by KJ Dahlen
Joel and Edward stood there glaring at the four of them. Edward turned and began walking toward the house while Joel just stood there with his fingers curled into fists. “Don’t you think you should include Daisy in your thoughts when you think to claim her?”
“I will let her know in my own way and in my own time,” Timor stated.
“Annnd, wrong answer asshole,” Joel swore. “You don’t know her very well if you think she’ll let that fly. She really will fill your ass with birdshot when she hears this bullshit.” He motioned toward the two men tied up. “You got what you came here for I think it might be best if you take this trash and go back where you came from.”
“If I can’t speak for her, neither can you,” Timor informed the other man. “I think I have a lot more claim on her than you do at this point.” He turned to the two men on the floor. “These men are not who we’re after. We may get information we need to track the bastard down. He is still a very dangerous man, probably even more so now. He’s setting something up and he needs this land to do it. We need to know what his plans are and who he’s working with. The Bratva is taking Anton down and taking everything the man has earned for the past thirty years away from him.”
Joel sneered, “Yeah, good luck with that asshole. But you still got no claim to Daisy. She’s her own person and she’ll be the first to tell you that.”
Timor nodded. “I agree and she’s a fine woman. I would never disrespect her that way. I don’t want to see her hurt at all and I will not allow Anton to hurt her in any way.”
“So you say, but yet, you are claiming her without even giving her a chance to put in her two cents.” Joel shook his head. He stared at Timor for a moment, “You know something, she might have taken you upon what you had to offer her. She’s been waiting a long time for someone like you, but she’s grown up taking whatever she wanted on her terms, not on someone else’s terms.”
“I’m not trying to change her. I like the way she is right now.” Timor assured him. “I will take her any way I can get her. And I’m hoping she’ll take me. I have a long way to go but I am a work in progress. All of this is new to me, where I come from I was a leader of men. I gave them orders as to what I wanted and they carried those orders out. When I stepped down, I knew I would have to change and I’m trying but there is one thing I will not give into and that is my urge to protect the innocent. Anton is my nemesis and I will not give him the chance to hurt anyone else. This land...” He motioned around him. “This is Daisy’s dream, her home and I want to share it with her, not take it away from her.”
“That’s good because I would never let you,” Daisy spoke from behind Joel. She pushed her way past both of them and walked over to where the two men were tied up. When she saw what they had in their pockets, she paled and shook her head. Nudging the ties with her foot, she growled. “Those lousy bastards.” She looked over at Timor with tears in her eyes. “You better find this Anton before I do, because I won’t hesitate to shoot him on sight.”
“What do you know about this that we don’t?” Timor asked her as he crossed his arms over his chest. He got the feeling he missed something here.
Daisy looked at the ties at her feet. “Those kind of ties are used by vets when they want to tie down an animal for surgery.” She looked at the men and kicked one of them in his belly. “They were going to tie my animals down so they couldn’t move then burn the barn down. Because that’s what Anton told us would happen if we didn’t take him seriously and sell to him within a week.” Daisy looked over at Timor. “Why do you think you were met at the gate with a gun yesterday? Our week was up two days ago.” Then she knelt down and touched something on one of the men’s jeans. “This is fauna unique to one particular swamp area in the region.”
“Where is this swamp?” Timor wanted to know.
“Over by Mandeville. It’s a plant the Native Americas used for healing. Some still do use it but its not accepted in Western medicine.”
“So we may have a starting point for our search,” Timor noted. Just then his phone pinged. It was a text from Yuri announcing they were waiting at the front gate. Timor looked over at Daisy. “My friends are waiting at the gate. Can you allow them to come inside?”
Daisy stared at him for a moment before she turned to Joel and nodded. She then looked at Timor.
He stared back. He knew she was sizing him up. He intended to be whatever she needed. She was a stubborn bullheaded woman but he felt he was up to this as no one was more stubborn than he was.
