Swampland, Ch 3
By Kim
Cristina de Luca and Ryan, her young bartender, rode on the flat bottom toward what had been the Orlando airport. Ryan was capable beyond working a bar, and Cristina kept him on as very handsome hired muscle. He was sitting in front and below her, and as the boat rocked she touched his solid upper back. In the deepening shadows of the evening they moved silently through the flooded streets. Two of her hired men were rowing. Cristina was wearing tight jeans and a long-sleeve shirt, blue and of light cotton, with a deep neckline that showed off her cleavage well. Some loose board or block dropped off to the side, and Ryan shifted toward the sound and held ready the rifle from under the tarps in the boat’s bottom. She enjoyed knowing that he would never talk about her and she would never have to worry about his constantly trying to get an advantage over her or improve on her. He had been taken in by her striking face and body, and she knew what she was getting from it and nothing more, and their relationship was secure for her in that.
They left the boat tied next to a ramp onto the highway and walked down to what had been a major hotel attached to the airport for their meeting with Mayor Barnwell. The two hired men Cristina told to wait at the entrance to the parking garage from which they entered. Sandbags had been piled in defense of the broken doors and they seemed as old and moldy as the rest of the building. In a pile at the base of a wall at the entrance by the sandbags were the remains of what had been a skeleton decades before, some warning or totem that no one remembered or cared to remove. Ryan followed her silently into the building. In the large open room at the center the water stood waist deep, and Cristina could see its flow down into what had been the airport terminal and the lines for check-in. Her father, a pilot smuggler who brought her here from Italy in search of business opportunities and who crashed his plane into this airport’s control tower, had been obsessed with the bygone era’s rich travel infrastructure. It had been a culture in which people could go where they liked, as they liked, he had explained to her, and they were supported by a widespread system of professionals who made sure they were safe at every step. It had been in that terminal he had left her to make a flight to New York in too strong a storm.
They found the stairwell and began climbing toward the top floor. At the fifth floor, Ryan grabbed her by the arm and said, “Let’s see about one of these rooms.” Cristina said that they had to make their meeting, but he pulled her gently through the fire door and into the hallway. Furniture and trash had been pulled out into the hallway. Ryan forced open the nearest room and led her inside. A hole had been blown through one of the walls and the glass of the windows had been knocked out. Cristina imagined some drifter hiding in the room in the first years the city had been given over to the water, some black empty shape of a man staring out the window days on end in the expectation that his old life would return to him, a life that had been over before he was born. She went to the window expecting to see the anonymous drifter himself standing outside the hotel in space and herself now staring out as that non-existent man had years before she thought of Ryan and Lilah and the other people who were depending on her to find a new steady line of work. The lines were thinner and thinner year by year as the world ran out of things worth smuggling, as it ran out of things.
“Do you ever think about the people who used to live here?”
In answer Ryan took hold of her from behind. He ran his over her breasts and her flat stomach and he kissed her on the neck then turning her head around by the hair he pressed her roughly on the mouth. She tried to turn to face him, but he held her in place and made her look out of the window. He slid his hand down the inside of the front of her jeans and rubbed his fingers up and down pressing against her mound.
“What do you think about them?”
“I think that they lived in rooms like this their whole fucking lives,” she answered him. “They had people to bring them food and to change the temperature in the room, and they lay on these beds and planned out their lives knowing what the fuck was going to happen them. Knowing that they would have the same food and the same temperature and the same dick and cxnt waiting for them every single day for all of fucking eternity. They just knew that it would be the same forever and they were running in place. And then the wheels started to rattle, and the gators got a bit closer and the heat started pressing in through the glass. When it did, they didn’t know to stop or to run or ask God to turn down the juice so they could get a little more time for themselves. So they just shit themselves and let it all fall apart. And they left it for the rest of us to live in their shit.”
Ryan threw her onto the bed and climbed on top of her, pressing against her and kissing her on the neck. She ran her fingers through his short hair and over his broad back where the muscle spread out from his waist. Cristina could feel the mold and the age creeping up out of the old material against her back and her flesh. Ryan pulled off her jeans and slid down his own and then threw himself inside of her. He pounded into over, groaning and sweating on top of her and she felt that the air was being pressed out of her life between the stench of the bed and the heat of his body and she enjoyed it. The feeling of the world outside of that window being squeezed away and her being left with only herself and this anonymous male body fucking her. She was being pressed down into nothingness and then when he was done she lay beside him, thinking of all the people who had stayed in the room before.
