Chapter Fifty-Four: Recon Missions and Rabid Brains
Katherine woke with the sunshine in her face the following morning and breathed in the scent of Ox's skin as she lay with her head on his chest. She pressed her trembling fingertips against the tight skin as she thought about what they had shared several times during the night.
Katherine had been with man men; more men then she could possibly hope to count, name or remember but being with Ox—being held so tenderly in his arms as he loved her so thoroughly—was something she would never forget for as long as she lived. And she knew that never again would she willingly give her body to any man who was not her Ox.
He had seemed so unsure of himself when she had stepped into the room last night but his confidence had risen quickly and Katherine was not surprised why—Ox certainly knew his way around a woman's body.
And he had adapted to her moans and responses, learning quickly what she liked. Katherine smiled to herself. Ox was certainly not dumb as his family tried to say—he was simply very wise in areas not commonly known to parents and bitter aunts.
But now it was morning and Katherine had no idea what was going to happen. She had never before woken up in the arms of a man after making love with him the night before. What was expected? Would he still be looking at her with the love he had the day before? While she wanted to scold herself for thinking that he wouldn't, she couldn't help but think it none the less.
Katherine had only ever been with men that wanted one thing from her but then again, Ox had only ever had women who wanted one thing from him. Katherine wanted him, all of him, forever. Even though in this new world, forever could prove to be no more than a week, a couple of days or simply a few hours.
"Good morning, Miss Kate."
Katherine looked up from Ox's stomach to find him watching her with those boyish eyes of his. Nervously Kate studied them, searching for any signs of regret and praying she'd see the emotion she longed to see.
And there it was. Love.
"Good morning, Ox."
His big hand reached across his body and smoothed golden waves of hair behind her ear. "I never have woken up with a woman in my arms before, Miss Kate, not like this."
Katherine snuggled her naked body against his, loving the way his hot skin felt against hers. She felt him harden against her inner thigh but the look on his face never changed. He didn't seem to be in any hurry to have his way with her again. Instead he seemed peaceful, content and happy to simply hold her. "I've never woken up in the arms of a man either, Ox."
"I sure am glad I found somebody to watch Susette last night."
Katherine laughed. "Me too."
"It sure makes me feel good to know you're happy about what we did, Miss Kate. The women I was with before didn't want nobody to know they—"
Katherine cut him off with a kiss. "Ox—" she began as she slowly pulled away. "—I am not those women."
"Shit, Miss Kate, that's true." he grinned from ear to ear. "You're not."
"You know what I just realized?" Katherine asked as she glanced out the window at the bright sky outside.
Ox followed her gaze. "What's that?"
"It's well past dawn and Colt hasn't been banging on our doors yet and demanding we all practice."
Ox sighed. "I'd say that means he and Evie made up."
"We should take advantage of his late start this morning and use what time we have to our advantage." Katherine urged, a smile tugging at her lips as she tried hard to appear serious.
Ox wasn't able to fight his own smile, which widened still more. "You don't have to tell me twice, Miss Kate."
Katherine's laughter filled the room as Ox grabbed her quickly and tossed her onto her back, though her laughter quickly turned to moans as his body picked back up where they'd left off only a couple of hours before.
***
Colt stared down at Evangeline's sleeping form lying in the bed and felt his heart swell. He loved her. She was more than he deserved and yet she stood beside him anyway. She had seemed so worried the night before that he would not forgive her temper from two nights ago but there had been nothing to forgive.
If anything Colt had been terrified that she really had realized the man she was married to and would truly never want him again. Colt was a survivor and did what was required to keep living even if that meant doing things that turned the stomachs of everyone else.
He finished tightening his gun belt and then dropped to his knees beside the bed. Evangeline was on her stomach with her cheek smashed against the pillow and her lips parted. Drool was dripping onto the white fabric of the pillowcase and it made Colt smile.
Her petite body was bare of clothes and the sheet she was tangled in was just barely wrapped around her backside before weaving between her legs and giving him tantalizing hints of bare skin.
Gently Colt reached out a hand and let his finger trail across her cheek. "I love you." He whispered. She had no reaction other than to shift her head slightly, spreading her drool as she went. Colt fought back a laugh. Women were at their most beautiful while they slept.
