The Kincher boy shot his seed deep inside her, bucking away at her with a pure animal frenzy that exceeded anything in Abby’s experience. The force of his pelvis thrusting against her, mashing her hard into the ground, caused excruciating pain. The pain was exacerbated by the sharp rock wedged into the small of her back. Each powerful thrust was accompanied by a corresponding stabbing sensation. Her blood leaked onto the ground. The boy’s frenzy increased as he came, his loud grunts giving way to a horrible, mangled scream, a sound that seemed to Abby like the shrieking of a demon. Then,spent, he thrust against her a few final times, slower, shaking and sighing as he grinned at her, the awful, distorted curl of his elongated mouth a promise of nightmares to come.
The boy climbed off her and staggered over to a tree stump, where he sat and continued to grin as he worked to catch his breath.
Laura stood over her. Arms crossed beneath her bare breasts. A smirk on her face. “You done got the shit fucked right out of you.” She laughed and the smirk deepened, curling in a way that was almost as ugly as the Kincher boy’s satiated grin. “Shoulda heard yourself screamin’, girl. Bet you came ten times.”
Abby glared at her.“Wasn’t screamin’ ’cause I liked it.”
Laura snorted. “Uh-huh. You keep on tellin’ yourself lies. It’s what you’re good at.”
Abby looked at her sister, struggled to contain the rage boiling inside her. She had never exactly loved Laura, but she was family, and she’d felt something like affection for her. But now that was gone, replaced by a black hate she felt deep in her heart. She sensed it wasn’t a fleeting thing. This hate was permanent. And she knew there was only way to keep it from eating her alive.
“I’m gonna kill you.”
Laura flinched.
She looked into Abby’s eyes, saw the burning hatred there, and for a moment looked genuinely afraid. Then she shook herself and the smirk returned. “Hell you are. You might wanna kill me, you miserable old bitch, but you ain’t got the balls.”
She dropped to her knees, wrapped a hand around Abby’s throat. “But I could kill you, you useless cunt.” Laura’s face went hard, made her look far older than her seventeen years. She tightened her grip on Abby’s throat, making her gag. “I could kill you now, and nobody would care. Nobody would miss you for a second, and you fucking know it. You’re a waste of air. A failure.”
Abby grabbed Laura’s wrist, tried to twist her hand away from her throat.
Laura just dug her fingers deeper into the tender flesh. “That the best you can do, girl? I could really do it, ya know. Just keep squeezin’ till you’re gone. And you wouldn’t be able to stop me. Know why?”
Abby whimpered.
Laura leaned closer, leering at her now.“I’ll tell you why. It’s because you’re weak. You’re weak, and I’m strong. And that’s why I’m gonna have everything you were supposed to get. And when I’m in charge, things are gonna change. Ma tolerates you, just lets you sit around the house and mope. I ain’t gonna have that, sister baby. No sir. You’re gonna have to pull your weight or pay the price.”
She leaned closer still, her lips almost grazing Abby’s mouth. Her voice dropped to a register so low it was nearly inaudible.
But Abby heard it.
And what Laura said was “If I was in your shoes, I’d maybe think about leavin’. For good.”
Laura let go of her throat and Abby sat up, gasping for breath.
Laura stood and left without another word, the Kincher boy trailing after her.
Abby touched the tender, bruised flesh of her throat and thought about what Laura had said. She would take her sister’s advice. Only she would not be leaving with her tail between her legs. And not without extracting her promised pound of flesh. She felt shame and more than a little self-disgust. In other circumstances, the younger girl would not have handled her in so dominating a manner. It was hard to be strong in the aftermath of a violent assault, and so easy for the aggressor to press the advantage. But the tables would turn, and, she swore to herself, Laura would soon know how it had felt to be in her position today.
A large bird flew across the sky, just visible through the latticework of tree limbs. She watched it disappear and envied its freedom.
Tears touched Abby’s eyes.
Soon,
she swore.
Soon I’ll be free.
She got to her feet, wobbled for a second, but managed to remain upright. She pushed the hem of her dress down and tried not to be sick as she felt some of the Kincher boy’s juice trickle down her thigh. But it was no use. A wave of nausea drove her back to her knees as a horrific possibility struck like a sudden and violent thunderclap: what if the boy’s tainted seed took root inside her?
Oh, God…
She shook, and fat droplets of sweat beaded on her brow.
It would just fucking figure. The ultimate slap in the face from fate. And yet so perfectly in keeping with the way her life had gone so far. Some twenty men had found their way to satisfaction between her legs. None had used any sort of protection. And yet she’d never become pregnant. Now she hoped she was simply physically incapable of getting knocked up. Because the thought of carrying a Kincher man’s child was more than she could bear.
