The Bears of Blackrock, Books 1 - 3: The Fenn Clan (37 page)

“Sorry. I’ll get out of your hair,” he said, hopping up from the stairs. He took a few steps, feeling strangely pulled back toward the tiny fisherman’s cottage where Maggie lived with her aging father. He scolded himself, softly. He had no place there, no right to stay. What the hell was he doing driving all the way to the rez to see why an old man was limping?

“Here,” Deacon said finally, turning back to Maggie as he pulled a business card from his wallet. It read his name, his cell number, and Fenn Construction Group. Despite not working for his uncle Terry for several years, he still carried the cards.

“What’s this?”

Deacon shrugged. “In case you need it. If he has any – I don’t know. Just have it, yeah?”

Maggie stared at him, her expression softening in a way that almost unnerved him.
Stop looking at me like that, Maggie. Or more aptly, stop looking back at her, Deacon! You twit.

Then Deacon piled into his SUV and fought with every ounce of his being not to glance back at Maggie as he pulled out of her driveway.

CHAPTER EIGHT

“You know what he will do when he finds out!”

Maggie lay in her bed, staring up at the open beams of her ceiling as she replayed the night her mother left.

“You know what he will do when he finds out!” Her mother had said. She referred to Maggie’s uncle, Richard White Eagle.

Maggie had managed to go unseen for four days in her home, feeling the comfort of waking in her own bed stripped away each morning as memory poured over her, turning her stomach before she’d even the chance to open her eyes. Tension hung over the house as though waiting for bad news. Still, Papa wasn’t well, and his state seemed to deteriorate rather than improve as the days passed. Now she knew why, Deacon Fenn having followed the man home and patched him up properly. Now she knew his injuries weren’t simple accident. He’d been attacked, and he’d been attacked by a bear.

“It has to look like any other day, girl! I’m going to get my damn breakfast, and you’re not stopping me!” He’d said again that morning as he stumbled out to his car.

Maggie fought with him for half an hour before relenting. Though he wasn’t wrong in his proclamations, he also wasn’t in the best shape to be going anywhere. Even Deacon asked that he stay put until his leg wound healed.

“I’m sure a few days at home won’t seem so strange with you injured.”

He furrowed his brow at this. “What makes you think anyone knows I’m injured?”

He still hadn’t confessed the source of his unseen hurts to her the day before, but now she knew. Despite her concern for her father, she also knew better than to press.

Talbot men liked to keep to themselves. Even from those they loved most.

Maggie was now curled up in her bed, replaying the day her mother left, over and over again – in between random thoughts of old Blue Eyes.

“What would you have me do, then?” Maynard had asked, watching helplessly as Maggie’s mother packed her things. Maggie had sat perched at her bedroom door, watching through a hairline crack as her parents argued in hushed conspiracy.

“I don’t know! Send her away. Send her back to her family.”

“We
are
her family!”

Maggie fought to be quiet despite tears streaming down her face. Her mother had changed the night of their hunt, going several days without saying a word to anyone. It was as though Maggie had somehow betrayed her, simply by being what she was. How could she have known she wasn’t a bear? How could she fix something as out of her control as the marrow in her bones?

“Maynard, if you don’t do something and he finds out -”

“I’m well aware of the consequences.”

“I don’t think you are,” her mother had said.

Maggie watched her mother come into view, watched her expression as she shot one parting glance toward Maggie’s door. Karen Talbot didn’t approach, didn’t come to say goodbye. She shook her head. “You’re making a mistake, Maynard Keeps His Word.”

With that, she turned for the door and was gone.

Maggie lay on her bed, the curtain of her bedroom window pulled aside to allow the gray light to pour in. She wasn’t unaccustomed to being cooped up for days on end, but somehow being cooped up by choice was far easier than being so by force. And to top it all off, she had a number that she desperately wanted to call.

As a form of distraction, she mulled over old contacts for her biological family out west – a grandmother was still alive, as was an uncle, but her mother and father were nowhere to be found.

