“But then,” Rory continued for him, “after making that first cut, we saw that your cottonwood was hollow.” They looked at each other for a long moment. “And I, uh, we,” Rory finally continued, his voice laden with guilt, “happened to have some explosives…”
Oh my god. My heart started to race. The deed had already been done, but my body reacted as if it were happening, as if I could jump forward yelling ‘Stop!’.
“Go on,” I choked out. I moved my finger from the trigger for everyone’s safety.
“We thought, there was no way that tree was going toward your cabin. We’d tied it off,” Zack said.
As he said it, I imagined his head exploding in a red mist.
“So we stuffed the explosives down into the trunk, rigged it to blow, and hid around the side of your cabin.”
“We heard glass break first…” Zack looked like he badly wanted to run.
“As flying chunks of tree took most of them out,” I said.
Rory swallowed. “Yeah. And then your cabin shuddered.”
“As a giant tree came barreling through my roof,” I supplied.
“Yeah,” said Rory. “Then there was a loud crackling of wood.”
“As that giant tree broke the smaller tree you had tied it to clean off at the base.”
“Yeah,” Rory rasped. “And then there was another crunch…”
“As that smaller tree obliterated my generator house, while its top branches smashed my garden.”
“Yeah…”
I may have sounded reasonable, but my heart was thudding with rage, and I swear my vision had gone red. They’d pushed me too far. My trigger finger had a mad itch.
“Suzy…” Ed said in his soft voice, trying to keep me from killing Helly’s kin.
“You will fix this,” I told the two brothers. “You will fix all of this. Everything that you broke, or smashed. You will fix my roof, you will replace my windows, and you will build me a new generator shack. You will replant my fucking garden. And you will stay here until it’s done. You will not go back to Helly’s place. You will stay here, in a tent, and you will work. Got it?”
They were nodding, probably just eager for me to quit holding them at gunpoint. I glared at them. Obviously, what I was demanding wasn’t enough.
“You will also cook me dinner, every evening until you are done.”
Their faces fell.
I eyed Zack’s tattooed, extremely yummy chest, still naked since he’d used his shirt to surrender. They may have been idiots whose particular brand of crazy I was afraid might be catching, but they were still damn fine models of masculinity. Physically.
“And. You will not wear shirts, when you are in my sight.” I transferred my glare to Rory, waiting for what I’d said to register.
He gulped, and then pulled off his shirt. He was more wrestler than street-fighter, but his chest was damn good, too. Too bad I wouldn’t be touching either of them with a ten-foot pole.
I nodded, and let my shotgun dip. That’s when I realized Zack had puffed up like a rooster, and was glaring at Ed, who stood close by my side.
“Oh no,” I said. “Oh, nonono, that’s not how this works. You have absolutely no right to get all jealous. You burned that right. You crushed it,” I said. “You two and I are not a thing. We are not dating. We’re not gonna have sex. You’re gonna sleep outside, in your tent, with only the mosquitos for company. There will be no benefits,” I snapped.
“But—” Rory started.
“I don’t want to hear even a peep of objection from you,” I said. “Even if I do something like this.” I turned, sank my fingers into Ed’s beard, and dragged his mouth down to mine.
“Umph!” Ed said. His hands went to my shoulders on reflex, but he didn’t push me away.
I kissed him. That’s right, I kissed Ed. I found his mouth in that mess of wiry hair sticking out of his face, and I rubbed mine against it. And as I did, I found out that he actually smelled… really nice. Like spruce, and soap, and clean masculinity.
I took a baby step closer, until the shotgun was wedged between us, and I licked his lips. He made this little moaning sound that I found instantly inflaming, and when he did that, he opened his mouth.
He was a goner. I kissed him like I hadn’t kissed anyone in years. I kissed him with all the anticipation I’d been saving up for Helly’s stupid brothers. I kissed him like he smelled amazing, and tasted good, and felt perfect—because he did.
