Go Big or Go Dead

By Rod Kackley

Get ready for a heart-pumping journey into the mind of a young woman who will stop at nothing to achieve her dreams.

 

Bree has a plan to become the most famous and successful woman in St. Isidore, but it involves teaming up with a dangerous serial killer.

 

As the body count rises and the St. Isidore Police Department struggles to stop them, Bree must decide if the price of fame is worth the risk.

 

With more twists and turns than you can imagine, 'Go Big or Go Dead' is a thrilling ride that will leave you on the edge of your seat.

 

If you're looking for a unique and captivating thriller that pushes the boundaries of the genre, this is the book for you.

 

Click 'Buy Now' and buckle up for a wild ride you won't forget.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rod Kackley
• Release date: Apr 4, 2023
• ISBN: 9798227366054

Rod Kackley

Rod Kackley is an award-winning journalist and author, living and writing, in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA.

Book preview

1

Another girl might be crying. Bree was showering. She’d been able to put off Steven this time, the motherfucker who was pretending to be her father.

Someday I am going to cut if off and feed it to him, Bree thought to herself as she turned the water as hot as possible, and soaped every inch of her tight, young skin where his fat, old fingers had gone, outside and inside.

It had been bad, but not nearly as bad as it could have been. The first time, two years ago, had been terrible. It had easily been the worst night of her very young life.

But Bree had survived. And this night she had been able to put him off, to keep him from ramming it inside her. Whenever she was able to keep his fat cock out of her pussy, it counted as a win.

This won’t go on much longer, she’d promised herself and Beth, her best friend, just the day before.

We’ll get rid of that asshole and we’ll be together. I promise.

Your mother, too?

Especially Debbie, that useless bitch.

Bree really wasn’t any closer to keeping that promise, that night. But she was a few thousand dollars richer, she’d had fun playing with another old  fucker, and Steven hadn’t gotten as far as he had hoped.

Not a bad night, Bree thought.

It had started off exactly as she planned.

Come on baby, you got what you wanted. Now I want what I want, the middle-age comb-over mumbled as his caffeine- and nicotine-stained teeth nibbled Bree’s neck, of course a little too hard to be erotic or sensual, even if he hadn’t been totally gross.

Alan was his name, or at least that was the name he gave the motel clerk, as he winked, paid in cash and handed over his drivers’ license. 

Oh, wow, a room at the Motel St.Isidore, rates by the half-hour. Not wasting any money on me, are you? Bree laughed to herself. If only mama knew,  she almost said out loud, thinking about how tasteless Alan’s wife’s home cooking must be.

Bree excelled at the things an underage girl had to do to score a bottle of booze or a six-pack of beer.

A few more years and she’d be twenty-one, Old enough to smoke, drink and score in St. Isidore, the teenagers chanted on the banks of the Red Run River as they chugged the booze, beer and wine that Bree was able to wheedle out of the Baby Boomers who trolled for teenage talent after midnight on DeVos Avenue.

It really was easier to get dope, any kind of dope in St. Isidore than it was to get a bottle of beer. While most kids figured with dope there’s hope, but with booze you lose, Bree enjoyed the games she played with her middle-aged lovers and the payoff was sometimes much better than just a bottle of beer.

In a minute baby, give me a minute, Bree said. I gotta put the protection in. Let me go! I gotta go into the bathroom.

Fuck. You do it out here. I gotta drain a vein to make the bladder gladder, Alan said as he hopped up off the bed.

Bree bounced in the air as the force of the 215-pounder leaving the queen-sized bed catapulted her slender frame a couple of inches off the mattress.

No rush, baby. Make sure you give me a few minutes, Bree said to the hairy-backed, overweight blob of St. Isidore manhood that wobbled into the john.

She’d been trying to figure out how to separate herself from the blob ever since the moron and thrown his wallet on the motel room desk as they entered the room.

What was inside the imitation leather is what Bree had really been after all night long.

Couple of minutes later behind the wheel of Alan’s Buick Regal, with the vodka he’d bought her, sliding the key into the ignition, Bree had her protection — Alan’s wallet, holding his credit cards and the all important driver’s license.

