by Shaye Marlow
I let my head thump to the floor.
Frances propped hers in her hand. She raised a brow. “Lucy?”
“Live-in girlfriend,” I explained.
“Rory’s?”
“Ours,” I admitted.
Frances’s expression said she was intrigued. Her mouth said, “So why aren’t you up there with him?”
“Because I’m tired of her rages, and he’s better with the talking.”
She cocked her head. “What good comes of opening his mouth, if he’s just gonna put his foot in it?”
I shrugged. I was tired. Lying there on the floor really brought that home. I ached all over, and I was beginning to think nabbing Frances had been a mistake. If she ran now, fuck… I’d let her.
“Why’d you take me?” she asked. “Seriously.”
“I seriously want to learn to fly.”
She gave me a skeptical look, and waited.
“And… you’re fucking hot. When I’m around you, my brain shuts down, and… it was dumb, what I did. I’m sorry.”
Frances considered that, then sat up. “Why don’t you just go to town, learn at a school?”
I continued to lie there, feeling defeated. “I don’t want to go to town. And I’ve called around, but nobody wants to come out here.”
“Maybe if you offered to pay them,” she said, getting to her feet.
I knew sarcasm when I heard it, but in this case, it was unwarranted. “I did,” I said, drinking in the sight of her, knowing our time together was coming to a close. “Ten thousand dollars for a month of their time.”
Mid-step, she froze. “You’re paying ten thousand dollars?”
“Yeah. Didn’t I tell you that?”
“No,” she said, gazing down at me. “No, you most certainly did not.” She glanced around. “You have cash?”
I shook my head as I clawed my way onto the couch. “It’s in the bank.”
“How do I know you have it?”
I let my head fall back onto the cushions as I scoffed. “Deceit is Rory’s middle name, not mine.”
The racket on the second floor had reached a crescendo, and Lucy came barreling down the stairs, Rory hot on her heels. She dashed out the front door. He followed. Seconds later, he hollered, “Zack, come help me with this! Zack, I need you!”
I ignored him. He could deal with the Russian princess. I was tired of Lucy’s drama, her moods. For once, she was right: We were done.
Frances’s weight settled on the cushion next to mine, and she pinned me with her stare. “What, exactly, are your terms?”
I rolled my head to look at her. “Teach me to fly, and I give you ten thousand dollars.”
“I’d have to stay here for a month?”
“I just thought that’s how long it’d take.”
“But if it takes less, do I still get the full ten thou?”
I had a headache, and her questions were making it worse. “Of course.”
“What if it takes longer?”
I groaned, waving a hand. “Why don’t you hash out the details with Rory.”
“Because I want to hash them out with you,” she said, stroking a finger down my thigh.
“You want to take advantage of me,” I said, wishing her manipulative stroking didn’t affect me as she so obviously intended. “I’m not as bright as my brother.”
“Debatable.”
I sighed. “I get my private pilot certificate, and you get ten K. Period.”
“Hmm.”
Rory stumped through the front door with an armful of clothes. He was glaring. “Are you happy now?”
Lucy shoved him aside to beeline for her room. She slammed the door, rocking the whole house.
“She threw our clothes in the river,” he said. “I was able to save a few of mine, but the vindictive bitch tossed in pretty much all of yours.”
“Huh.” Well, that sucked.
Rory dumped his armful next to the couch, and went to pound on her door. “You better be packing!”
What sounded like another boot hit the door.
“Well… where am I sleeping?” Frances asked.
Rory and I both looked at her with surprise.
“I’m considering your offer. And even if I decide against it, I’m not going anywhere tonight. It’s… one a.m.,” she said, glancing at the clock.
I patted the stained cushion between us. “Couch work?”
“Not on your life. I’ll have a bed, or I’ll walk out right now.”
A roguish smile bloomed on Rory’s face. “I’ve got a big bed—”
“I’ll have an empty bed,” Frances said, holding my gaze.
“You can have mine. Upstairs, door on the right. Have at it.” I dragged Rory’s blankie over my lap, and settled more deeply into the couch. Not a problem. I could sleep anywhere.
