31

NOAH

Min was in my arms.

I steadied my breathing, willed my heartbeat to slow. Tried to act natural, but my entire manner was fake—pretending to be relaxed when my body was on fire. Not that I wanted it to stop. Far from it. The moment was surreal. Magical. Wonderful. I wanted to keep my arms around Min for as long as she’d let me. It felt so . . . safe.

So of course it didn’t last.

Voices on the wind. Min glanced down the waterfront, then pulled free of me in a rush.

Toby and Chris were strolling along the dock, trading shoves and raucous laughter. They spotted us at the same time. Toby’s eyebrows quirked. He turned and whistled. Derrick and Mike spilled from an alley behind them, followed by Ethan and some of the girls.

Ugh.

Min stood up quickly as the group approached.

“Don’t get into it with them,” I whispered, hoping to avoid a showdown. Tack wasn’t around, but I didn’t know where Ethan stood with Min. I prayed he’d moved on to other things.

“Yo!” Derrick waved, smiling slyly. “Didn’t know it was date night, bro. My bad!”

Toby scooped up a rock and chucked it out over the water. It skipped twice before hitting a fishing skiff, causing him to cackle.

Min’s temper flashed. “That’s somebody’s boat, genius.”

My eyes snapped to her, begging for restraint, but she ignored the warning.

Toby smirked at Chris, who grinned back at him. “She doesn’t get it, does she?”

“Perhaps we could show the lady?”

“Indeed!”

Toby and Chris walked over to the bench we’d been sitting on. They nodded to each other, then kicked it in unison. The wood shivered but held, so they kicked again. This time the backrest broke off and went sliding, leaving just the seat intact.

“Huh.” Toby rubbed his chin. “How about that! Bolted to the ground.”

Derrick ran up and spiked a trash can on the bench’s remains, generating howls from all three. Min glanced at me, but I could only shrug. I knew where this was going, and it made me tired all over.

Ethan shook his head as he approached. “Really, Noah? It’s the end of the world, and you’re dumpster diving?”

I felt Sarah’s eyes. Knew it burned her, finding us together. I resisted an urge to shy from Min’s side.

“So you’re just breaking things now?” Min snapped, tightening the noose around my neck. “Real smart. The country’s under martial law, you know. Police will arrest you for stuff like this.”

Ethan scooped up a bottle at his feet, then casually fired it at the store behind us. Glass exploded like fireworks. “Look around you, Min. There’s no one here. The cops are all off planning evacuation routes or whatever. Oregon and Washington are demolished, and comets are about to pummel Asia. Nobody cares what we do.”

“My dad says more crackdowns are coming,” Toby said. “The guys in the liberty camp, they’ve got killer sources. People in the know. Everything’s gonna get worse.”

“Two comets hit today.” Jessica stood next to Sarah, dry-washing her hands. “The Russian one is still coming, and those wackos might nuke it. What if they miss, and their missiles end up here?”

Mike shook his head, actually spoke. “Won’t miss. Question is, where do the fragments land?”

Min shot me a troubled glance. We’d been unplugged and missed the news. How many people had died while we were cuddling on the bench?

“You guys still don’t get it!” Toby went on, working himself up. “The government is lying! On ham radio, people are reporting weird stuff all over. Plus there was some kind of mass suicide in Oklahoma. Like, hundreds in a cornfield, or something. Soldiers arrested a film crew on the scene and took their cameras. They don’t want people to see.”

“Up to speed, Melinda?” Ethan kicked trash into the water, a cardinal sin in this tourist town. “With all that going on, I’m not too worried about our local cops rounding up vandals.”

“You have no idea what’s going on,” Min spat. “Everyone in this town needs to be careful or . . . or . . .”

“Or what?” Ethan asked, suddenly intent. “What are you saying?”

“Nothing. Just . . . it could get dangerous around here.”

Chris snorted, pulling his fiery hair into a ponytail. “In Fire Lake? Whatever. We live in a mountain fortress. All we have to worry about is boredom.”

“And supplies.” Ethan ticked off fingers. “Food. Water. Ammo. We should gather as much as we can now. There’s no telling what might happen. Some of the smarter West Coast dips might realize what we’ve got up here and try to take it from us.”

