Read Online Snatchers 2: The Dead Don't Sleep by Shaun Whittington - Free Book Online

before he turned out to be some kind of sexual deviant and then finally meeting up with Pickle in the woods, although she originally thought he was a Snatcher and nearly broke his nose.
    Pickle released a sharp breath out.
    "What's wrong?" Karen had to ask.
    Pickle sighed, "I was thinking about Laz."
    "Why?"
    "Well," Pickle cleared his throat, "the radio reckons it takes about an hour to change, yet, it took Laz hours before he slipped into a coma, or whatever it was, about six or seven hours to be exact. He was bit in the supermarket and was ill for most o' the day, before he slipped away and I had to end him before he changed."
    Karen added, "The truth is they have no idea. Half an hour, twelve hours—who cares? As soon as you're bit or scratched deep enough, you're screwed."
    "It was just something that was beginning to bother me. Makes you wonder if countries overseas end up nuking this country if it isn't a global thing."
    "Isn't that a bit extreme?" Karen began to laugh, but she was sure he was being serious.
    "Also, these things can't drown; there could be hundreds of the things floating in the English Channel or the North Sea. The last thing the French would want is for those things getting washed upon their beaches and then for them to find their feet and start walking again."
    "Now you're being ridiculous."
    "Just saying." Pickle continued, "The winter's gonna be a nightmare. Unless it works in our favour and the cold kills these things off."
    "I've thought about it. We're gonna be freezing our tits off. The snow'll be a problem, not just the temperature."
    Continued Pickle, "Not only that, with the snow we won't know when it's coming, how many inches we'll get, and how long it'll last."
    "Sounds like my ex-boyfriend," Karen cackled and Pickle joined in as they continued to lay in the darkness, with sleep being almost impossible to achieve.
    "Honestly, Bradley," his snickering was beginning to diminish. "Yer have a mind like a sewer."
    Karen could sense that there was something else that was bothering Pickle, and there was another reason why he was still awake. She spoke once more. "You really okay?"
    Pickle cleared his throat, and seemed to take an age to answer. "Not really."
    Karen thought for a second if she should ask the next question. The subject hadn't been tackled for days, so she went ahead. "You thinking about KP?"
    "Maybe," he snapped. "Yer thinking about Gary?"
    Karen smiled, and wasn't sure if Pickle's question was a retaliation for bringing the subject of KP up. She lied, "I wasn't. But I am now, now that you've mentioned him."
    "Sorry," he whispered.
    His apology seemed false, but Karen forgave him. She had only known the man for nearly a week, and already knew that the pair of them were like brother and sister with a love/hate relationship. She thought back to the run-in they had when they were back at Stile Cop. Pickle thought that Karen had made an uncomplimentary comment about the body of Laz stinking the place out, and Pickle took exception to it. They had a couple of other run-ins during the week, but nothing that would give Karen sleepless nights.
    Since the news officially broke out last Sunday morning, Karen had to take up a new role in order to survive, and it was a role she had grown into with ease. Pickle was already a tough cookie being from the background that he came from, but found Karen equally as tough as him.
    Karen had every respect for Pickle, despite his past antics, and said to herself that she would rather have someone like him by her side, than someone who was weak and would literally fill their shorts as soon as one of the Snatchers was spotted. In order for her to survive in this new, terrifying world, she needed a good man to watch her back, and Pickle was definitely a good man.
    As Karen lay awake on her side, with her back against Pickle's back, she reminisced about a conversation they had a few evenings ago. The two of them had spent yet another monotonous evening on