I clean my father's rifle across from her cage, and she watches me with her one usable eye with a surprisingly icy glare. Don’t see many looks like that. Not here. Hard to look defiant when you’re half naked, three days starved, covered in your own shit, with one eye swollen shut, but damned if she’s not pulling it off.
This bitch is tough as nails.
I saw her at The Huntsman, sitting alone at the bar with a martini. The paleness of her complexion contrasted with her black hair and black dress that hung on her curves in a way that was both tasteful and maddeningly erotic. She looked like a Femme Fatale in an old noir boilermaker, ready flutter her eyelashes and win your heart, then cut it out with a stiletto.
Birds of a feather.
I sidled up next to her, and gave her a line that would have gotten a lesser man laughed out of the room. But I watched her sharp blue eyes move from the Patek Philippe on my wrist to the black card in my hand, and the corner of her lips moved up into an impish smile.
She was sweet enough then. We shared a bottle of champagne, her fingers deliberately brushing mine as I handed her the glass, her thigh flush against mine. She even made me laugh. A big belly laugh, not a fake chuckle like I usually had to force out with these girls.
By the time I got her in the Bentley she was looking at me like a tigress, all but tearing my clothes off as I drove. Tough as it was, I had to beg her off. The road was dark and winding, and I told her it wouldn’t do for her to take a spill into the ravine, where she’d never be seen again.
Not prematurely, anyway.
She actually made a noise in her throat when we pulled up and she saw The Lodge. I had to laugh. She was probably thinking this was her big break.
Inside, I sat her down next to the fire and poured us two snifters of Pappy van Winkle, and made idle conversation. She told me about her three brothers in Chicago. I told her about how my father taught me to hunt in these woods as a boy, and it had become my great passion. I gestured to the muzzle loaded hunting rifle that hung above the fire place, my father’s rifle, and when she looked at it with drunken, heavily lidded eyes, I swung the bottle and cracked her hard across the face with it. She went down like a pile of laundry, and I was relieved to see that the bottle didn’t break.
Damn good stuff, Pappy.
As I carried her to the pen I was musing how this was liable to be the worst hangover this broad has ever had, when, imagine my surprise, she woke up and clocked me upside the chin, making me bite my tongue. I dropped her and she hit the ground hard on her hip, but was on her feet a second later, like a cat. She tried to knee me in the balls, but this ain't my first rodeo, and I got a leg up in time. I grabbed a handful of her hair and yanked her head back. then knocked her around a bit before she went limp again. She snapped awake one last time as I was cramming her into the cage and bit me hard on the arm, breaking the skin. I got the door shut, though, and that was the end of that. She cursed me something good as I walked away, but I cut her off mid “cocksucker” as the soundproof door clanged shut.
My tongue and arm hurt, and I needed to clean the latter. It was bleeding pretty good, but I poured some antiseptic on it – no telling where that randy bitch has been - and wrapped it in gauze. After that, it took a couple bourbons to relax. In that time I resolved to take my time with her. I had been meaning to try something new for months now, and I thought what better time than now? I had a pack of a dozen of the meanest dogs you’ve ever seen, bred specifically for this purpose, but lately they been chasing these idiots down in under twenty minutes. I'd sent them loose and by the time I caught up there would be nothing left but strawberry jelly and bones. No fun at all. But this one would give me some sport, I knew. This one deserved a personal touch.
She was tough alright, but all the piss and vinegar would leak right out along with her brains when a .50 caliber round blew her skull into quivering giblets.
I thought that three cold days alone in a cage too small to sit or stand up straight in would have taken some of the bones out of her. I expected her to be a quivering shell like the others, begging for her life or just sobbing uncontrollably.
But I was mistaken.
The muscles of her exposed arms and legs are taut like springs, and I know that if I give her a chance she'll throw herself at me and we'll start round four. But I know she won't get that chance. She's not getting out of that cage until the precise moment I want her out. Too bad, so sad, darlin'. This is my game. Her once glossy black hair is a wild bird's nest of loose strands, and her expertly applied make up is smeared and blotched, making her look oddly ferocious. Like some kind of Indian Brave in war paint. A little Apache. She looks ridiculous in that little black party dress, though. I also notice that she doesn’t have shit to say when I start cleaning the rifle.
