Survived to see another day.
But lost our home.
Where would we go?
Chapter 15
“We need to get out of the city, at least until things calm down,” Xavion declared.
“No shit.” Seeing that many mutants in one place, cooperating in an effort to kill us? “Where are you thinking?”
“I have a farm.”
“Wait, what? You’re a farmer?” He was too sexy. I remembered Old McDonald. He wore coveralls, ate a piece of hay, and had chubby cheeks and twinkling eyes under his straw hat.
“Not really. I don’t raise many animals or anything, but I have a small garden.”
He almost sounded embarrassed as we walked away from the fire, alert because humans weren’t supposed to roam at night.
“You grow stuff.”
“Yeah. But mostly, I hunt and use that to get people to help me. That and let them keep some too.”
“Why are you in the city if you can live off your farm?” The very idea made me wonder.
“I told you, I hunt.”
He might, but if I had the choice to live in relative safety, with fresh food? Hello, country living. I’d learn to put my hair in pigtails, cut my jeans into daisy dukes, and make my own pickles.
“How will we get there?” I asked.
“I have a bike stashed in that alley.” He pointed.
Dumb me, I thought he meant a motorcycle.
When I saw it, my dumb reply was, “It’s a bike.”
“Yeah.”
“With no motor.”
“Doesn’t need gas.”
A good point. Who knew gas could go bad? By the time I figured it out, I was stuck in the city.
“I only see one,” I pointed out. A nice bike, matte black, with a rack and a basket that I wouldn’t make fun of. At least it didn’t have a bell. Always hated those stupid things. Listening to a podcast while walking to the subway and some psycho in spandex would go whipping by on the sidewalk ringing it nonstop.
“We can double up until we find you a ride of your own,” he said,
Which meant, while he stood and pedaled, I sat on the set, legs splayed, holding on to his ass.
The ride ended outside a sporting goods store not too badly damaged. With me keeping watch, he found one he said would be great for off-roading. I sweated bullets, not daring to blink at the dark while he inflated the flat tires.
Only as I sat on it did I admit, “I never learned to ride a bike as a kid.”
“It’s easy.”
Said the man who didn’t keep falling over.
“I’ve got an idea,” he said when I sniffled on the floor because my body hurt after the third fall.
The training wheels on my bike were humiliating. Good thing no one was around to see. I took a spin on them in the store. They were really freaking noisy.
Xavion grimaced. “That won’t do.”
“I’m sorry. This is my fault. My mom said bikes were dangerous. I wasn’t even allowed on the swings at the park.” Having read all the books I could find, I’d had time to examine my upbringing and admit my mom never let me experience enough. Never had I regretted it more than in this moment. Because of me, we couldn’t make a getaway.
“I’ll figure something out.” It took only fifteen minutes before his bike gained a third wheel with a seat and handlebars. A tag-along or so the box claimed. Used by children so they could ride with their parent. Or, in this case, for a woman who’d grown up in a concrete jungle.
With our three-wheeled machine, we made good time. It was liberating to ride in the open at night. I’d never been so bold. Now tell my instincts to stop screaming, Hide. Hide. Hide.
If I’d been hiding, I would have never met Xavion. Never realized I could still live.
We rode that entire night and only barely stopped. We couldn’t ride straight out of the city because some of the roads were blocked. Intentionally, which chilled me.
The fatigue began setting in around three a.m. according to my watch. And then I heard it. An ululating shriek to our left.
“We’ve been spotted!” were his grim words as he pedaled harder.
For the last few hours until dawn, that shrieking followed us, growing fainter as we left the crowded spaces of the city for the more spread-out suburbia.
And farther still.
Only when the sun fully bathed the land did we stop for a rest. I collapsed on a front lawn grown long and lush. Basked in the rays. With him lying beside me, I fell asleep. And he must have, too, because, next thing we knew, a rude voice woke us.
“What have we here, boys?” said a guy missing most of his front teeth blocking my sunlight.
“Dinner and dessert.”
Chapter 16
A pity more of humanity wasn’t like Xavion. Yes, he’d seduced me upon meeting, but he asked and ensured he got consent. Wanted my willingness.
The thugs who woke us from our nap? The kind of assholes who thought it was okay to reach for a woman to do unspeakable things.
Wrong move.
Xavion wasn’t the type to sit calmly by.
Sure, the one with the big goofy ears held a knife on my boyfriend, but Xavion looked pissed more than anything.
So I wasn’t surprised when he reacted, the movement sharp and sudden, Big Ears’ head snapping back before Toothless even managed to finish grabbing me.
As Big Ears started to scream and Toothless gaped even wider, Xavion took them out.
One with a knife to the heart, the other a bullet between his surprised eyes.
Xavion was cold as ice when he said, “Run or you die too.”
Who did he speak to?
The third thug, holding a piece of wood with jagged nails on the porch behind us, gaped then ran.
I blinked and said, “That was really fucking hot.”
Our lips met, and we couldn’t help ourselves. Stripping in the open was dumb—we’d just been attacked—but his hand down my pants and mine around his dick meant mutual masturbation to culmination.
Yes. I came. Yes. We lived.
We continued our trip but at a more leisurely pace, moving well past suburbia to where the land held untamed spaces. Where the air smelled of possibility. Where birds still flew in the sky.
The fields had been mowed in some areas. Others held tall corn stalks growing wild and sporadically.
Fucking corn, though. I wouldn’t starve.
I could have cried. Maybe the world hadn’t truly ended. Maybe we could ride far enough we’d find civilization again or at least an easier way of life.
Foolish and yet I couldn’t help but wonder.
It was midafternoon when we rode up a driveway to a cute little house. Made of gray river stone with a porch and a tree heavy with apples.
Apples!
I almost tipped us both in my haste to get off the bike and run for the fruit.
Xavion didn’t share my enthusiasm but rather glanced around suspiciously.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, mouth full of crunchy, mushy sweetness.
“The fruit. No one’s picked it.”
Some littered the ground, going bad. What a waste. I took another bite. “You have someone apple picking for you?”
“Yes, in exchange, they keep half.”
I slowed my enthusiastic eating. “You think something happened.”