Chapter 3 – Juliette
THREE
JULIETTE
I was currently laid out on the floor of my bedroom, trying to hear something through the heating vents on the floor.
The man had come to the house and was downstairs in the kitchen with Herb.
I’d seen the whole thing go down back in town.
Sheriff Barling finally had gotten Herb to leave the stage and had officially closed out the Rodeo Remnants Auction, reminding everyone to drink responsibly.
The streets would stay closed to car traffic until the evening, so the festivities of food, drink, and music would continue for the remainder of the afternoon. As neighbors, often from far distances on farms and ranches, became reacquainted with each other as well as the new folks in town.
I had stepped off the stage for a second when Kevin rushed over to me.
“Hey Juliette, I’m not calling you Miss Clarke,” he said, almost like he was disgusted with himself. “What happened up there? I mean, was this your idea?”
“No, it wasn’t my idea,” I hissed. “You think I wanted to be treated like a horse?”
“I thought…I thought…the other day. I mean, I’m not ready to marry you,” he said, like I’d asked him to do that.
I’d struggled for patience, knowing Kevin wasn’t the answer.
If he married me thinking he could save me, he’d resent me within the year. If I married him thinking I might fall in love with him and I didn’t, I’d resent him too.
No, it was better that if I was forced to marry someone, I’d loathe that person with everything in my soul. So that when I set them up for the divorce, I’d feel nothing when I reclaimed my property.
“Go home, Kevin,” I’d told him. “Don’t worry. Nothing is going to come of this. My dad is just crazy old fashioned. I’ll see you next month when I come in for supplies.”
He had nodded because what I’d said made sense. But I could see him looking at my father and wondering if what folks in Riverbend said about him was true.
That he was abusive to his daughter. That he treated her more like a slave than a child. That he was ruining her life by not allowing her to attend school regularly. That he was filling her head with outdated religious theories about the world.
Sure, all of those things were true.
But, what nobody understood was that I was smarter than my father.
Or, so I’d thought. This move, however, was one I was still developing a counter strategy for.
The man. The one I’d spotted in town looking at me like I was some kind of answer to a problem of his.
He’d found my father in the crowd. I’d watched them bend heads to talk.
Every other second the man had looked over at me.
My father had shaken his head, and, for a second, I’d thought that was it.
But then the stranger had put his hand on my father’s shoulder and my father had seemed compelled to listen.
They’d separated, but an hour after we got back to the farm, I’d heard a truck pulling up.
I’d run to the door to see the man getting out of what was a well-used Ford pickup.
“Upstairs, girl. This is man’s business.”
I’d whirled around to find my father right behind me. He’d known the man was coming.
They’d arranged this. Herb had told him where we lived.
“Not him,” I’d said, my voice low. “He’s not from here.”
“I’ll be deciding who,” my father had grumbled. “You know, in other parts of the world the child gets no say in who they marry. It’s all arranged by the family.”
It always killed me when he said things like that.
My father knew nothing beyond the plains and valleys of this farm.
The town of Riverbend. The hospital in Jefferson where he’d finally been diagnosed.
But any time something came up that he thought could prove his point, he’d reference the rest of the world.
Like he even knew what that meant.
Maybe he’d seen something about arranged marriages in India one time and that was enough to support this notion he could sell me off to the highest bidder.
Heck, who was I kidding?
This man, this stranger, had been the only bidder.
“Stay in your room. I’ll call, if you’re needed.”
If I was needed in deciding whether I would consider this man as my future husband.
Such. Utter. Bullshit.
Now I could hear the muttering of a discussion happening downstairs. My bedroom wasn’t close to the kitchen so I couldn’t make out any actual words. Then chairs were scraping across the linoleum floor. I scrambled to my feet, expecting to hear my father calling for me.
He hadn’t locked me in my room, but I knew better than to go downstairs prematurely.
He’d make a scene for the purpose of showing his authority and I really didn’t have the energy for that.