Who's the cocksucker now?
I finish up and put it aside, and I wonder if she knows what’s coming.
“Well, darlin’.” I say, slipping on that southern drawl and becoming every inch the gentleman that charmed her and all the others to the cabin in the first place, “Time we got to goin'.”
“Fuck. You.” She growls back. Her voice is hoarse and gravelly, and I just laugh.
“Now now. You keep talking like that, and I’ll cut you with this,” I pull out my Bowie Knife, “and then I’ll sic the dogs on you. Got them trained like sharks, just a drop of blood and they’ll chase you down and eat you the fuck alive. Is that what you want?" She just glares. "Hm?" I raise my eyebrows and lean in, like a teacher telling a particularly dull student to answer the question. It gives me great pleasure to force her shake her head "no". I straighten up and smile warmly. "I didn't think so. I didn’t wanna do that either. I wanna give you a chance. So I’m gonna open your cage and you’re gonna run.”
I do, and she does.
About a thirty strides into the yard, she turns back and gives me a good long stare, then half jogs, half limps towards the tree line.
Normally, I’d give them about a half hour head start, then I’d throw the switch to open the kennels and the air strike klaxon I’d rigged up would sound - The Dinner Bell, I called it. The drone of that howling siren would get the girls good and shitting and the mutts slavering. I always wondered what Pavlov would make of it. But this time I just have a drink and a cigar, real casual, and then I set off after her.
It rained earlier in the day, and her wonky foot prints are as clear as they would be in fresh snow. She’s sticking to the path where she’ll make better time, but barefoot and wounded she’s going nowhere fast, so I follow at my leisure.
“Go on girl!” I shout. “Take your time! Stretch them long legs!” There's no answer, except for the dull echo of my words coming back at me. It’s quiet. At this point in the hunt, the howls and yodels of my dogs would have filled the air, and I liked to imagine where the girls were at mentally. Maybe they thought they could fight them off, or outrun them. They were just dogs, after all. How bad could they be?
Bad enough.
These weren’t your childhood pets that would let you pull on their ears and roll around on the ground with them. These were eighty to one-hundred-and-twenty-five pounds of gaunt and hungry muscle, teeth, and claws, no want in them but killing. The arrogance of the girls would evaporate when they saw all twelve of them coming, like bolts from a crossbow.
A few years back, one of the more defiant girls climbed up a tree before the dogs could get to her. I found her clinging to the trunk about twelve feet up, crying and shuddering, with the dogs jumping and snapping at the base. I stood back with my rifle slung over my shoulder, and listened to her beg and plead for me to call them off. Oh, the things that girl said she'd do! In the end I shot her hands that were clasped around the trunk. Blew them off - damn near blew the tree in half - and let the dogs do the rest.
I smile, and once again question my decision to leave the dogs out of it this time. This bitch had plenty of arrogance, and it would be sweet to see the look in her eyes – well, eye - as the hounds chased her down.
But I also find I’m liking the serenity. I had forgotten until now that, while the dogs gave me a thrill like nothing else I could find, hunting could also be relaxing. Cathartic. I listen to the birds singing, and notice the subtle beams of light shining through the trees despite the clouds. I smell pine needles.
I focus back on the tracks, which are still clear, but veer off the path, and I know she's trying to lose me in the trees. I wish her luck. I’d been hunting these woods since I was a boy. I told her that. Does she really think this will help? I notice the prints are more stable, and the strides are longer. Seems she’s worked out some of those cramps and is making better time. They continue on for a bit, but then loop back towards the house. I curl my lip. She’d doubled back, trying to get behind me, and I’d somehow missed her. Too much time listening to the goddamn birds.
But it's no problem. I have her tracks, and there's nothing she could do about those. I walk for a few more minutes when suddenly a sound splits the air that makes my stomach drop into my balls and the wound on my arm throb through the tight gauze dotted with red.
