Mother Road Ch. 05 - One For The Road

"Listen up, you miserable fuckface," he growled, "this woman you abused just saved your fucking life. To thank her, you're going to sign these fucking divorce papers. If you don't sign, I can assure you there will be no place you can hide. In jail, out of jail it won't fucking matter. I'll be coming for you and I promise next time I'll finish the job. Understand?"

Sonny nodded and scrawled his signature on the lines as Walter directed.

By some miracle, the old tractor I'd parked next to the Gulf Stream had not caught fire, so I used it to pull the smoldering RV remains out of the driveway. The EMTs were first on the scene, tending to Sonny and his three pals that were wounded by the buckshot.

The Sheriff's deputies showed up shortly afterwards and took statements from all the adults. One of Sonny's wounded pals admitted they'd deliberately attacked the farm to kidnap Trent, so Walter and I weren't arrested.

Once we got everybody back in the house, Natalie made hot chocolate to settle the little ones down. It was about 2:15am when the kids finally got settled in and I made my way up to our bedroom. Laura was wide awake and cuddled up to me as soon as I got into bed. She stroked my face and began to cry, whispering, "Tom, those men had guns. I was so scared; I could have lost you."

"I'm sorry, sweetheart, I really am. If Walter hadn't been here it could have been a lot worse. It's all right now. Everybody's safe."

"Where's Walter?"

"He's in the cabin, sleeping on the couch while Dotty is sleeping in the bed with Trent. With all the noise the little guy was really shaken up. He insisted Walter be with him, so that's the solution they came up with."

Whether it was hormones, shock, or relief I wasn't sure, but Laura cried herself to sleep as I held and consoled her. I wasn't a praying man, but it had been a long-ass day. Now it was over, and my family was safe. I said a prayer of thanks for that. The minutes turned into hours as I lay there, the adrenaline in my body fading. My heart rate finally slowed enough to allow me to sleep. Fitful sleep, granted, but better than nothing.

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A hand shook me awake, and I made a mental note to start locking the damned bedroom door at night again. Blinking my eyes against the blinding morning light, I said, "What time is it?"

Elijah's voice answered, "It's 9:30. Dad, me and Natty have something to tell you."

My eyes started to focus, and sure enough there stood my prodigal son and his long, tall paramour. She was absolutely beaming.

By now Laura was waking up, and she saw the kids and asked, "Elijah, what are you doing here?"

Before he could answer, Natalie showed us her left hand. There was a diamond on her ring finger, and she happily declared, "Mama, Papa, we're engaged! Eli just gave me a ring, isn't it beautiful?" Unable to contain her joy, she climbed on the bed like a small child to give Laura and me each a kiss on the cheek.

Laura sat up and hugged the girl, then said, "We're so happy for you, Natty."

Eli blurted out, "What happened last night was all over the news this morning, I freaked out when I saw it! I hurried out here to see if Natalie was OK. I was planning on proposing later this week, but when I saw what happened, I couldn't wait any more. I love her, Dad. You were right, it would have been a huge mistake not to marry her."

Hearing this, Natty threw herself at Elijah, wrapping him in her long arms and kissing his face. Laura was crying happy tears, and I was ecstatic that Elijah finally got it figured out. More importantly, Natty was finally happy. I felt a huge emotional weight lift off my shoulders. Only one question remained.

"Elijah, how do you intend to support your family? How did you even afford the ring?""

"I have a job, Dad, I work for you now! Walter hired me last Friday, right after he loaned me the money to buy the ring."

Shit. I hated days when my world went sideways before I'd even had coffee. Shaking my head, I kissed Laura and went downstairs.

Trent was in the TV room with TJ, watching cartoons. Dotty came into the kitchen, humming. Her hair was slightly disheveled. The top two buttons on her blouse were open, and a nice bit of her cleavage was on display.

"Good morning, sister-in-law," I said cheerfully, "I trust you slept well?"

"After I made sure Trent had his waffles, I went back to bed for a little while. Poor Walter's worn out, I'm just bringing him his breakfast."

I chuckled, "I'm guessing he was already tired, but you probably wore him out a little more this morning."

Dotty smiled and blushed. "Good girls don't kiss and tell."

I nodded. I didn't need a weatherman to see Terhune family lightning had struck again. "You need to be careful with that bed in the cabin."

"How so? It seemed to hold up well this morning."

"Oh, it will hold plenty of weight, but it seems to make babies happen. My daughter Pearl was conceived there, and when Olly's in-laws used it a few years back, the result was their daughter Hannah."

