He hoped its presence had expired. He also hoped that this third and final chance would help him become a better person than he was before everything happened. He’d let his emotions get the better of him, send him down a path he should’ve never gone in the first place, knowing full well that there would be no coming back from it and make him the man he had no reason to become.

  “Hey.”

  Colin arched his brows.

  “Are you okay?”

  He nodded. “The heat playing tricks on me.”

  “Okay.”

  She nodded. She sped up and climbed the crest of the hill and across a shelf of one and two-story stucco and clapboard homes sitting back from the curb on unkempt lawns. The sky was a bright blue reflection against the deeper blue horizon of the river; thin wispy white clouds spread out for miles, shaped like whatever they wanted them to be.

  He’d never felt so glad to remind himself of his rightful place in this world. There was only one thing left to do and then they were free once again.

  Before long, he’d be back behind the wheel of his green-gray chariot to carry his friends safely away from this desolate wasteland and into a new utopia filled with friendly faces and kind hearts. No more sleepless nights triggered by the lingering sense of paranoia or the creeping sensation of an unknown demise.

  It would be smooth sailing from here.

  Colin saw something in the distance, stumbling drunkenly along the street and sighed. He did a quick count and slipped the Magnum out from his right hip. Teresa wrenched her left hand from the steering wheel and wrapped it around her pistol’s checkered black grip until it hurt.

  Nine on the left and seven on the right.

  “Can’t we get a goddamn break today?” Jason said.

  Dominic craned his head around and peered across the crown of his right shoulder. Jason saw the look of surprise etched across his face, closed his mouth with the middle fingers of his right hand and blushed.

  “Sorry.”

  The others shrugged it off.

  When the hordes began to close in, Teresa stomped her right foot down hard on the gas and veered right. She guided the Jeep through an antique brick street lined with parked cars and more one-story stucco houses; the horde on Colin’s side began to stumble out from the between the cars their crumbling gray fingers groping at the air. A male zombie with thinning brown hair wearing a tattered red uniform stumbled out from between two cars and flashed its ravenous black teeth in a wide grin for the two seconds it took Colin to cut him down with the first shot.

  Three more filed out across the street up ahead. An overweight fat man, his faded gray tee-shirt torn open to expose his meaty-red rib cage and blue jean cut-offs. A gawky-haired kid in a khaki-colored Boy Scout uniform dragging his sloppy red intestines behind him and a pair of toothless long-haired women in plus-size clothing that (like their glutinous leader) was torn open to reveal large chunks of missing flesh.

  Dominic waited for the heavyset man to approach the Jeep, braced the overhead armbar with both hands, launched his right foot across the side and drove his left foot hard against the fiend’s left cheek. The fat man stumbled back in the direction he’d came from, spewing a mist of blood and broken teeth from his jagged gray lips.

  Teresa sat up in her seat, stretched the Glock over the top window and fired. The Boy Scout flew back onto the sidewalk, spraying blood and broken teeth out the back of his skull.

  Colin aimed the Magnum at the back of a sports car sitting at the end of the block, waited for the two women to converge beside of it and fired. A thunderous report shook the neighborhood and rang inside of their ears. He scowled at the waves of recoil surging across the crown of his right shoulder and fell back in his seat.

  The first bullet struck the woman’s left eye and exited out the back of her head, spraying a mist of blood and brain matter across the rear of the sports car. The ground shook beneath them, vibrating under their feet.

  When she reached the end of the street, Teresa spun the wheel to the left and got onto the metal suspension bridge stretched across the Ohio River. The tires rumbled across the thin metallic pathway of the bridge as the wind whistled around their heads. She gasped, clamped a hand over her mouth and gazed up at the archway inside the bridge, her eyes wide with a mixture of shock and terror.

  He didn’t know how many were up there but he didn’t have the time nor the inclination to count. He’d seen these a hundred times, in a hundred other towns; it was a sign that this wasn’t the right place to be especially if you’re a zombie.

