The Cowboy's Make Believe Bride

by Kristi Rose

  “Deke doesn't have kids.”

  “But he owns his own home.”

  Fort sat back in the booth and repressed the urge to huff. “He inherited his family's ranch.”

  “True. He also has his business on main street.”

  “Also inherited.”

  Mrs. Z nodded. “He can't just grab his bedroll and hotfoot it out of town.”

  Now it was his turn to consider her words. He supposed from her perspective, it did look like he could just hightail it out any time he wanted.

  “Too bad you and that long-distance gal of yours ain't serious,” Mrs. Z said while smoothing the napkin in her lap.

  “What makes you think we aren’t?” He felt like a fool having a conversation about a make-believe person but, hell, it was time to chum the waters. See what surfaced.

  “Fortune Besingame, if you were to bring that girl here—what's her name?”

  Fort smiled coyly.

  “See! That's what I mean. If you were to bring her here, maybe things would be different. Maybe people wouldn't feel like you were gonna run off to be with her.”

  “What? No. That's crazy. I love it here.”

  Mrs. Z crossed her arms over her chest. “Well, how would we know? You won't even tell us her name.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Maybe you love her more than Wolf Creek.”

  “If I brought her here, wouldn't it look like a lame attempt to beat Deke?” Deke's dig had bothered Fort.

  “Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe it would show folks your intentions. They'd get to see a side of you they want to see.”

  When Sally put the check on the table, Fort reached for it as Mrs. Zykowski pushed it toward him. “I'm gonna let you treat me,” she said.

  “That was always my plan.” He smiled at her. “Thanks for the conversation, Mrs. Z.”

  “Think about what I said, and don't forget to come by tonight if you see something out there. I'm sure I'll be up.” She slid from the booth; her boots were bedazzled to match her hat. She then moved to stand by him and reached out to pat his shoulder. “You're a good boy, Fortune. Tell your mother I said hello.” She turned to Sally and called, “Bundle me up some of that pie, Sally, and put it on Fort's ticket.” She chuckled as she shuffled away.

  Well, hell, he was knee deep in a shit sandwich now. His girl may not exist, but he did have a friend who might be able to produce a real one for him. And now that he had the stupid idea, he couldn't stop ruminating over it. He couldn't even see any of its flaws, and that scared the piss out of him.

  3

  Nostalgia. For most people, recollections came with warm and fuzzy feelings. Laughter was often followed by a moment of longing for what used to be. Sadly, Cori Walters didn't long for what used to be, but more what she never had.

  Sitting in her rusty, old convertible and staring at the house that had been her childhood home, she felt as empty as it looked. Abandoned a decade ago when her father went to jail, the once grand brick two-story with its portico that stretched up to the second floor and the ionic columns was now in a dilapidated state. The windows were broken out, the grass was above her knees, and years of angry youths had left their mark in spray paint on the exterior walls. A well of sadness filled her. The house's federal colonial design stood out like a llama against the backdrop of a working cattle ranch. Cori saw the house for the harbinger it was—insight into the two adults who'd built it, both desperate to be better than the people and places around them. Perhaps the house's current state was just as indicative of who the Walters were now.

  Cori sighed heavily and straightened her slumped shoulders. She pushed open the car door, then slid from the seat to a stand. She trailed her fingers along the car door as she slowly closed it.

  Did she really want to go inside?

  One final farewell was what had propelled her to make the drive from town where she lived, not that it was far, only fifteen minutes. Her mom, Barbie, relocated to a swanky neighborhood on the west side of Dallas and used the hour-long drive as her excuse to not come down.

  For Cori, this goodbye was as much about the finality of her family's debt as it was a personal adios. The sale was the last of the restitution her family owed, and though Cori had sold it for far less than she could've ten years ago, she reminded herself that back then there'd been no potential buyers. She'd at least gotten more for the sale than the United States Government would have. Now, the victims of her father's crimes were able to petition the government and, hopefully, get back something of what they were swindled out of. After all, that had been a key point as to why she’d stayed. Never mind that Brewster, Texas was all she'd known.

