Page 3 of Not This Night

"Who are you?" The query came out strong, belying the tremor she felt.

The figure didn't respond, just continued its relentless approach. And then she spotted it.

The dead badger dangling over their shoulders, blood dripping down the front of their shirt. The nearly severed head of the animal lolling against the approaching figure’s chest.

"Stay back!" Heather's voice cracked like a whip through the cool air.

The distance between them shrank with every heartbeat. Heather's brain rapidly fired thoughts of escape routes, defensive maneuvers, the possibility of outrunning her potential assailant. But those heels, those damned heels, betrayed her confidence in evading the approaching figure.

Survival instincts screamed. She couldn't freeze, not now. Not when every cell in her body urged her to move, to survive. Heather sidestepped, aiming for more open ground away from the car, her makeshift anchor.

"Help!" The word tore from her lips, a primal call even as logic told her it was futile. Nobody would hear. Nobody would come.

And then the dark figure broke into a sprint behind her, racing like the night wind.

CHAPTER ONE

The air at the range was heavy with cordite and gun smoke. From beneath the brim of her white, wide-brimmed hat, Rachel Blackwood exhaled a steady breath, her finger coaxing the trigger with practiced finesse. The feather tucked into the leather banding on the brim fluttered.

She squeezed.

The crack.

Fifty yards away, another target struck. Bullseye. She cycled the bolt of her rifle without taking her eyes off the scope.

Boots shuffled on gravel behind her. The good ol' boys congregated like cattle at a water trough, their murmurs low and admiring. They knew her by reputation as much as by sight—the woman who could shoot sharper than any man for three counties.

It had started an hour ago when she'd first begun to warm up.

Then, the attention had been for the pretty half-Native girl playing with her boyfriend’s guns. At least, that’s what they’d likely thought. She’d felt their eyes on her.

But after the first round, clearing the range, the comments became less snarky, less bawdy.

She didn’t care. In her line of work, she’d faced far worse from far more.

Now, an hour into her usual routine, a small group of onlookers had gathered. And still, she didn’t glance towards them.

"Never seen nothing like it," one murmured, his drawl thick as molasses.

"Quiet," another hissed. "She's lining up again."

A hundred bullseyes.

That was the rule.

If she missed, she had to start again. A hundred bullseyes in a row.

A morning routine she’d established years ago, and one she stuck to religiously.

Rachel settled into her stance, the rifle an extension of her will. Her world narrowed to the crosshairs, the distant figure, the heartbeat steadying in her chest. The onlookers held their collective breath, captivated not just by skill but by the enigma she represented—a lone wolf amidst the pack. An odd outlier with that raven hair of hers, a single feather fluttering in her hat’s brim.

"Damn," breathed a third, as another bullseye met its fate. Admiration laced his tone.

Rachel ejected the spent casing, the sound crisp in the stillness. She didn’t need their words; every shot was a silent conversation with her past.

The bright-eyed creature in the forest, hunting her as she hunted it. Her mind conjured the memories even as she moved through her routine.

It was difficult, sometimes, when she got into flow state, to know what was memory and what was the present.

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