“We aren’t the ones who broke the world. I’m not the one who brought a little girl to the other side of the world and then wrecked my plane. And now I have to haul rich people’s shit through the swamp so that I can get together enough scratch to get some bigger and better shit to haul through the swamps.”
“I still love you, babe” Ryan said.
“No you don’t.”
They dressed and finished the climb to their meeting. At the top floor were two large men from the Mayor’s security who searched them and took their weapons. The Mayor’s suite was at the end of the hallway, with four more security men standing outside the door, smoking cigarettes rolled from tobacco Cristina had brought for them months ago. The Mayor kept the top floor in decent condition, with a new coat of painting and a bare floor to fight the decay. Candles flickered in holders they had screwed into the walls. The paint, candles, the scotch the Mayor was drinking inside the room, and the rest of it she had also brought into Orlando on her boat. One of the men, a tall, thin man with an oily mustache, looked her body up and down. Cristina took the oily man’s rolled cigarette as she passed him and entered the room with Ryan following her.
Mayor Jack Barnwell was sitting at his desk. His wife Allison was standing next to him and Brandy Connor was on the couch by the window. Selina Hu, Brandy’s woman, was standing in the corner with a smirk on her face. The Mayor was in his 60’s, bald and nearly deaf, with a large frame yet delicate hands and a striking, narrow face. He was wearing a white shirt that was buttoned up nearly to his neck in the front, smoking a cigar and staring at Cristina with his hard, black eyes. “You’ve met my fucking wife, I believe,” he said loudly, gesturing behind him. Allison was leaning back against the wall, arms crossed over her chest. She was much younger than her husband, in her 30’s, but equally intense. She was a blonde woman with short hair and a lean build that she put to good effect with a dress that had come from New York years ago. She nodded to Cristina and said nothing. Brandy was wearing jeans and a blouse open low enough that she seemed to be nearly spilling out of it. She rose from the couch and shook hands with Cristina. The two women held the grip and stared into each other’s eyes.
“Nice to see you again, honey,” Brandy said. “So glad you could make it for the end of your career.”
“I’m here to let the Mayor see what the competition will look like,” Cristina replied. She tightened her grip, and Brandy did the same.
“You two knock that shit off,” Barnwell ordered, grinding his cigar into an ashtray.
“He’s already seen that there won’t be much competition between us,” Brandy replied, loud enough for Barnwell to hear. She threw Cristina’s hand down and stepped closer, so close their breasts were touching and Cristina could feel her breath. Brandy leaned in and whispered in her ear, “Him and your boy here have that much in common at least. Although I have to say that your boy beats him in other areas.”
Cristina turned to look at Ryan. Behind her Brandy was talking about how Ryan had been feeding them information about her business and her crew. But she was thinking about the first night that Ryan had come into her bar. He had stabbed another man, a troublemaker, in the eye with the man’s own knife and then that night Cristina had taken him back into her bedroom and let him fuck her brains out. He had been her bartender ever since. In a life full of secret meetings in the swamp and tense standoffs, she had always looked forward to seeing him standing behind her bar when she returned. With a blank look on his face, Ryan stared back at her and then mouthed “I’m sorry.”
Brandy was still talking to the back of Cristina’s head. After winking at Ryan, she turned and hit the big blonde across the face. Brandy stumbled back, but as Cristina went after her Brandy hit Cristina in the stomach and then shoved her to the side. The two women hit the couch together and flipped it over. They landed on the floor in each other’s arms, but before Cristina could strike again she felt Ryan pulling both of them to their feet. As he put himself behind them, Brandy made a longing look at Ryan pushed her hair out of her face.
“You see why you can’t work with her anymore,” Brandy said to the Barnwells.
“Turn us loose and we’ll see who the better woman is. You know how we handle shit in the muck,” Cristina said loudly to the entire room.
“I’ll beat your ass in front of the whole city if you want,” Brandy offered. “Name the time and place.”
“Are you two finished?” Barnwell said. “If I wanted to go that route I would have arranged it. We don’t want the best brawler, we want the best businesswoman.”