"Lord, You and I don't speak often—" Colt whispered as he continued to stare at his wife's sleeping face. "—mostly because You never have seemed to help me out and I wasn't real sure You even existed.. I know You do now. I hope You're takin' good care of Sarah and Loralie up there and I hope that they aren't too ashamed of some of the things I've had to do since these monsters came.
"I want to thank You, Lord, for giving me Evangeline. A man wanders through this life, unsure of where he's supposed to go and just trying to do the best he can; never knowing what he's missing or what he needs until he finds it. She's my it, Lord, so thanks." Colt was about to stand when another through crossed his mind. "And, Lord, I reckon You don't much like it when folks commit suicide but maybe You could take it easy on Lily. You didn't give any of us much good to hold onto when this world went to hell and the way I see it, You gave her even less."
Satisfied that he'd said what he wanted to say, Colt stood straight and grabbed his hat off the bedpost. He could wake Evangeline up and insist they get the day started but she looked too peaceful. The woman had been exhausted when she had come to him last night and he hadn't allowed her to do much in the way of resting until nearly dawn.
A happy wife made for a happy life, or so Colt had heard said before. He figured another couple of hours wasn't going to make much of a difference .
He slid his hat on his head and slipped out the door without waking her.
Colt made his way first to the kitchen. He was hungry yet also wanted to look through the food stores here. Most of the supplies were packed up over in the warehouse but it wouldn't hurt to take stock of what was here at the brothel.
He stepped into the kitchen and instantly tried to back away when he found Charlotte and Silas wrapped in a passionate embrace beside the fireplace.
"Colt!" Silas's voice called out, stopping Colt in his tracks. Colt took a deep breath and pulled off his hat before shoving his hand through his hair.
"I didn't mean to interrupt anything." He mumbled.
Charlotte's face was beet red as she went about stirring the potatoes she was frying up.
"We need to talk." Silas said, obviously choosing to pretend as if Colt hadn't walked in on anything at all.
"About?" Colt questioned, happy to follow his lead. Silas hadn't spoken to him since he'd watched Colt throw Lily's body out the window.
"I'm just gonna get straight to it—" Silas began.
"That's the way I prefer folks to do it." Colt assured him.
"When you threw her out that window I was more than a little horrified. I didn't know what to say that wouldn't make things worse and so I walked off."
"I won't apologize."
"I know that and you don't owe me or anyone else here an apology. You've worked your ass off to keep us all safe. You've taken more watches, you've made the tough choices and you've let all of us fall apart when we needed to without ever falling apart yourself. I am sorry that I acted the way I did. I understand now why doing what you did with her was the only option there was. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm glad we have you with us. Without you, I doubt anyone in this group would still be living."
Colt didn't know what to say and so instead of speaking he simply held out a hand and gave Silas's hand a firm shake.
"Good, now that that's settled, I'm hoping that you and Evangeline made up? She was a mess yesterday worried that you no longer loved her. I told her that was ridiculous but she wouldn't listen." Charlotte spoke up as she poured some oats into a pot of boiling water.
"Yes, ma'am, we're doing good." Colt replied simply, which only served to make her and Silas smile more.
"I'm gonna go check out the cellar." Colt muttered, making a quick escape before there was any more talk of feelings and emotions.
***
"Colt, you've spent all this time training us—"
"It's been two days, Evangeline."
"So! It's been two very long days of training on top of months of surviving these monsters. What was the point if you're going to babysit us women instead of allowing us to gather supplies on our own and cover a lot more ground."
It was nearly midday and Colt had been informing the women that they were going to accompany the men into the city. When he'd said they'd have to stay with the men in one big group Evangeline had known she needed to argue.
"Evangeline..." Colt sighed as he rubbed his face.
"Colt—" she laid her hand on his arm. "—you have to trust that things will be fine. Why don't we pair up in groups of two and go building to building? You know that's the most efficient way to do this, you just don't want to say so because you're worried one of women will get hurt and you'll fell like you're to blame."
Evangeline saw the guilt flash in his blue eyes and knew that she'd been right. Colt spoke a lot of tough talk about the women needing to be in the middle of the fighting and pulling their weight and yet he didn't mean any of it. He was scared to death to risk their lives—or at least her life.
"Fine." He finally relented. "Me and Evangeline. Ox and Katherine. Silas and Charlotte. Jedidiah and Rachel—"
"But..." Rachel began and Colt fixed her with a glare.