  They dangled down from the inside archway of the bridge, their necks bound by cords of thick white rope fastened to the metal rafters above them. Their legs dangled down underneath them as rivers of blood slid down the front of their clothes and spread slick red pools underneath them. Colin remembered seeing the same thing something in an old historical photo on the day of his grandfather’s death when his grandmother had given him an old book on something called The Wild Frontier.

  Who would go out of their way to do something like this?

  “What the fuck!” Jason said.

  He slipped his right hand away from the bar and wrapped it around the back of Rosie’s head. She buried her face into the front of his tee-shirt and brushed her left jaw against his chest.

  “Who the hell would do something like this?”

  “Who cares?” Colin said.

  When Teresa reached the end of the bridge, Colin felt a twinge of nostalgia. All this time, he could’ve went in the other direction and been back to the boat within minutes. None of this, as good as it’d seemed to him now, would’ve been necessary.

  “Go left and stop in front of that A-frame.”

  Dominic leaned forward and peered through the left side of the bridge. The boat sat on the edge of the water, rocking along with the rhythm of the waves. A second horde appeared from around the corner of the street where their ill-faded journey had first began.

  “Keep going.” Colin said. “We’re almost there.”

  Teresa winced at the sight of the second horde, tightened her hands around the steering wheel and turned left. She sped down the street, drove up onto the sidewalk and stopped in front of the cafe. Colin mumbled under his breath and slapped his right knee.

  They leaped out and glanced down the street. Dominic around to the passenger side, slipped Rosie out of the sling while Jason climbed out. Behind them, the horde staggered down the street toward the café. Colin and Teresa backed away from the Jeep, holding their pistols down against their legs and shared a quizzical look with each other.

  Colin directed them toward the front of the restaurant with an urgent wave of his and eased the doors open with his spine. Teresa and Dominic breathed a sigh of relief, scowled at the cloud of muggy putrid air permeating around the restaurant and gagged.

  “What the fuck is that smell?”

  “You don’t want to know. My boat’s down there.”

  He led them across the restaurant and through the sea of dead bodies still scattered around the veranda. Dominic and Teresa hurried across the veranda, down a small flight of steps and hurried down the long jagged flight of stone steps sloping down the hill.

  When they reached the boat, Dominic grabbed the railing to keep from falling over. He tapped Jason on the crown of his left shoulder and motioned for him to give him Rosie.

  Jason braced Rosie’s hips with both hands, kissed her on the crown of her forehead, slid her out of the sling and handed her over. He braced the railing with both hands, planted his left foot on the edge of the boat and pulled himself up. He swung his right leg over the side first, followed by his left and held his arms out to retrieved his little sister.

  As he did what Jason asked him to, Teresa followed suite and stepped onto the boat. Colin tore the box open, slipped his hand inside and removed the spark plug.

  “Take this.” He said.

  He gave Teresa the Magnum. She nodded and tucked the Glock into the back waistband of her pants.

  “Give me enough time to get this fucker on.” Colin said.

  “Gotcha.”

  Colin braced the railing with both hands and hoisted himself onto the boat. He climbed over the railing and hurried over to the bow, his massive footsteps thudding against the floor; the boat shimmied, spreading a small radar map of wrinkles along the surface of the water. He stepped over the knee-high metallic gate, knelt down beside the engine hatch, slipped his right hand around the curved metal handle and raised the door.

  The mingled cloud of heat and fumes rode on the breeze and spun around his head. He ignored the noxious smell, laid down beside the open hatch and reached inside with his left hand. He groped the top of the engine, his fingers sliding across slick crusts of oil and felt his thumb slide into the empty hole.

  “Found it.”

  He switched the spark plug from his right hand to his left, stretched his arm up and over the side and reached inside. A mixture of elation and exhaustion washed over him like a bucket of ice water as he slipped the spark plug inside of the engine with a quick robotic click.

