How the White Trash Zombie Got Her Groove Back

Chapter 32

This is what my life has become. Stuffed into the bottom of a garbage bin.

It was a clean one, at least, and pretty darn roomy, for a garbage bin. Pierce and Brian had muttered stuff about specs and load capacity and two cubic yards, blah blah. About three feet deep with a footprint a smidge smaller than a hospital bed, it was basically a big ass blue industrial plastic mini-dumpster on wheels.

I’d been curled up inside of it for the last few minutes, or ever since we crossed the river heading into midtown Manhattan toward Saberton’s headquarters. The not-bad part was Brian curled up inside it as well. Spooning me, in fact, which I couldn’t help enjoying on a primitive physical level even though I considered Brian to be in the special category reserved for Best Friends and Big Brothers.

In turn, I spooned a blanket-covered selection of tools we figured might come in handy, and, for a slightly lumpy pillow, I had an insulated lunch box containing a few baggies of diced brains, since we were down to only three packets remaining from the lab. Maybe it’s a good thing Philip had to stay behind with Dr. Nikas, I mused. Philip was a pretty big guy, and I had a hard time imagining him and Brian cuddled up in the dumpster.

“Entering the garage now, folks,” Pierce said, interrupting my mental wanderings, which was probably a damn good thing considering the direction they were headed. I felt the van turn, and then some bumps, followed by a sense of going down a slight incline. “We have our plan, but everyone needs to keep their senses sharp,” he continued. “Anything could change at any time.”

The van backed up, stopped, and the engine died. Brian shifted positions behind me slightly, and I bit down on an insane need to giggle.

“What’s wrong?” Brian whispered.

“You’re poking me in the butt!”

He made a strangled sound, and I couldn’t tell if it was laughter or exasperation. Possibly both. “It’s my gun. Sorry.”

I clamped both hands over my mouth and shook with laughter.

“Not that kind of gun, you dork!”

The back doors of the van opened, and I quickly got myself under control.

“I’ll take care of this myself, sir.” That was Pierce’s voice. We were inside Saberton walls, which meant we were probably under surveillance already.

“Thank you, Gentry,” Andrew replied. He sounded tired and stressed but holding it together.

“Can’t let anything happen to the goods,” Pierce said, surprising me with a sharp yank on the bin. For an instant I thought we were going to tumble out of the back of the van and onto the ground, but instead I felt only a rough bump.

The loading dock, I realized as I did my best to relax again.

“Close your eyes and go limp,” Brian said very softly in my ear. “Someone could open the bin to check at any time.”

Right. Play tranqed. I obediently closed my eyes and went as limp as possible. It helped that Brian had moved the gun.

I heard a jingle of keys followed by a beep and a door opening. Andrew using his fob to activate the latch, I decided.

The cart moved through the door. “Morning, Ferguson,” Andrew said after a moment, as if he’d simply been out for a stroll—plausible since we figured that only Nicole and her Special Security Team would know Andrew was missing. After all, the bastards didn’t want cops snooping around.

“Morning, Mr. Saber.”

Another set of doors, a long roll, then the beep and ding of an elevator. Bump-bump going in, then silence while the car descended. According to Andrew, they’d converted old maintenance offices into a temporary holding area. Nothing fancy, but serviceable—a secure door to a corridor with a half dozen rooms, and a closed camera system to monitor a few makeshift cells.

“I’ll take care of the retina scan, Gentry,” Andrew said as the elevator doors opened.

“Yes, sir.”

I kept my eyes closed, barely daring to breathe as the cart moved. Things beeped, and a heavy door swung open with a slow metallic creak. I heard a scrape of metal on plastic, then a pop that was Pierce jamming the latch to make sure we couldn’t be locked in, and I only knew that because he’d told me he was going to do so.

A couple of seconds later we passed through. The air smelled different in here, antiseptic and rotten, along with something else that made my hair stand on end.

“Mr. Saber! Gentry!” A scrape of boot on linoleum was most likely a guard near the door. “I didn’t know you’d returned.”

“Now you know,” Pierce replied, tone hard and clipped. “Has the older Ivanov specimen been recaptured?”

“Not yet,” the guard replied. “No fucking leads either.”

“Are Marcus Ivanov and,” disgust filled Pierce’s voice, “Griffin secure?”

“Locked down tight.” The guard gave a sharp and nasty laugh. “Griffin’s been getting a lesson in loyalty. Ms. Saber’s orders. And, with the Dallas lab tech here, it’s been pretty entertaining.”

