Hunter's Choice Read Online Free Page A

unpredictable and a nasty old buggar
when he wanted to be and I didn’t want him coming after Piper. Piper was my
friend, not a snack.
    I quickly closed the large outdoor enclosure and stepped
back. Odin side stepped along his perch until he reached the rabbit. He
seemingly glared at me with is one orange eye and stomped a talon onto the
furry little offering. He savagely tore off a strip with his sharp beak and
bolted it down.
    Ungrateful wretch, I thought affectionately with a
wry twist of lips. He continued to tear at his breakfast and I winced and left
him to it. Out of all my birds, he was the least shy when it came to eating. I made
my way back to the barn as Charlie stuck his head out.
    “Got ‘em all fed except that big barred bastard,” he spit on
the ground. I smiled and put my fingers up for Piper who stepped onto them, I
transferred the little owl to Charlie’s shoulder and wrinkled up my nose at
him.
    “Hun-nnn-nnnn-ter!” I said as I passed him by.
    “Decided to go with it huh?” he asked. His brown eyes
twinkling in his craggy tan face. I grinned at him and nodded. He was
comfortable in well-worn jeans and a deep forest green cowboy shirt. The kind
with snaps for buttons. He had on his black mesh trucker hat that proclaimed
loudly on the front that he was proud to be Native American.
    When I was fifteen I’d seen Charlie get beaned in the head,
opened up quite the bleeding gash. My aunt had seen the blood and freaked out
and had called an ambulance. When the paramedics had gotten here they asked him
all the questions you were supposed to ask when dealing with a possible head
injury.
    I’d watched as the medic asked Charlie who the President of
the United States was and Charlie had glared at the man and shouted “Who gives
a shit!?” The medic had taken one look at Charlie’s hat, clutched in his hand
and had burst out laughing. He’d needed to go with them and get stitches but
otherwise had been okay. The point is, that was the kind of man Charlie was.
Simple and direct. Which given my limited communication ability, the pair of us
suited each other just fine.
    Charlie had worked for the Washington Department of Fish and
Wildlife and was a Vietnam Vet. He and my Uncle were best friends despite the
fact my Uncle worked for Weyerhaeuser, the forestry company that had put the
Spotted Owl on the Endangered Species list. They’d hunted together, fished
together, watched baseball together and when I showed up, had pretty much
raised me together too.
    My Aunt had always jokingly referred to Charlie as her
brother-wife, to which Charlie balked loudly every time… that is until my aunt
put some of her cooking in front of him. Quickest way to shut ol’ Charlie up
ever. I unashamedly learned every kitchen trick I could from her and used them
against Charlie freely if he was in one of his moods.
    When Uncle Dave and Aunt Margie had followed their
retirement dreams and moved to Arizona and away from the rain, it was pretty
much only on the promise that Charlie and me would take care of each other.
    Easy enough. We were best friends. Charlie was the one who
got me drunk off moonshine when I was eighteen. Aunt Margie had chewed him a
new one for that, screeching like an angry Barn Owl and beating him over the
head with her ever present dish rag. Charlie was as much my family as anyone
ever could be.
    I went to Hunter’s enclosure and opened the door. He sidled
up to me and I reached in with my leather clad hand. He blinked at me and
stepped up before I could make a grab for his ankles. I made a low whistle and
Charlie looked up, eyes narrowing suspiciously.
    “He loose?” he asked. I nodded confirming. I reached out
slowly with my other gloved hand to put it on the bird’s back to keep his wings
folded down but he stretched them out. I sucked in a breath but he gripped my
hand tighter with his feet and simply fanned his wings giving them a good
stretch before folding them down. I had really expected him to