Oh, they were out there, somewhere, but he could not see them. He could feel them, though, gathered thickly in the spreading shadows like locusts in a farmer’s field. Just as destructive, just as lethal, just as patient. He thought he could even smell them—their sweaty bodies and sour breath and bloody hands, the ripe stink of death hovering over them. As he stepped out into the fading sunlight, the precarious uneven illumination of twilight, he could certainly feel their eyes on him. It was very unsettling. Like being some beast of the field ringed in by the hungry eyes of predators. They were watching him, gauging him, seeing what kind of defense he could put up and how easy they could take him down. He felt like a suckling pig in a pen surrounded by ravenous wolves. He actually thought he could smell their hot breath and drool. Doris was behind him and she felt it, too. She kept the shotgun in both fists. She would kill anything that moved.
