Page 75 of Brood
I walk over to the fighting men, avoid the flailing limbs, and plunge the needle into the back of Brody’s neck.
He told us it would take five minutes, but it actually takes only two. After a minute, he starts choking. Will flips him over onto his back, holding him down as his body convulses.
Then Brody is dead on the floor. It looks exactly like it did with Vanessa, who was murdered by this man a year and a half ago.
Will stands and meets my eyes. I jostle a still-crying Bun. A heavy wave of relief washes over me as I look down at Brody’s body.
I’m not even sorry. I saved Will’s life, and the world is far better without that man in it.
* * *
After that, it’s almost easy. Things happen so smoothly and quickly, I can hardly keep up.
Because we don’t know exactly who Brody’s allies are, it’s still too dangerous to stay in the Refuge. So Will drags his body down the stairs and through the storage rooms to dump him in the empty hallway.
Then he races back to where Bun and I are waiting. He enters the code to let us into the air lock.
As he stands in front of the control panel next to the heavy bunker doors that lead outside, I touch his back.
He turns his head to meet my eyes.
“Before we go, I wanted to say that I figured it out.”
“Figured what out, love?” Will adjusts to face me.
“What you were trying to tell me this morning. And what you’ve been telling me all these months in so many ways. I figured it out.” I reach up to touch his rumpled beard. “And I love you too.”
His face breaks. He takes a ragged breath. Kisses me, brief and hard. Then he leans over my shoulder to kiss Bun’s head, making the boy giggle. “Let’s get out of here.”
He enters the code into the control panel, and the large heavy doors slowly slide open with a mechanical swoosh.
Will takes my hand, and we step outside.
Epilogue
Four months later, it’s Bun’s first birthday. I wake up to discover that Will has rolled on top of me.
He’s still asleep, his body heavy and his head tucked into the crook of my neck. His warm breath blows against my skin. I’m cozy and way too hot and affectionate and claustrophobic all at the exact same time.
I give him a little push to get him off.
He harrumphs as he jerks, grabbing for the gun he keeps on the nightstand. He’s always slightly on edge here on the surface. Everything is so vast and unknown, and people aren’t nearly as subdued and predictable as they were in the Refuge.
“It’s fine,” I murmur, drawing his hand back down and kissing his palm. “Sorry. Everything’s all right. You were on top of me.”
“Okay.” He gives his head a shake and then settles back onto the bed, smiling at me in the very dim light of the early morning through the window of our room. “Sorry about that.”
“I don’t care that much.” I lift my head to check on Bun, who is tucked into a rustic crib in the corner. When he appears to be sound asleep, I stretch out and take several deep breaths.
The air still feels different. Sometimes it smells dirty. Sometimes it smells grassy. Sometimes it smells like water, and sometimes it smells like warm sun. Acclimating to the world outside the bunker hasn’t been easy these past months. We’ve both had a lot of sinus problems, and I continue to occasionally be kind of dizzy.
But we’re getting used to it, and despite the learning curve, life here has been better and fuller and happier than we could have dreamed.
“How do you feel this morning?” Will asks, extending an arm to pull me over to his side.
“Not too bad. Just a little queasy. That ginger remedy the women gave me works really well.”
I’m pregnant again. I’m pretty sure I got pregnant the morning we made our escape, so I’m already into my second trimester. I had a few months of being quite sick, but even the worst of it wasn’t as bad as the first half of my pregnancy with Bun.