Joel took off and returned a few moments later with several men. Timor introduced them as Yuri, Barshan, Sazon, Roman and Iosif.
When Timor told the others about what the men were going to do here, Yuri ordered his men to drag the two away.
Barshan opened his trunk and they threw the pair into the trunk.
Then Petr told them what they’d learned from Daisy.
A few moments later, Pavel returned and told everyone, “They came by boat, not a car. I did sink the boat but I found this.” He handed a photo to Timor. It was a photo of Daisy with Joel standing at the gate.
“Well, this isn’t good.” Timor acknowledged.
“Why?” Daisy asked.
“This is to identify their target. Which is you,” Timor informed her. “This is Anton’s way of terrorizing you into giving him what he wants and that we know is this farm.”
“Anton must be growing sloppy,” Yuri argued. “He thinks he’s going to go free after all this time.”
“Surely, he knows the Bratva never forgets,” Barshan stated as he shook his head.
“They haven’t found him in thirty years,” Timor pointed out. “He probably didn’t think he had to hide who he was anymore.”
“Well, we’ll have to remind him we never do forget and the penalty for murder never goes away.” Yuri put out there. “Now that we have a general direction, we can search for him there.” Yuri’s eyes narrowed. “We have two and a half days to find him before Sergi and the High Council get here and I want to be able to turn this sorry ass over to them.”
Daisy simply looked back and forth at the men and their conversation. Her gaze met Timor’s. “He’ll just try to scare us into selling. We can handle that.”
Timor gazed into her eyes. “He will go further than those tactics, Daisy. He’s just getting started. We need to be ready for that. We will get him. Then your family and your land will be safe.
Chapter Six
Yuri, Barshan, and Sazon returned to the city, leaving Roman and Iosif with Timor at Daisy’s farm for the afternoon.
Roman and Iosif were astonished at the change they saw in their father. Roman watched in shock when he saw Timor doing chores such as feeding the animals and mucking out pens.
Roman looked over at Iosif and shook his head.
Iosif just smiled. “I was so hoping he would find his special woman and it looks like he might have a chance with this one.”
“Please don’t get ahead of the game here.” Roman sighed. “He barely knows this woman and she knows nothing about him at all. His past with women isn’t all that great and you never know how long this new man he seems to be is going to last. This...” He motioned around the barn, “All of this is still new to him. He’s almost too old to change that much in so little time, don’t you think?”
“Perhaps but at least wish him well in his efforts?” Iosif shrugged. “I for one, would like to see him happy. You didn’t know him growing up and I watched him, how he acted around me and others. I don’t think the man knew how to just enjoy himself. He always told me his father taught him discipline but not much else.”
“And the Bratva only enforced what his father started.” Roman shook his head. “No wonder the man is the way he is.”
Iosif laid his hand on his brother’s chest. “Please brother, give him a chance. He is a good man. I have seen him do good things while growing up, he is very capable of that, and he’s trying this time.”
“Da, I
can see that.” Roman shrugged.
Both men heard the sounds of his footsteps coming closer to them and they turned to see Timor joined them.
“Boys, I have something I’d like to tell you.” Timor seemed a little unsure of himself and this was so unlike him.
Roman and Iosif shared a look then turned to face Timor.
“What is it dad?” Iosif finally asked.
“I just wanted to tell you boys about Daisy.”
Roman looked beyond his father’s shoulder and found the woman he was speaking about. “What about her?”
“I’m claiming her,” he dropped his bomb.
Roman hissed and Iosif frowned. “You’re what?” Iosif asked.
“I’m claiming her,” Timor repeated his statement.
“You only just met her,” Roman reminded his father.
“I know but I also know she’s the woman for me,” Timor insisted. He looked at his oldest son and said, “How long did it take for you to know with your woman?”
Roman paused at this question.
Timor nodded then turned to Isoif. “And you... with Jaden?”
Both men shook their heads.