A couple minutes later, her voice drifted down from the top of the stairs. “Please tell me…”
I startled, and sucked a rivulet of drool back into my mouth.
“…that you’re not the kind of disgusting animal that sleeps without sheets,” she drawled.
“I’m not the kind of disgusting animal that sleeps without sheets.”
Frances waited a beat. “Where can I get some sheets? I already checked the closet.”
“Um. Clean clothes pile. On top of the dryer.”
“What do they look like?” she called from the dryer.
“I… flowers. Or plaid? I don’t remember.” Falling sideways on the couch, I buried my face in Rory’s pillow, trying to block out the world.
I started awake again when she yanked the pillow away. “I only found a flat sheet,” she said, holding up something blue with curly amoeba-looking things printed all over it. “No pillow cases.”
“Ernie ate holes in them. He was after the feathers.” I waved her off and reclaiming the pillow. “Just… throw a towel over it.”
“Where can I get a towel?”
I groaned, trying to think. The last time I’d used a towel, I’d discarded it on the floor next to the computer desk. But… she didn’t want that one. “Clean clothes pile?” I guessed. “Green. Or brown, maybe,” I mumbled.
If I’d still been awake, I would’ve seen the look she shot me as she walked back to the stairs with a purple towel.
Chapter Four
FRANCES
A shape hovered over me.
No, not just a shape. A creature.
It had eyes, and was watching me in the soft light. It was small, and very close. Just above me. On me.
My eyes snapped open, I was awake, and the creature was real.
I shrieked and rolled out of bed. At least, I would’ve rolled out of bed, if the bed hadn’t been up against a wall. I discovered this with my knee, and my face.
Recovering from the blow, simultaneously trying to figure out where the hell I was and trying to escape the tiny creature with the malevolent eyes, I launched myself off the end of the bed. The floor came up to meet me faster than expected, and I careened across the room trailing a mish-mash of blankets.
Regaining my balance, I whirled. I scanned the sparse and unfamiliar room. Blue paint on the walls. A dresser, drawers hanging open. A mattress on the floor. Two windows, through which morning sunshine was partially blocked by tinfoil.
No small brown creature with beady black eyes.
Expecting it to be hiding in a mound or fold, I carefully peeled a quilt off the floor, then a light satin comforter. The blue paisley flat sheet I’d slept on had followed me out of bed as well, and I tossed it onto the heap of blankets on the stained mattress.
It was coming back to me now. I was in Zack’s room. Zack of the brawny shoulders, the strong arms, the pretty blue eyes. Zack with the red Jeep and asshole brother. Zack, who’d kidnapped me.
I retrieved my clothes from their wad on a chair and yanked them on. Finger-combing my hair, I emerged. After the havoc last night, all was eerily quiet as I came down the stairs.
A single man sat
at the bar, his back to me. Zack, I knew, and not only because he was wearing the same shirt as last night. There were the shoulders, the arms. He was leaner than his brother, and his hair was lighter. Where Rory’s was a shaggy dirty-gold, Zack’s was too short to grab, and light enough to glow in the dark.
Smelling coffee, I approached.
He didn’t glance my way until I stood at the end of the bar. Then, it was a slow motion of reddened, bleary eyes. The side of his face was liberally decorated with pillow marks. Still looking at me, still saying nothing, he raised his mug, and sipped.
“Coffee?” I asked.
His eyes drifted toward the kitchen, and he extended his chin.
I spotted the machine, and grinning, went to get myself some. He’d accused me of trying to take advantage of him last night. Well, it occurred to me that morning might be an even better time to do so. “Do you have half and half?”
He just stared. Blankly.
In the fridge, I found grainy milk and a suspicious carton of heavy whipping cream. The cream failed the whiff test, but when I took a steak knife to it, decapitating the carton and taking the crusts and mold with it, what remained looked acceptable. Mixing them half and half into my coffee, I took a cautious sip, and grimaced. Somebody liked his coffee strong.
