Fortunes & Failures - 03 Read Free Page B

arms.
    The second girl reached him, throwing her arms around his waist, her muffled sobs feeling like puffs of heat against his side.
    “You’re alive!” Shari grabbed his face in her hands, planting a huge kiss on his mouth.
    “What…how…?” His eyes flicked to the truck and the lone figure still standing beside it. The third person was obviously male, and visibly nervous as he shifted from one foot to the other, his head on a swivel searching for trouble.
    “It was horrible,” the girl nestled against his side whimpered.
    “Maybe we could do this later,” Heather said as she stepped closer to the trio while still watching the nervous man by the truck that they were about to commandeer.
    “Where’s Mike and Darrin?” Shari asked, ignoring the rude girl trying to pull the plug on such an amazing and unlikely reunion.
    “Dead,” Kevin said with a grimace. “But Heather is right, we can catch up on things later. Right now we should try to get out of here while the coast is clear.”
    “I’m staying with you,” the tiny, but very pregnant girl, clinging to Kevin’s side insisted.
    “We can all stay together, Erin,” Kevin said as he hugged the girl. “Do you guys have room for more supplies in that truck?”
    “Lots.” Shari nodded.
    “Well, we’ve got a storeroom’s worth of canned food waiting just around the corner in front of an Italian restaurant.”
    “I’ll tell Peter.” Shari tossed a glance back at the man still standing nervously by the truck. “Do you need to ride back?”
    “It’s only right around the corner,” Kevin replied with a shake of his head. “We were actually coming to see if that truck worked. We were going to snag it and load it up ourselves.”
    “How funny,” Shari laughed, sounding anything but.
    “Are you guys ready to roll?” Kevin asked.
    “Yep,” Shari nodded, “we just finished loading everything Peter said was important and was fixing to leave ourselves.”
    “Then meet us right over at the building with the stack of boxes in the front.”
    “I’m staying with you.” Erin squeezed tighter.
    “Okay,” Kevin slipped an arm in between himself and the pregnant teen, “but we have to get moving. I don’t want to be on this street anymore.”
    “I can’t believe it’s you!” Shari said with a smile, hugging Kevin once more before turning and jogging back to the big truck.
    “C’mon.” Kevin steered Erin around the corner and back towards the restaurant.
    The sputter and rumble of a big diesel engine sounded like thunder, shattering the relative silence of the dead city of Newark, Ohio. Kevin and Heather both jumped and picked up the pace.
    “So,” Erin wedged in between the two, “who’s this?”
    “Oh yeah!” Kevin slapped his forehead. “Heather, Erin Bergman. Erin, Heather Godwin.”
    “Nice to meet you.” Heather patted the younger girl on the arm.
    “Nice to meet anybody,” Erin replied.
    “Of course the other girl was Shari,” Kevin added, then glanced down at Erin. “What about Ruth and your mom?”
    The girl stopped in her tracks. Heather kept going but Kevin stopped a few steps later when he realized that Erin was no longer beside him. She was standing in the middle of the street, tears rolling down her cheeks.
    “What the hell?” Heather trotted back.
    “Ruth’s one of those things ,” Erin sobbed.
    “We don’t have time for this,” Heather explained as she pointed up the street. There was definite movement in the shadows. Looking the other way, the direction they were heading, showed more of the same.
    “Erin,” Kevin croutched down in front of the girl, “I know you’re upset, and I probably shouldn’t have asked a stupid question like that right now—”
    “Ya think?” Heather quipped, chucking him in the ribs with an elbow.
    “I need you to hold it together for just a bit longer. Can you do that for me, Erin?”
    The girl scrubbed at her face with her hands and nodded. The trip continued, reaching