His hands slid down from my shoulders to span my waist, dragging me even closer as his tongue came out to play. The kiss that had been intended to spurn the two idiots who’d smashed my property turned into something hot, and wet. It went way past ‘friend’ territory, zooming straight toward 100% pure, undiluted sex.
I wanted to hook my knee over his hip and take him right there. But instead, I dropped back to my heels, and let our mouths part. I didn’t look at him. I couldn’t. I was still shocked that I’d just kissed Ed. That I’d had a kiss like that with a tame guy, a local I hadn’t looked at twice in my life.
Sensing my change in mood, he let his hands drop.
I turned away from them all, and let my breath sigh out. I was letting the anger and arousal go. I wasn’t going to kill anybody, and I wasn’t going to jump my employee in my fucked-up yard. I took a few moments, just breathing, letting the sound of the breeze stirring the leaves soothe my frayed nerves.
Then I tucked my wild, windblown curls behind my ears, and turned to smile sunnily up at Ed. “Thank you for helping me today. If you’ll just follow me back to the barge, I’ll pay you in cash.”
He was looking at me like he’d never seen me before. Or anything like me.
“No need,” he said.
I blinked at him. “What?”
“I don’t need payment. I’m happy to help.”
I stared at him. What?
Ed smiled at me. “You’ve got another trip in three days, right? Saturday?”
“Yeah, but—”
He nodded, already starting to back away. “I’ll see you then. In the meantime, let me know if I can help in any way with—” he waved his hand at the carnage “—this.”
I was still staring at him, dumbstruck. I simply didn’t know what to say, so I nodded.
With one last smile, he was gone.
I turned back to the brothers. Glared at them.
I was still pissed. Still. Fucking. Pissed. As long as that tree jutted from my collapsed roof, I’d be mad. And then probably for a long while after. In fact… it was probably going to take me years to get over this.
I stalked toward the two blond idiots, feeling some satisfaction when they scattered like game hens. “Follow me,” I growled at them. I led them to my shed, the single unmolested structure on my property, and let the door swing open wide. “Ladder,” I said, pointing to it. “Rope.”
I turned on them. “I want that tree out of my roof, and the hole covered by a tarp, and plastic over all of my windows, by tonight.” Before they could ask, I pointed in the shed again. “Tarp,” up on a shelf. “Visqueen,” a roll of heavy-duty, semi-clear plastic leaning in a corner. Standard Alaskan equipment.
The skinnier one spoke, tentatively. “Staple gun? Duct tape?”
“Yes.” I pulled two drawers out of the workbench along the left wall, and slapped the items in their hands. “Get to work,” I ordered.
Then I went inside to assess the damage.
Broken glass. That’s what caught my eye first. Glittering sprays across the window sills, the floor, the couch cushions.
I stuck my head back out. “And I want this glass up by tonight, too!”
“Yes, ma’am,” I thought I heard one of them murmur.
I set out a broom and dustpan while thinking vile thoughts about their ancestors. But, Helly shared those bloodlines, so… Well, I had no real idea what’d happened there. She was a halfway decent human being while those two—
Out one of my broken windows, I glimpsed them standing i
n the yard, gawking at what they’d done. Discussing how to approach this mess?
If only I were so lucky. Hell, they were probably congratulating each other.
Steeling myself, I walked up the stairs and looked into my bedroom.
There was a tree trunk crashed through the ceiling right above my bed. A tree. A friggin three-foot-wide cottonwood penetrated a couple feet through the sheetrock, angled from where it had splintered my headboard all the way up to punch through the ceiling on the other side. I could see daylight through the swath it had cut in my bedroom ceiling. I could feel a breeze.
Staring at the tree trunk, feeling like I might know the secrets of the universe if only I stared at it long enough, I slipped my phone from my pocket. Barely looking, still absorbing the surreal scene, I dialed Helly and put the phone up to my ear.
Helly answered on the second ring. “You make it back to your place yet?”
Still staring at the tree. “Yeah.”
A long silence filled the phone. “Suzy?” she finally asked.
