TWENTY-THREE
Ripper
No way they cleaned out Grandpa’s stash.
Levi definitely got my attention with those words.
We followed him around to the back of the house and entered through the wide-open kitchen door. Place looked like it had been sacked by Vandals. The oven door smashed and hanging on one hinge. Refrigerator tipped on its side, leaking coolant. A couple of empty kitchen cupboards half torn off the wall. Pointless acts of destruction, possibly fueled by frustration.
If the vandals were frustrated, that had to be a good sign, right?
Levi made a quick circuit of the house, avoiding the back bedroom. Didn’t blame him. A man could shove grief aside if he had to, least for a while. Mourning was a luxury when there was a job to be done.
He returned to the kitchen and circled the butcher block island. Stopping at one end, he crouched down and fiddled with something under the lip of the butcher block. A click, then the end panel of the island swung open like a door, revealing a stairway leading down to a hidden room.
Several high-power flashlights hung from hooks inside the stairwell. Levi grabbed one and headed down the steps.
“Hold on,” I told the others, then paused halfway down the stairs. Flashlight beams might not be enough to quell Mac’s fear of the dark. I glanced at Kyle. “You mind getting a lantern for Mac from the back of the jeep?”
“No problem.” He jogged out the door, then returned a couple of minutes later with an LED lantern, which he handed to her.
“Gimme a minute to check it out before you come down.” If the armory had been breached, somebody might’ve booby-trapped it.
I followed Levi down the stairs. What I saw when I reached the bottom stopped me dead in my tracks. I swept my flashlight around all four walls, blowing out a long, low whistle. No looter would have left behind this treasure trove.
“Come on down,” I called.
When I was a kid, one Christmas my folks gave me a boxed set of DVDs from an old TV series, The Incredible Hulk. For months, I was obsessed with the show. I loved the moment when the scientist hulked out, roaring with rage, his muscles bursting through his shirt.
If Miles’s stockpile was the mild-mannered scientist, Grandpa Kurt’s cache was his supersized, monster incarnation. I was looking at Miles’s hoard on steroids. Not so much the food—although the old man had a whole wall of shelves jampacked with foodstuffs. No, it was the weapons.
Holy fuck, the weapons.
“Told ya.” Levi shrugged.
Kyle and Sahdev filed down the stairs, then stood gawking at grandpa’s armory. Mac and Hannah paused halfway down, bending over to scan the room’s contents.
“Looks like your grandpa was getting ready for Armageddon,” Kyle said.
“He was.” Levi directed his flashlight at the left-hand wall. “Two AK-47s for close work. Grandpa liked them because they’re ridiculously reliable and almost indestructible. Two Israeli Tavors for distance shooting. They use the same rounds as an AR-15, but they’re manufactured to tighter specifications, so they’re more accurate. And because they’re more compact, they’re easier to carry.”
Kid knew a helluva lot more about firearms than the average seventeen-year-old.
“Two sniper rifles, an older Russian Mosin-Nagant, and a Barrett M82 with night vision scopes. Two shotguns.”
“Why two of everything?” Sahdev interrupted.
“I spent a month here every summer. I think Grandpa hoped that if the shit ever hit the fan that I’d be here with him, and I’d need my own weapons.”
Sahdev’s eyebrows shot up. “Did your parents know that your grandfather was teaching you how to shoot an assault rifle?”
“My mom would’ve shit bricks if she’d known. As far as she was concerned, it was bad enough that he taught me how to hunt and dress game. So, short answer, no. They had no idea. They wouldn’t have let me visit if they’d known.”
“My mom would’ve pitched a fit, too.” Kyle craned his neck and scanned the room. “What else is down here?”
“Sidearms. Smith and Wesson Model 10 revolver. Two Glock 17s. A couple of Sig Sauers. A Colt 1911 ACM 45, like Ripper’s. And of course, a buttload of ammo.”
Kyle pointed toward the corner of the room. “Is that what I think it is?”
“A compound hunting bow with a fifty-pound draw,” Levi answered.
“I was on the archery team in high school and college.” Kyle shot me a look. “Don’t bother with the Robin Hood jokes. I’ve heard them all.”
“Knowing how to handle a bow is nothing to laugh at,” I said.
Glanced up at Mac, who was staring at the collection of weapons. You had to be ready to defend yourself if you wanted to survive in the post-pandemic world. Mac accepted that reality, but the old man’s armory left her wide eyed and dazed.
I didn’t even try to wipe the grin from my face.
“Ripper, you got to see this.” Levi lifted a crate from a shelf and set it on the floor. I squatted next to him and pointed my flashlight at the crate while he pried off the lid.
I blinked. “Where the fuck did Grandpa Kurt get M67 fragmentation grenades?”
“I don’t know for sure. I imagine he knew a guy who knew a guy.” He picked up a grenade. “A black-market item for sure, but Grandpa was always willing to bend the law to get what he wanted.”
Hannah leaned over the stair rail. “Levi Greenburg, put that thing down.”
“Chill, baby. I’ve been handling grenades since I was twelve.”
I winced.
Two things occurred to me simultaneously. First, Levi had been handling grenades—and AK-47s and Tavors—since he was twelve? Second, you say chill baby to a woman in a patronizing tone like that, and there’d be hell to pay.
Hannah narrowed her eyes, harrumphed, then wheeled around and stomped back up the stairs. Mac glanced at me, raised her hands, then followed the girl.
Teenage love. My relationship with my first girlfriend—when I was sixteen—had been as volatile as it was exciting. She was either crazy about me or irked by something stupid I did. Should be interesting to watch the teenagers navigate their first real relationship.
That thought stopped me short.
Levi and Hannah had intended to stay put in La Pine, even if Grandpa Kurt was dead. What would they want to do, now that the place had been breached and ransacked and everything busted to shit?
“What did I say?” Levi gazed up the stairs at Mac’s retreating back.
I laid a hand on his shoulder. “Not so much what you said, but the way you said it.”
He looked baffled.
I sighed. “We can talk about it later, if you want. Right now, I need to ask what you and Hannah plan to do, now that grandpa is dead and the place has been trashed.”
“I’m not sure. I have to talk to Hannah about that, find out what she wants.”
“All right.” I nodded. “When you talk to Hannah, see what she thinks about the idea of you two joining up with our group and coming to Valhalla with us.”
Levi frowned. “You sure you’re not inviting us along so you can get your hands on Grandpa’s weapons?”
I snorted. “Hate to break it to you, kid, but if all I wanted was to take the old man’s stash, there’s nothing you could do to stop me.” I let the truth of those words sink in before I continued. “Nah. It’s not the weapons. You’re smart. You got skills. There’s strength in numbers. Besides, I think Hannah and Mac wanna stay together.”