Lauren whimpered, her chest tightened, and her body convulsed. She exhaled the discomfort with shallow breaths. “But I left you, didn’t I? I was the one who left you first. I abandoned you, just up and walked away. It was me, once again, fucking things up, doing whatever I wanted, assuming you would always be there. I accepted that because you always were. You were amazing to me, and I took you for granted. And I guess, by some means, I deserved to lose you. But I never wanted to lose you like this, John. I swear to God, I didn’t. And I pray this didn’t happen because of anything I’ve done.”
Lauren ran her index finger along the sheet concealing John’s left arm, able to perceive the polluted texture of burned skin below, but she wasn’t repulsed. “I don’t know what life’s going to be like now. And I don’t know how I’m supposed to live without you. But you will always be the love of my life, John. I never stopped since the day I first felt it…and I will love you for all eternity. That promise, I will never break. We’ll see each other again someday; I know we will. Watch over us down here until then if you can. And maybe put in a good word for me with the big man. He knows I could use it.” Lauren sat up, kissed her fingers, and placed them where the sheet lay over John’s forehead. “I’ll see you in my dreams.”
Lauren rose, pulled a hair tie from her pocket, and used it to pull her hair into a bun. She knelt beside Norman’s body, uttered her amity, gratitude and goodbyes to him, then paid her respects to Kristen in passing, and made her departure. She said nothing else, felt nothing else, and looked no one’s way, only stared ahead and vacant with eyes dark as night, like an unbroken prized mare with blinders, her expression emotionless and a contorted manifestation of the opposite.
She deserted the ATV that had brought her here and swaggered away on foot to the paved road, vanishing into the woods without a trace shortly thereafter.
Chapter 29
FEMA Resettlement Camp Bravo
Saturday, March 12th
Doug Bronson opened his driver-side door and stepped out, trying to recall the last time he had done so. Up until recently, he’d only ridden as passenger and had enjoyed that perspective, having grown accustomed to being chauffeured. He believed a man in his position had more than earned it. But as it was, Bronson was undergoing a shortfall in auxiliary personnel, including drivers, adjutants, and even wingmen. Consequently, if he wished to go anywhere and not exacerbate the contemptible boils eating way at his heels, he had to get behind the wheel and drive himself. And while that wasn’t so bad, it was taking a lot of getting used to.
Doug stared at the brick staircase leading to the porch at a residence he was preparing to enter. He’d been invited here for breakfast more than a day ago and hadn’t officially RSVP’d until the last minute. Despite Beatrice’s unfussy assurance of a ceasefire, Doug didn’t trust her. After all, she had single-handedly snuffed out every person with whom he had developed that platform of faith on the plantation. He had a stinking suspicion he was next in line and hadn’t yet found a single rhyme or reason to dispel the notion.
As he procrastinated, he imagined knocking on the door and Beatrice pulling it open while presenting a freshly polished, satin-finished pistol that she would immediately press against his face, doing so with a gilded smile on hers, no less. She’d tender one of her beloved southerly one-liners, complemented with an interstellar degree of snark, and then blow his goddamn brains out and through the back of his head, cerebrum, cerebellum, every lobe in between. She’d puff a humid breath into the barrel, set alight one of those wiry cigarettes, and close the door as if nothing had happened, then return to the kitchen to eat breakfast alone.
Doug shuddered at the thought and tried willing it away. He hadn’t intended for things to take this turn, and he certainly hadn’t wanted his existence to end like this. The only reason his convoluted psyche had accepted the invitation in the first place, even on such short notice, was that he knew both consciously and subconsciously if Beatrice wanted him dead, there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to stop her. If he ran, she’d give chase and run him down. If he tried hiding from her, she’d ultimately find him; thus spawning the conclusion that compliance, paradoxically enough, had become the only option he had left.
Doug coughed over a throat so raspy that it felt like he’d been smoking stale Cubans and gargling with his least favorite alcoholic beverage for weeks. Then he swallowed what little pride he’d brought along and marched to the door, hesitating several long seconds before tapping it with his knuckles.
The door opened less than a minute later, and Beatrice Carter greeted him with one of the broadest of smiles she retained in her repertoire. But it wasn’t one that conveyed happiness, pleasure, or delight. It was a conflicted smile, the type displayed against one’s will, like the kind funeral attendees greeted and consoled one another with.
Beyond that, the woman looked damned near picture-fucking-perfect and was sending an air of unusual self-actualization. She was freshly showered and smelled of a floral perfume Doug didn’t recall her wearing before. Her hair was neatly pulled back, makeup applied acutely, and her choice of attire, a navy-blue pantsuit, was spotless and recently pressed. Aside from the off-white apron she had on, with the words ‘Just Peachy’ embroidered in flesh-colored cursive, she looked presentable enough to assume the witness stand at a capital murder trial, attend a
