Hunter/Prey (A Revenge Thriller) Read online

  Hunter/Prey

  Sam Sisavath

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  Hunter/Prey

  Copyright © 2015 by Sam Sisavath

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Published by Road to Babylon Media

  Visit www.roadtobabylon.com for news, updates, and announcements

  Edited by Jennifer Jensen and Wendy Chan

  Cover Art by Deranged Doctor Design

  Formatting by BB eBooks

  Revenge means carrying a loaded shotgun.

  She has been planning this for ten years. She’s thought of everything and trained for this one single night. Nothing could possibly go wrong.

  He’s a serial killer who has eluded the police for the last ten years. When his latest victim turns out to not be who she appears, the hunter will discover what it’s like to be the prey.

  When these two very determined foes clash, there will be blood. One way or another, only one of them is coming out of this alive…

  “Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.”

  —Confucius

  Chapter 1

  He was going to kill her, there was no doubt about that. That was, after all, the whole point of tonight for the both of them. The question was: Who wanted to kill the other more?

  He took her with the kind of practiced ease that could only come from having done it many times before: Running her car off the highway, yanking her from her seat before she even had a chance to recover from the crash, and then throwing her to the ground. All of that was to show her he meant business. He needn’t have gone the extra mile; she knew his intentions as soon as he began ramming his truck into her back bumper.

  He pounced quickly, so quickly. She hadn’t expected that, and it threw her timing off until she realized that everything had worked out just as she had planned—which was both exhilarating and horrifying.

  He’s done this so, so many times before, she thought as he threw her to the soft, damp ground. It had rained yesterday, and the wetness seeped through her jeans and blouse instantly. Thank God it wasn’t as slippery as it could have been; she was going to need every bit of her agility against a man his size.

  “Don’t fight it; it’s just going to make things worse,” he said. Or hissed. This beast in man’s clothing. He even looked monstrous against the canvas of moonlight pouring through the trees around them.

  “No,” she said, the word coming out as a loud gasp.

  The heavy breathing, the feel of drowning, wasn’t part of the plan. She really did find it difficult to breathe at the moment because this was it. This was the night she had been waiting for.

  Ten years of research, six years of training, and three years of getting ready for this moment.

  God help me.

  “I know who you are,” she said. Those words came out easier. Much, much easier.

  It was all going according to plan. Mostly.

  Ten years of research…

  She could see it on his face. He hadn’t expected that response. She knew what he was waiting for—begging, crying, smeared makeup, and groveling at his feet. When he didn’t get any of those things, he cocked his head to one side as if to get a better view of her.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  “I’m exactly everything you wanted,” she said, and kicked out with her right leg, connecting with his crotch. It was such a “girl move,” as one of her instructors would say, but given her current position—on the ground, with him hovering over her—it was the most viable and effective option open to her.

  …six years of training…

  Before he could gather himself, she grabbed a handful of dirt and threw it in his face. He batted at it awkwardly, the knife gripped tightly in his right hand (Where the hell did that come from?) gleaming in the moonlight. The blade was long and sharp, with a serrated section for tough cutting.

  She scrambled to her feet and dived forward, back toward the car, aiming right at the open driver-side door. She didn’t go for the keys dangling from the ignition. Instead, she grabbed the lever next to the seat and yanked it, heard the pop! as the trunk opened in the back, the soft, metallic echo like a ringing bell against the quiet countryside.

  He was wincing, parts of his eyes still clogged with dirt while simultaneously trying to fight through the pain from between his legs. Girl move or not, men lived in mortal fear of getting kicked in the scrotum because it hurt.

  She pulled away from the open door and backpedaled along the length of the vehicle. She gave herself a brief second or two to enjoy the confusion clouding his eyes (they were light brown, but she didn’t know how much of that was dirt) as he attempted to follow her movements while the mind behind them tried in vain to understand what she was doing—why she was still here and why she hadn’t tried to flee yet.

  …and three years of getting ready for this moment…

  By the time he gathered himself and took his first stumbling step after her, she was already at the back of the car, reaching into the open trunk. She pulled back the rug, ignored the spare tire, and went right for the pump-action shotgun hidden inside its compartment.

  It was a Remington model, the kind used by cops around the country. The guy who had sold it to her, then taught her how to use it over the course of two months for a flat fee, said the SWAT guys liked carrying it for the firepower and accuracy. Training on the weapon had caused her a lot of bruises and painful mornings, but she had gotten good at it. When she put her mind on achieving something, there were few things in this universe that could stop her.

  He must have sensed that something had gone wrong, because when she stepped away from the trunk with the shotgun, he had already paused his pursuit of her. By the time she reappeared in the open, revealing herself (and the shotgun in her hands), he had already turned around and was running in the other direction.

