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A lot like…livestock.
“We’ll find a way out, Kara. We just got away from one of the most powerful factions in the Badlands. This should be nothing.”
“Did we?”
I stretched my arms out on either side. “Do you see Mal anywhere?”
“That isn’t what I meant. I’m asking—” She cut herself off and glanced in the general direction of Cherry, cautious of what was being said in front of a stranger.
I expected this girl to be somewhat emotional over her friend being punched in the face and hauled off, but nope. She’d been eerily silent since Hannah was dragged away.
Come to think of it, neither of these women had uttered a word about the guy who’d been shot in the back. I was sure Hannah was overly hysterical due to a personality flaw, not because whoever that man was in Phobos had been killed. So Cherry was either intently listening to everything we were saying, or she’d gone into shock or something.
“Hey, are you all right over there?” I asked.
“As okay as I can be.”
“I’m sorry about your friends,” Takara said softly.
“They weren’t really my friends. We just met six days ago.”
Well, now I had questions. Why had she been travelling with two strangers, and how did they end up in Phobos of all places?
The barn door suddenly slid open, causing sunlight to blast into the building’s poorly lit interior.
I squinted, watching the silhouette of someone approach.
“Good morning, girls,” Knox greeted us cheerfully. “Ma’s got your breakfast nearly ready to go. I need to borrow her for a few.”
The ‘her’ he was referring to was yours truly. He lacked the bandana he’d had on the day before, but the ridiculous goggles were back in place. And, of course, he had his gun cradled in the crook of his arm.
I wondered where he was going to take me. Hannah had yet to come back from wherever Tyson had dragged her off to. Something told me she wouldn’t be.
An apprehensive energy zinged down my spine, but I kept my mouth shut and held my composure. When he grabbed hold of the padlock to let me out, I could tell Takara was going to say something in my defense. I shook my head to deter her.
“I’ll be back for you after tonight.” Knox spoke to her directly.
He pulled open the stall door and leveled a stare at my partially exposed chest, motioning for me to come forward.
“You even think of trying something and I’ll blow a hole in ya.”
“Noted,” I quipped dryly.
When I was within reaching distance, he grabbed hold of my arm and led me out of the barn. We stepped out into blazing heat, and I got my first real look at where we were. An old show arena. To the far right was a small house that appeared to be in better shape than the barn.
Roboys’ Roadhouse was painted on a handmade sign near the pick-up and blue car we’d been brought here in. There didn’t seem to be any type of civilization close by.
Knox continued to lead me to where voices were coming from like I was a dog.
We walked alongside another building, this one made from sheet metal. Arrows were hung on the side of it, guiding us along.
“Get yourself ready.”
I stared at the side of his head. “Ready for what?”
We rounded a corner, and the smell that had been bothering the hell out of me in the barn became eye-wateringly potent. And no wonder.
“We got a bit behind on clean-up,” Knox explained.
“You don’t say?” I mumbled.
At least a dozen bodies were stacked on top of one another inside a smaller paddock. Some were half burnt. I should’ve known this was what I was smelling. Decomposition. Burning flesh.
This odor was always easier to recognize than to describe. You never really forgot it once you breathed it in a few times.
Imagine beef in a frying pan with a side of pig fat. Then, because these people hadn’t been gutted, burnt liver mixed with a nice musky perfume curated from spinal fluid.
Basically, the scent was both nauseating and sweet. Sometimes, like now, it was so thick and putrid that there was a richness to it you could almost taste.
These idiots had put the corpses on a large grill-like rack, which wasn’t doing them any favors. As the bodies gradually melted, bits and pieces were getting stuck in the grates. Thankfully, I didn’t see anyone that resembled Poet amongst them.
I looked away from the display to the arena coming up on my left.
They hadn’t cleaned this, either.
The sun shined down, casting a haze over bloodied sawdust, making it that much more vivid.
The surrounding bleachers were empty of all but four people who paid us no attention.
An additional four men were inside the arena. Jacob and Tyson. A man I didn’t recognize. And Poet. Both were facing our general direction, their backs to the other two.
