by Shaye Marlow
“Ralph told me you killed somebody in the ring,” Ed countered.
“I was wild with grief,” George said. “It was unintentional. And Ralph’s response was unreasonable. He had no right to banish me. I helped build this place.”
“I think he made the right decision. You were—are—unpredictable. Dangerous.”
George’s fists clenched, and his crazy stare swung to Suzy.
“You said I had everything to do with this,” Ed said, probably hoping to distract him. “What did you mean?”
“A few years ago, before Ralph died, we had started talking about peace. I wanted my rightful stake in the bar, and he was willing to give me that. Through my daughter.”
All eyes swung to me. I shook my head. My heart was thundering, because I knew where this was going. Frantically, I looked for a way out.
“He agreed to an alliance. By marriage,” George said. “Frances was to marry… you.”
There were murmurs of “Is he off his rocker?” and “These aren’t medieval times.”
Ed cleared his throat. “My father never said anything about that.”
“Frances found out about it, though, and you know what she did?”
I closed my eyes, wishing I could be free of this nightmare. Wishing I had a good, sane, loving father.
“She went off and got herself married,” George said. “And I’ll admit, I was a bit heartbroken, knowing the alliance wouldn’t go through. But, just recently…” I could feel his gaze boring into me “…she got an annulment.”
My eyes flew open. “How do you even know that?”
“So you see,” George continued, “she’s free, and you’re free, and now we can honor Ralph’s wishes, and end this war between us.”
Ed shook his head.
“There’s a gun to your bride’s head that says you’ll do this,” George said. “Right now.”
Phil tightened his grip, making Suzy cry out.
I exploded out of my chair. “George!” A couple guns swiveled my way, but I didn’t give a damn. “You are completely out of line right now. You have no right!”
“You can’t do this,” Suzy cried. “Legally, there’s no way. There are applications, waiting periods—”
George scoffed. “I can, and have. You don’t live here your whole life without making friends in the right places.”
“Frances, I’m sure you’re a very nice girl,” Ed started.
“She’s not,” George said, and all of the hunting guides were shaking their heads.
“And someday,” Ed continued, “you’ll make someone very happy. But I’m in love with Suzy, and it’s Suzy I’m marrying.”
“That’s fine,” I snapped, “because I’m not marrying you. And there’s nothing you can say or do to force me,” I said to George.
“You don’t think so? What about Morty? Are you prepared to give up your precious pet?”
The blood drained from my head, leaving me woozy. “You wouldn’t.”
“Oh, I would,” George assured me. “I would so fast, your head’d spin. I’d kill him, and I’d enjoy it.”
“Damn you.” When I shot him, I should’ve aimed a foot to the left.
“Isn’t there some other way we could settle this?” Ed asked. “I’d pay you half the value of the bar, in gold, right now, to let this go. To just drop it and walk away.”
“No,” George said. Then, to me, “Get up there.”
I shook my head. “I’m not doing this. You can’t do this. George, these people are in love.”
George snorted. “Doesn’t matter. They can still fuck after you two are hitched. It only has to be on paper. Though, you will need to consummate the marriage. Shouldn’t be too terribly difficult for you, eh?”
Joss made a grab for me, and Zack punched him in the throat. After a little skirmish, Ted had the muzzle of his rifle to Zack’s head, and Joss dragged me to the front. I drew blood with my nails, blackened his eye, and stabbed him with my heel, but he still managed to get me to the altar.
He deposited me, kicking and cussing, next to Ed.
George was right behind. “You don’t even need to say the words. Just sign here,” he continued, holding out a marriage license.
“I won’t do it.” I lashed out, trying to knock the paper from his grip, to tear it, but he pulled it away, fast for a big man.
“You will.” He nodded to Joss again, who grabbed my hand. George slapped the page on the altar. “Her signature is just a sloppy F with some squiggles behind it.”
Joss helped put a pen in my hand, then forced that hand to the paper.
