Harden (Lee Harden Series (The Remaining Universe) Book 1) Read online

  Had this woman never been in straits so dire?

  Or had she simply forgotten already?

  And did she not know that those times were coming again?

  “I’m sorry,” Marie snapped. “But do you have any fucking clue what’s going on out there?”

  “Oh, now you’re gonna cuss at me?”

  “Yeah, I’m gonna fucking cuss at you. You been cussing at me and my people for the last five fucking minutes, so why don’t you just think about the people that are outside the Safe Zone right now, risking their lives to grow enough food that we don’t starve. Do you not realize that in two months, you might have nothing?”

  The woman wasn’t impressed. If anything, she was getting madder.

  She thrust a finger at Marie’s face. “We wouldn’t even be in this position if you and your bullshit secession hadn’t happened!”

  The crowd rumbled its assent at that, and the woman heard it, and then she turned to the people in line behind her, now addressing them with an orator’s bravado. “We could all be safe with President Briggs right now! I bet they have plenty to eat in Colorado! Because they have a real government to take care of them! They have a real president!”

  Marie had run out of words. She was so flabbergasted by what was happening right in front of her face, she could only stand there, on the ragged edge of giving this woman an uppercut and letting her eat a few of her teeth to see if that didn’t curb her appetite…

  The woman turned, amid the bolstering cries of her peers behind her. She slapped the folding table. “I wanna know what Angela’s family eats!”

  Several others called out that they wanted to know too.

  “I heard her family eats whatever she wants! I hear that she and her cronies get first pick, while the rest of us get whatever’s left over!”

  “That’s a bullshit rumor,” Marie growled.

  “Yeah?” The woman leered at her. “Maybe you’re one of those cronies. I wanna talk to Angela! Right fucking now!”

  “No—”

  “If she wants my family to eat this shit, I want her to come down here, look me in my face, and tell me that she’s eating the same thing!”

  A roar of approval this time. More than just a dozen people.

  “We’re all eating the same thing!” Marie belted out. “If you don’t want the box, then get the hell outta the way and let someone else take it that is happy to have it!”

  “I’m not fuckin’ moving!” the woman declared.

  Out of the corner of Marie’s eyes, she saw two of Mitch’s team start to move in.

  But then four more people came rushing forward out of the line and planted themselves next to the woman with the dirt-colored halo of hair. Then a few more. And a few more. Until there were nearly a dozen standing there, all saying that they weren’t moving until Angela came down and talked to them directly.

  They started to link arms.

  Marie turned to Mitch and gave him a sharp stand-down gesture.

  Mitch waved his guys off. They retreated a couple steps, but kept a close eye on the group of people now standing one table’s-width away from Marie.

  Marie threw up her hands and leaned over to Mitch. “Fuck it,” she said. “Get on the horn and tell the Support Center we got a problem and they want to talk to Angela.”

  ***

  Angela stood in front of the desk in her office. She leaned back on it. Felt the molded, wooden edge of it. Tapped her fingertips on the lacquered wood. They didn’t make clicking noises. Just dull thumps. Because Angela didn’t have fingernails to speak of.

  Even if she didn’t chew them off all the time, she would keep them short.

  She did not dress for her office.

  She wore jeans and a button-up shirt. Boots on her feet. Curly blonde hair pulled into a plain pony tail. Her advisors all agreed that she should look more presidential, seeing as how the plaque on her desk said President Angela Houston.

  But she refused.

  What was she going to do? Wear a pants suit? Cut her hair into a conservative bob? Put on panty hose and business-style pumps?

  Fuck that.

  The mantle of leadership was not just a yoke on her shoulders. It was a millstone around her neck. She didn’t want this office. But it had been given to her nonetheless. She craved the end of this year, because the end of this year would bring about the end of her first term as the elected leader of the fledgling United Eastern States.

  First and only term, if God had an ounce of mercy in him.