The Dinner Bell was ringing.
This bitch is tough as nails.
I saw her at The Huntsman, sitting alone at the bar with a martini. The paleness of her complexion contrasted with her black hair and black dress that hung on her curves in a way that was both tasteful and maddeningly erotic. She looked like a Femme Fatale in an old noir boilermaker, ready flutter her eyelashes and win your heart, then cut it out with a stiletto.
Birds of a feather.
I sidled up next to her, and gave her a line that would have gotten a lesser man laughed out of the room. But I watched her sharp blue eyes move from the Patek Philippe on my wrist to the black card in my hand, and the corner of her lips moved up into an impish smile.
She was sweet enough then. We shared a bottle of champagne, her fingers deliberately brushing mine as I handed her the glass, her thigh flush against mine. She even made me laugh. A big belly laugh, not a fake chuckle like I usually had to force out with these girls.
By the time I got her in the Bentley she was looking at me like a tigress, all but tearing my clothes off as I drove. Tough as it was, I had to beg her off. The road was dark and winding, and I told her it wouldn’t do for her to take a spill into the ravine, where she’d never be seen again.
Not prematurely, anyway.
She actually made a noise in her throat when we pulled up and she saw The Lodge. I had to laugh. She was probably thinking this was her big break.
Inside, I sat her down next to the fire and poured us two snifters of Pappy van Winkle, and made idle conversation. She told me about her three brothers in Chicago. I told her about how my father taught me to hunt in these woods as a boy, and it had become my great passion. I gestured to the muzzle loaded hunting rifle that hung above the fire place, my father’s rifle, and when she looked at it with drunken, heavily lidded eyes, I swung the bottle and cracked her hard across the face with it. She went down like a pile of laundry, and I was relieved to see that the bottle didn’t break.
Damn good stuff, Pappy.
As I carried her to the pen I was musing how this was liable to be the worst hangover this broad has ever had, when, imagine my surprise, she woke up and clocked me upside the chin, making me bite my tongue. I dropped her and she hit the ground hard on her hip, but was on her feet a second later, like a cat. She tried to knee me in the balls, but this ain't my first rodeo, and I got a leg up in time. I grabbed a handful of her hair and yanked her head back. then knocked her around a bit before she went limp again. She snapped awake one last time as I was cramming her into the cage and bit me hard on the arm, breaking the skin. I got the door shut, though, and that was the end of that. She cursed me something good as I walked away, but I cut her off mid “cocksucker” as the soundproof door clanged shut.
My tongue and arm hurt, and I needed to clean the latter. It was bleeding pretty good, but I poured some antiseptic on it – no telling where that randy bitch has been - and wrapped it in gauze. After that, it took a couple bourbons to relax. In that time I resolved to take my time with her. I had been meaning to try something new for months now, and I thought what better time than now? I had a pack of a dozen of the meanest dogs you’ve ever seen, bred specifically for this purpose, but lately they been chasing these idiots down in under twenty minutes. I'd sent them loose and by the time I caught up there would be nothing left but strawberry jelly and bones. No fun at all. But this one would give me some sport, I knew. This one deserved a personal touch.
She was tough alright, but all the piss and vinegar would leak right out along with her brains when a .50 caliber round blew her skull into quivering giblets.
I thought that three cold days alone in a cage too small to sit or stand up straight in would have taken some of the bones out of her. I expected her to be a quivering shell like the others, begging for her life or just sobbing uncontrollably.
But I was mistaken.
The muscles of her exposed arms and legs are taut like springs, and I know that if I give her a chance she'll throw herself at me and we'll start round four. But I know she won't get that chance. She's not getting out of that cage until the precise moment I want her out. Too bad, so sad, darlin'. This is my game. Her once glossy black hair is a wild bird's nest of loose strands, and her expertly applied make up is smeared and blotched, making her look oddly ferocious. Like some kind of Indian Brave in war paint. A little Apache. She looks ridiculous in that little black party dress, though. I also notice that she doesn’t have shit to say when I start cleaning the rifle.
