The woman paused to dig out a folded sheet of paper from her back pocket. When she glanced down the dirt road the way they’d just come, Brock followed her gaze to the beat-up white pickup driving up to meet them. She bit her bottom lip when the driver started yelling at the approaching truck to hurry up.When it stopped and two more men got out, she made an abrupt about-face and hurried back to the truck.
“Wait, wait,” he heard her cry through the closed window. She picked her way quickly through the mud, hugging her baby as if that secure grip might help keep both of them from slipping and falling. “Please,” he heard her faintly saying.
The driver stalked around to the back of the truck, where she hurried her fastest to meet him.
They were arguing again.
The woman showed him the paper she was holding, but the trucker yanked it out of her hand, ripped it into pieces and flung it into the mud under his rear wheels.
“Son,” Pops growled, but Brock didn’t need to be told. He’d already put the pan and spatula on the Lazy Susan in the center of the table.
“Be right back,” he said, mildly enough, but inside his temper was pricked. He didn’t know what the problem was, but he couldn’t think of a single good reason for the way the driver was now yelling directly in her face.
Pulling on his boots and coat, Brock paused at the standing gun safe behind the front door. Stuffing his revolver into the back of his pants, he adjusted his coat and went outside.
***
Stace backed up a step, instinctively turning to put her own body between the truck driver and Lily, who had started crying the instant he started yelling. “But this is what I paid for,” she tried again to say. “I worked it out with your boss. I stop here for the interview first, and then we go to—”
“No second stop,” he snapped at her for the second time now. “Not for free, it’s not. Plus, I had to pay gas on two vehiclesand wages on two extra guys for all that time spent driving. Five grand, lady. Pay it now, or I drop your stuff right here.”
“But I did pay for it.” She tried again to show him the inventory and billing receipt she’d been given by the estimator of the moving company. “See, it’s right—”
Grabbing it out of her hand, the driver ripped it in half twice, then threw the scattering paper into the muddy dirt road behind his truck. “You pay now, or you get the hell out of my way.”
Stace Monroe’s heart was in her throat and her stomach had sunk so low she was sure she stepped over it when she tried again to calm the angry man. She didn’t hold much hope for that. He’d been angry at her practically from the moment he’d helped loaded her things into his van. He’d been angry that she was forced to ride in the truck with him, but what choice did she have when her in-laws had claimed her car in the divorce? He’d been angry for having to drive 680 miles to the tiny community of Myrtle Creek, because her favorite aunt had offered her rental cabin for as long as Stace needed. When he first clapped eyes on Lilly and her car seat, he’d gone through the proverbial roof, stomping and swearing, and even throwing her things, albeit only from the ground into the back of his truck.
Still, the entire drive had been spent with him silently fuming and her sitting so tensely beside him, trying her best to keep Lily as well as herself from making any noise that might set him off again. It made for a long, miserable drive. She’d almost wet her pants during that first leg of the trip because he drove when he wanted and stopped when he wanted, and she was too scared to ask him to stop when she needed to pee.
She needed to pee now, as a matter of fact, because their last stop had been two hours ago when Lilly had cried to be fed. They’d stopped at a roadside scenic viewing spot, which fortunately had two park tables and benches to sit on while shenursed her toddler. He hadn’t even let her do that in the warm privacy of the cab.
“Because that,” he’d said, stabbing at Lily with an angry finger, “ain’t puking her guts up in my truck.”
So, there she’d been, sitting on an icy bench, a baby blanket thrown over Lily and her shoulder, shivering in her light spring jacket and jeans as she watched the driver and the two movers who’d been following them in their truck smoking in a tight group while every now and then giving her assessing looks from where they stood talking near the back of the van.
She’d been so very grateful to see all of them when they’d pulled up to her old house. Now however, they only made her nervous.
“B-but,” she protested, pointing back at the first cabin they’d passed before continuing on to this one. “The house is right there!”
“Ten grand,” he snapped, abruptly upping the price. “Or your shit goes in the mud.”
Her jaw fell. “But I already paid. Call your boss!”
Snapping away from her, he marched to the back of the moving van.
“No!” Jumping to stop him, she grabbed the handle when he did. “You can’t! This isn’t fair—”
He let go of the handle so fast and grabbed the front of her coat, hauling her up on tiptoes right until her foot slipped in the mud and down she went. Not to her knees, though. When she lost her balance, he shoved her and she landed flat on her back with a wet, muddysplat!
Lily whacked her forehead against Stace’s cheek, and the baby instantly stopped crying and screamed instead.
Stace stared in shock up at the driver she had just spend the last two days riding with. He still had the front of her jacket in his fist. Bent over her, he shook her once, actually hauling herup off the ground before slamming her back down again. She flinched, shielding Lily as he ignored the screaming toddler and brought his other fist right to the end of her nose.
“I don’t like liars, and I don’t like cheaters. Rules are, I get paid upon delivery. You’ve already put me through enough grief, now you’re robbing me of my hard-earned pay. I’m not leaving until I get it.” He yanked her head and shoulders off the ground, and slammed her back into it again. “So, give it!”
Shouting, she threw up her arm to protect the baby from attack when he drew back his fist and opened his hand. That’s when she heard running footsteps in the slick mud—one of his mover buddies, coming right at her head to kick her, to kick Lily. Her shock broke and she screamed.
Which was when the massive, bearded, lumberjack of a man rushing up to meet them grabbed the driver’s slapping arm, yanking him off her—and off his own suddenly flailing feet—and slammed him into the side of the moving truck.
