“Ah … Why don’t you play anymore?”
Nick shrugged, as that brought up a memory he didn’t like thinking about. He’d been real y good at the game, but that hadn’t saved him. “Got thrown off the first week I made the team for fighting when Stone mocked my shoes. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not exactly a people person.” Kyrian laughed. “I noticed. Look, I need to make a few more cal s. Wander around the downstairs here and get acquainted with it. Don’t get too tired. If you need anything to eat or drink, it’s in the kitchen. Make yourself at home.” Nick waited until Kyrian left before he tried to cal Madaug again on his new phone.
Stil no answer.
Sighing, he had a bad feeling about this. If what Kyrian had said was right, they were down about a quarter of the team.
There won’t be any state finals for us this year.
Stupid concern given everything going on, but it was the first thing that popped into his mind.
What he couldn’t figure out was what had started it. Yeah, the jocks picked on certain people and now that they were becoming zombified, it would only get worse. Now they’d pick on everyone.
How could they stop this?
Aggravated with the lack of details, he made his way back to the kitchen, where Rosa was making something that smel ed unbelievably good.
Licking his lips, he went to investigate the pot while Rosa chopped shrimp and onions on the cutting board. “What are you making?”
“Gumbo.”
Nick’s brows shot up at a dish that he’d eaten most of his life, but this didn’t look anything like his mom’s. “Huh … so this is what rich man’s gumbo looks like.”
“How do you mean?”
“It ain’t got leftovers in it and you’re putting real meat into it and not bacon bits or roadkil .”
Rosa laughed. “I’m sure you’ve never eaten roadkil .” He wouldn’t bet on it. His mom might have denied it, but some of the meat she brought home … he was sure it’d been scraped off the street. Maybe even plucked out of the tread on tires.
Rosa handed him a spoon. “Feel free to sample it.”
“Real y? Thanks.” He dipped the spoon in and stepped away for it to cool before he took a bite. Man, it tasted even better than it smel ed. His stomach growled so loud, it sounded like a monster was about to pop out.
Rosa turned to stare at him.
“Sorry. I didn’t have lunch.” Bubba hadn’t given him permission to take money out of the til for it, and since school lunches came with his tuition, he didn’t have money to buy lunch somewhere else.
Rosa’s jaw went slack. “Why didn’t you say something about being hungry?” She pul ed him over to the island where two tal stools were set. “You have a seat and I’l make you a sandwich.”
“I can wait for dinner. I’m used to it.”
“No one goes hungry in this house, m’ijo. You just sit there while I make it.”
This was seriously creeping him out. No one was ever this nice to him. Had he fal en into the Twilight Zone or something?
I’m going to die. It had to be an omen of doom. Yeah, I’m going to turn into a flesh-rotting, flesh-eating, no-dating-
’cause-I-stink demon. His body parts, especial y the real y important one, were going to fal off like in that movie he’d seen. …
And al because he’d helped an old couple escape his friends.
Stop being stupid.
But it wasn’t stupid. It was a fact. Something was wrong with the world. It’d skittered sideways and nothing was like it should be.
He was doomed. No if, ands, or buts about it. He was going to die.
And no sooner had that thought finished than he heard something scratching around the back door. There was a low growl and the rattle of a pretty large creature. Vicious and guttural, the sound reminded him of a dog cornering a cat. It must be a Rottweiler or something.
He frowned at Rosa, who’d frozen to stare at the door too.
“What kind of dog does Kyrian have?”
She shook her head. “No dog.”
“Then what—” His words ended as the back door flew open and two members of his team rushed in to tackle him.
CHAPTER 7
In a move he hadn’t used since he was a running back, Nick went to the left, turned sharp, and sidestepped them, leaving them to slam into the wal . He grabbed Rosa and pushed her toward safety as he looked around for a weapon.
Rosa grabbed the cleaver in her right hand before he could.
His jaw went slack as she took the carving knife into her left and held the two of them like a pro as she faced their intruders.
Nick was aghast. “Rosa?”
“Stand back, Nick. I wasn’t always a housekeeper and any hijo de puta dumb enough to come in here to attack us deserves to die on the floor, butchered like a pig.” The zombies charged.
Rosa caught the first one with a slash to his arm. He didn’t so much as grunt. Instead, he shoved her back and went for Nick, who grabbed one of the pans from the stove.
So much for dinner.
He slung the piping hot food into the footbal player’s face.