Harden_The Remaining Universe by D. J. Molles

Author:D. J. Molles [Molles, D. J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Unknown
Published: 2018-10-22T18:30:00+00:00

NINETEEN

─▬▬▬─

OUTSIDERS

She was waiting for Sam in the same spot that she’d left him.

It was nearly dark and Sam didn’t see her until she stepped out from behind a tree.

“You come alone?” Charlie asked.

“Of course.”

A slat of moonlight caught her face as she stepped toward him. He could just make out her eyes taking him in, up and down, and then looking behind him, as though she couldn’t take his word for it.

That stung.

“Alright then,” she said. “Come on.”

She started away from him, but he caught her wrist.

“Wait.” He looked around. “Where are we going?”

She took his hand. The insistence of his thoughtless grab turning to something tender. She moved in close to him. Electrically close. He could smell her. “Do you trust me?”

“Yes?”

“Because I trust you.”

He shuffled his feet. “Yes, Charlie. I trust you.”

Then she leaned forward, and up, and their lips touched.

Firecrackers in his mind.

It was a brief kiss, not much more than a peck, but her lips were soft and warm and they filled his mind with pink. He felt a stir all through his body. A rush of wanting.

Then she was pulling him along with her. “Then come on.”

He allowed himself to be led for a time, and when she became sure that he would follow without her towing him, she released his hand.

Even though Sam knew the borders were secure, that the fences were high, built up higher, and topped with powerful electrical lines, he still never felt safe in the woods. Especially in the dark. During the day he could shrug it off, but when everything was shadows, every shadow felt like a threat.

He never communicated this to anyone. It was his own personal problem to deal with.

He was too old to be afraid of the dark. He was a soldier now, for chrissake.

A soldier like Lee. And Lee wasn’t afraid of the dark.

She led him into the clearing of McFayden Pond, and they skirted the edge of it, all the way around to the opposite bank, and then she began to descend the bank towards the water.

“We goin’ swimming or something?” Sam said in a hushed tone. He stared at the shimmering dark waters and thought no fuckin’ way. Then thought that if Charlie started disrobing and getting in the water, he probably would too.

“I hope not,” was Charlie’s only answer.

They came to a small cement dam. A washway. Something to drain off the pond during heavy rain. Charlie negotiated herself over the slick concrete, and Sam followed. The dam was now between them and the pond. She kept descending. Into darkness.

It wasn’t until he saw the big, black opening of the culvert that he came to a stop.

Charlie halted at the mouth of it. It was huge. Her shadowy figure barely came to the halfway mark of its height. She looked back at him expectantly.

“You want me to go in there?” Sam hissed.

Charlie pulled something out of her pocket. It clicked. Light speared the darkness in the culvert. By the glow, Sam saw she was smiling.

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