"Honestly nobody wants to be paired with you I'm sure. I'm sure Jedidiah isn't feeling all that blessed but I can't pair you with me because I'd probably use you as a shield in an attack and Katherine hates your guts. Silas is a colored man and I've heard you mumbling about them so you wouldn't want to be paired with him. Jedidiah's your only choice unless you want to go it alone."
Evangeline just shook her head as her aunt took a step back and lowered her gaze. Colt could certainly be an ass when he chose to be and yet that seemed to be what worked on her aunt.
"What about me?" Susette asked as she stood beside Ox and Katherine.
Colt crouched down and poked her nose. "You can come with me."
"We can...." Katherine began but Colt shook his head and stood up straight.
"The girl comes with me." He stated, making it clear there wouldn't be any arguments. Evangeline understood. Colt would feel guilty if anything happened to anyone but he'd never forgive himself if something happened to Susette. Better he kept her close to him so he could watch her better.
"Alright then." Colt addressed the group. "I'll assign each group an area. Main focus is food, medicine and ammunition. We've already got a few water kegs so we should be good on that count. We're not trying to eliminate the rabid so avoid them where you can. When you can't try not to use gunfire unless you have no other choice. Everybody ready?"
Nods greeted Colt's words. Everyone was as ready as they would ever be.
***
Jedidiah could finally not stand the silence any longer as he and Rachel walked through the abandoned old stage depot, searching for anything that might be useful. They had been assigned the north side of town which didn't include much. Jedidiah knew Colt had probably done that on purpose, not trusting Rachel with any bigger responsibility.
Simply wanting an end to this unbearable silence, Jedidiah glanced at Rachel. "You've been quiet for the last couple of days."
"No one wants me to speak." Rachel replied simply without looking at him as they made their way up a rickety staircase. "And I don't blame them."
"You brought the animosity upon yourself." Jedidiah reminded her, not liking the sympathy he could already feel growing in his chest for her.
She nodded. "I know that better than you think. I've always been too harsh. It led to my husband spending all his time at the saloon and my servants leaving more quickly than I could replace them."
"Haven't you ever heard you can catch more flies with honey?" Jedidiah questioned.
Rachel gave a rueful laugh. "I never could seem to get the hang of that."
Jedidiah was about to say something else when a long moan came from down the hall they'd just stepped into. A rabid was at the end of the hall and had yet to notice them. It was standing in the sunlight streaming through the window and weaving back and forth.
Jedidiah frowned as he tried to figure out what the creature was doing. It almost seemed to be asleep standing up.
"We should just go." Rachel whispered. "I don't think there's anything in this building we need."
Jedidiah nodded his agreement but as he took a step back his foot landed on a piece of broken glass which of course shattered under his weight.
The cracking sound had the rabid's head whipping around. It let out an animalistic screaming cry and rushed toward them.
Jedidiah barely had time to swing the axe in his hand and send the rabid flying, with a nearly severed head over the landing and down onto the floor below. He was about to boast about his kill when more groans, and hungry wails filled the air.
"Oh my God!" Rachel cried.
Jedidiah looked up to see rabid pouring into the tiny hall from around a far corner at the end. "Run!" he yelled. He went down the stairs first, knowing Rachel was right behind him.
When he was almost at the bottom, he heard her scream. He glanced over his shoulder to find that he'd been wrong. She wasn't right behind him. She was still at the top of the stairs and had somehow fallen over the railing.
She was gripping the rickety wood as her legs dangled a good fifteen feet above the ground and the rabid descended on her.
Jedidiah thought about leaving. Perhaps this was the way Rachel was supposed to die—he couldn't do it. He could not just leave a person to their death. With an angry yell, Jedidiah went back up the steps, his old arms swinging that axe with everything he had as he hacked at the rabid.
"You'll have either drop down or pull yourself up while I hold them off!" he yelled at Rachel.
A rabid closed its teeth around the handle of Jedidiah's axe and he grabbed his knife and stuck it deep into the creatures temple, before swinging his hand in an arc and sliding his knife into another rabid's eye.
All that helped him hold his own was the narrowness of this hall. The rabid were jamming it up in their hungry rush to get to their meal.