Who's the cocksucker now?
I finish up and put it aside, and I wonder if she knows what’s coming.
“Well, darlin’.” I say, slipping on that southern drawl and becoming every inch the gentleman that charmed her and all the others to the cabin in the first place, “Time we got to goin'.”
“Fuck. You.” She growls back. Her voice is hoarse and gravelly, and I just laugh.
“Now now. You keep talking like that, and I’ll cut you with this,” I pull out my Bowie Knife, “and then I’ll sic the dogs on you. Got them trained like sharks, just a drop of blood and they’ll chase you down and eat you the fuck alive. Is that what you want?" She just glares. "Hm?" I raise my eyebrows and lean in, like a teacher telling a particularly dull student to answer the question. It gives me great pleasure to force her shake her head "no". I straighten up and smile warmly. "I didn't think so. I didn’t wanna do that either. I wanna give you a chance. So I’m gonna open your cage and you’re gonna run.”
I do, and she does.
About a thirty strides into the yard, she turns back and gives me a good long stare, then half jogs, half limps towards the tree line.
Normally, I’d give them about a half hour head start, then I’d throw the switch to open the kennels and the air strike klaxon I’d rigged up would sound - The Dinner Bell, I called it. The drone of that howling siren would get the girls good and shitting and the mutts slavering. I always wondered what Pavlov would make of it. But this time I just have a drink and a cigar, real casual, and then I set off after her.
It rained earlier in the day, and her wonky foot prints are as clear as they would be in fresh snow. She’s sticking to the path where she’ll make better time, but barefoot and wounded she’s going nowhere fast, so I follow at my leisure.
“Go on girl!” I shout. “Take your time! Stretch them long legs!” There's no answer, except for the dull echo of my words coming back at me. It’s quiet. At this point in the hunt, the howls and yodels of my dogs would have filled the air, and I liked to imagine where the girls were at mentally. Maybe they thought they could fight them off, or outrun them. They were just dogs, after all. How bad could they be?
Bad enough.
These weren’t your childhood pets that would let you pull on their ears and roll around on the ground with them. These were eighty to one-hundred-and-twenty-five pounds of gaunt and hungry muscle, teeth, and claws, no want in them but killing. The arrogance of the girls would evaporate when they saw all twelve of them coming, like bolts from a crossbow.
A few years back, one of the more defiant girls climbed up a tree before the dogs could get to her. I found her clinging to the trunk about twelve feet up, crying and shuddering, with the dogs jumping and snapping at the base. I stood back with my rifle slung over my shoulder, and listened to her beg and plead for me to call them off. Oh, the things that girl said she'd do! In the end I shot her hands that were clasped around the trunk. Blew them off - damn near blew the tree in half - and let the dogs do the rest.
I smile, and once again question my decision to leave the dogs out of it this time. This bitch had plenty of arrogance, and it would be sweet to see the look in her eyes – well, eye - as the hounds chased her down.
But I also find I’m liking the serenity. I had forgotten until now that, while the dogs gave me a thrill like nothing else I could find, hunting could also be relaxing. Cathartic. I listen to the birds singing, and notice the subtle beams of light shining through the trees despite the clouds. I smell pine needles.
I focus back on the tracks, which are still clear, but veer off the path, and I know she's trying to lose me in the trees. I wish her luck. I’d been hunting these woods since I was a boy. I told her that. Does she really think this will help? I notice the prints are more stable, and the strides are longer. Seems she’s worked out some of those cramps and is making better time. They continue on for a bit, but then loop back towards the house. I curl my lip. She’d doubled back, trying to get behind me, and I’d somehow missed her. Too much time listening to the goddamn birds.
But it's no problem. I have her tracks, and there's nothing she could do about those. I walk for a few more minutes when suddenly a sound splits the air that makes my stomach drop into my balls and the wound on my arm throb through the tight gauze dotted with red.
The Dinner Bell was ringing.