David! That’s your real name, isn’t it Alan, Bree shouted through the driver’s side window as her midnight lover, clad in nothing but his baggy white briefs, slammed against the door of his — correction Bree’s — Buick.

Bree held the plastic ID that included everything but his wife’s name between her two fingers as she turned the key and dropped the Buick into reverse.

Hey David! I know who you are. You don’t have a clue who I am, Bree said, as the Buick’s tires spun on the gravel in the Motel St. Isidore parking lot, showering David’s bare skin with tiny pebbles and sand.

I’ll say hello to wifey for you.

Oh look at this, she thought as she turned right and drove away in Alan’s Buick that should be worth at least five-grand on the St. Isidore black market.

Dumb fuck put the motel room key card in his wallet.

That thought had occurred to David, too. He realized his mistake when he tried to cover his underwear-clad front and pulled open the locked glass door to get back into the motel.

Fuck!

2

Bree was still laughing about it at home in the shower, still a little buzzed from the vodka, when she heard the bathroom door open and saw the silhouette of a bulking bruiser that could only be Steven through the plastic shower curtain.

She didn’t bother to cover herself. Steven had seen too much, too often. He had touched her, groped her, tongued her and more. Too much more.

He’ll be fucking my dead body if that ever happens, again, Bree promised her best friend a few days before. But before that happens he’ll be minus one cock.

You carry a knife? said one of the kids at the high school lunch table, interrupting Bree’s conversation with Beth.

Don’t need to, said Bree. Doesn’t matter what you bite off as long as you can spit it out.

Steven didn’t hesitate to drop his briefs and climb into the shower with Bree for the same reason she didn’t bother to cover herself.

Been there, they both thought, and done that. Bree didn’t even shudder. Why give him the satisfaction of thinking she was scared? Bree knew if she played along just long enough and built up his ego, promising next time would be THE time, he would leave. She hoped.

Bree never pulled back from Steven. Just like with the others, Bree knew how to get what she wanted from Steven.

With the others it was booze and dope. With Steven, it was survival.

But this time Bree surprised Steven by stepping forward into his naked hug, caressing the hair on the back of his neck and returning his kiss, tongue for tongue.

You know I love you, Bree said when she took her tongue back and fought down the bile that was surging up her throat.

Why can’t we just leave? Why can’t we run away to Mexico, like you promised?

She was back on the tips of her toes, hands around Steven’s neck and nibbling his lower lip.

I want you now, said Steven. I need you now.

Bree knew she could only tell a man no so many times before he would either get discouraged and slink away or get pissed, start hitting and taking what he wanted.

That’s why Bree gave Steven what he wanted when there was no other choice. But some day, and that day was coming, she would be able to say No, for the last time.

Steven wasn’t some middle-aged loser who could find himself locked outside a motel on DeVos Avenue. He was a lot of things, but Steven was not a loser.

Still, Bree knew his dance of a predator and his prey could only go on so long. The music had to stop sometime, and Bree knew this song was coming to its coda.

My period starts soon. Can we give it just a few days, please? It will be so much better for you.

His big hands squeezed her bare shoulders.

One week, Steven said. We’ll get out of the house. We will go someplace where there is nothing to worry about. No one will hear you scream.

The thought that no one could hear her scream would make Bree shudder late that night. She had screamed the first time. Her mother must have heard. But she did nothing.

More than ever, Bree knew she was on her own. She had to stop Steven forever.

The motherfucker stepped out of the shower, dried himself off and went back to bed.

When Bree heard the bathroom door close, she  shuddered so hard she nearly fell down. When her knees stopped wobbling, Bree turned the hot water on full force. She scrubbed every spot on her body Steven had touched.

But she couldn’t get his scent out of her nose.

Later, even with the incense burning in her bedroom, Bree could still smell him.

In bed, she shuddered and shivered and pulled the quilt up over her face.

But still Bree felt better than she might have because she had not let herself go. She had not surrendered. Bree knew as scary as it had been, she had never lost control.

