Frenzied - A Suspense Thriller Read online

“Deacon?” Heart leaping, Hannah hurried forward.

  Deacon crawled out of the darkness and into the light.

  He was covered in blood, but he was alive.

  “Let’s get out of here,” he said.

  Chapter 33

  It was all over the news.

  Two days later, lying in bed in an ICU room at Grady Memorial Hospital in downtown Atlanta, Deacon flipped through various news broadcasts on the flat-screen TV positioned above him. All of them repeated the same fabricated story: a carbon monoxide leak isolated to the upscale live-work-play community of South Haven had resulted in a tragic loss of life. The area was under strict, federal government quarantine for an indefinite period.

  Social media, however, told a much different story. Before the military’s jammers had disrupted wireless communications, dozens of community residents had sent texts to friends and family, and posted videos of what had really happened within those gilded walls.

  The room’s glass door whooshed open. Emily and Hannah came inside, laden with paper bags.

  “Hey, ladies,” Deacon said. His stomach grumbled, and he adjusted the bed into an upright position. “Is that real food I smell?”

  Emily lifted a bag from a local deli. “Just what you ordered.”

  “Appreciate that. If I had to eat another cup of applesauce, I was gonna shoot somebody.”

  “I’m sorry, but I had to eat the pickles on the way here,” Emily said. “I’ve picked up these weird, pregnant-lady cravings.”

  Emily had spent some time in the hospital, too, to get treatment for her wounds. She’d gotten multiple stitches to address the bites from the frenzied chimps, and she’d been vaccinated for rabies and tetanus. None of it was expected to impact her pregnancy, a blessing for which all of them were grateful.

  Hannah placed a leather laptop carrying case on one of the wing chairs, and came to the bed. She grasped Deacon’s hand, kissed him on the lips.

  “You’re looking better,” she said. “How’re you feeling?”

  “Better than could be expected, considering that a black bear on steroids tried to rip my heart out—thank God for Kevlar body armor.” He squeezed her hand. “Better now that you’re here, too.”

  Hannah sat next to him on the mattress; they still held hands.

  “I finished reviewing Kent Falcon’s video journal, all forty-six entries,” she said.

  “And?” he asked.

  “He isn’t an anomaly.”

  “Tell me about it. He was a psychopathic douchebag. The world is full of them.”

  “It’s more complicated than that,” Hannah said. “He was a leading member of some sort of underground order. A secret network of anarcho-primitivists who want to push back the advances of modern technology by any means necessary. Remember Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber? He was another one, who acted as a lone wolf, but Falcon’s group seems much more organized. Extremely well-connected, too.”

  Deacon sighed, rested his head against the pillow.

  “Did he give names?” Deacon asked.

  “Only aliases.” Hannah watched him, her gaze expectant. “We’ll need to decide what we’re going to do about it. This isn’t over.”

  Deacon glanced at the television, at the media outlets dispensing fake news, whether they realized it or not.

  “Give everyone the truth.” He looked from Emily, to Hannah. “My dad, Jim, all of the others we lost, we owe them that, it’s our duty. We give everyone the truth.”

  “My thoughts exactly,” Hannah said. Emily was nodding, too.

  “But that’s a task for tomorrow,” he said, and pulled Hannah into his arms. She fit perfectly in the circle of his embrace, as if all along, throughout the ups and downs of his life, she and she alone always had been meant to be there next to him, and he to her. “I want to enjoy this day, this moment, before we face the rest of the world.”

  Emily gave them a knowing smile and quietly slipped out of the room. Their faces so close their noses nearly touched, Hannah laid her palm against his heart, and he put his hand against hers, too, felt the slow throbbing beneath his fingers.

  “Promise not to break it?” she asked.

  “Only if you promise not to break mine. It’s taken a lot of damage already, not sure how much more it can handle.”

  She traced her hand upward, to his chin, guided his face even closer, and gave him a teasing, feather-light kiss, then another, and another.

  “I think I can work with that,” she finally said.

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  Also by Brandon Massey

  Novels

  Thunderland

  Dark Corner

  Within the Shadows

  The Other Brother

  Vicious

  The Last Affair

  Don’t Ever Tell

  Cornered

  Covenant

  In the Dark

  Collections

  Twisted Tales

  The Ancestors

  Dark Dreams I – III

  About Brandon Massey

  Brandon Massey was born June 9, 1973 and grew up in Zion, Illinois. He lives with his family near Atlanta, Georgia, where he is at work on his next novel. Visit his web site at www.brandonmassey.com for the latest news on his upcoming books.