Life Goes On by Tayell, Frank (large ebook reader txt) 📗

the central villa. Corrie and Olivia had stood up, though Pete hadn’t. He sat, head bowed over a food-can whose contents he was shovelling into his mouth. Olivia rested a hand on his shoulder. Corrie had taken a few steps towards them, but then stopped, waiting, clearly anxious while the two professionals conducted their private conversation.

“Hey Corrie,” Tess said with a broad smile. “I can’t believe you’re here.”

“We’re guarding the food,” Corrie said, coming over to meet them.

“There’s food here?” Adams asked.

“This is their stash-house,” Corrie said. “They kept the food upstairs. They kept us in the cellar. You’ll want to know everything, Inspector— sorry, Commissioner, but can we talk alone?” She nodded towards Olivia and Pete. “I know everything you need to know, and they don’t need to relive it.”

“Sure,” Tess said. “Can you walk, Pete?”

“Mmm,” he said, his mouth full of pineapple.

“Take that road, and you’ll find my ship and crew,” Adams said. “Tell them there’s food here, and I want it aboard.”

“This is Captain Adams,” Tess said, as the couple walked away. “Corrie used to live in my patch of the bush, keeping an eye on the dingo-fence. She’s a mate of mine, and of Mick Dodson’s.”

Corrie nodded. “Hey. Thanks for saving us.”

“How did you come to be here?” Adams asked.

“After we flew to Canada, me and Pete went to find Olivia in South Bend. That’s where she and Pete lived before. Afterward, we linked up with General Yoon’s army. We were at the rear when the bombs fell, but the front was close to the Saint Lawrence. Ground zero for the nuclear strikes. The general’s army was wiped out. Judge Benton took command and was organising a retreat, but the three of us went west to see if we could make contact with you, with the Pacific Alliance. We didn’t get very far. But we found Lisa Kempton. She was being held prisoner by these cartel people.”

“Kempton? Do you mean that eccentric billionaire?” Adams asked.

“Oh, you don’t know?” Corrie asked. “Lisa’s been trying to stop these people for decades. The cartel and their pet politicians. Well, she failed, obviously. She went east to finish them off. We went west to try to reach you guys, but we didn’t get far before we learned Vancouver had been bombed and people were fleeing inland. It was a real mess. Zombies and refugees don’t mix well. People were hungry and scared. So were we. The three of us drove south, and crossed the border. Kempton had set up supply stashes for her people, for after the apocalypse. That’s where they caught us.”

“Who’s they?” Tess asked. “Do you mean the cartel?”

“They were waiting for Kempton but we turned up instead.”

“How did they get you here?” Adams asked.

“By jet-plane,” Corrie said. “We stopped once. I overheard them talking while we changed plane, and I think they said we were in West Virginia. We were blindfolded the whole time, and drugged when we changed aircraft, but it can’t have been more than two days between them grabbing us and bringing us down here.”

“They found you at a stash house in the U.S., near the Canadian border, and flew you here?” Adams asked. “Why not kill you?”

“Because I persuaded them I knew stuff,” Corrie said. “Things about Kempton, like where her other safe houses were. Where she might be. How she’d stayed ahead of the sisters all these years. I exaggerated a lot, and lied about the rest, but they believed me. Except the sisters were supposed to be here, so it was stupid.”

“It kept you alive,” Tess said.

“No,” Corrie said. “Because afterwards, Hernando explained what the sisters were going to do with Kempton when they caught her. They wanted to torture her for years. Literally. He was trained as a doctor. He even knew her blood type so he could set up transfusions. It was… even in a year where we’ve seen zombies and nuclear bombs, it was sickening. It would have been better if they’d killed us up north, because when the sisters got here, he made it clear he was going to practice on us.”

“But the sisters didn’t arrive?” Adams asked.

“No, so we were treated… not like guests, but we weren’t really harmed. Not except when we almost escaped. We made it to the docks, but they had a sentry watching the boats. We had some food with us, so they… they skinned the woman who was in charge of the kitchen. In front of us. It was like back in that golf club in Broken Hill.”

“We saw it in Colombia, too,” Tess said. “They even left a video of Hernando torturing some of the locals.”

“Right, you went to their mine, didn’t you?” Corrie said.

“You know about that?” Tess asked.

“They knew about that,” Corrie said. “The plane flew around looking for ships, looking for the sisters. Any ship that wasn’t cartel was lured here. Except, a few days ago, the plane returned reporting the mine was now just a smoking crater, and a warship was seen sailing northwest.”

“That was us,” Adams said. “What happened to the other locals, and the ships’ passengers?”

“The passengers were killed and dumped in the sea. Fed to the sharks. Usually after they were dead. Usually. But it was worse for the locals. Um…” She looked back at the house, and up to an upstairs window. “After we tried to escape, they beat Pete up. They were going to start on Olivia, but I got Mikael to stop them.”

“The old man? About sixty?” Tess asked.

“Yeah, him,” Corrie said. “He’s their brother.”

“Whose brother?” Tess asked.

“The sisters,” Corrie said. “He’s their younger brother.”

“He’s dead,” Tess said. “The sisters had a brother?”

“He’s dead? Good. He was a disappointment to them. Wasn’t evil enough, you see? He had a son, and the son, the sisters’