Read Black Tide Rising - eARC for Free Online

going to argue with women like that? Much less seventeen-year-old girls.
    * * *
    “I don’t think I’ve ever been so tired in my life,” said Sam. She was perched on a stack of goods with her elbows on her knees and her head handing down.
    Next to her, Rochelle Lewis was trying to bring her breathing under control. “Me, neither,” she said, almost gasping.
    But as exhausted as she was, Rochelle’s spirits were higher than they’d been in days. No, weeks —maybe even months or years. After her divorce three years earlier, she’d buried herself in her job as manager of the diner. That had kept her busy, but she realized now that she’d done it at the expense of being very lonely. And then the zombie apocalypse—she still thought that was a ridiculous name because, first, the people infected by the virus weren’t actually undead even if they were monsters, and second, she’d studied the Bible and knew damn well this wasn’t really the apocalypse, just a man-made catastrophe—had come along and left her completely alone. She’d thought she’d die in the bowels of that restaurant within a day or two—or, worse, get turned into a naked mindless shrieking monster herself.
    Now, she had a purpose again—and people to share it with. Impulsively, she put her arm around Sam’s shoulders and hugged her. “I’m really glad you’re here, sweetie.”
    Sam’s arm slid around her waist. “Me too, boss.” Boss carried a weight of affection in it that was not usually found in that particular term.
    Down on the ground below, they could see Tom Kaminski trying to maneuver his wheelchair. The old man’s expression was a cross between determined ferocity and exasperation. He had his rifle perched on his lap and was simultaneously trying to keep it from sliding off while he patrolled the area looking for any signs of approaching zombies. He was at least one hand short of what he needed.
    It was kind of funny, actually. Both Rochelle and Sam started chuckling.
    “I’d better go down and help him,” Sam said. She rose and headed for the stairs.
    “A guardian angel for a guardian angel,” Rochelle murmured to herself. “Hell, who knows? Maybe this is the apocalypse and St. John just got some of the details wrong.”
    * * *
    They’d gotten about half of their goods along with all the pallets up onto the roof when Freddy Rodriguez arrived with his industrial van full of more stuff to haul up—including fifty cases of paper each of which seemed to weigh a ton. They didn’t have the equipment to bring up a lot of cases at a time using the hoist, so most of the paper had to be hauled up by hand. Fortunately, Freddy was a big man and the three teenagers he brought with him were all fresh and rested.
    The general unspoken consensus among the old folks was: let them finish the job.
    “Yeah, take a rest,” said Freddy. “But not until you get all those pallets into position. And see if you can glue them down. We’ll have to attach the tent stakes to the pallets instead of welding them to the roof, so we don’t want them sliding around.”
    “What sort of glue should we use?” asked his wife Victoria.
    “I got no idea, honey. Try all of them and see what works best. But before you do, see if you can scrape the paint off the roof using the chisels and files we got. Glue will bond better to naked steel than it will to paint, especially if it’s roughed up a little.”
    The look Victoria gave him was not exactly full of spousal fondness. “I thought we were getting a break?” she said. But she didn’t complain any further before setting to the work. Jerry and Latoya Haywood joined her, along with their daughter Jayden. So did Andy, after she got a little more rest.
    Since there was no way to find out which sort of glue would work best before they had to start piling stuff onto the pallets, they just made sure to use every kind they had on every pallet. Gorilla glue, epoxy glue, super glue, Elmer’s glue,