Bunker (A Post-Apocalyptic Techno Thriller Book 4) Read online

  Contents

  Bunker (Book 4)

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Sneak Peak: REDFALL Chapter 1

  Books by Jay J. Falconer

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  Note From the Author

  About the Author

  BUNKER

  Lock and Load

  Book 4

  Mission Critical Series

  Published Sept 21, 2017

  by BookBreeze.com LLC

  ISBN-13: 978-1976412806

  ASIN: B072J9NWJG

  Written by Jay J. Falconer

  www.JayFalconer.com

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, or business establishments or organizations, actual events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 by Jay J. Falconer

  All Rights Reserved Worldwide. No part of this publication may be used, reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from the author (Jay J. Falconer) except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews, publicity mentions, book/author recommendations, or announcements.

  CHAPTER 1

  The heat from Stephanie’s beating chest soaked into Bunker’s skin as the reunion hug continued in front of Tuttle’s place. He was happy to see her, too, and the rest of the gang who hailed from Clearwater, Colorado. Her son’s ten-year-old arms couldn’t reach all the way around Stephanie’s legs, let alone Bunker’s, but it didn’t stop Jeffrey from trying.

  Everyone else had tears in their eyes, including the Sheriff and his deputy, Daisy—the same woman who’d pulled a gun on Bunker after learning his darkest secret at the miner’s camp.

  Bunker thought they’d patched things up after the incident, but was still worried she might turn on him now that she knew he used to ride with the infamous Kindred biker gang.

  Or at the least, share his background with the town’s chief law enforcement officer, Gus Apollo. Keeping one law enforcement officer on your side is hard enough. Trying to manipulate two would be impossible. Something would go wrong. It always does when you’re lying about your past.

  Until a second ago, Bunker thought the emotions pouring out of those in attendance were a result of the near-fatal execution he’d just stopped with his long-range sniper shot. It was a work of perfection. Part shooter, part weapon, especially when that weapon was a TrackingPoint Precision Guided Rifle.

  When you take down three masked men with a single long-range shot, a sense of relief should have been permeating the atmosphere. Yet it wasn’t. The air felt stale and heavy. Almost putrid.

  Stephanie pulled back from the tender embrace, her eyes filled with tears. Her tone turned somber when she spoke. “We needed you here ten minutes ago.”

  “Why? What happened?” he asked, his gut tightening after hearing the words.

  Stephanie didn’t answer. She turned her gaze to the women in attendance. Daisy and a gray-haired woman he’d seen in town were on their knees, consoling Megan and a mysterious brunette he didn’t know.

  Sheriff Apollo aimed a firm eye at Stephanie, lifting an eyebrow. “Where are Franklin and Cowie? Are they okay?”

  Stephanie shook her head. Her eyes indicated she wanted to speak, but something was holding her back. Something painful.

  Bunker pushed past Stephanie with his focus on the tiny black girl, Megan, and her innocent face.

  Stephanie let go of his hand as Bunker continued, moving closer to the precious soul he’d saved from certain death on the bus. He stood motionless behind the old woman hugging Megan.

  Every tear that rolled down Megan’s cheek impaled his heart with the savagery of a red-hot dagger. Normally the ten-year-old was a beacon of joy, filling the air with her exuberance. But that wasn’t the case at the moment.

  Megan was absent, both mentally and spiritually, her eyes locked in an empty stare, focused on something over the shoulder of the woman cradling her in her arms. It was clear the entirety of Megan’s being was under siege, suffocating the poor girl.

  Apollo asked again, “Where’s Franklin? Cowie?”

  More seconds ticked by without a response from Stephanie. Everyone else seemed to be avoiding the question, too, not wanting to speak or make eye contact with Apollo.

  Bunker knew the situation meant only one thing—bad news. Terribly so. The kind of bad news that squeezes your chest a few seconds before you hear the actual words.

  He knew from his days in the military that the all-consuming feeling of dread had a habit of transcending time and space, breaking the laws of physics to arrive early. The earlier it arrived, the worse the news, giving everyone in attendance a sensation of impending doom.

  Someone must have died.

  It was the only conclusion that made sense. Otherwise, there would’ve been a response to Apollo’s question by now. From someone: the kids, the women, the men.

  A group of this size would never remain silent, not after what had just happened with the bloody, last-second deaths of the attackers.

  “They’re inside,” a long-haired boy said in a slow and deliberate tone, breaking the quiet. A tall blonde woman stood behind him, her hands resting on the tops of his shoulders, squeezing at random.

  Bunker recognized the young lad from the bus crash. He was the kid who tossed his backpack out of the broken window and took off in a flash, before Bunker could stop him.

  The boy pointed at the old woman consoling Megan. “My grandma was there when it happened. Franklin is d—”

  “That’s enough, Victor. You don’t need explain,” the woman standing with the boy said. “He knows what happened.”

  “Both of them?” Apollo asked Dicky, the large man standing next to him. Apollo’s expression indicated he wanted to ask a different question, but settled on this one.