“And you think this cow is that?”
“We had a good run, Cristina,” Allison said. “But we believe that the time has come to move beyond bringing in some extracurricular pills and gas tanks. Brandy is the woman to come with us as we venture into new business areas.”
“He’s saying that I’m hot enough to bring in new clients and you aren’t, you dumb batch,” Brandy said. Cristina tried to grab her again but Ryan saw the move coming and stopped her. “But if you want to settle this without a sucker punch, you just let me know.”
Barnwell stood and walked into the center of the room. With his hands in the pockets of his respectable brown pants, with the tail of his pressed white shirt hanging over them, he looked the brunette and blonde up and down. “I had known that having you here together might be trouble, but still I thought that we could meet and talk things through. There are still a lot of workers in this fucking scatpile and a lot of money to be made before the goddam ocean takes it entirely. There needs to be someone in charge, an adult, for that to happen. I guess it won’t be you two bitches, and just from this one meeting I think I’ve had my fill. Brandy, from now on you deal with my wife, and she deals with me. Cristina, there are still plenty of opportunities for a woman in your milieu. You deal, well, you and Brandy settle things however you like and however Allison deems acceptable. But I’m not going to watch you two pull hair over some meathead.” He stared at them again, and then wringing his hands together said, “Now, I have other matters to attend. Allison, I will meet you at home.”
Cristina watched him leave the room. Allison took his place in front of the three of them. Despite the differences in size, gender, and experience, she filled the space every inch as he had. “I understand why you would want to kill each other. However, I am going to emphasize to both of you ladies that our economic interests would be hurt if either of you were to fail to return from a trip, or slip and fall on a knife in the back. And that would be a bad situation for the both of you. Do we understand each other?” she asked, and then paused. “Let me be clear, I need to hear you say it.”
“Yes,” both of them answered.
“And I’ll add on a personal level that I don’t think it’s particularly becoming for you two to pull hair over a meathead, either. No offense, Ryan, but that’s what you are.”
“That isn’t why I want to yank her bald,” Brandy said.
“That’s good to hear. You know that there was another Mrs. Barnwell before me. I started as his assistant. Mrs. Barnwell took a dislike to me, even though she was only a few years older and had a giant set of tits. She pushed me, and I pushed her back, and one night I convinced her that it would be in her interest to back off. I am sympathetic to your desires here, you see. I am familiar with them. But there are limits to what my husband will tolerate. I would not say that he is himself adverse to what you have in store for each other. What he is adverse to is his income being affected by it.”
With the atmosphere settled if not defused, Allison returned to the desk. Sitting behind the chair, she continued, “Now as to the actual reason for the meeting. Brandy here is going to be taking over our import business. That means that you will not be bringing things into the city, Cristina, and you will not make further attempts to reach out to the Sommersons. They are Brandy’s contact now.”
“So what do I get?” Cristina asked. An image was forming in her head: Allison Barnwell taking a liking to Brandy and a disliking toward her, and then pressing her husband to make changes in the Mayor’s office’s relationship with the representatives of the city’s underclass.
“There is quite a bit of untapped revenue in the area of town around the Lady Ace, we think. You are now in charge of it. Gambling, the sex trade, extracurriculars. You tax it, and what isn’t on the books already you bring onto the books. And then you kick that to Brandy, and she kicks it to us.”
“Not only did you lose your old job to me, princess, you report to me for your new one.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Or,” Allison replied, “we hear that you have that tenente of yours who is very capable. Maybe it’s time for her to step up?” She and Cristina stared at each other. “I thought not,” the new boss continued. “Brandy, as you saw today, Mayor Barnwell is no longer as involved in the day to day as he once was. So if anything happens, you bring it to me. And I don’t have to tell you, Cristina, that you need to find a new handyman,” she added, nodding at Ryan. “In fact, I think that you can leave him behind today. From what I hear, he’s quite capable.”
As Cristina left the room, Selina waved at her and mouthed “bye-bye.” She had never left the corner.
