Avenge My Chief (The Lost Land Series, #2) by Teresa Schulz

Author:Teresa Schulz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Survival fiction, action and adventure, Suspense thriller, family love, Dystopian thriller, Post-oil thriller
Publisher: Blue Phoenix Publishers NZ
Published: 2018-03-05T00:00:00+00:00

16

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THE FARM

Mid-afternoon, Wednesday – 23 May 2035

‘What about Mark?’ Carl dared ask timidly. ‘We weren’t sure where we should put him?’

Kev was in a right foul mood. Not that he was ever precisely cheerful. He looked around the contours of farmland for a short while. His cold, uncaring eyes settled on a nondescript bare corner way over the other side of the paddock. ‘There!’ he said, pointing. ‘But he can bloody wait. We bury Charlie first!’

He instructed Carl and Derek to dig a hole someplace nice on the farm to bury the old man. The girls had helpfully suggested a possibly suitable spot beneath the poplars down the back behind the barn, where Storm and Cocoa were also buried.

The thought of Charlie’s final resting place being there didn’t overly trouble them. Charlie’s last act had been one of kindness.

For about an hour, in the baking mid-afternoon sun, Carl and Derek took turns digging the deep hole for the grave. To everyone’s surprise, when they became too tired to dig, Kev stripped his shirt off and took up a shovel. He attacked that earth with ferocity, as though this was more a therapeutic act of purging, than a tiring chore.

He finished digging his father’s grave and stood breathing heavily. You could smell the strong musky scent of male sweat whenever the breeze changed direction. He wiped the beading trickles from his brow with his sleeve and pulled a hipflask out of his back pocket, taking a long swig of it. The undeniable smell of strong alcohol emanated. ‘Let’s go get him then,’ he said to his men.

Morbidly, Mark’s body rested for the time being in the shade beside the barn. The girls saw it as they walked ahead of the men towards the house where Charlie’s body lay. It was wrapped in an incongruous looking white and rose coloured sheet — likely one of Gen’s best. One of Kev’s men had grabbed it in haste; no doubt he would have taken the first one he set hands on.

When they emerged from the back doorstep with Charlie, the girls were walking backwards, carrying his legs. They had hold of the edges of an old grey army surplus blanket; his body swung with each step like a hammock. Kev held the remaining corners of the blanket up by his head.

Of course coffins would have been more appropriate and dignified. However Kev had neither time, nor patience, to spare for organizing those. And no one present could build anything to save themselves, having devoted their lives to larceny, arson, violence and any other pursuits that involved the biggest payoff for the least input of effort.

Then there was the spiritual side of things. Kev was a self-proclaimed atheist. He had no time for the whole church, prayers and worship mumbo-jumbo. The only reason for burying a dead body, in his mind, was the practical aspect of not having the smelly decomposing thing hanging around him attracting flies. In his whole life of 53 years, he’d never found need to mourn any particular relative or acquaintance.

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