Rather than watch him undress, I look at the huge screen to his right. Scott is gone. Now the camera is focused on another man, who glares into the lights. He’s massively muscled but wearing only a snug pair of black boxer shorts. His neck and chin are shaded with a day’s dark beard scruff, and his heavily lashed eyes are the most vibrant shade of blue I’ve ever seen. He clenches his jaw, refusing to speak, even though a guard in the frame appears to be asking him questions.
A white button-up shirt falls through my field of vision, momentarily obscuring the screen, and I tense, expecting the client’s weight to drop on top of me. Instead, he rounds the couch again, and a moment later I hear the clink of ice into a fresh glass.
“I’m not going to offer you any this time,” Hansen snaps.
I tune him out, my gaze glued to the screen as I try to pretend I’m not here. That this horrible room and the cruel man behind me don’t even exist.
On screen, the camera widens for a broader shot of the blue-eyed man, which is when I see that his hands are bound in front of him with thin wire I know from experience to be capable of carrying an electrical current. The guard steps into the frame again, blocking most of the muscular man from view, and when he steps back, the binding is gone. But I can tell from the way the blue-eyed man looks around, his gaze snapping from one point to the next, that there are several guns aimed at him off camera.
Then I see his hands. Tattooed on the fleshy part of his right palm is a seven-digit number. Just like mine.
He’s a prisoner.
When the view changes back to Scott, locked and loaded in his high-tech gear, I finally understand. He’s not here to hunt turkeys and rabbits.
He’s here to hunt inmates. One particular blue-eyed inmate, it seems.
Before I can truly process that fact, his brother rounds the end of the couch again, holding a fresh glass of alcohol. “Are you ready to play nice?” He drains half of the glass, then he sets it on the edge of the coffee table, next to the empty one.
I nod. My new plan is to lie still, squeeze my eyes shut, and pray that morning comes without any broken bones.
He uses one knee to wedge my legs open, and tears slide down my face as he settles over me, then crawls down my body. His tongue licks my left nipple, and I bite my lip—until his teeth sink into my breast.
I scream, and he bites harder. Then he lets me go, and on the lower edge of my vision, I see blood well from the wound. He licks it off, then slides his hand between us and positions himself between my legs.
I squeeze my eyes shut tight and reach to the left, grasping for the coffee table. For something to clutch.
My hand closes around the empty glass instead.
I swing with no intent. No forethought. I’m striking out blindly. Mindlessly. I am utterly shocked when the glass actually makes contact with a sickening thud.
For a moment, Hansen stares down at me, stunned. His eyes look unfocused. Then he blinks, and I can see reality rush back in. He stands, and when he touches his temple, his fingers come away bloody. The glass falls from my hand and thumps onto the carpet, but before I can process that, he grabs me by the throat with his bloody hand and hauls me up. Squeezing.
Pain shoots through my neck. Pressure builds in my head. I try to claw at his hand, but something bites into my fingers and as my vision starts to go dark, I realize I’m still holding a hunk from the broken glass. I swing again, aiming for his head. I feel the glass sink in, but before I can see how much damage I’ve done, the world goes dark…
I wake up on the floor, lying on my right side. The bite on my breast throbs. My cheek is wet and sticky. I push myself upright, and the black carpet beneath my palm feels spongy. My hand comes away covered in blood.
Some of it’s mine; the cut on my finger still burns. But the rest of it… I spin on the carpet, looking for the source.
Hansen lies an arm’s length away, bleeding from a gash in his neck. The blood beneath my hand is still warm, but the flow from his wound is little more than a trickle, and his eyes are staring at nothing.
He’s dead.
He holds the hunk of glass in his left hand. If he’d left it in and called for help, he might have lived.
I scramble away from the body, breathing heavily as I try to absorb what’s just happened.
I killed him. It was an accident, but I don’t regret it, and I won’t be forgiven.
Panic tries to close my throat.
No. Think! I have to get out of here, and I can’t do that naked and covered in blood.