Cristina returned to her boat and the two hired men waiting there for her without looking back at the hotel or at the airport or runway itself. None of the others in the room had given any sign of intending to leave soon. She told the men to take her back to the bar and sat in silence. The sun was going down. The meeting’s being held in the daytime might have been a tip to her, or Ryan’s insisting on coming along and his suddenly being better informed and more useful on issues of business. The last few days he had suggested that they think about moving into controlling the gambling that went on in the huts around the Lady Ace, or construction and renovation of those huts. And now he was in that hotel room doing Christ knew what with those two women who wanted to see her broken and who saw her as not woman enough to have a proper place in the city. Her entire life, she had worked to improve the lives of the people of Orlando. She had never cheated anyone on a deal, or taken advantage to overcharge, and now she was being ordered to step aside and let the swindling whore take over her position.
At the Lady Ace, Lilah was sitting on the bar, letting two old drunks talk her up. She was wearing jeans and a tight shirt, and her red hair was loose down around her face. “What went wrong?” she asked when she saw Cristina enter.
“Back room, now,” Cristina answered her, taking a bottle from under the bar.
In the storage room, Cristina recounted the meeting. “That fucking bitch,” Lilah said when it was done. “And Ryan, all the time alongside us. We’re going to get all of them back.”
“She made it clear that we can’t handle them that way. But there’s another way I’d like to handle them.”
Cristina and Lilah took another drink each and then left the Lady Ace headed for The Swampland, Brandy’s bar. Neither woman spoke as they walked the muddy streets. Both were wearing jeans and shirts. Men and women both who stepped aside, and as they approached the other establishment the onlookers gathered some sense of what was coming and fell in behind them. When they reached The Swampland, the evening crowd was just forming inside. Cristina stood in the doorway, Lilah beside her, with her hands on her hips, and she scanned the crowd. Brandy’s girls were working the crowd, leaning on the men and a few women and blowing in their ears. Two men were also working alongside the women, in pressed suits, standing by the roulette wheel and talking to a woman who seemed from her clothes to be a foreman from the gator farms.
“My name is Cristina de Luca!” she shouted. “Shut the fuck up and listen, because I have some news.” It was easy for her to get the men’s attention, her stern face and clothing adding to her appeal as it highlighted for them her and Lilah’s difference from the women who were trying so hard to turn their heads. “I’m now in charge of all the fun things that happen around here, outside of this cxnthold of a bar. And outside the cxntholds who work in this cxnthold of a bar.”
A large redheaded woman stepped forward. Her name was Amy, and she was the leader of Brandy’s women. Her hair was a deep red and hung in waves down below her shoulders. She had massive breasts and hips, and while there was not much fat on her elsewhere her bare shoulders and arms were obviously very powerful. She had a sultry beauty to her, in her own way as daring and strong-willed as Cristina and the opposite of Brandy’s warm, inviting face. She was wearing a blue dress that would have been modest on other women but on her only seemed to accentuate her appeal.
“Turn around and walk the fuck out of here while you still have teeth,” the redhead told her in a slow voice that seemed as pronounced as her feminine features.
“And I have another announcement,” Cristina shouted beyond the woman. “To kick off this new era, my girl Lilah and I will hold a little boxing tournament. Right now, down the street in the old turnaround. All of you are invited. And I was thinking that maybe you nice ladies could be enticed to provide our opponents,” she concluded, staring right into Amy’s green eyes.
Cristina and Lilah lead the majority of Brandy’s crowd away from The Swampland and down to a large clear area near the Lady Ace. Cristina told her hired men to construct a makeshift ring and after that to work security and to take bets. The ring would be what had once been a cul-de-sac, a few hundred yards of road off the main street of bars, huts, and the few brick buildings that still stood. Her men ran rope around the poles that encircled the dirt center. The audience was as many as two hundred people. Amy and a Black girl she had chosen to fight Lilah arrived not long after, now wearing jeans and shirts as well. The women eyeballed each other as the crowd grew and then settled in. Cristina could feel the throb of all these people here to watch her fight and the deep pounding of Amy’s staring at her. It had rained that afternoon here while Cristina was at the hotel, and the cool muck squished around her bare toes in contrast to the always-hot air on her face and bare arms.