  She didn’t see how she could possibly be re-elected.

  The populace was not that stupid.

  It was not that she had intentionally sabotaged them. Her desperation to be free of this leadership position didn’t extend to her putting everyone else in jeopardy.

  No, she’d done her level best. She’d done more than her best. She’d gone long days without sleep. She’d dug post holes with the work parties, and erected fences and planted seeds and herded cattle. Then she’d turned around and parlayed peace between warring parties and convinced fractious loners to become allies. She’d given every bit of herself to try to make things work.

  But…

  It wasn’t enough.

  The man standing in front of her shifted his feet.

  Angela realized that she’d been silently marooned in her thoughts for nearly a minute. She looked up at the man. He was tall and rangy. A good looking guy, but in a humble sort of way. He looked like a farmhand. Which was fitting, seeing as how he was her Director of Agriculture.

  Jesus. Such lofty names.

  The pomp and circumstance was necessary to secure people’s faith in their new government. She understood that. But every once in a while it seemed absolutely ridiculous, like they were kids in a treehouse, playing at being adults.

  “Sorry, Jeff,” Angela said, standing erect again, as though she didn’t feel like there were a thousand pounds on her back. “I was just considering the options.”

  “Right.” Jeff nodded. He seemed almost relieved to see Angela stand fully upright again. As though he’d been concerned that she’d been crushed by the bad news. “Look…” his eyes flitted to the rug beneath their feet. “…I know that you haven’t had it easy lately.”

  Angela forced a smile and gestured to the office around her, which was a far cry from the cold dungeon of the Camp Ryder office where her journey had begun. The Camp Ryder office had been a concrete and tile cube. This office had a nice green rug and hardwood floors and paint on the walls. Camp Ryder had been industrial steel and one small portal, like a prison cell. This office had a wooden desk and upholstered chairs and windows to let in natural light.

  She was living in comparative luxury.

  “Don’t worry about me, Jeff,” Angela said. “I’m just the figurehead. You guys are the ones that this shit is hitting. Pardon my language.”

  “That’s very humble of you to say, ma’am. But we’re all in this together.” He smiled. Then let it fall. “I know you feel the weight of it. Just like I do.”

  They sat there, staring at each other.

  And, dammit, Angela was suddenly on the verge of tears, like the weight of the pressure was condensing them out of her. She wanted to collapse into one of the chairs that surrounded the rug. Or curl up in a fetal position. Or grab a hold of Jeff and hug him. Cry into his shoulder.

  So weak…

  Instead, she took a breath. Smiled as warmly as she was capable of, and nodded to him. “Thank you. We will see what we can do.”

  “That’s all we can ask.”

  And with that, Jeff turned and exited the office.

  Angela watched him go, feeling the corners of her mouth melt out of that smile and stiffen like cold, hardening wax, into a grimace. It was only as Jeff reached the door to the office and went through it that Angela realized that her assistant was standing there.

  Angela raised her eyebrows. “Yes, Claire?”

  Claire Staley stepped forward. Green eyes level and
evaluating. “Captain Harden radioed in about ten minutes ago, but you were in the meeting.”

  Angela felt her gut twist up all over again. “Field Twenty-Nine?” she asked with an inward cringe.

  Claire watched her for a second or two, then shook her head. “Negative, ma’am. No survivors.”

  The room was still. For four steady beats of Angela’s heart. She didn’t breathe. Didn’t react. Neither did Claire. Both women just standing there facing each other.

  Finally: “Okay. Thank you, Claire.”

  Over the top of Claire’s head, one of Angela’s bodyguards loomed. His finger was pressed to his ear piece, as though he were listening to a garbled transmission. But he was looking at her with urgency in his eyes.

  “Ma’am, you’re being requested down at the food distribution,” he said. “It just came over the radio.”

  Angela’s already pensive demeanor fell even further. “Oh, Jesus. Is it the Lincolnists again?”

