Page 26 of Savagely Yours
“I’m not at liberty to say, ma’am.”
“Please don’t call me ma’am. It’s already the end of the world as we knew it. Don’t make things worse than they already are.”
One corner of his mouth twitched. “All right, then. What do I call you?”
“Larke,” I said. “Larke’s fine.”
“Well, Larke, what if you give me an answer for an answer?”
“An agreement like that is contingent upon the nature of the question. Your information must be useful.”
“And it is. Now, the man you arrived with, is his name Dez?”
I gave my uniform-clad companion a more thorough once-over. “You’re the guy from the train. The one who wouldn’t stop looking at us. You know him, don’t you?”
“So, his name is Dez?”
“Do you know him?” I reiterated.
“We enlisted together.”
“What does that mean, that you’ll bring him extra pudding or something?”
“No, no.” He rotated his right shoulder. “It’s just that here, there are rules. Everybody has to be useful. He might get put on guard duty or something. That’s what I’m hoping for, anyhow. He’d be a helpful addition to our operation. Not every job is…rightfor everyone.”
I didn’t appreciate his ominous tone, but my question remained unanswered.
“The colors,” I prodded.
“White means quarantine—inconclusive results on the swab,” he explained. “Red means medical isolation for conditions unrelated to the infection. Blue means you’re uninfected and can be transported to one of the long-term facilities. Black is for the ones we can’t save, and that’s for everyone’s safety. We still don’t understand this thing that’s going around, so our best bet is to control the spread.”
Dez wasn’t infected. There’d been no opportunity for him to get infected. Still, tests weren’t always accurate, and the thought of him receiving a false-positive made me want to vomit all over the gravel.
“You’re married to Dez, so you’ll be fine,” the soldier said.
I shook my head. “We’re not married.”
“What?” The soldier’s eyes opened wide. “You’re not married? Did you…did you tell them that?”
The nausea morphed into dread.
They’d repeatedly asked me about or hinted at my relationship status. Why did they keep asking about my relationship status? And, now that I was thinking a bit more clearly, what the hell didlawyer-NEmean?
A woman appeared at the end of the corridor, flanked by six armed men dressed in gray camouflage. A linen dress brushed her shins, both the hem and the apron that covered the dress soiled and stained. A plain scarf partially concealed her dark, glossy hair.
“Mira.” She motioned with an index finger. “Come with me. Your shift starts in ten minutes. And don’t worry—I’ll take good care of you, mama.”
CHAPTER SIX
DEZ
I stared at the tray ceiling of my moderately sized living quarters, my mind replaying the same sequence it did every morning since the first day I arrived at the so-called safe zone:
“So, she’s your wife?”
“That’s what I said.”
“If that’s so, where’s her ring?”