“Ah, I see it is fine for younger men to know instantly when a woman is meant for them but for me, an older man, I am just foolish, eh?” His eyes twinkled.
His sons simply stared at him. They never saw him look like this. They both were stunned.
Then Timor frowned and growled, “Now I just have to convince her of that and that might not be so easy to do.”
Roman threw back his head and laughed out loud.
Timor stared at him with a surprised expression on his face.
“Good luck with that old man,” Roman said as he chuckled some more. “I have watched her all afternoon. This lady isn’t a wilted flower nor is she shy. Looks to me like she’s also set in her ways.”
“Damn stubborn woman,” Timor grumbled under his breath. “I can’t seem to convince her that Anton means business. She doesn’t know what kind of man he really is. She thinks he will stay with just sabotage and we know that isn’t true. The man will murder without a thought to get what he wants.”
Just then, his phone lit up and when he went to look at the screen everyone heard a gunshot.
The miniature buffalo Daisy was standing next to dropped.
Daisy screamed and flew off her feet. She fell in slow motion to crumble in the dirt beside the buffalo.
“Bylad!” Timor swore in Russian and rushed over to her, his weapon in his hand. Dragging her clear of the door, he began looking her over. She’d taken a bullet of that there was no doubt. It caught her in the shoulder and her arm was drenched in blood.
He began shaking her gently. “Daisy, honey you need to open your eyes now.” He shook her again, “Come on dorogusha, I need to see your eyes.”
Just then, more gunshots were heard in the distance.
Timor snapped his head toward Roman and shouted, “Get Yuri on the phone and get a doctor out here now. Tell him we got that bastard on the run and we need backup.”
Roman made the call and watched as his father gathered Daisy in his arms and carried her all the way to the farmhouse. His eyes were plastered on Daisy but his footsteps carried them both to the front door.
Ethel was there waiting for them as she quickly opened the doors and moved aside.
Timor carried her all the way through the house and laid her out on his bed.
“This isn’t her room,” Ethel complained. “Her room is next door.”
“Da, I know, this is my room, and I want her in here.” He glared at the young woman. “You need to gather some things and get her cleaned up before the doctor gets here.”
Ethel snorted. “No doctor will come out here. But I’ll get her shirt off and get her cleaned up a bit. We’ll have to take her into the ER.”
Timor turned around and glared at her. “The hell we will. I’ve got a doctor on his way and we can’t take her to the ER. No one can know she was shot.” Pavel came to the doorway and Timor glared at him. “Did you find him?”
“Nyet, he had a boat waiting,” Pavel replied. “But we might have clipped him with a bullet. Tit for tat for Daisy.”
“Chert proberi!” Timor swore, in Russian. “I don’t want tit for tat. I want that man down and bloody for what he did.”
“Da. I know boss. We’ll find him and he will know he crossed the wrong man today.”
Roman led the way down the hall as Yuri and the doctor found them. The doctor pushed Timor out of his way and got right to work. He sent Ethel to the kitchen for a basin of water and he readied his tools. While she was gone, the doctor removed her shirt and pulled the sheets up to cover her body as he only needed her shoulder exposed. “Gentlemen, either get out or step out of the way,” he ordered Yuri, Roman and Timor, not caring who they were as he had a job to do.
Ethel joined them and he told her exactly what he wanted her to do.
They all stood close to the wall and watched as doc did what he did best. He had to dig the bullet out of her shoulder and Ethel almost passed out from all the blood but doc said something to her and she growled at him then toughened herself up.
Finally, after half an hour, he was done. He then wrapped her shoulder, washed his hands and turned to Yuri. “I had to dig the bullet out and it’s gonna hurt for a while, but she’ll survive. She’s lucky to be alive. She’s not as young as she once was. One centimeter to the right and he would have hit a major artery and that would have been it for Ms. Daisy.”
“We’re searching for the bastard that shot her. My men told me they think they put a bullet into him,” Yuri acknowledged.
