Chapter Fifteen
The next few minutes unfolded remarkably quickly.
Tyler pressed himself flatter against the pine trunk, hardly daring to breathe. Through the branches, he could see Trevor approaching Marty with the confidence of someone who definitely wasn’t about to get chased into a trap.
“Hey, Marty,” Trevor called out, holding up his phone like a trophy. “I have something you might want to see.”
Marty turned, his expression shifting from confusion to something ugly and sharp as Trevor played the video of Marty on the phone with the investor.
“You little, shit!” Marty lunged.
Trevor didn’t even pretend to be surprised. He bolted, exactly as planned. His feet pounded on the snow-packed path toward the tree line.
This has to work, Tyler thought, his gloved hands tightening around the strands of lights.
He glanced down at his supplies: twelve strands of Christmas lights, four spools of tinsel garland in red, green, gold, and silver, and a fistful of zip ties. Enough to decorate the entire village, or in this case, one medium-sized corporate criminal.
Trevor was running full tilt now, Marty gaining on him with surprising speed for a guy in Italian loafers.
Tyler held his breath as his brother hit the marked spot, a slight clearing where the path curved around the biggest spruce, and then executed a perfect spin, backpedaling until Marty was right where they needed him.
“Now!” Trevor shouted.
Tyler exploded from his hiding spot, Christmas lights in hand. Marty barely had time to turn before Tyler had a strand of lights around his chest, looping twice with practiced efficiency.
“What the hell?” Marty thrashed, but Trevor was already there, wrapping garland around his waist while Tyler secured the lights.
“Arms up,” Trevor commanded, and when Marty tried to swing at him instead, Tyler caught his wrist and looped another strand, blinking icicle lights this time around both arms, pinning them to his sides.
“You’re making a huge mistake,” Marty sputtered, his face turning an interesting shade of crimson. “Do you little shits have any idea who I am?”
“Yeah, yeah, you’re very scary, and a big jerk,” Trevor said, grabbing the gold garland. “Ty, get his legs.”
They worked in tandem, the way they always did, Trevor, holding while Tyler wrapped. Three minutes later, Marty was secured to the tree trunk, arms pinned, legs trussed, completely cocooned in enough Christmas paraphernalia to make Santa weep with envy.
Tyler had to admit, Marty looked exactly like an unlit Christmas tree. The garland spiraled from shoulders to ankles, the lights crisscrossed in a pattern that could only be described as “aggressive festive,” and the whole thing was secured with enough zip ties to survive a hurricane.
“I’ll destroy you, you little monsters,” Marty snarled, thrashing uselessly. “Then I’ll destroy your mother.”
“Should we gag him?” Trevor asked, examining their handiwork.
“Definitely.” Tyler rummaged through the box and found a roll of red duct tape.
“Don’t you dare! Mmph!”
Trevor held Marty’s head while Tyler secured the piece of tape over his mouth.
“Oh, wait! I have something else,” Tyler said, and reached back into the box and pulled out a Santa hat.
Trevor chuckled. “Nice.”
Tyler placed the hat on Marty’s head. The effect of it all was immediate and deeply satisfying. Marty looked like the world’s angriest lawn decoration.
“Nice work,” Trevor said as he high-fived Tyler.
Tyler grinned and stepped back beside his brother to properly admire their handiwork.
Trevor folded his arms across his chest. “You know,” he said thoughtfully, “I think it needs a bow.”
Tyler nodded. “A big one.”
Marty made an angry sound from behind the tape covering his mouth.
“See?” Trevor said. “He’s excited about it.”
Tyler couldn’t help helping.
Then a familiar voice cut through the air, and the amusement vanished instantly.
“Boys!”
Slowly, they turned around.
Their mom stood a few yards away, staring at the scene in complete disbelief.
Beside her was their dad, who looked equally stunned.
Then there were Mac, Jessie, Nico, and Rafe gathered behind them, all taking in the sight of Marty currently tied to a Christmas tree like a particularly disgruntled holiday ornament.
For several seconds, nobody said anything.
Tyler exchanged a glance with Trevor.
Then he offered his mother what he hoped was a very reasonable smile.
“Hi, Mom.”
His mom had one of those expressions she got whenever she was either seconds away from laughing or seconds away from grounding them for the rest of their natural lives. Unfortunately, years of experience had taught him that the two often looked exactly the same.
Beside her, their dad wasn’t much help either. His dad’s mouth was pressed into a firm line, but Tyler could see the corners twitching. The man was absolutely trying not to laugh.
