Page 13 of Nine Month Contract
“Yeah, I’ll show up.” The air is whooshed out of me when Everly jumps up and binds her arms around my neck in a big hug.
Millie bleats and jumps up, hoofing us both until we break apart and make room for her.
“I have a good feeling about her, Uncle Wyatt,” she exclaims, dropping back down to pat Millie on her side.
“Just don’t get your hopes up,” I reply dryly, assuming I’ll probably be able to get home before sundown.
She instantly stops smiling and nods seriously. “My hopes are in the dirt.”
“Good.”
“Under Millie’s manure…which I’m going to go scoop out of her pen right now.”
The corner of my mouth tips up. “You’re a good kid.”
“Uncle Wyatt, I’m a goodadult.Remember? Eighteen? Going to college?” She flutters her eyelashes at me.
“Hmmm,” I grunt.
She smiles and walks off, dangling a carrot as Millie excitedly pounces behind her like a puppy.
One dinner. And then it’s back to the drawing board that is my life these days.
SurrogatesInterviewed:13
Jamestown is a small foothills community where if you blink, you could miss it. It boasts a population of a whopping 260 people with little room for growth as the town rests snugly between steep canyon walls and thick forests. It cost me an arm and a leg to pave the private gravel drive up the mountain that overlooks the town. And because it’s private, I can’t get city snow removal in the winter, which means in a bad storm, my brothers and I have to leave our trucks at the bottom of the range and ride snowmobiles up until we can run my tractor plow through everything.
It’s a bitch, but it’s also very freeing to let your life go for a while because of old Mother Nature.
Because of the mining history here, the town has an old Western feel. Remnants of those gold rush days are scattered throughout. Like the old hotel that’s now the fire department run by volunteers, two of which are my brothers. Then the dance hall that’s now the post office, plus the parlor house that’s the town’s only bar called the Jamestown Mercantile. Their catchphrase is “where everyone is a little feral,” and hell, it fits.
The Mercantile is more than just a bar, though. It serves decent grub, and its small grocery supply comes in handy during the winter when the weather gets bad. My brothers and I are regulars as we eatmany of our meals here and grab beers after work a lot. It’s about as small-town as you can get because I know literally everyone when I walk in. Something that took my brothers and me a bit of time to adjust to.
The first year after my brothers joined me on the mountain and built their cabins, we spent a lot of late nights at the Mercantile, making friends with the very limited single local ladies. Most of whom are long gone now. And truth be told…that’s probably our fault.
The high of the mountain air and living off the land in our self-sustaining cabins was an intense aphrodisiac. So intense it nearly ruined everything my brothers and I were trying to build together. That was the first and last time we ever let a woman come between us.
Thankfully, that’s ancient history now, and as a group, we all made a pact of sorts to choose mountain life over traditional lives. Women come and go, but mountain life and our brotherhood…it’s forever. The three of us even do this annual Dark Night bonding tradition, which is meant to remind us of what is most important. Our pact seems even more meaningful now after the loss of our father.
“Here you go, Wyatt.” A pilsner glass of amber liquid appears in front of me, and I glance up to see the owner, Judy, gazing out the large plate glass window through the Mercantile Café block text scrawled across the front. Her head nods toward the mountain, where you can see our three log cabins nestled up there like a postcard. “There’s been a lot of traffic up your way this week.”
“You’re telling me,” I grumble and tip my beer to her in silent thanks before taking a drink.
“Everly stopped in a few hours ago and asked if she could make a reservation.” She barks out a smoky laugh and drops her hand on my shoulder for balance. “That slayed me.”
“Yeah, she’s kind of on a roll these days,” I drawl before taking another sip of my beer.
“You be nice to her. That girl gives me a toothache she’s so sweet.” Judy smiles affectionately, then gets a nosy look in her eye. “Does this meeting have something to do with that surrogate ad Calder posted on my tagboard the other day? I thought that was a joke.”
My hand tightens around my glass as my fingers twitch to wrap around my brother’s neck. “It might.”
Judy’s brows lift as she takes a moment to digest this information. I would have liked to keep my plans to hire a surrogate quiet from the locals, but secrets spread like forest fires in a small town, especially with an obnoxious brother like Calder making it front-page fucking news for everyone to see. I’m sure they all think I’m crazy, but luckily, I don’t give a shit what anyone thinks.
Judy pats me on the shoulder and shakes her head. “I hope you know what you’re getting into, son.”
“I guess we’ll find out,” I reply through clenched teeth.
She nods, seemingly appeased by that answer, and walks away without asking more questions. Judy always knows when to walk away. She also knows when to smack one of us Fletchers upside the head when we need it. Calder needs a smack more often than all of us.