I’d rather die.
The thought so disturbed her she knew there was only one thing to do.
Go to the seer.
Mama Weeks.
Yes.
Now.
Abby hitched in a deep breath, shoved herself upright again, and turned in a slow, woozy circle. She was still disoriented and needed a moment to get her bearings. Then she spotted a familiar, crooked old tree, with big, low branches that hung almost to the ground.
She wiped sweat from her brow and set off toward the east.
Toward the domicile of the ancient and revered Cassie Weeks, known to all in these parts as Mama Weeks.
The fortune teller.
Some time had passed. He wasn’t sure how long. The sun was sinking toward the horizon, its dimming rays staining the sky pretty shades of violet and orange. It was an image he’d like to see on a beach, maybe standing at the water’s edge with Megan, his arm draped around her small, almost bony shoulders, the warm tide lapping at their bare, sand-coated feet.
Yeah, the beach would be nice.
Somewhere in Florida, down in the Keys.
Or maybe even Hawaii, spending their honeymoon lolling in the lush tropical paradise. It was a tempting, sweet vision. And a bitter irony. Not so long ago the notion of marriage, specifically to Megan, had frightened him. Had borderline repelled him, to be honest about it. And now, scarcely more than two hours since he’d last contemplated the qualities his eventual wife should possess, none of them embodied by Megan Renee Phillips, he couldn’t imagine anything he would like more.
Life could be a real kick in the pants at times.
You spend all your time working hard to steer clear of something, avoiding even the merest mention of the subject, and then something big happens, a tragedy or some other major event. Something that clears away all the bullshit in one big swoop and forces you to face that hidden truth, to deal with it once and for all.
Right then, Pete decided he would propose to Megan if, through some unfathomable miracle, he should ever find himself in her presence again.
The thought galvanized him.
I’m getting the fuck out, one way or another.
He surged to his feet and strode purposefully toward the locked gate of the pen. He grabbed the padlocked latch and rattled it, testing its strength. It barely budged. He looked up and eyed the coils of barbed wire strung across the top of the cage. The chain-link fencing stood maybe a dozen feet high. He was more than fit enough to climb it. That wasn’t the issue. The question was what to do once he reached the top. Hell. He would just have to position his body as well as possible and sling himself over the top. His flesh would get shredded by the barbed wire. There was just no way around that. But he thought he could endure the pain.
Hoped
he could endure the pain. For Megan. For both of them, and for the life they might have together.
Pete reached high over his head, curled fingers through chain links. He took a deep breath and tensed his muscles, psyching himself up for what he had to do. Dredging up the mental strength to face the searing pain of the barbs piercing and ripping his flesh.
You can do it,
he told himself.
For Megan.
He pictured her smiling face, the cute dimples at the corners of her mouth A shiny shade of lipstick making her lips glisten, inviting a kiss.
It was all he needed.
Pete began to hoist himself up.
“You better not.”
The soft voice was devoid of inflection, but something in the warning it carried stopped him long enough to let go of the fence and turn toward the young woman
sitting in a rear corner of the cage. It was the first time she’d spoken. The first time she’d even acknowledged him. He’d tried to engage her soon after the departure of Carl and Gil, but she had been unresponsive to the point of near catatonia. He’d given up after the first several conversational gambits, not feeling much like talking himself at that point.
But now that she’d broken the ice, his curiosity was piqued. He walked over to her and squatted in front of her.“Why not?”
She still wouldn’t look him in the eye. She kept her arms wrapped around bruised and scraped knees and stared at the ground, rocking in a strange, herky-jerky movement. It was as if there was something inside her she was fighting to contain, something she didn’t dare let out, lest it destroy her. And the harder she fought against it, whatever it was, the less she was aware of him.
A full minute passed.
Then another.
“Okay. Don’t tell me.”
Pete started to rise, but she grabbed him by a wrist and pulled him back down. She stopped rocking and leaned close to his face, her warm, rank breath making his nose curl. He wondered how long it’d been since she’d brushed her teeth. Days? Weeks?
Longer?
Jesus…
Her eyes were wide and livid, filled with a terrible knowledge of things Pete was sure he did not want to know about. He trembled in her grip, wishing now she’d kept staring at the ground instead.