I took a ragged breath.
“Oh, shit, Suzy, what did they do?”
“They blew out all my windows, crushed my generator shack, and… crashed a tree through my roof.”
Helly gave that the moment of silence it deserved, then, “You’re not kidding, are you? How did they even—you know what, never mind, don’t tell me. What are we going to do to them? Have them drawn and quartered? Chinese water torture? Break something of theirs? I’m up for it, and I know Gary’d help.”
“No,” I said. I sat on the edge of the bed, finally turning away from the spectacle. The far end of my room actually looked soothingly normal. “I’ve told them they’re going to stay, and they’re going to fix what they broke. They’re carpenters, right? They’re the perfect men for the job.”
“Um… the notion’s sound, but… are you sure you want to keep them for another several days? Every day, every hour, every minute, is an opportunity for them to pull more shit like this. They could sink your boat. Or set your woods on fire. Or… shoot something.”
“I’ll take their guns,” I said. “And I’ll kill them if they go anywhere near my boats. Seriously. Kill them. I’m sorry, Helly, but I’ll do it. I’ll make you an only child.”
“You’d be doing the world a favor,” she said. “But you’re forgetting about J.D.”
I shrugged, dismissing her third brother. “Speaking of boats, you need to come get yours. I don’t want them to escape before the job’s done.”
I heard her moving around, as if she were already getting up. “Understandable, and I can’t afford to leave my boat there for a week anyway. Gary and I’ll be down within the hour to get it. We’ve got some spare building materials—we’ll bring those, too.”
I sighed, and dropped my head forward to pinch the bridge of my nose. “Thank you,” I said.
What a shitty couple days this was turning into. Jimmie bails on me, then my gold nugget goes missing, and then my cabin gets partially destroyed while I’m left high and dry without a single orgasm in sight. I suppose I could demand orgasms as part of the brothers’ penance, but… they’d enjoy it too much.
“You find anything out about Ed?” Helly asked.
I half-laughed and shook my head. “He’s a nice guy,” I said. “Ridiculously so, and handy at fixing just about anything. And he refuses to take payment, ever.”
“Mm-hm,” said Helly.
“If you knew he was this way,” I said, feeling crotchety, “whyever would you think he took my nugget?”
“Do you ever get the sense that he’s too nice?” Helly asked.
“Yes, actually, I did have that thought.”
“I feel like he’s hiding something. Or if not that, there’s something plain wrong with him. No one’s that nice.”
“Hmm.” She had a point.
“I had a thought,” Helly said. “What about the airport? You could ask Dotty if there’s been any unusual traffic. Heck, you could even call the air services, see what they know. Only way in and out of here in summer is boat or plane.”
I glanced at the clock on my wall. 8:30. Which meant two things. One: Dotty and Harv were probably in bed by now, and Two: It was going to be a long night for me. I’d heard some scuffling against the siding I guessed might be the ladder, but the brothers hadn’t even fired up the chainsaw yet.
“I’m getting the mail in the morning,” I said. “I’ll ask her then. And ask her about Ed.”
“Good idea. What about the guides? They’re always up to something. Are you going to follow up on them?”
“Helly,” I said, trying very hard not to yell. “One thing at a time. It’s supposed to rain tonight, and I’m just hoping your brothers get that tree down and the tarp over the hole in my roof in time to keep it from raining on me. I just want to sleep tonight, and I want them to fix what they broke.”
“I am very sorry that they did that,” she said, her voice tentative.
“It’s all right,” I said with a heavy sigh. Same bloodlines, but, “Not your fault. I’ll drop your mail by after I talk to Dotty tomorrow morning, ‘kay?”
As it turned out, the brothers were able to get the tree down and a tarp over the hole before it rained. But did it stop the roof from leaking? No.
I lay in bed, trying to sleep, as the gaping hole in my roof began to drip. As the rain continued, the center of the tarp sagged inward. Water pooled. Then, began to trickle.
