"Marty Price.”
Darien nodded. "Yeah. Marty. What kind of stupid name is that?" He turned and walked with Harriet to the front door where they said good night to each member of the board as they left. None of them did anything other than shake hands with Darien and avert their eyes. They mumbled pleasantries and left.
"Daniel is going to give us problems," Harriet said as soon as the door was shut.
"Who's that?" asked Darien. "The one that gave me some lip?"
She nodded, then smiled. "I don't think I've ever seen him taken down so quickly. That was amazing," she said as she stepped closer to Darien.
As much as he was intrigued by where their conversation might lead next, Darien had business to attend to. He had to finalize the plans for another raid in a few hours and didn't have time to play with Harriet. He stepped around her and opened the front door. "Whatever you’re thinking, we’re going to have to shelve that for another time."
She reached to push the door shut. "What are you doing? You can't go out the front door?" she hissed.
"Why not? People around here need to see who I am. If they see me leaving your house right after the board meeting, they’ll put two and two together and realize that I'm legit. Now's the perfect time for me to walk home."
Home. That was a strange thought. Even at the high point of his career, Darien had never been able to steal enough cars to afford a place in a neighborhood like Bee's Landing. It took an apocalypse to correct class inequality.
"Then I’ll walk with you," Harriet said as they stepped out together. They hadn't reached the end of the driveway when Darien picked up the glint of metal in the dying sunlight down the street. He turned and cursed silently.
"Oh no…It's the cops…somebody called!" Harriet blurted. "What do we do?” she asked as she froze in place.
"First off we relax,” Darien soothed. “Nobody called the cops—-nobody's got working telephones or radios, remember? Just be cool. I've handled more than my fair share of police interviews before. Let me do the talking and just stand there and look pretty."
Harriet relaxed instantly. "Well, apocalypse or no, I know how to do that."
They waited patiently at the end of the driveway until the sheriff’s deputy car rolled to a stop and the tires crunched on the loose gravel at the end of the driveway. The sound of the supercharged engine at idle was music to Darien's ears. He licked his lips and dreamed for a split second that he might boost the cop car. That was one ride on his bucket list that he'd never been able to swing. He'd snagged luxury cars, imports, American muscle cars, even a tractor-trailer or two…but had never swiped a souped-up police interceptor.
The passenger window rolled down and the driver, a baby-faced officer in a pressed uniform, leaned over. "You folks doing all right this evening?"
Darien leaned down and rested a meaty arm on the door. "Doing just fine…” he chuckled. "Or, I guess as well as can be expected…"
The deputy nodded. “How are folks here getting on?"
Darien sighed. "You know, I guess about as well as anyone can.” He shrugged. “We’re all a little tight on food and water but we’re managing. I hear it's a lot worse in Charleston," Darien said in an attempt to change the subject.
The deputy held his gaze a little too long for Darien's comfort, but smiled. "Well, you're not wrong. From what I hear, there's not much left. Not much left of anything across the state, actually. We're extending our patrols through the county just to make sure everyone's doing okay. Got a report the other day that there were some home invasions in this neighborhood. You know anything about that?"
Darien turned and feigned ignorance toward Harriet. "Gosh, honey, we haven't had any problems. What do you think?”
Harriet's lips were pressed into a tight line and she shook her head, which made her golden tresses flash in the evening light.
Darien turned back to the cop. "I wish I could help, but honestly we haven't heard anything. Oh wait," he said with a snap of his fingers. "About four nights ago…or was it five…?” he said with a glance over his shoulder at Harriet. "Anyway, we heard what I thought were fireworks in the middle the night…I talked to a couple of the fellas the next day. Turns out it was gunshots. Somebody was getting feisty over on the other side of the neighborhood. But it's been pretty quiet on this side, if you ask me."
"It's a nice change of pace, actually," Harriet said. “Everyone walks more, and we actually talk with our neighbors now.”
The deputy nodded and looked out the windshield. "Well, if it's been quiet over here, I guess I should go check out the other side. Listen, we know communications are down, but if anybody happens to have a ham radio, we can still get messages through. That's how we originally contacted someone in this neighborhood."
"Oh? I wasn't aware anybody had a ham radio in Bee's Landing,” Darien said.
"It's against the HOA rules," Harriet supplied.
The deputy stared at them with a blank look. "Is that so? Well, it seems like that's a pretty stupid rule to have, given what we’re looking at
