He’d been watching two fat guys working their way up his ridge for the last two hours. They looked like they were headed straight into the Homestead “area of control.”
Jeff had made it crystal clear: no person was to cross the line by more than ten meters. After that, the risk for the Homestead was too great. Any intruders who reached the ridge would disappear almost immediately into the forest. The forest continued, uninterrupted, for two miles right down to the Homestead lawn. In a nutshell, anyone entering the forest could be shooting at women and kids within twenty minutes, and there would be nothing they could do to stop them once they got under cover of forest. Also, anyone cresting the ridge could see directly into the Homestead. They could recon the Homestead positions, track their shift changes, observe their defensive strength, and ultimately mount a well-informed attack.
The rules were clear, and Marines didn’t screw with the rules. When a person crossed the wire and ignored the signs, they would get one warning shot. After that, it was lights out.
The secondary position to the left of Winslow luckily could see these knuckleheads, so they would be able to place a solid warning shot. The shooter over there, Crandall, was a great aim for a civilian, and Winslow trusted he would make the six-hundred-fifty-yard shot, no problem.
Winslow’s spotter, Eric, was still learning, and he sat back in their dug-in spider hole.
“Eric, come forward and spot for me. These guys are crossing the line,” Winslow ordered. Shooting at two guys meant the second guy would be moving fast after the shot. If Winslow was forced to shoot, his rifle would buck and there would be a split second when he would lose sight of the targets. If the second guy bolted, Winslow would need to know where he had gone.
Eric slid up to the spotting scope on the ledge.
“The guys are two ridges over, right at the boundary line.”
Eric panned the spotting scope toward the setting sun.
“Boooom…Whump!” Crandall made his warning shot and busted a boulder right below the guys.
That should make them think twice.
But the two guys just stood there like idiots. Eric panned the spotting scope a bit more.
Winslow saw one of the men look straight at them, as if startled. The man unslung his rifle.
“NO, NO, NO,” Winslow shouted in his mind.
Jimmy levered the 30-06 up to his shoulder to get a better look at the glint through his scope. Through the magnified glass, he saw a puff of dust from the same spot as the glint.
Then Jimmy had his last thought, actually more of a feeling.
“…mistake…”
Something slammed into his chest, like when he had been kicked by a goat as a child. He dropped to his knees and rolled over backward, tumbling head over heels.
Sky, ground, sky, ground, sky, ground and then a tangle of trees.
Jimmy gazed at the beautifully random tangle of tree branches and sky. The pain in his legs and his bumps and bruises drifted away on a gentle wind.
He exhaled, but the exhale went deep, so impossibly deep that he couldn’t bring the breath back.
The last thing he saw in this world was Olivia. The light of his life, in her Disney Princess pajamas on Christmas morning. Then darkness.
Winslow wanted to scream. He wanted to yell at the dead man and call him a STUPID MOTHER FUCKER. But the Marine in him held back.
Winslow tracked the second man in his rifle optic, his emotions barely held in check.
The other man—a huge man—ran like a rabbit in the easiest direction possible―straight downhill. When the guy hit the barbed wire, he ran through it, flipped ass over teakettle, jumped up, lost his rifle and charged blindly down the hill.
Winslow gave thanks that he wouldn’t have to kill this man, too. He was running away from the boundary now, no longer a threat.
When the big man bounded clear of the threat zone, Winslow put his rifle on safety, grabbed his jacket, buried his face into the wadded fabric and screamed at the top of his lungs.
“MOTHERFUCKER, MOTHERFUCKER, MOTHERFUCKER, MOTHERFUCKER!”
Winslow looked up at his spotter, who was staring back in disbelief.
“We need to displace. Now,” Winslow barked. He grabbed his kit and his rifle and slid out the back of the sniper hide. His spotter followed.
10
“ANOTHER CALL FROM MY FAVORITE hottie on comms with the 5th Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea. Seems our admiralty has decided nobody gives a shit anymore about the Middle East and the entire task force is sailing home. Just in time to sweep up the ashes of America. Brilliant call, y’all…
“Also, I heard from a Drinking Bro holed up in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Tennessee… He just fought off a bunch of bandidos with his wife and father-in-law. Stay frosty, lads…”
Ross Homestead
Oakwood, Utah
Jeff sipped his third coffee of the morning, mostly in an effort to drive back his fatigue. Coffee had always been the booby prize for a sleepless night. Get crap sleep—enjoy a half-gallon of coffee the next morning. Except, as always in life, the easy solution was a junk solution. Coffee might keep his eyes open, but it sure as hell didn’t improve his attitude.
This morning, Jeff felt like strangling someone.
He had returned late last night from the refinery and it had taken forever to get to sleep.
When his family originally arrived at the Homestead, Jeff had taken a couple of racks in the barracks as their temporary home. There wasn’t time for him to fool around with tents and the area called the bunkhouse had been the simplest option.
Jeff didn’t mind all the bodies and the snoring in the bunkhouse. He’d had plenty of that in the military. Jeff did, however, mind that his kids couldn’t sleep with seventy people around making inexplicable noises. The kids fussed with him and Tara constantly throughout the night. He would lose it pretty soon if he didn’t get some real sleep.
“Good morning.” Jason walked around the colonnade in front of the office, greeting Jeff. Jason had his own coffee.
“Morning. Hey, before the day kicks off, could I ask a favor?” Jeff wanted to get this sleep thing fixed before the day got hairy.
“Sure.”
“Can Tara and I get a room in the big house? I’m going to murder someone if I don’t get some sleep, and the kids aren’t sleeping for a damn in the bunkhouse.”
“Yeah,” Jason replied. “I’ll ask Jenna to figure it out. No problem. Everyone appreciates you guys, despite the complaints from the peaceniks. Without you… dude, I wouldn’t be sleeping at all.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
“How did it go with the hospital and refinery yesterday?”
“We got it all buttoned up. We’re holding the hospital and two pharmacies. We don’t quite own the refinery, but we’ll get it soon. It’s safe for now.”
“Wow,” Jason glanced back at Jeff with raised eyebrows, “you did all that without going to war with the town?” Jason’s unspoken question was clear: did you have to kill anyone?
“No. We didn’t shoot anyone. Actually, I added a few members to your—our—shindig here. One cop, one doctor, a security guard and a couple of pharmacists, and their families.”
“Okay.” Jason looked to the sunrise, making mental calculations. “That should work. Can someone on your team get me more info about the families? I already met the cop yesterday. Jacobs, right? Seems like a good addition. I need to keep my mind around our numbers.” Again, the subtext: you can add people, but there’s a limit to how many we can feed.