The same went for the rest of the group.
Mac had suddenly become very interested in the snow beneath his boots. Rafe was staring off toward the mountains with the determination of a man avoiding eye contact. Jessie’s shoulders were shaking suspiciously. And Nico looked like he was one poorly timed comment away from completely losing it.
Based on their reactions, Tyler was beginning to feel cautiously optimistic.
Then Amelie slowly looked from her sons to Marty. Then back to her sons. Then back to Marty.
The silence stretched.
Finally, she spoke.
“Would one of you care to explain why Marty is tied to a Christmas tree looking like the world’s angriest holiday decoration?”
Tyler glanced at Trevor.
“Well,” Tyler began, “it probably sounds bad if you start in the middle.”
Amelie folded her arms. “I’m listening.”
Tyler reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone.
“See, Trevor, and I found Marty talking to somebody, and then things got interesting.”
◆◆◆
The moment Tyler’s text had come through telling her and Grant to hurry to the lodge because it involved Marty, Amelie’s stomach had dropped.
During the frantic walk from the hotel to the lodge, her mind had supplied no shortage of terrible possibilities. By the time she and the others arrived, she had worked herself into a state of genuine panic.
Not once had she imagined she would find Marty tied to a tree like a disgruntled holiday decoration while Tyler and Trevor stood nearby looking immensely proud of themselves.
For several seconds, she stared, trying to convince herself that she was really seeing what was in front of her. Part of her wanted to laugh, while the other part wanted answers.
Considering how angry she already was with Marty after their confrontation earlier, she was honestly more curious than anything else.
Tyler and Trevor were good kids. Mischievous? Absolutely. But they weren’t cruel. For them to go to these lengths, Marty had clearly done something spectacularly stupid.
As the boys explained what had happened, the amusement she had been fighting quickly disappeared.
Tyler stepped forward. “Mom, we have evidence.”
“Yeah, they were gonna steal the company from you,” Trevor added, producing his phone. “We recorded him talking to the investor guy.”
Amelie took the phone, and the other adults watched it with her. And the longer she listened, the colder she became.
By the end of the video, she felt sick. The betrayal cut deeper than she expected.
Marty hadn’t simply been pushing a business deal. He had been deliberately hiding critical information while positioning himself to profit from it. Worse, he had done it while pretending to be her friend.
Slowly, Amelie looked toward Grant. She didn’t need him to say a word.
The hard set of his jaw told her everything. He was furious. Truthfully, so was she.
But before she questioned Marty, she needed to know one thing.
Turning toward the boys, she asked, “I’m assuming that you two did this?”
Tyler shrugged. “We needed to stop him from leaving before you got here.”
“And we didn’t have rope,” Trevor added, as if this explained everything.
“And dad told us yesterday about how sometimes, if things don’t go as planned, you have to improvise. So, we improvised with what we had.”
Behind her, Amelie heard Grant make a sound that was definitely a laugh being smothered.
Mac was outright grinning. Jessie made a comment saying something about the boys definitely being Grant’s kids.
Nico had his hand over his mouth. And Rafe made some smart ass comment, wondering if Marty was in kinky Christmas bondage.
Amelie squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and pinched the bridge of her nose. This was exactly the sort of situation where she should have been horrified. Her sons had tied a grown man to a tree. Any reasonable parent would have been furious.
The problem was that every time she looked at Marty, wrapped in lights and garland, looking like an aggressively festive hostage, she felt another laugh threatening to escape.
For a moment, Amelie ignored Marty and turned toward her sons.
She looked at them and saw two young men who had assessed a threat, devised a plan, and executed it with the kind of teamwork that made her proud. Even though what they did was inappropriate and probably illegal, at the end of the day, they had done it for her.
“Mom?” Tyler said, speaking up. “Are you mad?”
Amelie pressed her lips together. She looked at Marty, then at Grant, who looked like the proudest father as he looked at his sons.
Shaking her head, she sighed. “No, I’m not mad. But we are going to discuss more appropriate ways to handle situations like this in the future.” Her eyes shifted to Marty. “Preferably methods that don’t involve wrapping someone in enough Christmas lights that could power a small village.”
Nico looked at Marty, then at Tyler and Trevor.
“I just want to point out that their execution was solid. Most adults couldn’t secure a target this effectively using nothing but Christmas decorations.”
“The planning phase was impressive. Excellent use of available resources,” Rafe agreed.
“I’m impressed with the teamwork,” Mac added.