Page 37 of Bailey

“This is going to take forever!” Mike yelled after a while. He was right. I looked at the packed hallway. By now, the cafeteria had to be pretty empty.

“Come on,” I say to Caleb and the man on my other side. I lead them around the building toward the cafeteria. After going through a dome opening in the building, we found ourselves inside a courtyard that the cafeteria opened out to. I looked through the windows as I passed the pagoda and saw that less than half of the zombies were gone. That was a good sign. I tried to open the door, but it was locked.

“Ok,” I said, looking at the floor-to-ceiling windows. “Let’s break a windowpane, and we can take them out as they come through. Then we can slowly work through the back of the pack.”

“Sounds good to me,” Caleb said.

I nodded to the other man, I think his name was Kyle or something, and he broke the window. As expected, the sound attracted the zombies inside, and they shifted toward us. Things were going good, really good. The amount funneling through was manageable for the three of us. That was until they broke through the windowpane that Kyle was standing closest to. They were on him before I could react, his screams echoing off the courtyard walls.

Caleb grabbed my hand, and we ran toward the pagoda. I didn’t need to turn around to know we were in trouble. We jumped onto the picnic table and pulled ourselves onto the pagoda. I looked down at the sea of zombies below us and then at Caleb.

“Well, this isn’t what we wanted,” I remarked.

“You fucking think?!” Caleb replied.

I gripped the boards as the pagoda shook from the zombies running into the poles repeatedly, my eyes widening.

“Please tell me you have a radio on you,” Caleb said.

I moved my hand to my back and felt the radio I had clipped there. “I have a radio,” I told him as I whipped it out to show him. I pressed the button and brought the radio up. “So… Caleb and I are in a little bit of a pickle… and we lost Kyle.”

“Where the fuck are you?” Pike yelled through the radio. He might be a little pissed.

“Go around the school toward the cafeteria, through the arch, and you’ll see us. We’re on top of the pagoda in the courtyard, but be careful. It’s swamped.”

“On our way, Honey Bee,” Boone replied.

I reclipped the radio just as the pagoda jolted harder. “Oof. Maybe we should move to the center to help this thing stay balanced,” I suggested.

“Go slow,” Caleb said as we moved toward the center. Once we were within touching distance, Caleb wrapped himself around me. The way he held me, I got the impression that if things went even further to shit, he would be tossing me as far away as possible. I hoped it didn’t come to that because I didn’t want to play the part of the human javelin.

The pagoda shook again, and this time the sound of cracking wood accompanied it. I looked nervously toward the arch in time to see Boone, Pike, and Ethan come running through, and they weren’t alone. Henry, Mike, and a few other men were hot on their heels and came packing. Mike started to lay down fire from the machine gun in his hands. Too bad we didn’t have him here initially. We might have been able to save Kyle. Henry, his other men, and Ethan went around the side to get some of the zombies to split from the group toward them, allowing Pike and Boone to get closer to the pagoda.

“Come on,” Pike yelled.

Caleb and I stood and carefully picked our way to the edge of the pagoda. Unfortunately, this compromised the pagoda even more, and I felt it start to lean with our weight.

“Get ready to jump!” Caleb yelled. I barely had time to nod before it started to tip, and he grabbed me and threw me off the pagoda into Boone’s waiting arms. Pike helped break Caleb’s fall as the entire thing finally tipped over, partially collapsing and trapping many of the zombies beneath it.

I didn’t have time to rest as Boone set me down, and I turned to fight off the zombies, still mobile. Close-quarter fighting with these monsters was par for the course, and we watched each other's backs as we killed off the rest of them. Once the living were the only things left moving in the courtyard, we rushed back to the front of the school to finish off the rest of the zombies.

We returned to Lowes, many finding somewhere to rest. Henry sent a group out to scout the rest of the town now that we knew it should be zombie-free. After sitting for a while, I went to clean up in the bathroom. I didn’t realize Boone and Pike had followed me until they entered the bathroom. They didn’t waste any time sandwiching me between them, and it didn’t take long for me to react to their adrenaline-fueled kisses and touches.

“That was too fucking close, Honey Bee,” Boone said between kisses.

“I don’t know if I want to spank you or handcuff myself to you so that you can’t get into any more trouble,” Pike growled.

“I don’t care what you do, just don’t stop,” I moaned. Seconds later, Pike left the bathroom, but Boone kept me distracted by his absence as he lifted me onto the bathroom counter.

“I don’t know what I would do if I lost you, Bailey,” Boone murmured against my neck. “I love you so much.”

I froze as the words fell from his lips. Love hadn’t been brought up since Gray mentioned it that one time. They loved me. Did I love them? I realized that I did. I wasn’t sure if it was a smart move, but I couldn’t deny my feelings for them anymore.

“I love you, too. I love all of you,” I admitted. Boone stilled as he leaned back to search my eyes with his own.

“You mean that.” It wasn’t a question. He saw the truth in my eyes and was surprised.

“I do.”

Source: www.allfreenovel.com