  The bodyguard, Kurt, shrugged. “I don’t know, ma’am. But it’s Marie that’s asking for you.”

  ***

  Angela descended the stairwell from the top level of what had once been the Fort Bragg Soldier Support Center. It was now…offices.

  What the hell else would she call it? It was nothing like a government building, with an orderly conglomeration of “this person in this room, and this group of people on this floor.” It was much more slapdash than that. It was simply a place for people who needed a place, of which Angela had the nicest place, because the tag on her desk said “president.”

  Kids playing in a tree house.

  In front of and behind her paced her two bodyguards.

  No dress uniforms and salutes here. They all kept it pretty casual. Kurt and Anthony wore their regular operational gear, although they typically eschewed the helmets, and Angela didn’t blame them. When they’d first been assigned to her, she’d had trouble telling them apart. They were both medium-height and brown haired, with remarkably unremarkable faces, and the rank of sergeant.

  Luckily, they wore their name tapes on their plate carriers.

  Anthony was “MIZZUTTI”.

  Kurt was “BARSCH”.

  An additional identifier for Angela was that Anthony was typically dour and didn’t say much, and Kurt was generally smiley and exchanged pleasantries with her. From a distance, it was helpful that Kurt had painted his rifle tan, and Anthony chose to leave his black.

  Anthony led them, and Kurt took up the rear.

  They reached the bottom of the stairs and stepped through the door, Anthony holding it for Angela while keeping his eyes outward-oriented with that grim, suspicious expression of his.

  “Your meeting go okay?” Kurt offered as he took Anthony’s spot holding the door for her.

  Angela’s mind was lost in thought.

  She blinked as she walked, glanced over her shoulder. “I’m sorry, what was that?”

  Kurt nodded at Angela. “Wasn’t tryin’ to pry. You just seem a little tense, that’s all.”

  A noise like a subtle groan came from Anthony. Like Kurt’s small talk was testing the structural integrity of his patience.

  Angela walked through the foyer of the Support Center and towards the front doors. “I’m fine, thank you for asking.” She realized it came out very stiff, though she did actually appreciate Kurt’s concern.

  She decided to give Kurt something for his efforts. “It was just more bad news. And we’ve got enough of that already, don’t we?”

  “Yeah, we sure do.” Kurt nodded ahead. “The car’s pulling around for you now.”

  Angela slowed her pace, thinking about what Jeff had told her and swallowing it down. We don’t have enough. “No, actually. I think we should just walk. If it’s okay with you two.”

  Anthony reached the front doors of the building and pulled one open for her. “Fine by us, ma’am.”

  She heard Kurt’s voice, speaking through his radio on the command net: “Diamondback One to command. We’re going to be on foot towards the food distribution.”

  Diamondback.

  That was her.

  A dangerous sounding codename for a housewife who didn’t know what the fuck she was doing. But it had been chosen for her. A vague reference to the Gadsden flag. A subtle warning that she often feared she didn’t have the teeth for.

  She stepped out into bright, late-morning sunshine. It was early April, and beginning to hint at spring. The nights stayed cold, as well as the mornings. It had been cold when she’d arrived. But already the sun was warming things up.

  Warming the earth.

  Getting it ready for planting.

  If only we had enough to actually plant.

  To her left, the dusty black Tahoe that ferried her around the base was pulling up. Kurt stepped forward and waved it off. The passenger’s side window came down as the SUV stopped at the sidewalk.

  Kurt hollered at the driver, “She’s gonna walk.”

  The driver responded something that she couldn’t hear.

  She stepped out from under the shadow of the building she’d just come from and enjoyed the warmth of the sun on her face.

  Something on the third floor of the middle school across the way twinkled in the sun.

  She didn’t pay it any mind.

  Anthony shuffled to get in front of her. They always liked to have one in front and one behind.

  The next few seconds were very odd.

