Free Forsaken World (Book 1): Innocence Lost by Thomas A. Watson Page A

downstairs. Halfway down, he heard a house alarm down the street and froze.
    The group standing in the front yard turned as one and moved toward the sound. When they were all moving away from the house, he continued downstairs and eased up to the window. Lights at the corners of the house two houses down from Doug’s were on, and Lance knew that’s where the alarm was coming from.
    He looked away from the house and was shocked at the numerous forms moving toward the alarm. “This is so fucking not good,” he said, backing away from the window.
    Coming into the den, Lance saw Ian standing over two backpacks. “Good idea to bring my scout pack,” Ian said, moving over and taking it.
    “The crowd just left the front yard. A house down from Doug’s alarm went off, and you wouldn’t believe how many are out there,” Lance said. “Let’s get bullets.”
    Nodding, Ian passed by him, heading for his dad’s office. Lance saw Jennifer still on the couch with Carrie and Allie and followed. When he got to the office, Ian already had the safe open and was pulling out magazines for the AR and boxes of shells for the shotgun.
    They quickly loaded the ten magazines, and Lance passed the AR back to Ian. “Keep some of those on you,” Lance said, shoving ammo in his backpack.
    Ian nodded and reached in the safe and pulled out a big key. “Think we should take the key to the cabin?” he asked, and Lance looked up at it. It reminded him of the keys in movies that cops used to lock jail cells. The key was almost as long as a fork, wider than a tablespoon, and looked like brass, but they knew it was much tougher.
    “Yes, we might need to go there,” Lance said, zipping his backpack up. “We are going to have to leave here soon and get to my house.”
    “Are you fucking insane?”
    Lance held up his hands, looked Ian in the eyes, and said, “Will you listen? Your house has a porch across the front. That’s six regular windows and one big ass picture window they can break into not counting the door. The porch on the back, they can reach two windows and the door. Your house is made of wood. The windows here may be double, but the ones at my house are storm windows and can’t be reached from the ground. My house is brick with no porch. All three doors have storm doors then a metal door.” He lowered his hands, seeing Ian understanding what he was talking about.
    The alarm stopped down the street, filling the night with an eerie quiet. “When?” Ian asked, shoving two magazines in his back pockets.
    “Soon,” Lance said, pulling on his backpack.
    “I’m going to the garage. You head back to the den,” Ian said, pushing the AR so it hung on the side of his body and grabbed the bat.
    Not liking it but knowing Ian had his reasons, Lance nodded, and Ian took off. Reaching for the door of the safe, Lance glanced inside, making sure they had the best weapons available. The safe held thirty guns and was full, but all of them were fancy hunting rifles, bolt or double barrel on one side. The other side held the hunting shotguns with long barrels. Glancing at the top shelf, Lance saw a key ring and a bag of flash drives.
    Knowing his dad had information for the family stored on flash drives in their safe, Lance grabbed the bag and key ring. Closing the door, he locked it and put the bag and keys in his back pocket. Leaving the office, he stopped in the kitchen and looked down the hall to the front and didn’t see anything out the windows. From where he was, that only meant nothing was on the porch.
    Afraid something outside could hear his heart beating and his breathing, Lance tried to swallow, but his throat was dry. With his throat sticking to itself, he coughed and moved over to the sink, turned on the water, and shoved his mouth under the faucet.
    When his stomach was full, Lance turned off the water and stood up, looking out the windows over the sink. His mouth fell open, spilling water over his chest, when he saw three