Hunting. In the forest. With the man responsible for my sister’s death. This is going to be difficult. Every time his back is to me, I’m going to be filled with the temptation to put a bullet in the back of his head. I won’t give in to that temptation, though. Fernando Villalobos will see his death coming, unstoppable and undeniable, and he will know it’s being dealt to him by my hand.
“I love to hunt,” I tell him, smiling easily. I’m probably a sociopath. I can put up a front like this without a second thought. I can lie and mislead people until the cows come home. I don’t flinch. I don’t hesitate. The words just fall from my lips, and no one is ever any the wiser. Fernando nods, holding his hand out, gesturing for me to climb into the passenger seat of the Patriot.
“Perfect. The others are already waiting for us. Let’s go and find them, shall we?”
******
Natalia is the first person I notice when we arrive at our rally point. Another six vehicles are already parked, half concealed by the trees and undergrowth, and eight men with rifles are standing around, leaning against the cars, chatting amiably in Spanish as they wait for us to arrive. Natalia’s eyes meet mine as I get out of the car, and my dick stirs in my pants. I can’t fucking help it. She’s too goddamn beautiful for words, and I’m a hot-blooded male with an overactive imagination. When I look at her, I see too much. I see her naked, pinned to a mattress beneath me. I see her eyes rolling back into her head as she comes. I see my own tongue, burying itself into her pussy as I eat her out from behind.
Her cheeks color, as if she can read my thoughts, and I have to make sure I’m not sporting some serious wood. I’m not, thank fuck. I don’t know how I’d explain that away to Fernando. The prospect of hunting gets me hot and horny? Yeah, I don’t think that would pan out too well.
Natalia slings the strap of her rifle over her shoulder, looking away. One of Fernando’s guys says something to her and she nods, walking away with him to collect empty bags from the back of one of the vehicles.
Fernando gives instructions to his men in Spanish, and then he relays them to me in English, obviously assuming I haven’t understood him the first time around. His orders are simple: we’re here to hunt for small game. Anyone that shoots a wolf will regret it for the rest of their incredibly short lives. We’re to pair off into twos and rendezvous at regular intervals.
“And it’s the rainy season,” he continues. “It’s going to pour down for an hour or so. I hope you’re not afraid of a little water, Kechu?”
“I’m sure I’ll manage.”
“Good. You and I will hunt together. Later, after we have stopped for food, you will go back out with Ocho, and I will go with my daughter.”
Fernando’s men disperse; five separate groups head in five different directions, and for the next hour and a half Fernando and I stealthily move through the forest, not speaking, not breathing a word to one another. He uses a total of five rudimentary hand signals, which I pick up very quickly: slow, stop, listen, look, and fire.
I snap off four shots, making all four kills. Fernando seems impressed each time I take an animal down, patting me on the arm, nodding encouragingly, as a father might to his son. The entire time we’re stalking through the trees, I’m thinking about what it will feel like to end his life. My mouth is filled with the taste of copper. It’s only when I catch myself literally biting my tongue that I realize where the blood in my mouth is coming from.
Finally, Fernando raises his rifle to his shoulder, and squeezes the trigger, the first time since we started the hunt. The way he handles his weapon, and the way he aims, takes sight, and shoots all in one smooth, fluid moment, defines him as an expert marksman, and yet he only clips the deer in the shoulder.
Strange.
I’m on the verge of asking him what went wrong, when Fernando hands me his rifle and starts rooting through his pack for something.
“I find these kills with guns so impersonal, don’t you? I’m the kind of man who likes to get his hands dirty.” From the bag, he produces something that surprises me—a fucking ball hammer. It’s old, or at least it looks like it is. He spins it around in his hand, and then jerks his head in the direction of the fallen deer. “Come. Best not to keep her waiting.”
Twenty feet away, through the dense vegetation, the deer he’s shot is lying on its side, writhing and groaning, its eyes rolling with wild panic in its head, and frothing at the mouth.
“There she is,” Fernando says. He stands for a second in front of the injured animal, hands on his hips, still gripping hold of the hammer, admiring the poor creature at his feet. “I always feel so guilty afterwards,” he says. “But not in this moment. When I’m holding the hammer, ready to bring it down, I feel nothing but anticipation. You understand this, I think, Kechu.”