Dead South Rising (Book 2): Death Row Read Online Free PDF Page A

now, baking away like overdone cornbread in the Texas sun. What about his health? His well-being?”
    “He’s dead, Roy.” The words slipped over Jessica’s tight lips before she’d even realized it.
    Roy’s chest heaved, blowing him up like a balloon. “Fucking bitch.”
    “Roy—”
    “ Murdering , fucking bitch!”
    Jessica stood, her chair launching behind her, catching Randy’s legs. He let out a groan.
    The tension in the room crackled and buzzed like an overloaded power line trying to drink from a water puddle. Everyone started talking at once. Hands arced. Fingers pointed. Jaws yapped.
    The Janitor held his arms out to his sides, raised his voice to be heard over the blustering roar. “People, people. Calm down.” The small room served only to amplify the clamor. “People! I said cool it!”
    Like a wave slipping down the sloping sand and back into the ocean, the din died down to a manageable murmur.  
    “Folks,” the Janitor said, “We’ve been at this for almost three days, cooped up in this room, making no headway—”
    “And whose fault is that?”
    The Janitor ignored the unsolicited comment. “We’ve got to come to a rational decision. Sitting around, fighting about this… things that need doing ain’t getting done. We’re two days overdue for a supply run. Resources ain’t been tallied. Hell, we’re running generators like they ain’t never gonna run outta gas. I love the air conditioning as much as the next fella, but we’ve got to start thinking and acting responsibly if we’re gonna make it to the Fall.”
    For several seconds, no one said anything. Not even under their breaths. Eyes darted about the room. A couple of men rolled up on the balls of their feet several times, rocking nervously. A few others pivoted back and forth in their chairs.
    “So,” Gabriel said, “we’ve got to come first. Not them. Not the dead or the sick or the in between. Us. The positively living. ”  
    Roy piped up again, sucking the air out of Gabriel’s pep speech, sending it fluttering to the floor. “So we’re just gonna ignore the sick? Let ‘em just rot on those tennis courts and swimming pool, while we sit in here in the air conditioning?”
    Despite wanting to stay out of it, to not get involved, Jessica said, “Are you listening? Do you hear what he’s saying? What he’s implying ?” She let her gaze fall on several of the residents, forcing them to make eye contact with her, to drive her point home. “ We are going to be just as dead as those things on the tennis courts and swimming pool if we don’t get our shit together. This place will deteriorate in a matter of days if all we do is sit in here and fight and argue about the obvious all day.”
    “The obvious? ” Luz said. “And what do you mean by that? That we’re wrong?”
    “No, that you’re wrong.”
    “Bullshit,” Roy said. A few others nodded, uttering agreement in unison.
    Jessica glowered at those nodding and siding with Roy and Luz. “Have you people been out there? I mean really been out there ?” She pointed at the door. “Have you seen those shufflers in action? What they’re capable of? They are biological killing machines. It’s like they’re… programmed… or something to just… kill. They’re the murderers. Not me. Not us. They are.”
    “They aren’t in their right minds,” Luz countered. “That’s why we have to restrain them. Until this whole mess blows over.”
    “It’s not gonna just blow over , Luz. Don’t you get it?”
    A hint of a smile peeked out from under Gabriel’s push broom mustache.
    Jessica continued, “These ‘people’ you think are sick are deader than doornails.”
    “Impossible.”
    “Impossible? Shit, you’re the doctor. You hold a stethoscope to their chests? You give ‘em a physical yet? What would you prescribe to them to make them well since you think they’re just sick ? Huh? What would that be, because I’d really like to know.”
    “The last