Brian tensed behind me while I trembled. Holy shit, did I ever want to leap out of the bin and tear off the ugly smile I heard in this guard’s voice.

“I have two more,” Pierce said with a note of triumph. I forced myself limp again as he pulled the hinged bin lid up and let it fall open with a loud plastic clatter. “Crawford and Archer. But we have a change of plans. We’re moving them all out of here. With Pietro Ivanov on the loose, and no clue how he got out, we can’t risk him returning to free Griffin and his nephew. Mr. Saber, you can arrange the plane to Dallas?”

Andrew cleared his throat. “Yes. Of course.”

“Thank you, sir,” Pierce said and pushed the cart farther along. “I’ll check the condition of the specimens and prepare them to move.”

“After yesterday’s bullshit in the conference room, this one got his arms broken and no brains,” a different guard said as the cart came to a stop. I carefully opened my eyes a thin crack and peered through my lashes, relieved that it was enough to allow me to see nearby people over the lip of the dumpster. A brawny, bald guard stood in front of Pierce. “He’s chained up now, and a rotting mess,” he added without a trace of compassion in his voice as he nodded toward the door beside him. “Griffin’s another story.” His smile widened, cruel and vicious. “The tech tested some new shit on him that supposedly keeps them aware and slows the rot when they get injured and hungry. It worked like a fucking charm.”

Brian’s hand curled into a fist against my back. I bit the inside of my cheek, quivering with rage.

A small frown crossed Andrew’s face. “I hope my mother is taking care not to do irreparable damage. They’re useless as test subjects if they become unstable, like Philip Reinhardt.”

I held back a growl with effort. Fuck you too, Andy.

“Bring out whatever brains we have left,” Pierce ordered. “We’re going to need to get them into shape to move.”

“Yes, sir.”

As the guard stepped out of my thin field of vision, Pierce dropped a quick glance down and gave us a very slight Not Yet head shake. I fought to look limp and tranqed, and focused on running through the plan in my head. At Brian’s signal I was to leap out with him right behind me, then he’d get through the door, mod up, and kick some serious ass. The effect of the mods didn’t last very long, so activating it before the time was right would only waste it.

The bald guard returned with a Ziploc freezer bag, presumably containing brains. He handed it to Pierce then turned at the sound of the entrance door swinging open.

“Yes, ma’am.” It was the head of security, Thea Braddock, and it sounded as if she was talking on the phone. “I’d just gone off duty when I heard. I came back to check it out.” A pause. “Crawford and Archer, or so I’ve just been told, ma’am,” she continued. “I’ll call you back as soon as I know more.”

Shit shit shit shit. She was on the phone with Nicole Fucking Saber.

Approaching footsteps. “Good to have you back safe and sound, Mr. Saber,” Braddock said, sounding genuinely pleased that he’d returned. “Gentry? You’re the one who got him back?”

Pierce offered a tight-lipped smile. Having Braddock show up complicated things that much more. “Yes, ma’am. And took down these two as well,” he said, flicking fingers toward us. “Lost Reinhardt and Comtesse though.”

Braddock peered into the bin and gave a low whistle of appreciation. She wore an emerald green hoody, a bag strap over one shoulder, and a hospital-blue sling supporting the arm Philip had injured. “Solid work, Gentry,” she said. “I need to call Ms. Saber back and let her know it’s confirmed. She’s on her way in now.”

“Leave off calling her for the moment, please, Thea,” Andrew put in quickly. “With Pietro Ivanov in the wind, we can’t risk staying in New York. This section wasn’t meant to be anything more than a temporary holding place for specimens.” He made a noise of aggravation. “I’m shocked the other two haven’t escaped as well, considering how quickly this floor was refitted for this purpose. We’re moving the lot to the airport for transfer to Dallas. No one escapes from there.”

Braddock looked briefly pained. “Yes, sir. I understand your concerns regarding the security of this section, but I don’t know if Ms. Saber will support that decision.”

“She won’t,” Andrew said tightly. “But it’s the right move in order to maintain security. I’ll make sure she understands.”

Pierce turned away, murmured to Baldy to open the door beside us.

“Yes, sir,” Braddock said. “However, I still need to call her with an update.”

She wrinkled her nose as a choking wave of rot smell poured out of the open door. A gurgling yowl and the rattling of chains followed it.

Marcus! I stiffened, and only Brian’s hand tight on the back of my jacket kept me from leaping up to see him. Braddock’s gaze went beyond Andrew and into the room. She took a half step back, face suddenly ashen, and for a second I thought she was going to hurl. Had she never seen Saberton’s loving care of zombies?

