Running Towards The Abyss Read online

  McCain had forgotten how emotionally draining it could be dealing with the opposite sex. The two beers and the little bit of bourbon that Beth had consumed had lowered her inhibitions and loosened her tongue. Chuck was at a loss for what to say.

  There was no doubt he was ready to get her back to her people and continue with his mission of locating Melanie. At the same time, if he had to be stuck inside of a house in a winter storm during the zombie apocalypse, Beth was pretty good company, even after a few drinks.

  “You’re going to forget about me,” he heard her say again, very softly. A few minutes later, she was asleep.

  McCain woke to the sound of vehicles moving outside. The luminous dial on his watch showed 0150 hours. Car tires driving over the icy streets got louder as they got closer. Elizabeth’s face was pressed against his chest with Chuck lying on the front edge of the couch. He kissed her on top of the head and slid out from under her to the floor. Why did I kiss her? he asked himself.

  Headlights lit up the living room curtains. They’re on our street, he realized, feeling a stab of fear and quickly grabbing for his rifle. A peek through the curtains showed three sets of headlights pulling into the driveway of the kidnappers’ house. Chuck quietly put on his body armor and pistol belt. The voices of the vehicles’ occupants carried loudly through the dark night as they exited two pickups and a passenger car.

  Chuck sat down on the sofa next to Elizabeth and gently shook her shoulder. He put his mouth to her ear, speaking softly, “Beth, wake up. There are people outside.”

  The girl sat up slowly, pulling the blanket around herself and wiping the sleep out of her eyes. McCain told her what he had seen and asked her to go upstairs. He loaded Benton’s 9mm Springfield pistol and handed it to her as she stood up.

  She leaned in to Chuck and asked, “Did you kiss me on top of the head or was that a dream?”

  “We’ll talk about it later. Please go upstairs,” he said. Why did I do that? he wondered.

  Kidnappers’ house, Thursday, 0155 hours

  Joey Lester turned into the icy driveway of the safe house and bounced over something. His passenger wasn’t wearing a seatbelt so his head hit the roof of the black Ford F-150 pickup as they lurched to a stop.

  “Ouch! What did you hit?” Joey’s bigger, but younger brother, Don, asked, rubbing the top of his head.

  “I don’t know. Something laying on the driveway. I hope I didn’t mess up my truck,” he said, as the two men exited the vehicle.

  A silver four-door Toyota Tundra and a blue Chevrolet Malibu pulled into the driveway behind the Ford. Joey withdrew a three-cell Maglite from under the seat to see what he had run over. The beam of light illuminated the small figure of a snow-covered child underneath his truck. His gasp brought Don over.

  “Look, Don. We ran over a kid. A zombie kid. Looks like 5-0 or one of the guys shot her in the head.”

  Don looked around nervously. “Man, I didn’t think there were anymore zombies around here.”

  The driver of the Toyota, Hoss Harper, walked up holding a flashlight of his own. His three passengers started unloading boxes from the bed of their truck. Hoss and Don had anchored the offensive line of the Franklin County High School football team several years earlier. After getting arrested for stealing cars, however, they had both dropped out of school and had been pursuing a life of crime ever since.

  Hoss shined his light around the driveway and front yard, excitedly pointing out several other suspicious mounds. He kicked the snow off of the closest one and found the decomposing body of a woman. She had a bullet hole under her left eye and the back of her head was missing.

  “Looks like the boys had a fun time of it,” Harper commented. “Let’s go wake ‘em up and see what they’ve got to drink.”

  Wesley Maddox, the driver of the Malibu, popped the trunk and his two passengers started unloading, as well, carrying supplies towards the front of the house. Curses and yelling suddenly came from inside the residence. Bo Harris was the voice that carried the furthest. He had ridden with Harper and had just wrangled a large box of canned goods through the front door.

  Joey and Hoss both drew pistols from their belts. Don reached inside the Ford and grabbed his .12 gauge Benelli M4 shotgun. Wesley pulled an AR-15 rifle out of the passenger compartment of his car and the four men cautiously entered the house.

