Break Free The Night (Book 2): Loss of Light Read Online Free PDF Page B

unresponsive. "They're too hungry, best not to risk it."
     
    ~
     
                  It was better than walking down the stairs and through the mall, because Kaylee knew that walking through the infected didn't really mean through them, more like on them, tripping and stumbling and crashing over the bodies of infected men, women, and children, trying to avoid their teeth at all costs. In her head she could imagine the sound as bones were broken, bodies crushed under sneakers and boots. It was nauseating. And dangerous too. But the alternative was just as nauseating in a completely different way.
     
                  They tied a loop in a thin rope. Quinton swore it was made for rock climbing and that it would support their weight, but it felt awfully thin grasped in her frozen fingers. She was being lowered from the roof to the parking lot below where the vehicles waited. Jack had already been lowered down. He descended gracefully, like a bulky spider. His feet connected against the brick of the building and from above it looked as though he had just walked down the outer wall. That wasn't working for Kaylee. She tried to keep her feet to the brick, but she kept slipping. Her body twist in the loop she was sitting in and her shoulder slammed into the cold brick.
     
                  The shivering wasn't helping.
     
                  "Almost there, Kay," Jack called up encouragingly. His voice drifted up clear through the black of the night she was being lowered through. It made it worse, the darkness. She couldn't see more than the neon colored rope in her fingers and the dull, pale bricks in the moonlight. After the storm that had soaked her for the entire day from steel colored clouds, the sky had cleared some. The stars were winking in haphazard sprays; the moon a sliver standing guard over them. Clouds drifted through the sky, diffuse, thin; but they did block the light, enough that she wasn't able to see clearly, that the ground was invisible as it loomed below her.
     
                  Warm hands settled on her waist and she tipped back into Jack's chest.
     
                  "Got you," he murmured, helping her get her feet on the ground. She thanked him, untangled herself from the rope, and turned to pick her way through the sleeping bodies of the infected that lay on the asphalt.
     
                  The motor home was untouched. Bodies lay scattered all around it, making Kaylee wince when she thought of how they were going to drive away. She popped the door open and checked inside, no one had gotten in. Kaylee didn't waste a moment in pulling off her wet clothing. It felt stuck to her skin. Just the act of peeling it off had her feeling instantly warmer.
     
                  The door flew open behind her and Kaylee jumped.
     
                  "We had the same idea," Emma said, ripping her new shirt over her head. She frowned at Kaylee when she looked down at her new bra. Kaylee couldn't help a laugh through chattering teeth. She thought she saw Emma bite back a grin too before she bent to pull off her sodden jeans.
     
                  "Kay, is my-" Andrew choked off as he stepped into the motor home. Kaylee was shrugging into Jack's worn zip up hoodie, which offered some cover at least, but Emma didn't even try for decency. "Geez, Emma!"
     
                  "What?" she asked, staring at Andrew.
     
                  He didn't answer right away, just averted his eyes from her until he pulled an old flannel shirt from the back pack he had tucked under the table. "Here, put this on," he said gruffly, shoving the shirt into her hands.
     
                  "But these are still wet!" Emma said, gesturing to the bra and panties set. Kaylee could have sworn she was trying not to smirk.
     
                  "Oh for the love of- I'm riding with Jack," Andrew muttered,