White Trash Zombie Apocalypse (White Trash Zombie 3)

I thought quickly. “Okay, I’m coming toward you—almost to the bridge over Bayou Zaire. I’ll pull off the road right past that. D’ya know how many people are in the cars?”

“Only one in the first, I think,” she replied. “Don’t know about the second. Oh, and I have my shotgun, so we’re not going to be completely helpless.”

“I have a shitty attitude,” I offered. “That’s my best weapon.”

She chuckled. “Sounds good. Okay, I’m gonna try and get some distance between me and my buddies. See you in a couple.” And with that she hung up.

The rain picked up, forcing me to set my wipers to mega-speed, and I yelled a curse as the right wiper blade flew off into the night. Thank god for the heightened senses of being over-brained. I floored the accelerator, but my poor little Honda shuddered so badly above eighty that I had to back off a bit for fear of dropping the engine out of the damn thing. Still, I managed to catch a bit of air when I went over the Bayou Zaire bridge—noticing rather absently that the water was overflowing the banks—and came down with a cringe-inducing screech of undercarriage on pavement.>Her eyes dropped to the card, and I could practically see her memorizing the number. “You mean now?” she said, glancing back up at me. “It’s after midnight.”

“Yeah, well, I’m pretty sure he’s a robot and doesn’t sleep,” I said, then shrugged. “Trust me, those fuckers owe me enough that I can wake a few people up.” I paused. “Unless you want to wait ’til morning and see what happens.”

“Shit, no.” She pulled a phone out of her pocket.

“Yeah.” I reached and put a hand on hers. “And maybe better to use mine. In case yours is, er, tapped or whatever.”

She blew out her breath. “You’re right. I’m not thinking all that clearly right now. I’m usually good in a tight situation, but this has me clamped down.”

“Pretty understandable.” I retrieved my phone from the depths of my purse, dialed. “I’m putting it on speakerphone, but I’ll talk to him first.”

The tinny sound of the ringer filled the car, and a few seconds later: “Archer here.” A hint of hoarse slur in his voice suggested he’d likely been asleep.

“Hey, Brian, it’s Angel,” I said. “Hate to bother you so late, but…remember that chick whose fingers you broke today? Well, she’s here with me, and she wants to, um, defect.”

“The…photographer?” he asked, voice still a bit muzzy. “I don’t understand.”

“Yeah, she works for Saberton and—”

“What?” he demanded, all hint of sleep gone.

Blinking, I quickly put pieces together. “Oh. You just thought she was a reporter or something, didn’t you.” I flicked a glance at her. She gave me a shrug in return, coupled with a pained grimace. I supposed I couldn’t blame her for lying to Brian. If she’d admitted to being some sort of industrial espionage person she probably wouldn’t have escaped at all, and certainly not with only a couple of broken fingers.

“Something like that, yes,” Brian replied, voice controlled once again.

“Okay, well, she wants to leave. Quit. But figures it’s only a matter of time before they find her and, well, y’know.”

I could practically hear Brian processing all of this. “All right, Angel,” he said with zero hint of the stress he was surely feeling. “What does she want?”

I handed the phone to Heather, though I kept it on speakerphone. “You’re up, chick.”

She bit her lip and took a deep breath. “Um, hello, Brian. It’s me again.”

“What do you want, Naomi?” Brian asked. “Or whatever your name is.”

Naomi, huh? I realized that Heather probably wasn’t her name either. Though truth be told, she looked more like a Naomi than a Heather.

She closed her eyes. “Shit,” she breathed. “This was a bad idea.”

“Perhaps,” Brian said, surprising me by the admission. “How about you tell me why you want to leave Saberton, and why you’re afraid they’ll come after you.”

A mix of emotions crawled across her face, tight lines of anger, a lip curl of disgust. “I can’t deal with it anymore—what they’re doing with your kind, with zombies.”

A beat of silence while Brian processed that she knew about the zombies, which meant that she had to be in fairly deep with Saberton. I doubted that the info about zombies being totally real was handed out along with Christmas bonuses. “And you’re interested in…sanctuary with us?” A faintly dubious note crept into his voice for the first time.

She opened her eyes, flicked her gaze toward me. I gave her an encouraging nod. “I…yes,” she said. “They’ll kill me or take me back if they catch me.” She paused. “I don’t want to go back.”

“All right. How long do you suppose you have before they catch up with you?”

“I was on my way out of town when Angel caught me.” Her eyes went to the dashboard clock. “Now, I don’t know. Not long.” The dread in her eyes deepened.