by Lydia Olson
“Well?” Ryan said, tapping his foot impatiently. “What will it be, Wilson?”
Wilson silently got to his feet, looked at Eloise with concern, and left the house before things could get any worse. As he left, Ryan shuddered and struggled to catch his breath. Startled but too scared to approach him, Eloise silently watched Ryan’s strange episode.
“Sorry about that, Ellie,” he said when he came back to normal. “It’s been a long day trying to track him down, and seeing your father so worried about you was worrisome to me, too. I thought something bad might’ve happened to you, and then I saw Wilson headed this way on the street and had to be sure he wasn’t coming here. But he was, obviously, and I had to stop him.”
“Wilson isn’t dangerous!” Eloise cried. “He came to give Daddy the deed to our land, and he just wanted to see me again. Why are you so desperate to hate him?”
“Eloise, when I really think about it, I think I’ve always hated him,” Ryan confessed. “He was never willing to hear me out or see things my way, he just wanted to argue and poke fun. He was my friend only because I was a child in need of friendship, and he was the only option.”
“What a terrible thing to say,” replied Eloise. “What about all those times you two built things together, or all three of us made up games while we worked? I couldn’t imagine doing any of that without all three of us there to enjoy it together. We were all friends.”
“No, Ellie, he was your friend and I was your friend, but neither of us liked each other,” Ryan pointed out. “When are you gonna get it into your head that it was only ever about you for us? Everything we did was about getting closer to you.”
“W-what do you mean?” she demanded. “Wilson told me he wanted to reconnect with you, but he didn’t know how to talk to you. He even planned to apologize for the way he was as a child.”
“Oh, and now you know Wilson perfectly well, but what do you know about me?” Ryan yelled.
“Ryan, you’re scaring me.” Eloise backed into the wall.
“Oh, I’m sorry – better not scare Eloise! Better make sure little Ellie has all the friends and flowers she deserves, because otherwise she’ll throw a tantrum!” shouted Ryan, flailing his arms around. “Look at me, little Eloise, who never knows when it’s time to grow up!”
Ryan’s laughter turned insane, and the look on his face was unrecognizable. Eloise instinctively searched around her for the nearest weapon, fearing Ryan’s words were about to turn to violence. After Ryan cackled for several moments, he suddenly calmed down and stood up straight again.
“Eloise, forgive me,” he said. “I’ve been under pressure, and I didn’t mean to put that on you. I just can’t stress enough that you need to stay away from Wilson. He is not everything you believe him to be. Even as he comes here pretending to help, he has no intention of treating you well.
“I, on the other hand, forgive you for whatever it was that did or didn’t happen between you and Wilson, in regard to your honor. My proposal still stands, and I would still willingly make you my wife – that is, with a few more heads of cattle added to the deal I made with you father.”
“What?” Eloise said, disgusted. “You are making my father pay you to marry me? And what was all this about forgiving me and knowing me so well? Is that how little you think of me, that Daddy should have to pay you extra to take me after I told you I preferred Wilson to you?”
“No, no, no – you haven’t listened to me,” Ryan insisted. “All I meant to say was that my proposal still stands, regardless of your behavior with Wilson, and that I will not shun you – ah, just who I wanted to see!”
Startled, Eloise wheeled around to see her father standing down the hallway. He looked angry at first, but his expression quickly turned to confusion. It seemed that he had come back to check if Wilson had left yet, only to find Ryan in the entryway in his place.
“Sorry, my boy – I thought you were someone else,” Dillion said, waving his hand in the air.
“Not to worry; I only just sent Wilson off,” Ryan told him.
“Ah, yes, and I thank you for that.” Dillion nodded. “Well, if it’s true that he’s gone, then I think my business here is done, and I best return to my reading.”
“As it happens, I have come to see you just as well,” said Ryan. “I’ve just finished telling Eloise that I forgive her, and that I would not shun her for her transgressions. I was, and still am, willing to marry her despite her flaws – that is, if you add a few heads of cattle to our deal.”
“What is this you say?” Dillion clarified, his face turning bright red once more. “I’ve only just removed a scandal from my household, and you see fit to bore me with your extended proposals on the same day?”
“Of course, that was not my intention –”
“I don’t care for your intention,” interrupted Dillion. “I’ve heard more than I wished to hear about intentions today as it is! Matter of fact, everyone thinks their intention is good until someone else gets hurt, but what about my intention? I wish only to return to my reading, and then to go to bed hoping I’ll wake in the morning and none of this will have actually happened!”
