Chapter 24

I cut the rope and laid the man in the bed and covered his body. I walked out of the room and a wave of nausea instantly rolled over me. I put a hand on the wall to steady myself, the Russians laughter still echoing deep within my head.

     I walk down the stairs, suppressing the urge to vomit what little contents my stomach actually holds. I walk into the living room and Cassie is still playing with the Husky. When she hears me step into the room she turns around. "What's wrong? You look like you've seen a ghost," she says, brushing dog hair from her face.

     "I found out what was making the noise upstairs." I say, my vision spinning, even mentioning what I had found made me nauseous. "A man was hung." I left out the part about me being next, Cassie was already worried enough.

"Well?" She asked.

"Well, what?"

"What did you do with him?"

"I laid him in the bed and covered him up. Let's just sleep downstairs." I tell her, walking to the chair and sitting down. Every muscle in my body ached.

"What should we name him?" Cassie says, looking from me to the dog. She patted its head and it panted, tired from playing with Cassie.

"Who said we're taking it with us?" I asked, closing my eyes and leaning my head back.

"Please, Jack, we can't just leave it here." I open my eyes and look at her, she and the dog are both giving puppy eyes.

"Is it a boy or a girl?" I say, a sigh following the question.

She looks under and comes up, "a boy."

I look at the dog for while, it stares back at me, in my eyes. In that moment something happened, something that has never happened before. It was as if the dog and I had connected on a mental level. The warrior in my bent down on one knee, respecting the power of the animal.

I swear to god the dog smiled at me, but in that instance I knew what to name him. "Wolf." I said.

The dog sat, almost as if he knew that this was his new name, his eyes flickered in the dying light.

"I guess that's his name," Cassie said, standing and walking to the couch. Wolf walked up to me and laid his chin on my knee.

    I gave him a pet and he curled up at my feet.

     "He likes you too, by the looks of it." Cassie said, laying her head on the arm of the couch. "What's for food, in starving here?"

     "That is a good question," I say, standing and walking to the kitchen to investigate the cabinets. Wolf and Cassie follow closely behind.

After a quick search I turn up some potted meat and two cans of baked beans. "It's not going to be a five star meal, but it's definitely going to give us the energy we need."

"I hate Spam." Cassie says, a grimace plastered on her face.

"If you're hungry enough, you'll eat anything, trust me." I say, thinking back to when I was in Iraq eating cooked bugs while on a stake-out mission.

Cassie clears the table while I heat up the beans and meat. It's surprising that this place still has power.

     "Bon appetite, mademoiselle," I say, putting on my best French accent while serving her a plate of what looked like dog food. I even made Wolf a plate.

     We ate at the table like a small family. Well, Cassie and I did, Wolf sat between our chairs. We talked about what would happen after Charleston, where we would go, and how we would live.

     We came to an agreement that we were going to make a sort of sanctuary for any survivors, where that would be, though was still up in the air.

      It was silent a while after that, we finished our plates and I took them to the sink. While rinsing them off Cassie asked me something that took me off guard.

     "What was she like?"

     "Who?"

     "The girl you told us about before. Laurel, was it? No, it was..."

     "Lauren." We said together.

     I don't say anything for a while, not because I don't want to answer, but because I'm trying to think of how to describe her perfection.

     "She was perfect, Cass. She was everything you could ever dream of in a girl. In a wife. There was never a dull moment with her. She always had a smile on her face and knew what to say and the exact moment to say it. When I tell you there was no one better than her, I'm telling the God's honest truth." Tears well behind my eyes describing her, it brings back memories that hurt and make me smile.

     "She sounds like a great women. I wish I could have met her."

     "Yeah, I do too. You and her would of got along so well, I know it."

    After that Cassie walks into the living room and Wolf rubs up against my leg, whining softly. He senses my pain. "It's okay, boy," I say, bending down to pet his head.

     I walk to the living room and recline in the chair. The events of everything from the morning I woke up for the therapist meeting to now goes through my mind.

     "Good night, Jack, I love you." Cassie says, rolling over on the couch.

     "Love you too, good night." I say, thinking of Lauren's picture that I left in New York. Now I wish that I had brought it.

"I love you too, Lauren." I say under my breath and close my eyes. Sleep falls over me almost instantly.

***

Wolfs barking wakes me up. He's standing, looking at the front door and barking. Somethings wrong. I put a hand on his back, he's tense. Somethings scaring him. He looks into my eyes, trying to tell me.

I stand and unholster my .45, and walk over to Cassie. "Wake up," I whisper. She opens her eyes, at first they're groggy but then the severity of the situation hits her and the grogginess fades.

     I walk to the door, Cassie and Wolf following close behind. A knocking began to come from outside, slow and palpitated , like a dying heart beat. The house was silent, the only noise the knocking and our quiet footsteps.

I wrap my fingers around the cold door knob, take two deep breaths and swing it open. My heart fell through my stomach. They say seeing is believing, but what I see is hard to believe.

A zombie stood at the door, eyes closed and head down. His arm raised, still making the knocking motion. But that's not what made my heart drop. Behind the zombie was a sea of lowered heads. A sea of death. A sea of the undead. They stretched all the way to the woods and there was no telling how many were in the woods.

"I told you, Jack, you're next." The whisper of the Russian invades my mind. "Kill." He whispers.

     All of the sudden every head snaps upwards, every pair of eyes open, and every throat emits a moan. Wolf whines, not seeing a way out of this, Cassie whimpers and tugs at my shirt.

     A grimace plasters itself on my face, the warrior feeds on my fear. I raise the gun and fire a round through the zombies head that was knocking on the door.

     The sea begins to move forward, a tidal wave of death converging on the house. I slam the door and put my back against the door.

     "Get Wolf and get out the back window fast, before they surround us!" I scream to Cassie, she kicks into gear and runs to the other side of the house.

     The first of the wave reaches the porch. The wood creaks and struggles to support all of the weight that's standing upon it.

     "Jack, they're everywhere!" Cassie screams back to me, her voice breaking.

     Time grinds to halt as the first of the zombies begin to beat on the front door. The hinges squeak and whine. Somewhere, in the back of my head the Russian laughs maniacally.

Where the fuck did they all come from? I think to myself as the hands begin to reach in and tear at my shirt.