  Bo was on his knees, crying beside two figures on the floor. His flashlight was laying beside him providing the only illumination in the dark room. One of the other men pulled out a cigarette lighter and lit the candles that had been left there earlier.

  “Somebody killed my daddy!” Bo wailed, grabbing at Larry’s dead body and shaking him.

  Joey put his hand on his friend’s shoulder and shone his flashlight around the carnage in the living room. Bobby and Larry were clearly dead. Bobby had been shot in the center of the forehead, while Larry had a bullet hole in his chest and another above his right eye. And to make it even worse, someone had vomited all over both bodies. The smells of death and puke were making Joey feel nauseous.

  Joey’s light illuminated another figure lying in the remains of a coffee table a few feet away. “Is that 5-0?” he exclaimed. “Guys, I think 5-0 is dead!”

  All talking ceased. Even Bo quieted down for the moment at that revelation. How was that even possible? 5-0 was one of the few people whom Joey Lester had feared and respected. And now he was dead?

  Lester’s flashlight illuminated the smashed and broken features of the muscular man’s face as he knelt beside him. Joey rolled him over and saw an apparent knife wound to the back of his head and the bloody damage to his left hand.

  “Ronnie’s dead, too,” Wesley said. “He’s over here behind the couch.”

  “Where’s Jerry?” Hoss asked.

  “You guys check the rest of the house,” Joey ordered.

  Several of the men spread through the residence, Don leading the way with his shotgun. They returned a minute later reporting that it was empty.

  “There’s no sign of Jerry,” Don said, “and everything’s gone. The guns, the food, the booze. Somebody cleaned us out, Big Brother. What do we do now?”

  Wesley spoke up, “We need to get out of here. Whoever did this might come back.”

  “Shut up, Wesley!” Bo yelled, spittle flying out of his mouth, climbing to his feet. “I hope they come back. I’ll kill every one of them.”

  “Bo, you’ve got to quit yelling,” Hoss said, stepping over to his much smaller friend and putting a big hand on his shoulder. “Man, we’re sorry about your dad. We all liked Larry and we’ll try to find out who did this. But we don’t need any more zombies over here. There’s already a bunch of dead ones in the front yard.”

  “I’m sorry, Hoss. It just hurts so bad. I want to make ‘em suffer,” he said, starting to cry again, his fists balled up at his sides.

  “What now, Joey?” asked Wesley. He and Joey were best friends and looked more like brothers than Joey and Don did. While Don and Hoss were both six foot three and weighed around two hundred and sixty pounds, Joey and Wesley were both around five foot ten and weighed a solid one hundred and eighty pounds. The two friends even sported matching mullets. They enjoyed lifting weights together at Maddox’s house when they weren’t out breaking into other people’s houses.

  Joey Lester realized that everyone was looking at him, waiting for some direction.

  “Give me a minute to think,” he said, stepping towards the shattered back door.

  He shone his light through the opening, looking for clues on the back deck. The snow had covered any footprints that might have been there. Something reflected light back at him from the living room floor, just inside the doorway. Lester knelt down and picked up a piece of brass. 5.56mm. He saw several of those scattered around the room. So, the gang that hit us is probably carrying AR-15s. That means they’re well armed.

  Joey walked over to the backside of the couch and saw stringy-haired Ronnie lying on his back. He had b
een shot in the chest and face. A few feet to his left lay an AK-47, or at least what was left of it. He recognized with a start that it was 5-0’s gun. The front stock had been shattered, with the bullet also striking the barrel, and ruining the firearm. A couple of empty 7.62x39 pieces of brass lay a few feet away. So Ronnie or 5-0 had managed to get a couple of shots off but it didn’t stop whoever had raided their safe house. These guys had even taken the magazine out of the AK. They had left nothing behind.

  He stood back up and crossed the room to where 5-0’s body lay. Joey bent down to take a closer look at the man who had taught him how to be a professional criminal. They were never really friends but in a warped sort of way, the corrupt police officer was the father figure he and Don had never had. Their business relationship had been a profitable one. If he was honest, the only reason that he wasn’t in jail or dead was because of Mike Carter’s influence. Even Don, as big and tough as he was, always showed respect towards the big man.

