by Shaye Marlow
The women made sounds of irritation. A couple turned and headed toward the bar.
“Where y’all going?” Rory called. “We’re not done yet!” They ignored him, and Rory stuck his tongue out at their retreating backs.
Then he took the rocket launcher from Ed. He reloaded, and passed it to Wreck.
The Frenchman staggered under the thing’s weight. He was muttering about Americans and their guns as he pointed the business end toward the woods.
“Now, wait a damn minute. You can’t tell me just holding that thing doesn’t tickle your dick,” Rory said.
Wreck didn’t answer, squinting awkwardly as he attempted to aim.
“No?” asked Rory. “Well, then… I’m docking you for your lack of excitement about one of the biggest, baddest, red-bloodedest ‘guns’ you’ll ever have the pleasure of handling.”
Flinching, Wreck pulled the trigger.
Ka-BOOM! The ground shook under another plume of dirt and dust and smoke.
Creeeeaaak. He’d finished off the tree Ed’d fired at, widening the hole under its roots and knocking it back with the force of the explosion. Roots snapped as it tipped. But then, it got caught up on another birch, teetering there, looking like—
“Timber!” Rory yelled.
Both trees toppled, the weight of the first felling the second. They crashed to the ground in a thrashing of branches and trailing flutter of leaves.
“Ha! That’ll be hard to beat,” Zack said.
“Just gimme the damn thing,” I said.
Rory was looking back at Wreck as he handed the rocket launcher to me. “You flinched,” he accused the other man.
“So? I took down two trees. It is the results that count.”
“Actually, style counts, too,” Rory said, with a nod to Zack, who made a note.
I was a little uncomfortable with this, but that was quickly overshadowed by a tsunami of childlike glee. I was holding a rocket launcher in my hands. I was going to fire it. I was going to blow something up!
None of those video games could have prepared me for the real deal, for its heft, the curve of cool metal. The ridiculous directions printed on the side.
I propped it up on my good shoulder, lining up the little sights. And then… I pulled the trigger.
And… I’m not really sure what happened. The rocket came out; that, I knew. Then, noises, one on top of the other. Muffled clangs. And then… Ka-BOOM!
But there was no explosion. None in the woods—at least, none that I could see.
It was Ed’s curse that drew my head around.
Oh… shit.
Smoke rose from next to the dock, a big cloud of it, obscuring what I’d hit. There were boats there, at least a dozen. I hoped like hell I hadn’t hit one, but I knew in my heart I had to’ve. There’d been no spray of water…
And then, the smoke cleared. “Oh, no.” It was worse than I’d thought.
It was Suzy’s barge. She’d parked on the beach next to the dock to deliver the bar’s new furniture. And the thirty-foot boat was still there, but now there was a gigantic hole in the deck. The aluminum twisted back from the gaping wound, the gunwales were torqued outward, and the cabin’s front window was a total loss.
Water boiled up onto the aluminum decking from the gaping wound, running and pooling around a 55-gallon drum sitting in the back. Flame gouted from the mouth of the dented drum, blackening the front wall of the barge’s cabin.
Suddenly Ed was there. He jumped onto the sinking boat, kicking up water as he ran to the back. He slapped the cap on the drum, smothering the fire.
The barge was tilting with the force of the current, aluminum screeching on aluminum as it leaned on the other boats. They dipped under the pressure, their bows starting to ride up onto the dock.
Ed tossed me the stern line. “Pull!” he yelled.
I had no idea how I’d even gotten there, but I was, and I caught the rope, and I knew it wouldn’t be enough. The barge was sinking, and as it sank, more water hit it. Which made it pull harder, even as it looked like it might make the big boat roll. Gritting my teeth, I dug in my heels, relieved when people piled in behind me. I didn’t know who or how many, just that they were taking up the slack, and the boat slowed its awful swinging roll.
“We need to get it up out of the water!” Ed yelled. He was reeling the gate up, hanging onto the side as the big boat tilted, leaning heavily on the boats next to it. Plastic crunched as engine casings collapsed under the pressure.
