Survivalist - 22 - Brutal Conquest by Jerry Ahern Read Free Book Online Page A

old man your father or your husband?”
    “My old man,” she reiterated.
    Natalia said, “I assume you’ll go in from the front. Why don’t I circle behind the buildings just in case?” “Right,” Rourke nodded. He touched Mary Ann’s elbow and she started ahead, toward the wide street and
    the seven buildings. If her “old man” were neither father j
    nor husband, then what was he? I
    John Rourke was already cold, but he removed the j
    glove from his right hand as he started to walk, then the
    glove from his left… . •
    I
    The German assault rifle she carried was reminiscent ( to her of the short M-16, the XM-77. The barrel of the j German rifle was twelve inches in length, the buttstock i collapsible. It fired a modern caseless rifle cartridge, but | the overall dimensions were more submachine gunlike in j proportion. ‘
    The stock of the rifle extended, Natalia Anastasia I Tiemerovna moved along the scrub brush toward the rear faces of the four buildings on the north side of the street. As difficult as it was was for her to comprehend, the rear of the structures were even uglier than the front faces had appeared.
    She was as close as she could get to the nearest of the buildings, which might be some sort of livery stable. There was a corral behind it, but no animals were in evidence. ,
    Natalia started running, favoring the straight-line-is-j the-shortest-distance-between-two-points theory rather ) than the zigzagging pattern. She had always been a fast { runner, usually able to oudast and outdistance most of the men she’d known.
    But Michael could outrun her.
    She liked that.
    And she thought of Michael Rourke now. She was in love with him, totally. At first that had frightened her, j confused her. And she understood the almost slavish ! manner in which Michael’s dead wife, Madison, had
    treated him, the same way his longtime mistress, Maria Leuden, had behaved. There was something about Michael that made a woman want to yield to him.
    She was afraid for him now, afraid that the terrible risk he took pretending to be Martin Zimmer might cost him his life. And she was afraid for herself as well, because she would be desolate if he left her.
    He was his father’s son, but he was unique unto himself. Where John was reserved, Michael was wild. She realized that if she had somehow been John Rourke’s lover Before the Night Of The War, he might have been like that. Both men had endured the terror and death, but Michael, unlike herself or John, was perfectly innocent of any of its cause.
    And, perhaps that was the difference.
    She reached the rear wall of the building. It definitely was a livery stable. There was smoke filtering through between the slats, likely from a cookstove or something similar, and with the smoke came the smell of manure.
    There was an almost religious quality to the guilt she felt, which she knew John felt, too. To a lesser degree, Paul also felt it. Unlike Annie and Michael, who were children of The Night Of The War, she and John had been part of the opposing forces that had brought the war about. And Paul, although not in what was euphemistically called “the game” by some, was on the sidelines, as was every adult in the world. If one didn’t try to prevent the unthinkable from occurring, then one was part of the reason that it did occur.
    If she and John were guilty by sins of commission, then Paul felt himself guilty by sins of omission.
    In this world, there were only four people who could have that guilt, and one of those was Sarah Rourke.
    If John was right and there was a God, then why was Sarah Rourke on the edge of death?
    Natalia closed her eyes for an instant, then opened them sniffing back a tear.
    Michael had made her feel alive again, and she did not want to lose him, lose that… .
    Michael Rourke cursed his lack of formal education. He knew so litde about computers, beyond the comparatively simple machine at The Retreat, that he could do no more than turn on Martin