One of Cristina’s men, the referee, stepped into the center. His name was Dulphur, and he would be the replacement for Ryan. He was physically imposing, with a scar that ran up the side of his head. Not as large as Ryan had been, he always gave the impression he was considering stabbing someone. He had not been with Cristina long--her shrinking realm of choice. “Lilah and Renee, step forward.” The two women came into the ring with him. Both teenage girls were wearing only jeans. Lilah’s green eyes were sharp in the flickering light. Her red hair brushed against the tops of her shoulders, and her lean arms and torso showed her strength well. Her breasts seemed a bit large against her frame, but they did not overwhelm her profile. In comparison Renee was nearly flat-chested. Her nipples were like black diamonds against her muscled chest. Renee’s skin was dark as the cherry wood of the posts that ringed the two women, a strong contrast to Lilah’s paleness that refused even the harsh sun of Florida. Where Lilah was pretty and referred to as “spunky,” Renee had a withdrawn handsome quality to her face and carried with her a quiet that suggested deep contemplation against the world. She was at least two inches and fifteen pounds smaller than Lilah but seemed the larger of the two. Cristina thought she seemed a poor fit for Brandy’s whorehouse.
On Dulphor’s call the two women began. They moved slowly in the soft muck. Lilah threw the first punch, a left jab. Renee ducked it and hit her in the stomach and then across the face and was out of her way again before Lilah could react. Lilah was a quick woman but she was outmatched here. Lilah lunged forward and threw another punch, but Renee hit her in the breast with a hook and stepped away. The two women circled each other in the makeshift ring, both breathing hard and Lilah holding her hands more cautiously in front of her face. This time Lilah waited her out, and when Renee came in to throw a jab Lilah took it on the nose and slugged Renee across the jaw. The Black teen stumbled back, and Lilah leapt onto her and drove her down into the mud. Renee scrambled away but Lilah followed her up. Cristina’s girl grabbed her from behind, pinning Renee’s arms to her side, and then with a growl she bit down into her shoulder. Renee screamed and wrenched herself free. She checked her shoulder without taking her eye from Lilah and found no serious damage. The two women were staring at each other, pacing back and forth.
Then Renee shouted “Bitch!” and the two ran at each other. Lilah had her arms out to grab hold again, but it was a mistake. Renee threw herself forward and put her shoulder into Lilah’s chest. They landed in the mud, and Renee was on top. She hit Lilah back and forth across the face and with a hard punch to the center of her chest, and then when Lilah threw her off with a desperate heave Renee got alongside her and rammed her knee into Lilah’s ribs. By the time Lilah got away Renee had given her a pounding. The Black girl got in close but this time Lilah somehow beat her to the draw despite the beating to her ribs. She popped Renee in the nose, and as the smaller girl winced and turned her head, Lilah slammed her in the side with her fist, again and again. Cristina’s girl had the chance to show her strength, now holding Renee with one arm and pounding her in the ribs and side of the head with the other. But to escape Renee had only to hit her in the stomach once and Lilah was forced to back away. Renee clipped her across the brow with a right hand, opening up a cut.
Renee pressed forward, driving Lilah back near the rope. Cristina yelled for Lilah to attack, but it was of no use. Lilah threw a wild punch as Renee got in on her, working her body again. Lilah got her arms around her, but she was too hurt to make use of it as she would have before. Renee stayed close to her, hitting her sides and breasts until Lilah seized her short hair and pulled her away. Lilah tried to throw her knee up into Renee’s face, but she was too tired and lost her balance. The two women were down in the muck now, and the fight was ending. Renee got on top of her and hit Lilah in the face until the redhead could not defend herself and Dulphor pulled her off. Brandy’s teenager had won the first fight.
Men helped both girls out of the ring and then Cristina and Amy stepped in. Like the girls, the two women were barefoot and wearing tight jeans. But before either could take off her shirt, Brandy Connor yelled, “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” and hopped over the rope and stepped between the two of them. Her blonde hair was flowing freely, and she wore the jeans and open blouse from their earlier meeting. The material hugged her feminine curves as well as the other two women’s.
“She came in and talked shit about you and all of us,” Amy replied. “I aim to teach her some manners.”
“Shut the fuck up, you dumb whore,” Brandy told her. Turning on Cristina she said, “After that embarrassment you endured this afternoon, I’m surprised you would show your face at all around here. But I guess you and your little friend are both slow learners.”
“I just thought that these good people would want some entertainment tonight. Your girl seemed eager to provide some for them. I didn’t realize that she needed your permission.”