However, at the same time, something had snapped. She was like a camel the instant after a straw hit his back. Something had broken inside Bree. She had no doubt what had to be done, and even better, Bree didn’t doubt that it would happen. She knew she would never surrender.

She smiled. Bree knew she had won again, so she just laid back and listened to the night.

Bree had grown up with the sound of the traffic rumbling on the interstate, four city blocks south of her home. To her it was as gentle as the white noise of a flowing river or a babbling brook. It always helped her sleep, especially those nights when her mother didn’t make it home.

It was the soundtrack of St. Isidore, the town that had become her mother, Debbie’s, sanctuary.

Swingin’ Izzy was so predictable.

At that time of night, Bree knew Bradford Glasscock would be taking a last delivery at his family’s funeral home. The hot dogs would be turning and spitting at the St. Isidore Stop ’N Go. The kids driving up and down DeVos Avenue would be stopping to do their nightly mating dances. The regulars at the Lamplighter would be getting ready for a couple hours of power drinking before last call.

Some nights Bree would wait in the bar’s parking lot for those who had lost what common sense and decency they had left.

It was amazing what a teenage girl could get with just a little flash.

Bree was almost asleep when she heard the 11:45 train blowing its horn as the locomotive approached Eastern Avenue, another sound that reassured her everything was going to be okay. No matter what happened, that train would go east at night and west in the morning. Nothing would stop it.

To Bree, the sound of that train was more than another  note in the symphony of a St. Isidore night. It was her dream — to hop that train and get out of town as quickly as she could.

3

His dick was almost inside me, Bree texted.

OMG! He nearly fucked you,  Beth texted back.

Disgusted, Bree texted. So gross.

He wants you so bad.

I know.

What are you gonna do?

Stop  him.

How?

I will

U have plan?

Yes perfect plan.

One we talked about

Yeah.

U nuts?

It worked for the girls in Ohio and that girl in California.

OMG

Serious. They got kidnapped

And raped

And survived.

OMG

Now they are stars!

Fuck. what about your step dad and your mom

Dead

Fuck

Fuck is right. That’s what that dickhead wants. I could feel it bouncing against my belly.

OMG!

Gonna get rid of him.

What?

Get rid of him, like he wont wanna fuck me cuz he wont exist. Get rid of him.

Kill?

Don’t make me make you an accessory after fact.

Oh fuck

yeah, oh fuck.

What about your mom?

Fucking in bed the whole time listening, she don’t care.

your mom! Love her?

Not like you

U luv me

yeah baby only u

We are gonna be stars?

yeah baby...we are gonna be stars

Bree had told Beth almost everything about her life. Even about Steven and how he raped her at least once a week. She told Beth about how she pretended to like it. How she pretended to love Steven and how she would cut if off and feed it to him one day.

Bree’s life might have seemed like an open book to Beth, but Bree was the one who turned the pages. She never surrendered that control.

Control. That’s why Bree never told Beth she loved her either in a text or in conversation, even when they were wrapped in each others’ arms.

Do I love Beth? Bree wasn’t sure. But she did know there are times when you have to tell the other person in your life what that person wants to hear whether it’s true or not. If they want to believe it enough, they will believe it.

And Bree wanted Beth to believe.

She didn’t have a total A-to-B-to-C plan in her head yet. But Bree knew that Steven had to die. Forget going to the cops in this town, she told herself for the millionth time. Chief Lumpy and the donut squad? You must be fucking kidding me.

And forget about her mother, Bree had told Beth more than once.

She would never stand up for me against Steven, Bree said. Never has, never will.

Steven had to die. Her mother too. Bree was convinced that was the only way to wake up from the nightmare that had consumed her life.

Then Bree and Beth could run away together and leave her parents behind, hopefully in their final resting place.

But how to make it happen and get away with it. That was the question she had yet to answer.

But Bree is working on it, Beth said to herself as she drifted off to sleep in the house across the street. And if Bree is working on it, it is going to happen. I will bet her mother and stepfather are never going to know what hit them.

Bree’s mother, had actually been reflecting on her good fortune while she waited for Steven to get done doing his business in the bathroom.

Debbie’s life had finally come together. Most days were good. Not every day, but who could say every day was perfect, she thought to herself. If you didn’t have bad days, how could you appreciate the good?