And still, Zack stared. One of his brows had twitched when I’d picked up a knife, but he didn’t speak. I wondered if I’d damaged his brain with that wall.
Coming around the bar, I saw Lucy’s door gaped open. The interior of the room had been stripped.
I climbed up onto the stool next to Zack’s. “Where is everybody?”
He sucked in another mouthful of coffee. “Left,” he croaked.
Sipping my own, I waited.
“Rory took Lucy to Dotty’s. Gonna catch a plane.”
“So she actually is leaving?”
“Left. You can have her room. If you’re staying.”
Smiling, I shook my head. “I thought about it, and…” I watched his shoulders droop, “…I’ll do it. For twenty thousand dollars.”
He sprayed coffee across the bar. “What?!”
“Twenty thousand,” I said. “Half up front. And I will take her bedroom. And you will make sure I have sheets. I like satin.”
Zack threw his head back and laughed. “Twenty K for a month? You gotta be kidding me. I mean, for that, I could get a flight instructor—a male one—a cook, a maid, a masseuse, a fluffer, and several cheap whores.”
“Twenty thousand,” I repeated. “And I won’t be cooking, or cleaning, or fluffing any-damn-thing.”
“But… why?” he sputtered.
“Why so much?” At his nod, I slid from my stool, and crossed to the front door. “Exhibit A,” I said, indicating the moldering roast lying on the floor, which was carpeted in astroturf.
“That’s Ernie’s,” Zack said.
“Who is Ernie?”
“He’s our ermine.”
“Ah. An ermine.” That’s what’d woken me up, a little weasel. “Is he tame?”
Zack wiggled his hand in the so-so gesture. And, considering my own choice of pets, I understood the concept of somewhat-but-not-really tame completely.
Moving on. “Exhibit B,” I said, sweeping my arm in a kitchen-encompassing arc. The counters were covered in dirty dishes. A cloud of fruit flies hovered lazily over the sink.
“That’s what happens when you eat,” Zack said. “Which you have to do, you know, to survive.”
“Uh-huh. Exhibit C,” I said, pulling the fridge door wide.
Zack stared blankly at the interior. “What’s wrong with it?”
I reached in and pulled out a bag of some greenery that’d long since turned into brown sludge, and then had disgorged its contents all over the glass shelves. “You have exactly four things in here,” I said, holding it up. “Grainy milk. Moldy cream. Rotten… whatever this is. And one wilted carrot.” I snagged it, then wiggled it at him.
His cheeks pinkened. “What about the door?”
“Oh, you’re right! I missed a beer, and a beer, and half a beer, and a bottle that’s probably more beer—”
“It’s cider, actually,” Zack muttered.
“And a bottle of horseradish, two years expired.”
“It’s still good. It’s horseradish.”
“Fucking hell,” I said, throwing the contents back in before slamming the door. “Why should I believe you have ten thousand dollars—let alone twenty—when you can’t even afford food?”
Zack scratched his chest. “We can afford food. Due for a grocery run. You done?”
“Not even by half,” I said, rounding the bar. “Exhibit D.”
He swiveled in his seat to look at the snow blower disguised as a coffee table. A piece of plywood had been fixed to the top with duct tape. A few nuts and bolts littered the floor beneath it, along with some oil stains. “What? We’re fixing it.”
“Didn’t I see a shop out there, just before you slammed my head into the door?”
He winced. “Yeah.”
“So, why are you doing it in here?” And how could they ‘fix’ it with a sheet of plywood duct-taped to the top of the damn thing?
“The TV’s in here,” he said, glancing past me.
“And this couch!” ‘Extremely well-used’ didn’t even begin to cover it. I saw exposed springs and batting as well as crusty, white… “What are these white stains?”
“Ice cream?”
Shaking my head, I braced myself, then headed to the bathroom. “Exhibit E.” I was unwilling to go in, to even look in. I’d discovered the horror last night, and had run outside to squat on their lawn instead. “That,” I said, “is foul. Disgusting. Disturbing. Putrid. Utterly nasty. Shall I go on?”