“Juliette!” I heard. Followed by his raspy cough.
Herb couldn’t fill his lungs with enough oxygen for shouting anymore.
I’d obviously changed since coming home. Chores had to be done and I wasn’t butchering a chicken in a dress.
Much less a white one.
I was wearing denim overalls over a short sleeved work shirt. My feet were bare, no toe polish for me, as Herb considered it sinful.
I took the steps to the main floor like a death march.
One. At. A. Time. To a beat.
The house was built back in the nineteen-twenties in the traditional Craftsman-style that was popular around these parts. Natural woods, front porch, heavy-handed dormers that made the front of the house look joyless. There were two bedrooms on the main floor and two upstairs.
When it was originally built there’d been only one bathroom, but at some point Herb’s father had gotten creative with the space upstairs and carved out another one with room for a tub that I could use separately from Herb.
The front door opened up to a narrow foyer lined with hooks for various clothing needs, then came the living room and the kitchen and dining area were at the back of the house.
No grand windows, no open concepts or spacious views of the mountains behind us.
Sometimes, to me it seemed that whoever had built this place hadn’t even liked the outdoors, that’s how closed off to it, it seemed.
I made my way to the kitchen and stopped when I saw the stranger. He was still looking at me.
Dark, worn jeans. A threadbare, blue, denim shirt that had recently been laundered. No watch. Some kind of chain around his neck, covered mostly by the shirt.
The scars on his face might have made him fully ugly, however there was a sharpness about all of his features. Cheekbones, nose and chin. Nothing softened him except the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes.
From the sun, I thought. Not from smiling.
“This is Creed O’Mara,” Herb said.
“I’ll need to see your ID,” I said.
He appeared startled. “I’m sorry?”
I turned to my father. “Otherwise, how could we be certain he is who he says he is?”
Herb seemed to consider that. He was not a man of the world. His first thought was never to consider conmen or tricksters, but they were real. An opportunist in the crowd today might find my situation lucrative for short term gain.
However, before Herb could say anything the stranger was taking his wallet out of his back pocket. He fished out a card and handed it to me between two fingers. I took it without touching him.
“This is a military ID,” I noted. “Not a Montana state driver’s license.”
“No ma’am. I’ve recently left the military and have not had a chance to renew my driver’s license in Montana.”
His name was real, which strangely didn’t match his ethnicity. Age, thirty four. Eye color, brown. (They were darker than that.) His height was listed as 6’3, but standing this close to him he seemed taller.
Military branch: Navy. Rank: Chief Petty Officer.
I handed him back his ID and he tucked it back into his wallet and pocketed it.
Then he held out his hand in greeting. “Creed O’Mara, ma’am. And you are?”
“Told ya her name,” Herb spat. “Juliette.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Juliette.”
I looked at his hand but didn’t shake it. Instead, I folded my arms across my chest.
“Why are you here?” I asked him.
“You know damn well why he’s here,” Herb said.
“I know what your agenda is,” I told my father, then looked to Creed. “What’s yours?”
He nodded once, then tucked his hands behind his back like he was standing at attention. “No agenda. Left the Navy. Looking for what comes next. Decided I wanted some land so I got in my truck and headed out here. Just happened to be in town because I heard about the auction-”
“The horse auction,” I said.
“Yes, ma’am. A guy in the town over told me about it, and I thought I would check it out. Heard what your father had to say and something just hit me. Like a sign from God that maybe this was meant to be.”
A sign from God? Give me a break.
My father was eating it up, though. It was all there. The few spoken words. The ma’am. Throw in God and it was a done deal.
I wasn’t buying any of it.
“Daddy, would it be okay if Mr. O’Mara and I spoke on the porch? I have some questions,” I said it in my most demure tone, “that I don’t feel comfortable asking in your presence.”
Herb was about to shake me off when the stranger started toward the door. “That’s right. We should speak. Privately.”
He opened the front door to step out onto the porch. I moved to follow him when Herb grabbed me around my upper arm.
