Try Hard: a post-apocalyptic thriller (180 Days and Counting... Series Book 7) Read online

  Try Hard

  180 Days and Counting… Series

  Book 7

  By

  B.R. Paulson

  Try Hard

  Something is coming.

  There’s a culmination of events all shooting toward each other and Cady can feel it. She can sense the change.

  Not of the virus… not of impending death or riots – although, why not? No, Cady knows that something even worse is coming but she can’t put her finger on it.

  As she and Scott try to save Beth and return to the homestead, her mother works her way back to her family.

  And Jackson… He’s almost there. He’s so close. Is that what Cady senses? Does she know her time is almost up?

  What happens when all the bad implodes on each other? Can anything survive this path of destruction?

  Prologue

  Dear Reader,

  As you’re getting deeper into the end with Cady, Margie, and Bailey, I hope you see a little of yourself in them. There’s always going to be someone trying to save another loved one. Someone seeking a way “home”. Someone determined to help themselves or another.

  Most of the time, readers who read this genre – post-apocalyptic or apocalyptic – already have it in their mind to be prepared on some level. I encourage you to look for local resources to help you be prepared for whatever might come your way – be it in the form of an apocalyptic event or something like a job loss, or the death of a loved one, or even a case of a very bad flu strain (I’m looking at winter of 2018. Sigh.).

  In any event, we get to decide who we are and what we will be doing – what type of person we will be. Will we be the type to help our neighbors? Or will we be in it only for ourselves?

  In the interim, be safe, be loved, and God Bless America.

  Survive,

  B.R. Paulson

  Chapter 1

  Margie

  Margie clenched and unclenched her hands on the steering wheel. The vinyl felt sticky and unclean, but that didn’t stop her from moving her hands over the curves, trying to release the tension in her grip.

  The sun worked its way up in the east, lighting the sky as if there were no virus, no death, no Cure, and no loss. As if the sun didn’t have a care in the world and was just another uncaring jerk, Margie longed to pull to the side of the freeway and rale at the yellow orb in the sky.

  No mountains could be seen in front of them for a long way. Even some kind of a ridge would have helped draw out the sunrise. Margie didn’t even have the blessing of clouds to cover it. No, that would be too easy. And nothing was easy lately.

  In all honestly, the sun wasn’t the problem getting on Margie’s nerves. She just needed to direct her anxiety away from the real root of the problem, away from the circumstances around her.

  The sun didn’t bug her as much as she pretended. No, the real issue was the responsibility of looking out for Kelsey and Ryker in the car with her. Margie had somehow become the leader of the small trio as if being behind the wheel gave her special command. Although, she had to admit, the leadership role had started before she’d taken Kelsey’s post in the driver’s seat.

  Kelsey lifted her hand and rubbed her tattooed and beringed fingers over her recently shorn gray hair. Her left leg bounced in a random rhythm as she watched out the window from her seat in the passenger side. Shaking her head, Kelsey acted as if she didn’t notice her cheeks moving with the movement. She was jittery and it was getting on Margie’s nerves. “It’s my turn to drive, Margie. You’ve got to be tired.”

  The comment was out of place and Margie glanced sharply at Kelsey. “I’ve only been driving for an hour. What are you talking about? We haven’t reached Cle Elum yet.” Margie dropped a hand from the steering wheel, wiping her damp palm onto the dirty denim covering her thigh.

  Cle Elum was a passing point they had to pass through on the freeway. They hadn’t reached it yet and they didn’t want to.

  Kelsey had claimed that the men who had terrorized her at the gas station day in and day out as well as killing anyone who had stopped for gas or help were from Cle Elum. That information combined with the general anxiety Kelsey exuded as they got closer to the small town didn’t help the ambience in the car.

  None of them had a good feeling about Cle Elum, but there was no other way around it. They had to go through the blip on a map to get to Cady, Margie’s daughter’s, place. The fastest way to get there without wasting a lot of fuel was via the freeway. No matter how much Kelsey wanted to take the backroads north, there was no way Kelsey was taking the risk of running out of fuel or shortening the trip more than necessary.

