The woman is bear shaped—maybe five feet tall and shapeless in a faded house dress. Her face looks like unformed dough and her hair is a wild gray nimbus around it. She wears rubber boots and walks with a stick.
“Hello!” Dawn calls, trying for a smile. “Stu sent me!”
Dawn has more of a story prepped. Stu has a cold, and he didn’t want to infect Millie, so Dawn volunteered to bring the supplies. She doesn’t need the excuse. Millie’s features rearrange themself in a broad smile.
Looking at that gap-toothed smile, Dawn is half-tempted to keep the butter tarts for herself. This woman doesn’t need more sugar. Dawn had asked Stu what she could bring Millie—her treat, of course—and he’d suggested butter tarts and mystery books, which was perfect because Dawn considered herself a connoisseur of both. She’d driven almost an hour for the best butter tarts around and she’d loaded up a box at the used bookstore.
She reminds herself that this old woman doesn’t have much longer to live, which means those remaining teeth don’t need to last much longer either.
“Brought you butter tarts!” Dawn crows as she lifts the box like a hunter with a prize buck. “From Leander’s. Best butter tarts in the region.”
“Well, ain’t that a treat,” Millie says. “Come on in, child. The cabin’s just through here.”
Millie stumps off with her makeshift cane, and Dawn makes a mental note to buy her a real one. Pay attention, see everything the old woman needs—materially and emotionally—and supply it. The surest way to win someone over.
Dawn loads up her arms with supplies. As she heads down the path, the brush closes in on either side, and she chuckles to herself. Did she ever think she’d be following scary old ladiesinto their home, deep in the forest? It’s like something out of a Grimm’s fairy tale.
Mental note to bring tools and clear this out. Maybe hire a young man from town, if Millie will allow it.
As she draws closer, she stops smiling and starts resisting the urge to gag. What the hell is that stink? Not the outhouse. It’s more like…
The pile of boxes in Dawn’s arms hits something and she staggers back, only to see what she hit and nearly drop the stack in her backpedaling.
A chunk of raw meat hangs from a hook suspended in a tree. She stares at it and then sees the other chunks—a leg, a rib cage, pieces she can’t identify—all hanging from hooks.
“Whoops,” Millie cackles. “Should have warned you about the deer.”
“Deer?” Dawn croaks, looking for signs of hooves or fur and seeing none.
“I might not be able to row my old boat, but I’m still a crack shot, and God saw fit to leave near perfect vision in these old eyes. Well, during the day at least. Remind me to give you a piece to take back to Stu. He loves the way I cure my venison.”
With what? Flies? Dawn tries not to gag and imagines that Stu admires the venison the same way she admires his burgers.
Yum, yum, this is so good that I’m going to have to take it home with me for later.
She shudders and adjusts her pile of boxes. When they reach the cabin, Dawn has to admit it looks better than she expected. Of course, she’s made her living buying and tearing down places like this, so she has an appreciation anyone else from the city might lack. This one looks decent enough. Still a teardown, but at least she won’t need to hold her breath going inside. That’s just for out here.
“Set those boxes right over there,” Millie says, pointing a doughy finger. “The house is a mess. We’ll sit outside.”
“I don’t mind a mess. You should see my place.”
“Sit,” Millie commands.
Something in her voice makes the hairs on Dawn’s neck rise, and she fights the urge to say she has to be going. Millie is an elderly recluse. Dawn can’t expect perfect social behavior.
She lowers herself into a surprisingly sturdy wooden chair. When she looks over, Millie’s yanking an old knife from a block, and Dawn fights for a smile, ready with a quip, but the old woman doesn’t look her way. She just toddles over to a leg of meat, pulls a rope to lower it and then removes it from the hook and takes it to a chopping block.
“I’d love a piece of that to take back, too,” Dawn says. “If there’s extra.”
“Oh, there’ll be extra. Plenty more where this came from.”
Dawn clears her throat, ready to start a bit of small talk. Before she can speak, Millie says, “Stu tells me you’re in the real estate business.”
Dawn freezes. Damn it. Stu didn’t warn her about this. She’d been planning to skip that for a visit or two.
“He tells me you bought the Porter place in Blind Bay last year.”
Dawn tenses. Stu hadn’t been happy about that particular purchase. Sure, he’d asked her to take a look at it, because he liked the Porters. He’d been afraid another real estate agent might take advantage of their daughter, who was distracted dealing with her parents in longterm care. He wanted Dawn to pay a fair price. They apparently had different ideas of what constituted fair.