  Good luck to them, Cori thought with all sincerity. The townsfolk deserved a break. She'd done the best she could to make sure the pot the government would pull from was as full as it could be. It wasn't the entire amount, penalties and fees having added an insurmountable amount. Cori could work three jobs for the rest of her life and never earn enough money. But everyone in Brewster should get something back. That had been her goal.

  Cori shook her head, hoping to break away from the unbidden memories swarming in her mind. She turned when she heard a truck coming up the long drive and recognized it as Mr. Miller's. He was towing his zero-turn lawn mower on a small trailer.

  She stepped closer to her car, uncomfortable with having been caught here. The last thing she wanted was the town to gossip about why she'd gone to her old house. That story would be easily misconstrued, a classic case of the childhood game of Chinese Operator. The first person might start the story with a modicum of accuracy, but the last person would get a version drastically different. Chances were slim there would be any sympathy for her.

  The good people of Brewster, Texas were quite angry with her family, and rightfully so. Which was why Cori had done everything in her power to try to right the situation as best she could. After graduation, when most kids were off to college or the military, Cori spent any free hour at the library learning about the best way to sell off everything her family owned for the restitution pot, all while working at the local supercenter.

  Mr. Miller had been caught up in her father's web and lost his small ranch, but had managed to keep his zero-turn. She was never certain how these interactions would go with someone shafted by her father. Mr. Miller had never been outwardly mean to her, but he hadn't come to her defense either. Generally, she was persona non grata, never mind this was her hometown.

  “Morning, Cori,” he said, hopping down from the dually truck. He was a portly man with thinning hair and an affinity for pie.

  “You want me to make you a path to the door?” he asked as he prepared to unload the mower.

  Cori wagged her head. “No thanks.” Nothing was left inside. What Barbie hadn't smuggled out before her husband's sentencing, Cori had sold off first thing.

  “You have to mow the entire yard?” Cori swept her hand in the general direction of the land, several hundred acres.

  Mr. Miller nodded. “Just up to the Besingame land.”

  Instantly, images of Fort Besingame and his dad popped into Cori's mind. Man, Fort had been a ginormous pain. A few years older than her and consummate know-it-all on all things ranching. As if! Cori had made it her life's goal to antagonize the living daylights out of him and challenge him on everything she could.

  Good times, she thought with sadness.

  Truth be told, anything had been better than being in a stupid beauty pageant her mother forced her into. As much as Fort Be-so-lame, as she liked to call him, annoyed her, he'd was real. A welcome reminder that life was more than the stupid pageant world.

  Cori patted her short pixy cut. First thing she'd done when she'd stopped participating was to chop off her butt-length hair, infuriating her mother. The next thing she'd done following Barbie's escape to Dallas after the sentencing of Cori's father was to burn her wigs and those stupid flippers. Man she'd hated wearing those false teeth overlays.

  Smile big, Corinne.

  Flip
your hair, Corinne.

  Strut girl, strut. Shoulders back.

  You can smile bigger than that!

  But she couldn't. There was no such thing as a large smile when it was faked. The face can only be forced to stretch so far without the smile becoming a grimace.

  Fort and his dad's ranch was located behind hers and had been an easy place to escape to. Especially when she hadn't placed first in a pageant and her mother would lose her mind, screaming at Cori about all the things she'd done wrong. Without fail, Cori would sneak out and run. Sometimes there was time to saddle a horse. and she would ride to the lake that divided their land from Besingame's.

  Their pretend annoyance with each other had been comfortable and safe until they moved into their late teens. Cori blamed it on Fort's ball's dropping. Once he realized the junk in his pants could be used for more than constant cupping or readjustment, their dynamics changed. No longer was their irritation faux, but morphed into the real thing. Gone was the young boy who would let her complain and help feed his cattle. He'd been replaced by a single-minded, strung out on adolescent hormones, sex-craved junkie, all while she still sported the shapeless figure of a twelve-year-old boy. Cori recalled the last pageant she did and the stupid severely padded bra her mother forced on her. Humiliated, Cori refused to participate in any pageants after that.

