Page 10 of Bait (After the End #2)

Chapter Five

The question was for Candela, but Torch answered.

“There are a couple hundred of us that were pushed out.” That didn’t add up to all the people who had disappeared, not accounting for deaths. There had been quite a few deaths and mysterious illnesses in the last few years, a lot more than normal.

“A lot of people they got rid of, like Gregorio,” Candela tells me, as if she can read my mind. I’ve had time to grieve for my brother, and I was able to see his body. But now that I know it wasn’t an accident, the wound I thought was healed felt raw once again.

“It started with Candela.” My stomach dropped when he said that. To think it was my actions that began all of this. God I was a monster.

“Was it because of…” I started to ask, but Candela cut me off.

“Don’t blame yourself, Brains.” She waved her hand like she wanted to shoo away my frown.

“The best thing that happened to us was getting pushed out of that place. And it wasn’t you.

” She said that now, but I could see the scars on her shoulders.

It could not have been easy. “A lot of lower levelers were staring to ask questions.” She ran her finger of the edge seat as she talked, her eyes unfocused.

“People were wondering if we were being told the truth. I think Becker was testing it with us, if he could just get rid of people who were ‘disruptive’.”

“Is your dad still alive?” I asked in a small voice.

“Alive and well,” she said with a grin. I let out a breath I’d probably been holding for the last ten years.

“The air was still iffy when we came out,” she shook her head like she wanted to dislodge whatever memory was in her head.

“Hell, it was more than iffy, it was foul, but they let us take one of those filtration masks we could share between us.” One mask for both of them when we had thousands.

Becker was a fucking monster. “But we managed, my dad was always good at the survivalist stuff.” Her dad had been a world-renowned geologist before The Burst. I’d heard stories of him living off the land for months at a time as part of his research.

At least Candela had him. “Becker let us bring our go-packs too, he always does. You’re the first one they sent out with nothing.

” That was not a surprise. He hated Gregorio and probably hated me too.

Everyone in the bunker had an assigned backpack that lived in their rooms. It was for the event of an evacuation and had enough water and supplies to keep us alive for a few days.

“We got lucky and found some folks who took us in. A lot of the peoples whose ancestral lands are in this area have come back and are trying to rebuild in the old ways. We made community with them. Dad’s still there.

He got himself a woman.” That made me grin.

Candela’s mother had passed away shortly after she was born, and he’d never remarried, despite probably being pressured by the council.

“Is there a town or does everyone live in trucks like this?” Torch coughed at that, and Candela laughed.

“No one else has a truck like this.” I liked seeing her cockiness.

It was something I’d always loved about Candela.

She was so confident. “There is a little township about two days’ drive where a lot of the bunker folks have settled.

” She lifted a hand and waved it in a “more or less” gesture.

“Pre-Burst times, it would’ve been more like ten hours, but roads are not as easy to navigate, and we stop to scavenge where we can.

It’s an old ski lodge. It’s high in the mountains close to where Flagstaff used to be. ”

“How long has it been safe to be outside?” I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answer.

“From what surface folks say, it’s been a good fifteen years now.

” Candela’s voice lost its usual lightness then.

It was right around the time they’d really ramped up the Population Revitalization Project, basically forcing women to be bred.

That was when they started cracking down on what we could read.

Access to electronics. I opened my mouth to ask if the council knew but decided to spare myself.

“Fuck.” That pretty much encompassed how I felt.

“There’s a whole lot our fearless bunker leaders never bothered to tell us, but we’ll enlighten you, Almita,” Candela said, before sending a fond glance at Torch, then winked at me before leaning back on her seat.

I wanted to ask more questions, but I didn’t want to be a nuisance, and in truth I had more than enough to keep my head spinning for a while.

Again, I wondered if Torch and Candela were an item.

They had to be something more than just friends.

They seemed to almost know what the other person was thinking.

And this place was very small. It could be they only were together when they travelled on the rig, but even that seemed like something they did as partners.

Maybe they were a couple, it’s not like they owed me an explanation of what they were to each other.

Instantly my mind was hijacked by an image of them together.

