Page 136 of Into the Mist (Into the Mist 1)

Ford nodded. “Right. We’ll cut through the neighborhoods that frame the street. Stay close.”

The neighborhoods that flanked B Street were deserted, dark, and utterly silent. Ford, with Mercury beside him, led them through yards and across alleys as they wound around privacy fences and avoided anything that appeared to be a major street.

They found dead bodies. A lot of dead bodies, deflated and with their fluids drained away to leave limp sacks of fetid skin and clothes. Ford grabbed Mercury’s arm and pulled her back just before her boot sank into the flattened gut of what used to be a man. She had to press her hand against her mouth to keep from screaming.

The wind picked up as they got closer to the edge of town. It was cold, but not freezing, though the scent of rain was on the breeze. Finally, the houses gave way to scrub and a few ramshackle trailers. On their right was what looked like a roomy home with a neat yard and a broken sign that proclaimed that not long ago “Beeson’s House” had been a bed and breakfast. On the left side of the road was a scraggly park—and at the intersection that marked the edge of town, were two SUVs parked side by side, blocking the road.

Ford stopped and then silently backtracked before he whispered, “Let’s cross the street and cut through that park to get past the roadblock. I could just make out the outlines of playground equipment. That should give us some cover. On this side of the street, there’s nothing but scrub and sagebrush—nowhere to hide. Sound good?”

The three women nodded.

The little group sprinted across the street in twos—Mercury and Ford first, followed by Stella and Karen. Then they entered the park. They had to move slowly to keep from making noise or running into slides or teeter-totters, and it seemed to Mercury that it took them forever just to get halfway through the park.

“I can’t believe Ron’s dead.” A male voice Mercury recognized as the mostly silent Wes drifted to them from the road, and they froze. “As if we haven’t lost enough men.”

Another male voice answered, one Mercury didn’t recognize. “Hey, look at it this way: fewer men mean more women sniffing around after us. I mean, there are so many of them now compared to us that they’re in charge. Shit, we deserve some kinda compensation.”

“Totally agree with ya, bro,” said Wes.

Ford motioned for them to keep walking, which they did—even more slowly—until Amber’s voice broke the silence from only a few feet in front of them.

“You two are disgusting. As my mother often said, it takes a very good man to be better than no man at all, and neither you, Wes, nor you, Mitch, are good men. One of the many wondrous things this apocalypse has done is to finally put the entitled white man on the endangered-and-soon-to-be-extinct species list.”

Ford had put his hand up to stop them. He motioned for them to retrace their steps, but what Mercury had assumed was a short, squatty bush suddenly stood. As she pulled up her pants, Amber lifted her head and looked directly at Ford.