  Margie had promised her granddaughter she’d hurry back. She was already taking more time than she should have.

  The closer they got to Cle Elum, the more antsy Kelsey became and it was beginning to wear on the Margie.

  Ryker leaned forward. His teenage hairstyle flopping in his eyes and he brushed the bangs from his forehead. Hanging his arm off the edge of Kelsey’s seat, he narrowed his eyes. “Is there something you’re not telling me about Cle Elum?” Maybe Ryker hadn’t known what Kelsey had told Margie in the convenience store part of the gas station. Did they want to tell him? Maybe freak him out more?

  Margie glanced in the rearview mirror at him. His skin was pale and his eyes wide with worry. She nodded tightly when she met his gaze. He deserved to know what had Kelsey and Margie on edge.

  “There were these guys at the gas station who Kelsey said were from Cle Elum. They were going from gas station to gas station killing people. We’re worried we might not be able to get through Cle Elum because of a possible road block or something.” Margie returned her lowered hand to the steering wheel. She didn’t want to talk anymore about it. What if just talking about it would conjure more possibilities? Margie wasn’t a superstitious person, but she wasn’t in the position not to be more cautious on all fronts.

  Ryker pulled back from the seats, sitting straight up in his spot and staring at Margie in the mirror. His eyebrows furrowed, he cocked his head to the side in confusion. “Were they friends of yours, Kelsey?” He glanced at the back of her head with his question.

  “What? No. I didn’t know them.” Kelsey stopped her leg from jiggling, half-turning to cast a glance toward Ryker. Her bark-like laugh gave away more of her nervousness. She turned back to face forward, scoffing under her breath at his suggestion.

  “How did you know they were from Cle Elum?” Ryker leaned back further, as if sinking into the seat to get away from Kelsey.

  His question made Margie glance at Kelsey with renewed suspicion. It was a valid question and Margie was irritated she hadn’t thought to ask it. Margie had seen the men a few nights in a row and they didn’t have signs on their trucks or anything else that would give away any information on them.

  Kelsey swallowed, rubbing her hands on her upper thighs. She cleared her throat. “I… Maybe I’m wrong. They might not be from Cle Elum. They came from the east and I assumed Cle Elum. If it’s not Cle Elum, it could be any of these towns where they came from. I just know I watched them torture and kill people who came in for gas.” She looked out the window.

  They fell silent, each locked in their own thoughts.

  Margie had to give Kelsey the benefit of the doubt. Kelsey had been stuck in that gas station for who knew exactly how long. Margie herself had the savagery of the men and had been lucky not to have been one of their victims. That didn’t mean she would give Kelsey a free pass, though. They all had to answer for their actions and Kelsey’s weren
’t adding up.

  Margie trained her gaze on the freeway. Two-lanes going east and two lanes going west. A concrete divider and sometimes a good span of land separated the opposing sections. They passed another mile marker without another car in sight. Why were they the only ones on the road? Would they stop and talk to the people they came across? Margie hadn’t considered the possibility, but it was real and something they had to decide, probably before it happened.

  But she didn’t want to bring it up, not right then. There were too many other questions in the air.

  The Volkswagen Rabbit carrying them was slight in size but the engine had them at a fairly good speed. Margie could see them getting to Cady’s in about four or five hours, if everything stayed static and mundane.

  She could do with mundane.

  “I can drive, if you want. I need to use the restroom, anyway. If you want to pull over? It might be good to take the next exit. We could go north a ways and at least try to drive around Cle Elum on the backroads and then get back on the freeway?” Kelsey broke through the silence, her fingers tapping in sync with the jiggling motion of her legs. She’d turned into a mess of nerves and Margie couldn’t figure out why.

