Page 47 of Stags

It had felt freeing.

He couldn’t believe he’d spoken to her the way he had. He couldn’t believe she hadn’t slapped him.

No, that wasn’t true. There was something else to their interaction, an undercurrent. He couldn’t explain exactly how he knew it was true, but he did.

Yeah, and that’s exactly the kind of thing an arrogant dickwad would say, though.

Whatever. This was his chance to try it out, to inhabit it, to be that kind of an arrogant dickwad, to see what it was like to indulge in the arrogant dickery of being that kind of a buck. He was going to fuck Tawny and he was going to chase her, and he was going to get her pregnant.

Fuck, thinking that made his balls feel tight.

Just about then, Stockton showed up in the courtyard. He came over to ask him what was going on.

“You know how I’m supposed to look out for you out there?” said Athos. “I know I promised Bruin I would.”

“I already said I don’t need you to babysit me,” said Stockton. “I definitely don’t want you to watch me fuck anyone.”

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t going to do that, but I am just trying to tell you that something’s come up, and I need to be focused out there.”

Stockton snorted. “You’re going after a specific doe.”

“Ineedto go after a specific doe,” said Athos. “I don’t expect you to understand. You can even be annoyed with me for breaking my promise. That’s fair. I only wanted to give you a heads up.”

Stockton was still laughing. “I really hope you have fun out there, Athos. And I also hope she doesn’t turn you down flat when you catch her.”

“She would probably do that,” said Athos. “I can just picture her doing that.” Her doing that, for some fucked up reason, was giving him an erection. “But no, she’s not going to. She’s going to let me knock her up. It’s just a question of how much she puts me through before she does let me.”

Stockton raised both hands. “I’m staying away from breeders.”

“Yeah, good for you.” Athos clapped him on the shoulder. “Okay, then, well, good talk. Sorry about everything.”

“Seriously, you don’t need to apologize,” said Stockton. “But I really am thinking I’m going to go home. Well.” He considered. “If I go back to Bruin’s, he’ll know I left, and that’ll make him annoyed. I could go to my ma’s, maybe, instead.”

“You might as well stay and try to get out of this what you paid for,” said Athos. “Got to go, though.”

“Why?” said Stockton.

“I never found the keycard,” said Athos. “I’m going to check the bar again, because it’s 10:20, and maybe she’s out of there by now, getting ready to start the run.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“I’ll find you later, okay?” said Athos, taking off in the direction of the bar again. “Do not check out, Stockton. Stay.”

FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER, Athos had discovered the keycard had, in fact, been turned in to the front desk, who offered to issue him another one, since the keycards were just programmed to open various doors. He had said that he didn’t need two. One was fine. And the front desk had pointed out that if he’d lost a keycard once, he did—in fact—need a spare.

So, then, armed with the new keycard, he’d gone up to his room, dropped the spare off, and then come back down to the courtyard.

He’d missed the announcement of the run, but he could see that people were already running over the lawn. He looked around for Tawny, both in the field and in the courtyard, and he didn’t see her anywhere.

He considered going to make sure she wasn’t anywhere in the courtyard or the bar or elsewhere, even though—if she was out here—that would give her quite a head start on him.

Then, he spotted her, all the way across the field, disappearing into the woods. He recognized her tail somehow, and he hadn’t realized he’d already found her tail to be so distinctive, but apparently, somehow, he’d noticed.

Another man was after her, a stag with a rack full of antlers, someone who was probably ten years older than Athos.

I can definitely take him,he thought, and he took off as quickly as he could, racing across the lawn.

He could see that he was gaining on the stag, who was going after Tawny, but seemed to be keeping his distance, dragging out the chase.

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