I crush the head of my dick like a stress ball as the video zooms in closer to the woman’s face. Her snarl transforms into a desperate cry. She twists, fighting to survive. Brown hair is matted to her temples with sweat and grime. Still, she grits her teeth and pushes herself back to keep the rope around her neck from cutting into her windpipe. A black-gloved hand grips the rope, pulling the noose taut, and terror crawls over her eyes. She knows she’s not getting out of this. I stretch the skin of my balls as the rope goes tighter around her throat. Her face bulges red. A blood vessel bursts in her eye. Red veins splatter across the sclera like modern art. Her whole body twitches, reaching desperately for that last breath of air.

 

I bet her pussy is tightest right then.

 

Her eyelashes flutter like the wings of a dying insect, and my dick convulses. Jizz erupts from the tip and drips over my clenched fist. 

 

My cock jolts with the last spurt of come. Then I wipe my hand with a tissue, cleaning the sticky clumps of semen as if it’s loose clay. I sigh deeply and stare at my spare laptop again. The camera pulls back, panning over the limp body. With the corpse stretched out in the woods, it resembles a deer carcass. Red scratches are carved deep into the sides from where it struggled, but it doesn’t feel anything now.

 

I used to wonder why snuff films were always in the woods. Then I figured it must be easier to get rid of the bodies if you film their deaths exactly where you bury them. With dense trees, it’s nearly impossible to figure out where it’s recorded. Law enforcement would have a hell of a time with the footage.

 

Not that I give a shit. Even if sick fucks like me hadn’t stumbled—or searched—for this kind of video, the bitch would still be dead. Denying my orgasm wasn’t going to save her life.

 

I exit out of the dark web and the encryption software, then log out of the VPN. I click through the settings until the entire laptop begins wiping its memory clean. It’s my ritual. I don’t have any friends or family I keep in contact with, but you can never be too careful with these sorts of interests.

 

With a clear head, I go back to work. The air in the garage is still and dank, the metallic scent of animal blood pungent in the air. Hunting season is past, so it’s back to pets again. Hamsters. Lizards. Cats. So many goddamn cats. Sometimes, the large dogs keep my urges quiet for a while, but I never stop counting down the days to hunting season. I prefer big game animals. There’s more of a challenge in preserving them. 

 

On the table, the hide of a tabby cat is stretched out, salted and dried, ready for the form. I pick through the drawer of glass eyes. They go in first. Green. Brown. Honey. Even blue. I select two black ones, then form clay to the sockets. My thumbs jam the glass spheres into the soft material. 

 

The doorbell rings.

 

That’s the shitty thing about living where you work. It’s after hours, and I never talk directly to the customers unless it’s Wednesday—intake day. There’s even a sign near the doorbell that directs visitors to my website’s request form. And yet every once in a while, some pet owner gets particularly feverish about preserving their dead animal. They ring, and they ring, and they’re met with silence. Eventually, they get the picture. 

 

You never see hunters act like that. They know the drill. 

 

The doorbell chimes three times in a row. I grunt, then click through the apps on my phone until I pull up the security camera attached to the doorbell. On the screen, the fisheye view shows a middle-aged woman standing on the porch. She wipes her nose, the crinkly sniffles popping through the microphone. Blond-white hair. Probably blue eyes. A long-sleeved blazer clings to her arms. She’s professional. Well-kept. From this angle, she’s attractive, the kind of woman that knows she looks good naked. The expensive type. Rich bitches don’t usually get attached to their pets. When someone else takes care of them for you, there’s no need to mourn when they die.

So why is she here?

 

Then I see the cardboard box, which is the size of a refrigerator, on the metal appliance dolly next to her. 

 

She presses the doorbell again. 

 

Curiosity sparks in my chest, clawing its way to my shoulders. I squint my eyes at the video feed, then zoom in on the box. It’s too small to be an actual refrigerator. It’s flatter than one too. No… It’s more like a box for the unconstructed parts of a dinner table.

 

I’m not expecting any supplies or deliveries. She must want me to stuff something.

 

For a split second, I imagine a human. Her dead husband in the cardboard box. Naked and blue, his eyes sunken and cloudy.

 

“Hello?” the woman asks, her voice scratching through the speaker. Then she pounds her fist on the door. “Theodore Wright? I’m looking for Theodore Wright. Hello? Are you in there?”

 

I shake those thoughts away. I’ve had a lot of strange requests in this career, but I’ve also surfed the dark web long enough to know that the most morbid shit doesn’t happen in places like this. It happens in the woods. Places where people can’t see unless you want them to. I live in the city, where we’re surrounded by an audience, where we all have to face judgment. 

 

Make her fill out the form online, my brain instructs. Just like everyone else. You can use the speaker on the doorbell to tell her.

 

I wipe the gray grime onto a rag, little spots of clay still sticking to the webs between my fingers. I step closer to the front door. 

 

It’s not a human, my mind screams. You’re making a mistake. She’s using that oversized box to lure you in. You’re on a watch list, and this is the bait to see if you’ll break the law. Don’t fall for it, you fucking idiot.

 

Need prickles inside of me, drawing me closer to the entrance.

 

What’s in the box?

 

I open the door.

 

“Oh!” She startles, then immediately grabs the dolly and rolls it closer to me. Her sleeves pull up on her arms, exposing red, scaly skin, evidence that she’s been scratching the surface, clawing for a way inside. An SUV is parked on the street, a man waiting behind the wheel.

 

“Come back on Wednesday,” I say. “That’s when I do the intake. There’s a form online—”

 

 Her body collides with mine abruptly, and her heat closes in on me so fast that I instantly lurch back. 

 

She goes past me, wheeling the box inside.

 

“Please,” she begs. “It’s my daughter.”