She rolled over to put her arm around the mountain of a man that was her husband, Steven. He wasn’t perfect either, but then again, how could you appreciate the good times if it wasn’t for the bad, Debbie had decided long ago.

Taking the good with the bad, he was her rock.

A few minutes after Debbie put her arm around Steven and nuzzled up against his furry back she could feel him starting to rustle.

Damn, I woke him up again, Debbie thought, as she held on to her man tighter or at least as tight as a petite woman could grip a man whose body she had never been able to get her arms around.

It didn’t work this night any better than it had that night last week when he left her alone.

Steven got up.

Debbie pulled her covers over her head, lay awake, held her breath and listened as Steven walked down the hall, and into the bathroom.

Debbie breathed a sigh of relief. Thank God, he hadn’t gone into Bree’s room again. 

4

Debbie had done the best she could. She was only twenty-nine, but fourteen years as a single mother had taken a toll. There wasn’t a day of it that had been easy. When Steven came into her life, Debbie thought it would make her happy. That’s all she ever wanted.

It didn’t.

Steven arrived on the scene early enough that Debbie hoped Brianna would think he was her father. Of course he wasn’t. Of course he never bonded with her. Of course Brianna was sharp enough to see through the deception.

Steven never helped. He only hurt.

Her relationship with Steven, if that is what she could call it, was just one more mistake in the life of Debbie.

Truth be told, Debbie had no more idea than Brianna whose sperm wiggled its way into her egg. It could have been any one of a hundred guys, or at least a dozen.

There were some moments when she was a child that Debbie dreamt of being a mother. Not just any mother, the mother she never had. The perfect mother.

But, not one day of being mom was anything like the fantasies that rolled through her brain day and night.

Be happy for what the Lord has blessed you with, Debbie’s grandmother would say. She was the only family Debbie had ever known. Her grandmother passed on when Debbie was only twelve. The old woman’s place was taken by a nameless, shapeless, overworked social worker who recommended to an equally tired judge that Debbie should go to foster care. What choice did they have? Even a twelve-year old could understand that.

Debbie’s new home was a warm suburban ranch on the outside that hid a family of foster children inside who were nothing more than a third-world, no-wage workforce for the woman who wanted them to call her Momma.

The small-business staff of five children, ages ten through fourteen, would clean office buildings at night, then eat out of garbage bins and dumpsters as the sun came up. They would spend a couple of hours napping in Momma’s mini-van on the way to the new shopping mall on the other side of the city where they would lift wallets, purses and beg for spare change.

The children were dirty, grungy, bruised and heartbreaking. None of that was an act. It was hard to turn them down when they stood with their sticky, grimy little hands out.

When the children got tired or cranky as kids do, Momma knew that correction was a simple as a leather strap.

Debbie couldn’t take it. Only a couple of days after what she believed to be her thirteenth birthday — she was never really sure — and the wonderful birthday party she had given herself in her mind, Debbie hit back. She hit back hard. Momma went  down. Debbie punched her in the stomach, kicked her in the knee, and when she hit the ground, Debbie jumped on her letting gravity give her feet and fists extra power. Debbie was never sure if Momma got up. She never looked back. She never slowed down.  What else could Debbie do but run?

And run she did, right into the arms of Reginald Sheets, one notorious wannabe drug dealing, cradle robbing, gangster.

Debbie had seen men like him. Debbie had slept with men like him. Clean, pressed and successful. They had always given the most and had always been the nicest. Sometimes Momma had let the girls spend a night with them. Debbie always came back with money.

Reginald Sheets was that kind of smooth. At first he was as elegant as the other suits.

Debbie imagined a life with Reginald inside a nice, warm house with children, a dog, and a picket fence. Debbie dreamed of a life nicer than anything she had seen on TV.

After a couple of weeks, Reginald explained it was time for her to go to work.

The fantasy was over for Debbie.

Reginald’s approach was still soft and soothing. He made it seem the most natural thing. Because he cared, Reginald said. Because he knew that Debbie cared about him and about them.

