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“You can’t. You agreed to it.”
“I agreed to spend the evening with you and to spend five eight-hour days with you. Doing what you want, without you touching me. Don’t you remember that part?”
“No. I don’t.” He sneered at her, and it was obvious to Travis that he obviously did remember, he just chose to ignore it.
“The lady said unhand her.”
“What are you gonna do about it?” Chalmer said.
Uh oh. That was a good question. What was he going to do about it? Travis couldn’t remember the last time he’d gotten into a fight. It had been a decade.
Back in the day, he’d been a bit of a brawler, although he’d never been any good at it. He’d had a temper, a chip on his shoulder, and thought the world was against him. Ford had fixed all of that, but maybe he fixed it a little too well, considering that the idea of fighting about anything was distasteful. But the man wasn’t going to manhandle Ellen. Plus, as he thought about it, he realized that they must not be married. She said something about five days, eight hours.
“You guys aren’t married?” he said, figuring that probably should have been his first question.
Chapter 7
“Travis! Ew!”
“I was married to that jerkface, and only a fool would do that again.” Shanna’s voice came from behind him. He’d heard that she got married, but he hadn’t known to whom, only that they had a couple of kids and got divorced. And he thought that information came from one of his brothers, not Ellen. She didn’t typically relay the gossip in town when they talked. She talked more about her animals, what was happening on the farm, her ideas and things she hoped to do, and she seemed very interested in what was going on with him.
“Shut up. Who asked you anyway?” The man spat in Shanna’s direction.
“Let go,” Ellen said to him, tugging on her arm. She said it in a low voice, like she was appeasing everyone, and Travis hid a smile. If the man hadn’t been so annoying, he probably wouldn’t have. But he was guessing that Ellen just wanted him to let go so Travis wouldn’t end up in a fight. He could almost hear her saying it now.
“I’m not letting go. You’re coming with me. It’s too crowded around here,” he said and started dragging Ellen away.
Travis hesitated for just a second. Maybe a split second. He wasn’t going to allow that man to drag his best friend away. Was he?
He didn’t know how else to stop it, other than to take three large strides forward, grab the man’s shoulder, spinning him around, and growl, “Let go of her.”
At least he was holding onto her with his right hand, so if they were going to fight, assuming the man was right-handed, he would have to let go of Ellen first.
“Get ready to duck, kiddo,” he said to Ellen.
“Travis,” she said with a warning note in her voice, and Travis wasn’t sure whether it was because he called her kiddo, which she didn’t really like, or whether it was because she didn’t want him to get into a fight, which he didn’t really have a choice about.
He didn’t take his eyes off the man in front of him to try to figure out which thing Ellen meant.
“Chalmer, let me go. Travis is a lot bigger than you are.”
Travis didn’t think he was any bigger than Chalmer. In fact, Chalmer definitely outweighed him. They were about the same height, though.
Chalmer sneered. “That toothpick? He’s not bigger than me.”
Maybe Ellen was just trying to convince Chalmer that he was going to lose the fight. Travis couldn’t be sure who would win, but he couldn’t not do something.
“He’ll go down with the first swing,” the man said, grinning for one second before his grin faded, his eyes narrowed, and he swung at Travis as hard as he could.
Travis was not expecting it. He was more concerned about telling Ellen to get out of the way. He had his mouth open when Chalmer hit him square in the jaw.
The blow felt like a sledgehammer hitting him in the face. Travis stumbled back. Immediately something warm and wet started running down his face, and the world seemed to dip and sway and get black or red, he couldn’t really tell what color it was. He felt dizzy, like he was going to fall down at any second.
But in some subconscious quarter of his brain, he knew he couldn’t just walk away and tend to his wounds. He needed to fight back. He must have been softer than what he realized, because the temptation to just sit down and hold his head in his hand for a few seconds was strong.
But he couldn’t do that and risk Chalmer grabbing Ellen and walking away with her. The only witness was Shanna, and she didn’t seem to be the slightest bit concerned about Ellen’s safety. Nor did she seem to care about anything other than the fact that he hadn’t listened to her and followed her across the parking lot.
So he stepped forward, his eyes on Chalmer as he smirked.