“Well, as long as I don’t have to treat him as well, I’m good. I might just have to betray my oath and let the man bleed to death.” Doc shook his head as he began to put away his instruments.
Timor shook his head. “Oh no doc, we can’t have that, he has to go back to Russia and be hung. He’s already been to trial and received his death sentence, so now we just have to see it happen.”
“Then I would get him there and keep him alive long enough to hang. Believe me the world isn’t going to miss a man such as him.”
“No they aren’t.” Timor looked over the doctor’s shoulder and found Daisy’s eyes open looking back at him. “Excuse me.” He brushed past Yuri and the doctor then made him way over to Daisy. He knelt at the side of the bed and searched her face. “Are you all right?”
“Ethel tells me I will be.” She looked over at the other men in the room. “You had a doctor come out here?”
Timor nodded. “He’s a doctor we use all the time when going to the ER is impossible.”
“Why would that have been impossible in my case?” She wrinkled her forehead.
“The doctors in hospitals have to report gunshot wounds. We can’t have the cops poking their noses in our business, now can we?”
She closed her eyes and whispered, “No I guess you can’t.”
“Doc says you’ll be ok,” he told her softly.
“Why did you bring me back here? This isn’t my room,” she asked in a whisper.
“Because here is where you belong. In my arms, in my bed and right beside me,” Timor insisted. He hesitated then gently told her, “He shot your buffalo.”
Daisy nodded. “I know. Edward will take care of the carcass.” She closed her eyes. “I think I’d like to rest now.”
“Of course, my dear. But I won’t be that far away.” Timor got to his feet and pulled the blanket up to cover her shoulders then leaned over and kissed her forehead. He stared at her for a moment and tightened his lips as tears filled her eyes.
He turned and ushered the others out of the room closing the door behind him.
When they reached the kitchen, Timor noted the rest of Daisy’s crew was waiting for them.
Edward and Joel got to their feet and asked him, “How is she doing?”
“She’ll be fine,” Timor assured both men. “The bullet went in
to her shoulder but we were able to get it out and doc patched her up. She’s resting now but is expected to make a full recovery.”
Edward growled. “The bastard that shot her didn’t completely get away. He’s still out there somewhere. I saw him and it was Anton himself. Guess after his men failed he stepped up to the job. We chased him as far as the lake and when he tried to get on his boat, we kind of shot it to pieces. That boat ain’t going anywhere. He jumped off and disappeared into the glades. I put a call into a friend who has some dogs and they are on their way over right now. We’ll track him down.”
Yuri perked up at the news. He looked over at Roman and Iosif then smiled. “Da, this is a good thing. Maybe we’ll find him yet.”
Then suddenly, they heard a bunch of dogs out in the yard.
Edward and Joel went over to the front door and greeted someone. “Gentlemen, get your weapons ready, it’s time to get your man,” Edward told the Russian group.
Joel went into the living room and when he came back, he was holding several rifles. “These might work better in the glades than your handguns.” He suggested.
“Da, they will indeed.” Yuri reached for one of the rifles.
“I’ll stay behind and watch over the women, or be here just in case Anton doubles back to finish the job,” Timor told them.
“I’ll stay as well and watch the back,” Iosif said.
A few minutes later, the house was quiet again. In the distance, they could hear the dogs when they got shooter’s scent, then they all heard the dog’s barking fade as they followed the scent over toward the lake.
Ethel tried to keep busy but she was just plain too scared.
Timor went over to her and put his arm around her shoulder. “It will be alright young one. We will not allow this man to hurt you or your family.”
“He already got to Daisy though didn’t he?” Ethel whispered. “And he could come back here and murder us all. You can’t control that.”
“The hell I can’t.” Timor growled. “My men and yours are out there right now hunting this pissant down. You can bank on the fact that they won’t stop until they find him and bring him back so he can face a hangman’s noose in his own land. He escaped from us once, he’ll not do that again.”