  Now, thinking back on it, the past felt like it had been another life, a different person's story that she had read in a book or saw on TV. Cori pressed the palms of her hands into her eyes and tried to clear the past from her mind. As of today, she was technically free. Nothing held her to Brewster except the fact that this was her home, and that meant something to Cori. Roots had value; they told a story. Yes, hers was a pathetic one, but maybe now she could shift her focus and change the story moving forward. Hopefully, with the house sold and the government accepting claims, she could turn the bad feelings the townsfolk had toward her into good ones. Her motto, keep her nose clean and mouth shut, should help in her endeavors of finding a bright future. How hard could that be?

  4

  After dinner, when the sun was finally dipping low in the sky, Fort did an initial drive by Mrs. Z's, which had yielded very little. Some footprints, large like men’s, and the occasional cigarette butt. No bottles of any sort, and unless the teens came out to the tracks to smoke, none of it made any sense. Wolf Creek's teens liked bonfires, cheap beer, and cow tipping. Very few smoked; instead, they preferred to chew tobacco. Something about the scene felt off.

  When his shift ended at midnight, he did a second pass with hopes of catching the rowdy teens. Maybe they could provide a clue to the missing cattle. But his stakeout yielded nothing except more questions and time alone with his frustration of the town and the make-believe girl. It irked him that they, the townsfolk, didn't see him putting down roots. And since when did being private mean the same as being a flight risk?

  After a two-hour wait, Fort left Mrs. Z's for home and much needed sleep. He had ranch work to do, and dawn was quickly approaching. Once he was home, he fell into bed, slept a solid four hours, and started the new day. More of the same. At least he didn’t work for the county tonight, though he still planned on driving out to Mrs. Z's again to see if he missed anything.

  First there were livestock to feed, salt blocks to replace, wells to check, and he was anxious to hear from the ranch's foreman, George Rockman, if any more cows were missing. Paul and Matias hadn't found a trace of anything amiss. Heck, the only way they knew a cow was missing was when they went out to tag the new heads with the GPS locator and found they were one short.

  When, later that day, word came back that the numbers hadn't changed, no more lost heads, it didn't make the discomfort in his gut go away, but it had eased up some. Every animal on the ranch had a purpose, and a loss or injury to one had a greater impact on the ranch's bottom dollar than most people thought.

  Since his family and George were out checking the rest of the herds, Fort did the run to the feed store, making a pass by Mrs. Z's. He still didn’t find an answer to his question: who had come out and why? Maybe the answer was nothing of consequence and he was wasting his time on this, but his gut told him otherwise. He needed answers.

  He drove up to Mrs. Z's house and found her sitting on the porch, cleaning her rifle.

  “Something I should know?” he asked after getting out of the truck then slamming the door.

  Her hair was in curlers, and a purple scarf tied around her head matched her cowboy boots. “Not really. Couple nights ago, I lost a heifer. Think it might be a mountain lion. Thought I'd ride the perimeter and check the fence line.”

  Fort came to her porch and rested one boot on the step, his hands in his pocket. “I lost one, too. Was thinking the same thing. Your foreman find the carcass?”

  “Not yet. I'm hoping to come across it today. Hopefully sooner rather than later as I've got bingo tonight.” She adjusted her scarf, then checked her reflection in the silver plate on the rifle's stock.

  “We haven't found ours yet so don't get your hopes up.”

  “Well, aren't you full of sunshine today?” She set the rifle aside and packed up the cleaning kit.

  “Yep,” he said with a chuckle. “And as for the tracks and those kids. Nothing. I sat out here last night, but no one came by. If you hear them again, call me directly, and I'll be out fast as I can.” He handed her his deputy card.

  She stuck it in her shirt pocket. “Will do.” She stared at him, her lips pursed, as if she was trying to figure him out.