“This won’t hold up in court,” I said, struggling.
“Of course it will. No one gives a damn. Vital Statistics is just some clerk in a little fluorescent office entering data.”
“God damn you, I’ll never forgive you for this,” I said, both to the guide I’d ‘boinked’ once upon a time, and to my father. I watched as a signature remarkably like mine began to form. I yelled my frustration, then bit Joss’s arm. He ignored it long enough to finish the deed, then shook me off. I made a grab for the paper, but George had already snatched it up.
He turned to Ed. “Now you.”
Ed shook his head.
Behind me, Suzy made a pained little sound, and I knew Phil had applied pressure. We all heard the subtle click of a gun cocking.
Eyes on his bride, Ed held out his hand. George put a pen in it, and Ed signed.
George chuckled as he gathered up the signed marriage license. “Well, folks, you’ve made me a very happy man. Congratulations to the new couple.” With a wink, he pivoted, walked down the aisle, and let himself out the door. His guides followed, walking slowly backward, covering the room as they left.
Then they were gone. Ed ran to Suzy and Helly to Gary.
Zack came to me. “You okay?” he asked. They’d ripped his blue tux.
“Of course she’s not okay,” Dotty said. “She was just forced into marriage at gunpoint.”
Zack pulled me close, and I didn’t cry on men’s shoulders as a general rule, but… I buried my face against his shirt, letting his jacket block out the world as I concentrated on breathing past the lump in my throat.
“Are we going to let that stand?” Harv asked.
“No,” Zack said, his voice rumbling against my ear.
“No,” Ed agreed. “I want that piece of paper.”
“And I want to kick his ass,” Zack said.
“What’s the plan?” Gary asked. “Go after them now? Or tonight?”
“They’ll be expecting us tonight,” Dotty said.
“They’re probably expecting us now,” Harv pointed out.
“The cover of darkness would be advantageous,” Gary said.
“To them, as well as us,” Dotty said. “They’ll be on their home turf, and by tonight, would’ve had time to dig themselves in.”
“Here’s what we’re going to do,” Ed said. “Everyone who wants to participate in this—and this very well might exacerbate the feud, and at the worst, people might die, so think about that—needs to go home, and get armed. We meet at Zack and Rory’s place in exactly one hour. And we go from there.”
ZACK
Frances and I headed back to my cabin, and Ed followed soon after. I opened the door for him before he got the chance to knock.
He was standing at the base of the slick steps, holding out a hand to catch a drip from the eaves. “What on earth?”
“We had a little bit of a lube spill,” I said. “Watch your step.”
Shaking his head, Ed picked his way carefully up, but stopped shy of entering to fix me with his intense stare. “If you help me with this,” he said, “I’ll help you. I know you’re trying to improve your reputation in the neighborhood. Getting this ironed out is my first priority, and so I’m telling you, you help me, we get this fixed, and you are no longer a pariah.”
“Me and Rory.”
Ed nodded. “We can extend it to Rory.”
&n
bsp; “We’ll be in with you?”
“You’ll be in with everybody,” Ed said.
I rubbed the back of my neck. “Wow, that would be… Yes,” I said, and shook his hand.
Ed turned to offer Suzy a steadying hand, and when they stepped inside, their feet squished on lube-sodden astroturf. After they got over their initial bewildered disgust, their gazes found Frances crumpled at the bar.
“Frances,” Ed said, “what kind of defenses does your dad have up there?”
“Guns,” she muttered into her hands.
“Anything else?” Ed asked. “Pit traps? An armored tank?” Where Ed’s look was mild, Suzy was glaring at Frances like she wanted to break a chair over her, knock her to the ground, and stomp all over her with her tiny, steel-toed boots.
Frances slanted her eyes our direction. “No. Nothing like Zack and Rory’ve got. He just has lots of guns.”
“Don’t forget the Rottweilers,” I said.
“How many men to hold those guns?” Ed asked.
