Rivals

Rivals Page 48

Maggie reeled backwards, her jaw erupting in violent agony. She staggered and nearly fell, one hand grabbing at the ground behind her. She hadn't expected him to come at her so fast.

She cleared her head and started to get up, but he was already on her again, smashing at her face with a vicious left hook. She spun around, just trying to get her balance, and tripped over her own feet. She landed face down in the dirt, coughing and gasping for breath.

He kicked her in the back of the head, hard enough to force her face into the soil until she couldn't see or breathe. She tried to control herself, tried to hold back the pain, but her body rebelled and tried to breathe in. Her mouth filled with loose wet dirt and her brain started to scream in panic.

That wouldn't do.

She had left a ten pound sledge hammer propped up against the glaring white side of the trailer. Her left hand flailed out and felt the rough wood handle. As he stomped on her head, pushing her down deeper into the dry earth, she got a grip on the hammer and swung it around blindly behind her, just hoping it would connect enough to startle him.

Instead it caught him in the side hard enough to knock him five yards through the air. She twisted around on the ground and spat up dirt as he bounced off a patch of hard-packed dirt corrugated with tire tracks. In a split second she was up, standing with her feet well apart in a solid stance, grasping her sledge hammer with both hands.

If she could catch him before he had time to get back up, before he -

- but he was fast, so fast. He came at her out of her blind spot, holding a length of iron rebar like a samurai sword. He swung wide and low, his blow intended to catch her in the stomach. She just had time to bring the sledge hammer around to parry his strike. Metal hit wood with enough force to send painful vibrations all the way up Maggie's arms.

"You're quick," she said, as she stepped backwards, breaking contact.

"Faster than you," he said, bringing his bar up for another attack, this time aiming at her head.

She caught the attack just in time, catching the iron bar in the angle between the handle and the metal head of her sledge hammer. The rebar dug a nasty gouge in the wooden handle, but in return it bent in his hands, forming an obtuse angle. He pulled back to try another swing. She was ready for it this time, and rather than parrying his blow she ducked under it and swept his legs with her hammer, spilling him onto the ground.

"I'm still smarter, apparently," she said, dancing backwards and bringing up her hammer. She swung it back behind her head and started to bring it down - except the damage to the handle must have been worse than she thought. The heavy head went flying to ricochet off the side of the trailer with an ear-shattering clang.

He laughed bitterly as she stared at the length of wood in her hands. She noticed, however, that what she was left with was a two foot long club with a sharp and jagged end. She switched up her grip and stabbed downward with what had become a pointed stake, intending to drive it right through his heart. It worked on vampires.

The jagged wood splintered and shattered against his tough skin. The handle split right up the middle, driving inch-long splinters into both her palms.

He groaned in pain - the impact would still have hurt him, she thought - and raised his iron bar as if to ward her off. She kicked it out of his hands and then jumped up on top of the trailer.

He roared and slammed into the side of the trailer like a bull.

It was working.

He was made enough now. He was pissed off enough to not be able to stop himself, when the time came. When he had her down and defenseless, he would not just tie her up an wait for the police to arrive. Oh, no. He wouldn't be able to help himself - he would take this to its logical conclusion, and kill her.

Which was exactly what she wanted.

She needed an end to this. She needed to stop running. She couldn't make excuses for her behavior any more, couldn't forgive herself for the things she'd done, and -

"Come down," he shouted, and hit the trailer again.

"Why don't you come up here and make me?" she told him.

As she'd expected he grabbed two handfuls of the metal side of the trailer and hauled himself upward, threw his body into the air to come crashing down right next to her. The impact caved in the metal roof of the trailer. She stepped backwards and leaned to the side to avoid his flying fists.

She couldn't let on that he was being set up. He had to believe he had no choice. He had to think she was fighting back as hard as she could. So she stuck out her leg and let him trip over it, let him fall face forward onto the trailer's roof, denting it further.

He pushed himself upward on his arms. She aimed a kick at his face but made it just slow enough that he would see it coming. He grabbed her foot with both hands and twisted, and she went flying. She hit the roof of the trailer with her back and it hurt. It hurt a lot. She cried out. He loomed over her, his hands balled into fists so tightly his knuckles were white.

She reached down, grabbed the metal roof with both hands, and tore.

The roof had been damaged when they started fighting. It had come close to caving in every time one of them hit the other. It couldn't take any more abuse. As she'd thought it might, the roof collapsed as she pulled and twisted at it, spilling them both into the trailer's interior.

She saw him slam against a side wall, his head flopping against his shoulder. She hit a desk that caught her right in the small of her back, folding her in half the wrong way. The incredibly painful way. She felt her vertebrae pulling apart, felt every muscle in her back screaming as it was stretched beyond its limit.

She shrieked in agony and flailed around her with her arms and legs. Leaning over to one side she struck out with both fists and one of them went right through the trailer wall. She could have freed it easily, of course, but she saw him standing up. Saw Brent watching her.

She made a show of pulling at her arm, trying to get her fist out of the hole she'd made in the wall. As he came closer, his shoulders tight, his head slightly bowed, she rolled her eyes in simulated panic.

This is it, she thought. This is my last chance.

Stop me, Brent. If you don't, the darkness will win. It will take over completely and there will be nothing left of Maggie Gill. There will just be the villain.

Finish me off.