She had to be satisfied with peering out from behind the corner of the large countertop because the last time she poked her head up over it, someone nearly took it off with a bullet that was still lodged somewhere in the wall behind her. She looked past the broken curtain glass wall that separated the diner and the empty street beyond. There were no signs of a shooter out there, not that they would have made it that easy for her to spot them, because they were definitely out there somewhere.
The diner was a placed called “Tobey”-something; the rest of the name was buried with the debris that covered large sections of the streets outside. And this was one of the few parts of Gallant that was still (mostly) intact. The rest, particularly around the middle section, was almost complete rubble. She hadn’t realized the full extent of damage Mercer’s warplane had inflicted on the abandoned town until she, Danny, and Nate stepped out of what was left of the bank and into the morning sunlight.
The carnage was everywhere they looked. Shards in big chunks and small pebble sizes had carpeted everything, and walking over them was like trying to tiptoe through one of those mailing foam bubble wraps where every step produced a sharp crunching noise. Despite all that, Tobey-whatever was strangely in one piece — or its interior, anyway, which was why she had stopped to search it for supplies, and maybe a forgotten bottle of water or two.
“Now you’re just being rude, Gaby.” Mason again, his annoying voice still coming through the radio sitting on the floor behind her. He was either having the best time of his life or he wanted her to think so. “If you’re waiting for your boy toys to come to the rescue, you’re gonna have a long wait ahead of you, sweetheart. They got problems of their own right now.”
As if on cue, a series of pop-pop-pop cracked across the Gallant morning skyline. They originated from her left, farther up the street…which was the direction where she had last seen Danny and Nate.
“Speaking of the devils,” Mason said.
She pulled her head back and scooted away from the counter until she was leaning against the back wall with the kitchen window above her. She was still facing the street, even though she couldn’t see very much of it. She laid her rifle across her knees and opened the pouch around her waist and pulled out the field first-aid kit.
There was a hole in her left shoulder, the bullet that had caused it wedged somewhere just under the clavicle. The shot had come from across the street and sailed undeterred through the already-broken front windows. Sooner or later, she was going to have to dig the bullet out. Or have someone do it for her, more likely. Either way, it was going to hurt even more than it was hurting now, and it was hurting now plenty.
She gritted her teeth and fought back a scream the entire time she treated the wound, the silence around her only broken by the pop-pop-pop of automatic rifle fire continuing to roll back and forth from up the street. Danny and Nate were out there, either together or separately, and making their way toward her. She could tell from the way the gunshots continued to get closer with each new volley. More importantly, she knew they wouldn’t abandon her, just as she would never abandon either one of them.
Gaby swallowed the pain and didn’t stop working until she was done. She breathed in a deep breath and blinked away the tears, then tossed the remains of the kit and picked her rifle back up and crawled to the other side of the counter, toward the blasted front doors. To get to the other end, she had to maneuver around the fresh trail of her own blood. There was surprisingly very little, which she guessed was a good thing.
“Gaby, you still there?” Mason was saying through the radio behind her. For all she knew, he could have been talking this entire time, but she just hadn’t noticed because she was so focused on treating the wound. “I’m starting to think you don’t like me. After all we’ve been through. Remember Louisiana? Those were good times, huh?” Then, almost as an afterthought, “Remember Josh?”
She ignored him (The past is the past. Concentrate on the now!) and kept going until she reached her destination and looked out from behind the counter. She scanned the street and the buildings on the other side.
A thrift shop and a donut place were flanked by a couple of storefronts whose signs had come down last night, their windows blown out and contents scattered. Mason and whoever else was out there with him had to be in one of those places, she was sure of it. How else could they have seen her going into the diner earlier, and then later, taken that second shot at her?
“That kid,” Mason was saying, undeterred by her silence, “I swear he had it bad for you. Even when he had you locked up in that town, he was convinced you’d see the light. You know teenagers in love, runaway hormones and all that good stuff.” Mason paused for a moment before continuing. “I guess he was wrong.”
She wasn’t sure if he was trying to goad her into answering or if he really was just reminiscing. And he had to know that the longer he toyed with her, the more time he was giving Danny and Nate to reach her. Or was that the point, she wondered, even as the pop-pop-pop continued unabated outside, getting closer…
Is that it? Is he using me as bait to lure Danny and Nate here?
That, more than anything, pissed her off. Gaby had stopped thinking of herself as a damsel-in-distress a long time ago, and to be used as one now…
She leaned against the counter and rested for a moment. The crawling from one side to the other had tired her out more than she wanted to admit. Her shoulder continued to throb underneath the bandage, as if the entire arm was going to fall off at any moment.
Maybe that would have been best; maybe the pain wouldn’t be so unbearable if the arm just plopped right off…
No!
She opened her eyes.
When had she closed them?
She blinked against the sweat and wiped dirt from her face, then painfully picked herself up from the floor and searched frantically for — there, her rifle. She grabbed it with her good hand.
How long had she been out? Worse, she had laid her head down on the floor just beyond the edge of the counter’s protection, and it was a miracle Mason or whoever was out there with him hadn’t spotted her and ended everything right then.
Stupid. Don’t ever do something stupid like that again!
She pulled farther back from the edge and sat up, using the wall as support, and tried to calm down her breathing. Her left shoulder pulsed with every breath she took, and the pain was still as awful as anything she had experienced. What she wouldn’t do for some painkillers, or maybe just a little bit of morphine. They still had some from when they treated Nate—
Wait, something’s wrong.
She didn’t know what it was — what grabbed her and refused to let go — for the first couple of seconds, but then it came to her.
It was quiet around her.
The shooting had stopped!
Glancing down at her watch did her no good because she had no frame of reference. They had climbed out of the rubble around the bank as soon as the sun washed over the town, and it had taken her maybe an hour to walk the length of the street, maneuvering around the destruction, all the while looking for danger. No one had wanted to separate, but they had no choice. They weren’t going to get anywhere on foot with their cargo.
They needed a vehicle. A working vehicle. And that meant spreading out to cover as much ground as possible. It was a calculated risk, especially with Nate still hobbling around moving almost entirely on pain meds.