“Of course I understand she needs to be told,” Andrew was saying. “I’m making the call to Dallas to coordinate transport, but it’s easier on everyone for me to wait and tell my mother face to face. You know that.”

Yes, please, get Nicole in my grasp again, I seethed.

But Braddock wasn’t listening to Andrew anymore. She stared into the room, her entire focus locked on its rotting occupant.

“Braddock!” Andrew snapped to get her attention. “Why are you down here anyway? You shouldn’t be in this far.” It was obvious he wasn’t at all happy that Thea Braddock was witness to what happened behind these closed doors.

“No, sir. I mean, yes, sir,” she replied, voice taut. “I had to come down when I heard the report that you were back.”

“You know my mother,” he said. “You do understand that it’s best I inform her of this move in person, yes?”

She didn’t immediately answer. Her gaze tracked from the doorway, down to Brian and me, then back to Andrew. “Yes, sir. I do,” she finally said. The unspoken “but” hung between them. She had questions. Her instincts told her something was seriously off. Maybe she was wondering why Pierce or Andrew hadn’t called ahead to let them know they were coming in with prisoners. Or maybe Pierce’s mannerisms didn’t match the Pierce Gentry she knew. Whatever it was, the seed of suspicion was getting a whole lot of fertilizer.

“I respect your opinion, sir,” Braddock said as she took a step back and out of my view. “But it’s my duty to notify Ms. Saber.” I heard the soft beep of a phone.

I didn’t need Brian’s quick double-hand squeeze to let me know it was time to move. Baring my teeth in a snarl, I surged up and vaulted out, though far less gracefully than I’d hoped, which turned my dash to Marcus’s door into more of a stagger. Brian was right on my heels, but none of us had considered the instability of the bin. Brian’s weight had stabilized it for my exit, but he didn’t have that advantage. The instant he came over the side the whole thing tipped to throw him off balance, then slammed back to the floor as his weight shifted off it.

Brian recovered in a zombie-speed flash, but Braddock had solid instincts and damn good reflexes. She had her gun half out of her purse even as the dumpster slammed back down. No doubt realizing Brian was the bigger threat—and apparently well aware it was pointless to tell a zombie, “Stop or I’ll shoot!”—she brought bag and all to bear on him and fired twice.

I yelped and ducked as the sound of the gunshots slammed through the corridor. Brian staggered back against the wall as both rounds hit him center chest. Fortunately for him, that was the best place to get hit, considering his body armor, though I had to give an instant of mad respect for Braddock’s shooting skill, especially with the purse in the way.

“Angel! Take care of Marcus!” Pierce tossed me the bag of brains, and the instant it left his hands he pulled a knife, spun, and sliced Baldy’s throat open in a spray of blood.

As I caught the bag, the guard gurgled, clutched at his throat, and crumpled. Braddock got off another shot that seared a line across Pierce’s shoulder, but he retaliated with zombie speed and stepped into a vicious side kick directly on her injured arm. She let out a choked cry as she crashed back into a partially open door then tumbled out of sight into an unlit room.

Down the corridor past Brian, the first guard grabbed his tranq gun and pointed it our way. I heard a dart skitter off the wall as I turned toward Marcus’s open cell door. The guard fired again, and I distantly heard the thuk sound of a dart hitting flesh and Brian’s grunt of pain. On my other side, as if from far away, I heard Andrew curse then saw him bolt toward the opposite end of the corridor and the exit door. But the instant I took in the sight of Marcus everything else seemed to retreat.

Marcus stood chained to the wall like a storybook ogre—naked, shackles at wrists, ankles, neck, and another chain wrapped around his waist. His arms were bent at odd angles and seemed to have too many joints. Rotted flesh peeled away from bones where the chains bit into him, and black blood dripped from a deep gash in his thigh. His breath came in ugly, wet rattles, and drool streamed from the corner of his mouth to string over his chest.

Eyes wild with hunger, he lunged at me a with wailing scream that sliced right through my core, then slammed to an ugly, flesh-shredding stop at the limit of his chains.

“Angel. Angel!” That was Pierce. “Get Andrew!” he shouted as he sprang toward the tranq wielding guard.

Cursing, I tossed the open bag of brains to Marcus, pausing only long enough to make sure he caught it before I pushed off into a sprint to chase down Andrew. Behind me I heard Marcus’s growl and the squish slurp of him devouring brains.

I tackled Andrew before he made it to the door, then hauled him right back up with the idea of using him as a handy dandy human shield. Pierce dropped the other guard and turned our way, even as Braddock emerged from the room and ran at me, gun in hand and face twisted in pain and determination. A stupid little squeal slipped out of me at the sight of the security chief charging in my direction, and I thrust Andrew at her as hard as I could.