Options were slim, as Maggie realized, and she had little to build a life on her own. How far could a single, unemployed female get with only two hundred bucks in her pocket?

Two hundred bucks her father handed her the day before.

Well, at least that’s a bus ticket, she thought.

Or…

This thought crossed her mind many times over the past twenty four hours. What if she told Richard she’d reconsidered; let the marriage agreement play itself out? Richard would get what he wanted, the Fenn land grant could be divvied as planned, and she could be engaged to old Blue Eyes.

Damn it, Maggie. Just stop thinking about it. No one comes out a winner in that scenario. Not even you. The poor bastard is hung up on a break up texter. Let that shit lie right where it is.

The familiar sound of her father’s car announced his arrival home from breakfast. She half hoped he’d brought her something, but knowing his cautious nature, Maynard Talbot wouldn’t take the chance.

She lay there for another moment or two, listening. The day before, there’d been a second set of wheels coming down the drive. The day before, Old Blue Eyes had followed her father home. She’d nearly lost her mind.

Oh god, oh god, oh god. He’s coming. They’re coming. They know.

She’d grabbed her sweater from the chair and hurried out into the front room, seeing her father hobbling toward the house as a black SUV rolled into the drive.

Her heart shot into her throat. It wasn’t Richard’s car. She remembered the moment of realization; the way it made her chest grow tight.

She’d almost fell over at the sight of him.

Now she lay in her bed again, the tiny scrap of paper pressed between her fingers. She stared up at it, letting it block the light of the window from view.

Deacon Fenn

Fenn Contracting

You’re not calling, Light Foot. You’re never calling this number, she thought, over and over. Yet there she lay, staring at the words with a smile glued to her face.

Why had he come all the way out to the rez? Could he really have just been checking on Maynard? Or was there another reason?

Yes, Mag. There’s another reason. The poor bastard is heartbroken and trying to distract himself. Stop reading into it.

Papa hobbled through the front door, groaning and grumbling as he sloughed off his coat.

“Got you some blueberry pancakes here, if you’re interested.”

What?! She thought, launching out of bed to greet her father. “Did you get me any sausage? Bacon? Tell me you brought meat!”

Maynard glared at her, then offered up the take out bag. “Ingrate.”

She snatched the bag, smelling the sweet and savory mix from within. Maple bacon, her favorite. She took to the breakfast like a starved animal, her father ignoring her as he settled into his recliner to watch Fox News.

She was halfway through her breakfast when wheels began tearing up the dirt driveway, announcing an incoming car – an incoming car with frightening speed. Before Maggie and Maynard could even respond, the sound of car door slamming sent Maggie running through the house, heading for the back door.

“Is she here?”

Maggie stopped dead, turning to face the source of the voice.

Papa struggled with his recliner, trying to stand as Karen Talbot lunged across the living room toward Maggie.

“Go. Go now. They’re on their way.”

Maggie’s jaw dropped as Karen hurried past her, opening the back door wide to let Maggie pass.

“Stay away from the roads. Head up along the coast, but go now. Go now!”

Maggie didn’t have time to speak, let alone make sense of what was happening, but she did as she was told. Maggie took off from the back porch, hauling across the lawn and into the brush, crouching low as she moved. She was no more than a hundred yards from the back door when another car rolled into her father’s driveway. Maggie dropped even lower, letting the high grass along the shore shield her from view as she ran away, the woods of the peninsula calling to her up ahead.

Walking barefoot in the woods was nothing new to her, but her feet were getting cold after two hours and several miles along the old hunting trail. She was just passing the boundary of the rez when noon rolled around, the trees offering up an eerie jostling sound in the breeze. The leaves were long fallen now, leaving bare branches to clack and scrape against each other in an almost foreboding way as she trudged a path toward the south. These woods had long lost their appeal. These were the woods where Candyce and Beth disappeared years earlier. She remembered trudging through these woods with members of the tribe, calling names and unleashing dogs, trying to pick up the scent of her lost kin. They’d never found it; the scent died along the roadside that headed back to Blackrock Proper. In the few times that she’d returned to this portion of the woods, she still found the strange stick figures from time to time. She always ripped them down and stomped on them when she did.

