Up her ass, she meant, the poor kid!
"And Patty got all hot and bothered, just watchin', see. She finally said the hell with the doctor, and Luke and Randy took turns screwin' her on the kitchen table, with her legs hangin' over the side. And the doctor said she shouldn't be havin' any sex at all, her so close to her time."
"Anyway, a couple hours ago she started bleedin', real bad, and she was hollerin' because her stomach hurt. So Pa and Randy loaded her up in the car and bustled into town, to the hospital."
"Not Luke?"
"Luke was screwin' me then," she confessed, "and he passed out from drinkin' not very long after. In fact, he's still laid out like a dead man. Don't you see, Marilyn? We can get away now, you and me! There's nobody around to stop us! But we gotta hurry, 'cause Luke always wakes up early, even if he's been drinkin'. Here, I brought you this shirt, and there's a path through the woods that gets to the main road. It's only six or seven miles. If we hurry, we can be gone before Luke drags out of bed."
Luke! The most animalistic of them all! The one who'd taken the lead in everything! And he lay asleep now, snoring off a drunken debauch of rape and brutality. Luke!
"We're not going quite yet," I told the girl, kissing her cheek. "Give me that shirt, Emmylou, darling, please. Oh, you want to help me button it? Mmmm, hold me again. It feels so nice when it's your hands on my tits."
"Hurry," she sighed.
"First," I replied, "we have a little business with Mr. Luke Tolliver. Some business I shall enjoy with all my heart. Bring those ropes, if you would. And – let me see – what else will we need?"
I had my first sight, then, of the world outside that barn. Strangely, the house wasn't a ramshackle shack. It was probably 40 or 50 years old, and it had seen better days, but it looked like a hundred, a thousand other houses I'd seen in rural areas of this marvelous country. From the outside it gave no indications that it was home to a family of rapists, kidnapers, and would-be murderers.
A pickup truck was parked beside the house – the same truck in which I'd been abducted. I nodded to myself. There was no need for us to walk. We could ride away.
Quietly, Emmylou and I entered the house. Inside, it was neat, though disordered here and there, probably from last night's orgy. Emmylou had to be the one responsible for the essential sense of order. Patty was too sluttish to be a housekeeper, and the men would gladly live in their own filth.
"Where is he?" I asked.
She pointed to a staircase.
Luke lay spraddled on his bed, snoring drunkenly. He was naked, and only a sheet covered his body. Gently, I pulled that sheet down. The man was at my mercy. Mercy? What did that word mean? I couldn't remember.
"The ropes," I whispered.
Emmylou trembled as she handed them to me, but she moved without fear when I told her what to do. The bed was made of brass and it had a post at each corner. We fastened Luke Tolliver's hands and feet to those corners, fastened them securely. Only when I was certain of that did I advance to the gun rack on his wall.
I think I picked a twenty-two. Guns were never a specialty of mine, and I picked this one principally for the long slim barrel and for the large triangular-shaped sight at the tip of that barrel. It fit my plans perfectly.
"Luke!" I snapped, the rifle in my hands. "Luke Tolliver!"
He stirred, eyes opening tentatively. They stared at me through a film of his last night's debauchery, struggling to get a focus. Finally they opened, and he knew, and I knew that he knew.
"Good morning, sleepyhead," I smiled, gesturing with the rifle. "And how are we this morning?"
He smiled. That was just before he realized that he'd been tied down. The smile faded. That was when I smiled.
"You bastard," I said. "You're a disgrace to the human race. You don't have the right to live." I stepped closer and put the muzzle of the rifle squarely between his eyes. "Do you know any prayers, Luke Tolliver? If you do, I'd suggest you say them. Fast."
"Oh my God," he said, and it was fantastic to see that he was really, truly frightened. His eyes crossed, staring at the gun barrel between them, and for a moment I was afraid he would pass out on the spot. I didn't want that.
"Well, Luke Tolliver, it seems the shoes are on my feet now. And I'm going to stop your nuts with those shoes, you mother-fucker!"
I reversed the gun and gave him a quick chop in the balls. He screeched but he couldn't double up, though he tried.
"This," I added, "is how it feels to be at the mercy of someone who doesn't have any mercy."
I gestured to Emmylou. Nervously, she lifted his cock and balls out of the way. I could see Luke's asshole, brown and hairy. A perfect target.
"Maybe we shouldn't," Emmylou whispered.
I shook my head. Definitely we should.
I touched his asshole with the gun barrel. He squirmed and I saw him bite his lip to keep from crying out.
"Hold still, Luke, or we might have an accident."
I pushed again, gouging his shitter with the twenty-two's muzzle. It seemed to yield a little.
"Goddamn it, what the fuck are you tryin' to do to me?"
"I'm fucking you, Luke. You fucked me. More times than I can remember. Isn't it only fair that I get to fuck you, too, you miserable cock-sucker?"
Again I pushed, and he screamed. It was a satisfying scream, the first I'd heard him make, but it only whetted my appetite for more. So I shoved harder. He screamed more shrilly, as if I'd just cut off his balls.
"That still isn't exactly it," I mused.
My wrists flexed and I thrust the gun barrel up Luke's asshole.
The sight, as I mentioned, was large and triangular. It must have torn the hell out of his rectal sleeve. I hoped so, at least. I pushed farther, wedging the gun firmly in Luke's ass, and then I stepped back.
"Oh, my God! Oh, my God! Oh, my God!" he wailed. "That fuckin' thing's killin' me! Take it the fuck out! Oh, Jesus, take it out, take it out!"
"It's not for what you did to me, Luke," I said sweetly but earnestly. "It's for what you did to Emmylou. That was unforgivable. And I can't forgive you, so don't ask me."
I reached for the gunlock. My finger found the trigger and I pulled it.
CHAPTER TEN
Nothing happened.
"What the hell?" I blurted. I'd psyched myself up for this. I was emotionally ready to kill the man. I had even pulled the mother-fucking trigger.
Beside me, Emmylou gasped, and she grabbed my arm. "Oh, my God, Marilyn!"
I staggered back. My resolve faded like spring morning dew. I couldn't touch that gun again, not for any amount of money, not for any sense of satisfaction.
"Come on," I told her. "Let's get the hell out of here. We've done enough."
"Uh… you go on," she said. "I gotta get a couple things out of my bedroom; my mama's picture and my doll. I don't want nothin' else."
Her doll! Her mother's picture! My God, she was only a child! Yet she'd been through so much. Emmylou rose onto tiptoes and she kissed me sweetly on the mouth. Luke had to see that if his eyes were open, and I hoped the son of a bitch was looking. He had used the girl's body, but I was positive her heart belonged to me.
I went downstairs and out the door. Ole Blue came out from under the porch. If I'd had a gun, I'd have shot the dog.
And precisely as I was telling myself that, I heard a resonating blast – an explosion that shattered the air and seemed to come from the second story of the house. In a moment Emmylou came out the front door, her face dead-white, her eyes enormous. She ran to me, collapsing against my breast, and I hugged her tightly, absorbing the tears and shudders that seized her then. I couldn't blame her. I'd have done it myself. I should have done it myself.