Braddock caught Andrew and staggered back a couple of steps which gave me all the time I needed to dash past her. She lifted her gun again, but I dodged to the other side of the blue mini-dumpster and shoved it at her to knock her off balance.

“I have this,” Pierce said as Andrew went sprawling. “Check on Kyle.” He gestured to the next door as he slapped our last three brain packets into my hand, then shifted his attention to Braddock and Andrew.

Hands shaking from adrenaline, I yanked a blood-drenched ring of keys from Baldy’s belt and got Kyle’s door open. I steeled myself for a sight similar to Marcus: broken, twisted, rotting, mindless, and slavering—

It was a thousand times worse.

Head lowered, Kyle crouched against the wall, naked and covered with areas of deep rot that showed bone and organs in places. Only one chain around his waist held him, and it took me a hideous second to process that his wrists weren’t shackled because his hands had been cut off. He lifted his head, eyes full of fury and agony, and I received a second vicious shock as I saw what was left of his face. No lower jaw or tongue—nothing but a gaping and ragged hole. He breathed in wet gurgles, blood bubbling from his throat with each exhalation.

My reeling mind fought to make sense of the scene before me. With that much rot Kyle should’ve been mindless and hunger-crazed, yet his eyes reflected full awareness of me and his agony.

Realization shot through me. The new drug. The first guard said they’d used a new drug on him that slowed rot and kept him aware.

Kyle’s gaze tore from mine and went to my left. I followed it to where a large metal bowl containing red and brown lumps rested in the corner.

No. Containing his hands and jaw and tongue.

A white hot scream of rage tore from my throat. I grabbed the bowl and ran to him. “Fuck. Fuck them. These fucking assholes.” I seized the severed jaw first, ripped open a packet with my teeth. No way would three packets—or even all the brains we had with us—be enough to fix this. “Oh, Jesus fuck, Kyle.” He wouldn’t be able to eat the brains properly, I realized, and so I squeezed the paste out onto the exposed flesh of the jaw, then set it against his face as best I could. “Hold still,” I said as a heavy shudder went through him, but once it passed he held himself motionless, eyes blazing with hatred and anger that I knew wasn’t directed at me. My hands shook as I squeezed the rest of that packet and a second one into his mouth and throat, but fortunately the parasite seemed to know its business. Within seconds the jaw shifted in my hands as the tendons and muscle began to knit together to pull the bone into place.

As soon as I knew his jaw wouldn’t fall off, I grabbed up one of his hands, ripped open the third packet and squeezed more brain paste out onto the stump of his forearm and the severed hand. I caught myself right before sticking the right hand onto the left arm. That would’ve been a bit embarrassing. I hurriedly grabbed up the other, brain-pasted it, and put left hand to left arm then flicked a glance up to his face. To my relief his jaw continued to adjust and knit back in place, though it sagged open still.

“I’ll be right back,” I said once I knew his hands weren’t going to fall off. I darted out of the cell in time to see Andrew face down on the floor with his wrists zip-tied behind him, and Pierce bodily shoving Braddock into the room next to Marcus’s.

“Remember that and come over to the dark side sometime,” Pierce said to the security chief as he slammed the door closed and locked it. I didn’t waste time trying to figure out what that was supposed to mean and instead grabbed the lunch box of brains from the bin and raced back into Kyle’s room.

His hands and jaw hadn’t fallen off in the few seconds I was gone, but he let out a heart-wrenching cry of pain. I bit off a corner of the baggie and squeezed diced brains into his mouth, relieved to see his tongue move sluggishly to help him swallow, though his hands didn’t seem to be functioning yet.

From the corridor, I heard the crackle of a radio.

“Rutledge,” said a voice I recognized as Edwards. “What’s your status down there?”

“Mr. Saber and Gentry are in with the guests,” Pierce answered in a gruff voice convincingly close enough to Baldy’s to send a shiver through me.

“Davis and Gordon are running late, but should be here in five. You got anywhere you need to be?”

“I’m good. Checking new guests into the hotel. I’d pay for the privilege.”

“Roger that. I’ll be down to tuck them in later.”

Kyle shifted. “Hate . . . them,” he gurgled, deep anger boiling in his eyes.

“You and me both, dude,” I muttered, hands shaking with my own fury. While he swallowed brains, I tried keys from the guard’s ring until I found the one that opened the padlock on the chain.