  Teresa and Dominic caught the sound of broken twigs echoing across the left side of the lake. A dead brunette with a triple-layer chin wearing a frayed floral-print muumuu stumbled out of the forest, gnashing her rotten black teeth together and wielding a pulpy red stub that used to be her left arm.

  She swung the Magnum around, raised it in both hands, and fired. The gun bellowed, sending ripples of thunder across the shore and intense waves of recoil vibrating across her arms. She flew back, felt the Magnum sliding from her grasp, and plopped down onto the boat.

  The bullet cleaved the top half of the brunette’s skull clean off. Bits of broken skull and soft brain matter and a geyser of blood sprayed the air and hit the ground with a wet plop. Teresa scowled at the thunder bellowing loudly in her ears as the Magnum leapt across the boat, struck the railing, flew off the boat in a drunken pirouette and landed on the shore.

  Colin raised his head from the floor when he caught something in the corner of his left eye. Jason ran toward the port side of the boat toward a thin piece of paper clinging to the railing. Rosie jostled around the inside of the sling, kicking her legs out from her side as her back made tiny whispers as it rubbed against the middle of his chest.

  When he glanced in the direction Jason was going, he glanced over the side of the railing and saw it lumbering toward the boat. A male zombie wearing a frayed red flannel shirt, jeans and a mud-stained trucker cap stumbled toward the railing sporting one good eye and an exposed pocket of wet red flesh along the left corner of his jawline. He’d gotten the shameful pleasure of watching Stacey die by the hands of these carnivorous bastards but he’d be damned if it happened again; not on his watch.

  If his math had been correct–and it was–Jason would make it over there in time to be dealt the same fate as his big sister. In time to feel the ravenous fiend’s rotten black teeth sink into his flesh, to strip the boy’s fingers clean off of his hands and gnash them into a pulp.

  Colin shifted onto his right hip, planted his hands onto the green-felt floor, scrambled to his feet and ran across the boat. His footsteps pounded against the boat, spreading more ripples across the water.

  “Get back.”

  When he glanced down at the zombie clambering toward the boat, cold fear slid down Jason’s back and coiled around his spine. His eyes widened as his skin prickled with horror.

  The sound of his voice snapped Teresa out of her stupor and back into reality. She grasped the railing with both hands and, her heart hammering against her chest, rose up on her feet. Dominic pulled the Glock from the small of Teresa’s back, raised it in both hands and aimed it at the dead trucker staggering toward the boat.

  Colin grunted, swung his left arm out from his sides and pushed him away. He leapt over the side of the boat, sucked a cloud of air deep into his lungs and rammed his shoulder into the dead trucker’s face. The zombie staggered back on wobbly legs and stumbled back into the forest, crashing into the mingled array of shaggy pines and oaks.

  He struck the shore with a loud bone-jarring crunch. Pain flooded his right hip, sliced the back of his legs and squeezed his face together into a sour mask of defeat. He sighed, scowling under his breath and rolled onto his back, his knees leaving large divots in the sand.

  Dominic scooped the kids up in his arms and carried them toward the steering podium. Rosie gave a loud painful cry that echoed across the lake and reverberated under the awning. Teresa aimed the Glock and fired six shots into the trees where the dead trucker had fallen, bowed her head and scowled behind tightly-clenched teeth.

  “Son of a bitch.” She said. “Are you okay?”

  Colin sat up and gave a heavy exhale, his eyes wide with fear. His head grew hot as fresh beads of sweat slid down his temples and cheeks, glinting in the sunlight streaming through the trees. A tight ache spread across his chest, making it hard for him to breathe.

  “Are you okay?” Dominic said.

  He glanced up at them and felt a sour taste in the back of his throat. His head felt hot. A loud cough burst through his lips and increased the tightness in his chest; a fresh sheen of sweat broke out across his forehead.

  Shock registering across her face, Teresa tucked the Glock back into her side holster and scanned him up and down. She clamped her hands together and pressed them against her face. Tears brimmed in her eyes as she threw herself over the railing and hit the sand with both feet.