  Cle Elum couldn’t be that big of a deal. Maybe there was a roadblock and that’s why there were no other cars on the freeway yet. Or maybe not. How could those men maintain a roadblock while they were off terrorizing towns? Or, better yet, had those men even made it back to their town of origin after the explosion of the gas station?

  “Kelsey, it’s okay. We’re going to be fine. We just have to get to Cady’s.” Margie didn’t know why she was so determined to get Kelsey up to Cady’s. It most likely had nothing to do with Kelsey herself but more like Margie needed the car to get there. She could be pragmatic enough to recognize that the most benefit to keeping Kelsey around was the car and of course, safety in numbers.

  “It’s not that. I mean… I want you to pull over.” Kelsey’s words became a mumbled mess and she slapped her hand on her knee. “I’m serious. I just want you to pull over.”

  The next green freeway sign declared Cle Elum was only a few miles ahead.

  Margie tensed further. She gripped the steering wheel and pressed her foot harder on the gas pedal. Maybe they could blow through any road blocks, or past anything in the way. Although the thought of the small Rabbit doing any damage to anything besides daisy chains was laughable.

  None of that mattered. They wouldn’t stop. Not unless they had no other options.

  Margie’s chest tightened and her breathing shallowed out. She tried to control her response to the stress, but realized she was breathing too deeply and would most likely pass out. She needed to just be fine with whatever was going to happen.

  Kelsey’s anxiety increased and she folded her arms. The stress coming off both women had to be affecting Ryker who stared forward with a strange angle to his jaw, like he’d thrust his lower jaw to the side in frustration.

  Margie glanced at her – what did she call Kelsey? They weren’t exactly friends. Acquaintance maybe? She wasn’t sure they were friends per se, but they were certainly stuck together for survival for the imminent future. She cast an uncertain but hopeful smile at Ryker who hadn’t stopped staring at Kelsey, suspicion heavy in his eyes.

  One mile to the first exit for Cle Elum and suddenly they were there, passing by the exit ramp with nothing in sight. The next exit came and went with nothing but the tops of buildings visible. No cars on the freeway, nothing set up to block their path.

  On the other side of town, Margie glanced behind them at the last on-ramp going their direction and the absence of cars or anything else had her shifting in her seat and offsetting her own jaw to the side.

  What was going on? Instead of sitting there with more confusion running rampant in her head, Margie voiced her concern as she shot a glance at her passenger. “Kelsey, what was that?”

  But Kelsey’s anxiety hadn’t lessened. In fact, another road sign flashed information at them as they passed and she clenched her fists in her lap. Her breathing became more erratic and she squeezed her eyes shut like a child avoiding a monster.

  Looking around as they continued down the freeway at a fast seventy miles an hour – the Rabbit couldn’t handle much more than that – Margie couldn’t find anything to cause such concern. Even the lack of cars was drastically preferable to the threat that Kelsey had convinced Margie was there. “What is going on, Kelsey? What aren’t you telling me?”

  “Maybe that she knew those guys and they weren’t from anywhere, but right there in Easton.” Ryker’s voice was soft but accusatory as he kept his hands tucked under his folded arms. “You knew them, right? That’s how you knew what they wanted. You watched them kill those people. Yeah, I saw the bodies. I had to go looking for food and I saw the bodies, every day.” He lifted his hand and covered his mouth as he looked out the rear passenger window. “I didn’t know it was you in that gas station. I know those men didn’t leave Easton – not at night and not during the day. They stayed right there.”

  Margie glanced at Kelsey, her mouth suspended half-open. “Did you know them?” Everything was making sense. Kelsey hadn’t wanted to leave. She’d been safe in that building. Probably because she’d known them and had made a deal with them to act as bait. Maybe they’d set up other kinds of deals that Margie didn’t have the right frame of mind to imagine.

  Why then had Kelsey involved Margie? Why did Kelsey leave with Margie and blow up the gas station? She wanted to stay off the freeway and head north on the back roads, but that didn’t make sense.