“I don’t need her permission to kick your fat ass,” Amy said.
“Would you shut the fuck up,” Brandy said to her, and she slapped her across the face. “Remember your place.”
“Scared of a real fight?” Cristina asked her. “Want to try someone who can hit you back?”
“I guess I could pick a fight with a smaller woman,” Brandy answered her, putting her hands on her hips and sticking out her chest. “If you’re so keen on entertaining this lot, then I can give them a taste of what your man betrayed you for.”
Cristina took off her shirt and threw it aside. She stuck out her own breasts, which hardly hung down despite their size. She took great pride in their firmness and their shape, jutting out from her chest, as much as Brandy took in hers. Cristina’s black hair hung down around her cold, beautiful face, and her jeans stuck to her thighs, firm as they were after years of manual work. Tonight Brandy’s face had none of its usual veneer of friendliness and charm. Tonight her hatred was an equal match to her sensuality in the beauty of her features. Her blonde hair curled about her wide cheeks and blue eyes. She was the same height as Cristina but likely had ten pounds on her, much of it in her wider hips and thighs and some smaller amount in her chest. Her nipples were like brown caps to the great mountains of her breasts. The broad cut of her hips, the lines of her thighs, and above that her tight stomach was like some great feminine valley, all power and fortitude. Her body was the equal of Cristina’s in its being desired by their audience as well as its capabilities. Brandy had as much experience brawling in her profession as Cristina had in hers.
The two women stood before each other as the moments leading up to their fight passed. It was as if each woman was staring into the heart of the other. Without another sound the two came at each other. Their feet made dull splats in the muck as they stalked each other, both of them with their hands curled into talons, each woman with her strong legs and hips and their heaving breasts moving in stride with that of her opposite. Brandy surged forward and threw out both of her arms, but Cristina flicked her foot up and put it against the wall of her stomach. The force put Brandy back a step and left a muddy print just under her breasts, against the pure flesh of her torso. It was as if some light brown part of Cristina’s Mediterranean hue had been marked against her. With a grim smile Brandy brushed the mark off of her and came forward again, more carefully. She threw out a lazy jab, but when Cristina went to grab her arm she slugged her in the side. With the thud of the impact the two buxom fighters clashed together in a whirling donnybrook. They turned a circle, holding on to each other and thudding open hands and fists against each other’s side and back.
Brandy drove Cristina back toward the rope. Cristina threw her feet into the ground and turned the blonde woman about and then with a heave tossed her against the post. Brandy hit the cherry wood with her shoulder but she was off it again too quickly and Cristina could not press her advantage. Brandy regathered herself and came forward again. Cristina hit her with an open hand to the face but Brandy took it and slammed her shoulder into her chest. The two women went storming across the opening and fell to the ground together. They rolled over each other, grabbing and pulling hair, the muck and the grains of sand and the water all sticking to them. Brandy got on top of her, sitting across her stomach, and she yanked Cristina’s head by the hair and slammed her into the ground. In relation Cristina grabbed hold of her breasts and squeezed with all she could. Brandy howled and pulled the hands out of her breasts and rolled free. As she was getting to her hands and knees Cristina leapt onto her. She threw one leg between the blonde’s and hooked her arm across her throat. With her other hand she drove weak punches up into her stomach and her breasts. Brandy hissed with the pain and rolled onto her back. Cristina worked her legs both between Brandy’s and then seized hold of her breasts again. She savaged Brandy’s imposing chest, digging her fingers in. Brandy howled in pain but she could not get free. At last she pulled one hand off her breast and then bringing it to her mouth she bit. Now it was Cristina’s turn to howl in pain and try to roll away. As she did, Brandy lashed out with her foot, catching Cristina in the ass and driving face first into the ground.
The two female brawlers rose to their feet. “I’m going to be chewing on those tits of yours in a few seconds, bitch,” Brandy told her.
“You fucking cxnt. I’m going to smash your pretty face into the ground.”
