Shadow Woman A Novel Page 0,44
camo sign hanging high: HUNTING AND FISHING GEAR. Just what she wanted—not that she had any desire to take up fishing.
She felt kind of like a kid in a candy store, almost giddy, and definitely thrilled. This didn’t feel like foreign territory.
What captured her attention first was an impressive display of weapons against the rear wall: rifles, mostly; some shotguns, air rifles. An employee stood at the counter, closely watching the aisles, on the lookout for shoplifters. Swiftly, automatically, she assessed him. Brown hair, small eyes. Maybe thirty, skinny, not much in the way of upper body strength. He looked at her, nodded, and immediately dismissed her as not being a likely customer.
Fat lot he knew. She didn’t bother nodding back. He’d already looked away.
She scanned the weapons display and remembered wishing for a gun when she’d thought she might be cornered in the parking lot of a slightly seedy apartment complex.
But you want a handgun that can’t be traced, and you sure as hell don’t want anyone doing a background check and alerting Them.
A big display of hunting knives caught her eye. There were other, more expensive knives in a locked display case, but these were encased in hard plastic and hanging on an end cap. Obviously they weren’t top of the line, but she didn’t want to blow a couple of hundred dollars on a knife, either. She pulled one from the peg and examined it. It had a six-inch stainless-steel fixed blade with a very slight curve. It wasn’t fancy, but it was a decent length, and the grip was small enough to fit her hand better than one of the behemoth hunting knives would. She dropped the clamshell package in her cart, along with a leather sheath that hung nearby. On the next aisle over, she almost crowed with joy. Bear spray! It was really pepper spray, extra strength, which wasn’t as good as a handgun but way better than nothing. And if she was going to jog alone, pepper spray would be a good thing to have on hand. What had she been thinking, walking in her neighborhood without it all these years?
She put two canisters into her cart, paused, then got another one. Three wasn’t too many. Over by the camping gear she found some wasp and hornet spray and almost automatically dropped two big cans into her cart. One would go by her bed, the other in the bathroom. It was just as good as pepper spray and could shoot a stream a good twenty feet. Huzzah!
In the camping section there was a huge selection of backpacks. She took her time selecting one that spoke to her, as in wasn’t too big but had plenty of zippers and pockets. Nylon rope. Some carabiners. She paused, looking at the last two items, remembering just this morning when she’d thought about an assault team roping down the outside of a building. The image didn’t bring on a headache attack now, but it did give her a tight feeling in her stomach, one almost of … anticipation. Good God, had she actually done something like that?
Probably not. Some weekend rock climbing was far more likely. Still, the idea was tantalizing.
She got some protein bars, a rain poncho, other items that appealed to her on some level. Her shopping was almost automatic; she barely gave any thought to the things she grabbed and threw into her cart. If she stopped to think she’d make herself sick, and she’d had enough of that. She needed these things; she needed them all.
Finally she made it to the middle of the store and the impressive display of running shoes.
Half an hour later, with shoes, thick socks, and a sleek new black jogging outfit—because who started a new exercise regime without all new gear?—she headed for the checkout counter. The days were still long; it wouldn’t be dark for a while. Even though she’d be late getting home, she could eat one of the protein bars on the way, dump her shopping bags, change clothes, and hit the pavement before dark. She wouldn’t run for long, not on her first day, but she was oddly interested in pushing herself, to see what she could do.
When she reached the counter, she stopped and considered the contents of her cart. Pulling out the knife and pepper spray, the protein bars, the rain poncho, and anything else that could even remotely be considered as preparation for the coming zombie invasion, she pushed them toward