Dutch's Girl

Chapter One

Chelsea

I lifted the hay bale off the ground and hustled it over to the feeder. My four horses Julian, Christian, Sally, and Matilda whined and pawed the ground in impatience. "I'm gettin' it ya crazy animals!", I playfully hollered. My personal horse, Matilda, walked alongside me so the other three wouldn't knock me over to get to the hay. They did that quite a lot if she didn't protect me.

Once all the feeders had a hay bale in them, I gave each horse an oatcake and a pat on the neck before walking out to find one of my sisters. I lived on my farm, the Wolff Pack, with my two sisters Shelly and August, and Shelly's husband Jae. We weren't too far away from Valentine. It was a decent enough life. Me and Shelly mainly took care of the horses' needs, but she just revealed to me and August that she was pregnant with her and Jae's first child, and I instructed her to try and relax so she wouldn't hurt anything.

I came around the side of the barn and spotted my sister August. "Hey August, how are things looking for the wheat? Is it growin' the way it should?" August shook her head and looked at her feet. "Something's not right about the back piece of land. Someone is stealing our crops back there. There are plants missing, and no deer could do such a thing."

I ran a hand through my hair and sighed in frustration. August had been paranoid and saying someone was stealing crops from our back field, but when I checked, everything seemed normal to me. I think something in the woods behind our settlement spooked her or something, but I doubted it was a crop stealer. Who would want to steal wheat?

I patted August's shoulder. "I'll take a look and see what I can find. Why don't you go find Shelly and Jae? See if they need anything." My petite sister nodded and walked in the direction of the house. I stared after her for a few moments before turning and walking into the barn to grab a lantern and our farm dog, Jeremiah. "Jeremiah, here boy!", I called.

Suddenly a blue tick hound with long ,floppy ears padded up to me, a happy bark slipping out of his mouth. I patted his head and grabbed a lantern and my pistol. We rarely had troubles on the farm, so we didn't have heavy firepower. The most powerful thing we had was my Springfield rifle, but I chose my Cattleman revolver for this. I glanced down at Jeremiah and then started walking out the barn and in the direction of the backfield, my dog in tow.

Once we reached the field, I looked around to see if perhaps I could spot anything, but nothing out of the ordinary was caught in my field of vision. I opened the gate to the field and led Jeremiah inside before closing it behind me. The blue tick and I walked through the field, foot by foot, and scanned the area. Jeremiah kept his nose to the ground, but nothing was caught. I felt stupid for even considering that August saw something, but I knew if I didn't check this out, she would hassle me until I did.

As we neared the back of the field, I began to study the plants a bit more. None of them seemed to be out of place. I sighed and looked down at the dog. "Well Jeremiah, it seems August was just paranoid again." The canine wagged his stub tail and looked into the woods behind us. He froze and stared off into the wilderness. I furrowed my brow in confusion and followed his gaze. I didn't see what caught his attention. "What do you see boy?"

A low growl erupted from Jeremiah's throat, and I pulled out my pistol. I stared into the woods a bit longer, and gasped as I saw the moonlight hit something silver. Before I had time to react, the silver object was aimed at my dog, and a bullet soon penetrated Jeremiah's skull. The blue tick hound let out a scared yelp before hitting the ground and laying there lifelessly. My blood ran cold.

Soon men began to pour out of the trees, and the only thing I could think to do was run. From where I was, I could see the Wolff Pack. Men were everywhere. My muscles where protesting against all the running, but I had to hurry. My family was in danger.

Bullets were flying past my head as the men behind me started laying on their triggers. I jumped the fence and kept going, growing closer to the house. Men stopped me as I entered the yard. Shelly and August were both crying. Jae was on his knees, some bulky man in grimy clothes was pointing a gun at his head. "Shelly, be strong for our baby," Jae said before a shot fired. He slumped to the ground. Shelly screamed out. "Awww, did we shoot your sweetheart?", teased one of the bastards holding us at gunpoint. "You sick, twisted freaks!", August yelled. The man who killed Jae turned and looked at my sister, a sinister smirk on his face. "Ma'am, do you have any idea who we are?"

I spoke up. "Who are you?" He turned to look at me and smiled wider. "We are the O'Driscolls. Ever heard of Colm O'Driscoll?" My eyes widened. I've heard of them. They were a horrible band of outlaws who ran around and slaughtered people like cattle. August and Shelly were clinging to each other, both shaking at the name. "Why are you doing this? We don't have anything with any value here!", I shouted with rage. The O'Driscoll man laughed. "We need a new place to stay, and your settlement is so isolated, I doubt anyone even heard my men firing at you."

I looked at my sisters and then back at the monster. "What are you going to do with us?" The outlaw thought to himself for a moment before glancing at August and Shelly. "I was instructed to kill everyone that lived here, but I kinda like you girls. I think we oughta keep one of you." I froze. The O'Driscolls were looking us up and down, and I felt sick to my stomach. I didn't even want to think about the reason they wanted to keep us.

They muttered things to each other, but soon all eyes landed on me. My heart was pounding. "We choose you." Before I could process what was happening, two shots fired and my sisters fell to the ground dead. I cried out as a man grabbed me and began leading me to the house. I was trying to look back and run to the corpses on the ground, but the door was closed, blocking my view. They led me upstairs and dumped me into one of the bedrooms we had. "We'll be nice and wait until Colm gets here. We're not allowed to do anything until he's had his fun first." I trembled and sunk into a corner. The O'Driscolls laughed and closed the door, leaving me alone in the room.

I sat on the floor staring off into space. I couldn't understand what just happened. All I knew was that I needed help, but who would come? No one is going to find me. We have no visitors here!