  Bunker figured the Sheriff had tailored his words to protect the children from having to endure any more drama than was necessary. Especially with all that had happened recently. These kids always seemed to be in the center of everything, taking the brunt of death head-on.

  Dicky’s head slumped before he finally spoke to Apollo. “Sorry boss. They came out of nowhere.”

  Bunker knelt next to the old woman and Megan, avoiding the girl’s injured leg and its heavy knee brace. His mind searched for the proper words, but all that came back was a cloud of dust.

  His tongue was empty, but not his heart, feeling compelled to comfort the child in some way. Yet he wasn’t sure how. Former hardcore, white-supremacist bikers with no kids and a bloody stain on their military record usually don’t have a deep connection with children they just met. Or ad
ults, for that matter. But Megan Atwater was different, and it wasn’t solely due to her rescue from the bus.

  The old bag let go of Megan and stood up, as if she did so specifically to give Bunker access. He raised his hands a few inches, then pulled them back, not sure if the emotional girl wanted a hug from him.

  Stephanie and her motherly instincts would know exactly what to do for a child in need, but he had no clue. Before he could make a decision, Deputy Daisy appeared next to him, throwing her arms around the other woman sitting next to Megan. A brunette. Distraught. About thirty. Someone he didn’t know.

  “I’m so sorry, Misty,” Daisy said, the two of them starting a symbiotic cry inside an arm-filled hug. She pulled away for a second, then shot Bunker a nod before she spoke again. “Bunker and I tried to save your father, but we got here a second too late.”

  The woman’s familiar name and Daisy’s words came together in Bunker’s mind. He knew who the girl was: Misty Tuttle. Frank Tuttle’s daughter. The woman who threw away her lifelong friendship with Daisy when she ran off with a foreigner shortly after high school.

  “Was it these same men?” Misty asked the deputy, pushing the words through her trembling lips.

  “No, it was someone else. Earlier.”

  Misty turned her eyes to the old woman who’d been comforting Megan. “Angus and my dad? Both of them?”

  The lady shook her head, the skin on her cheeks sagging.

  “Please Martha, tell me it’s not true. Please.”

  Martha’s face flushed a deep red color. “I can’t. I’m so sorry.”

  Misty’s cries shot up a level, her hands shaking against Daisy’s shoulder blades. “Oh God! No! Please no!”

  “It’ll be okay,” Daisy said, her voice cracking through her tears. “I’m right here. Just let it out.”

  “This is all my fault. We never should’ve come back.”

  “It’s not your fault, Misty. It was these men,” Apollo said, standing with Dicky, Dallas, and the Mayor’s grandson Rusty, who Bunker had met a few days earlier in town. “They did this and now they got what was coming to them.”

  “But I never got a chance to tell my dad . . .”

  “I’m sure he knows how much you loved him,” Daisy said, her tone confident.

  “It’s just not fair.”

  “No, it’s not. But you’ll get through this. I promise. Look around. You have a lot of friends who will be here for you, every step of the way.”

  Misty cried for another minute before she spoke again. “But you don’t understand. We just got engaged. That’s part of why we came back. I wanted Dad to know. From me. About the engagement and everything else.”

  Stephanie broke her silence, her tone soft yet to the point as she addressed the long-haired kid from the bus. “Victor, maybe you and your mom should take Megan to your grandmother’s house. Where it’s quiet. She needs to lie down and rest for a bit. She’s been through a lot today.”

  “I’m sure we can make room for both of them,” Martha said, looking at Daisy, then motioning to Misty. “Everyone should eat something, too.”

  Daisy nodded.

  “Can I help, Mommy?” Jeffrey asked, his nose sniffing as he wrapped his hand around his mother’s.

  Even though Stephanie’s son had just been through yet another traumatic, death-defying incident, the boy didn’t seem scared or withdrawn. Bunker wasn’t sure if Jeffrey had become immune to the nonstop evil or not, but the boy was showing incredible strength. Far more than he was at the moment.

  Kids are much stronger than adults think, he decided. Most adults, that is. Bunker’s dad never cut him any slack, about anything. Everyone else in the neighborhood back then seemed to shield their kids from the harder aspects of life. And death. In the long run, he didn’t think that approach prepared young people for the harshness of humanity. A harshness that would continue to escalate after the apparent cyber-attack and EMP that had taken down society.

  Before Stephanie could answer Jeffrey’s lingering question, Megan brought her pear-shaped eyes to Bunker with a crane of her neck. A second later, the girl’s emotions came to a boil and let go all at once.

  Megan’s mouth shot open in a silent, sick-like grimace as her eyes ran thin. Then the waterworks exploded, sending streams of tears down her cheeks, more than double the amount before.

  She leaned forward and wrapped her rail-thin arms around Bunker’s neck, then bawled into the soft of his shoulder, the volume intensifying by the second.

