Bay of the Dead by Mark Morris Read Free Book Online Page A

people in the house—'
'What are the two of us going to do against this lot? We'll have to call for back-up.'
Andy nodded, and they ran towards their car. In his peripheral vision he saw zombies registering them with whatever passed for cognisance in their dead brains. He was aware of the creatures abandoning their meals, converging on this new living prey with lurching, lumbering steps. He and Dawn dodged a girl in a green dress who had had part of her face torn away; a balding man in a mechanic's oily overall, his face bloated with rot.
As they neared the car, Andy fumbled for the key fob in his pocket, found it with sweaty fingers and pressed the button. He and Dawn wrenched the doors open and threw themselves inside. Andy rammed the key card into the slot and pressed the button which started the engine. All he could see around them were dead faces, slack and vacant, but also livid with a kind of relentless, idiot hunger. As he slammed the car into gear and they screeched away up the road, his only thought was that as soon as they'd requested back-up, he'd call Gwen. She and her Torchwood mates would know what was going on.

FIVE
Trystan Thomas spooned Horlicks into his mug, added a little milk and stirred vigorously. He glanced at the cooker, where more milk was heating up in a small pan for Sarah's hot chocolate. His wife hated Horlicks with a passion. She said it smelled like 'the Devil's vomit'. She always insisted Trys brush his teeth immediately after drinking it. In fact, she maintained that if it came to a choice between kissing a dog's bottom or her husband's Horlicksy mouth, she'd go for the dog every time.
They had been up watching a Tom Cruise movie, and now Sarah had hauled her bulk upstairs and was getting ready for bed. Trys still found it hard to get his head round the fact that in a matter of days they'd have a new addition to their household, a tiny human being who would be linked to them for the rest of their lives.
How many more nights would they spend in this house as a 'couple', Trys wondered. How much longer until they officially became a 'family'? And until he officially became a 'dad'?
Sometimes the thought frightened him. Sometimes he'd lie in bed, staring at the ceiling, with Sarah moving restlessly beside him, and he'd feel utterly overwhelmed. He'd feel too young to be a dad, not much more than a kid himself. How would he cope? What would he do? At those times he would get an overwhelming sense both of life rushing onwards, and of a door – the door leading back to his own youth and freedom – slamming firmly shut behind him.
But then in the morning, in the daylight, he would look at his beautiful pregnant wife, at the woman he loved, who had their baby growing inside her, and he would feel that surge of joy all over again, that sense of wonder and excitement.
The kettle and the milk boiled at the same time. Trys tipped the steaming milk into Sarah's favourite mug and added two big spoonfuls of instant hot chocolate. He was stirring it in when he heard his wife call his name. No, not call – shout . It was only one syllable, but Trys heard the urgency in it, the trace of panic.
He threw the spoon into the sink, and was out of the kitchen before it had even stopped clattering. Their house was small, two up, two down, with a narrow hallway. He bounded up the stairs two, three at a time, and burst into the bedroom, panting.
'What's up?'
Sarah was sitting on the edge of the bed with her nightie on and a look of alarm on her face. She was not conventionally attractive – her nose was a little too big, her eyes slightly too deep-set – but to Trys she was fascinating and unusual, and therefore twice as gorgeous as all those boringly pretty girls with their dyed hair and regular features.
'My waters have broken,' she said. 'It's starting, Trys.'
He noticed that the bed was wet, that there was a puddle on the carpet between her bare feet. 'Oh hell.'
'Phone Rianne,' instructed Sarah. 'Tell her