Reginald made Debbie feel like a person even though he treated her like a commodity.

He sold Debbie the same way any other business man sold what he had to sell. They had theirs. He had Debbie. It was as simple as that. Reginald was a business man. He knew what men, and sometimes women, wanted and Debbie was it.

She was young, slim, blond, not a muscle sagging, not a wrinkle anywhere. She was porcelain. She knew how to play the role of a virgin. So much of her life was pretend.

Debbie was Reginald’s business. She was his property. Reginald owned her like the mechanic owns his tools, like the driver owns his truck, and like a barista owns his coffee shop.

Business is all about a means to an end. The end was money for Reginald. There was nothing more, and never anything less.

Reginald’s means were any orifice in Debbie’s body.

Ten men a night on average, twenty minutes a man, seven nights a week, twelve hours a night.

Debbie got pregnant six months later, sure to be a mother within nine.

You stupid, fucking, bitch, Reginald shrieked as he hit her with a doubled-over leather belt. I give you pills. I give you rubbers. Still you get fucking pregnant. How the fuck did you manage that? punctuating the last eight syllables with slaps from the belt.

5

She was no good to Reginald anymore. At least not at the price he wanted. Nobody was going to believe Debbie was a virgin, not after giving birth. She was damaged goods. She would be thrown away just like any other piece of property that was no longer useful. Debbie knew how Reginald threw girls away. He didn’t just beat them as they ran out the door.

They wound up dead. He never thought twice about it. She hadn’t seen it happen, but she didn’t have to. Debbie knew.

So, again Debbie ran. She ran as fast and far as she could, landing in St. Isidore. It was a little city where there were no Reginald Sheets, where the men in town drove to the big city to get what they wanted, so that no one at home would ever know what they needed.

As far as she was concerned it was like walking into a Norman Rockwell painting, if he had painted the inside of a $120 a week motel room on a good week, a bus station when money ran tight.

Still Debbie felt like she had a new chance to make the fairy tales in her dreams come true.

Almost.

At least Debbie felt safe for the first eleven years. She found a couple of part-time jobs. One was working in a deli inside a department store, the other was for a cleaning company.

Twelve hours a day, six days a week, she was working. When Debbie wasn’t working, she was praying. She prayed the buses would be running on time so she could connect without standing too long in the hot sun, a pouring rain or a driving snow storm.

She prayed to be able to have enough money to buy food. She prayed not to fall asleep on the job.

She prayed for the baby she carried.

She lived for its hope.

If she punched in late, Debbie’s pay got docked. If she called in sick, no pay at all. No health care. No benefits of any kind. But there was also no Reginald. Those days were over.

Never again will I make that mistake, she told herself.

Debbie had her baby in the hospital. Free care, welfare. The doctors and nurses let her know it every time they looked down on Debbie.

Debbie was back in her motel-room home as fast as the hospital’s computer keyboard operators, working-poor themselves, could process her out. Still she survived. Debbie had to live. She had her baby. Something — no — someone to live for.

Her baby girl became Debbie’s life.

They had breakfast together, rode the bus to the free daycare center together, spent nights cleaning office buildings together. Brianna and Debbie, Debbie and Brianna, were together. They were a family, a real family.

There was always a little money for Thanksgiving dinner at the Big Boy restaurant or maybe the Ponderosa buffet. There was Christmas. Debbie would starve herself the last week of November and the first two weeks of December to make sure that Brianna had presents. A doll. A dress. A book. Never as much as Debbie wanted to give her, but more than Brianna expected.

She was just a kid. What did she know?

If there was anything more important than making sure Brianna had a decent Christmas it was making sure she was in school. Debbie was the first in line to get Brianna into kindergarten. Free breakfast. Free lunch.  A warm, safe place to play for a couple of hours after school.

Brianna fit right into school. She did more than just make friends. Brianna was a magnet for the other kids. Her teachers told Debbie that Bree, as her friends were starting to call her, was a natural-born leader.

Debbie was starting to seriously dream about what her little girl would be like when she grew up. Debbie wanted Bree to do everything she would never be able to do and have the life she always wanted. It was a new fairy tale. A fairy tale that was making her happier than any other.