I use the coffee table to push myself to my feet, then I run for the bathroom. I wet a rag in the sink and scrub the blood from my hands, face, and neck, then I search the suite for something to wear. Other than the robe on the back of the bathroom door and the dead man’s clothes, there is nothing.
Desperate, I put on his whiskey-scented shirt—it hangs halfway down my thighs—and as I’m buttoning it, movement on the screen catches my attention.
Scott and the inmate with the blue eyes stand on the screen together, facing each other. A man in a guard’s uniform stands between them, holding a rifle across his chest, staring at the camera. His eyes gleam with excitement, and he’s saying something, but the sound is still muted. Then he raises his hand, fingers spread, and begins to count, dropping one finger with every number.
The camera zooms in on Scott Hansen, the hunter, and he’s practically salivating. Then the view switches to the blue-eyed man briefly—he’s tense and ready for something—before focusing on the guard again. The guard drops his final finger. Then the camera angle changes, and suddenly I’m watching the blue-eyed man race across the broad, flat lawn toward the gate into the forest, wearing nothing but those snug shorts and a strange, thin pair of shoes.
As he disappears through the open gate into the woods, a ten-minute countdown appears in the lower left corner of the screen, as the camera pans around to show an impatient-looking Scott.
The inmate gets a ten-minute head start.
Someone knocks on the door, and I jump, then slap a hand over my mouth to stifle a scream. “Mr. Hansen? I have your room service order.”
Panic paralyzes me. I stare at the door, willing the waiter to go away.
“Mr. Hansen?” He knocks again. “Sir, I’m sorry, but if you don’t answer, I’ll have to open the door. I assure you, however, that I’ve seen everything there is to see around here.” He goes silent again, and I’m opening my mouth, ready to try an impersonation of the client’s voice, when the knob turns.
The door swings open, revealing a well-groomed waiter in a black suit. His right palm is tattooed with a seven-digit number. Next to him stands a cart holding a dome-covered tray and a bottle of champagne chilling in a bucket of ice. With one glass.
The waiter’s focus narrows on me. Then it drops to the floor, where the body lies at my feet. “Um…guys?” he says. “We have a problem.”
Two guards push the waiter and his cart aside and look through the doorway. They raise their rifles, both aimed at my head, and my heart jumps into my throat as the one on the left starts shouting.
“Code red! Code red! You so much as breathe, bitch, and we’ll blow your head clean off!”
4
MACI
I sit tethered to a chair with a thin metal cable, behind a long, empty folding table. The cable, like the thinner wire around my wrists, can be electrified with the press of a button. Maybe even with a verbal command, by someone with authorization.
Two guards stand at my back, and in the reflection from the window overlooking a brightly lit shuttle landing pad, I can see that they’re both aiming their rifles at my back.
I want to explain that the restraints aren’t necessary. Despite how they found me, I’m not actually dangerous. I just got lucky with Mr. Hansen.
Or very, very unlucky.
Either way, I pose no threat to armed guards. But I’m a convict on Devil’s Eye. Speaking has never been in my best interest, no matter how terrifie
d I am of this cold, empty room, and the fact that they haven’t yet thrown me into a prison cell. Or back into zone four.
I twist my wrists in the tight wire cuffs, trying to draw feeling back into my fingers. I have no way to measure time, short of counting my own frenzied heartbeats, but I don’t think I’ve been here for long. Minutes, maybe.
A familiar buzzing begins to build in my head—more of a feeling than a sound—and my pulse races. I turn to the window, but for at least a minute, I see and hear nothing. Then, finally, I hear the soft, high-pitched whine of a shuttle engine.
I wait, terrified, as I stare out at a series of landing pads. Have they called someone down from one of the guard stations? Am I finally being transferred back to an open-population zone?
Can that really be any worse than what’s happening here in zone two?
The shuttle descends from darkness onto the well-lit landing zone and sets down on the second pad from the right. I expect to see the distinct markings of a patrol, but the sides of the vehicle bear only the UA emblem, next to a black cross.
