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“I’m not leaving you alone here. You don’t seem to get it—Imade vows to you. I’m not going anywhere.”
“I’m going to stay in the RV tonight. Alone,” she says.
She stands up and starts picking things up around the barn.
Her eyes are so sad as she turns and looks at me. “I’m not trying to treat you like a stranger. I feel like I’mdyinginside. I love you. You’re the man I want to be with, the one I will always crave. I know that more than I know anything. But I need to handle this. I don’t know what will happen for sure, but I’m asking you to give me some space, let me try to figure this out. I’m shaken right now and I can’t think, but worrying he’ll come back and destroy things or worse, hurt you…” She shakes her head. “I need you to go. This is my mess. Callum, if you love me, you’ve got to leave.”
She reaches into her coat pocket and holds out keys for me to take.
“For the rental,” she says.
I stand up, at a complete loss. “What makes you think you’re safe from him? If he’s capable of all you’re saying, you aren’t.”
“Because all his threats hinge on me marrying him. He won’t hurt me…at least not before Tuesday at four.”
“What happens then?”
“I’m supposed to marry him.”
I curse and it’s so loud, she jumps. “This is madness, Ruby.”
I put my hands on my hips and try to get my bearings, but everything feels upside down.
“I’ll leave, but I’ll be close. You get scared for even a second, you call me or blink the lights or scream your head off.” I stalk close to her. “Do you hear me?”
She nods. “I hear you.”
“When you’re in a relationship with someone you love, you’re supposed to work together,” I tell her. “Two are better than one and all that.”
“I’m sorry, Callum,” she whispers.
I nod, feeling dazed, as I set the keys to her RV on the bench and walk out of the barn.
Away from my wife.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
KEEPING WATCH
RUBY
When Callum leaves, I’m drained and heartbroken and scattered. I want to call him and ask him to come right back, but I’m too worried about what Junior would do if he saw Callum here. I allow myself to cry for a few minutes and once those are up, I straighten and get to work.
I call Kess and leave a message, letting her know I’m in town and I’ve checked on the emus. I call the sheriff that Kess talked to, and the situation seems evenmore hopeless.
He says there was no proof that anything had been done to harm the emu. He saw the place in the gate but didn’t see a wound like that on the animal. That maybe the emu had just gotten too cold and died of hypothermia.
When I ask to see Thor, he says that won’t be possible. He’s already been disposed of.
That’s when the tears start flowing again and my nose feels like a faucet.
I have to wonder if Junior paid off the sheriff. Nothing would surprise me at this point.
When I get my bearings, I call the county’s office to see when I can look at the paperwork about this property. The lady who answers, Debbie Melton, is polite, but she doesn’t waver when she says the office will be closed in five minutes and she can’t stay open a second longer until I can get there.
It’s ten minutes from here, so I wouldn’t make it.
“You’re the second person who’s asked for this recently,” she says.