I dashed downstairs to get the tub I kept under the sink. Feeling miserable, I curled around that tub as water pissed into it from the ceiling.
I couldn’t sleep like this.
I got up, grabbed a bedpost, and tugged. As expected, it didn’t move. It’d taken two men to wrestle this bed into place, and that was before the box springs and mattress had been applied.
I stood there for a second, staring at my bed in the wee-hour gloom. I’d put on new sheets, but they were now spotted with water. My headboard was splintered, and that blue tarp sagged dangerously through the jagged hole in my ceiling. For about the dozenth time tonight, I felt like crying.
But crying wouldn’t get me anywhere, so instead, I tugged on the mattress. I moved the tub onto the box springs, and dragged my mattress over into a dry corner of the room.
I curled up in my damp blankets again, on my side facing toward the wreckage. After several minutes, I decided I probably was not going to be able to sleep at all. I had trouble sleeping at the best of times—which this was not.
My usual trick was masturbation. One or two orgasms would relax me to the point where I could drift off.
But now? Staring at the wreckage that was my bedroom? I really wasn’t in the mood.
I was tired, and angry, and damp. Hell, the brothers were probably dryer, out in their borrowed tent, than I was.
That last thought was the straw that broke the camel’s back. I threw back my blankets, grabbed the mostly-full tub, quickly slid an empty into its place, and stomped down the stairs. I pushed out my screen door, and stepped into the rain, in nothing but a night shirt.
Between the rain and the heavy fog creeping off the river, I could barely see their tent, which they’d set up in a shady nook at the edge of the trees. Not that I needed to see it—I’d locate those bastards by smell if that’s what it took to exact a little Helly-style revenge.
I didn’t try to move quietly as I crossed my yard. The rain was loud, covering any sounds I might have made as it slapped against leaves, spattered in mud puddles, and pinged off my roof.
It was a little surreal, really. I was out at two a.m., in the rain. I never stayed up till two a.m., and I wasn’t a real fan of being wet, either.
I set the tub down, and unzipped their tent flap. Inside, they were sleeping, snug as a couple bugs in a rug. I picked up the tub, swung it back.
And, with a joyous heave, I threw a couple gallons of cold rainwater on them.
One shrieked. The other howled. There was instant, flailing, mostly-naked
confusion.
I watched for a split second. Took a mental snapshot. Then, wearing an evil grin, I faded into the mist.
They’d figure out who’d done it—they’d have to be brain-dead not to—but there wasn’t a damn thing they could do about it. I should say, quite simply, that if they tried, I’d shoot them. That’s how mad I was.
I curled back up in bed. And—what do ya know?—I was finally able to fall asleep, rather quickly too, lulled by the memory of their screams.
Chap
ter Four
Our little community had mail flown in once a week. That day or the day after, residents would go and fetch it, usually for themselves as well as their close friends and neighbors. Mail day had been yesterday.
I left my cabin just before eight in the morning. I knew traditional post offices didn’t open until nine-ish, but ours was run by a sweet old couple, both of whom were early risers. Dotty and Harv had been living in that spot, and running that post office, for over forty years.
The post office was upstream, a few minutes past Helly’s slough, and on the left. I pulled my little boat in along the shore, and noticed the sound of a lawnmower the moment my engine cut out. I tossed out my anchor, and as I climbed up to the post office—it was a little log affair, technically one room though it had been divided into a front and back—I saw that Harv was out mowing the yard.
He dropped the push mower to an idle as I stopped next to him along the trail. “G’morning,” he said. “Here for your mail?”
“Good morning! Yes, but I was hoping to visit with Dotty a bit. She around?” I asked.
“Oh yeah, she was baking some something or other. Scones?” He scratched his head.
I smiled at him.
“You want Helly’s and your parents’ too?” he asked.
“That’d be great.”
Harv nodded. “Go on up to the house,” he said, waving his hand. “I’ll have the mail bagged up and on the porch for ya when you come back through.”
Two Captains, One Chair: An Alaskan Romantic Comedy Page 5
