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She and Brandon were all grins as they got out.
“We hit the jackpot on this last gas station. They had a meat case with cheese and everything. It’s all vacuum sealed and still looks good.”
“Looks like you ran into trouble,” I said with a nod toward the fueler’s exterior.
“Nothing Molev couldn’t handle,” Roni said. “He worked fast.” The leer she gave me at the end let me know my time with Molev yesterday hadn’t gone unnoticed.
“Bring the food in, and come to our room. Team meeting.”
Molev was already out of the shower and waiting in our room with a towel wrapped around his waist.
“You might want to put some pants on,” I said. “Roni will be here in a few minutes. We need to have a planning meeting before they rest.”
His heated gaze never left mine as he pulled on the shorts he’d tossed on the bed.
“Knock-knock,” Katie called before walking through the open door. “I was told there’s a team meeting.”
“Yep.”
Our core group slowly trickled in, and I pulled out the map I had from Rick that showed the locations of all the FOBs between Vance and Whiteman.
“We need to plan how we’re going to get to Whiteman. We know it’s not going to be as simple as driving straight through. With the roadblocks, rerouting, and refueling, we’ll be lucky if we can manage a hundred miles a day.” I opened the map and pointed to the FOB outside of Wichita. “This is the closest FOB between us and Whiteman. It’s just over one hundred miles away, and we know it’s defensible and big enough to house everyone overnight. And it’s remote enough that we shouldn’t draw unwanted attention while we’re there.”
“Defensible and it might have more fuel,” Sid said. “We’re going to need it.”
I nodded, glad I wasn’t the only one who was seeing the problem we faced.
“We should be able to reach it within four to six hours. How much fuel we use is going to depend on so many factors. Idle time…backtracking…you name it. We’ll have a better idea of how much fuel we’re going to need and how far we can push after we reach it.”
“Have we given any thought to using civilian vehicles instead of military ones?” Steve asked. “They’ll be more fuel efficient.”
“They would, but they’d also be less likely to make it through roadblocks.”
“How many vehicles are we looking at? Twenty-five? Thirty? That’s a long convoy for Molev to protect,” Katie said.
“Is one fueler going to be enough?” Roni asked.
Three hours later, we all agreed on the plan. While the others left to spread the word and start preparations, I hung back with Molev.
“How are you feeling?” I asked.
“Tired,” he admitted.
“Then, sleep. We’ll wake you up if the dummy stops working.”
* * *
The absenceof Molev’s arm around my middle woke me, and I opened my eyes in time to see him tug a clean shirt on in the dim light.
“Did you sleep enough?” I asked.
“I did. Rest. I will check the fences.”
I sat up and shook my head.
“Nope. If you’re up and moving around, so am I. There’s plenty for me to do.”
He didn’t argue with me, and we left the room together. The guard at the end of the hall nodded to us as we passed.