I turned sharply at a clatter behind me. It was Pierce, pushing the mini-dumpster through the door. His eyes flicked from Kyle’s jaw to his hands to the bloody bowl, and rage tightened his face as he drew the correct conclusion.

Kyle sucked in a wet breath at the sight of Pierce. “An . . . gel.” Even through the gurgle I heard the alarm and warning in his voice.

Oh, right, he didn’t know about Pietro/Pierce. “It’s okay,” I assured Kyle. “He’s an ally. I promise. I’ll explain later, but right now we need to get the fuck out of here.”

Kyle growled low but didn’t resist when Pierce slid his arms beneath him, lifted him gently and placed him in the bin with the tranqed Brian and messed up Marcus. I peered in, disturbed to see Marcus lying with his head lolling and eyes glassy. After eating the bag of brains he should have been better off, more responsive. “Marcus?”

Pierce answered instead. “He was coming out of the hunger craze then went down. Most likely due to whatever they drugged him with earlier.” He placed a hand on Marcus’s shoulder. “He seems stable for now.”

“Stable” didn’t do much to ease my worry.

The radio crackled again.

“Jenkins. Ms. Saber just got here and says she can’t get Mr. Saber, Ms. Braddock, or Gentry via phone. Who’s still down there with you?”

Pierce shook his head. “Can’t fake Jenkins. We’re out of time.”

“Jenkins, do you copy?” A pause. “Rutledge.” Another pause. “Gentry.”

“Best for me not to answer. That way I can surprise them.”

“How many more guards are between us and The Fuck Out Of Here?” I asked Pierce.

“Eleven to fourteen if they stick with the Special Security Team,” he said grimly as he pushed the bin into the hallway and started down the corridor toward the exit. “Grab him,” he angled his head toward Andrew, “and then we can get out of this deathtrap area, collect the package, and reassess.”

“Package?” I gave him a puzzled look.

He tapped his chest and gave me a knowing look. Oh. Gentry’s body. The original Gentry, the one now missing a brain.

I hauled Andrew up to his feet. “You promised to let me go,” he said with an accusing glare at Pierce.

“You promised to see this through, and last thing I remember is you bolting,” Pierce said. “Now would be a bad time to get me thinking about altering the terms of our agreement.”

Andrew fell silent and didn’t resist as I hustled him after Pierce. As soon as we were past the security door, Pierce and I both breathed a sigh of relief. Even though we still had a long way to go, being pinned in the Torture Zone would’ve been the worst case scenario.

A bank of overly bright fluorescent lights lit the concrete-walled area beyond the door. It was as if they’d tried—and failed miserably—to create a sense of sunlight underground. I turned a quick circle to get my bearings and found no noteworthy features other than an elevator and four doors: the one we’d come through, one marked Maintenance, one marked Electrical Room, and the stairwell.

Pierce called the elevator then blocked the doors open with the bin when it arrived. I sat Andrew down in front of the bin and gave him a Don’t you fucking dare move look.

“Stairwell door,” I said, “Need to block it too.”

Pierce frowned. “I’ll dismantle the lock on this side. That should slow them down a few minutes, at least.” He dug a big screwdriver out of the bin and proceeded to destroy the lock control panel, then leaned into the elevator as if listening.

“Got any change?” I asked as I scowled at the stairwell door. “Coins, I mean.”

He looked at me blankly, then nodded in understanding. He quickly rifled through Andrew’s pockets, and came up with enough coins for me to penny the door. A couple of stacks of coins wedged high and low between the door and frame would jam it shut. In theory at least. It was a long shot, but it had sure as hell worked on Sissy Collard’s bathroom door during a junior high prank involving a big ass spider in the sink and a rubber snake by the toilet.

“Good thinking, Angel,” Pierce said with an approving nod as I prepped the coins. “I’ll get the package.” He lifted the lid of the mini-dumpster, reached in, and pulled out the body bag, then headed toward the door marked Maintenance. “Back in a minute.”

“Got it,” I said, and by the time the coins were wedged in place Pierce was back, with the loaded bag slung over his shoulder.

Andrew stared. “Who the fuck is that?”

I ignored him and peered into the bin. “Hey guys, got a body coming in. Sorry.” Kyle shifted to sit up and gave me a weak nod. He’d made an effort to pull the blanket over his crotch, but his hands were still too weak to untangle the blanket from the tools and bodies. Keeping my expression even and clinical, I reached in and tugged the blanket up for him. I couldn’t do much else for him, but I could at least give him a little fucking dignity. Marcus groaned, stacked on top of the still-tranqed Brian. Worried, I stroked a hand over his hair, then helped Pierce get everyone rearranged, with the corpse at the bottom beneath Kyle.

