Chapter 38: Open season
The contentment felt like a physical thing, a warmth in Beth’s chest that had nothing to do with the relentless Texas sun beating down on the ranch’s limestone patio. For three days, she’d simply existed. She’d helped Dove inventory the new security system for the north pasture, the one that looked like ordinary fencing unless you knew where to look. She’d driven into town for coffee at the dusty, ancient diner, enduring the speculative stares with a placid smile. She’d spent hours in her mother’s old library, the leather-bound ledgers of family obligations open before her, not with dread, but with a curator’s curiosity.
She was happy. Not the performative, glossy-magazine happiness she’d cultivated in Brooklyn, but a settled, deep-running current. Damien called every night, just his voice, sometimes tired, sometimes edged with the dark humor that came from dealing with fools. The sound of it, a rumble through the phone pressed to her ear in her vast, silent bedroom, was an anchor. She hadn’t chosen the Ranch’s legacy yet, not fully. And she had her man back. The inconveniences—the spotty cell service, the humidity that could wilt silk in seconds—felt trivial, even charming. She had access to both worlds now. It was a novel, uplifting feeling.
“You’re grinning at nothing again,” Dove drawled, dropping into the wrought-iron chair beside her. She shoved a sweaty bottle of local IPA toward Beth. “It’s unsettling. Like watching a lion lay down with lambs.”
“Maybe the lion’s just full,” Beth said, accepting the bottle. The condensation felt good against her palm.
“Or scheming.” Dove took a long pull from her own beer. “Either way, I’m bored. Let’s go out.”
“Out where? The diner’s closed.”
“The Blue Cactus. It’s Friday. They’ve got that cover band that only knows songs from 2004. It’ll be awful. We’ll drink cheap beer and make fun of everyone.”
It sounded perfect.
The Blue Cactus was a long, low building on the county road, its neon sign buzzing against the deepening twilight. The air inside was a solid wall of cooled sweat, cheap perfume, and fried food. The promised band was murdering a pop-punk anthem, the bass thumping through the scarred wooden floor.
Beth, in designer jeans and a simple black tank top, stuck out like a diamond in a gravel pit. She didn’t mind. Dove, in her usual uniform, blended right in. They claimed a small, sticky table near the back, a fortress of two.
For an hour, it was exactly what she needed. The beer was terrible and cold. Dove pointed out the town’s recurring characters: the eternally-engaged couple fighting by the jukebox, the group of ranch hands pretending not to watch them, the mayor’s nephew trying to dance. Beth laughed, genuinely, her shoulders loosening. This was normalcy. This was life.
Then she saw it.
A man at the bar, big in the way that spoke of softness over muscle, was leaning into a woman’s space. His voice, a ragged saw-blade of sound, cut through the musical muddle. “—think you’re so goddamn smart, don’t you? Huh?”
The woman—small, with faded blonde hair—tried to turn away. He grabbed her wrist, not hard enough to make a scene, but with a possessive finality. The bar’s dim light caught the side of her face as she twisted. Caked foundation, a layer too thick, sat over a faint, yellowish bloom along her jawline. A weeks-old bruise, carefully painted over.
Beth’s body went still. The laughter died in her throat.
She watched the townspeople. The bartender polished a glass, eyes fixed on his task. The couple at the nearest table studied their phones. A man walking past averted his gaze, quickening his step. The collective decision to mind one’s own business was a palpable, cowardly force in the room.
A cold, familiar clarity washed through Beth. This was not Brooklyn. This was her county. Her family’s land. Her silence here wasn’t discretion; it was complicity.
“Beth,” Dove said softly, a warning.
Beth stood up. The movement was smooth, deliberate. She didn’t look at Dove. She wove through the tables, her focus narrowing to the man at the bar. The music swelled, covering the sound of her approach.
She tapped him on the shoulder.
He turned, his face flushed with anger and liquor. “What?”
“You’re making a nuisance,” Beth said, her voice calm, almost conversational. It wasn’t the voice of a socialite. It was the voice she used in boardrooms before a hostile takeover.
“This is a private conversation,” he sneered, his breath sour. “Run along, princess.”
“The lady doesn’t want to have it.” Beth’s eyes flicked to the woman, who was frozen, a rabbit in headlights. “Let her go.”
“Or what?” He puffed out his chest, releasing the woman’s wrist to square up to Beth. He had a good eight inches and a hundred pounds on her. “You gonna call your daddy?”
Someone nearby snickered.
Beth smiled. It was a small, terrifying thing. “No.”
Her hand shot out, not to his face, but to the half-empty bottle of whiskey in front of him. She grabbed it by the neck. In one fluid motion, she swung it in a short, vicious arc against the thick wooden edge of the bar.
The bottom third of the bottle exploded in a shower of brown glass and liquor.
The band faltered. A sudden pocket of silence opened around them.
The man stared, dumbfounded, at the jagged weapon in her hand. The violence of the action had been so efficient, so devoid of hysterics, it momentarily broke his drunk bravado.
“Now,” Beth said, her voice still that terrifying, pleasant register. She held the shorn bottle loosely, the wicked points glinting. “You’re going to walk out that door. You’re going to get in your truck. And you’re not going to come back here. Ever. If you do, I’ll know. And we’ll have a different conversation. One without an audience.”
He gawped. “You’re crazy.”
“I’m a Montgomery.” She took a half-step closer. The splattered whiskey soaked into her boots. “This is my bar. My town. You’re the nuisance. And we have a long tradition of making nuisances disappear.”
The name landed. Montgomery. She saw the understanding, and the fear, flood his bloated face. It wasn’t about socialites or money. It was about the stories whispered about the ranch, about the people who went into the wetlands and didn’t come out.
He backed up, hands rising. “Alright. Jesus. Alright.” He glanced once at the woman, then shoved his way toward the exit, the crowd parting for him like water.
The band, sensing the drama was over, lurched back into their chorus. The bubble of normal noise rushed back in, louder, as if to drown out the interruption.
Beth placed the broken bottle carefully on the bar. She turned to the woman. “Are you alright?”
The woman just nodded, her eyes huge, welling with tears of shock.
“Go out the back. My sister will give you a ride wherever you need to go.” Beth caught Dove’s eye across the room. A single, almost imperceptible nod passed between them. Dove was already moving toward the back hallway, herding the stunned woman away.
Beth looked down at her own hand. A fine spray of blood mixed with the whiskey. A shallow, stinging cut across her knuckles from the glass. She hadn’t even felt it.
She walked to the restroom, past stares that were now openly fearful, not just curious. Inside, the fluorescent light was harsh and humming. She ran cold water over her hands, watching the pink-tinged liquid swirl down the drain. The adrenaline began to recede, leaving a hollow, shaking space behind.
She looked at herself in the smudged mirror. Her hair was perfect. Her makeup flawless. Her eyes were the eyes of a stranger—flat, green, and utterly calm. She saw the monster the town feared. The legacy in her blood, not chosen, but used.
A wave of revulsion hit her, hot and sour. She had just threatened a man with mutilation in a crowded bar. She had enjoyed it. The power of it. The sheer, silencing effect of her name and her willingness to escalate.
She dried her hands on a rough paper towel, examining the cut. It was clean, minor.
But as the disgust crested, something else welled up beneath it. A dark, undeniable catharsis. It was the same feeling she got after a brutal, winning negotiation.