Isolation , Jones, Nathan [top 20 books to read TXT] 📗

time to hear the distant roar of its engine as it began peeling out down the road towards Stanberry.

“Oh shoot,” she breathed, wishing today hadn't been the day she'd been late for her shift and left her gun behind.

Served her right for letting her guard down, just because Jay hadn't tried anything for days. As if she actually believed that psycho would go away.

Chapter Seven

Wedding Gift

Nick stood on a hill southwest of town, where he had a good vantage of the surrounding area. Including the truck roaring closer to Stanberry's barricade by the second.

His radio crackled. “So that's Jay's plan?” Darrel said with a mocking laugh. “After all this time waiting to see what he'd do next, he's going back to the first thing he tried that didn't even work back then? He must be completely out of ideas . . . a speeding truck's not going to do jack to our reinforced roadblock. He could throw them at us all day and it wouldn't matter.”

It did look like a desperation move, but something about it struck Nick as wrong.

He lifted his binoculars to give the speeding vehicle a closer look, and his worry turned to alarm as he realized the truck's bed wasn't empty. It held what looked like a pile of . . . was that bags of gardening soil? Fertilizer? And some sort of makeshift tangle of wires attached to trash bags on top-

He lifted his radio to his mouth, screaming through it. “Get away from the roadblock, it's a bomb!”

It was almost too late, the truck less than ten seconds away from colliding. Nick watched in horror as men on the barricade threw themselves away from the barrier across the road, the radio erupting in shouted warnings.

Gen! Her post was a hundred yards farther east from the roadblock, and she might not even be there right now, so soon after the wedding. But what if she was? The thought of something happening to her, with him unable to even come close to help her, sent a surge of frantic worry through him.

He felt sick to his stomach as he watched the truck close the remaining distance to the roadblock.

It struck the reinforced barrier with a deafening crash, followed almost immediately by an explosion that shook the ground and slapped him with a concussive blast of air, even from hundreds of yards away.

Shouts turned to screams as Nick lowered the arm he'd protectively raised in front of his face, rising from the crouch he'd fallen into to view the devastation.

There was a huge, ragged hole in the roadblock, flaming debris lying everywhere, the entire scene all but obscured by smoke. Nick couldn't see any bodies, but the commotion on the radio was replaced by voices screaming for medical aid for the wounded.

Then a new voice rose over even those. “Another one's coming from the north!”

“And the west!” a second voice shouted, followed by two more voices yelling almost on top of each other warning about a vehicle coming from the southwest and two from the northeast.

“Shoot out their tires!” Darrel screamed. “Just on one side . . . try to get them to veer off the road and crash!”

Nick wasn't sure if the sentries in Stanberry succeeded, all he knew was that several seconds later more explosions rocked him back on his heels, several in quick succession. Followed by more screams and calls for medical aid.

“Stay sharp,” Darby called tersely through the confusion on the radio. “Jay might follow this up with an attack.”

As if mentioning him was an invitation, Jay's voice cut in over the radio, temporarily silencing the confusion. His message was unexpectedly brief.

“I hear you guys are celebrating a wedding, Stanberry. What's a wedding without some fireworks?”

Nick clenched his fist around his radio, then slammed it onto its clip on his belt and continued on to join up with his patrol to the west of town.

They needed to be ready in case that psycho tried anything else.

✽✽✽

Gen had a feeling she should be at her post keeping watch in case of another attack, but the screams from the south roadblock had drawn her towards them; she wanted to help those poor people, even if it was just helping shift rubble or hold hands until people trained in first aid could help them.

She staggered along the walkway, ears still ringing from the deafening blast. A man she passed shouted something at her, but she didn't catch it among the rest of the noise and confusion. There were fires up ahead, flickering fitfully through the smoke. She could also hear screams from other places in town, cries of pain and calls for help, from what she was sure must be other trucks that had hit the barricade.

She really regretted not having her radio right now.

A figure stumbled out of the smoke on the ground below the barricade, following it with one arm pressing the collar of her shirt up over her mouth. It was Mrs. Gerson, who'd been part of the group who'd gone to attend Ellie's wedding; she must've hung back by the gate talking to someone and been caught in the blast.

Gen hopped down from the barricade and rushed forward to lend the older woman her shoulder; blood streaked the left side of Mrs. Gerson's face from a small cut above her ear, but otherwise she seemed unhurt. Mostly dazed.

“It's all right,” Gen murmured, patting her friend's hand. “Let's get you away from the barricade, get that cut cleaned up and bandaged.”

“The gate just blew up!” Mrs. Gerson gasped, leaning heavily on her. “Out of nowhere . . . people on the walkway just started screaming, and then the next thing I knew I was on the ground and the world was spinning.”

Gen listened worriedly; it might be more than just a small cut, then. She should probably get her friend to a doctor.

They'd only gone a few blocks when a shout from up ahead made Gen lift her head, breathing