Read Break Free The Night (Book 1) for Free Online

her shoulders. Kaylee swallowed.
     
                  He pulled her into an embrace, but it was not the crushing, friendly embrace from the roof. He folded her into himself, his hands settling low on her back, his mouth close to her neck. He nuzzled her lightly and inhaled deeply. When he spoke, his lips flit over her skin.
     
                  “ I care for you, very much ,” he whispered and though he had said the words a thousand times over, they were not the same. Kaylee found herself sinking into him, closing her eyes against the heat of his skin and breathing in the aroma she knew was his. He was familiar and comfortable and safe, and she knew it.
     
                  Footsteps sounded on the stairs and Kaylee wrenched herself from his arms.
                 
                  “ Hey, you two ,” Anna said, waving over to them as she hauled the laundry up the stairs .“ Did you leave it to Emma to put this away? Is that why it was left on the bottom of the staircase ? ”
     
                  Kaylee offered a wooden grin .“ Must be ,” she answered through a dry throat. Anna nodded knowingly.
     
                  “ Well, I gave Nick and Bill their clothes, yours too Andrew. So just put your own away and w e’ ll be set ,” Anna said, passing the basket to Kaylee. She waved as she retreated to her room and Kaylee gave a tight smile to Andrew before twisting the knob of her door and escaping into her room.
     

Chapter Three
     
    A late summer wind flit through the gaps of the buildings and lifted the hair from the nape of Kayle e’ s neck. The first batch of corn was ready for harvesting and she and her sister were trudging across the street, two empty wicker baskets between them. The infected were still moaning and twitching, but as the sun lowered steadily, their movements became less focused, less hostile. As long as Kaylee and Emma were careful, they could pick their way through the bodies, avoiding dulling teeth and grasping fingers.
     
    “ Su n’ s almost down ,” Emma grunted, giving a rotting old man a wide berth .“ The y’ ll shut up then . ”
     
    “ Right, and we wo n’ t be able to see a thing ,” Kaylee reminded her.
     
    While some of their crops could be grown in shallow basins and roughly constructed boxes on the rooftop, nurtured by the tons of soil that Andrew and their fathers had hauled up there, the larger crops needed the deep earth and wide space that the park across the street provided. Using the protection of a chain-link fence that surrounded an old, overgrown baseball field, Nick and Bill had tilled and readied the dirt for several rows of crops. Tonight it was the corn that needed tending.
     
    And dusk, just as the sun was finally setting, was the safest and easiest time to complete this task. The purple haze that the light left in it s’ wake was just enough to illuminate the field without the dangerous use of lanterns or flashlights. Because after all, even a chain-link fence might succumb to a growing horde of infected who sensed a good meal behind the metal links.
     
    As the girls stepped from the cracked pavement of the street to the dusty edge of the park, Kaylee scanned the fence for damages. Ripened or not, if they could easily get to it, the infected would trample through the garden, devouring the roughage in their wake. But tonight, the fence was intact, the chains and combination lock still in place. It had survived one more day and Andrew and his father would not have to worry about repairing anything in the park that night. As it was, Bill had discovered a loosened fastening over a window on the ground floor of the fire station that needed immediate attention. The men would be checking and re-soldering the metal hangings that completely obscured the large glass windows for a majority of the night.
     
    Emma set her basket down and turned, keeping her eye on the street and her back