“We only have one way out,” I said to Pierce after we closed the dumpster lid. My heart pounded as the weight of the situation hit me. “We lost Brian, and we can’t just walk out with Andrew now.”

“They still don’t know what they’re dealing with.” He turned intense, calm eyes on me. “For now, we wait. A team will be on the way to check out why no one’s responding. They’ll run into a stuck elevator and blocked stairwell and realize shit’s fucked up. Based on how they respond, we make our plan. They’re fucked if they try one at a time through the elevator hatch. Stairwell is a better option, but ambush outside the elevator upstairs is what I’d do.”

Oh, great. Ambush. That made me feel SO much better.

A dull thud and muffled voices came from the stairwell door. I spun to face it, tense, and twitched at another thud.

“It’s holding for now,” Pierce said from behind me.

A face appeared in the little window in the door, then the man’s eyes widened, and he ducked down. More muffled voices.

I glanced back to see Pierce lowering the gun he’d pointed at the window. “Now they know what they’re dealing with,” he said as he pulled out his phone. How the hell could he be so calm? “We have a few minutes while they scramble,” he continued. “I’ll call Dr. Nikas to give a sit rep.”

I gave him a blank look. “A what?”

“Situation report,” he clarified. “Dr. Nikas and Reinhardt need to know our status and might have some new info.”

“Oh, right, gotcha.” I moved over to the sullen-faced Andrew and crouched just inside his personal space. “Did you see what they did to Kyle?”

A muscle in his jaw twitched, and he gave me a slight nod. He didn’t look away, though a faint flush of what I sure fucking hoped was shame crept up his neck. Behind me I caught bits and pieces of Pierce’s conversation with Dr. Nikas.

“No, he’s out. Tranqed . . . No antidote that I could find . . . Right. Got it . . . Marcus is barely under control, and I think they gave him something as well. Weaker than he should be . . . No, Brian never got to use it . . . Right. All three syringes should still be on him . . . Yes, of course . . . No, it would take too long for him to get here . . . Griffin . . . Griffin’s in very bad shape.”

I kept my gaze locked on Andrew. “You’re okay with that sort of thing?”

His flush continued to rise, but along with it came that damn defensive wall I’d seen before. He lifted his chin arrogantly. “It was a foolish move, given the circumstances.”

“A foolish move,” I repeated, almost as disgusted by his need to be superior as by his choice of words. Behind him I saw the lid of the bin lift and an arm snake out, a red line around the wrist that had yet to fully heal. The fingers moved in jerks, still not fully functional, but they worked well enough to grip Andrew’s hair.

I kept my face impassive as Andrew let out a strangled cry of horror and tried to scramble to his feet.

“Fooooolish,” Kyle rasped, using his hold on Andrew as leverage to haul himself up and partially out of the bin. Andrew twisted, squealing like a kid in a carnival haunted house, but with his hands secured behind him he couldn’t pull free. I stood and shifted back a couple of feet to avoid getting kicked by Andrew’s scrabbling feet, and bit my tongue to keep from laughing.

“Foooolish,” Kyle breathed, wet and burbly, and pulled his face close to Andrew’s. His stench rolled over me as blood and ichor dripped from his mouth and onto Andrew’s neck. “I . . . am feeling . . . foolish.” He shifted closer, and Andrew screamed. I almost felt sorry for Andrew, since this had to seem like a scene from a horror movie. Almost sorry. Okay, not really.

Then again, in the next instant, I saw he had a real reason to scream. Kyle had his teeth clamped on Andrew’s ear and probably the only reason he hadn’t bitten it off yet was the weakness of his jaw.

“Kyle, he’s Naomi’s brother,” I said mildly. “Take it easy, for her sake.”

Kyle loosened the bite, and I noted that the top half of Andrew’s ear already hung oddly and dribbled blood. “No promises,” he growled, but he released Andrew with a shove before flopping back into the bin.

Pierce hung up behind me. If he’d noticed the altercation, he’d seen no reason to intervene. “I’ll get the mod syringes off Brian.” As he spoke he pulled a second phone from his pocket. “Mine,” he said as he handed it to me, and I realized he meant Gentry’s. “Try calling Saber. Stall her or make a deal for him.” He gestured toward Andrew without looking at him. “Do what you can.”

“Got it.” I turned on the phone then started scrolling through Gentry’s contacts, somewhat surprised that there were only a dozen or so and none for Nicole Saber. I opened my mouth to ask Andrew for his mother’s number, then closed it as I saw a contact with the name CEOILF.