A rather devious look crossed Dotty's face, "Good to know. Frankly, I wouldn't mind another baby. I don't think Walter would mind, either. I get the feeling he's rather taken with me." I couldn't resist a quick shoulder hug and a cheek kiss.

"Sis, I saw you stop Walter from killing a man simply by putting your arms around him" I whispered, "saying 'taken with you' doesn't begin to describe it." Then I looked at the time, and saw the morning slipping away.

"Dotty, can you take breakfast up to Laura for me? I'll take the breakfast tray to Walter; he and I need to talk business." I gestured towards her cleavage, "Also, can you please button up? We have impressionable adolescent boys in the house."

"Whoops, sorry," she laughed and took care of her runaway buttons.

I took the tray into the cabin. As I expected, Walter was not sleeping on the sofa. I heard his deep voice call from the bedroom, "Dotty, is that you?"

"No Walter, it's Tom. I brought your breakfast." I walked into the cabin's bedroom and put the tray down on the dresser. "How'd you sleep last night?"

"It took me a while to settle in. Having Dotty and Trent with me was relaxing, though. I like not being alone at night." Sure, I could have told Walter about 2am newborn feedings, but thought I should let him enjoy himself for now. Why should I disrupt his reverie?

"I see you moved to the bed now. Congratulations, it's much more comfortable. I trust you weren't alone."

A look of contentment was on Walter's face like I'd never seen before. "You were right about Dotty, Tom."

"Oh yeah? How so?" Like I didn't see this coming.

"You told me once I kissed her, I wouldn't want anybody else. You were right. As soon as her divorce is final, I'm going to marry her. I haven't told her yet, but this afternoon I'm taking her to a jewelry store to pick out a ring, then we're going to look for a bigger apartment. I only have one bedroom right now; when she moves in with me, Trent will need his own."

If Walter were talking about any other woman, I would have pointed out that maybe it was a little soon to be making these decisions; given the fact I'd decided to marry Laura pretty much the first night I met her, however, I was hardly in a position to argue the point.

"Congratulations Walter. I'm genuinely happy for you. Before you do that, though, we have some business to discuss. Our activity of last night made the news, and this morning my business phone and email have been blowing up. A lot of people want to interview us, especially you, on how you used non-lethal security measures to defend the farm. It's a good opportunity to give our security consulting business a high profile. Take the day off and relax, but you'll need to be available the rest of the week to talk to these people."

Walter looked hesitant, "I'm not sure how good I'll be at it. I never been interviewed before."

I laughed, "Well, my friend, for 30 years you were never a security consultant, either, but here you are. Welcome to the big leagues." Walter nodded, I had him there.

I continued on, "Now, let's talk about my son Elijah. Did you actually hire him and loan him money like he said?"

Now it was Walter's turn to chuckle, "Yeah. One night when I was leaving the farm, I caught him sneaking out of Natalie's bedroom window. He told me about you giving him the boot because of Natalie. When you told him he couldn't stay here, he couldn't keep away, he was like that kid in the Julio and Juliet play."

"It's 'Romeo and Juliet'."

"Yeah, whatever. Anyway, when he told me he wanted to marry Natalie but didn't have a ring for her, I felt sorry for him and loaned him the money. That poor kid can't afford a pack of gum right now."

I replied, a little more heatedly than I intended, "That's exactly my point! He can't pay you back, he just graduated from high school, he has no skills and no job, and pretty soon he'll have a baby to support! Even if he enlists in the Army, he'll barely be squeaking by!"

In a calm voice, Walter replied "Take it easy, Tom. That's all true, and it's why I hired him to work for me as a trainee. We'll be paying him minimum wage at first, then if he does good, after 90 days we'll give him a raise. I'm 50 years old, Tom. I need a helper; I can't go climbing around buildings so much anymore. I figure he'll start off as a cable jockey for me, helping with installations and learning about camera placement, all that shit."

I was still not comfortable with the idea, and protested, "But Walter, Elijah doesn't know anything about security. Hell, he's never been a great student, he doesn't know much about anything!"

"Neither did I when I started working for Mr. Bartolo. He'll learn. A guy's got to start somewhere, right? Besides, I already trust Eli. I hear his dad's a pretty good guy." I thought to myself, 'Walter, you bastard. Flattery will get you everywhere'. I had to admit, Walter had a point. It appeared he also had a much bigger heart than I ever knew.

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Author's note: The vasectomy failure phenomenon mentioned in this chapter, "vas deferens reconnect/recanalization", is a rare (1 in 4,000) but very real thing.