Kat, Bobby Imprisoned in Bayou Manchac

In case you’ve missed the installments on Facebook and Twitter, we’ve only got a couple of weeks left, and one character didn’t make it through this week alive…

As Rarick pulled another dead gator to the dock, Kat asked, "Where's DJ?"

"Sorry, Hun, he skedaddled on you, had me drop him at the landing with Leta, said you were gonna get him killed."

"If he takes the bike and leaves me stranded, he'll wish he was dead."

 

Grim sneered from the duck blind. He'd taken a chance telling Kat about Rarick, but she'd promised to get the hell out when Rarick got back, but he came back without the DJ kid. Grim watched him waving his arms, spewing his typical politician bullshit.

A week of mosquito, snake, and gator bites, then fever and fat chicks. All out hell, and Bobby Grim couldn't wait to get back to California. Maybe he'd swim over and rip the dude's tongue out in front of her.

Before he could climb down, he heard music, then eight boats and a party barge rounded the farthest bend in the bayou. "Now what?"

Rarick grabbed the girl by the arm, dragging her inside. Grim wanted to dive, but the boats picked up speed, bouncing on the water. He could make out the lyrics now, some foreign language, singing words like iko-iko, wild Tchoupitoulas, and Jockomo feena nay.

 

"Check it out." Kat pointed at the boats speeding down the bayou. "Leta said the TV crew'd be back to wrap up their story. Maybe she's riding along." Rarick grabbed Kat's shoulders and pushed her to the door. "No way, old man. I'm going to find out what you did with DJ."

"Listen, you little tramp. Get inside, do exactly what I tell you, or I gut you and use your intestines for gator-bait. Got it?"

Rarick pressed the hunting knife against her throat, opened the door, then shoved her down the hall with his body.

At the room Grim had warned her about, she heard a click behind her and the padlock fell to the floor. He pushed her into the blackness and bent her arms behind her back.

Handcuffs. Chains rattled. Cold at her ankles. She couldn't move.

Death by Gator in Bayou Manchac

In case you’ve missed the installments on Facebook and Twitter, we’ve only got a couple of weeks left, and one character didn’t make it through this week alive…

All three ate in front of the TV, DJ sprawled on a duct-taped orange sofa, Rarick in a folding chair, and Kat on the remains of a Lazy Boy. They didn't know the name of the movie. Some ex-wrestler and an ex-rapper trying to be action heroes.

They had just reached the darkest before dawn part of the film, when the spring in Kat's recliner creaked. She hit the floor, half-crawling down the hall and fell through the bathroom door.

"Shit." DJ jumped from the sofa, going after her.

"Relax," Rarick said, "That's normal when you're not used to spicy alligator."

Later, DJ stood outside the locked door of Rarick's bathroom. "No way, Kat. If it were food poison, wouldn't we all be puking? Oh, God. You don't think you're pregnant?"

Through the door and the gagging, he thought she said, "Morning sickness not afternoon sickness, you stupid Duck." But knowing Kat as he did, DJ must have gotten that last word wrong.

 

Late evening. Across the bayou, the skinny kid and Rarick were climbing into the boat. The girl wasn't with them. They weren't leaving yet.

Bobby Grim squirmed in his tree stand, rubbing his arm. Not healed, but close. Still, he was ready to leave this God-forsaken swamp. He couldn't finish his business with witnesses around, and the longer these two followed Rarick, the less chance they had of seeing twenty-five.

Ten minutes after the boat's rooster tail slid around the bend, Grim stood at the front door of the camp, this time an unlocked door. Inside, the TV blared, but no sign of the girl. The room where the gator latched on Grim's arm, locked again. A shiny-new Masterlock.

He made three steps on the creaky Cypress floor before the girl, Kat, stepped out of another room. "Who the fuck are you?"