She’ll be the first one in this little family to graduate high school, Debbie told herself while she cleaned the first in a long line of filthy urinals. And she will never have to clean an office or work for minimum wage. My baby is going to have a life  she thought, punctuating each word with a hard scrub on the yellow urinals as the stink of cleaning solvent drove a spike from nostril to brain and a tear to her eye.

6

Brianna did well in school. She wasn’t at the top of her class, but she wasn’t at the bottom either, and she hardly ever got into any serious trouble. At least nothing bad enough that Debbie had to take the connecting buses to the school and miss time at work.

Brianna learned to take care of herself in a latchkey world. She had a key around her neck and instructions to never, ever open that door to anyone, Debbie said pointing at the front door of their motel room.

You open that door to anyone and they are going to kill you, Debbie said. I am not talking about the boogie man. I am talking about The Man. Every man. Any man. You keep that door closed.

Life in the motel room really wasn’t so bad. There was always a TV and always cable. That meant Bree always had friends. Oprah, Dr. Phil, Dr. Ruth, and all the TV soaps and TV gossips shows after school.

As long as there was a TV, Bree had friends, and dreams.

It worked for a couple of years. But even a child can only stay scared so long. Even a child can only spend so many afternoons and evenings with no company but the TV.  Finally, Brianna started opening the door. First to boys from her middle school. Then she let boys from high school inside. Soon, men were knocking at her door.

It was in that middle school, that things started to change, Debbie told the counselor. Everything was perfect until Brianna had to get on that bus and ride out before dawn to get to the school on the other side of town.

Debbie had always been afraid that her baby would fall in with a bad crowd when she was so far away from home all day long, and was scared to death the child would let boys in the motel room when she had to work at night

If only Debbie had known how much she really didn’t know. Brianna didn’t fall into a bad crowd. Brianna led the bad crowd.

The really bad news was Debbie’s baby was tired of boys. She wanted men. And, the men wanted her.

And, just like her mom when she was young, Brianna knew how to play the part of a virgin.

Brianna knew what they really wanted. She also knew when they got it, they would stop giving her what she wanted.

So, Brianna almost always said, No.

Almost always, unless she got what she wanted first.

Besides, teasing was fun. Teasing was controlling. Controlling meant Bree was in charge. That’s the way she liked it.

Boys always liked Brianna. Even in grade school, a time when boys usually only notice girls when they get in their way, the boys flocked around Brianna. They couldn’t get enough of her.

Although Brianna had her fill of them early in the game, she wouldn’t turn down the attention.

Who would? Everything that came along with the attention was a bonus.

Yet it was more than simple attention. It was more than the warm glow of the spotlight. Brianna learned she could use the boys to get what she wanted.

This was an epiphany. The younger boys did her homework. The older boys bought her cigarettes. They did anything she wanted. Without question. Without fail. They always wanted a little something in return. No, that is wrong. They wanted it all.

Bree gave them a little something for a little something.

When they gave more, she gave more.

But still, the boys were nothing but a means to an end.

Just the way Brianna wanted it.

I really don’t think Brianna knows anything about sex, Debbie said to Laura, one of the women on her cleaning crew who was twice as old as Debbie with three times as many miles on her soul.

Whispering the last word of the sentence, her eyes banging back and forth in her head as she looked to the right and the left to make sure no one else in Billy’s Lounge heard what she had just said about her baby.

But, my baby knows everything about how to get what she wants, Debbie explained, lifting her head and looking around proudly to make sure everyone had heard that, nodding her head as she reached for her cigarette.

The Bic flicked. The Marlboro glowed.

Still, self-control is getting to be an issue, Debbie said.

The men were able to get much more for Brianna than the boys. They happily bought the beer and wine and brought it out to the car for Bree and whomever she allowed into her aura for the evening. Boys, girls, and men, Bree was learning how to use them all.

When the men brought the booze to the car, or the weed, or whatever Bree wanted, they didn’t want much in return. They wanted everything.

Brianna never forgot that if she gave everything, she would have nothing left to give, and the men, boys and girls would never be back.

