Empty Bodies (Book 2): Adaptation Read Free Page A

him.
    “Honors?” Gabriel asked.
    Will chuckled and pulled on the door.
    Somewhat to his surprise, the door swung open when he pulled the handle. A bell strung to the interior of the door rang once, and Gabriel quickly reached down and muted it with his hand. Will looked back and saw Marcus and Holly with their backs to him, scanning the parking lot with their rifles out the window. Dylan was at the window with his hands pressed against it, looking toward him and Gabriel. Will gave Dylan a thumbs up, then turned around and walked through the door.
    ***
    The little bit of sunlight remaining in the day was the only thing illuminating the inside of the shop. Gabriel still had his gun raised in front of him, but Will had his down at his side. The shop was fairly small and appeared to be vacant, so he didn’t see the point in trying to look like an action hero. Will assumed that Gabriel’s nerves were calming, because he now lowered his gun as well.
    “This is weird,” Gabriel said.
    “Yeah,” Will said, looking around the room.
    The shop looked like it hadn’t been touched. Aside from the abandoned mechanical garage they stayed in when they escaped from Ellis Metals, everywhere else they’d stopped had been ransacked and beaten to hell. The pawn shop had all its shelves intact, and the items displayed on the floor were still neatly placed.  
    A glass case spanned the length of the tiny store. The wall behind it still had some items on the shelves, but much of it was conspicuously empty.
    Will walked over to the glass case and saw all the jewelry inside still neatly displayed. As he walked down the length of the case, stroking the glass, he noticed that one part of the case had been emptied. There was nothing left except the price tags in front of where the items had been.
    Used Sub Compact .380 Auto - $299
    Used Compact Single Action .22 - $229
    Used Std. 9mm - $329
    “Gabriel,” Will said, waving him over.
    Gabriel walked over and looked inside of the case where there had presumably once been guns.
    “Shit,” Gabriel said, slamming his fist down on the glass.
    Will heard a crash and looked up from the case. A door in the back of the shop swung open, its knob banging against the wall, and a large man appeared in the doorway holding a dual-barrel shotgun. He wore an old, faded yellow t-shirt that had the brand of a pilsner silk-screened across the front, tucked into a pair of pants that were held up by a set of suspenders. He also wore a camouflage trucker hat and had a Fu Manchu mustache. The gun was already pointed toward Will and Gabriel when the man pumped it, preparing the slugs for flight.
    “What da fuck y’all doin’ in my shop?”
    Gabriel had his gun pointed back at the man, and Will’s hands were up.
    “Gabriel, put your gun down,” Will said.
    “No fuckin’ way, man.”
    “Gabriel!” Will yelled, but Gabriel kept the gun drawn on the hillbilly shop owner.
    “I suggest you two pricks get da fuck out here, right now, or y’all both go’na end up dead.”
    “We don’t want any trouble,” Will told the man. “We were just coming here looking for ammunition. We’re almost out, and the shop looked abandoned.”
    “It look abandoned to you? How da fuck y’all get in here anyways?”
    “The door was unlocked, dumb ass,” Gabriel said.
    “Gabriel, fucking stop!” Will said.
    The man aimed his shotgun right at Gabriel’s head. “This dude says some shit like that one more time, I blow both your God damned brains out. Now, I’ll say it one more time, get the fuck out of my store, and I’ll ‘member to lock the God damned door this time.”
    “Okay, we’re leaving,” Will said, keeping his hands up and quivering.
    “The hell we are!” Gabriel replied.
    The bell from the front door rang as it swung open, and the shop owner pointed his gun that way.
    Will turned around, his hands still up in the air, and he saw Dylan come walking through the door.
    “Dylan!” he cried out. “Get out