Though she often hiked barefoot in the woods, the allure of such a walk when she was younger was the choice of it. Not only was this walk not a choice, she had no idea when she’d next have shoes. She couldn’t call Papa and have him bring them, she’d left her phone on the kitchen table. Even if she could get to a phone, calling her dad while Richard White Eagle was at the house was probably not the best course of action.

Exile meant severance. None of the Talbots were meant to communicate with her now. Even if a cousin were to drive past along the main road, acknowledging her could get them in trouble. She was as good as plague ridden now, and almost every one of her family members had been there to witness her banishment. Everyone save for Theron. Theron was like Papa, though. He would never disown her, would he?

The woods opened up at the road side, and Maggie stood there a moment, staring across the street at a landmark that felt almost mocking with its mere presence. 

The gate to the Fenn property, closed up tight as it always was. It stood creaking in the breeze across the way. She’d heard stories of how unfriendly Patrick Fenn could be to unannounced visitors. Besides, she had no reason to go trudging onto Fenn property. What business did she have there?

Maggie patted her hands on her pockets – the business card was sitting on her bedside table. She took a deep breath.

What other choice do you have, right? She thought.

Maggie trudged into the brush and around the gate, walking along the shoulder of the dirt road to avoid the sharp rocks underfoot.

Where the hell are you going, Light Foot? You don’t even know his address.

Despite the inner monologue of disdain, she marched on, the bottom of her foot catching on a shard of glass within the first mile of roadway.

Nice, Mag. That’s a good sign. Now you’re bleeding all over their property. They’re bears, they’ll smell it when they pass, know you were here, come find you in the night.

“Shut up,” she said aloud, as though her mind might listen.

It didn’t. She was still berating herself with fervor as a house came into view up ahead.

Maggie slowed. She recognized the woman kneeling by her rose bushes, pruning away the stems for winter.

“Excuse me,” Maggie said, half expecting someone to jump from the bushes and shank her for merely being there.

The woman from the council hall turned up with a startled expression. The expression quickly shifted, and the woman was on her feet, brushing her gloved hands on her pants as she approached.

“Well, hello there. I’m Janice. What on earth are you doing out with no shoes on, girly?”

The woman extended a hand for Maggie to shake, a warm smile on her face. Maggie took her hand, her brow furrowing as she searched for response. This sort of warm welcome was not something she was used to. She could only imagine her father glowering from the front window if a complete stranger were to come limping up to his door. This woman’s reaction to visitors was nothing like the rumors she’d heard of Patrick Fenn.

“Oh, I left in a bit of a hurry. I’m Maggie Light Foot, by the way.”

“Yes, yes. I remember that,” Janice said, then startled, glancing down at Maggie’s feet. “Oh, jeez! You’re bleeding. Come on inside. Come on, now.”

Janice led the way into the house, holding the screen door open for Maggie to enter.

Maggie paused by the door, fearing to track blood across the kind woman’s floors. Janice cast her worries aside, pulling Maggie to a kitchen chair and demanding she display her feet. A moment later, Maggie’s feet were soaking in a bowl of warm water and Epsom salts, and Janice was on the hunt for a pair of warm socks.

It’s official, Maggie thought. First Old Blue Eyes, and now this woman. Clearly the rumors of the Fenn family were complete bull shit.

“What do we have here?” A male voice said behind her.

Maggie turned to find a man smiling in the doorway, folding a newspaper up as he entered. He wasn’t tall like the other Fenns, but he had piercing blue eyes. Seeing them in this more mature face startled her speechless.

The man approached her, glancing down at the bowl under her feet. “I’m Carl, Janice’s husband. And you are?”

Maggie introduced herself, unable to tear her gaze from the man’s eyes. He made some small talk about the reservation, the distance she must’ve walked. Finally, he turned for the fridge as Janice marched back into the kitchen wielding a pair of heavy wool socks.

“Here we are. I found these in Deacon’s old room. I’m sure he won’t mind you borrowing them.”