He Left Me to Die. Now I'll Survive Without Him! novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: Haskell

Eli Garner hadn't changed, except that the gray at his temples had spread.

"You look like hell, Haskell," he said.

"You look old, Sergeant."

"I've earned it." The corner of his mouth moved. "Staff Sergeant. First sergeant, if you want to be fussy about it."

Hank said he had a dozer to oil, and he left us on the tailgate of my truck.

The wind came up the ridge and rattled the barn doors.

Eli sat beside me, close enough that the bed of the truck dipped.

He didn't ask why I was home.

He didn't ask about Brent, either, though his eyes went once to my left hand.

I twisted the wedding ring off my finger and put it in my pocket.

Eli looked at the hayfield and said nothing about that.

"I need a favor, and it's going to sound insane," I said.

"I've heard you say insane things. You once told me to drive a truck into a river."

"It worked."

"It did."

I took a breath.

"On December 17th, the people at the Marlow pork plant start dying and getting up again. By Christmas it's the whole county. I was bitten on the twentieth."

He turned his head and looked at me.

"I died, Eli. My husband threw me off the back of my own truck to make room for his girlfriend and her kid. I got torn apart on a gas station lot, and then I woke up in my bed this morning, sixty days early."

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