  How many people had it taken to kill the big sheriff’s deputy? Joey shone the light over 5-0’s body again. Three of his fingers were all but gone, hanging by exposed tendons and skin. His face looked like it had been pulverized and his nose had been flattened. His right eye and the bones around it were destroyed, and to finish him off, someone had stabbed him in the base of the skull. It must have taken four or five big men to take 5-0 down and kill him with a knife.

  And where was Jerry? he wondered. He knew that Jerry and 5-0 didn’t get along but he couldn’t picture Jerry doing this. He wasn’t capable of it. He was a strong back and he knew how to use a gun but there was no way he could have pulled this horrific scene off on his own. Plus, he was as scared of 5-0 as the rest of them. No, this had to be a rival gang. Maybe they took Jerry with them for some reason or maybe he’d escaped.

  Whoever this other group was, they were a force to be reckoned with. They had killed at least four of his people, including their leader, and there were a bunch of dead zombies outside, as well. Had the other gang killed the Zs or had 5-0 and his guys?

  Joey stood up. “Wesley’s right. We can’t stay here. Take the stuff that we just brought back to the cars and let’s go over to the truck stops at the interstate. That was the last place these guys were supposed to hit. Maybe there’ll be a clue or something. We can spend the night there and head for one of the other houses tomorrow.”

  Within minutes, the vehicles were on the road. With the icy conditions, what would normally have been a five minute trip took almost twenty. Joey was still trying to wrap his head around the fact that his criminal mentor was dead.

  Carter had recruited him and Wesley six years earlier, when they were both nineteen. Joey had managed to graduate from high school but just couldn’t hold a job. Instead, he and his buddy, Wesley, were breaking into one or two homes a day in and around Carnesville, Lavonia, and Hartwell.

  They were careful to only pick empty houses in which the homeowners were at work. The two young men stole jewelry, guns, cash, and other items that they could quickly pawn or sell to their friends. Joey loved the adrenaline rush of breaking into someone’s home, digging through their possessions, and then taking what he wanted.

  The Lester brothers had both been arrested and served time as juveniles for burglary and car theft. Don, younger than Joey by a year and a half, wasn’t quite as smart as his older brother and was back in jail almost as soon as he became an adult. Don and his best buddy, Hoss, were stopped by the Georgia State Patrol, driving a stolen car and in possession of a stolen firearm. A short stint in a medium-security prison convinced the two big men they didn’t want to go back there.

  Joey and Wesley were childhood friends. They both considered themselves smart, as well as cautious, having pulled off over a hundred successful burglaries. Until 5-0 stopped them.

  They’d had a good day, hitting two houses several miles outside the city limits of Lavonia in Franklin County. Both of the homes sat way off the road and the burglars had followed their familiar routine. Wesley drove his Malibu up the driveway and parked. Joey would ring the doorbell or knock on the door. If someone answered, he asked them if they had any scrap metal they wanted to get rid of. The usual answer was ‘no’ and the two thieves would leave the area, driving into neighboring Hart County and taking the long way home. Any contact with a resident signaled the end of their day. They always assumed that person would call the police on them for suspicious activity and they did everything they could to avoid contact with the local authorities.

  Today, however, they had been lucky and no one had been home at either location. Joey and Wesley took turns kicking in the back doors. They had loaded the trunk of the car with five guns, some nice jewelry, an iMac computer, two iPads, a forty-two inch flat screen TV, some high-end liquor and various other odds and ends that they could turn quickly. After splitting their stolen cash, each man also lined his wallet with three hundred and twenty dollars before they had even tried to fence the stolen property.

  Maddox took a roundabout way back to town, utilizing several dirt roads just in case someone had seen them and alerted the police. The dirt road that they were on would soon dead end into Highway 17, which would take them back into Lavonia. Joey and Wesley were talking about what they were going to buy with their latest windfall of cash and stolen property when the sound of a siren and the flash of blue lights in their rear view mirrors got their attention.

  “What do I do?” Maddox asked, panic in his voice. “Should I run?”