  She hurried over, hooked her left arm around the crook of his right arm and whispered in his right ear. She bent down, clenched the back waistband of his jeans and hoisted him onto his feet. He gave a painful exhale and met her gaze.

  When she pressed her hand against his right hip, he scowled behind tightly-clenched teeth. He squeezed his eyes shut, pouring hot lucid tears down his face. She jerked her hand back, curled it into a white-knuckled fist and looked him up and down.

  Colin’s lips quivered as the tightness in his chest intensified. He met her gaze again and, this time, it was anything but hospitable. He clenched the front of her shirt and pulled her over to him as the color drained from his face.

  Dominic clamped his right hand across his mouth and braced the railing with his left. Jason stood, his face creased with confusion. Rosie glanced at him from the corner of her right eye, kicked her feet a few more times and buried her face against the front of his tee-shirt.

  An uncomfortable silence permeated around them, raising the hair along the nape of their necks. Their stomachs burned with the varied emotions swirling through them like a shot of hot whiskey. All they could hear was the beat of their hearts, the wind sighing through the treetops and the distant moans coming from the other side of the street.

  “I don’t have to tell you what you’re going to–”

  “I just don’t want to.” She said.

  Her cheeks flared. Her lips coiled into a lopsided grin that caught the lone tear sliding down her face.

  “You don’t have a choice.” He said. “I’m not going to make it. My rib is broken and its jammed into my right lung. I won’t even make to the state line.”

  A cough burst from his lips. The tightness in his chest intensified with each cough.

  “If I got those kids to Abilene in one piece,” He said. “it would’ve been the one thing I’d actually done right in my entire life. I know Alicia would never forgive me and I don’t expect her to but there was nothing wrong with making a difference in someone’s life.”

  “You already have.”

  She took his right hand, brought it to her mouth and kissed the knuckle between his third and second finger. Hot lucid tears trickled down her cheeks.

  She said. “We’re all gonna go there together and you’re going to have a bottle of Jose and I’m gonna have a cold beer.”

  “You wanted tequila, remember?”

  She knew what she said but she wanted to hear it from his own lips. She wanted to hear something else besides what he was going to do no matter how stupid and reckless it was.

  “Do you even know how to drive a boat?”

  “Did you forget what I do for a living?”

  She tapped the gold star on the front of her work shirt. He glanced down. She wasn’t the kind of cop he’d thought that she was.

  Now he realized why everyone said she wasn’t “a real cop”.

  “You’re a harbor cop.”

  She nodded. Her lips puckered as she choked back another sob. Rosie peered back over her shoulder once more, glanced at him from the corner of her eye and gave a loud piercing wail.

  It was as if she knew what was about to happen, even though the other two didn’t. Jason made a tentative step toward the railing, tears brimming in his eyes. Dominic saw the wounded look on Jason’s face and glanced over, his face flooded with a mixture of shock and regret.

  “You made an oath to those kids,” Teresa said. “and their parents.”

  “You’re an officer of the law.” He said. “It’s your oath now.”

  She glanced up at the top of the hill, her vision blurry with tears. She could see the horde approaching the mouth of the bridge, their withered gray bodies jerking with each step they made. She looked down at his hand, rubbed her thumb gently across his knuckles and brought it to her lips one final time.

  She stepped back and felt his hand slide from her grasp. It was like the wind slipping through her fingers as her heart slipped out of her chest and plopped down onto the sand. Jason hurried over to the railing, bracing it with both hands and stretched his hand over the port side.

  “Come on, Colin.” He said. “You’ve got to come with us. If we get you there in time, the doctors will make you feel better. Please come with us.”

  “Don’t be mad at yourself, Jason.” Colin said. “This is not your fault.”

  Teresa rubbed the tears from her eyes with the back of her hand, braced the railing with both hands and climbed onto the boat. The boat shimmied, spreading more ripples across the water. She walked across the boat and stopped beside of the steering podium.