That professor, the guy I’d taken a call from, he’d said they’ll always be hungry. That we have to destroy the brain to stop them. Destroy the brain.

Could I do that? Could I. . .

“Chase!”

I turned to face Allison. The third zombie. Don’t know where it had come from. Hadn’t seen it emerge from the woods like the other two. Didn’t matter. It was right there. In front of me. Mere feet from Allison.

Feet.

I raised the tire iron and came at it. The thing never looked at me.

Not once. It was focused with tunnel vision. Allison was its planned dinner. When I brought down the iron, I gained the thing’s attention. With a cracked skull, flattened temple – it looked up.

“Now you see me, motherfucker?” I brought the iron down again. It crumpled to its knees. The thing’s hands still shot forward, fingertips brushing over Allison’s pants.

She screamed. Loud. Like it burned.

I smacked the thing in the head again, and once more. The skull was in halves. The third and fourth strike was crushing through brain.

Lifeless, the body sprawled on the grass.

“We need a car. One of these other cars,” I said, and smiled. An SUV was not far ahead, headlights on. Keys had to be in the ignition. “Grab the First Aid kit.”

She did not move.

“Allison, I am not fucking around. Grab the First Aid kit. We’re out of here.” I didn’t take her hand. I didn’t reach for the kit. Instead, I moved around the dead zombie and ran for the SUV.

She was either coming, or she wasn’t.

It was now that simple.

“Chase!” I didn’t turn around. Love was important. Getting to my kids, and surviving . . . essential.

I slowed when I reached the front of the SUV. Didn’t look like anyone was inside. I wasn’t just going to jump in, though.

A hand on my shoulder. I should have jumped. I knew the touch. “Be careful,” she said.

“Stand back,” I said, and did a walk-around, checking inside the windows. Vacant. I tried the driver side door. Unlocked.

I said, “Get in.”

Chapter Ten

The SUV cut across the median, surged back onto I-490. Thankfully, the streetlights made it seem like daytime. More and more vehicles clogged the road. Best I could guess, we’d get stuck on a shoulder not far ahead. All I could see were disabled cars. “We’re gonna need to get off the expressway. Take the main roads. We don’t, we’re going to get—”

My cell vibrated in my pants pocket. “Stuck. We’ll get stuck.”

“Chase?”

“My kids, Allison.” I used a knee to steer, shoved a hand into my pocket and pulled out the phone. A quick look at the screen: my daughter. “Hello? Char? Charlene?”

“Daddy?” I’d gotten both Charlene and Cash cells when their mother and I divorced; wanted direct access to my kids. Didn’t need Julie acting like she had more control over my kids than she actually did. She had no clue how lucky she was, how easy I’d let her have it. Always told her if we divorced, the kids were mine. Turned out I loved my kids more than that. They didn’t need courtroom custody hearings, being pulled and torn between choosing. Fuck her. Fuck her.

“Charlene! You okay? Where’s Cash? Where’s your brother?”

“Daddy, mom’s sick. Something’s wrong with mom. And Don too, they—they’re sick, really sick. I tried calling you. I kept calling you.” She was yelling. Crying. Sounded hysterical.

“Where are your Mom, and Donald? Where are you? I’m on my way there. Right now. Driving there right now. Where are they, Char?”

“Daddy? Dad?”

I looked at the phone. Still connected. “Char?”

“Watch it!” Allison reached for the steering wheel.

Instinct, I stamped the brakes, spun the wheel right, swerved around an accident scene, three cars, two bumper-to-bumper and the third t-boned. Shattered glass and a muffler covered two of three lanes. Dark . . . wetness clearly visible. Could be gas or oil. Could be anti-freeze. In all the vehicles, not one person. Not one body. Fire department wasn’t coming to cut anyone out, and flush the scene. Police weren’t going to issue tickets and call for a hook to clear the jam caused.

“You’re right. We have to get off the expressway,” Allison said.

“Charlene?” She wasn’t hearing me. I couldn’t hear her. I looked at the phone again. Call disconnected. I gave it to Allison. “Please, keep calling my daughter back.”

Once on I-390 North, I stayed in the far right lane. Took Exit 21, Lyell Avenue. And stopped.

“Phone’s dead,” Allison said.

“Keep trying.”

“There’s no signal.” She held the phone out.

“Alley, keep trying.”

“Keep trying what? There’s nothing. No signal. No bars. Nothing.”

I climbed out of the SUV.

“Where are you going, Chase?” Allison’s door opened. She stayed inside the vehicle. Couldn’t blame her. There was no way I was getting this thing off the expressway. Ramp was completely blocked.

Charlene had been screaming for me. For her Daddy.

I needed to move cars. I absently banged the tire iron against my thigh. I walked to the front of the SUV and surveyed as much as I could see.

Get the cars out of the way was one option. I liked the SUV, wanted to keep it. But it would take too long. We’d have to cautiously check each car for keys, creatures, and bodies, move ‘em, get back to the ramp, move another, and so on and so forth until a path was cleared. Then the SUV would have a shot. But for how far, for how long? Until the next roadblock. That was it. That’s what we could count on. This, the mess here, it was impassable. With the SUV, in the future, maybe we could take it up onto the shoulder, across a field, through some uncertain terrain. I know it would last longer, stand up stronger to challenges than a Focus, or some small, compact hybrid piece of shit.

We’d have to find another SUV later. My kids were in trouble. I had no doubt. My fucking ex and her husband were monsters, zombies and, apparently, Julie didn’t know enough not to attack and eat her fucking children.

“We have to move.” I waved Allison out of the SUV. I kept looking in all directions. Too many cars left abandoned without people. Where were the people, the zombies? They had to be close. “You know what? Hold on.”

I went to the rear of the SUV. “You have the First Aid kit?”

She held it up. “Right here.”

I opened the back door, lifted the false floor and fished around for the SUV’s tire iron. I handed it to Allison. “There ya go.”

She took it, held it; eyes snaked over it like it was filled with poison. “I don’t know, Chase. I’m not sure giving me this is going to make much of a difference. I don’t know that I could kill a person.”

“Allison, Alley, you see these things? You see anything that’s happened since we left work? While we were at work, honey? Anything?” I didn’t have time for this. At every turn, she was a problem. Uncertain, and wishy-washy. “Allison, take the fucking thing. And if I get into trouble, bash its head in. It’s pretty simple. You love me, right? A couple. I’d do anything for you. Hope you’d do anything for me. See how this is—how it looks? So if I’m in trouble, you see one of those things on me, maybe about to bite my throat off of my neck—what are you going to do?” I pointed at her. This wasn’t rhetorical. I didn’t want an answer, I expected one. We were definitely at a pivotal point in our relationship. “Dear?”

“Bash its head in,” she said. Barely above a whisper. But I heard it. I heard her. I could be a dick about it, have her say it again, only louder. Didn’t matter. She’d said it.

“You better mean it, okay? That’s all I’m saying. You better mean it. One of those zombie’s gets anywhere near you, know what I’m doing? Honey, do you know what I’m going to do?” Again, I pointed at her.

“Bash its head in.”