Toby leaned forward, eyes dancing. “The camp has a plan for that. I’m not supposed to talk about it—or even know about it, but Uncle Danny can’t shut up when he’s drinking. There’s something serious in the works.”

“What trash are you talking?” Chris scoffed. “Man, you don’t know jack.”

“The hell I don’t! You watch. I’m not saying any more about it.”

Derrick pointed toward Main Street with a mischievous smile. “You guys really want to act like doomsday preppers? Nobody’s watching the hardware store right now.”

Ethan straightened. “Anyone around up there?”

“Get serious,” Min growled. “You’re not going to rob Buford’s. You wouldn’t get ten feet. Not after I called the owners, anyway.”

All heads swung her way. “You heard us,” she said, glancing at me for support.

Something in my face must’ve betrayed me.

“Noah?”

I wanted to back Min up. Take her side, and stand up for what was right.

Ethan smirked, enjoying the hard place in which I’d landed. “You gonna rat on your friends, Noah?”

I nearly told Ethan what I thought of him. What I thought about all of them, really.

Instead, I shrugged. “I don’t care. Seems stupid, but whatever.”

I heard Min’s intake of breath. Her entire body radiated disappointment.

She turned on Ethan. “Well, I do care. Touch that store, or any other, and I’ll tell Sher—” Min stumbled in her words, then finished quietly. “I’ll tell the police who did it.”

Then Min glared at me. “Good-bye. I’m going to find Tack. I need to decompress with a friend for a while.”

The guys whistled and laughed as she left, shouting overwrought apologies and begging for her to come back. The girls hid wicked smiles. I said nothing as Min disappeared around a corner. I’d never felt more ashamed.

Why am I so worthless? God, I hate myself.

Anger detonated inside me. My head rose, lips forming a snarl.

“Why are you such a prick all the time?” I said to Ethan. “You need to leave Min alone.”

He stopped dead. Silence fell like a scythe.

“Excuse me?” Ethan said, casually moving closer. “Did you just say something?”

“You heard me.”

I took a step toward him, about to do something very, very stupid.

BOOM.

BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

Blasts echoed across the canyon.

Everyone flinched. “Oh my God!” Jessica cried. “Earthquake!”

“No, no!” Toby ran down the wharf, waving for us to follow. “This is it! This is what I was talking about! C’mon!”

The others set off after him. I followed in spite of myself, as curious as the rest.

“Where are we going?” Ethan demanded.

“The Plank!” Toby reached the Nolans’ van and started pounding on its side, eyes wild. “Head for the bridge!”

Everyone piled inside. Sarah ended up on my lap. I shifted uncomfortably, wondering why I was even in the car as Mike sped west. Then he slammed the brakes. “What the hell?”

Thirty yards from the canyon, half a dozen cars were parked bumper to bumper across the highway. A Fire Lake police cruiser idled next to the makeshift barricade, with two deputies standing beside it and furiously whispering to each other. Beyond them, a dozen armed men were blocking access to the bridge.

They were scruffy types in jeans and dirty overalls, bearded, wearing sunglasses and bandanas to cover their faces. Smoke was rising from the span behind them and drifting across the gorge.

A small crowd had gathered, some yelling angrily, others cheering the men on. The deputies pointed and shouted, but to no avail. One jumped inside the cruiser and started hollering into her radio.

“Holy crap!” Derrick’s eyes darted nervously as we joined the onlookers. “What are they doing out there? Were those explosions we heard?”

I shook my head, baffled. Then the answer clicked home.

“They’re trying to blow the bridge.”

Heads turned to me in surprise. Toby nodded, elated.

“Sealing off the valley,” he said proudly. “We’ll be safe from everything to the west. Liberty men planned this whole op last night. Told you I knew something, Chris! Nobody’s coming up here and taking our stuff.”

“But that’s the only way in or out.” I glanced around for support. Sarah and Jessica looked too stunned to speak. Chris was smiling like a zealot, while Mike was stone-faced. Ethan rubbed his cheek, his expression guarded. Only Derrick seemed to share my horror.

