Read Online The McClane Apocalypse: Book One by Kate Morris - Free Book Online Page A

Reagan has taken to spending hours upon hours alone which frightens Sue. She’d much prefer her sister spend time with the rest of the family than be by herself. But with a house this size, it is easy to disappear.
    The McClane farm has been in the McClane family for three generations. It had started out as a farm, but had morphed over the years to fit the needs of the current McClane owners, whichever descendent they should be. It could never be sold to a non-McClane. Their great, great grandfather McClane had built a simple six bedroom Georgian style farmhouse, complete with the front pillars. He’d had a rather large family but was a strict man with a no-nonsense approach to the home. He added nothing extravagant, no fancy schmancy decorating for his wife. The home still boasts most of the original hardwood floors. His only son who had any interest had taken on the farm and being a lawyer with a practice in Nashville, he’d had the money to add on and make upgrades as he saw fit. He had also acquired another sixty acres to add to the existing two hundred. He’d only had one child and that was Susan’s Grandpa. He’d bought out a neighbor’s farm, which wasn’t much more than a shack on ninety acres. Over the years, Grandpa had again updated the home and added four more bedrooms in the renovated basement, each with a set of bunk beds and thick, warm carpeting to combat against cold Tennessee winters. They had planned on having a large family, but Grams had only ever been able to have one child, the girls’ father. The updated security system had proven recently useless because of the failure of satellite uplinking. But the cameras are still operable, making it possible to scan many areas of the farm from the comfort of Grandpa’s study.
    Reagan’s room is in the attic, something she’d always loved. Hannah and their grandparents stay on the first floor in the add-on at the back of the house that Grandpa had built with his own two hands right after the girls had moved in. He said it was because Grams and he didn’t want to go up and down stairs anymore, but Sue knew it was for Hannah. Hannah has her own suite back there and all the privacy she needs, but she’d always felt safest near them. Sue and her children take up most of the space, with the exception of two extra bedrooms, on the second floor. The kids share a room. They are only five and seven, after all, and the things they saw on the news at the beginning of the end hadn’t made a breakaway from each other a possibility anytime in their near future. There are two separate bathrooms which makes things more convenient, except for when Reagan came down to use one. The kids were nagging a lot recently to sleep in the basement in one of the bunk rooms, but Sue can’t be so far from them. Not exactly the brave example she should be setting for her children.
    But for all its size and grandeur, Grams had made the farm into a cozy home, and Sue never really thought of it as a mansion. She’d learned back in high school that her home was stately simply from the reactions of her friends and by the stunned looks on their faces when they saw it for the first time. There are family pictures lining many of the walls and stairwells and soft, plush area rugs lay upon the hardwood flooring. Most of the walls had been painted pale, monochromatic tones which make the rooms with tall ceilings more comfortable. The kitchen had been a labor of love redesigned by Hannah and Grams, who had co-conspired on the project. It is massive compared to the kitchen in Sue’s house. A house she will likely never see again.
    She’d taken most of their family pictures and video files on her portable computer pad when she’d left over three months ago. At the time, she hadn’t wanted to leave Kentucky to live with her grandparents. It had made her feel childish and not adequate to handle her own problems. But Derek had insisted that she stay with them until the baby was born because