Claws

by Ricky Sides

  Ricky moved to her bowl and saw that it was indeed empty. “Your bowl is empty! Did those foxes come eat all your food? No wonder you’re so hungry. I’ll feed you now,” he said and opened the sack of cat feed.

  The grey queen was so hungry she ate even as the man filled her bowl. “You are hungry,” Ricky observed as he continued to pour in her food. He fed her more than the normal amount in anticipation of her needs, and then folded the neck of the sack neatly closed and set it on the table.

  “I’ll be right back with some fresh water for you, girl,” he said as he grabbed her water bowl and headed inside to refill her bowl with fresh water. It took him a moment to remove the small block of ice because her water had frozen overnight.

  When he got back outside with the bowl of water, the grey queen ignored him as she continued to eat her food as if she were starving. Ricky felt bad about her hunger. “Geez, I guess they ate your food early in the weekend. I’m sorry, girl. I guess I need to start coming to work on the weekends to check on you.”

  He reached down and petted her briefly, and then he said, “I’ll be back soon. I need to go see to startup.” He grabbed the remainder of the Alley Cat pet food off the tabletop as he walked past it and headed inside to turn on the machinery so that it could warm up prior to his 5:00 A.M. shift.

  The cat continued to eat hungrily, but the whole time she was eating, she watched the woods for the big cat that had been eating her food. It had almost caught her over the weekend. It was larger than she was, and it was getting faster everyday as its atrophied muscles adjusted to its newfound freedom.

  Soon, Ricky returned and sat at his spot on the bench at their picnic table where they were sheltered from the worst of the wind. The grey cat joined him almost at once. “Did you get enough to eat, girl?” he asked as he reached out to pet her. She rubbed her head into the palm of his caressing hand until Ricky removed his hand to light a cigarette.

  The cat turned her face away as she normally did when the man played with his fire. When she did so, she saw the large tomcat sitting on its haunches watching her and the man. Her head swiveled to the right, looking in the direction of her escape route, but she couldn’t leave her friend to face the menace alone. She could tell by his scent that he wasn’t even aware that the strange cat was a threat. In fact, she didn’t think he’d even realized it was present.

  The strange cat rose to all four legs and advanced slowly toward the pair at the table. It held its head low as it stalked toward its intended victims.

  The grey queen hopped down off the bench and walked to the edge of the concrete deck. Her own head held low, her tail upright and bristled. “What’s wrong, girl? Do you see those foxes?” Ricky asked, and then he saw the giant cat approaching. “Whoa, what the hell? Come back here, girl. That thing will hurt you,” Ricky said as he got up.

  The giant cat saw the aggressive stance of the little queen and it saw the man begin to rise. The man’s odor betrayed his fear, and that excited the tomcat. The big animal advanced rapidly, intending to attack the man and drive him away from the little queen.

  The grey cat launched her body off the deck into the face of the charging tom, which surprised the male. She had always fled in the past, so he wasn’t prepared for her savage attack. Before he could even respond to her onslaught, she had scored his face with her claws and shredded one ear.

  The tomcat exploded into a violent rage, biting the female and clawing her forelegs with such ferocity that the skin fell away exposing the muscles beneath. In its haste to punish the female, the big male grew careless, exposing its throat. The furious grey queen clamped her jaws into the tom’s throat.

  Ricky stepped off the deck, appalled at the damage the strange animal had done to his friend in the opening moments of the fight. Without forethought, he lifted his foot above the strange cat’s back and stomped down hard with his heavy work boot. There was a loud cracking sound as something broke in the savage animal’s back. The grey queen let go of the tom and meowed in pain as she backed away. She saw the tomcat try to claw its way toward her and knew that if he closed with her again he would finish her, but then she saw her friend lift his foot again and stomp down hard on the animal’s back. The tomcat died as a result of that blow.

  There were tears in his eyes when the man came to her. She meowed in pain as he knelt beside her on the cold ground. “Oh, girl, just look at you. I’m sorry, I don’t know what to do. I can’t even pick you up. I’ll be back. I’ll go get some help,” Ricky said. The cat meowed as the man left her. He called the police and reported the incident, asking them what he should do to help the female cat. They promised to contact an animal control officer who would come and try to get the cat to get her some help, but when the man arrived, the cat was nowhere to be seen.

  For days after that, worried employees tried their best to coax the cat into coming close enough so that they could get her and take her to a veterinarian, but she avoided all contact with anyone as if she sensed their intentions.

  The grey queen didn’t intend to leave her home. She knew she would heal in time, and in time, she did. Her courageous fight for survival that winter mellowed the hearts of even the most inconsiderate of people. The man, who had questioned Ricky’s care for the cat, even fed her portions of his dinners as she mended, though he always insisted he hated that damned cat.

  ***

  Jerry awoke to the sound of his cell phone ringing at 6:00 A.M. He scrambled out of bed to answer the phone before it could wake Patricia. “Hello,” he said quietly. He listened to the police officer on the other end of the line for a minute, and then he said, “I’ll be there in an hour. Thank you for the call,” and then he hung up.

  “Trouble?” Patricia asked from her side of the bed.