"Just go without me!" Rachel sobbed and Jedidiah shook his head before taking off a rabid arm with the axe. The beast paused to glance at the blood oozing from the stump protruding from his shoulder and then screamed and lunged once again.
"Drop down!" Jedidiah screamed again. He wouldn't be able to hold them back much longer. He was too old and his body was already growing tired. He knew he could use his gun but there was only six shots in it and there were at least fifty rabid clogging this hall. The gun wouldn't help much and the sound of the shots would draw more.
"Come on, Jedidiah!" Rachel's voice sounded further away and Jedidiah realized that she had done as he'd told her and dropped down from the railing.
Jedidiah began to back away toward the stairs, swinging his axe as he did so. Rachel was suddenly jumping in front of him, swinging the machete that she'd chosen from the weapons chest before leaving the brothel.
"Go, I'll cover your back!" she urged him. Jedidiah felt the love he'd buried for this woman coming back to life as she so bravely arced that machete through a rabids head, slicing it clean in half. A section of the rabid's brain fell out of the top half of its skull and hit the floor with a thud but Rachel didn't seem fazed as she swung that hatchet again and ran it across the face of another rabid and it slumped to the floor minus its nose and jaw.
They made it outside and Jedidiah took her hand, racing to the ladder he could see on a saloon across the street. He let Rachel up the ladder first and he followed second. He nearly fell when a rabid grabbed his ankle, but he brought his other foot down on its face, shattering its nose. The grip on his ankle loosened just enough for Jedidiah to pull free.
They fell into a bloody, panting heap on the edge of the saloon roof.
"I'm getting too old for this." Jedidiah gasped, though he smiled at Rachel as she said it.
"Me too." She agreed as she tossed her machete to the side.
Jedidiah reached over and smoothed a bit of blood from her cheek. "Nothing left to do but wait for them to leave."
"We could always go down into the saloon and look around." Rachel offered, though her eyes made it clear that wasn't what she wanted.
Jedidiah smiled. "Or we could just wait here." He leaned closer and brushed a soft kiss against her parted lips.
Her eyes slid closed as she leaned in closer. "Sounds good to me."
***
"I'll go look for them..." Colt's words were cut off when the subjects of the current conversation came limping through the cracked warehouse doors.
Ox quickly secured the doors behind Jedidiah and Rachel as Colt took in their disheveled, bloody and yet somehow happy appearances.
"What the hell happened to the two of you?" he demanded.
"Rabid." Rachel replied, tossing her big sack full of loot to the floor.
"A lot of rabid..." Jedidiah added. "We took cover on a rooftop but it took a while for them to wander enough that we could get down and finish our search."
"Are you both okay?" Evangeline asked with worry. Colt raised a brow when he saw Jedidiah's hand wrap firmly around Rachel's.
"Just fine." He assured her.
Rachel cleared her throat and looked around at the rest of the group which was all gathered together in the warehouse. "I want to apologize to all of you. I know that I don't deserve your forgiveness and I understand if you still hate me but I truly am sorry for the things I've said and done the last few weeks. I have no good excuse I can give, though I wish I did."
"I'll tell you what, Rachel," Colt said stepping forward. "Apologies don't mean much, actions mean more. You gonna back up what you're saying and actually treat folks a bit nicer?"
"Yes, Colt. I am." Rachel promised and he believed her.
"Then it's all good." Colt glanced around at all the sacks piled on the floor. "Well let's get this stuff gone through."
"Did y'all have any trouble out of rabid?" Jedidiah asked, taking in the sight of everyone. No one was quite as bloody and fatigued looking as he and Rachel.
"Nope. There were a few here and there but nothing bad." Ox spoke up.
"We must have come on a nest of them or something...." Rachel shivered. "It was horrible."
"I would say so." Charlotte whispered. "They always are."
"Enough chit chatting." Colt snapped his fingers. "We gotta get it all gone through and packed up because we're leaving at first light."
He would love nothing more than to stay in their safe little cocoon at the brothel but knew that they couldn't. Susette's vision had pointed them somewhere else and he was going to listen to the girl. That meant they still had months of traveling to reach their destination. It was going to be a long haul but Colt was more confident than ever that they would make it.
For the first time since all this had begun he was thinking that everything might just turn out alright. He just hoped he wasn't fooling himself.