I’m the most lost I’ve ever been, and I am also in the most pain.
Did Claudia shoot me? If so, why stitch me up? I couldn’t have been shot by a guard. Otherwise, how did I get to my cabin? It’s miles away from Meadow Fields. Claudia is a little firecracker with more gusto than her demure mousy composure displays, but she struggled carrying two logs of wood last night. She’d never manage a man of my height and frame.
I freeze, stunned. That was a memory. It was as worthless as a stripper who doesn’t give extra services when you hand her a hundred, but a memory all the same.
Realizing only one person can give me answers, I charge back to the main area of the cabin. My steps aren’t as thunderous as my earlier ones, weighed down with both confusion and pain.
Claudia rouses when the mattress dips under my frame, but she remains asleep. Even with her back facing me, I can tell her chest is rising and falling in rhythm with mine. I’d even go as far as saying her breaths are just as regular. Her hair is tousled from a restless night, and her face is void of makeup. She looks peaceful. So much so, I almost feel bad sneaking a peek at her breasts.
For a lady with a fucked-up head, she has a nice rack. Her rosy-pink nipples sit high on her chest, as puckered and inviting as her ruddy lips. She’s more attractive out of her clothes than she is in them. I’m not surprised. Lee didn’t have her on his radar for no reason. Her tempting body was the second thing I noticed after her virtuous eyes and face. Her fantastic tits were most likely the first thing Lee noticed.
I remain rooted in place for the second time when another memory breaks through the fog in my head. It’s of Lee and his soulless eyes. Not the lifeless ones he generally carries.
Soulless—soulless.
As in dead.
I killed him.
He’s dead because of me.
Damn—my morning just got ten times better.
Desperate to feed off a surge of adrenaline and eagerness to get back to the game I started years ago, I snag a set of keys from a canister in the makeshift kitchen then exit the cabin.
I like Claudia—my fingers itch to corrupt her curvy frame—but she’s all types of fucked-up, and I’ve got business to take care of.
Business that doesn’t include bedding a psychotic woman.
The gleaming grin I’ve been wearing since my Pontiac GTO kicked over at the first turn of the keys thirty minutes ago turns blinding when the radio switches to a news broadcast. I’m not just grinning at the report that two long-serving guards at a penitentiary for the criminally insane were killed last night. It’s knowing my dad is still at the top of his game.
I’ve been locked up so long, my GTO’s battery should have died years ago. The fact it started on the first try proves he’s still playing the game he taught me the day of my sixth birthday.
I didn’t get a toy truck or any other gift you’d expect a normal child to receive. I was given an invitation to an exclusive club, a club so secretive only the founder knows each member’s name—my father.
I’m not going to lie. I pissed my pants when I spotted their target for the day. The girl was young, around my mom’s age when she had me—approximately sixteen. The welts on her body and face were so disfiguring, the only thing I can recall about her now is the scent of her blood.
Although I did the occasional hunt with my dad in my teens, my interests did a one-eighty when Shelley entered the equation. My dad was disappointed, but he understood. He didn’t have much choice. He had done the same thing with my mother. She was supposed to be his victim, not occupy his bed.
I don’t know if my father altered the rules because my mother’s stomach was swollen with me or because he had an instant connection with her like I had with both Shelley and Cleo. But whatever it was, I’m certain it was fate.
He raised me as if I were his own flesh and blood. His parenting methods were unheard of by the many doctors my mother had probe my head in my early teens, but I wouldn’t be the man I am today if it weren’t for my father.
For that alone, I’ll be forever in his debt.
My mind drifts from fond memories when the radio crackles, announcing a news bulletin. “Police are on the lookout for three patients who escaped Meadow Fields Penitentiary for the Criminally Insane last night. Dexter Elias, Claudia Sanchez, and Ashlee Vought are considered armed and dangerous. Extreme discretion is advised before approaching the assailants.”
“Three?” The rest of my curiosity comes out in a groan.
Claudia’s escape makes sense. I played the game right. But Ashlee? I’m at a loss.
From the pieces of my memory I’ve stitched together the past thirty minutes, I’m confident Claudia was with me during my escape, but Ashlee hasn’t come up once in my endeavor to clear the fog from my mind.
We interacted a few times when I strategized a way to put my game plan into play, but I never clued her in on my plans to escape. As far as she was aware, my interest in Claudia was purely to bed her. Hearing Ashlee escaped with me is more shocking than waking up with a sleeping Claudia in my arms.
Snickering at my stupidity of being lumped with two loons, I continue my trip. I make it another forty miles before I have to pull over to pump gas. My father’s staff kept my battery charged, but they weren’t as courteous with the gas tank.
With police two counties over seeking Dexter Elias, I secure one of three wallets in my glove compartment before clambering out of my car. The gas stations have drastically improved from what they once were. I can watch the news broadcast of my escape on a small television in the pump while my gas guzzler’s tank is replenished.