  “No, not this time. It seems a giant cat attacked a normal one earlier this morning at Tris. An employee witnessed the attack and intervened, saving the normal animal and killing the giant cat in the process. They have its body at the station and want me to come in to confirm that it’s one from the testing.”

  “If that’s true, then there’s no reason your superiors would turn down your leave request, is there?” Patricia asked hopefully.

  Smiling, he answered, “It’s difficult to get a leave while you’re in the middle of an important assignment, but in between missions, they like to encourage leaves. That keeps us fresher on the assignments, and keeps us from bitching about wanting our leaves at a bad time.”

  “If this is the last of the cats, then right after I report it to my superiors, I intend to apply for all my available leave. I plan to tell them I’ve met this wonderful woman I want to get to know better. I won’t tell them I have no plans to reenlist. Sometimes they get crabby and won’t let you take your leave if you tell them you’re walking away from the military,” he explained.

  “The cat’s on ice. Come back to bed for a while,” Patricia coaxed.

  Smiling, Jerry slid back under the covers and Patricia moved closer to him, laying her thigh across his and placing her head on his chest. “God, you’re freezing. Keep those ice cube feet off me,” she insisted as he wrapped his arm around her shoulder and pulled her atop his body. She kissed him tenderly, and then she asked, “Did you really mean all those wonderful things you said about me last night?”

  “I did,” Jerry responded looking earnestly into her eyes.

  “That’s good, because I love you too, and I want you in my life for a long time to come.”

  “Nothing would make me happier,” Jerry responded.

  Chapter 19

  Weeks had passed since Talbot had fled America. Just as he had planned, he set himself up in style in Switzerland. He now lived the life of a rich man, accustomed to getting anything he wanted, and he could easily afford anything he wanted. But there were some things money can’t buy. He was eager to relive the exotic sexual experiences he had enjoyed with Clarisse and the prostitute in Jacksonville, Florida. To that end, he had taken to going on the prowl late
at night in some of the clubs and bars.

  Tonight, he thought he had finally located the perfect victim when a raven-haired beauty staggered drunkenly into him at a club, causing him to spill his drink on his immaculate suit. She had apologized drunkenly, and then she had swooned. He caught her and held her a moment until she recovered, and then he escorted the lovely woman to his table and sat her down. They talked for an hour and he’d learned that she was an American woman, who had recently divorced her husband and was out vacationing in Switzerland and spending his money like there was no tomorrow.

  When he had asked her name, she had shocked him when she had responded, “If I decide I like you, I’ll tell you that in the morning. You do intend to take me home with you don’t you? If you aren’t interested, let me know now so I can find a stud who is, because I plan to get banged hard tonight, and I’m not looking for a boy scout.”

  “I assure you that I’m no boy scout,” he said, deciding that she would be his next victim.

  “Then let’s get out of here. The sooner we leave, the sooner we can start having some serious fun,” the woman said. She almost fell when she climbed to her feet, but Rusty obligingly caught her arm and helped her to the door.

  When the valet brought his car around, Rusty managed to get the woman inside, and then he drove across town and out into the country to his walled estate with its state of the art security system. Once he had the woman inside the walls of the estate, the only way she could get out would be for him to let her out, and he didn’t intend to let her go.

  “Nice place,” the woman observed as Talbot triggered the automatic gate opener.

  “Thank you. I like it,” Talbot stated.

  Once the gate rolled aside, Talbot drove through the only break in the twelve-foot high wall surrounding the thirteen-acre estate. The estate had cost him millions, but he had millions to spare.

  Rusty drove up the long tree-lined drive to the house. When they went inside the house he armed the security system, and for all practical purposes, the woman was then his prisoner. However, Talbot wanted to enjoy her full cooperation before he took her captive. He would wait until after she had shown him a good time to spring the surprise.

  “You live in the huge house all alone? No servants?” the woman inquired curiously.

  “I enjoy my privacy. A team of house cleaners comes once a week. They stay eight hours and then leave until the next week,” Talbot explained. He wasn’t concerned about her knowing visitors would be in the house. They were forbidden to enter the basement area, which he kept locked, and the room where she would be kept was soundproof. He had gone to a great deal of trouble to make certain no one in the house would be able to hear her cries for help.

  “Shall we get to that banging?” the woman asked mischievously.

  “Yes, let’s,” Rusty said with a wicked grin, and then he led the woman to his bedroom.

  “Nice!” said the woman as she eyed the elegant heavy bed and plush carpeting in the room. She set her bag on a tabletop near the door and reached inside for a bottle of perfume, which she sprayed on her ample cleavage. “It drives most men wild,” she explained with a wicked grin.

  “I’ll bet it does,” stated Rusty as the woman began to remove her skintight black dress. He whistled appreciatively. She was blessed with a near perfect figure. He wasted no time in joining her in disrobing. He lay down on the bed and asked, “How would you like to start?”

  “On top!” she said eagerly.

  Rusty smiled. He liked that position. He thought that this encounter just might turn out to be as good as the ones he had planned for her later.

  The woman crawled onto the bed. She straddled his body and pulled his face into her breasts. The man inhaled deeply, enjoying the sweet perfume.

