Damariscove Read online

  ***

  Where are they? Elle thought as she slowly walked toward the house, trying to give the boys enough time to coordinate something.

  “What do you want from us?” she asked, not turning around or lowering her hands.

  The man behind her just laughed. “Same as you, darling. Just a safe place.”

  “You expect me to believe that?” she said angrily. “If that’s all you wanted, why hold me at gunpoint?”

  “Darling, you have no idea what the worlds become. You think the corpses are the monsters? Ha. It’s the survivors you have to worry about.”

  “I’m beginning to agree with you,” she said with a snicker.

  “The first place we was at,” he continued, “We had it pretty good. We were in a hotel. It was nice and we had supplies and food and a generator. Problem was, other people wanted in. We tried to keep them out cause we didn’t have any more room, but they broke down the fence.”

  “Then you were surrounded,” Elle said softly.

  “That’s the half of it,” he said, a hint of sadness in his hard voice. “We started out with a little group of nearly thirty survivors. Todd and me are the only ones left.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that, but why are you here?” Elle asked.

  “This place is safe and protected.”

  “So you’re just going to take it?” she said stunned. “What do you plan on doing with my dad and me?”

  The man paused for a second, clearly unsure of what his actual plans were. It was obvious he was caught up in the moment and hadn’t expected to come across her..

  “I hadn’t thought that through,” he said with a sigh. “We thought this place would be empty.”

  Elle turned around, her face red with anger and disgust. “Well, it’s not empty and we spent a long time setting this place up. You’re not going to just come here and take it. It seems like you used to be a decent person once. How can you do this?”

  “I was a decent person,’ the man growled. “Until the world went to hell and I learned you can’t trust anyone and you have to protect yourself. Sometimes that comes at a cost.”