The Siege by Darrell Maloney Read Free Book Online Page B

remember exactly where that gravel road was. The problem was, there were dozens of such roads along Highway 83, unnamed and seldom used. Many of them led into the woods and to ranch houses, where old geezers with shotguns might not take too kindly to visitors. Many others led to old oil drilling sites, or were service roads for the power lines that went through the area.
         Finding the same road again after seven years would be difficult, even if he had a mind to.
         And what he told Lenny was true. He’d like to have a big juicy steak or some fresh tomatoes, but it wasn’t the end of the world if he didn’t get them. He and Lenny and carved out a fairly comfortable life here. Despite what the sign out front said, it wasn’t quite a paradise for truckers. But he was surviving from day to day on dry stock stored in the abandoned trailers along the highway.
         And they were performing a needed service to other survivors by providing them necessary provisions as well, at no cost.
         And the old farmer out in back of the truck stop, well, he was starting to get some things to grow from old seeds preserved by the long freeze.
         So all in all, it seemed like a fool’s game to go traipsing off to find some kind of utopia hidden in the woods. And even if he found it, it wouldn’t necessarily mean the people inside would share or barter with him.
         In the end, he decided that nothing in the fenced compound would be worth the effort of finding it.
         That left him with just his conscience, telling him he needed to warn the people in the compound that bad men were looking for it. And that they had plans to take it by force.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 12
     
         Hannah was applying mineral oil to the stitches on Sami’s back. She was due to get them out in a couple of days, but in the meantime, they itched like crazy, and she couldn’t reach them to apply the oil herself. Her boyfriend Brad was on duty at the control center, so that left her best friend.
         “Sure,” Hannah had said. “It’ s the least I can do. After all, it was nice of you to volunteer to get shot so I didn’t have to.”
         “Yeah, sure. Let’s go with that.”
         As Hannah applied the oil and gently rubbed it in to soothe the itching, Sami asked her, “Hannah, I can’t see the wound on my back. I’ve tried to see it in the mirror but I can’t. Tell me the truth, is it ugly?”
         “You want the truth truth or the ‘gotta spare my best friend’s feelings' truth?”
         “I want the truth truth.”
         “Okay. The truth truth is that it isn’t pretty. David might be great at making sutures in people’s mouths after he extracts teeth, but he’d never make it as a plastic surgeon. Please don’t tell him I said that.”
         “I won’t. But he already knows. The whole time he was stitching me up he was apologizing to me. He said he knew he wasn’t the best stitcher-upper in the world, but that he was more concerned with stopping the bleeding. And after all, he saved my life, so I could never be upset with him. ”
         She suddenly laughed out loud.
         “I’m sorry, did I hit a ticklish spot?”
         “Oh, no. I just remembered something else David said when he was stitching me up. I told him I was worried that Brad would find me ugly when he saw my scars.
         “He told me not to worry. That Brad was a man. He said anytime I was self conscious about my scars, just to get naked. And as soon as Brad saw my boobs he’d forget all about the scars.”
         She looked at Hannah and giggled.
         “And guess what? After I finally got brave enough to let him see me in the light, I found out it works!”
         Hannah shook her head, then wiped the oil from her hands and put a new dressing on Sami’s wound.
         “You’re