  She fired.

  The flames that stabbed out of the Remington’s barrel lit up the darkened woods for less than a second and illuminated the sight of him darting to his right and over the hood of the car. He was sliding across the vehicle as she ran after him, racking the shotgun as she went, and fired again.

  The driver-side window exploded and the ping-ping! of buckshot slamming into the side of the Ford echoed back and forth against the trees, the gunshot ear-splitting against the quiet night. She hoped the noise didn’t go further than the woods. She didn’t need strangers butting in on them right now. Not yet. Not until she had finished what she had come here to do.

  Ten years of research, six years of training, and three years of getting ready for this moment…

  The man wasn’t on the hood anymore. He had probably dropped down on the other side. Which was slick of him. Like something out of a TV show about a couple of brothers and an old souped-up car. Something about Dukes…

  She skirted around the vehicle, racking another shell into the shotgun as she did so. Her finger anxiously tested the trigger as she moved sideways, feeling her way without looking. Then she finally circled the hood and lifted the shotgun, ready to fire—

  —except there was nothing
on the other side to shoot at.

  He was gone.

  She spun in a circle, searching the woods around her, chest tightening.

  Shit.

  Shit, shit, shit!

  They were less than twenty yards from the state highway, but light out here was scarce except for the generous glow of the moon above. One of her vehicle’s headlights was still working, but it was shining in the wrong direction. Both of her taillights had gone out about the fifth time he rammed his truck into them.

  She could barely see, much less make out the trees from the branches from the shadows. And if she couldn’t see, she couldn’t shoot. And if she couldn’t shoot, then all of this would be for nothing.

  Ten years…

  She hurried back around the hood of the Ford to the driver-side door. She slipped inside and used the ceiling light to reach across the seats, opened the glove compartment, and came back out with a heavy Maglite. She clicked it on, the bright LED beam showering the woods around her and illuminating what was once hidden.

  She had light now, but he was gone. Disappeared into the darkness. She turned the beam left, right, then all around her.

  He was gone.

  Just like that, he was gone.

  She ran the flashlight along the Ford to gauge the damage. Thin tendrils of smoke were still rising from the corners of the hood, which had lifted like crumpled paper when she hit a tree a few yards back and spun briefly before finally coming to rest. The engine had shut down, though she couldn’t remember if she had done that.

  The sound of the sleeping woods was suffocating, with the only out-of-place noise being the slightly chaotic thrumming in her chest.

  Then she saw it, and suddenly everything seemed to get instantly better.

  There was blood on the hood of the car. A large trail of it slashing from left to right where he had slid across during his escape—not unscathed, after all.

  She trained her flashlight back on the woods and smiled.

  “You can run, but you can’t hide!” she shouted, just barely able to contain her rising excitement.

  Chapter 2

  A part of him wanted to laugh. Out loud, even.

  LOL, amirite?

  How could he not? All his life had been spent chasing and stalking and taking people, and here he was stumbling through the woods (Where the hell am I, anyway?) while bleeding like a stuck pig. He had seen other people lying, sitting, or running while looking like stuck pigs, but seeing himself (or well, as much of himself as he could see in the semidarkness, anyway) was quite the experience.

  Not necessarily a good one, unfortunately.

  It would be funny if it weren’t so tragic. The younger him wouldn’t have fallen for this; but then again, that was a smarter, quicker, and hungrier him. This present him—the one trying to keep himself from bleeding to death—was older but not necessarily wiser. Most damning of all, he had become overconfident and too pleased with himself.

  He had gotten sloppy.

  Lazy and old and stupid and sloppy.

  What was that old saying? Pride comes before the fall.

  Or maybe it was more like, You get old, you get lazy, and you get ambushed by a girl.

  He might have actually laughed that time.

  Or, at least, a small chuckle, possibly.

  He stopped for a moment and took in his surroundings.

  What was he doing? He didn’t even know where he was going and was literally bumbling around in the dark. He just had to get away from there, that’s all.

  Where did that shotgun come from?

  She must have had it in the trunk the whole time. He remembered seeing her diving into the driver-side door and expecting her to reach for the key and try to drive off. It wouldn’t have worked. He was faster, and he would have grabbed her legs before she could even lunge all the way into the vehicle. He was even looking forward to it when he saw her making the leap.

  But instead, she had gone for the lever. The trunk lever!

  Now that had thrown him off. Big time.

  Then the shotgun…

  The whole thing wasn’t even supposed to go down this far up the highway. The spot where he had prepared to take her was two miles back down the road. But she had proven too resourceful. He should known something was wrong the moment he tried to knock her off the road and she didn’t lose control of her vehicle. That should have been his first tip-off. No one drove that well unless they had some training.