  Fort shifted his feet, moving the opposite one to rest on her porch step.

  “Something bothering you, Fortune? You look like a man trying to solve a complex problem. You've got forehead creases, and they aren't going away, even when you laugh.”

  Fort looked at the ground and sighed. “Nothing in particular bothering me. Normal stuff, mountain lions, the upcoming auction, getting the herd tagged, and the dry grass.”

  Mrs. Z snorted. “It's awful, right. I'd come out here and dance naked if I thought it would help with making it rain.”

  They shared a laugh.

  “I'm headed to the feed store. You need anything?”

  “Of course, I do,” she said, her smile large. “I have a weekly supply pickup. It's waiting there for me. I'll call ahead and tell them you're picking it up. This is a huge help. Thanks, Fort.”

  “No problem. I can help out anytime. I get a weekly supply as well and can grab yours when I get ours if you'd like.”

  Mrs. Z clapped her hands together with glee. “Oh, bless you. With Earl gone, my workload has doubled. I feel as if cattle are slipping through my fingers.” She stared over his shoulder at the mountains, looking lost in thought. “So much to keep track of.”

  Fort's gut clenched. A sure sign that something wasn't adding up. “You missing more than the cow you mentioned earlier?”

  She jerked, as if his words had knocked her from her reverie. “Not this week. But it seems I'm always one or two down each week. My herd is much smaller these days, easier for me to manage, but at this rate I'll be herd-less by the end of the year.”

  “That's a rate I wouldn't be happy with either. You know the cause?” Did he have something here? Was something happening under their noses?

  Mrs. Z forehead puckered as she confessed, “I'm to blame. I've had some fence lines down that I took too long to fix. A mountain lion for another. Nothing unusual if you're asking. Just feels like it’s gonna be one of those bad luck years. Know what I mean?”

  Fort nodded. Indeed, he did. Instinct was telling him the same thing. That something was off, and it frustrated him he couldn’t figure it out. “I'll be headed over to the feed store then. Be back in a few hours. If you come across any more missing head, will you let me know?” He started to turn away, but paused.

  “You think there might be something to it?”

  Fort lifted a hand, palm up, to indicate his uncertainty. “Hard to say, but mostly I'm just being caut
ious. I want to make sure there is nothing to it.”

  “Will do,” she said.

  With a wave, he was off and headed to the feed store, his mind going over what she’d said. He hoped the store would be busy. All those old ranchers together were just as bad as gossiping women in a quilting circle, and he might get some good information. Maybe others were experiencing the same as him and Mrs. Z. Unexplained missing cows were just that. Unexplained. They could assume all they wanted.

  Luck was on his side. The store was packed. Mr. Phillips, one of the Vietnam veterans, was the loudest, spouting his latest angst against the Bureau of Land Management and Oprah Winfrey. Why the latter was anyone's guess. Phillips was the saltiest of ranchers. His skin was weathered due to endless years under the sun, his voice scratchy from years of smoking, an unlit cigarillo clamped between his teeth every waking moment, like now. He wasn't a man who kept his thoughts to himself and had an opinion about every single stinking thing. It often amazed Fort that he had the energy to do so. He started most sentences with “listen here” or “as I see it.”

  Fort mingled and chatted and kept his ears open. He was settling his tab at the front when he became part of Mr. Phillips rantings.

  “Listen here,” Mr. Phillips said and whacked Fort on the back. “I hear Deke Sutton is ready to file to run for sheriff. I hear he's the only one. Why do you reckon that is?”

  Fort leaned against the counter. “Filing doesn't start for three more days. Maybe others are keeping their intentions a secret until then.” A plan he'd considered himself.

  Phillips grunted his skepticism. “Nah, ain't nobody here that can keep a secret, and ain't nobody interested in it except Deke and maybe you. What do you say? You thinking of running?”

  Fort scratched his chin and considered his words. It would seem the town was interested in him running. Even if they thought he wouldn't win.