  She felt something hard hit her waist, just above her hip. And she thought for a second that Kurt had grabbed her, but then it didn’t quite feel like someone’s hands, it was something else, something she’d never experienced before, and why in the hell would anyone grab her that hard anyway?

  And when she turned to look at Kurt, he was two paces behind her.

  As she turned, her core suddenly spasmed, and the strength went abruptly and mysteriously out of her legs, and she toppled, barely catching herself with her arms and wondering what the fuck had just hit her…

  All of this in a bare instant.

  And in the next instant, the rumble of a rifle report, and she knew what had hit her.

  I’ve been shot.

  FIVE

  ─▬▬▬─

  DIAMONDBACK ACTUAL

  By Mitch’s best estimate, the crowd at the food distribution point was now split right down the middle.

  Half of them were bolstering the angry woman that had started the problems in the first place. The second half were yelling at the first half, telling them to get out of the way and quit holding up the line.

  Marie was trying to tell everyone to calm down, and that Angela was on her way to speak to them. Behind Marie, her two helpers stood, a young girl and a middle-aged guy, and they looked supremely uncomfortable with being caught in the middle of this.

  Mitch was busy scanning the crowd for faces he might recognize. People that he knew were involved with the Lincolnists. He was looking for one face in particular: Elsie Foster, their leader.

  So far, she’d made herself scarce.

  His two 82nd Airborne boys, Logan and Blake, were flanking him on either side, several paces out. Further towards the rear of the crowd, he saw his two Delta teammates, Rudy and Morrow, hanging around semi-casually. Not exactly brandishing their rifles, but holding them in a loose port position.

  Amid the tumult of angry proclamations from both sides, Mitch heard a distinct pop.

  He twitched. Turned to his left, where he thought the sound had come from.

  The crowd hadn’t reacted to it, they were still focused on bitching at each other.

  But Blake was peering off towards the middle school grounds. He turned back to Mitch and frowned. “Did you—”

  Pop-pop-pop

  This time there was no denying what it was.

  Not everyone reacted, but enough of the crowd heard it and went silent that the overall volume dropped a few decibels.

  Mitch grabbed his radio PTT. “Mitch to command, we just heard so
mething like gunshots coming from the area of the middle school…” Jesus, someone wouldn’t do that, would they? Not here! Not now! “Can you advise?”

  Another flurry of gunshots. And then an answering rattle of fully-automatic fire.

  The crowd had now forgotten that they were about to start choking each other. The tone had turned abruptly from anger to fear.

  At the edges of the crowd, Rudy and Morrow were already jogging in Mitch’s direction.

  Logan appeared at his elbow. “That’s fuckin’ gunfire, for sure.”

  “Yeah, I know it’s gunfire.” Mitch started to move in that direction.

  Then his earpiece crackled, and the voice of the Watch Commander came over. “Command to Mitch, I’ve got word that Diamondback One is taking fire. Be advised, they’re saying Diamondback Actual is down. Diamondback Actual is down.”

  ***

  It’s just the stomach.

  Just the stomach.

  I’m still alive.

  The world swirled. Went topsy-turvy. Pitched and yawed.

  Angela found herself on her hands and knees, trying to get back to her feet, but she felt like she was on the center of a whirling dervish and she didn’t trust her balance.

  She heard rifle fire.

  Some close, some far away.

  She saw her hands on the blacktop, crawling. Shuffling knees. A burdensome, pregnant pain in her belly, like the first contractions before labor.

  You’re not dead. You’re still moving.

  Is this really happening?

  It was so monumentally unbelievable…

  Something hit the concrete very close to her.

  She turned and saw the crater that it had left, a little cloud of concrete dust hanging in the air like a smoke plume over an active volcano.

  Shit. They’re still shooting at me.

  But it did her a favor. Focusing on that little pockmark in the concrete gave her a center to her reeling universe and it shut the whirling dervish down long enough for her to stagger to her feet.