“Eight, including himself. Everyone you saw at the wedding.” She grimaced, looking like she might cry.
“So, eight crack shots?”
“Half have excellent aim. The rest get on all right.”
“Tell me about the lodge and property.”
“It’s a single big building, surrounded by trees. 18-inch log construction.”
“So we’ll need heavy artillery,” Ed mused. He looked at me. “We should take your Jeep.”
“Yeah, about that. Rory has it, and I don’t know where he went. I’ve called him, and he’s not answering.” One thing I did know: He hadn’t cleaned up the lube before he’d left. Not that that would’ve been a mere couple-hour operation. I suspected the astroturf would need to come up.
“Okay,” Ed said evenly. “What about that rocket launcher?”
“We planning on blowing George’s place up?” I asked, glancing Frances’s way. If she cared, she didn’t show it.
“The fact is,” Ed said, “we need leverage, and I’m thinking a man like George may respond well to threats.” He raised a brow. “So, do you still have it?
“That’s not really my area—Rory’s the weapons guy—but I think so. Here.” I jabbed the button in the bottom of the wastebasket, opening the door to the bunker, then waved Ed on. “The lockers on the right, labeled by type. Knock yourself out.”
Moving with a slowness borne of caution, Ed began his descent.
“Mmmm,” the disembodied feminine voice purred. “Rory, you’re so huge.”
Ed cast me a glance over his shoulder.
I shrugged, then turned to look at Frances. She still had her head in her hands, and a few feet off, Suzy was still giving her the evil eye.
I crossed to Ed’s woman, gently grasped her arm, and pulled her a bit farther away from mine. “It wasn’t her fault,” I said.
“Not her fault? She had a choice,” Suzy said. “She signed the paper.”
“Under duress,” I pointed out. “Forced, by her crazy dad.”
“Yeah, well, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.” If her gaze had been laser beams, Frances would’ve had two big holes in her.
“Suzy,” I said. “Think about this. You don’t see eye-to-eye with your dad, either, correct? Yet you’re holding Frances responsible for her dad’s actions?”
Suzy looked away, the muscles in her jaw flexing.
“You liked her well enough a few days ago. Ed and I will fix this, and you two will get hitched, and everything will be fine. Okay?”
She looked from me to Frances with her posture softening by degrees.
“Why don’t you go down and help your fiancé select some weapons of mass destruction,” I suggested, steering her toward the opening that was no longer secret.
Suzy shrugged me off and went to Frances. “Hey.”
Frances looked up with reddened eyes, and I prepared to grab Suzy and drag her away. If she was mean…
Instead of yelling, or saying anything at all, Suzy patted Frances on the back. Her hand lingered as the two women exchanged a long look. Then Suzy nodded, patted her one last time, and headed downstairs.
I let out the breath I’d been holding. “You all right?” I asked, approaching.
Frances put her head back in her hands and mumbled something.
“Frances?” When she didn’t respond, I stroked a hand over her hair, and lowered my voice. “Franny?”
I was pretty sure the next mumble was, “Don’t do it.”
I grinned. “Fanny?”
She lifted her head to glare at me. Green. They were green when she was upset.
“How does it feel to be Mrs. Ed?” I asked, because, let’s face it, I couldn’t be sensitive 24/7.
“We want to talk!” Ed yelled.
We’d taken four-wheelers up to George’s place; me and Frances, Ed and Suzy, Helly and Gary, and about a dozen other residents and fishing guides, all bristling with weapons. The better shots had stationed themselves in the trees surrounding George’s place, while the rest staged just inside the tree line in a show of support and, if necessary, force.
Frances and Ed and I stepped out into the open. The dogs made a run for us, but Frances quickly corralled them. She sat with them, keeping them calm.
“I have nothing to say to you,” George called from the balcony. “It’s done.”
“It won’t hold up in court. I’ll see that it doesn’t,” Ed said.
