Black Water Read Free Page B

do it, he hauled off and smacked her on the butt with the back of his hand. That hurt. It felt like her cheek was on fire.
    She felt his body twist like he was getting ready to give her another and she dropped to her forearms and put her forehead on the mattress. It musta been what he wanted because it felt like his man part got a lot harder. Half a dozen more pushes and he pulled it out. He wasn’t done, though. Not by a long shot. He just wanted to keep it from goin’ off before he was ready. He was watchin’ it bounce when he noticed her other little puckered hole. Lookin’ at it, just sittin’ there, goin’ to waste, gave him an idea. He started running his thumb down the little gap between her cheeks. Thinking. Picturing. And if it’d been possible, grinning.
    “Awright! Awright,” she squeaked through dry, parched lips. She’d figured where he was going even before he did. “It’s over, you win, I give up. I’m done. I’m broke, finished. I ain’t no match fer yer manliness.” Crocodile tears rolled down her pale, dirty little cheeks and dripped onto the bloodstained mattress. She looked over her shoulder at him. “I’ve learnt who’s boss. Please don’t hurt me no more. I honest t’ God believe yer tearin’ me apart inside. Please, Mista, you’re scarin’ me s’ bad I almost can’t stand it. You’re ‘bout more man than I can take and I promise if ya cut me loose, feed, and take care a me, I swear a solemn promise t’ God ‘n all th’angels in Heaven I’ll stay with ya’s long as ya live.”
    He flipped her on her back. The cot was only inches from the floor so he spread her legs, snugged up close, put his elbows alongside her hips on the mattress, and leaned over, his face three inches from hers. “D’ya mean it?” he blubbered. At least, that’s what she thought he’d asked. His hot breath was as foul as his face, and she was scared shitless he was gonna try to kiss her on the mouth.
    She couldn’t nod her head fast enough. “Yeah, I promise.”
    “If ya really mean it, you ‘n me’ll get married.”
    It was hard to understand a lot of what he said but she got the gist of it. She just looked at him, unsure of what to do. She had it in her mind that what he’d been doing to her for five days and nights was what married people did, so what was he talkin’ about?
    “Awright.”
    Mule was beside hisself with joy. The courtin’ was over and he was gonna have a wife!
    “Whada we do?” she asked.
    “Make promises, I think,” he said, earnestly.
    “I awready done that. I said I’d stay with ya’s long’s ya live.”
    His face contorted with what she assumed was a smile. “Yeah…I guess ya’ did! Whadaya want me t’ promise?” He was so excited he looked like an ugly, two-hundred-and-ninety-four pound four-year-old. But a lot dumber.
    “Bein’ married t’you’s more’n enough fer me,” she lied. It was hardly a way to start a healthy, trusting relationship.
    His little bug brain, softened by victory and half a bottle of hearty alcoholic beverage, convinced him she was telling the truth, and gigglin’ like a fool, unlocked the chain clamped around her neck but stood between her and the door just in case she changed her mind and bolted.
    As of that moment, they were Mr. and Mrs. Mule.
     

 
CHAPTER 4
     
    Later that evening, during his second honeymoon poke and with him tanked up with enough inebriant to pickle an adult mastodon, Smoke whuffed out a lungful when he blacked out on top of her. Seeing her chance, she wraggled her top half out from under him, and by bracing her bony little shoulders agin the wall, shoved her new husband’s fat, drunk ass off the cot, thudding to the floor on his back. She stopped breathing when he started waving his arms around and raised one leg like he was trying to get up. Then he farted and passed out again. She took a second to catch her breath, and that’s when she noticed the big knife stuck in the table. Everthing else in