Suzy snatched up one of the bow lines. Helly crowded in behind her, then Harv, and then—thank god—the giant twins grabbed the end of the rope, while several people piled up on the other.
I strained at my rope, feet skidding on slick beach rocks as we tried to keep Suzy’s barge from rolling. If the barge rolled, it would go over on top of those other boats. If it rolled, the surface it’d present to the current would be so large, it might just take out the dock. And if it took out the dock, all the boats tied to the dock—even those on the other side—would go with it.
And years from now, the story would still be told: How J.D., with a single rocket, killed Suzy’s livelihood, and sank everyone’s boat.
I gritted my teeth, hauling back for all I was worth. It couldn’t happen. I wouldn’t… freaking… let it!
“On three!” Ed yelled, leaping ashore. “One. Two!” He attached himself to the end of one of the bow ropes. “Three!
The two lines of people on the bow heaved, and the big boat grated an inch or two up the beach.
“Heave!” Ed yelled, and they did. Again, and again, coaxing the boat up the beach with painful slowness.
Literally, painful. My arms shook from exertion, and still the boat was trying to tip.
Above us, an engine growled. I looked up to find the Jeep backed to the edge of the cutbank. A set of realistic-looking balls dangled from the hitch at eye-level.
Well. That was new.
“Tie her off!” Zack yelled, jumping down to the shore.
We struggled to hold the rear end as they let up pressure, and the boat slid back an inch. We were losing the battle, one millimeter at a time.
“Hurry!” I urged, hearing the grunts of the guys behind me, the grating of rocks beneath our feet.
The Jeep’s engine growled. The lines went taut.
The boat started to slide up out of the water.
The Jeep slowed, shuddered, and finally jumped as all four tires broke loose. The vehicle swung to the side and was dragged almost back to where it’d started before the brakes caught.
“We need more weight!” Rory yelled out the window.
Several people piled in. The last had barely pulled his foot off the ground before the Jeep lunged forward once more. It gained an inch. Then two. Four. It hit that spot it’d lost traction before, and the engine bogged down, straining.
“Pull!” Ed yelled.
Everyone hauled on the ropes, helping the Jeep.
“Again!” Grunts of effort joined the throaty roar of the engine as they gained more ground.
A foot now. The pressure on our line decreased, and then it was two feet, and the barge was righting itself as it grated up onto dry land. Water sluiced back and drained from the scuppers as it slid slowly from the water.
The people on the lines jumped out of the way as Rory dragged the barge all the way up until it was nosed in against the grass. The last few feet of the big boat still sat in the water, but the current next to shore was lazy, and the other twenty-some feet were well and truly beached. It wasn’t going anywhere.
But I tied our line off to a tree, just in case.
Then I went to Suzy, who stood stock-still, staring at the wreck of her boat.
“I’m so sorry,” I said, knowing I could never be sorry enough. Knowing ‘sorry’ wouldn’t change things, wouldn’t fix her barge.
She turned her head to look up at me. Her expression was blank.
Then, her eyes narrowed.
I held up my hands.
“I’m sorry,” I repeated, remorse weighing heavily on my heart. “Tell me what I can do to make this right.”
But her head turned some more, and her body followed, and then she was striding up the beach. I watched her go, wondering if she’d just decided never to talk to me again.
Rory’d gotten out of the Jeep and was preening. He and Zack high-fived. “Well, J.D., I’d say you won that round!” Rory called.
Suzy boosted herself up onto her newly-wonkified gunwale, and stepped from it up onto the grass. She walked right up to Rory—who was grinning, looking quite ready to receive her profuse thanks, and who apparently didn’t notice the way she telegraphed her punch—and she hit him right in the teeth. It was a mean feat for one so short, but she managed it.
It seemed like Zack might get a little love, too, but Ed interposed himself. He caught her tiny fist. “It’s okay,” he was saying. “I can fix it. I will fix it.”