It’s not that she cared about them any more than they cared for her. Brianna cared about what they could do for her. If she gave in, they would never be any use to her again. So she teased. She took it to the limit and taught her girlfriends how to do it too.

One of them didn’t do it right and got her jaw broken for refusing to go down on a guy. Brianna never would have let him get that close.

Brianna was totally in control until the minute that plastic bag went over her head. At least that is what she thought.

Her little teenage world had been spinning off its axis for weeks. She was just the last one to find out about it.

7

Bree was walking home from the Stop ’N Go when the plastic bag went over her head.

In an instant, instead of bouncing on the balls of her feet, teasing the men and the boys, Bree was fighting for breath, feeling the plastic wrap itself around her nose and mouth as she struggled for air.

Bree could taste the plastic. It was on her tongue. It was on her teeth. There was no air. She couldn’t breathe. Her lungs rebelled, demanding oxygen. Her brain was starting to shut down.

Bree gulped for air. She got only plastic. Still she tried to fight. That only made it worse. Bree was using up what little oxygen was left in her lungs and in the blood going to her brain. It didn’t take long. It all shut down. Bree blacked out.

When she came to, the plastic bag was gone, replaced by a rag duct-taped into her mouth. Her feet were off the ground. At first her oxygen-starved mind thought she was flying. Then Bree realized she was being carried across the parking lot.

At least she could breathe. At least she could think. At least Bree could fight back.

Bucking, squirming, screaming, kicking and thrashing, using her head as a weapon, Bree was in a battle for her life.

This wasn’t the first time someone had grabbed her. Guys had done that when they got so excited their male signifiers were busting out of their jeans.

It wasn’t the first time Bree had been in a fight. She could defend herself. Bree never put it into so many words, but she knew the best defense was a good offense. Once Bree absorbed the impact of the first punch she found the second and the third didn’t hurt as much.

Any other kid would waste precious seconds wondering who was hitting them, then why, and then how they could get away.

There was no flight or fight choice for Bree. It was all fight, except with one man.

The only one who still scared her was her father — no, not her father, her ‘whatever’ — Steven.

The rest of them, she could destroy. Bree fought with a shield of invincibility that only a sixteen-year old could possess. It didn’t hurt that Bree also had the fighting skills of an athletic kid who had been taking karate and judo classes since she was eight years old.

The martial arts classes were Debbie’s idea. If she had taken those classes when she was Bree’s age, life might have been different.

Debbie was taking them now, but it was too late to change what had gone before.

There were other kids Bree’s age in the karate class. None of them could hold a candle to her. Even the older kids would back off from a real fight with Bree.

It wasn’t just that Bree was a quick student. Bree not only learned how to fight. Bree learned that she liked to fight. Correction — she loved to fight. She adored the combat.

Most of the other kids didn’t fight very well for two reasons. They didn’t want to get hurt and they didn’t want to hurt. Bree could never understand either attitude.

But they are real good at flinching, Bree would think to herself with a smirk.

Sometimes, Bree just looked at them and they buckled. They broke. One boy almost turned and ran. Another did. When she did hit them, Bree loved the feeling of their soft skin giving way under her sharp knuckles.

The bigger kids never saw her coming.

She was only 5-foot 2-inches tall.

You can smoke a cigarette while she blows you, one boy said. All you have to do is put an ashtray on her head.

When Bree heard about that, he wound up in first place on her hit list.

She went down on her knees in the parking lot. He sprang to attention, unzipped his jeans, and she threw a right cross right into his nut sack.

Bree jumped out of the way when he fell, and was able to dodge the vomit that spewed from the bastard’s mouth.

One down, so many more to go, she thought.

Hitting and hurting people didn’t bother Bree much at all. Especially when they deserved it.

Bree’s reputation preceded her. The other kids would cross the street when they saw Bree coming with that look in her eye and her fists clenched.

However, there was one boy who refused to be intimidated. When the kids formed a circle around them to keep the police officers’ prying eyes away and make sure neither of the combatants would turn chicken and run away, he was smiling.

This one could turn out to be a problem.

Bree could tell that this kid knew how to fight and he probably loved combat at least as much as she did.