“What if I want to leave, Toby?” Derrick threw his hands into the air. “My sister’s down at Boise State. She won’t be able to get home!”

“What if we run out of food?” I asked. “We have one supermarket.”

“You’ve seen the news,” Toby said firmly, eyes glued to the bandits. “The country is about to catch fire—this way, we don’t burn with it. We can start planting crops like the Indians used to. Run our own government.”

Ethan looked sharply at Toby.

Chris Nolan pointed. “Heads up!”

A man in a ski mask came running off the bridge, waving his hands. The other gunmen scattered, taking cover. There was another series of ear-shattering booms. I watched in horror as smoke billowed skyward.

Seconds ticked. The smoke cleared. Gunmen emerged from their hiding places, looking confused. Several threw anxious glances into town as sirens began to wail.

A long metallic groan. Then a loud crack.

We watched in silence as the bridge split in the center, cables snapping as the two sides swung apart and smashed into the canyon walls. A cloud of dust erupted, choking and blinding everyone. When the air cleared, the Plank was gone.

“Oh my God.” I ran both hands over my scalp. Those lunatics had done it. Our only link to the outside world was now at the bottom of the gorge.

Derrick was stomping back and forth with his fists clenched. “Why didn’t the cops stop them? Where’s Sheriff Watson?”

I stiffened. Watson couldn’t help us, or anyone else, ever again. Maybe it was his absence that had allowed this nightmare to happen. I glanced at the cruiser. The deputy still outside it was discreetly pumping a fist. Was there another conspiracy in Fire Lake, involving the liberty camp? Maybe the police had reacted slowly on purpose.

Engine noises behind me. I turned. Nearly leapt from my skin.

“Get out of here!” I yelled at the others, already booking it for the woods. But I tripped and fell, rolling into a roadside ditch.

Ethan frowned down at me. “God, Noah, you’re such a wuss. It’s embarrassing.” Then he saw the gray vehicles that had sent me scrambling.

I staggered to my feet. “Guys! Get out of here, seriously! Those dudes are dangerous!”

No one listened, watching in silence as a wedge of jeeps and Humvees rolled to a halt behind the car barricade. Caught in no-man’s-land, I ducked back into the ditch.

Soldiers leapt down and pushed through the crowd, covered by others manning machine guns atop each Humvee. Fire Lake residents began shouting questions, spooked. To them, these grim-faced troops must’ve dropped straight out of the sky.

The soldiers were silent and efficient, taking up positions in seconds. The liberty campers had gathered at the edge of the ruined bridge, caught off guard by the military response. But they remained defiant. Four-letter words floated on the breeze.

An officer with short black hair stepped up beside one of the machine guns. I recognized him immediately—he’d driven Lowell and Myers away last night, before everything went bad. A chest patch named him Captain Harkes.

Harkes surveyed the gunmen through a pair of binoculars. I saw one give him the finger, to the roaring approval of his comrades. A sandy-haired man in a yellow bandana cupped his hands to his mouth. “What are you going to do, make us rebuild it? This is our valley! You’re not wanted here!”

Captain Harkes pressed a finger to his ear. Nodded. Then he raised a gloved fist.

All down the line, the soldiers took aim.

Yellow Bandana froze. Then his hands shot up. “Hold on! Okay, you win. We surr—”

“Fire,” Harkes ordered calmly.

A line of bullets tore through the liberty men, cutting them in half. They fell in a bloody mass, each body pierced a dozen times.

Residents screamed, fled in terror. A pair of injured gunmen broke for the woods. I watched, horrified, as three soldiers stepped out onto the road, knelt smoothly, and shot them in the back.

It was over in seconds. The liberty men were dead. The crowd had scattered, their shouts echoing off the canyon walls. But I was still crouching in a ditch like an idiot, ten feet away from an active death squad.

Get out of here, you moron!

Ethan and the others were scrambling into the van. I saw Jessica throw herself inside, blubbering uncontrollably to Sarah, followed by Derrick, Chris, and Toby, who was screaming something about his uncle.

Ethan was last. He spotted me as Mike fired the engine and waved for me to hurry.

I spun, ran into the woods. Had only one thought in my head.

Min. I’ve got to tell Min.