Read Online Tempted by the Night by Colleen Gleason - Free Book Online

going outside the city walls when the zombies are out.
    Oh God. What was wrong with her?
    But she couldn’t let him go alone. She couldn’t let him get caught—by either Ian Marck or the zombies. He was still weak, and injured, and…well, she didn’t want anything to happen to him.
    â€œThis way,” she whispered, tugging his hand. A quick glance behind confirmed no one was following them as she led him between the buildings that made up the living spaces for the settlement of River Vale.
    At one time, before the Change, the buildings had been a cluster of homes and small shops in a little downtown square. Grandma Nell used to describe it as Main Street, U.S.A.—though Marisa couldn’t quite picture what that meant. Now, whatever buildings had survived the earthquakes and storms had been maintained and turned into homes for the hundred-fifty people who lived here. Those usable structures had been enclosed by a protective wall decades ago. Beyond the barrier were other places that were vacant, either structurally unsound or simply uninhabitable.
    Caved-in roofs, ivy- and moss-covered walls, broken and mildewed windows, cracked pavement and bricks, curling siding—those buildings were part of the landscape now, which included a jungle of trees and grasses, wild tomatoes, berries, and other vegetables, along with vestiges of twenty-first century America. Old mailboxes, rusted-out vehicles, street lamps, buckled-up sidewalks, sagging billboards, obliterated signs and grass-veined roads showed off fifty years of decay and the muscle of Mother Nature.
    The barrier encircling River Vale was more than ten feet high and five to ten feet deep in places, because it had been partially constructed of whatever massive objects the survivors could gather and wanted to remove from the midst of the settlement: billboards, train cars, vehicles. There were other materials too, like bricks, metal roofing, and even pieces of wrought-iron fence. A team maintained the wall, ensuring there were no weak points, no openings through which the crooning, crying zombies could struggle.
    Not that they were smart enough to do so, the orange-eyed creatures who stumbled and staggered and had the motor skills of an eighteen-month-old, but no one wanted to take the chance.
    â€œHere,” Marisa said as they came to an old piece of gate. It looked as if it were merely propped and fastened against the train car behind it, but it wasn’t.
    â€œI didn’t know this existed,” Luke said in a hushed voice as Marisa unlatched the gate. “How long has it been here?”
    â€œI don’t know. Dad showed it to me before he died.”
    The gate gave a soft sigh and a faint whine as she pulled it open. Behind it she pushed on the boxcar wall, and then yawned an opening—the old door—in the train car. “In there. There’s a tunnel—like a passageway. It goes through the right end of the car there, and then under a piece of metal and through a truck. We come out next to the big oak.”
    â€œWe? I think not.” He made as if to push past her, but Marisa grabbed his arm.
    â€œI’m coming with you. Someone needs to keep a lookout. And you’ve been hurt. Where is your bag hidden?”
    Before he could respond, she heard it. The soft sound of a footstep, crunching on stone. A murmured comment wafting through the night. A shadow coming around the corner.
    They both froze, then he shoved her through the open door just as she pulled him by the arm. Marisa had the presence of mind to drag the wrought-iron gate closed behind them, and Luke reached out to help it settle into place without a telltale clank.
    Silently, they slipped into the pitch-black interior of the train car, Luke’s strong hand guiding her up and inside. There were no words between them—only her hand tugging his as she tried to feel her way through to the trap door on the other side without tripping on