Her bra was off now, joining her T-shirt on the sand, and her breasts were perfect: large enough that they made her look like a woman but small enough that they did not droop even a centimeter once freed from the confines of the bra.
He forced himself to look away. ''Did you ever wonder why they named this town Rio Verde? Rio Verde means 'Green River' in Spanish. It makes it sound like it's in the middle of some lush valley, but it's just an old desert town with this pathetic little river running by it.
And the river water's brown, not green.' He was babbling and he knew it, but he couldn't stop himself. 'Maybe it's like Greenland, you know? They named Greenland 'Greenland' to attract people, even though it's really not green at all.'
Cheri unzipped her pants, pulled them down. He looked back at her. Her panties were white and lacy. Through the transparent material he could see the thick triangular darkness of her pubic hair.
She grinned at him. 'Your turn, bud. Drop 'em.'
She's done this before, he thought. With Matt and Mike and Steve. Guys with bodes. How can I hope to compare? But he was already taking off his shoes, his socks.
He began unbuttoning his shirt. What if she laughed? What if she told all her friends that he wasn't..' big enough?
She put a tentative toe in the water, shivered. 'Cold!' 'Maybe we should skip it.'
'Never.' Laughing, she leaped into the water.
He quickly took off his pants and jumped in after her before she could see him. The water was indeed cold, unexpectedly so, and his penis shrunk instantly. He quickly reached between his legs and pulled on it, trying to make it grow, trying to make it big enough not to embarrass him, but his body wouldn't cooperate, and his organ remained soft and small. The river was shallow at this point, enough for them to stand, but they remained floating, and Cheri swam over to him. Her wet hair looked muddy in the moonlight, but he thought that she was most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.
Her breasts brushed against his arm, soft and givi and she put a hand around his neck and gave him a s kiss on the mouth before laughing and swimming a His penis sprang instantly to life, his erection strong e in the cold water, and he paddled after her, feeling pier, more alive than he could remember having ever before. He no longer worried about her past, was longer concerned about being compared to other she'd known.
Tonight she was here, with him. And was happy.
He swam across the river toward her, chasing her, she squealed and pushed off from the opposite heading upriver, away from him. He sped after her, paddling furiously, and caught her near an overhangin[ ton wood grabbing her right foot. She laughed, tri twist away, and he saw the white smooth skin of her tocks. He held onto her foot, and she stopped tryi, escape, righting herself. She stood, he stood, and kissed, his tongue slipping easily and effortlessly into her mouth, tasting warm mint and fresh breath.
They drew apart as quickly as they had come to8 both breathing heavily.
He had felt her breasts him again. He wondered i she had felt his erect io hoped she had. :.
She looked away from him, looked up, and looked up as well. Above them, the cottonwood branches were moving, whipping to the left as if propelled unusually strong wind.
But there was no wind.
The temperature changed, instantly dropping ten degrees. Goose bumps popped up en masse on bare shoulders, and she shivered, hugging her warmth. Should he be hugging her? Should he be keeping her warm? He didn't know, and he didn't have make a decision one way or the other because she suddenly looked behind him, past him, and yelped in surprise.
:'L,.:
Her eyes widened in horror. 'Daddy!'
Her father!
Oh, God. How was he going to explain this? His penis shriveled to nothing, and he turned around, looking toward the opposite bank. But it was not her father. He could not tell who the figure was--it was too dark to see much of anything--but he knew that it was not her father. Because it was not human.
The form, big and black and shadowy, slid smoothly down the dirt and into the water.
In the second before it entered the river, he saw lips and teeth and wavy watfley arms.
He and Cheri both began paddling simultaneously and desperately toward the opposite shore, toward their clothes and car and safety.
'It's not what you think, Daddy!' she was screaming, but she did not slow down in her effort to escape, did not make an effort to confront the creature.
Oh, God, Aaron thought. What if that thing really was her dad? What if she was some sort of haft-human creature, and now her father had caught her with a real human being and was going to punish her?
And him.
Cold slime slid against the bottom of his feet, pressed against his lower leg. In the dark water his fingers touched flesh the consistency of Jell-O. He stopped swimming, stopped paddling, stood. He saw humps of jet break the water, saw a black tentacled hand reach out and grab Cheri by the shoulder.
'No[' she screamed. 'Daddyl'
There was a syncopated crack, then a squishy sound, as of wet pages being torn from a waterlogged book. Cheri thrashed wildly in the water, going down, another dark deformed hand grabbing her blond head.
She was jerking crazily, hands, head, and feet flailing in furious counter rhythms as though the parts of her body were all controlled by different and competing brains. Desperate screams came in staccato bursts between splashes, and Aaron remained rooted in place, unable to move, unable to scream, hoping that one of the other parked couples could hear them, hoping that he was dreaming and this wasn't really taking place.
He smelled gas and excrement, and then he noticed that the thrashing had stopped, the screams had been silenced. Chef and the creature were gone.
Then the hideous black shape emerged from the river, drawing to its full height, making a strange whistling, sucking sound that was quiet but could somehow be heard over the rush of the water. A dark, irregular object bobbed in front of the creature, floating down the river toward him, and Aaron saw immediately that it was Chefi---only her breasts were gone, her arms had shriveled, and as she floated past him he noticed with horror that she had the wdnlded crone face of an old woman.
The creature splashed through the water toward him. He couldn't breathe, couldn't think, couldn't move. He tried to run, tried to swim, but his muscles wouldn't obey his brain, and he remained frozen in place as the creature advanced, whistling, hissing, splashing. Water flew into his face, and then aJell-O hand wrapped around his shoulder and pulled him into the water toward a mouth that had far, far too many teeth.
'We used to swim here, too. Remember that?' Rid looked over at his brother, who nodded thoughtfully.
Rich watched the water flowing past his feet, swirlin! around the exposed cottonwood roots at the edge of that bank. ''So what do you think happened?'
'You really want to know?' ,. Rich didn't answer. :;-' :
'I think it's time we admit it. We've got ourselve, vampire here.'
'Come on,' Rich said, but his voice had no heart it.
,i 'Look, Rich, I'm a cop. I deal in facts. I don't spe my time trying to jigsaw the facts so they jibe with my of things. I don't give a shit about preserving the integn of my philosophy. The fact is, we have two more hod drained of blood. That's pretty convincing evidence in book.' ' 'Don't give me that 'I'm a cop. I deal in facts Who do you think you are, Joe Friday?'
'Fine. Have it your way.' Robert walked away from brother, toward the two sheet-covered bodies on the b Beneath the thin cloth, the angular outlines of the for looked like skeletons.
Woods, standing on the other side of the bodies, I0o over at the police chief. 'You're right,' he said. 'We have a vampire here.',
'You through with the onsite?'
The coroner nodded. ::
'Take 'em away.'
'You find anything?,'.Noods asked, 'Tracks?' 'Not yet.'
'There must've been other kids parked out h Maybe you should ask them if they saw anything.'
'You do your job, okay? Don't tell me how to do mine.' 'Sorry.'
