Lost World Read Online Free PDF

back and gives Anne a reassuring smile before getting to his feet. “I’ll walk with you up to the truck. That way I can write a few things down. I don’t want you grabbing the wrong thing.”
    “I know I don’t really have to say it,” Winston says, frowning, “but watch your backs.” He doesn’t look like he’s in love with the idea, but he doesn’t tell anyone they can’t go. It’s not his style.
    “Will do,” Jon says, heading to the stairs with the others.
    I watch them walk away with a pit in my stomach. I know why they didn’t ask me to go. If Axl came back and found me gone, he’d be furious. It still hurts, though. Like being picked last for a team in gym class.

3

    I JUMP TO MY FEET AND spin around when footsteps pound against the stone behind me. The second Axl and Angus come into view a deep sigh of relief whooshes out of me. It’s about time.
    Unable to stay where I am, I rush forward to meet Axl halfway between the fire and the stairs. He pulls me in for a hug, and my body feels instantly lighter. “What took you so long?”
    Axl presses his lips to the top of my head. “Checkin’ out the area.”
    “If you wanted fast food you shoulda gone to McDonald’s,” Angus mutters, practically shoving past me to get to the fire.
    “Can we?” Max asks, his eyes lighting up like the prospect is the best news he’s ever heard.
    The question should make me laugh at the adorable naivety of children, but it doesn’t. Instead my eyes fill with tears, and I have the sudden urge to sit down and sob. All I can think about is how much these kids have lost and how different their futures are now. They don’t have the hope we had when we were young. I grew up with nothing, but I never lost the desire to have more. To believe something better could happen for me.
    These kids will never have that.
    Anne sighs and shakes her head. She looks as sad as I feel. “No, honey. There’s no more McDonald’s.”
    Max’s face falls and he stares at the ground.
    “Shit, you don’t want McDonald’s,” Angus says, holding up two rabbits. “This here is real food. That stuff they fed you in them restaurants will kill you if you eat too much.” He kneels in front of Dylan and Max, and leans in close to the boys like he’s going to tell them a secret. “In fact, you wanna know what I heard?”
    The boys’ eyes get big and round as they stare at the dead animals, and they shake their heads. Angus motions for them to get closer. They lean forward, along with everyone else sitting around the fire. Even Axl and I step closer.
    “I heard them restaurants is what started all this mess.”
    “You mean the zombies?” Max asks, his eyes once again full of wonder.
    Angus leans even closer. Everyone around the fire watches him, waiting to hear what he has to say. Like he might actually have the missing piece of the puzzle.
    “Sure. Them places were cheap, right?”
    The boys nod in unison.
    “Well, they had to get real cheap stuff to make their food. Meat that nobody else wanted an’ all that. I hear they got a real bad batch right ‘round the time people started gettin’ sick.”
    Max’s face scrunches up and he shakes his head. “I thought it was a flu.”
    “Yeah,” Dylan pipes in. His tone tells me he knows Angus is full of shit. “And my mom never ate at McDonald’s, but she got sick and died.”
    Angus shrugs and sits back. “Just what I heard. I don’t know nothin’ for sure. Nobody does.” He holds the rabbit up in front of the boys again. “I do know this, though. Rabbits didn’t get that flu, right?”
    “No animals did,” Max says quietly, studying Angus like he’s trying to figure out if this man is telling him the truth.
    “They didn’t eat at McDonald’s neither.” Angus gets up before the boys can say anything else. When he turns away, there’s a big grin on his face.
    Axl chuckles. “Son of a bitch.”
    “Yeah,” I mutter.
    The expression on Angus’s face reminds me of how