Read Hungry Independents (Book 2) for Free Online Page A

said you guys saved me. Thank you so
     much!” He squeezed and she squeezed him back. Hunter was happy he
     hadn’t been caught in the middle of that embrace.
    “You’re very welcome. I’m Barbie. What’s your
     name?”
    “Wesley, but you can call me Wes. Only my
     sister calls me Wesley anymore. Oh gosh! I hope Carissa is
     okay.”
    “Do you guys live in Cozad?” Hunter
     asked.
    “Yes. We came here after the plague.”
    “Well let’s climb down and go find her. I bet
     she’s worried about you.”
    “Climb down? Where…? Oh gosh!” Wes scrambled
     away from the edge like a pack of giant spiders had crested the top
     looking for food and he was it. He pressed his back against the
     metal building. “Oh gosh, oh gosh! Too high! Too high!”
    Hunter and Barbie shared a look. “I think Wes
     is afraid of heights,” he said to her.
    “Guess you’re going to have to carry him
     down.”
    Wes closed his eyes and kicked his feet,
     shoving back against the building so hard that the sheet metal
     warped and popped. Given enough time, he might have torn a second
     hole in it.
    “I don’t suppose we could knock him out for
     the trip down? It’s going to be hard enough without him squirming
     in fright.”
    “Leave everything to me,” Barbie said. She
     caressed Hunter’s cheek with her index finger. “Big boy.”
    “I have a girlfriend.” Hunter blurted the
     statement out for two reasons: he wanted her to know so there were
     no misunderstandings, and he needed the reminder.
    Barbie paused, turning her head back to
     regard Hunter. “I’m sure you do.” She looked him over, toes to top
     and back again. “Jealous.” She laughed and continued walking.
     Hunter swore her hips swung wider on the trip over to where Wes was
     still trying to escape the scary distance to the ground.
    Barbie knelt and laid her hands on the sides
     of his head. “Wes, we’re going to need you calm so we can get down
     from here.”
    “Down! I’m not going anywhere!”
    Barbie bowed her head and her hands crackled
     with electrical sparks. Wes looked shocked. Hunter expected the
     boy’s head to explode, releasing a hardboiled brain, but Wes smiled
     up at her as his feet stopped squirming and his eyes drooped. She
     helped him stand and leaned him against the building.
    “Time to go,” she said.
    “How long will that last?”
    “Long enough, but let’s not dally.”
    “C’mon, Wes. Let’s go find your sister,”
     Hunter said.
    “Okay,” Wes said, sounding half-asleep.
    Hunter led them to the taller building that
     capped the end. He jiggled the doorknob and bumped it with his good
     shoulder to break the lock, but nothing doing. They were going down
     the hard way. He looked over a different ladder than the one on the
     opposite side, figuring out how the hell he would climb down with a
     limp body draped over him. Wes stood close by, oblivious to the
     dangerous height.
    Barbie opened the locked door with a simple
     turn and whistled Hunter over. “Hey, I think there’s some stairs in
     here if you want.”
    Hunter patted Wes on the back. “What do you
     know? Something is going right.”
    Wes gazed at him in an open-mouthed
     stupor.
    “Never mind. Just stay close to me.”
    Hunter led the way inside where a control
     panel for operating the grain elevator occupied one wall and the
     smell of rotten grain overpowered everything. He lifted his shirt
     to mask the stench. No help. Murky light crept in through filthy
     windows, but the light was enough to navigate the flight of stairs
     leading down. Hunter went first, followed by Wes, then Barbie.
    The trip ended with ease as Hunter found the
     unlocked door that led outside.
    “Fucking great,” he said. “I didn’t even try
     this door. I thought the ladders were the only way up.”
    Barbie narrowed her eyes at him.
    “What?”
    She covered Wes’s ears. “I wish you would not
     use language like that, especially in front of the