Read Online H10N1 by M. R. Cornelius, Marsha Cornelius - Free Book Online Page A

for this woman and all she could do was boss him around? His heart was pumping adrenaline so fast he felt woozy.
    “This is a danger zone,” he hissed back. “Where’s your goddamn gun?”
    The Doc shot him the bug-eye before she whipped her Beretta out of the back of her pants—and pointed it at him again! Then she cocked her head to the side in one of those female tilts like she was just waiting for an answer.
    Rick looked past her to the pregnant girl. Her dirty face had streaks from tears that had rolled down her cheeks; long, stringy hair seemed to be weighing down her frail body. And she definitely was scared to death. He caught snatches of a mumbled prayer. “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done…”
    Just beyond her, someone lay in the weeds. Rick made a move in that direction, but Sanchez blocked him. She laid a hand on his chest again, but she didn’t push him this time.
    “It’s her husband,” she said softly. “He’s been beaten.”
    She inched her palm up until Rick locked eyes with her.
    Her soothing, doctor-talk kicked in. “Why don’t you go back to the van and get your mask. And maybe grab a couple MREs?”
    He peered over her shoulder again. “Are they sick?”
    She shook her head. “I don’t think so. Their lungs are clear. I’m still assessing.”
    Rick’s legs wobbled as he shuffled back to the van. The adrenaline stopped rushing, the hackles on the back of his neck flattened. He tried not to think about how close he’d come to blasting that young girl right in the gut.
    By the time Rick got back with the rations, the Doc was babbling with the strangers like they were one big, happy family. She introduced the couple as Lily and Bobby Ray. The boy didn’t look much older than the girl, maybe sixteen, seventeen. He wore an orange Allis Chalmers hat, with long sideburns halfway down his cheeks. One eye was swollen shut, and his mouth was caked with dried blood.
    The Doc had decided they weren’t contagious, so now she was checking out the boy’s knee. She’d rolled up the pant leg of his overalls, and was poking at skin so swollen you couldn’t even see the kneecap.
    “We come acrosst a crippled man, hobblin’ along the highway on crutches,” Bobby Ray was telling Sanchez. “We couldn’t very well pass him by.”
    “Is that what he hit you with?” Rick asked. “His crutch?”
    Bobby Ray’s eyes darted away. Guess so. Rick fought the urge to call him an idiot.
    The Doc poked the kid’s knee again and he sucked in a painful gulp of air. Then he apologized for jerking!
    He sounded like some coal miner from the hills. And his wife—probably his sister—nodded in agreement, her limp, brown hair swaying around her pregnant belly.
    Lily Belle glossed over their stupidity by telling how they’d come from some podunk town in West Virginia called Gravel Springs. Some infected white trash from a neighboring town had come to Gravel Springs looking for a doctor. There was a Hatfields and McCoys shootout, so Bobby Ray and the missus lit out in his pickup.
    The “crippled man” ended up taking all their supplies and the truck. When Bobby Ray pleaded with the man to leave enough food for pregnant Lily, the guy kneecapped the kid for good measure.
    Rick thought about the Doc’s rant on barbarians. Why couldn’t the guy just take the truck and go? Why did he have to whip this wimpy kid’s ass?
    Rick made a slow turn, scanning the area with his M-16. “When did this happen?”
    “Two days ago,” Lily said. “We tried walking, but Bobby Ray was in so much pain.”
    “So you just camped out here — until what?”
    The Doc glared at him over her shoulder. “How’s the food coming?”
    Yeah, yeah. He’d heard enough anyway. Using the hood of her car, Rick spread out the contents of the MREs. After he glugged some bottled water into the heating pouches, he tucked the vacuum packs of meatloaf underneath and let them warm.
    Bobby Ray raised up on his elbows, and broke into a