eating some pretty strange, stomach-turning things. One group of fellow travelers I'd come across, three elderly gentlemen, told me that they'd witnessed people boiling old library books to get some kind of a calorie-dense broth from the glue used to bind antique book spines.

  From Anton's group, even fairly early into the apocalypse, I'd heard talk of some people resorting to cannibalism in places where all houses, businesses, and agricultural storehouses had been picked clean of all possible food products. That was why Anton was leading Chris and the rest of the members of his group to Pennsylvania, where there was supposedly a large community of survivors.

  It was said that this community had gotten hold of military supplies and would have enough food to last for years. In the meantime, they would start farming and raising cattle and poultry for meat.

  I had no problem with raising cattle and poultry for meat. I had no problem eating beef and chicken for dinner. I did, however, have a huge problem with the thought of any pet-like creature being eaten for dinner. Which was why I attempted to tackle Blaine in some sort of a wild blitz attack, the very act of doing it making my head swim with intense vertigo.

  "You let them go! You let those rabbits go!"

  Instead of making him drop the sack and fall to the ground, my attack had almost no effect on Blaine whatsoever. It had actually barely caused a hitch in his long, unhurried strides. Really, it was as if I'd just hopped on his back for a piggyback ride, although I now hopped off, becoming increasingly dizzy.

  "You just let those rabbits go, Blaine. So help me."

  Slinging the sack over one shoulder, he turned to look at me. "Easy. Just relax. The rabbits in my bag are long dead anyway...at least a couple hours dead. I threw 'em in the truck before we set out again. They're still fresh enough for eating, though."

  Head still swimming, I staggered backward, almost falling.

  Blaine grabbed my arm to stop that from happening. "Damn. Just how hard did you hit your head?"

  "Just hard enough to be absolutely disgusted by what you're doing. People just shouldn't eat pets. You understand me? No matter what is going on in the world, people should keep up on their grooming, and not eat pets, and...." I paused for a deep breath while another strong wave of dizziness threatened to tip me backward. "That's how we survive."

  I hadn't even noticed Nick come up alongside us, but somehow, he was just suddenly there.

  "I think the real question isn't how hard she hit her head, but when was the last time she's eaten. You hungry, Evangeline?"

  Shaking my head, I didn't know why I felt like being contrary, but I just did. "No. I'm actually not hungry at all right now. I just ate like...not too long ago. It was earlier today. It was breakfast, I think, a few crackers and some jam, and then I was making such good time that I just didn't want to stop for lunch."

  Nick glanced at Blaine before returning his gaze to my face. "Even the latest breakfast would have been ten or so hours ago...and I'm guessing you walked miles and miles today after that. I'm also guessing that because of that, maybe your blood sugar's a little low."

  When I'd been in training, skating every day, I'd grown used to eating so little that my body had almost seemed to adapt to running on near-empty. I'd only rarely experienced extreme hunger and low blood sugar symptoms. But as of late, with even rationed portions of food seeming to me like indulgent daily buffets, I'd grown used to meals on a pretty regular schedule.

  With a faint sigh, realizing that all his guessing was right, I looked at Nick. "Look. Maybe I am suffering from a little low blood sugar. But I won't eat pets. I won't eat rabbits. I have a lentil-and-rice mix packet in my backpack that I'd like to make instead."

  With his earlier sternness now gone, Nick said that was fine. "We'll make it for you. And in the meantime, we'll get you sitting down somewhere."

  A short while later, I was sitting on a log near a campfire, scarfing peach slices from a bowl that I wasn't entirely sure had been properly cleaned beforehand. I didn't care. I was too hungry. Famished, I ate probably a dozen peach slices before I even really started tasting them.

  Above the fire, on a frame he'd constructed from sticks, Nick had hung a kettle containing water and my lentil-and-rice mix. With his face glowing gold from the flames, Blaine was holding a thick stick above the fire. On the stick, he'd speared several enormous chunks of rabbit flesh. I couldn't deny that the cooking meat smelled good.

  Even amazing, actually. Which made me feel repulsed and yet further starving at the same time. I certainly wasn't going to tell Blaine and Nick that the cooking meat smelled good to me.

  However, despite the fact that I hadn't said a peep, when Blaine had deemed the rabbit sufficiently cooked, he handed me a hearty chunk on a plastic plate. "Just eat some. It wasn't a pet. These were wild rabbits."

  Instead of thanking him, I took the plate silently, not entirely sure what I was going to do with the contents of it. Part of me wanted to hurl the plate into the darkened trees. But another part of me wanted to pick up the aromatic piece of roasted rabbit and see how big of a bite I could shove in my mouth.

  Blaine filled his own plate with meat, took a seat on a log opposite me, and dug in, taking large, greedy bites, smacking his lips.

  "You're a sick, sick man."

  I hadn't even really meant to say that. It had just kind of come out.

  Filling his mouth with cooked rabbit flesh, Blaine just grunted in response, although his grunt actually sounded more like an mm-hmm, as if he were actually agreeing with me that he was a sick, sick man.

  Disgusted, I turned my gaze to my plate and found myself suddenly very not disgusted. The meat looked and smelled so incredibly good. It's just chicken, I told myself for some reason, suddenly picking up the meat and taking the tiniest of bites. Disappointing me somehow, it was phenomenal. Just slightly charred on the outside, it was flav
orful, juicy, and well-seasoned.

  I'd watched while Blaine had taken a few jars out of a knapsack and had sprinkled the meat with something or other before spearing it on the stick.

  When Nick began spooning my lentils-and-rice onto my plate, I told him that he and Blaine could have some, too, if they wanted, and they both took me up on my offer, each spooning a little onto their plates.

  With the campfire crackling and popping, the three of us ate without speaking. When I finished my chunk of rabbit, Blaine got up and silently put another on my plate. Twice during dinner, we were interrupted in our eating by hissing, growling Huskers shambling into our little camp among the trees, possibly attracted by the fire.

  Blaine got up and got the first group of two; Nick got the second. To deal with such a small number of Bloodsuckers, neither of them even bothered shifting into their animal forms. Both of them just used knives to make their kills.