My neck prickled, feeling the guns trained on me. I could only see two of George’s men—one at the corner of the building, his rifle braced on a jutting corner log, while the other perched on the balcony next to George—but I was sure there were more, hidden somewhere.
“Then I kill her bear, Morty.”
“You think I give a fuck?” Ed asked. “She might choose to save the life of an illegal pet over happiness in her own life, but I will not. Now, I came prepared to bring this place down around your ears—”
“Uh-huh. And how do you propose to do that?” George looked amused.
“Zack has rockets.”
George’s gaze swung to me.
“We are prepared to use those rockets,” Ed said. “But we are willing to deal. Let me come in. Let’s talk about this.”
George considered. “Fine. Just you.”
“Me and Zack.”
“Why?”
“This concerns him.”
“Why?”
“He loves your daughter.”
I looked first at Ed, then over at Frances. She looked just as surprised as I was. Not as surprised as George, though.
“Did you not know?” Ed asked.
“I’m afraid Frances left that little detail out of her reports,” George said. “Fine. You and the idiot Zack may come in. Frances stays out here. I’m tired of her histrionics.”
I cautiously approached the porch, noting that the railing had been repaired. One of George’s men swung the door open from the inside, and Ed and I entered the building.
The interior was cavernlike, smelled like dusty fur, and was cluttered with trophies. The stuffed heads of just about every cloven-hoofed critter known to man covered the walls, while big cats slunk in the shadows. A huge set of elephant tusks towered in one corner, next to a standing bear.
“Come,” said George.
We waded through two bear furs to get to the living room. George lowered himself into a big chair apparently upholstered in wolf pelts, then gestured us toward the couch, which was trimmed in beaver.
“So,” George said. “Deal.”
“I want that marriage license,” Ed said.
“And you offer?”
“Him,” Ed said, pointing at me.
George’s brows drew down as I sputtered. “And why would I take that trade?”
“The bar’s a money pit, which frankly, you don’t want,” Ed said.
“But, all the gold nuggets—”
“Are from my mining claim. The bar’s not worth much. It’s dry-rott
ed and being eaten by carpenter ants.”
“But you’re having work done on it,” George argued.
“There’s only so much you can do. It’s a labor of love at this point, more than anything else. Zack, on the other hand, is part owner in a very lucrative business.”
Frances’s father looked at me balefully. “That catapult business?”
“You know of it?” I asked.
“I’d have to be blind not to see the catapults lined up on the shore. And then, there were Frances’s reports. So, what about it?” George asked, sounding impatient.
“Zack owns half, and his half is worth more than half of the bar, and Zack is single. And he loves your daughter,” Ed said.
George glared at me. I thought about punching him in the eye.
“He’s an idiot,” George said. “That shit’s heritable.”
“I read somewhere,” Ed said, “that 80% of a child’s intelligence comes from its mother.”
“And, actually, like I said, I think it was the concussions,” I added.
I really thought George was going to fly into a rage, what with the way his fingers gripped the arms of his chair and his face reddened. But, gradually his expression mellowed. “Promise me you’ll take good care of her,” he said, “and I’ll sign her over to you.”
His phrasing made me wince. “Of course I’d take good care of her, but Frances isn’t going to like this.”
“She has two choices: him, or you,” George said.
“She actually likes you,” Ed said.
“I dunno. Her last husband, she stole his plane and flew away.”
“So don’t give her the keys,” George said.
“I doubt it’d be that simple. She won’t like this,” I repeated.
“Ehhh, she’ll forgive you. Just apologize and buy her something nice. Diamonds always worked on her mother.”
“Apologies don’t seem to work on her.”
George leaned forward, eye flashing. “Look, I’m tired of discussing this. Him, or you. Choose.”
“Him,” Ed said.
George got up and retrieved a couple pieces of paper. He dropped them in front of me, along with a pen. “Sign.”
The top one was a Marriage License Application, the next a Certificate of Marriage. I began to hear a roaring in my ears. Am I really doing this?