Her voice as she spoke was still quiet, but there was no longer anything else soft about it. It was hard and brittle at the same time, vibrating with an unstable, electric intensity. “If you climb, the dogs will bark. They will
growl and howl. And if the dogs howl,
they
will come. And if they come, you and I will be punished.” And now she smiled, a sick, forced twisting of lips, a terrible perversion of soiled beauty that rivaled Gil’s pudgy, dead-eyed leer for the title of most disturbing expression he’d ever seen on a human face.“We will be tortured. Maybe even killed.”
Pete swallowed hard.“Jesus…fuck…”
She let go of his wrist, and he fell backward onto his ass.
She watched him, that sick smile diminished some but still there.“Yes. Jesus has fucked us. This is hell.”
Pete wiped moisture from his mouth and scooted backward a few feet. He regarded her warily. Yes, she was a victim, too, and worthy of his pity. But her sanity seemed to have shifted free of its moorings at some point during her ordeal. Her whole manner was that of an utterly deranged person. For all he knew, she might raise the alarm herself if he tried to climb out of here now.
So…slight change of plans.
He would wait until she was asleep. Even crazy people had to sleep at some point. He could even feign sleep himself, watch her through half-open eyes until she stretched out and nodded off. It would be better than having to interact with her again in any way. But for now he would allow her to think he’d seen the wisdom in her words.
He forced a nod.“Yeah. Hell. I think you’re right.”
She licked her lips. “When the sun goes down, you’ll fuck me.”
“What?”
Her smile shifted subtly, hinted at a twisted eroticism. “When the sun goes down, you’ll fuck me.”
Pete appraised her again. Cleaned up, she would be very pretty. Perhaps even beautiful. She had a nice figure and
a pretty face underneath the grime and the stench. A few showers and a few generous applications of an expensive shampoo would render her dark, matted hair glossy and lush. In another life, another setting, her come-on would have been damn near irresistible.
But here and now?
Like hell I’ll fuck you, you goddamn psycho.
But she didn’t need to know that yet. It occurred to him he should distract her somehow, steer the conversation in a less-disturbing direction. “I don’t even know your name. I’m Pete, by the way.”
The woman smiled.“I’m Justine.”
“Nice to meet—”
“That’s the name you’ll be crying out in a little while. Do you like the sound of it?”
“Um…”
Justine laughed.
Pete knew he should stop talking now, but a helpless compulsion kept his mouth in motion. “How did you wind up here, Justine? I can tell by your accent you’re not from these parts.”
Justine’s eyes glittered with mad amusement. “You enjoy the sound of my voice?”
Pete didn’t bother suppressing the groan that came then.
For fuck’s sake, lady.
She laughed again and leaned closer to him, making him cringe. “You’re right, Petey Pete.” Her voice took on an exaggerated Southern drawl. “I ain’t from round these here parts.”
Yet more mad laughter ensued.
As did more mad talk.
This time Pete didn’t take the bait. He kept his mouth shut and kept one eye on the sun as it continued its slow exit from the warm Southern sky.
Jessica got off just the one shot before the lawmen on the other side of the roadblock returned fire. The truck’s windshield exploded as bullets penetrated. One buzzed by her ear. Jessica screamed and cringed. The .38 fell from her hand and went tumbling into the ditch. The steering wheel slipped from her grip, and the truck veered sharply away from the angled cruisers. The top of her head smacked the truck’s roof as its wheels bounced through the ditch. Her feet found the brake pedal and jammed down hard mere moments before the truck’s front end struck a tree, bringing her desperate dash to freedom to a sudden, violent halt as the force of the impact propelled her body against the steering wheel. This knocked the breath from her lungs and sent shock waves of pain lashing through her body. She felt as though she had been hit by a freight train.
She pushed herself away from the steering wheel and fell sideways across the seat. Her throat burned as she struggled to pull in a breath. At first she heard only the dying whine of the old truck’s engine, but other sounds became audible as the engine gave up the ghost with a final, rattling clunk. Voices. One on a radio, heard through a crackle of static. Another somewhere close by—one of the lawmen urging caution as they drew closer to the truck. And now she heard a crunch of twigs beneath booted feet. A desperate, burning terror stole
into her heart. They were so close. Within moments they would have her. She did not want to think about what might happen to her then. Some distant voice inside her urged her to action again, a fading echo of the drive that had brought her this far. The voice told her to drag her battered body through the shattered windshield and flee again into the woods. And Jessica ached to do just that, but the collision with the steering wheel had at least temporarily robbed her of her strength. Get up and crawl through the windshield? Right. Right now she could barely breathe. Even the slightest movement unleashed yet another whipcrack of pain.