Candela naked on a bed while Torch kissed her small breasts, his fingers inside her pussy while she writhed on the mattress.

“Did you hear me, Alma?” I was so lost in my very inappropriate fantasies that I clearly hadn’t heard Torch the first time. He sounded like it might have been a couple times that he’d asked, and I’d ignored him.

“Sorry, what did you say?”

“We’re stopping soon to check out a spot where we might find some supplies.”

“There are still places where you can find loot?” It had been so long, I would’ve thought everything had been taken. Torch sent me a look that said, “do you ever ask non-asinine questions?” but he did answer.

“There’s some areas that were hidden by the ash but have cleared up recently. We go in and take a peek in case we find anything that is still usable.”

“Car parts or car maintenance stuff is especially useful.” I nodded at Candela’s words. That made sense. It was also exciting to get to explore a bit.

“No,” Torch snapped out. He actually turned around and glared at me.

What the hell was his problem? “You cannot go off on your own.” Could he read minds now?

“Stick by one of us and don’t do anything dumb.

” I stuck out my tongue, which he did not think was cute or funny.

Candela did, though, and her sexy grin made something very nice happen in my chest.

“What am I going to do?” Again, he just glared.

“Something like whatever you did to get pushed out of the bunker?” That was uncalled for.

“I was giving women suppressors to delay their cycle,” I told him defiantly, because despite everything, I was not sorry for that.

That seemed to knock the sails out of him. He actually looked a little embarrassed, if Mr. I’m Always Right could even feel that way. Then he went silent, his jaw clenched like he was even more pissed at me. But it was Candela who spoke.

“Holy hell, Brains. Were you trying to get yourself killed?” She seemed genuinely spooked. Torch looked like he wanted to tear the head off something.

“I wasn’t thinking about the risks so much.” Which wasn’t exactly true. I thought about them, just not enough to stop. “My mom showed me how to do it, and I did for as long as I could.”

“You were doing that while I was still inside?” Torch’s voice came out rough. I knew it was probably taking everything he had not to yell at me.

“I was.” Back then I was just starting, not that it made a difference to Torch.

“You need a keeper, Corvado.” That pissed me off. Because where did he even get off, when he’d left me to my own devices after Gregorio was killed.

“Are you offering Bernal?” I shot back, with all the sarcasm I could manage.

Torch didn’t react, but he did hit the breaks hard enough to jolt me in my seat.

Candela high-fived me and I sat back smugly.

Until I remembered the question I was going to ask.

“Do we just stop for the night, or do we have to find a place to hide the rig?” I assumed raiders could come for us easier while we slept.

“There’s a township in between the ski lodge and the bunker. We’ll stay there tonight. I knew it was useless to ask him for more details, so I didn’t. Candela would tell me if I asked, but I’d pestered her enough already.

We drove for a few more minutes in silence until we came up to a very small building with glass doors and floor-to-ceiling glass windows.

There was also a large awning that seemed to house some kind of pumping station.

I ran through my mental catalogue trying to identify it.

It was all white, and I couldn’t make out the sign. But the abandoned cars gave it away.

“An old gas station!” I called out, earning an approving grin from Candela—and a cold shoulder from Torch, but what else was new.

“Very good, Brains,” she said, high fiving me again. From where I was, it seemed like it had been cleaned out, but Torch pulled to a stop anyway.

“You can stay here,” Candela said when she saw my hesitation, but I shook my head and unlatched my seatbelt.

“No way, I want to see.” Torch made us wear our goggles and gave me a pistol.

He made a show of demonstrating how to undo the safety and how to holster it, like an ass.

I tore it from his hand and reminded him he’d taught me how to shoot when I was fifteen.

He still had me unlatch the safety twice before he let me get out.

“I know The Burst took out a lot of the population, but I didn’t think there wouldn’t be anyone around.

” The cracked road we were on spanned as far as the eye could see.

The colors of the chaparral blended with the blue of the sky in a striking manner, but the solitude was overwhelming.

After life in a place where there were always people, it was eerie to be the only ones around for miles.