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window. She rose up a little to look at the
vehicles parked out front. "How many of you are there?"
    "Ten."
    "There's ten of you?" she croaked out.
    A pang shot through Riley's heart and she
had to blink away her own tears at the yearning and disbelief she
heard in the woman's voice. "There were more of us, but…" Riley
couldn't find the words anymore so she became silent as she looked
toward Xander.
    He rested his hand on her shoulder and
stepped closer to her. His hazel eyes were flecked with beautiful
shades of jade green and gold that she found fascinating. His dark,
sandy blond hair curled around his ears and forehead. "But it looks
like you've been through hell too. You know what it's like now,"
Xander said.
    Fresh tears began to stream down the woman's
cheeks. She released her first hiccup. "What is your name?" Riley
inquired.
    "Nancy, Nancy Wainthrop. It's so odd to say
that." Her gaze drifted to them, her brow furrowed. "I haven't said
it in… days… weeks?"
    "I don't even know what day it is," Riley
assured her. "But it has been weeks since the beginning. I'm Riley,
that's Mary Ellen, Xander, Josh, Carl, and Al. How long have you
been here?"
    Nancy's eyes remained distrustful as they
slid over each person Riley introduced. Her gaze lingered on Al,
and Riley didn't miss the fact that she moved closer to the older
man. If Nancy believed Al was the weakest of them because of his
age, or the most easily taken advantage of, she was in for a
shock.
    "Days, I think," Nancy replied.
    Riley sat back on her heels as Nancy's eyes
took on a glazed look. Her hand dropped down by her side and she
edged further away from them. Riley didn't try to stop her. Judging
by Nancy's tangled and matted blonde hair, torn clothing, and
bruises on the exposed skin of her arms and neck, she'd been
through a lot over the past few weeks.
    Nancy again dabbed at her eyes with the
tissues before focusing on Riley and Mary Ellen. A noise in the
hall drew Riley's attention to John stepping into the doorway.
"Everything ok in here?" he demanded.
    Carl nodded and stepped out of the room with
him. "Help me search the rest of the building; we have to get out
of here soon."
    Riley turned back toward Nancy as she
hiccupped again. "What happened to your family or friends?"
    Nancy's gaze focused on the wall behind
Riley. "I was with my family for awhile, but I was on my own for a
couple of days before arriving here. There were five of us left,
myself, my brother and his wife, and my mom and dad. My younger
sister was away at college when it started. We were trying to get
to her in the city but we were jumped by some of those rabid
humans." Her lower lip began to tremble as she tugged at her hair.
"And now it's just me."
    "Where are you from?" Al inquired.
    "Plattsburg New York, it's near the Canadian
border."
    "What was it like by you? Did the quakes
cause a lot of damage?"
    "It wasn't so bad in the beginning," Nancy
whispered. "Some homes were lost in the quakes and fires. Lake
Champlain overflowed when parts of it were dammed up and new
outlets were formed. Our area held up better than some of the
others I've been through but then the sickness started. At first no
one knew what was happening, but then people started changing. They
stopped speaking or they started speaking gibberish. My best
friend…"
    She shook her head and took a deep breath
before continuing. "Well the gibberish and silence were the best
part of it all. When they started turning on us things just became
complete chaos. We'd been holding off on trying to get to my
sister, certain that someone would come to help us, or that she
would somehow get a hold of us. We were scared we would leave and
she would be coming to us. When it became obvious things were only
going to get worse we decided to try and get to her. We never made
it. There are so many of those people out there, and so few of us ."
    Riley touched Nancy's arm when fresh tears
began to fall, but Nancy moved it away from her.