John smiled. “You watched too many movies. I knew him from Iraq. He and another soldier went missing and I promised I’d find them.”
“Oh.” Brandon seemed to be contemplating this. “And did you?”
“I did. Listen, we should probably eat something before we head out.” In the back of the truck, the goose sat in his cage, not making a sound. John threw a thumb over his shoulder. “You know, I forgot he was here.”
The boy laughed. “Who, George? Me too.”
John frowned. “I’m not sure naming him is such a great idea. Might not be long before George ends up on a spit over a fire, and it’s so much harder to eat something you’ve named, don’t you think? That was one of the reasons we got rid of the rabbits. Had a pen in the backyard and Emma named each and every one of those little buggers. Whenever we tried to grab the fattest one for dinner she’d raise a real ruckus. You’d think we were trying to cook her best friend.”
The smile on Brandon’s face betrayed a hint of pain at the mention of Emma’s name. John decided to change the subject.
After losing both cabins and just about all his preps, they’d been reduced to eating from the few cans they had left. There was plenty of game in these woods and Brandon’s aim was good enough to keep them freshly supplied with squirrels, but at the moment there really wasn’t time for all that.
The funny look on Brandon’s face made John ask what was wrong.
“I’ve gotta go to the bathroom,” the boy said.
John studied him from the corner of his eye. “You don’t need my permission, son. Go on and I’ll have the food heated up by the time you return.”
“The thing is, I don’t need to pee.”
One of John’s eyebrows rose. “I see.” Who would have thought that toilet paper would become such a prized commodity after a societal collapse? The average Joe might have told you gold or silver, maybe even batteries, but surely not toilet paper.
“All right,” John said, nudging the car door open. “Wait here with George. I’ll be right back.”
The search in the woods took him a little longer than expected, but John returned to the truck when he found what he was looking for. He handed a number of furry-looking leaves to Brandon who stared on with bewilderment.
“You want me to wipe with leaves?”
John shook his head. “These aren’t regular leaves. They’re mullein. One of the best toilet-paper substitutes you’ll find in the woods. You can thank me later.” John held up another plant that had a series of small white flowers. “I also grabbed some yarrow since I was out there.”
“What’s that do?”
“You apply it to bleeding cuts to promote clotting.”
Talk of bleeding created a noticeable change in Brandon’s face. “I hope we don’t need it.”
“Me too,” John said. “Go take care of your business so we can get a move on.”
Brandon took the leaves and waved them in the air. “This better not be poison ivy or something.”
John wasn’t much of a practical joker, although he had served with men who would relish any opportunity to pull a prank like that on a fellow soldier. He held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor. Now go.”
After a quick breakfast, John rolled the camo net back up and put it in the trunk. George looked up at him. He didn’t nearly have the fight from when they first met. John reached into his pocket and pushed some soft grasses he’d collected in a nearby field through the spaces in the cage. He knew geese preferred corn and grains, but for now this would have to do. George looked at the offering briefly before starting to eat.
John reached into his pocket to get some more and came out with Diane’s silver necklace with the sapphire heart.
“Whatchu looking at?” Brandon asked, returning from the woods.
John shoved it deep into his pocket. “Nothing.”
“You were right,” Brandon said, poking his head in to check on George. “It’s even better than the double-ply stuff from the grocery store.”
Back in the driver’s seat, John started the truck and put it into gear.
“What’s our plan?” Brandon asked. The crack in his voice made John wonder if he was still thinking about the blood clot remark.
“Plan’s simple,” John said. “First we find the ones who killed your dad, kidnapped our loved ones and burned down our cabins. Then we make them pay for what they’ve done.”
Chapter 9
They weren’t cruising along the back roads for more than a few minutes before they spotted a man with bloody clothes. He was staggering along the centerline, which meant he was either crazy, suicidal or somewhere in between. John slowed down, feeling for the familiar weight of the pistol in his leg holster. After coming to a stop, John rolled down the window and called out to him.
“Where you headed?”
The trick was to act as though nothing were out of the ordinary. The man spun and threw his hands in the air.
“I knew you’d be back to finish me off.”
“What’s he saying?” Brandon said.
“I’m not sure.” John asked him to clarify, after which the man burst into tears.
“He’s gone crazy,” Brandon observed, offering his clinical assessment.
John scanned the forest on either side of the road, then up ahead and behind them. There was no sign of anyone else. He opened the door and stepped out. His gut told him this wasn’t an ambush, since it hardly seemed reasonable that a man would wait for a vehicle to come along in a post-EMP world.
“Take the AR and cover me from here,” he told the boy, who did so by leaning slightly out the passenger window.
It was one thing being sure this wasn’t an ambush, but another thing altogether not taking the proper precautions in case he was wrong.
The man in the middle of the road was still sobbing. His clothes were ripped and it was clear someone had beaten him, possibly even left him for dead.
“You’re bleeding,” John said.
“My son,” the man said. “I’m looking for my son.”
“Where did you leave him?”
A string of drool ran down his chin. “I didn’t. He was taken from me.”
Chills ran down John’s spine. He checked his surroundings again, to calm the creeping feeling that they were being watched.
“Do you know who did this to you?”
The man nodded.
“Okay, come with us.”
He ushered the man into the back of the truck, checking him quickly for knives or weapons and finding none.
A second later they were off again, rolling down Carson Hill Road with a million questions coursing through John’s head. He still wasn’t sure what the source of the man’s wound was, or if the blood was even his. Sitting in the back, the man pulled his hand down over his face in an effort to clean away the tears and dribble.
“What’s your name?” John asked.
He drew in a deep breath. “Gary Bertolino. Thank you for stopping to help. Seems decent people are getting scarcer and scarcer these days.”
“I couldn’t just leave a bloodied man on the side of the road. Where are you from, Gary?” John wondered if perhaps the man had been in one of the waves of golden horders who’d fled the city.
“I have a house in Oneida and a cabin on Owens Ridge. Once the lights went out and the cars stopped working, my wife and son and I packed a few supplies together and made our way east.”
“You walked here from Oneida?”
Gary shook his head. He was a skinny man who floated in his clothes and moving his head only accentuated the impression. “We rode our bikes. It wasn’t further than twenty miles or so and I knew our cabin would be as safe a place as any to ride out the storm. Least, I thought it would be.” His face crumpled with fresh tears.