Ripper (Hunter #1)(62)

My heart races as my father looks around the woods and decides this is the spot. I can see the Little Red River from here. It’s low in this part of the woods but cold, so cold. The woods here are isolated and filled with game. I let the cold air wash over me and I know that my father is right. Wolves are in the woods.

“They’re here, Dad,” I say with a glimmer of excitement. I can tell they were here. That has to mean I’m a hunter.

My father frowns down at me. “Don’t talk too much, girl.”

“But I can sense them.”

Now my father looks downright mad and I wonder what I said to make him that way. I try to be so good around my dad. He’s only hit me once or twice, but it really hurt when he did it, so I try to avoid making him mad. When he hit me in the face, it left bruises and then I had to skip school so I didn’t have to explain.

“Little freak.” My father turns away from me. He sets his pack down and starts to pull out the things he will need.

Despite the cold Arkansas mountain air, I flush. I should never, never talk about those weird flashes I get. I thought it would make him see that I was a hunter like him, but anytime I mention how I can sense things or feel them he gets mad and calls me a freak.

“I’m sixteen,” I want to yell at him. I’m not a little girl anymore.

I stand there in the chill as the moon starts to rise and realize I can never, never tell him about the dreams I have. At night, mostly on the nights when the moon is full, I dream of running. I am alone in the woods and the solitude is perfection. I run, starting on two legs, but ending on four. When I change, the world is different. It’s better. I can see everything with my new eyes. Smells and sounds are sharper. There is nothing in these dreams except the hunt. Well, and the brown wolf who hunts with me. But I try not to think of him. My father would not like to know that I dream sometimes that he’s a wolf.

“We’ll put you on that tree there,” Dad says, his voice harsh. Mom says it’s because he smokes too much and there’s disdain in her voice when she says it. Sometimes I think she hates my father. She always seems happy when he goes on his trips. That’s when she takes my brothers and me places. When Dad is gone we go out to eat, and when I was younger, we went to the zoo and parks. Sometimes we went to East Texas to see my granddad. I wish I’d been able to spend more time with him before he died.

“Do I get a gun?” I ask quietly because I have to keep my voice down.

My father laughs like I said something hysterical. “No, idiot. I’m not giving you a gun.” His green eyes seem cold. They always seem that way. His gaze slides past mine. He never looks me in the eyes. I think he doesn’t like brown eyes. I’m the only one in the family with dull brown eyes. He calls them muddy.

I want to question him, but that’s when he usually uses his fists.

He picks up a length of rope. “Go stand by the tree. Take your coat off first.”

I do what he tells me to do. I start to shiver and not entirely from the freezing air. I can hear the wolves howl in the distance. He starts to wind the rope around me. My arms are free, but he wraps the rope around my waist. I am utterly helpless to run.

“What are you doing?” I begin to panic. I stay still though because he’s my dad. I want him to love me. Maybe if I do this for him, he’ll see that I can help him.

He tightens the rope and secures it. It burns against my skin it’s so tight. He’s good with knots. I watched as he spent hours teaching Jamie and Nate how to tie knots. I watched from the stairs of our little duplex because he didn’t teach girls. Sometimes Nate would come up after bedtime and he’d show me what he’d learned.

“There.” He finishes up, tightening it further, and I can tell he’s happy with his work.

“I’m cold,” I say before realizing I shouldn’t complain.

“Suck it up, girl.” He looks me over and then pulls out his wicked large bowie knife. “This’ll bring ’em.”

I try to beg him not to cut me, but it doesn’t work. He simply turns my forearms over and cuts a long gash in both. I start to bleed. There’s a lot of blood. How much can I lose?

“I’ll stitch you up when it’s over,” he says, but I’m not sure if I believe him. He walks off and I know he’s hiding. He’ll pick a spot where he can shoot quickly and efficiently.

I get woozy from the cold and all the blood. My arms feel strange, like they should be numb, but they’re tingling. My arms are covered in blood and I wonder if he means to let the wolves get me. It would be easy to pick them off while they’re feasting. My father says wolves go crazy when they eat humans. They love it, love the kill so much they don’t think about protecting themselves. They’re vicious animals.

I think about my mom. Dad picked me up from school. He’d been standing in the courtyard where I waited every day for Nate. Nate was a year ahead of me at Bell High School, and he always drove me home in that piece of crap Ford Mom had saved to buy. Yesterday had been Thursday and Nate had chess club. Dad thought it was for pussies, but Nate liked games, so I waited for him in the courtyard. Dad told me we were going hunting. I wonder if he even told Mom. I wonder if she thinks I ran away. Did Nate spend time looking for me?

I sense them before I see them. I look up and in the moonlight I can see them. My heart speeds up. There are four of them. They approach me cautiously. I wonder why. Why aren’t they growling? I am a helpless human. I am food. They should attack immediately because they hate us. They eat our flesh. The small group comes from across the river and I see for the first time this creature my father taught me to hate.