Read Alaskan Undead Apocalypse (Book 4): Resolution for Free Online Page A

long drive; at least an hour
and a half and back again. It was a hell of a fare and it was a
good way to shake things up a bit. A little deviation from the
routine every now and then was good for the soul. Still, Abdul
looked at the man who flashed a wallet with a significant amount of
cash in it. The man said, “I take cabs down there all the time. I’m
not allowed to drive for a bit longer.”
    Abdul smiled. A nice long fare would be a
great way to end this shift. Maybe the guy would be a big tipper
too.
    Abdul closed the Plexiglas divider
separating him from the backseat. Not many of the cabs in the fleet
had dividers. He liked having the option available to him if he
wanted a little distance between himself and his passengers. He
didn’t close it often, but on longer fares he found people often
liked their privacy. Abdul found his iPod in his jacket’s pocket
and hit the resume button, sending melodies to the ear buds tucked
just inside his jacket’s collar. They weren’t in his ears
technically, but he could still listen to his music without drawing
a lot of attention or criticism. He loved to listen to tunes that
could warm his soul on cold, dark, Anchorage winter mornings and
brighten his eyes on melancholy Mondays. Typically, the soulful
notes drifting up to his ears were teeming with saxophones,
trumpets, guitars, bass, piano, drums, and above it all and through
it all was Bob Marley’s voice.
    Abdul loved reggae, having even adapted his
own speech to match the tenor and pace of a generic Jamaican
accent. Daniel Tosh. Bunny Wailer. Prince Buster. Even Ken Boothe.
But Bob Marley was the messiah. His beautiful, soulful rhythms and
angelic, soothing voice were how he envisioned Jah’s voice. He
could only hope that when his time came and he took that wild ride
in the sky that Bob’s voice would help him onto the right path. In
Abdul’s vision of heaven, the cherubs were singing backup on Walkin’ Blues and
Jah was jamming to No Woman No Cry .
    The drive went quicker than Abdul had
anticipated. There were a few cars stopped at Beluga Point, their
occupants hoping to catch an early morning glimpse of the migrating
pods of opaque white Beluga whales.
    For Abdul, whale watching along the Seward
Highway was neither the best use of his time, unless he was being
paid by a curious tourist, nor was it the best way to see Belugas.
He had never seen Belugas when he went looking for them. He always
had the best luck when he wasn’t even paying attention. On those
rare occasions when he did see those pasty heads bobbing up and
down in the surf, he couldn’t deny his own wonder. It felt like
such a personal accomplishment, as if he had something to do with
it. He felt something akin to pride. Maybe this was where he’d like to see his children grow into
adults.
    Lost in his thoughts and his tunes, Abdul
almost didn’t spot the State Trooper barreling toward him on the
highway. Abdul had just passed the sign warning him that he had
entered a Safety Corridor on the Seward Highway with a lower speed
limit and more intimidating penalties. He looked down at his
speedometer and felt his mouth go dry. He was going a mile or two
over seventy. He’d never gotten a ticket and was normally much more
careful and attentive. He looked into the rearview mirror and was
relieved to see his passenger drifting off to sleep.
    He was trying to prepare himself for the
inevitable when the Trooper’s white sedan passed him traveling more
than a hundred miles an hour. The law enforcement vehicle was out
of sight in little more than a blink of an eye. Abdul thought to
himself that something must be brewing in the city, making him all
the more glad that he was away from it. Maybe it would be all
resolved before he had to return.
    Moments later, they passed a bustling gas
station on the road to Girdwood. It seemed unusually crowded for
such an early hour. Abdul decided that if he couldn’t decide on
something to eat in Whittier then he would