“True, sir, I only thought that you should know the circumstances have changed ever so slightly regarding our deal, and certain measures will have to be put into effect immediately,” Ryan said smoothly. “I hope you can forgive the urgency, but that is how a business is run...”
“What did you say to me?” The vein in Dillion’s temple was pulsing.
Between a colorful array of swearwords, he ignored the proposal, wished Ryan a good day, and stormed down the hall to his study. Eloise couldn’t recall a time when her father had reacted so emotionally as he had been today. This was also the first time he’d let his tongue slip so freely around her.
Due to his age, Eloise worried the events of the day might’ve been too much for him. It upset her to think that she couldn’t be there for him the way she would have any other night.
“Why did you have to do that to him tonight?” Eloise asked Ryan. “Hasn’t he dealt with enough today?”
“Perhaps what you put him through was quite a lot, but that’s not of my concern,” Ryan informed her. “A man should be able to handle business no matter his personal affairs.”
“What is the matter with you?!” Eloise yelled. “I’ve noticed there’s something different about you today, and I don’t like it!”
Rather than answer, Ryan raised an eyebrow and looked at Eloise like she was speaking a foreign language. She knew he understood exactly what she said, but she couldn’t help but feel he was trying to hide something from her. A slight breeze drifted through the open door and the strong smell of fire reminded her of Ryan’s strange campfire smell.
“Ryan, why do your clothes smell like smoke?” she wondered.
“Oh, yes, that.” Clenching his teeth, he rubbed the back of his neck. “I had to clear a field before tomorrow morning, and I didn’t get a chance to change before I saw Wilson coming over here. There was no choice – I had to react immediately.”
“But why did you have to clear a field? And why did you have to react?” Eloise persisted. “This is my daddy’s property; you should’ve let him deal with Wilson.”
“A fine job he was doing of that, huh?” Ryan spat. “If I hadn’t come over, I think it’s fair to say Wilson would never have left, and Dillion would still have a problem on his hands.”
“And the field?”
“Ah, right – like I said, I had to clear it before tomorrow.”
Eloise still didn’t understand his answer, but she worried that pushing him to divulge further information would result in another one of his insane episodes. Between Ryan and her father, Eloise didn’t know what to do. Neither was acting himself, today.
“Well, then, you’d better get home and make sure that fire doesn’t spread onto our property,” she instructed, “because I can still smell the smoke coming from outside, which makes me think it hasn’t burnt out ye
t. Never a good idea to leave a fire alone before it’s died – not in this heat.”
“Right, well, it’s not one of those kinds of fires,” Ryan said, brushing the sweat from his brow.
Again, Eloise was confused by his explanation. The only way she knew of to clear a field was to burn the entire field and make sure it didn’t spread beyond a certain boundary.
If Ryan was clearing a field by himself, it would’ve been dangerous for him to leave it alone for even a second. There was no way he’d left a burning field just because he saw Wilson running past his property.
“If you were clearing a field by yourself just now, it’s kind of amazing that you noticed Wilson running this way, isn’t it?” she said curiously. “Normally, your whole focus would have to be on the fire...?”
“Then it’s a good thing I was just finishing up, now isn’t it?” he said, sarcastically.
His answer confirmed her suspicions. She wasn’t sure what he’d been doing, but she knew he wasn’t clearing a field, and that worried her.
There weren’t many innocent things Ryan could do with fire, and if he felt the need to lie about it, that was probably because he knew what he was doing was wrong. What’s more, Eloise had a feeling it had something to do with her.
That thought led Eloise to replay all the things Ryan had done to or about her over the last several days, and how desperate he seemed to be to control every aspect of her life. Suddenly filled with rage, Eloise stomped nearer to Ryan and punched him in the stomach. He looked startled initially, but his reaction was unusual. He just scoffed and rolled his eyes.
Eloise was surprised at first, considering that she was so used to Ryan acting scared of her when she was angry.
However, when she considered how he’d been behaving toward her lately, she wondered if maybe his friendship with her had always been an act. Maybe he had always been pretending to be nervous around her just to make her think he cared what she thought. That made Eloise even angrier.
“What gives you the right to try to force me to do everything your way?” Eloise demanded.
“What’s this all of a sudden?” said Ryan. “We were just talking about the field, and now you’re hitting me and accusing me of ill intent? You think I cleared my field to control you? But really, what does that even have to do with you? Not everything is about you, Ellie.”
“Well, you sure make it seem that way,” Eloise countered. “You come over here to ‘protect’ me whenever you see Wilson’s here, you strike deals with Daddy about marrying me, you seem to think you can judge me and criticize everything I do – and that’s just the beginning of the list!”
