Total pages in book: 16
Estimated words: 15337 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 77(@200wpm)___ 61(@250wpm)___ 51(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 15337 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 77(@200wpm)___ 61(@250wpm)___ 51(@300wpm)
That was how the next few hours went. We swam. We blew up floats and sun bathed on the water.
We laughed.
We sang, forgetting half the lyrics but absolutely none of the enthusiasm.
And it was fun.
I hadn’t known fun since before the virus.
Actually, I probably hadn’t known much fun before then even.
“Okay. Picnic?” he asked as he hauled himself up onto the boat.
“Yes. I’m starving,” I admitted.
“On the boat, or on the beach with our toes in the sand?”
Clearly, he had a preference.
And, well, I wouldn’t mind playing in the sand a little bit either.
“Load up my float and I will swim it to shore,” I said.
With that, we got everything we would need, sans Toddy who was passed out with his belly up, and set up an actual picnic on the beach.
Like it was normal times.
Like we hadn’t a care in the world.
“Okay. You digest. I will start packing up,” he offered, folding up.
And I absolutely did not watch him as he moved around, as his muscles flexed, under skin that had been made a bit more golden in the unrelenting summer sun.
I was convinced that was how I missed it.
Until I heard the grunting right behind me.
“Caleb!” I shrieked as I lurched forward onto all fours, scrambling to try to grab one of the weapons we’d brought to shore for just this reason.
A hand closed around my ankle, yanking backward, making me faceplate in the sand.
I watched it unfold like it was in slow motion as the terror gripped my system.
Caleb turned back, seeing the zombie, and somehow in the same turning motion, leaning down, grabbing his machete he’d packed, and rushing forward.
He planted his legs wide in the sand, cocked back, then swung forward, taking the zombie’s decaying head clean off his shoulders.
“Behind you,” I gasped, my hand reaching out for a knife as Caleb didn’t seem to loose his cool at all, just ducked low, then sliced upward, cutting the zombie from the groin and up.
I was just getting up onto my knees again when I felt something grab me once more, making another shriek escape me.
I was caught too off-guard.
I wasn’t on my game.
I was slow and loud and helpless.
Luckily, Caleb wasn’t quite so afflicted.
He turned back from one kill, striking out with his filthy red-black bloody machete and slicing it down on the wrist of the hand that was grabbing me.
“Get in the water,” Celeb demanded, his voice more serious than I’d ever heard it as I ripped the hand off of my wrist, the food I’d just eaten sloshing up my throat at the action. “Catie, now!” Celeb roared.
I didn’t stop to think, I half scrambled toward it on my hands and knees before getting to my feet and throwing myself into the water.
It wasn’t until then that I could look back and see what had made the usually so light and fun Caleb so firm.
And it was an entire freaking shoreline of zombies.
Caleb moved with the precision that came from practice, striking out, creating maximum damage with as little effort as possible as he retreated toward the water, knowing it was useless.
It didn’t matter what kind of training the man had, and clearly it was a lot, there was no way he could fight them all of.
The two of us stood no chance.
We had no choice but to run.
Or, as it was, swim.
“Move your ass!” Celeb roared as he took out the closest zombie then threw himself into the water too.
I didn’t stop to think.
I turned and swam with everything inside of me toward the boat.
It hadn’t seemed so far when we’d been casually making our way to shore.
But moving at a life-or-death pace meant my arms, shoulder, back, stomach, and legs were screaming as I pushed myself harder and faster toward the boat.
Somehow, even though I’d had a big head start, Caleb managed to make it to the boat first.
I didn’t know that, though, until I felt hands grabbing me, yanking me up out of the water.
I couldn’t help it.
It was pure adrenaline and bone-deep fear.
I screamed and flailed as the arms kept pulling me up.
“Are you okay? Are you alright?” Caleb’s voice asked as he held me, his hands framing my face, wiping my hair and water out of the way so he could look at me.
I didn’t know what to blame.
How hot he was when he was fighting.
The need to confirm we were alive.
Or something a little deeper than that.
But I just threw my arms around his neck, pulling him closer, then sealing my lips to his.
His whole body stiffened for a moment.
But just a moment.
Then his arms were going around my back, pulling me flush against him as his lips took over.
Hard.
Hungry.
Demanding.
And I just melted into him as his lips pressed, as his teeth nipped, as his tongue claimed mine.