Feral by Holly Schindler Read Free Book Online

Owen grumbled. “Look. I’ll take you by Serena’s house again. See if her mom’s heard anything. She’s probably there right now. Probably just had to stop by the library before she went home or something.”
    â€œPrincipal Sanders told everyone to go straight home ,” Becca argued.
    â€œYeah, and if Serena needed background info to work on a story, do you think a warning from Sanders could keep her from it?”
    Becca slumped, her posture saying Owen was right.
    â€œWe’re stopping by Serena’s house first ,” Becca said, just as a door banged open in the back of the store.
    â€œRuthie!” a woman’s voice thundered. “We got honest-to-goodness paying customers in here. Gossiping with your friends is fine when we don’t have any shoppers, but I told you to knock it off now that the storm’s closing in. We got to help people get ready.”
    A heavyset woman appeared with a metal cart loaded with boxes and shovels and bags of ice melt and kitty litter. “Come on, now,” she urged, grunting as she reached forward to start unloading the supplies, “you got to help me get some of this out on display.”
    â€œYes, Mom,” Ruthie said quietly.
    â€œHere, let me,” Owen said, trying to relieve Ruthie’s mother of a large cardboard box of canned goods. But the box teetered in his arms.
    â€œWatch out there, pretty boy,” Chas said. “Oughtta leave that to the athlete.”
    â€œWhatever,” Owen grunted, refusing to give up the box, even as he struggled for balance. “I’m on the football team, too.”
    But Chas reached out and plucked the box right out of Owen’s arms. In Chas’s hands, it seemed more like a box of matches than a box of heavy canned food. “What’s with you?” he teased. “You act like you just ran about a hundred wind sprints. Your mom’s groceries must’ve worn you out. You’re even wussier than usual.”
    â€œAre you two done with your pissing contest now?” Becca interrupted, tugging on Owen’s sleeve. “Can we go look?”
    â€œI’m staying to help,” Chas announced, wrapping his large hand around a couple of shovels and carrying them toward a display space by the door.
    â€œFine,” Becca snapped. “Come on, Owen,” she insisted, stomping right past Claire in a flurry.
    â€œClaire!” Dr. Cain shouted, popping into her face. “Got some things for us. Maxine, the owner,” he said, pointing at Ruthie’s mother, “took me into the storeroom to give me the pick of her canned goods. Been a run on them in the last couple of hours.”
    Claire accepted her father’s plastic shopping basket. Cradling it in her arms, she peered inside to find cans of Spam and chili, pork and beans and vegetable soup.
    â€œThat kerosene lamp!” Dr. Cain shouted, pointing. Ruthie turned to pluck it from a shelf behind the counter. “Looks like the last one, too,” he said, happily handing over his credit card. He hummed as Ruthie punched the buttons on a brass cash register that looked like it had been freed from the shelves of an antique store, not noticing the embarrassed flush that was still painted across her cheeks following her exchange with Becca.
    Dr. Cain pushed Claire outside quickly, announcing, “It’s getting dangerous. I think we can make it before the storm turns the roads completely impassable, if we hurry.”
    They’d moved so fast, in fact, that the couple who’d clustered about the counter were still piling into the white Honda as Claire and her father stepped through the door of ’Bout Out.
    In her haste to get in the car, Becca knocked an empty NOS energy drink can into the lot. Her voice carried across the still parking lot as she urged, “Come on. Hurry.”
    Car doors slammed; the Honda revved and skidded across the lot.
    Claire swore that the