“Hey, that’s a great idea,” Rory mumbled. “We can make a challenge out of it…”
Ed turned his stare on him.
“What?” Rory asked.
All Ed had to do was give a little jerk of his head, and suddenly there were two fishing guides on each of my brothers, restraining them.
I stepped forward, wondering if I should intervene. Wondering why they hadn’t grabbed me, when I was so obviously at fault. “Hey, it was my rocket,” I said.
Ed gave me a subtle head-shake.
Suzy was glaring up at Zack. “You two broke my roof, and now you’ve broken my barge.”
“But, J.D.—”
“It was your rocket launcher!” she shrilled. “You brought it here, you thought it would be a good idea to blow shit up. This is your fault. I’m not gonna ask you to fix it, this time, because you two are incapable. But, you are going to pay for materials.”
Both of my brothers were nodding. “Yeah. We can do that.”
Suzy’s eyes went downright squinty. “And you know what else? I’m crashing your party.”
“What?”
“I’m taking over your little program, here. You two are no longer judges. In fact, instead, you two assholes will be competing right alongside J.D. and Pierre. I will judge, along with a panel of my choosing.”
Rory deflated, hanging in the grip of Ed’s men.
“Hon, why don’t we call it a night, instead?” Ed suggested. “We can get some revenge at a later date.”
Suzy considered.
I winced upon noticing the moisture gathering in the corners of her eyes. No matter how she wanted to spin it, I’d done this. I felt terrible.
Suzy looked up at Ed. “You really think you can fix it?”
“I do,” he said, stroking her cheek. “I’ll have it good as new in no time. I’ve got it taken care of,” Ed assured her.
“Thank you,” Suzy said quietly. She glanced up at my brothers. “You two assholes have been granted a reprieve. Now get the hell out of my sight. And take your rocket launcher, and your stupid boy-truck with you!”
Chapter Twenty-Three
J.D.
Time had gotten away from me, and now I was down to the wire. My flight left tomorrow.
But, I didn’t want to go. Thea and I had something good going, and I wanted to see where it took us.
What I really wanted, what I needed from her, was some confirmation that our relationship meant as much to her as it did to me. And if she was going to give it, it needed to be today.
I hadn’t spent the night with her, hadn’t ‘pressed my advantage’, as my brothers would’ve put it, because she hadn’t asked me to. She’d been walking like she was sore, and so I’d just kissed her goodnight, and let her get some sleep
But today, this morning, I was realizing I had limited time. And so, I was going to take the direct approach: I was gonna go over there, and ask her where we stood.
I neatened myself up in my best shirt, and feeling the first flutters of nerves, I headed out.
I stepped out the cabin door—and my whole world turned upside down. Literally. I was upright, walking, and then I wasn’t.
Instead, I was hanging from my ankles, the greens and browns and blues swirling as I spun.
“Get his arm,” Zack said. Hands latched onto my good arm, and it was Rory, practically hanging from me.
“What the hell?” I demanded, twisting, thumping him on the back of the head. He just scrunched his shoulders, pulled his head in like a turtle, and held on.
Then, Zack was on my bad arm. I howled as it extended to capacity, then gasped for breath as he must’ve realized his mistake and let up the pressure.
“Make sure and stabilize his scapula,” Rory said, confusing me.
Then Zack yanked, and sunbursts exploded across my vision. The pain was so great—so fucking excruciating—it overrode everything else. I vomited down Rory’s neck.
“Aiiieeee!” Scraping at the chunks caught in his hair and sliding down his collar, Rory released me and stumbled away.
I retched again as Zack manipulated my shoulder, turning it in a full rotation. He grunted with satisfaction. “Cut him down!” he called.
He left my field of vision, and a few moments later, I landed on the ground—on my injured shoulder. This time, I nearly blacked out.
As I lay there in a cold sweat, curled around my side, I reflected on the fact that this was quite possibly the most awful I’d ever felt. My rotator cuff was a ring of fire, throbbing, burning. My mouth tasted like bile, and I thought I might’ve landed in my own puke. I moaned, wondering where I’d gone wrong. Wondering how, exactly, my life had gotten to this point.
