Excerpt: Brains, Love, and Shotgun Shells

Though they’d agreed at the inception of their relationship that it would be for the best, Zadie still had second thoughts about pulling the trigger and splattering her lover’s brains all over the cinder-block wall behind him. She and Kyle had shared some good times running from the restless dead for the past year or so. Time was meaningless without electricity, but with Kyle, it didn’t matter what they did. Landmines at sunrise. High noon, pistols at ten paces, blasting the decaying faces off those sorry undead sons of bitches. Sharing a bottle of cheap champagne and his scoped .308 up on top of the Hilton.
The only rules they had in those times were the ones they made for themselves. And the key rule was an oath more binding than matrimony. “Till death do us part” wasn’t enough in this day and time. Their rule was simple: if either one became infected with the Z-virus, the other would shoot to kill. End of story.