The Woods Are Dark

“Are you sure?” Johnny asked. “Here?”

She kept her eyes on Johnny. If she turned to the field of impaled heads, she knew she could not go through with it. “Here’s the only place we can,” she said.

“Inside?”

“Sherri.” She tugged at her belt, and opened it. “Here’s fine. In the sunlight.” She unfastened her corduroys, and slid them down her legs. Stepping out of them, she stood before Johnny, clad only in her brief panties. She slipped them off. The morning breeze licked her skin. The sun was warm.

She crouched in front of Johnny, and helped remove his boots and socks. Standing, he peeled off his T-shirt. As he opened his pants, Neala stroked his broad shoulders. His chest was smooth and muscular and tanned. She fingered his nipples.

He bent down to lower his pants. Then he embraced her. He was warm and big. His tongue pushed into her mouth like the phallus of a small, insistent animal.

For a long time, they held each other. They touched and probed. Then they spread their clothes on the ground.

Neala lay on her back.

Johnny knelt between her legs. His shaft was huge and solid.

It filled her, stretched her, hurt her, but the pain only sharpened her desire. She whimpered into his mouth. She clutched his buttocks as he drove into her with long, endless strokes that seemed to plunge deeper with each thrust.

Then it was too much.

He pounded, pumping, flooding her, and she tried not to cry out as she quaked with her own spasms more intense than any she had ever known.

The cabin door squeaked. Opening her eyes, Neala saw Sherri step out.

“You done?” she asked, her voice sarcastic.

“For Godsake, Sherri!”

“Oh, don’t pay any attention to me.”

“Get out of here! What’s the matter with you!”

Shaking her head, Sherri gazed into the distance. “Nothing’s the matter with me. I just wonder about you two.”

“If you’ll go inside for a minute,” Johnny said, “we’ll finish up and get dressed.” His voice was calm.

“Don’t you like an audience?”

“Damn it, Sherri!”

“Well, you’ve got one. Just thought I’d let you know.” She pointed.

Neala turned her head. “Oh God,” she moaned. She gripped Johnny’s sides.

“They’ve been out there since you started,” Sherri said. “Just a couple, at first. Must be fifteen or twenty now. I guess they liked the show.”

“Don’t worry,” Johnny whispered to Neala.

He raised himself. He was still inside her, still erect. With a look of tenderness and regret, he slowly slid out. Moving on his knees, he grabbed his rifle. He stood, shouldered it, and aimed toward the scattered group beyond the barrier of heads.

Neala began to gather the cast-off clothes. She glanced up. Sherri was staring at her. “Give me a hand, damn it!”

Nodding, Sherri crouched and picked up Johnny’s boots, his socks, his pants. That took care of it. Neala rushed ahead of her into the cabin.

Sherri stopped in the doorway, and looked out. She stayed in the doorway as Johnny moved toward it.

Dropping her bundle of clothes, Neala grabbed Sherri’s arm and tugged her inside.

Sherri swung around. “Leave me alone!”

“Sherri, for Godsake, you’re acting…”

Sherri clutched Nealas hair and jerked her head back. “Shut up,” she hissed. “Just shut your fucking mouth!”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Waking up, Cordie stared through the tangled roof of bushes, and listened, afraid to move.

She heard running. She heard the jabber of voices. She heard harsh laughter. From the sounds, she guessed that half a dozen teenage kids were nearby.

The thicket no longer felt like a refuge. Now it was a trap.

She wanted to get out, to run…

They might hear her, though. They might hear her crawling over the matted leaves and twigs, and get to her before she was free. Trapped in the mesh of bushes, she would be helpless. A game for the kids.

Play with her.

Taunt her, cut her, set her on fire.

She listened to their vicious laughter, their squeals.

All around the thicket.

As if they knew she was there.

She wanted to curl up on her side and hug her knees to her breasts. She didn’t dare. Instead, she pressed her legs tightly together. She pressed her arms to her sides. She stared at the morning sky through a cross-work of limbs.

And waited.

The kids argued in sharp, high voices. Someone chuckled. Bushes rustled.

Cordie’s rigid body trembled. Her neck ached with stiffening muscles.

They know I’m here!

How could they?

She heard the sounds of someone crawling inside the thicket. Coming for her.

She sucked in her breath and held it, trying not to scream.

All other sounds stopped.

They’re listening, she thought. They’re all out there listening, waiting.

Cordie raised her head. She looked down her body, past her shoes, and saw a face appear. The face of a girl. A blond girl with twigs in her wild hair. A girl with blood smeared on her lips, her cheeks, her chin.

She was young. Thirteen or fourteen. Her tanned shoulders were bare.

As the girl crawled closer, Cordie heard herself gulping quick, short breaths. Like a dog with a nightmare. Swallowing, she choked and gasped for air.

The girl moved alongside Cordie. The skin of her back was crosshatched with scratches, smudges of dirt. Her buttocks were bleeding from scratches like the rake marks of fingernails.

She sat up and crossed her legs. “I’m Lilly,” she said. “What’s your name?”

Cordie mumbled her name.

“What?”

“Cordelia.”

“That’s a weirdo name.” She wrinkled her nose. “What kind of a weirdo name is that?”

“Who are you?”

“Lilly.”

“You’re one of them”

“Sure.” Lilly scratched one of her small, cone-shaped breasts. “I’ve been with ’em a couple of years. It’s fun.”

“Fun?”

“Shit yes!” She giggled. “No school, nobody telling you what to do, fucking all the time. It’s great. You’ll like it.”