Free Under His Domain by Kelly Favor Page B

and fired off
three quick rounds, hitting three different cans in succession.
    “Hooboy!   He sure can shoot,” Sid exclaimed, his teeth brown.
    “I told you, my boy inherited my
twenty-twenty vision,” Billy said.   “Of course, he’s not as good a marksman as me, but he can hold his own.”
    Easton rolled his eyes, smiling a little
for Kennedy’s benefit.
    “So, you want to learn to shoot?” Sid
asked her.
    “Hell yes, she wants to learn,” Billy
replied, walking to her with the rifle outstretched.   “Take this,” he ordered.
    Easton put his gun down on the table,
folded his arms and watched.
    As Kennedy took hold of the rifle, she
instantly felt afraid.   The gun was
heavy and its power seemed to pour off of it in waves that she could sense in
her hands.
    “Now, you hold the gun up to your
shoulder, like so,” Easton’s father said, miming the motion she should use with
an invisible rifle.
    Kennedy tried to copy him to the best of
her ability, while Easton stood by and watched, and Sid continued to smile and
ogle.  
    “Like this?” she asked, uncertain.   Her hands were shaking.
    “Not bad, not bad.”   Billy licked his lips and pointed
out.   “Now turn your head and stare
into the gun sight, and line up a target.   Focus, and then gently squeeze the trigger like you’re squeezing a…” he
started to laugh, as did the others. “Just pretend you’re squeezing a stuffed
animal or something.”
    Kennedy targeted the couch.   It seemed safe and large.   She started to squeeze the trigger, and
then there was a violent burst from the barrel and the butt of the gun lashed
backwards into her shoulder, causing the nose of the rifle to move upwards at
the last second.
    The sound was deafening in her ears.
    “Okay, not so good.   Now, try again,” Billy said.
    Sweat had broken out on her forehead and
she felt a wave of dizziness.   Where
was Easton?   Why wasn’t he showing
her how to do this?   She’d have felt
so much more comfortable if he’d been touching her, smiling, with his calm
voice guiding her movements.
    She didn’t want to shoot firearms.
    She didn’t like this place, or these
people.
    Kennedy hardly even aimed this time, she
just shot, almost blindly, and the gun kicked again and she yelped, more from
being startled than anything else.
    “Okay, I think she’s had enough,” Easton
said.
    “Nonsense, she hasn’t even hit nothing,”
his dad replied.
    “No, that’s okay,” Kennedy smiled,
handing the rifle back to him.
    His expression was puzzled and a little
bit frustrated as he took the rifle.   “You want we can give you a smaller pistol?   Some ladies like to shoot derringers,
aint that so, Sid?”
    “Yup,” Sid said, spitting into the
dirt.   “They make teeny tiny cute
holes.”
    “No thanks.   I’ll just watch.”   She tried to smile.
    Billy turned away from her, and just from
the twitch of his eyes, she knew he didn’t like her—not one bit.
    And then Kennedy realized—the feeling
was mutual.

 
    ***

 
    How had she ended up here, in this place,
with these people?
    Kennedy wasn’t sure.
    Maybe
you’re just drunk.
    Easton and Dean were slap boxing over by
the jukebox, seemingly having forgotten about the harsh words they’d exchanged
earlier, and their father, the mad conductor of this little orchestra, was
watching from the bar where he was collecting another pitcher of beer.
    They were at some hole-in-the-wall dive
bar where Billy seemed to know most everyone, even though he apparently hadn’t
been there in a very long time.
    Now Easton had Dean in a headlock and was
trying to grind his knuckles into Dean’s head, while Dean protested and tried
to push Easton’s hand away.
    Kennedy sipped her warm, disgusting beer
and then wiped her lips with the back of her hand.
    Billy returned to the table, placing the
pitcher down, and some of the contents sloshed onto the table, splattering her
hand.  
    Billy noticed but didn’t