Page 68 of Blackwood

“Fucking dig or I’ll put a bullet in your forehead right this second.” He shook the pistol at me. “No loss now that I’ve fucked up your pretty face.”

He stepped closer and stabbed his tatty shoe into the dirt. “His head was about here if I remember correctly. That’s where I want you to dig.”

Tears coursed down my cheeks as I took the spade with trembling hands. I thought of throwing it at him, but I knew I was kidding myself. One shot and it was over. I was going to die here.

“Dig!” His scream was animalistic as he began muttering to himself again.

I pushed the spade into the earth and hit something only a few inches down. Atinkof the shovel blade and all forward progress halted. I knew the sound, the feel. It was a skull. My father’s skull.

“Please, don’t make me.” I stared up at him as horror ripped through my mind. “Please.”

“You need to learn.” What might have been remorse passed across his face. “This is what happens when you keep pushing and pushing and pushing. Now dig. Learn your last lesson. Dig.”

“No.”

He fired a shot into the dirt. “Dig!”

My body turned to ice, my heart to forgotten stone. I had no way out. Digging was the only thing that would prolong my life, give me some semblance of a chance. I gripped the shovel with freezing fingers and moved a few inches to the left of where I’d just planted the spade. The shovel blade sank into the dank earth, nothing halting its progress. I twisted it slightly, then leaned on the handle.

A skull pressed up through the earth, pushing through the secrets and the lies until the dappled sunlight hit the dingy bone. I sobbed as bits of flesh stayed behind and strands of hair just a few shades darker than mine snaked through the dirt. I sat back and threw the spade away.

“See, girl? See?” He walked over to me. “Your daddy, he asked too many questions, too. Wanted to know things. Him and Lillian.” His voice cracked. “My Lillian.”

“You killed her.” A tremor went through me as he wrapped one arm around my shoulders. “Both of them.”

“I’d never hurt my Lillian. No. No. That wasn’t me. That was him. Not me. No.”

“My dad?” I closed my eyes, refusing to look at my father’s skull any longer. The cheeks I’d kissed, the face I’d loved before I even knew what love was.

“No, fool woman! The one who runs things around here. The one who told me to do this.” He pointed the gun toward my father’s skull.

“The mayor?”

He cackled, the sound sick and wrong in the cold, quiet woods. “Try a little closer to home. Cozied right up, didn’t you? Did you know he likes to chase ‘em through the woods? Hunt them?” He ended his laughter on a wheezing note.

Did he mean Garrett?No. “Garrett had nothing to do with his sister’s death. You’re lying.”

“You think I’m just some mad dog killer, don’t you?” He tapped the barrel against my forehead. “That I just killed your daddy for kicks.”

I winced, but he kept me still, his arm tightening around my shoulders.

“I’m not a mad dog. No, no, no. I’m a kept dog. I get table scraps if I behave. But you, you were like a little bunny out here, running through the woods, whee! And I chased you, but instead of snapping you up in my jaws”—He shrieked and clapped his remaining teeth together—“I warned you.” His voice lowered to a hurried whisper. “I tried to tell you. Just like your daddy, you didn’t stop asking questions. Just like Lillian, you have to die. Just like both of them, your blood will be on my hands.”

“You said you didn’t kill her. Lillian. You said—”

“I didn’t stop it. I haven’t stopped any of the killing around here. Done a fair share myself. Now I’ll add you to my list.” He sighed and pressed the barrel to the center of my forehead. “I really do keep a list, you know? It’s long, longer than my beard, longer than your pretty brown hair, longer than Lillian’s was.” He mumbled quick words.

“The mass grave in the woods.” The photo from Lillian’s memory card resurfaced, though this time my body was piled in with the others.No.

“Seen some of my handiwork, eh? I didn’t know you’d ventured over there, but I guess a gal like you gets around.” He cackled and pressed the metal harder into my skull. “Lots of graves in these woods. Lots of señoritas and señors and whoever I can get for cheap.”

I couldn’t follow his words, only the shine of his barrel. “Let me go.”

His finger rested on the trigger. I couldn’t see anything else. Just the cold metal and his dirty index finger flirting with my death.

“They always say that.” He chuckled, then stopped abruptly. “I never do.”

I shoved my elbow into his side with all the strength I had and grabbed for the gun. A deafening shot went off, and my right ear burned and rang. I fought with him, both of us grunting as I tried to wrest the gun away from his bony grip. He shoved me to the ground as we struggled, my hands around his on the butt of the gun. He punched me in the jaw and ripped the gun away from my desperate fingers. It was over. I stared up at him as he leveled the pistol.

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