Waking Up Dead

“Yeah. Put your arm around me and I’ll drape my legs over you. Our body heat will help keep us warm.”

“That won’t work,” he said and Jackson felt her heart drop. Embarrassment clawed its way down her spine and she wanted to squirm. Did he think she was coming on to him? Crossing some sort of line? She wanted to say something smart-assed to cover her blunder, but before she could mull over what the hell to say Luke slid an arm under her thighs and lifted her onto his lap—in one smooth move. “This is much better.”

Jackson almost smiled, relief settling across her, and laid Mandy across her thighs. Warmth spread along the parts that were touching and she sighed. “Yep, much. Now sleep. I’ll wake you in a few hours.”

“You need sleep too.”

“And I’m going to, but like I said I only sleep for a few hours at a time. We’ll be fine here,” she added. “Those filing cabinets’ll make a hell of a noise if they try and get in. We’ll have more than enough time to wake up and deal with the situation.” Batman and Robin to the rescue.

Luke nodded, closed his eyes, and pulled her a little closer. She’d known he was big. That he was tall and wonderfully muscular. But being swept up all Gone with the Wind style and deposited on his lap brought it home in a way she hadn’t considered before. She stroked a finger along Mandy’s hilt, wondering at how quickly things could change in such a short space of time. Only yesterday she’d been sitting with Tye in an abandoned warehouse eating old sardines and huddling under a blanket that had smelled like mold.

And now? She looked up at Luke, the last of the day’s light shadowing him. A smattering of stubble was already decorating his jaw and his hair was wonderfully tousled. The hotness could not be denied. More than that though, his actions and his words cheered her in an odd sort of way. That he already trusted her enough to put his life in her hands and that the precedent they’d set felt okay for them both.

Another stroke along Mandy and she dragged her gaze from Luke and swept the room instead. All was well and that left her thoughts free to dwell on other matters. She missed Tye. That one was a given, and her heart clenched as she thought of him. Assuming the best-case scenario, he’d be making his way to the interstate about now, or maybe resting up in a house somewhere. He was probably worried about her, wondering where she was…and for the first time it occurred to Jackson that Tye had not come looking for her.

She must have spent well over an hour in the pool room, both before and after meeting Luke. And she had gone looking for him, hadn’t she, so why hadn’t he come looking for her? The answer sprung into her mind and Jackson gritted her teeth to deny it. She wasn’t ready to accept it yet.

She wished instead that she were warmer, but being cold was part of life for her now, there was nothing to be done about that but shift and settle in against Luke. Which she did and felt her stomach clench as he tightened his hold. Fact of the matter was, worries and problems aside, the feel of Luke’s huge arms around her waist was very distracting, extremely comforting, and disturbingly exciting.

Priorities, she told herself, but all of a sudden they seemed to shift. Possibilities filled her, sparking anticipation that helped her bruised heart heal just a little, and she knew without a doubt that she had to convince him to come south with her.

There was nothing else for it now.

…

When Luke awoke he woke to the smell of strawberries. For a moment he was reminded of another time. Back in the days when the dead stayed dead. Back when the world still functioned and the only worries he’d had were balancing the garage’s books or making himself presentable for a date. His mom had grown strawberries on the little porch outside her house. The baskets would overflow in the summer, the smell intense in the muggy air and he’d pick one or two before walking through the door to see his folks—dead now of course, properly dead. He hadn’t been able to get to them before they had been eaten.

The scent filled his nostrils now, not exact of course, the faint chemical ring to it jarring, but despite that, and having two sleepy legs and a numbly cold ass, he inhaled a satisfied breath.

“How long have I been asleep?”

“A while,” Jackson whispered. “About nine hours according to the clock.”

He let out a groan, opened his eyes to complete darkness, and shifted position. He was massively uncomfortable and the fact he’d slept for so long shocked him slightly—because clearly it was night. “You should have woken me.”

“It’s fine.”

He shifted again as soon as he became aware of his hard-on. Fuck. “You need to sleep too,” he said, more to fill the silence than anything else. She had to be aware of it, didn’t she? It was clearly obvious, no doubt prodding her through his pants. It couldn’t be helped though, even as embarrassment flooded him. The end of the world did not mean the end of a man’s natural urges—or a woman’s for that matter. How long had it been since he’d awoken with a firm ass on his lap? Not to mention two luscious legs draped over his side and a distinctly female scent surrounding him? It could only be more perfect if they had been sitting in his bunker, sans zombies. Well, no, being in the pre-dead world, in his old house would be the epitome of perfection, but that was like asking for a return trip to the Moon.

“I did, and you’re gonna need to keep your voice down.”

Both his erection and his musings subsided in an instant. “What’s happened?”

Jackson leaned in closer to him so that her mouth was right next to his ear. “I heard noises out there about a half hour ago. Faint, but there all the same. I’m guessing zombies are close by, but they haven’t found us yet.”

“We need to move then.”

“No, we’re fine for the moment. Wake up properly first and let your eyes adjust to the dark.”

“They’ll smell us, Jackson, and I’m good. I can make out your shape now.”

She waved a hand in front of his face, as if checking to see if he was telling the truth. When he reached out to grab it she nodded and pushed off his lap. Though Luke was sure the lack of weight should have felt like a relief, it didn’t. She was so slight that her extra pounds had barely made a dent. He could just about see her reaching out a hand to steady herself and guilt swamped him. How many hours sleep had she managed?

“You should have woken me sooner,” he whispered.

She stretched against the wall, miniature squat thrusts, limbering herself up for movement. “Why? We were safe enough and out here you have to take advantage of those moments. Besides if I get tired you can give me a piggyback.”

The image of her legs wrapped around his waist filled his head and Luke had to take a deep breath. Now was not the time for such thoughts. Hell, there was hardly ever a time anymore. The zombies were everywhere. Intimate moments were going to be few and far between—if ever—he suspected.

“It’s four in the morning,” Jackson said. “If we leave now, we’ll have a couple of hours of darkness to cover our tracks.”

“Zombies and darkness.” Luke sighed. “The perfect combination.”

Jackson bent down and picked up the sweater and sweats before folding them and placing them in her small backpack. “I know, but it makes sense to take advantage of the cover. If we leave when it’s day, they could be out there waiting for us, and they’ll see us immediately. The dark gives us a chance to sneak away. Besides it’s never completely dark. The human eye adjusts pretty well to the smallest light source.”

“I know. So what are you thinking, about a million years to make it down the interstate on foot?”

“Down the interstate?” She paused while swinging her backpack on and gave him a look he probably couldn’t have deciphered even with lots of light. “You’re coming with me? To Texas?”

Luke took a deep breath and nodded. His mind had been made up really the moment he’d seen the Lily zombie waiting to get into his bunker and realized it wasn’t a safe haven anymore. No, that wasn’t right. More like when he’d spotted Jackson’s purple panty-clad ass sprinting down the road. It just took Lily in his home to make him see it. The loss of his safe house to clarify his mind. The thought of leaving Jackson to make her way to Texas alone seemed wrong somehow. Sure there was no doubt that the girl could take care of herself, damn, could she. But the border must be a couple of thousand of miles or so, and that meant a whole lot of dead things—all wanting to eat her—all of them starving. It just made sense for the two of them to stick together. The fact he was attracted to her was an added bonus. He wanted to explore the possibility of something happening between them, and he wanted to see if her dream had any chance of being made a reality.