A hearse. Dead convicts are left to rot on the surface of the Red Rock, so the shuttle must have come for Mr. Hansen.
It’s odd to think that I still don’t know his first name, considering that he saw me naked and I practically watched him die. But maybe that’s for the best. I don’t need to know anything about him, other than that he was a wealthy rapist, and that the world is better without him in it. Even this festering hellhole of a world.
But, as he seemed fond of telling me, there will be consequences.
The door slides open at my back, and the reflection in the window shows two more guards entering the room. The woman looks familiar—she’s the guard who inspected my teeth and hair. Who led the line of female convicts down the hall and put me in that room.
The male guard who comes in with her is one of the ones who dragged me from the room at gunpoint, half-naked and trembling.
They took Hansen’s shirt from me, so now I’m fully naked. And still trembling.
“How the hell did this happen?” The female guard demands of her coworker as she rounds the table I’m seated behind. According to her nameplate, she’s Commander Harris. There’s an insignia next to it that seems to underline the fact that she’s in charge here. “And what the hell were you doing there?”
“I had a rough morning in F block, so I traded with Nelson.” Dalton, the male guard shrugs. “Ergis and I were escorting room service. The client didn’t respond, so the waiter opened the door and found her standing over the body. Blood everywhere. Looks like she stabbed him in the throat with a broken drinking glass.”
I don’t bother explaining that it was self-defense. There’s no such thing here. Not for an inmate.
“Did she say anything?”
“No, she doesn’t—” Dalton’s mouth snaps closed as the huge window flashes, then becomes a viewing screen, blocking the hearse shuttle from sight. He turns while the image comes into focus, showing a man with thick gray hair sitting behind a cluttered desk in a nicely appointed office.
The name plate on the desk reads “Arnold Shaw, Warden.”
Shit.
“This is her?” The warden glances at a file open on the smart-surface of his desk. “Maci Bishop?” He looks up, and his gaze bores into me. Then it falls to the bite mark on my left breast, but he makes no comment. “Is that your name, inmate?”
I nod.
Harris crosses her arms over her chest. “You’re required to answer aloud, for the official record.”
“Yes,” I say. “That’s my name.” The warden doesn’t seem to care about my prisoner number.
“Maci Bishop, you stand accused murdering Steven Hansen—a personal friend of mine. Do you deny the charge?”
Oh, no. This is my trial—or what passes for a trial on Devil’s Eye. Though the body’s not even cold yet. “May I speak with an attorney?”
The warden frowns. “Convicted criminals are only allowed contact with an attorney if they have one on record or have the funds to pay for one. Your file says you have neither. Is that accurate?”
I exhale slowly, trying to stay focused as reality seems to be collapsing around me. “That’s accurate. So, I’m on my own?”
“I’m afraid so. Do you deny the charge? And before you answer, you should know that our security cameras caught the whole thing.”
“No. I don’t deny it.” I can hardly hear my own voice, but evidently the warden understands me.
“Well, that was easy enough. It’s about damn time something ran smoothly around here.” He seems to be talking to the guards now. “A murder confession carries an automatic death sentence. Someone send a copy of this hearing to corporate and tell them we’ll take care of the execution. Steven signed away the right to sue, so there shouldn’t be any legal complications. Score one for the liability department, for demanding I follow the rules, even with my own friends. If there’s nothing more…” The warden stands, and my head spins.
Death sentence.
The phrase echoes in my mind. My fists clench in my lap, my wrists straining uselessly against the wire cuffs. Yesterday morning, I had a full belly and a locked door in zone four. How could so much have gone so wrong in so little time?
“Warden, there’s one more thing,” Harris says, facing the screen.
“What is it?” The warden sinks back into his chair.
“The victim’s brother is the hunter scheduled for this week. He’s already suited up and ready to go, but obviously we had to put the whole thing on pause, considering what’s happened.”