A groan of rusted metal made her gasp. She lifted her head and saw a lawman’s arm poking through the suddenly open driver’s-side door. The barrel of a service revolver was aimed at her belly. Then the cop poked his head in, saw she was no longer a threat, and visibly relaxed. He turned his head and called over his shoulder to the other cops. “Stand down. Bitch is down for the count.”
Jessica didn’t know where it came from.
The strength.
It was just there.
Strength and a cold, black fury.
Her leg shot out, the sole of her shoe connecting with the lawman’s nose as his head turned back toward her. She heard a satisfying crack of bone as his nose splintered. And she saw blood fountain from his nostrils as he cried out and staggered backward, collapsing to the ground. Jessica’s eyes went to the truck’s floorboard. The lawman had dropped his gun. It was wedged beneath the gas pedal. This time survival instinct overwhelmed pain. She summoned strength again, twisted around on the seat, and dove for the gun. The lawmen were screaming at her, violent exhortations to get the fuck out of the fucking
truck and get down on the fucking ground right fucking now. But the men stopped yelling when they saw her moving in the truck. She heard a
pop-pop-pop
as they discharged their weapons. Jessica cringed below the level of the seat, wincing as bullets thunked holes through metal. This was it. She was seconds away from dying. She had the gun, but it was useless to her now, because she couldn’t hope to get into a position to return fire, not without instantly being shot down. Her stomach twisted as her flesh anticipated how it would feel to have high-caliber slugs ripping through it.
The whole of her awareness was so concentrated on the prospect of imminent, painful death that she never heard the approach of the other vehicle. But she did hear the subsequent violent rending of metal and shattering glass as it struck the cruisers still blocking the road. The lawmen were screaming again, but it was evident their focus was elsewhere now. Jessica crawled out of the truck and stared down at the lawman she’d kicked in the face. He wasn’t breathing and his eyes were turning glassy. It didn’t seem possible that she’d killed a man with a single kick to the face. But his body was untouched by stray bullets. She’d killed him, all right. Maybe the blow had driven a bone fragment into his brain. Whatever the case, he was dead.
But the others…
Their backs were turned to her now. Another truck, an old one that closely resembled the one she’d stolen, had crashed into the parked cruisers. A man’s bloody body lay across the hood. So here was the guy they’d set up the roadblock to catch. He looked like he was already half-dead. One of the lawmen sealed the deal by stepping up to the truck’s crumpled hood and putting a bullet through his brain.
Jessica raised the service revolver and fired until it was
empty. The lawman closest to her went down first, taking a bullet square in the middle of his back. The other man spun toward her and got off one shot that went wide. Then a bullet went through his open mouth and sent a rain of blood and brains out the back of his head.
Jessica lowered the gun and walked into the street to survey the carnage.
She thought for a moment, realized she was close to losing count of how many people she’d killed today, and decided it no longer mattered. These weren’t people to her anymore. They were just obstacles. If she had to kill a hundred more to get free of this place, she would do it.
But to get free, she needed to get moving again. A cruiser was parked at the side of the road, probably the one driven by the cop who had originally spotted her. It was the only still-operational vehicle in the immediate vicinity. She didn’t relish the idea of fleeing in a cop car, but she was out of other options.
She exchanged the empty pistol for a loaded one, prying it from the stiffening fingers of a dead lawman. She took some spare bullets, too, and stood up. Then she took a step toward the intact cruiser and winced, her knees buckling beneath her. With the adrenaline of the moment fading, the pain had come back. She drew in a wheezing breath and continued to hobble toward the cruiser. Each step triggered another jolt of pain. It was worse when she paused to kneel again and retrieve a dropped pump-action shotgun. She felt faint for a moment and almost keeled over. But she got herself upright again and staggered the rest of the way to the car. She slipped behind the wheel and set the guns and bullets on the passenger seat.
Her eyes surveyed the array of unfamiliar cop equipment on the dash. A strained voice squawked through a burst of static over the radio. Keys dangled from the ignition
slot. The engine was still running. Jessica put the car in gear and swung out into the road, twisting the steering wheel until she was pointed away from the roadblock. Her fingers curled around the steering wheel as she stared at the empty stretch of road ahead. A road that wouldn’t remain empty very much longer. She tapped the gas pedal and the car rolled forward, picked up speed.
She had no idea where she was going.
Her ribs hurt like a son of a bitch. Some of them were cracked, or maybe worse.
She was in perhaps the most conspicuous getaway car in the history of getaway cars.
But she was alive.
Goddammit, she was still alive.
She gritted her teeth and drove.