“Ellie, I asked you to marry me because I... well, because I care for you a great deal...” Ryan stammered. “And yes, I made some missteps in my proposal, but it wasn’t with ill intent. You’ve been angry with me over this for a while, and whenever I’ve come over to speak with you about it, Wilson is here.
“In fact, it’s not me you should be worrying about; it’s him. Wilson knew about the proposal, and he stepped between us intentionally. He prevented me from spending any time with you, and he made you think that he cared for you when he didn’t. He’s the one you should be angry with.”
“Oh, will you stop trying to tell me what Wilson’s thinking?” Eloise said, exasperated. “He may have been your best friend once, but you’ve avoided speaking to him since he got back. You don’t know him anymore.”
“I’ve heard talk in town about him,” Ryan told her. “He’s done things that should repulse you, and yet you’re caught in his deception because that’s what he’s good at. When we were kids, he told me that he finds pleasure in cheating people. So, yes, I worry that he’s cheating you of a good life.
“I came over here when I saw him, because I was worried he was going to do something rash and it would end up getting you in worse trouble than anything he ever convinced you to do as a kid. And I even offered to marry you anyway, before your reputation made you unable to be married.”
“And that’s another thing – why don’t you believe me when I say nothing happened between us?” yelled Eloise. “Isn’t a marriage supposed to be about trust? If you can’t even trust me, why would you wanna marry me? Yet, you seem to think you have the right to judge me just because you proposed to me?”
“Ellie, I’m not judging you,” he said. “I told you, I still accept you the way you are, but it just complicates things a bit, me being with someone with your... reputation.”
“I don’t have a reputation!” Eloise insisted, pushing passed Ryan and dashing up the stairs.
In her room, Eloise slammed the door and leaned against it, breathing deeply. She listened through the door for a moment, almost expecting Ryan to follow her up the stairs and try to reason with her. She’d always hated arguing with Ryan, but now, she hated even talking to him. Eloise was distracted from her thoughts when her cat, Piper, yowled and came to sit at her feet.
“Why can’t Ryan see that he’s hurting our friendship by acting this way?” Eloise said, kneeling down to pet the cat. “He has to know that things are never gonna be the same between us after this.”
Piper yowled again and purred as Eloise scratched beneath her ear. Eloise was exhausted from the events of the day, but she knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight, either. Instead, she slowly walked to the window and stared out across the field. Squinting into the darkness, she searched for the silhouette of Ryan walking back to his property.
It was too dark to see smaller details, but she couldn’t see any movement or shapes that might have been Ryan. Even from this distance, Eloise could still see the remains of a fire at the border of her family’s and the McKinnon property. There was smoke rising from a small stretch of land, and a few flames sparkled at the edge of the ditches along the property line.
The size of the fire confirmed Eloise’s suspicion that Ryan had not actually been clearing a field, but it also made it clear that Ryan thought she was too stupid to know the difference. He knew that her window faced his property, and yet he expected her not to notice the fire was much too small to be the kind of fire he’d claimed it was.
“Why would I wanna marry a man who would lie to me about something so stupid?” she muttered. “He should’ve known I would see right through that.”
As she gazed at the fire, Eloise noticed that the flames were low to the ground, as if it was the kind of fire a person would make to get the warmest coals.
Again, Eloise was insulted that Ryan expected her not to notice he’d lit the wrong kind of fire. This was the type of fire someone might build to keep warm or to cook over, but it wouldn’t effectively clear a field.
Something about the fire put her on edge. Even though it was small and had almost gone out, she felt the desperate need to run over and put it out herself. In that instant, Eloise realized something.
This fire made her so nervous because it was the same type of fire which had caused so much damage to her father’s ranch last week. That fire hadn’t been a field-clearing fire, either.
“Oh, Piper.” Eloise picked up the cat and held her close. “I’m starting to think I might not know Ryan as well as I thought I did.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Eloise opened her door part of the way and peered down the stairs. She couldn’t see Ryan anymore, but she still couldn’t be sure he’d gone home.
Desperate to get to the site of the fire before Ryan did, she hurriedly tip-toed down the stairs and looked closer at where she’d last seen Ryan. He wasn’t there. Piper hopped down the stairs behind her and brushed against Eloise’s ankles, as if pleading with her to reconsider her plan and return to her room.
“It’ll be all right, Piper,” Eloise assured her pet. “Ryan may be guilty of something, but he’s not gonna hurt me.”