I’m hardly listening. All I can think about is the fact that I’m about to die. They’ll probably send someone in with a hypodermic needle pen any second.
Warden Shaw sighs. “I guess Scott wants his brother’s money back. Normally I’d say no, but under the circumstances, I suppose a half-refund—”
“No, sir, he wants…well, he wants her.” Harris waves one arm in my direction, without turning.
“The inmate? I guess that’s fair. We’re just going to execute her anyway. Comp him a room and send her up. She’s to remain handcuffed and under armed guard the whole time, for his safety. When he’s done with her, send in an executioner.”
“No, I’m sorry I wasn’t clear sir,” Harris says. “He wants her released into the enclosure. He wants to hunt her.”
Oh my god. I can’t breathe. I’m gasping, but my lungs are on lockdown.
The warden looks intrigued, and I can only wait to see what he’ll decide. For several seconds, he studies me. “She doesn’t look like she’ll be much sport. I’m not sure there’d be any value in that for our spectators, and they paid for a good show.”
“He’ll still hunt the other inmate,” Harris clarifies. “He just wants to be the one to pull the trigger on his brother’s murderer as well.”
“Oh.” The warden shrugs. “I don’t see any problem with that. Someone has to do the honors; it might as well be Scott Hansen.” He stands and pockets a thin tablet. “Tell him we’ll allow it, but she gets a half-hour head-start, so the audience can watch her stumble through the woods, terrified. But tell him I said to get it done fast, once he’s in the enclosure.”
“Yes, sir,” Harris says, and the screen flickers, then becomes a window again.
Outside, two men in black uniforms are guiding a body bag on a hovering stretcher toward the hearse. I stare at them, focusing on my breathing to keep from hyperventilating.
“Let her up,” Harris says, waving a hand in my direction. One of the guards at my back steps toward me, and a second later, the cord tethering me to the chair slides loose. “Stand up, Bishop.”
I stand, my hands still cuffed in front of me.
“This is a first. We’ve never put a woman in the enclosure before.” Harris’s head cocks to one side. “I think we’ll let your fellow inmates watch, in the dorm. That way, we may never have to do this again.”
I stare past her, out the windo
w, to where Steven Hansen is being loaded into the hearse.
If I have to die, I’ll die happy knowing he went first.
Downstairs, in a sterile white room, a guard removes my wire cuffs, while three others aim rifles at me. I stare around, trying to take it all in—trying to prepare for the inevitable—but all I can really process is the fact that I’m naked and shivering in a room full of armed guards.
“What should we put her in?” Dalton asks, staring at a bin full of pairs of stretchy black shorts. “We’re not equipped for girls.”
“Give her the smallest shorts and shoes you’ve got. And someone go find a sports bra. If the supply room doesn’t have one, hit up all the female guards and offer reimbursement.”
One of the guards leaves to follow orders, while Dalton digs in the bin and finally comes up with an extra-small pair of stretchy shorts, with a flap at the crotch. Because they’re designed for men. He tosses them to me, and while I pull them on, relieved to be wearing something, he digs in a bin of the strange, thin shoes the blue-eyed man on screen was wearing.
“This is the best I can do.” He shoves a pair at me, and when I pull them on, I realize they’re really more like stretchy ankle socks with thick rubber soles.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t bother,” he snaps. “They’re not for your comfort. They’re so you last longer out there. So our customers get their money’s worth. Same with the clothes.”
If the men’s underwear I’m wearing can even be called clothing. Not that it matters.
“You understand what’s about to happen?” Harris asks, stepping into my line of vision.
I nod. “You’re going to let me go, and Scott’s going to try to track me down and shoot me.”
Harris glances at Dalton, both brows raised.
“The client was watching the hunt pre-show on the screen in his room.”
“Ah.” Harris turns back to me. “We’re not going to let you go. We’re going to release you into a large, enclosed hunting ground. You’ll get a thirty-minute head start. Ten is the norm, but the average target is much stronger and faster than you are.”
Hunter Page 4