  Or a lot of training.

  All the signs were there; he just hadn’t seen them.

  Suckered by a girl. This would be embarrassing if anyone knew what I did with my free time.

  He had dismissed the possibility that she was a cop and that all of this was one elaborate sting to catch him. Cops had to follow proper police procedure, like reading you your Miranda rights before they pumped you full of buckshot.

  No. He had a feeling this was personal.

  A grudge.

  Or a vendetta.

  Same difference? Maybe. He was hurting too much to start doing the semantics dance right now.

  He could imagine telling the boys about how a girl had tricked him. Lured him right into a trap like the big ol’ dummy he was. Because that’s what he felt like at the moment. A big ol’ lumbering, bleeding dumb—

  Where was I going again?

  No idea. This wasn’t part of the plan. Far, far from it.

  There was no doubt about it. He was lost. All the woods looked the same at night, all the trees identical to the million other trees in the area. There were no signs, no hiking trails, and definitely no roads or buildings to help shed light on his current whereabouts. Unlike the spot he had picked out, everything here was new to him.

  He was certain of one thing, though: his truck was behind him, and the highway after that. Of course, there was a woman with a shotgun—and, from all signs, the will and skills to use it—between him and freedom.

  Nope. That’s definitely not going to work.

  Man, he was getting old. Slowing down. About three years ago, he had almost pulled the trigger and called it quits. But no, he had to come back. Because he couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t temper it, no matter how hard he tried. The girls, the one-night stands, even the widow with the kids had only been temporary buffers.

  And then she showed up.

  Perfect. So, so perfect.

  Suckered by a girl.

  Well, goddamn.

  He had stopped moving some time ago and hadn’t realized it. The root of a tree had caught the tip of his boot and snagged him in place. That drew another short chuckle out of him. The old him wouldn’t have let something as minor as a root sticking out of the ground impede his progress. Then again, the younger him wasn’t bleeding right now.

  The blood…

  He looked behind him.

  Shit. How had he not noticed that before?

  Even under the limited moonlight, he could see still-glistening red drops following him all the way from the highway, a long, jagged trail that just about anyone could follow if they had eyes. The leather fabric of his right glove, pressed against the wound in his side, was sloppily drenched with his own blood.

  Snap!

  His head whipped around. Too fast; a jolt of pain ripped through his body. He swam through it anyway and stared, barely breathing, waiting for the inevitable. Maybe it was just his imagination, but he swore he heard branches snapping from behind him. Had she found him already? Her and that shotgun?

  She had the shotgun in the trunk the whole time. Christ, she knew what she was doing, all right.

  There was nothing back there.

  At least, nothing (no one) that he could see.

  Of course, it was so dark…

  He trudged on, forcing his legs to move one at a time. He had to keep going because she would be coming. He knew that for a fact. She hadn’t set all of this up to give up now, especially when she had the upper hand. And as hard as it was to admit, she was in control here.

 
Her and that shotgun of hers…

  He gripped the knife tighter, comforted by its presence. Ten inches of magnificent, sharp stainless steel. Fifteen inches in all, with a rubberized metal handle at the end. It was an extremely efficient weapon and easy to toss and replace later from an online store. This one was exactly twenty-four months old. Of course, the knife could have been thirty feet long, and it still wouldn’t make a difference if she caught him.

  Who brings a knife to a shotgun fight? You big dummy.

  He flexed his hand over the wound. The blood had seeped through the glove material, and it was warm and sticky against his fingers. For some reason, he always assumed his own blood would feel different against his skin, but it was just the same as all the others he had taken in the past.

  Should have retired.

  Now look at you, wandering around in the woods at night like a lost old man.

  Get off my lawn!

  He was pretty sure he actually laughed out loud that time.

  Maybe, even, LMAO.

  Chapter 3

  The truck was big and black and shiny. The front grill was outfitted to take on lesser-size vehicles, and although her back bumper was a twisted wreck, there was barely any noticeable damage on his hood. Staring at it (was something like this even legal?), she thought it was a minor miracle she had managed to stay on the road and drag the chase out for as long as she had.

  The driver-side door had been left open, and inside she found an empty can of Red Bull in the cup holder. The key was nowhere to be found and the ceiling light had turned off, so she had to use the Maglite to sift through the glove compartment. There was a roll of paper towels inside, an unopened pack of gum, and a pair of brand new black leather gloves. There was no insurance paper or ID, nothing that would tell her who he was.

  Not that it mattered. She knew exactly who he was even if she didn’t know his name. That was superfluous information she could find out after he was dead and she had finished hauling his lifeless corpse to the nearest police station.