CEO I’d Like to Fuck? No way.

I quickly checked the text messages between Gentry and CEOILF. “Ohhhhhh myyyyyyy goddddddddddd!”

Pierce turned sharply, in the process of lifting the still unconscious Brian. “What? What’s wrong?”

“Dude! You were banging Nicole!”

Andrew jerked in shock. “What?”

Pierce almost dropped Brian back into the bin, denial in his eyes before he remembered he had to play Gentry in front of Andrew. He nodded once, tense. “Right. More info that way,” he said, improvising quickly. “And she was hot for it.”

Grinning, I skimmed through the texts, then checked Gentry’s pics on a whim. “Oh, dude! Pics and all! In the front lobby?” I looked back up at Pierce. “You animal!”

“Just doing my job.” He gave me an exasperated glare that Andrew couldn’t see and continued to search Brian for the syringes. Andrew simply looked horrified.

I was more than happy to twist this particular knife, especially since the taunting was a healthier way to channel my anger and fear than, say, punching him in the nose. “Oh, snap! A crotch shot!” I crowed to Andrew. “You came out of there!” His mouth worked soundlessly, flush deepening to crimson.

“Angel,” Pierce growled softly.

“Oh, right. The call. Sorry.” I’d give Pierce shit later about how his persona’s penis had been in Nicole Saber.

I returned to the contact list and dialed her number. Time to channel some more stress and worry into a bit of trash-talking. Luckily, I was damn good at that sort of thing.

She picked up on the second ring. “Pierce. You fucking asshole. What the hell is going on?”

Sounded like she’d heard the news Gentry had switched sides, and was appropriately freaked that her loverboy had duped her. Good. As much as I wanted to fuck with Andrew for not opposing the shit Kyle and Marcus went through, I wanted Nicole to fucking suffer for being responsible for it in the first place. “Nikki, darling!” I trilled. “It’s been so long, sweetie. We have got to get together for coffee someday soon!” I began to gloat about the naughty pics, then stopped. I’d save those for a special occasion.

“Crawford.” She snarled my name, managing to pack disdain and disgust into the one word. “What do you want?”

“Ooh! A pony? I’ve always wanted a pony!” I gushed, getting into the spirit of it. “Or, if I can’t have that, then maybe you can clear a passage for us, and in return I won’t eat your darlin’ son’s brain.” I covered the mouthpiece and spoke in a stage whisper to Andrew, “Don’t worry, I won’t eat your brain.” I paused and grinned. “I’ll let Kyle eat it!”

He glared but cast a fear-filled glance toward the bin. His bitten ear still trickled blood down the side of his neck.

Nicole remained quiet for a moment. “Agreed,” she finally said with icy calm. “Bring him up, and we’ll escort you out.”

“What about my pony?” I asked brightly. Since she had zero reason to believe otherwise, Nicole surely assumed that Gentry-the-traitor was human. She thought she was dealing “only” with zombie-me and human-Gentry. Not to mention, she figured we’d be dragging butt as we wrangled a bunch of out-of-commission zombies.

“You’ll have to wait on that one,” she replied, voice still cool though a bit stiff.

“Darn it! Santa says the same thing.” I heaved a tragic sigh. “Thing is, Nikki, honey, I don’t have a lot of faith that you’re really going to let us out of here.”

Pierce straightened with what looked like a slim waist pack in his hand, then got all three zombies arranged in the bin as comfortably as possible before he closed the lid.

“I can’t afford to lose Andrew,” Nicole replied, loading her voice with resignation and a touch of anger. “I’ll play your game.”

She was a good manipulator, but I had her pegged. I covered the mouthpiece again. “Hey, Andy, she says she can’t afford to lose you. Am I correct in assuming she’s full of shit?”

He lifted his eyes to mine, and I saw behind his wall of arrogance, to the pain and despair that came with being a pawn in a brutal game. Welcome to the fucking club, I thought.

“She can’t afford to lose me,” he said. “But right now she can’t afford to lose you people even more.” He let out a shaky breath, eyes bleak. “She’d rather win with me dead than lose with me alive.”

In that moment I actually felt a glimmer of sympathy toward him. To survive, he had no choice but to accept enemies as allies.

“Sorry, dude,” I said quietly, meaning it. I uncovered the phone. “Hey, Nikki, honey, about this whole playing-my-game thing. See, I think you’re chock full of shit. And Botox too.”

“You little piece of worthless trash,” she hissed. “Bring Andrew up, and you go free. Otherwise, you’ll force me to take radical action.”