  He awoke an hour later to find himself expertly tied spread eagle to the posts of his four-poster bed. A rope was also around his neck. The other end was affixed to the top of the headboard.

  “What the hell is this? What happened to me?” Rusty demanded of the nude woman who was quietly watching his every move.

  “You smelled my perfume. Allow me to introduce myself,” the woman said with no hint of drunkenness. “They call me Black Widow. I’m a specialist who gets called in when the American government needs a citizen to die, but can’t be tied to the death. I’ve studied your case, and I know about your crimes against women, therefore, I’ve decided on a special punishment for you. You and I are going to party, baby. As we do, your body will slide further down in the bed. As it does, the noose around your neck will tighten until you strangle, and there isn’t one damned thing you can do about it, you bastard.”

  She rolled her eyes and said, “The things I do for my country.”

  “I won’t cooperate with you, bitch,” Talbot stated furiously.

  Laughing, the woman said, “Oh you’ll cooperate. I know a hundred tricks of the trade to ensure that. You see, they recruited me off the streets. Before I went to work for the CIA, I worked as a prostitute. A damned successful one at that, but the money I earned turning those tricks was nothing compared to what I earn now, and I get to pick my assignments. I’d have done you for free, but I’m lucky. The government is paying me to off you. You see, I worked in Jacksonville, Florida for a while, and Angela was my best friend in the business there, you son of a bitch.”

  Then the woman who called herself Black Widow went to work on Talbot. True to his word, he tried to resist her, but she had told the truth. She knew all the tricks of the trade. “Care to guess why they call me Black Widow? No? I’ll tell you anyway. My specialty is to have sex with a man and murder him in the process,” she explained with a gleam in her eyes. “Ah there now, you’re beginning to respond. That’s good,” she taunted.

  Talbot struggled against his bindings, but soon, his body betrayed him and she mounted the frustrated man.

  The moment she began to have intercourse with him, Talbot felt his body slide downward in the bed from the force of her impacts. The noose tightened and his face turned red. “How’s that, baby? Is it good for you? Is that what you asked Angela?” she asked him increasing the tempo and power of her strokes.

  Talbot almost lost consciousness, but the woman stopped moving and slapped him hard across the face several times. “Don’t you die on me yet,” she said vehemently. “I haven’t gotten mine yet,” she added smiling sweetly. “I’ll just bet that’s what you said to Angela, wasn’t it, you sick bastard?”

  Talbot was only semiconscious, but he heard the woman cry out in ecstasy a few moments later. “Now you can die. I got mine, just as you got yours with Angela,” she said angrily. She climbed off the man and walked to the foot of the bed. Grabbing his ankles, she pulled hard until he slowly suffocated. As he was dying, she said, “The authorities will think you’re just another rich guy who died during kinky sex. They won’t find your arms and legs tied though. That would arouse suspicion, which is why I used the special ropes. They won’t leave a mark.”

  “How does it feel to be on the receiving end, you bastard? How did it feel to have someone use you for their demented sexual pleasure while you were dying?” she asked as Talbot died.

  With professional detachment, now that the man she hated was dead, the woman got dressed and then she walked around the room removing all evidence of her presence. She untied his arms and legs, but left the noose around his neck and his right hand draped across his genitals. Now the police would assume he had died of autoerotic asphyxiation.

  She double-checked to ensure that she had overlooked nothing, and then she let herself out of the house, using Talbot’s remote to deactivate the system. As the agent walked to the wall near the gate, she made a call with her cell phone. Her accomplice was waiting on the other side of the wall to the right of the gate when she reached it. He threw a weighted line over the top of the wall and anchored it for her as she climbed it to the top.

  The woman scrambled down a ladder placed there for her escape, and then the two agents lo
aded the ladder into the back of a truck and left. On the drive to the airport, the agent made a single call. When a voice answered, she said, “This is Black Widow. Mission accomplished.”

  ***

  “Yes, Mr. President. There’s no mistake. It’s definitely the compound we’ve been watching for the past several weeks,” said the Secretary of Homeland Security.

  “How much do we know for a fact has gotten into the country,” asked the shaken president.

  “The man we captured admitted to eleven tons, Mr. President. They were shipped in one-ton increments. His was the twelfth load. We stopped it, but the rest is already in the food chain.”

  “Do we know who sent it?” asked the president.

  “All eight countries, sir,” responded the secretary. “They pooled their resources and worked cooperatively in the hopes of bringing us down. They may well do that too, Mr. President. We have no way of knowing where it was placed in the food chain.”

  “He wouldn’t give you that information?”

  “We don’t think he knew, but if he did, he took that secret with him to the grave.”

  “You tortured the man for information?” asked the president incredulously.

  “No, Mr. President. He was mortally wounded during the fighting when he was captured. He succumbed to his wounds but he told us everything he knew because we warned him that his entire nation would be nuked off the face of the earth unless he cooperated with us,” the secretary explained.

  “He believed that?”

  “Hell, why not? It’s what we should do. It’s what they’d do if they could,” stated the man in frustration.

  “I won’t escalate the conflict to that point,” the president stated adamantly. ”Are the ground assets ready to go now?” asked the president.