“Don’t you ruin this, girl,” he hissed into my ear.
There was no point in trying to pull away from him. Even with the cancer, he was still stronger than I was. It wasn’t lost on me, though, that the stranger’s eyes were pinned to Herb’s grip through the open doorway.
After a moment, Herb dropped his hold and I followed the man out onto the porch, shutting the front door behind me.
By some mutual consent, we moved as far away as the porch would allow us and leaned on the railing.
“You think it’s a sign from God that you might have an opportunity to buy a woman?” I asked him.
He chuckled. “No. I think it’s a goddamn piece of good luck. And that’s something I don’t ever have a lot of.”
“Why did you leave the Navy?”
He turned to face me. “They kicked me out for killing too many people.”
I snorted. “You ever spent a day in church in your life?”
“No, ma’am,” he smiled. “Always afraid lightening would strike.”
“You make this deal with my father and I will make your life a living hell,” I told him.
“Living hell? Hmmm,” he mused. “Been there. Done that. Doesn’t scare me too much.”
“You’re stealing my legacy,” I snapped. A sense of powerlessness flooding me. This was going to happen and I couldn’t stop it.
“Your father is doing that, darling. Not me. Dying man wants to make sure his farm and his daughter are in good hands. I can be that man.”
“A good man wouldn’t do what you’re doing.”
That had him laughing, but there was no humor in the sound. “No, ma’am. He would not.”
“Are you going to rape me?” I asked him, then swallowed.
That was the elephant in my particular room.
I could participate in this sham of a marriage. Bury my father. Figure out how to get out of this sham marriage and reclaim my legacy, but more importantly, my freedom.
I could do all of that, but I needed to know what that was going to cost me.
I wasn’t worried about pregnancy. I’d had an IUD put in at the women’s free clinic in Jefferson the day after I turned eighteen.
But, if he was going to sexually assault me? For months? Because he was stronger than me and he could? I needed to know that now. I needed to mentally prepare myself for how much of my soul it was going to cost me.
He looked at me then and something inside him deflated. His shoulders slumped a bit and it looked like he’d just taken on the weight of the world.
“No,” he said, quietly. “No, I’m not going to rape you.
But you need to wrap your head around the idea that, eventually, we will have sex.
I’m not lying about my intentions. Knew when I left active duty, I couldn’t handle coming home to crowds of people.
Was thinking about a horse ranch, but a farm works for me, too.
Good wife. Solid partner. We’ll raise some kids and call it a life. ”
“You call that a life? What about love and happiness?”
“Doesn’t exist. Fucking, orgasms, and babies do.”
“That’s never going to happen,” I told him. “If you’re not going to force me, you can sure as hell bet I’m not willingly going to have sex with you.”
His eyes narrowed. “You a virgin?”
“None of your damn business.”
“It will be,” he sighed. “Here’s how this is going to go down. We’re going to go back in there and tell your father the good news. I’ll apply for the license and we’ll get married in the nearest courthouse as soon as it’s legal. Then you and I will find a way to…figure each other out.”
“How much?”
He shook his head at first, then shrugged. “I’m putting fifty K in an escrow account that will be used to invest in the farm and property. My stake in all this. That will happen as soon as your father shows me his will, leaving me the house and property.”
“Fifty thousand,” I whooshed out a breath. So that’s what I was worth on this earth in cash money. A number that definitely would have gotten Herb’s attention.
I banged my hands on the wood railing, not with any real anger…just resignation. There was no stopping this. I either ran away and figured out how to survive. Or I stayed, figured out how to survive, and won back what was mine.
He hadn’t pulled any punches with me, so maybe he was sincere about not raping me. Maybe not. But I hadn’t pulled my punches either.
I was going to make his life a living hell.
Smiling brightly, I curtsied to him like the proper miss I was. “Wow. For all that money you should have forced me to show you my tits. I’ll tell Daddy the good news!”
Then I went back inside the house and told myself to not look back.