“Hey, can my pony be white with brown spots?” I asked, but she’d already hung up on me. I tsked. “Jeez, rude much?”

“Angel, I have the mods,” Pierce said.

I closed the phone and stuffed it into a pocket. “Cool. You need me to help you inject them?”

He shook his head. “I can’t use them. They’re not designed for my . . .mature physiology.” He lifted the waist pack he’d pulled from Brian. “But you can.”

I blinked stupidly at him. “I don’t have a port.”

“There weren’t any ports when we first began using mods,” he told me. “It’ll be a raw surge, and it won’t last as long, but it will work.”

“But . . .” I gulped. “I’m not a trained soldier operative martial artist ninja. I’m a scrawny lightweight. What the hell will this SuperMod do for me? Make me snarkier?”

A thud from the top of the elevator pulled our attention. Scowling, I jumped atop the bin, reached up and banged my fist on the emergency hatch. “BACK OFF, ASSHOLE,” I yelled. “I’M HUNGRY, AND YOU’RE ABOUT TO BE MY HAPPY MEAL!”

Silence reigned. Satisfied, I jumped back off the bin and returned to where Pierce regarded me with a bemused look on his face. “Okay, fine, so I get turbocharged. How does this work without a port? Do I eat it?”

“Stomach acid would destroy it,” Pierce said. “For maximum effectiveness, it needs to be injected directly into the abdominal cavity.” He pulled a folding knife and flicked it open. “It’s similar to what you did to yourself when you stored brain reserves in your abdomen.”

“Great,” I said with a grimace. When my dad had been taken hostage I’d traded myself for him, but my ace in the hole had been brains packed in sausage casings and stuffed into my gut. “That shit was loads of fun.”

“It will be a much smaller cut,” he promised.

“You’re giving me this mod so I can take out any guards we run into, right?” Take out. Nicer and easier way to say kill. A shiver crawled through me.

His eyes met mine. “Yes,” he said with an evenness that told me he understood my angst and didn’t find it odd or misplaced. “War isn’t pretty. Ever. Nicole Saber has declared war on our kind and will move heaven and earth to keep us from making good our escape. Her Special Security Team will be well armed and, with only two of us functional, we’ll need as much speed and strength as possible.”

“Wouldn’t using guns be better than jumping their asses?”

“Guns have their place,” he said, “but in some situations, especially close quarters, we waste our zombie edge if we stand off and shoot. We can take damage humans can’t, which gives us a psychological advantage when we’re in their face, kicking ass despite their weapons.”

“Got it,” I said, grateful that he’d bothered to talk this out with me. Then again, this probably wasn’t the first time he’d given a soldier a pep talk right before a pitched battle.

A scrape of metal made us both look toward the stairwell again. “Shit,” I said. “They’re trying to flush us. Let’s fucking oblige and get this done.”

“Lift your shirt,” he instructed, then went on one knee before me as I obeyed “I’ll make the cut and insert the syringe but won’t inject. Once you press the plunger, it’ll take a few seconds to kick in, then you’ll have two to three minutes at the most before you lose the effect.” He glanced up at me. “It’ll probably be best to hit the mod right before the elevator stops.”

I licked dry lips. “Sure thing. Sounds like a great plan.”

“Put the other mods in your pocket,” he said as opened the waist pack. Within it were three enormous stainless steel syringes, much like the kind used to marinate meat and hefty enough to deliver a load of the thick SuperMod goop. I took two and dropped them into the side pocket of my pants, heart already beginning to race in anticipation and dread. “Once I’ve made the cut I’ll give you the knife so that you can administer the other doses if needed.”

“Got it. I’m totally ready,” I lied.

Either he believed me or it didn’t matter to him. He set the point of the knife halfway between my belly button and my sternum then, without a lick of warning, drove the two-inch blade in to the hilt. I gasped and stiffened at the sharp burn of pain, then clenched my teeth as he pulled the knife to make the gash wider.

“Almost there,” he murmured. He removed the knife and slipped the first syringe into the gash until only half its length and the plunger protruded. “Hold that there.”

As soon as I had it, Pierce moved to Andrew and hauled him to his feet.

“I’m cutting the zipties,” he growled, “but if you fuck with me again or try to run, our agreement is null, and your ass is mine. Understood?”

Andrew gave a tight nod. “Understood.”

Pierce pulled a much larger knife from a sheath on his belt—the same knife he’d used to kill the two guards in the holding area. “Good deal. I suggest you take cover behind the bin when the shooting starts.”

Andrew paled, but he nodded again.

Pierce lifted his chin. “Let’s roll.”