They came at each other again. Brandy threw a wild slap that caught Cristina across the face. Cristina slapped her back, but before she could do more Brandy hit her square in the upper chest with the palm of her hand. Then while Cristina was staggered, holding herself and gasping for breath, Brandy brought both of her hands together crashing into the brunette’s ears. The blow stunned her and brought her to her knees. Brandy took hold of her by the hair and was ready to drive her knee up into her vulnerable face, but Cristina regained herself in time. She put her face against the top of Brandy’s thighs and then clipped her in the back of the knees. Brandy tumbled over her and Christina got her down on the ground. As Brandy rose Cristina slapped her across the face, and then she hit her in the back and yanked her head up by the hair. She pulled Brandy by her blonde hair toward the rope that divided them from their audience, who was at this point yelling for either or both of them. Neither of these women would have cared had they heard them. The image of the two fighters, both with muck and sand stuck to their striking bodies and faces, black and blonde hair entangled, their buxom bodies with the black-haired beauty standing over the blonde, gasping for air and their feminine rage holding back the pain they both felt.
“You dumb bitch,” Cristina gasped.
Still holding Brandy by the hair Cristina pulled her up and drove her onto the rope, face down, so that the rope was across her upper chest. Howls of pain as Cristina dragged her back and forth across the material as it burned into her flesh. Brandy tried to push herself off the rope but pulling her hair with one hand Cristina held her down by pushing down on her upper back and punching her upper back as well. After she had hurt her like this, Cristina said into her ear that she had warned her that she was a stupid bitch who should not have fought her. Cristina also told her that she would make her hurt for what Brandy had done to her that afternoon. She came around in front of Brandy, leaving the circle and still holding her by the hair she slapped her lightly in the face on one cheek and then the other.
“Such a beauty,” Cristina said to the crowd in as loud a voice as she could manage. “Don’t you all enjoy seeing this great beauty get her ass kicked like this?” She reached down and cupped Brandy’s breasts, massaging the flesh and then digging in her fingers. “Such a pretty face, such a pretty body.”
With a burst of energy Brandy punched her between the legs. Cristina fell to the ground immediately, landing dully on the planks that formed the sidewalk in the turnaround. She lay clutching at herself, the pain in her sex and the air knocked out of her. She could see Brandy pushing herself off the rope, slowly, and resting with one hand on the nearby pole, her hair a mess and the scratches and red abrasions on her side, back, and breasts in the flickering light. The whole time she was watching the blonde the blonde was watching her. At last, Brandy had her legs under her again and came forward. She pulled Cristina up by the hair. Cristina hit her in the stomach but with no strength. Brandy took the blow easily and slapped her across the face with a right and then backhanded her with the same hand. On the second blow Cristina spun around and fell face down into the dirt. Brandy then fell on her, her knees driving into Cristina’s back. The pain went through her. Then Brandy rolled her over onto her back. Kneeling beside her, Brandy grabbed her by the hair and put her head between her thighs. She squeezed Cristina’s head between her legs and slapped and pinched her breast with her hand as she pulled her hair with the other.
“Say good night, batch,” Brandy hissed.
Cristina hit and pulled at her legs with no success. Desperate, she pried the hand off her breast with both hands and got hold of Brandy’s fingers. She began prying the fingers apart. The realization of what she intended had Brandy screaming and she released her scissors. As she did Cristina kicked her in the face, knocking her onto her back. Brandy got clear of her and stood watching as Cristina pulled herself to her feet. The two women came together again. Both of them were bent over, struggling to hold their hands up, hair dangling in front of their faces. Brandy threw a punch at Cristina’s face, but Cristina got under it. She hit Brandy in the stomach and then uppercut her in the breast. Brandy hitched in pain and tried to back up. Cristina pressed her. She slapped Brandy in the face and got hold of her hair. Brandy yanked her hair in return. The two exhausted women turned in a circle, pulling hair. At last Cristina let go of her hair and hit her in the stomach with both hands. When Brandy bent over Cristina hit her in the face. The blonde woman fell onto her back, arms and legs spread wide, her massive breasts heaving up and down as she breathed. Cristina stood over her, pushing her hair out of her face. Her own chest and face and stomach carried the same abrasions as the blonde’s. The crowd around her was alternatively cheering and booing her. Without a look at them she planted herself on the blonde’s stomach. She slapped her across the face and on the breasts.
“Now let’s see how you chew on my tits,” Cristina said, and then she saw Sheriff Lane step in front of her with a shotgun across the crook of his arm.