  Lester thought quickly. Very few people actually escaped the police. “You might outrun the one but you weren’t going to outrun the radio,” the saying went. And Wesley wasn’t known for any NASCAR driving skills.

  “Go ahead and stop but play it cool. Maybe he’s just getting you for speeding or something.”

  Wesley slowed down and pulled to the side of the narrow dirt road. A large figure emerged from the Franklin County Sheriff’s car and slowly walked up to the Malibu.

  “It’s 5-0!” Wesley whispered loudly to Joey as he glimpsed the deputy’s face in the mirror, his eyes concealed behind mirrored sunglasses, his big biceps stretching against the polyester uniform shirt. Deputy Mike Carter had a reputation among the local toughs as a no-nonsense officer who wasn’t afraid to use force to arrest people. He lifted weights daily at the Fitness Plus Gym in Lavonia and there were rumors that he was involved in the local steroid scene.

  Big Don Lester had made the mistake of smarting off to the deputy one night after being caught drinking underage with Hoss Harper in a school parking lot. Don woke up in the back of the police car, on his way to jail. Hoss told him later that Carter had a thrown a single punch that had knocked him out.

  “Well, well, what do we have here? Mr. Maddox and Mr. Lester. It’s been a while since I’ve seen you boys. What’re y’all up to today?” the deputy asked, standing next to Wesley’s open window. Carter’s hand rested conspicuously on his holstered Glock.

  Wesley and Joey both tried to answer at once, nervously talking over each other. 5-0 cut them off with a wave of his hand.

  “Turn off the vehicle,” he ordered, “and hand me the keys.” Wesley quickly complied.

  “Step out of the vehicle, Mr. Maddox.”

  As soon as Wesley’s feet hit the ground, the deputy spun him around, handcuffed him, searched him, and walked him back to the patrol car.

  Over his shoulder, Carter said, “Mr. Lester, don’t you move a muscle, do you hear me?”

  “Yes, sir,” Joey answered quickly. How did he catch us? he wondered. It doesn’t really matter because as soon as he sees all the stolen property in the trunk, we’re going to prison for a long time.

  Deputy Carter appeared at the passenger door, opening it, and motioning for Joey to get out. In moments, the process was repeated and Joey was secured in the back of the police car with his friend.

  “Did he say anything to you?” Wesley asked.

  “Nothing, what about you?” Joey answered.

  Ma
ddox just shook his head as they both watched Carter searching the interior of the Chevrolet Malibu. He appeared to be taking his time, letting the two prisoners watch him, just waiting for their stash to be uncovered. After a few minutes, the policeman walked to the rear of Wesley’s car and leaned against the trunk as if he was thinking. He made eye contact with the two men in the back of his cruiser and smiled an evil smile.

  Slowly and deliberately, 5-0 turned around and used Maddox’s key to open the trunk. The two thieves could see the deputy shaking his head as he dug through the stolen property. After letting them sweat for a while, Carter walked back to his police car and opened the rear door on the side where Joey was sitting.

  “It looks like we have a serious problem here, boys.”

  Joey and Wesley hung their heads. They had been caught red-handed with thousands of dollars worth of stolen goods and didn’t even try to deny it. Both of the men had been to jail before as juveniles and as adults. Since turning eighteen, however, their arrests had been minor and neither had served any time in prison. They knew that was about to change.

  “Here’s the deal,” the police officer stated. “I’ve been watching you fellows for a while and compiling a file on you a mile long. Today wasn’t your first rodeo and I’ve got enough evidence to link y’all to at least another fifty burglaries. That’s a lot of jail time, boys.”

  Wesley finally found his voice. “Deputy Carter, I know this doesn’t look good but…”

  “Shut up, Wesley,” the deputy ordered. “I’m the one talking right now. Yep, it certainly looks like you two are about to be exposed to a whole new level of the criminal justice system.”

  He let that thought hang in the air for a minute before continuing, staring intently at both of the young men. “That is unless we can reach some type of agreement.”

  Maddox and Lester looked at each other, thinking that their ears were playing tricks on them. Were they being offered a lifeline? They both knew that the police would sometimes turn criminals into informants in exchange for keeping them out of jail. Neither man wanted to become a snitch.