Zack huffed.
I took that as a no, and crossed to Lucy’s open door. “And finally,” I said, “the coup de grâce.”
I went in. Zack was slow to follow.
“Exhibit F,” I said. “‘F’ as in what. The fuck?” I pointed to the contraption dangling in the corner.
“It’s a sex swing,” Zack said.
I stared at him.
“You want me to pay you an extra ten K because I have a sex swing? That makes no sense.”
“I want an extra ten K,” I said, “because you and your brother are crazy, filthy, and depraved. And living here would be a hazard to my health, my sanity, and my virtue.”
Zack snort-laughed. Casting a glance at my face—I was serious, damn it!—his chuckles escalated. “Your virtue,” he said. “Good one.”
I followed him from the room. “Hey, if you’re gonna malign my character—”
“Save the ten-thousand-dollar words for Rory,” he said. “And, you wanna deal? Let’s deal.” He spun to face me. “Fifteen thousand for the month, but you also have to do the dishes every other day, and clean the bathroom weekly while you’re here.”
I drew myself up. “No amount of money in the world would be enough to persuade me to touch that toilet. And it doesn’t need cleaning; it needs some kerosene and a match.”
He crossed his arms, looking at me with an infuriating smirk.
“Twenty thousand,” I said, “and I won’t start until the kitchen and bathroom are clean, and you’ve stocked the fridge.”
His eyes had narrowed. “Seventeen-five, and we make use of the swing three times a week.”
My mouth fell open. I hadn’t even begun to decide how to respond to that when glass shattered, and something whizzed through the air between us. The object met the large flat-screen, and exploded. The wall around it, the ceiling, the floor, and the snow-blower were all spattered with pink chunks. I felt something wet land in my hair.
Zack stared at the mess. Then he turned, and booked it outside.
“What the… hell?” If I didn’t miss my guess, that’d been a watermelon.
I raced after my kidnapper, faltering as I spotted the row of catapults lining the river’s edge.
Zack latched onto my wri
st and hauled me to the biggest catapult. “You load it,” he said. “I’ll crank.”
“Load it?” Clueless wasn’t usually my thing, but this was so far outside my realm of experience—
Watermelon guts spattered me as another bomb landed.
“That bucket,” Zack yelled, gesturing impatiently. “Put it in the basket.”
I got a little distracted by his arm muscles bulging, and bulging, and bulging again as he cranked, but finally bent to the lidded bucket. “Oof,” I said, hefting it into my arms. “What’s in this thing?”
“Poop,” Zack said.
I froze where I’d been struggling to lift it over my head. “Seriously?”
Zack answered with a slow, naughty grin.
Ew, ew, ew. “Human?”
“Oh yeah.”
“Yours?”
“Half.”
Holding the heavy bucket in my arms—was it just me, or was it slightly warm?—I reflected that this might be the most intimate I’d ever gotten with a man. I had to be holding about forty pounds of pure brown gold to my chest—though only half of that was Zack’s.
“They’re running! Gimme that.” Zack grabbed the bucket from me, and slung it into the basket with the strength of a man and the ease of long practice. “Clear!”
My hair wooshed back as the orange Home Depot bucket, full to the brim with the product of two true do-it-yourselfers, launched. It spun as it arced majestically over the river. End over end over end…
Beyond the whirling shit-bomb, on the opposite shore, the men’s eyes widened. A couple dived aside. One, though, was caught in the headlights. The bucket burst just feet in front of him, painting the landscape—and that unfortunate soul—brown. Grimacing, I had to look away.
Zack tried to give me a high-five.
I stared at him, Zack, my kidnapper, who’d just launched a bucket of human feces at his neighbors. I swung my gaze over to his cabin, which was a madhouse and royal mess. I thought about his seventeen thousand dollars, the potential twenty, and what I could do with that money.
The money… just wasn’t enough.
I spun, sprinted across the yard, and jumped into the driver’s side of the Jeep, found the keys in the ignition, and turned them. Nothing. Glancing down at the shifter, I realized why.