Page 19

As we stepped through the covered entertaining area, I waited for someone to yank the sliding door open and yell at us for trespassing. I stared at the beige curtain obscuring part of the view inside, my heart hammering. Something moved, but at first all I could see was my reflection.

Then a face slammed into the glass—a woman with pale, waxy skin and blood smeared across her mouth. She scrabbled at the door, her nails broken, eyes unfocused.

Kirby swore and jumped backward, knocking me straight into Luke. I gasped and half turned, my hands shooting out and grasping his biceps.

We were too close, chest to chest, his solid warmth pressed against me. I dragged in air and almost forgot about the nightmare on the other side of the glass.

“Sorry,” Kirby and I said at the same time.

Luke supported my elbows until I’d found my balance, then his hands slipped away.

“Thanks.” I sent him a quick smile. “I wasn’t expecting that.”

With a raspy growl, the woman ramped up the urgency and threw her body into the barrier, sliding against her own blood.

“Come on.” Kirby grabbed my arm. “We need to move before the noise brings more of these freaks.”

Luke led the way to the side gate and eased the latch open.

My arm brushed a climbing plant as I followed him through, the scent of jasmine in the rot-tinged air taking me back to the games of hide-and-seek I’d played with Sadie in my nan’s garden. The memory helped to settle my racing pulse.

“It’s so quiet here,” I whispered.

Kirby stayed close to me. “I don’t like it.”

“Me neither. We don’t know how much worse it got overnight.”

“Thanks,” Kirby said. “So much.”

A black sedan sat under the carport, with a plastic ride-on car alongside it, its door left open as if a toddler might return any minute.

I almost suggested breaking into the house to see if we could find the keys, then immediately rejected the idea. The infected woman at the glass might not be the only one inside.

The three of us moved down the driveway, the houses and gardens on the other side of the street showing no signs of life.

I pulled the meat tenderiser from my waistband, turning the tool over in my hand. Just a chunk of ridged metal between me and the infected. I would have laughed if our situation hadn’t been so dire.

Dew dampened the ground, and the front garden was just as overgrown as the rear. A bike lay on its side near the letterbox, a bloody helmet almost lost in the long grass.

We reached the end of the driveway, and the street finally came into view.

“All right, what are we dealing with here?” Kirby asked.

The area appeared empty at first glance.

But no.

A man stood halfway down the road with his back to us, his feet bare and head lowered.

“That.” I nodded in his direction.

Kirby clutched her rolling pin, and Luke took the kitchen knife from the side pocket of his backpack.

None of us knew what to say. We just stared for long seconds, and I suddenly wanted to rush into the backyard we’d just come through. See if there was a garden shed. I hadn’t thought to look for tools on the way through.

“Want to do some practice?” Luke asked.

I had little faith our weapons would work, but we could outrun it if we had no other option. “Not really, but it makes more sense to do it now when there’s less pressure.”