  As they’d gone through Cle Elum, Margie had been sure Kelsey was worried about Cle Elum gangs, but they were through the city and Kelsey was only getting more anxious, more upset.

  “Kelsey, what aren’t you telling me? What did you do?” Margie didn’t have time for games. It seemed like everything Kelsey did was to stall moving east. But why?

  Kelsey turned wide eyes toward Margie and reached over to grip her upper bicep. “You need to stop. You have no idea what is going to happen. It should be soon. Any time now.” She pressed her knuckles to her teeth and stared out the window in the south-east direction. Was she holding her breath?

  Margie searched the horizon and the land all around them. She couldn’t see any sign of danger or impending doom. What was out there and why was Kelsey so afraid of it?

  Chapter 2

  Bailey

  Bailey took a deep breath, the sound ragged and loud in the silence. Where had Jason gone? Had he disappeared? Or maybe he’d lain down and died. Her adrenaline slowly ebbed, letting her breathe and relax into a slumped position.

  Jessica slept, her exhaustion palpable in the small room. Bailey’s own fatigue wore on her. Would she ever feel safe again? Reaching up, she rubbed at the smooth skin on her temple and closed her eyes.

  Jason most likely left in search of relief from the pain the virus was causing. Wasn’t that what their neighbor, Kent, had done? He’d gone crazy as if seeking relief from something – anything. From what Bailey’s mom had said, the virus caused excruciating pain. Since Bailey had gotten the vaccine – even if she hadn’t wanted it – she wouldn’t have to face the pain of the virus. She was grateful for that. Even more grateful that her mom had survived the virus.

  Bailey leaned forward, her elbows on her knees, and hung her head.

  Boom! Boom! Boom!

  The pounding was full-fisted and on the door right beside her head. Bailey jumped from her spot on the toilet lid, standing and staring at the bathroom door.

  Tears pricked her eyes and adrenaline coursed through her, again affecting her breathing and making her want to throw up at the intensity. The quiet had been nice for the short time period it had lasted. Why hadn’t she been trying to get out? Because she was tired, and the relief was nice – no matter how short-lived.

  She’d hoped – stupidly, of course – that Jason, in his sick delirium would have moved on or forgotten why he was doing wh
at he was doing and go away. Leave her in peace.

  But as she stared at the door, seeking a way to figure out what he was going to do or where he was going to try to get in, the sound of feet dragging across the bathroom linoleum away from the door flooded her with hope. Something clicked, maybe he dug through the cabinets under the sink, but Bailey couldn’t be sure.

  The dragging returned, but the shuffling sound came closer toward the outside of the toilet cave’s door. Bailey glanced down at the space under the door. Jason’s shadow stretched under the panel as he stood on the other side.

  Terror clogged in her throat as she waited for him to do something, say something. Anything. Reaching out, she slowly and carefully tried the door, as quiet as possible, to make sure it was locked. The doorknob didn’t turn.

  The slight lock would never keep him out long. Not if he really wanted in.

  Was he just going to stand there?

  Bailey chewed on her bottom lip and closed her eyes. Please, Jason, come back.

  The sudden booming of his hands on the wood made her jump and she gripped her hands together in fists, one wrapped tight around the butt of her mother’s gun. The booming grew louder, echoing through the small room with increasing persistence.

  Finally, Bailey screamed. “Stop it! Jason, stop it! You have to stop.” She pressed her hand to the door as if she could keep him out. Her scream died to a sob and her shoulders shook. She was trapped in some horror movie and she couldn’t escape.

  A small whimper brought her attention to the bassinet at her feet. Bailey reached down and gently brushed the baby’s forehead. The child wouldn’t stay quiet for long. It was only a matter of time until she lost it and started crying. Bailey was right behind her on needing that release.

  Bailey had to get out of there. She wasn’t sure if she and Jessica, the infant, would survive an escape attempt if they went out the window. If she didn’t try, she had no doubt they would die in that bathroom.