Red the First by C. D. Verhoff Read Free Book Online Page A

Uh, hi,” Red said groggily.
“How long have I been asleep?”
    “ Two days—off and on. You
got shot in the head and the back. Good thing Dr. Patel was
here.”
    “ If he hadn’t showed up, we
wouldn’t have went for the truck...never mind. Yeah, good thing he
was here.”
    “ I’m glad you didn’t die.
Zena would have been scared without you.”
    “ You would have taken care
of her for me though—right?”
    “ Of course. Want me to call
her?”
    “ No, I’m not ready for a
hundred and ten pounds of lonely dog. Where’s
Elizabeth?”
    “ Out in the garden. Dr.
Patel is downstairs though. Want me to get him?”
    “ Please.”
    A few minutes later, Dr. Patel came to
sit next to the bed, giving him the low-down on his
injuries.
    “ One bullet barely skimmed
your skull, but it was enough to give you a concussion. The other
one entered through your left side, just passing through the
muscles surrounding your abdomen, and never entered the true
abdominal cavity. A messy-looking wound, but a very lucky
one.”
    “ It doesn’t feel lucky,” Red
said, trying to readjust his legs, but finding it too painful to
move.
    “ Very, very, lucky,” Dr.
Patel said, patting his hand.
    “ Thank you for, you know,
saving my life.”
    “ You are very
welcome.”
    “ And I’m sorry about tying
you to the chair.” Red said sheepishly. “A man can’t be too careful
these days.”
    “ I understand,” the doctor
said. “If my wife and children were still alive, I would have done
the same.”
    “ Elizabeth and the boy are
not my real family...”
    “ Biologically, that’s true,”
Dr. Patel said. “Elizabeth has told me about your situation. But
they love you like family, and judging by how they speak of you,
you them. In these sorrowful times that makes you a doubly lucky
man.”
    “ Are you planning on staying
a while?” Red asked.
    “ If I am
welcome.”
    “ Of course, you are
welcome.”
    “ There’s a suitable home
down the road. I can help you move in, if you would
like.”
    “ Not for six to eight
weeks,” Dr. Patel said. “That’s how long it’ll take for you to
recover, at least enough to resume anything more strenuous than
bathing. No moving. No wood-chopping duties. Besides, I already
moved in down the road.”
    “ Oh.”
    With Elizabeth, Michael and Dr. Patel
on the case, Red was nursed back to health in record time, but he
wasn’t back to chopping firewood for two months. Dr. Patel visited
almost every day, asking if anyone felt sick. When nobody did, he
seemed almost disappointed. The man admitted that he needed the
companionship, but when he learned that a small town was forming a
few miles away, he expanded his new practice, frequently made the
trip to tend to the community, but he always returned to the house
down the lane.
    But it wasn’t long before a second
stranger came knocking on Red Wakeland’s door. This time it was a
woman, a very attractive blonde in her late-twenties, named
Veronica Frend. She didn’t appreciate being greeted with a gun to
the face, but at least Red didn’t tie her to the chair. After a
long interrogation, he decided that Veronica and her four chickens
weren’t a threat.
    In her old life, she had been the head
IT person for a big insurance company. She said that she didn’t
know a damn thing about raising poultry, but when life gives you
chickens, you learn how to make omelets.
    One evening, when Veronica and
Elizabeth were cutting up carrots on the back patio, she made a
confession. Before the plague hit, the company she worked for was
being investigated for investment fraud. When Red asked her if she
had played any part in the company’s underhanded dealings, she
replied, “Of course.” She saw the turn of events as a chance to
come clean, to live an honest life in which she could help people
instead of swindle them. As a former car dealer, Red could
relate.
    The next arrivals were a lanky
fourteen-year-old named Nathan Steelsun, and a factory