  Bunker held her tight, her chest heaving in concert with the uncontrollable waves of misery flooding out. His chest, arms, and hands could feel the pain escaping from every pore in her body. Her emotions bled into him, racing past his defenses and taking residence deep inside his heart.

  When the tears came to Bunker’s eyes, he knew he wasn’t going to be able to hold them back. Her pain was now his pain, even though he hadn’t known her long. All he could do was hold this child and wait for the turmoil to pass. It might take minutes or hours, but he wasn’t going to let go of this precious girl.

  Sure, if he had a choice, he wished he was somewhere else, but Megan needed him. So did the others, their lives inexplicably commingled with his, well past the point of no return.

  CHAPTER 2

  Megan slowed her crying and leaned back from the hug she was in. She looked at the towering white man who’d saved her from the bus, Jack Bunker. He was almost as tall as her father, but his muscles were bigger.

  Despite his scary tattoos, she could tell he was a nice man, not a mean one like the others who had hurt her and her dad.

  When Jack was around, she felt safe. Not just because he’d saved her and her friends more than once. It was more than that.

  She wasn’t sure what it was called, but when she was in his arms, it felt like home. A home that was now missing her mom and her dad. She couldn’t believe it. Both of them were dead. Even her favorite horse, Star, was missing. All she had left was Jack and her dad’s favorite horse, Tango.

  Megan wanted to go inside Tuttle’s trailer to see her father, but she was scared to look at his body. Or his face. The bad men had shot him. There’d be blood everywhere and a big hole from the bullet. It would be too gross. She didn’t think she could do it. She wanted to, but she didn’t know how.

  “Jack?” she asked in a weak voice, her lips shaking.

  His tone was gentle and fatherly. “Do you need something, sweetheart?”

  The tightness in her chest wouldn’t stop growing, making it hard to breathe. It hurt. A lot. Her lips were trembling even more now as the words arrived, air shooting in and out of her mouth in bursts. “I, uh, think I want to go see my papa. But I’m not sure I can do it. Will you come with me? I don’t want to go alone.”

  “Sure, Megan. Anything you need. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Ah, no. That’s not a good idea,” Stephanie King told Jack in a firm voice, her hand still latched onto Jeffrey’s. “Little girls shouldn’t see those kinds of things.”

  “No offense, Steph, but I think you might be overreacting a bit,” Jack said.

  “How do you figure that?”

  “Kids are stronger than you think.”

  “Really, now. And I guess that observation is based on all your years of experience? Being a parent, I mean.”

  Jack shrugged, his eyes drifting into a long stare. “It’s what my father would have done. He believed in facing everything head-on. Especially tragedy. Regardless of age. You can’t outrun death.”

  “Well, then. That explains it,” she said with attitude.

  “Explains what?”

  Stephanie opened her mouth to say something, then closed it as if she’d just had a change of heart. After a couple more seconds went by, she shook her head and said, “Never mind. It’s not important.”

  Jack looked confused, his eyes squinting. “Not important, huh?”

  “No, it’s not. Let’s move on. Okay?”

  “Look, my old man might
have been more than a little tough on me, but facing things is what makes you stronger. Sure, most people didn’t understand him and more than a few hated his guts, but he was always fair. No matter what the situation.”

  “Sure, whatever,” Stephanie said after a long exhale, rolling her eyes. “They’re both in the master. Down the hall on the right.”

  Jack nodded, flaring his eyebrows before he spoke again. “Megan, sweetheart, are you positive you want to go inside? It might be pretty hard to see.”

  She wanted to be strong for herself, but more so for Jack. He was brave and she wanted to be like him. “Yeah, I think so. As long as you come with me.”

  “Well, you need to be sure because I don’t want you to be scared. We don’t know what the bad men did, exactly. Maybe I should go inside first and check it out?”

  When Jack let go of her and tried to stand up, Megan grabbed his hand and wouldn’t let him leave. He just couldn’t leave. Bad things always happen when Jack leaves, she thought. He’s got to stay.

  “Please, don’t go, Jack. Don’t leave me here. Take me with you.”

  “It’ll be hard, darling.”

  “I know, but papa needs a goodnight kiss, like we did every night before I went to sleep. Otherwise, he’ll have bad dreams. Forever.”

  Jack sucked in a sudden breath, then turned to Stephanie, his voice different than before. He sounded sad, like she’d hurt his feelings. “Sorry, Steph, but I’m doing this. I’m taking her inside.”

  “That’s a mistake.”

  “Maybe, but she needs to say goodbye to Franklin. You heard her. He needs a goodbye kiss. We can’t deny her this one chance, no matter how hard it is.”

  “I don’t think you’re hearing me. She’ll be traumatized.”

  “I hear you, trust me. I just went through this with Dallas after what happened to his father. But in the end, we all have to face this—eventually. Even little girls. More so now than ever before with everything that’s happening out there. We can’t shield them forever.”

  Stephanie dropped her head and shook it. When she brought her eyes back up, she looked tired and maybe a little upset. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”