Zack’s shadow fell over me. “We fixed it,” he said.
My breath started to slow as I focused on his legs. His dumb, brute legs, which led up to his dumb, brute waist, and a couple feet above it, his dumb, brute face.
Him. He’d done this.
Maybe he mistook my silence for curiosity. “Remember how Thea said jerking it would help?” He took a moment to chortle at the pun. “And you said you couldn’t afford to pay a doctor to jerk it for you?” More chortling.
My eyes narrowed. The pounding had migrated to my head. In a detached section of my brain, I realized I’d never been so mad in my life. Anger problems seemed to run in the family, but they’d never before been my problem.
“Well, we figured out a work-around. We fixed you.” He sounded proud.
Carefully, cautiously, I shifted my weight. My shoulder screamed, and I fell back panting. Then I rocked forward again, put my hand down, and pushed upward.
My arm still worked, I discovered. My shoulder was burning, my fingers tingling, but it worked. I couldn’t believe it. I especially couldn’t believe that I was able to rotate my elbow up above shoulder height without any sort of help.
“See?” said Zack.
Still rotating my arm, slowly, deliberately, I waited for the debilitating pain to lessen.
“Zack,” called Rory. “Remember the plan?”
“Eh?” Zack just grinned.
“The plan was we jerk it—”
Yes, he chortled again.
“—and then we run.”
“Oh. Yeah,” Zack said thoughtfully. He was still watching me, still grinning. Not running.
Rory was behind me, so I couldn’t see, but his voice sounded farther away. “You see that look he’s giving you?” he called.
Zack inspected my expression.
“Do you know what that look means?” Rory’s voice was even smaller, but that was okay. I’d hunt him down, if need be, in order to give him his. Just as soon as I was done with Zack.
I popped my knuckles.
Zack looked puzzled.
“It means,” I said, climbing from the pile of my own vomit, “you’re a dead man.”
“But… why?” Zack scratched his head. “We fixed you. We did you a favor.”
He didn’t get it. The dumbass didn’t understand just how badly they could’ve hurt me—maybe had hurt me—with their little s
tunt. They weren’t doctors. They didn’t have the faintest idea what jerking it—ha ha—involved. They could have torn tendons, ligaments. Broken my bones. And I needed this body, not just for things like eating and getting dressed and awesome sex with the gorgeous woman next door, but also, it was my freaking livelihood.
What they’d done was unforgivable.
He looked confused even as I jumped on him. It gets a little repetitive here: I beat on him, found him to be surprisingly resilient, and beat on him some more. We wrestled across the yard in an extremely violent, balls-to-the-wall fashion. Though I favored my arm, I fought like a demon.
I soon had him subdued, very near where we’d begun. I picked him up by the collar, and slammed his head into the ground. “You two are done messing with me,” I told him, getting right up in his face. “No more ‘manover’, no more ‘helping’ me, no more shed. You’re done. Do you hear me?” I demanded, slamming his head again.
He bared his teeth at me.
I rolled him over, and ground his face into the vomit.
He started to struggle and gag, but I didn’t let up.
“Say it!” I yelled. “Say you’re done!”
“We’re done!” Rory cried, running into my field of vision. “We’re done messing with you! Don’t hurt him,” he said. “It was my idea.”
I glared up at him, actually a little charmed by the way Frankenstein didn’t want me to hurt his monster. If I’d been less pissed, I might have smiled. “You swear you’re done tormenting me?” I asked. “You swear on Zack’s life, on our mother’s soul?”
He fidgeted. “Define ‘torment’.”
In response, I ground Zack’s face into the mud again. He craned his neck around enough to growl at me through bloody teeth. “You can’t swear on someone’s soul, if they’re not dead,” he spat.
I was impressed. If he ever found himself in an action movie, he’d be that guy that couldn’t be killed, that kept getting up, that won against all odds. Hell, he had an MMA champ on his back, and he was still givin’ me ’tude.