There was no doubt in Bree’s mind that he wanted to hurt her. She had seen that look on Steven’s face.

She knew that this boy wanted to hurt her as much as she wanted to hurt him.

Bree was in for the fight of her life.

There would be pain. She was sure of that. This boy was going to hurt her. Bree had learned how to take a punch. She knew the taste of blood in her mouth after getting hit or kicked in the face. The difference this time was that this boy would love it. If she was going to come out of this alive, Bree had to be willing to kill him. 

That wouldn’t be a problem.

She looked up at his face about a foot above hers. His shoulders stretched his blue t-shirt to its limit. Bree could see the outline of his pecs through the shirt and couldn’t help but notice he had a nice ass. Any other time she would have lusted after all of the above. Bree didn’t have time for love, but lust was very high on her priority list. Just because she didn’t give it away didn’t mean she wouldn’t do some give and take.

This was different. This time the guy’s build was trouble. The shoulders and chest didn’t interest Bree as much as the boy’s ass. It meant he had some strength in his legs and that is where his real power would come from, especially if they started wrestling. If he was able to grab her, it might all end too quickly.

Yeah, well, I’ve got a nice ass too.

His forearms and wrists were thick for a high school kid. More trouble. If he grabbed hold of Bree, she was never going to get free. Not until she was bloody or worse.

Bree knew there was only one way to bring this prick down. His shins. Funny how the human shin bone was perfect to deliver a quick kick to the nuts. It was strong that way, the perfect weapon. But for some reason it could also snap like a number-two pencil at final exam time if it got hit just right.

Bree had never done it, but she had seen it happen. She remembered the sound. She would never forget the look of pain on the face of the kid whose leg had broken.

Two more potential targets were his knees. They looked kind of bony as he bounced on the balls of his feet, left foot forward, right foot to the back, weight evenly balanced between the two.

Bree almost froze when she saw the look of a predator in his eyes. He wasn’t smiling anymore.

Neither was she.

They were equals in combat.

The kids circled around them chanting quietly for blood. They wanted a fight. They wanted to see blood. They loved the pain, not receiving or even giving, but watching was another story. Some identified with the victim, some with the victor. For all of them there was an incredible fascination with pain and adrenalin.

Bree bounced on the balls of her feet keeping them shoulder width apart, not locking into a boxer’s stance yet, unwilling to show him which hand, foot, elbow, or knee would be her lead weapon.

She bounced about an inch off the ground, nodding her head from the left to the right and back again, breathing deeply, getting ready for the combat. Getting ready for the pain. Getting ready to hurt and be hurt.

Bree wasn’t sure if he felt that way, but he sure looked like he did.

The boy took a shuffle step forward, sliding his left foot, stabbing at Bree with his left fist. This is where her size helped. Bree was so short she easily moved back and under the left jab, pivoting on the ball of her right foot, she kicked with her left, and hit his shin perfectly.

Only ninety-eight pounds of fury true, but it was all directed in one spot. Bree got his right shin. The leg that was locked. The shin that broke. The leg that snapped.

He shrieked. The kids stopped breathing. They had expected broken, bloody noses, faces purple with bruises, wet with tears and snot, flushed with humiliation and pain.

This was different.

However, this was still Bree. So, this was just the beginning.

The instant the prick hit the ground, saliva drooled out of his mouth, his face rippled with pain. He held on to his broken, dangling, compound-fractured leg with both hands, his eyes pleading for mercy.

Mercy.

That word was not in Bree’s vocabulary.

She jumped on his chest, each of her knees holding down an arm, and started punching down with both fists, one after the other.

Bree kept her wrists straight. She didn’t work too hard. She let gravity do the heavy punching.

Bree realized this prick didn’t know where he was anymore. She kept punching. She could tell when he lost consciousness. Somewhere along the way of this beating he lost control of his bladder. Then his bowels cut loose.

She was beating him to death.

His mind was gone. It was in a place of happiness, at least a place of nothingness.

Bree didn’t know where she was anymore, either. Totally consumed by the moment. Her knuckles felt like they were being pushed back into her wrists.