Jessica leaned back in her chair. “They’re cutting off the island?”
Mike nodded. “Outbound only unless they can provide proof of residency such as a driver’s license or a deed.”
“Wow, that’s big,” said Jessica.
“The Conch Republic rises from the ashes,” added Hank with a smile.
Mike explained, “Well, we’ve caught bits and pieces on the news of things Hank’s already learned from the Ag secretary and Peter. Hell, we can see and feel it for ourselves. It’s getting colder. A little bit at a time, but noticeable.”
Jessica nodded in agreement. “The haze started before the bombs dropped here. It’s a lot worse than Thursday.”
“People in the southeast who weren’t impacted by the EMP or the blackouts began to drive south as the news media frightened everyone with this nuclear winter thing,” said Mike. “The consensus seems to be that the best place to be in America is the southernmost point—Key West.”
“Just where the hell do they expect to stay?” asked Hank.
“Wherever, apparently,” Mike replied. “If they run out of gas, they take up residency off the side of the road and use their car as a temporary shelter. They’re offering outrageous sums of money to hotel owners to let them stay there. All cash transactions. If they don’t have money, they’re breaking into any structure they can find. Hell, the owner of the Marathon boatyard ran off several families who pried open yachts and settled in for the night.”
Hank asked a logical question. “Okay, so we’ve all got our passports from the Conch Republic and have sworn allegiance and all of that. Big deal. But can Monroe County legally cut itself off from the rest of the state? The whole country for that matter.”
“I guess we’ll find out,” replied Mike. “The sheriff radioed me this morning and told us to report to the Key Largo Fire Department at Reef Drive. We’re gonna close off the access and send people back up north.”
“What if they refuse?” asked Jessica. “We let nonviolents out of jail yesterday.”
Mike shrugged. “Again, I don’t know, but I will say this. It’s absolutely necessary. The other tourists who remained in the Keys are causing a helluva problem. They’re almost lawless. They stay drunk. They tear shit up. They know there aren’t enough cops to stop them. It’s just a matter of time before the locals start taking the law into their own hands.”
“Where are the hotspots?” asked Hank.
“Key West and Key Largo,” replied Jessica.
Mike added, “I’m speculating now, but if it were me, I’d close off the Keys and stop the bleeding, so to speak. Then we’d systematically throw out everyone who doesn’t belong here.”
Hank scowled. “That’s kinda harsh, isn’t it?”
“Not really,” Mike shot back. “It’s not that different from what you had to do here.”
“I was giving those people a head start based upon a hunch,” argued Hank. “If they got stuck here, we wouldn’t be able to feed them.”
“Same thing out there,” countered Mike. “The grocery stores are closed, not because of the brownouts, but because they’re empty. When I say empty, I’m talking about everything. Publix maintained its normal pricing, and they were emptied first. The C-Stores and mom-and-pops jacked their prices up, and they still sold virtually everything in sight. Hell, twenty-pound bags of ice were goin’ for a hundred bucks.”
Hank didn’t respond. He was pensive as he thought about the fate of those he’d sent home. He hoped he did the right thing.
“We need to get going,” said Jessica, taking advantage of the pause in the conversation. It wasn’t heated between the two brothers, but it certainly could’ve headed that way if their difference of opinion became an argument.
Hank cleared the table as the two sheriff’s department employees headed out for the day. Jimmy and Sonny were tending to the hydroponics and greenhouses. Hank intended to cover any of the machinery used on Driftwood Key with a tarp or at least plastic sheeting to shield it from the smoky air.
When he entered the kitchen, Phoebe was in the middle of a project.
“You look like a chemist,” he said with a chuckle. “What are you up to?”
“While I have power, I’m working up several batches of essential oils that we might need.”
“Does it have to do with one of your conch concoctions?” asked Hank jokingly. Phoebe had been infusing conch, supposedly a natural aphrodisiac, into Hank’s morning power shakes. Especially when there were lady guests staying at the inn.
“No, but I think you’ve forgotten that your ancestors were big believers in its natural benefits, like iron, calcium, and vitamins E and B12.”
“Yeah, yeah. So what are you working on?”
“Mr. Hank, sometimes you have to do things that you never imagined you’d need to do, much less use,” she replied. She placed her hand on a book with recipes for using essential oils and spun it around for Hank to see. “I’m making this recipe for radiation exposure damage. Did you know many cancer patients who are required to have radiation therapy use antioxidants and essential oils to minimize the damage to their skin and organs?”
Hank flinched at the mention of the C-word, cancer. His wife, Megan, had died of breast cancer eight years prior. He didn’t respond, and Phoebe noticed his reaction, so she continued.
“She didn’t want you to know about how much pain she was in, Mr. Hank. I helped her through it the best I could using this recipe.” She paused to pick up a bronze glass medicine dropper bottle and handed it to Hank. It was labeled QuadShield.
“What is QuadShield?” he asked.
“It’s a brand of essential oils that I can recreate on my own with this recipe. It has a blend of Melrose and citrus oils like lemon and orange. When you take it with vitamin C, which we bought before, you know, the bombs, plus a medicine like Megan’s thyroid capsules, your body can fight off the effects of the radiation.”
“I’m sure none of her medicine is still around,” said Hank.
“True, but there are natural alternatives like bananas, which are rich in potassium, and this.” She reached for a four-pound box of Morton iodized table salt. She refilled the salt shakers in the bar and dining room with it.
“Will that work?” Hank asked. “I mean, to block radiation or whatever.”
“I hope we’ll never have to find out, but for now, it’s all we’ve got.”
Hank nodded his approval. He began to wander around the kitchen, randomly picking up dropper bottles and reading the labels. Lavender, lemon, peppermint, rosemary, and chamomile were some of the ingredients he saw used the most often. Each label also had the oil’s proposed use, including antibacterial, pain, headache, and stress.
“I’ll take a bottle of this,” he said before adding, “Make it a double.”
It was lavender, the most effective essential oil for stress.
PART IV
Day eleven, Monday, October 28
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Monday, October 28
Fairfax, Virginia
Jackie was sobbing as Peter grasped her by the hand and led her through the CVS parking lot. He constantly glanced over his shoulder to watch for the last gunman to emerge in some poorly conceived effort to gain revenge for the deaths of his buddies. Peter had murdered them. That was a fact. Not that his actions could ever be justified, he knew that if he didn’t strike first, they would’ve killed him.
Once they crossed the boulevard and entered the woods, Jackie dropped to her knees from mental and physical exhaustion. Peter knelt down next to her. The sun was rising although it was mostly obscured by the smoky skies. The fires surrounding Washington had apparently intensified, and the cloud floating above them was mostly black from soot.