“Exactly. What would you think about having a more… permanent security team?”
“We’ve loosely talked about it.” Dante said. “Why did you want to switch channels to talk about this though?”
“I was curious and didn’t know what you folks would think. I’m worried. This election coming up, the riots, looting and arson? It’s all got me worried. What if we end up with people on the other side of the fence who could do more than scream obscenities and wave dildos in the air?”
“Anna did get shot by them, remember?” Dante asked, knowing that the police had also had their losses and injured.
“I know, but if you had one hundred guys show up, serious guys with training…”
“Then we’d need two or three hundred of our own, right?” Dante asked back.
“Not really, not with the right preparations we wouldn’t.”
“What do you have in mind?” Dante asked.
Rob noted they were almost at the end of the row, and the shelled corn was almost to the top of the edge of the dump truck’s edges.
“Let’s drop the load and we’ll talk. Make your way to the barn, I’m going to fill up the corn head so I can dump it right in the hopper.”
“Got it. See you in five.”
“See you,” Rob told him. “Switching radio back.”
“Copy.”
Anna and Leah watched as the guys loaded the silos. Andrea had gone in to take a nice long hot shower, without garbage bags, and spend some time getting ready for later on. Angelica was working with Harry on some math problems. Since schools had closed down in-person learning, they had a mixture of homeschool and online learning. As long as the kids passed the testing the schools provided, they didn’t care.
“So, you and Angel are headed to the farm store tomorrow?” Leah asked her.
“Yes,” she said. “I guess Rob has a thousand feed sacks and a ton of pallets for me to pick up.”
“A thousand feed sacks? What are those, fifty to eighty pounds when full?” Leah asked.
“I think so,” Anna told her. “I know what we’re thinking of doing with all the extra grain, but how do we prepare it?”
“What do you mean?” Leah asked her.
“I mean, back in the days, they would grind that shit up. Wheat into flour, corn into cornmeal, stuff like that.”
“I mean, how would we do that now?”
“I hate that I’m such a city mouse sometimes,” Anna told her.
“I really hate how behind the curve we are sometimes,” Leah agreed. “Let’s buy a farm, we’ll have a bugout and all the food in the world. Look what’s happened.”
“Don’t be bitter. It could always be worse, we could be stuck in Memphis and in the middle of those riots with no supplies.”
Leah shivered, then nodded. “See if they can get you even more feed sacks. When Luis puts in his wish list, double it, and don’t even tell him.”
“That might be some big bucks,” Anna said softly.
“We sold off our shares we had in the hospital,” Leah said simply.
“I don’t know what that means,” Anna said. “Like, stock market stocks?”
“Yes,” Leah told her. “At the time, we owned almost fourteen percent of the hospital.”
“Holy shit,” she said softly. “So, you guys are like, Forbes 500 and shit?”
Leah turned red in the face. “No, but when I say that money isn’t a worry, trust me. My only worry about money is that inflation gets worse than it is, and then it’ll be worth nothing. So, if we can, I’d like to be set up ahead of time. I don’t like feeling I’m behind the eight ball all the time. I’d like to be ready the next time Murphy’s Law throws some shit at us.”
“That’s been bugging me a bit too. The fallout from the tar and feathering, mostly,” she admitted.
“Yeah, but they only had to walk like a mile before they were picked up, and all their supplies were dropped off at the Sheriff’s Department. The only one hurt was that Kendricks guy who snuck in before.”
“I wonder what happened to that guy anyway?” Anna mused.
“I hope he got what was coming to him. Will they ever be done with hounding Andrea and Curt?”
“I hope so,” Anna told her. “I really do.”
Seven
The manager at the farm and feed had had enough of a heads up that he was able to get all the supplies pulled and staged ahead of time. His workers liked doing business with the Langtry farm. They seemed to be the only larger operation still kicking along good. The smaller sales they used to get from smaller homesteads and farms had dried up. He had been following the news and rumors, and knew there had been trouble there, dangerous trouble. That wasn’t bothering him as the group at the farm always seemed to be on the up and up, but now the USDA and ATF had been sniffing around.
Like many country farm and feeds, they sold firearms and ammunition as well as the regular things. A couple of the ATF had popped in the day before to inventory what they had and make sure their paperwork was up to date on everything. The NICS system had been overloaded, they’d explained, and after three days of waiting for a background check, the customers could come in and pick up their firearm if nothing was flagged in the system. They were also very interested in the pharmacy section at the farm store, though that was a less regulated area. Who would black market antibiotics and worming medications?
“It looks like Mrs. Castiglione has pulled in,” a worker said over the radio.
“Good, flag her down and have her park near the fence. Are you ok loading up with the forklift?”
“Sure thing.”
Anna and Angel walked into the farm store. They didn’t have their vests on, but both had guns on their hips, worn just under their long button up shirts that they left untucked.
“It looks like they’re ready for us,” Angel told
