“What is it?” Jett asks his younger brother.
“It's Marley,” Dylan cries. "There's been an incident."
Maker
Dylan ends his call with Weathermore after we get more details. Father John came for Marley. Took her.
“I’m going to speak with Sheriff Price next door,” he says and we all agree to come with.
Before we can go anywhere, though, my phone rings. I answer it, putting it on speakerphone as a cryptic voice comes through. It’s Father John, all right.
"I've got her, your girl, Marley. If you want to see her alive, I need a million dollars by the end of the night."
He lists off coordinates, and Gavin has his phone out, recording the message as John delivers it.
"Why did you do this? What do you want from me?" I shout at John. But he’s already ended the call. I try to call the number back but there's no answer. "Fuck!" I shout to the sky, screaming profanities for what he’s done.
"We need to go to the sheriff," Jett says.
I grimace, thinking of what it means if we get the cops involved. I've had enough run-ins with them in my life to know how it all ends. Who wins, who loses, who dies. I clench my fists, wishing it had all gone down differently, but knowing only one thing matters now: Marley coming home.
A few hours later, I've made my choice. I'm in a helicopter, with a duffel bag full of cash. A million dollars. I'm in the same clothes I had on this morning, but there are a few vital differences. Assurances. And so as the helicopter flies toward the coordinates given by Father John, I take a deep breath, knowing I'm doing the right thing for once.
For Marley, for our future, for our baby.
When the helicopter lands, I get out of the plane, nodding stoically to the men still on board. "We're here if you need us," they say. “And we'll come in with back up as soon as you make the call.”
I nod, grabbing the bag of cash, hoping like hell John hasn't done something stupid in the time it took to get the money and make the plans.
I walk toward an old farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. I called Bellamy before we came, asking if the coordinates given by Father John were the same ones that she'd been living at not so long ago.
Sadly, she told me they were. "Oh my God," she'd cried into the receiver. "If he does something to her…"
"Is he a violent man?" I asked her.
"He's a desperate man," she told me, "He's not a killer, but he is an addict, and if he wants something, he's going to get it."
I ended the call more resolute than I'd ever been in my life, and now I hold that feeling with me as I walk toward the farmhouse.
Father John stalks out to the front porch, his hair long and raggedy. He's missing some teeth, and his skin is more than sun-weathered. It looks like he's been beat up a time or two. His eyes are bright red, cracked out. He's high as a kite. He doesn't know what he's doing, which means Marley might really be in trouble.
"You want this money?" I shout to him when I'm ten yards away. "Then I need to see Marley.”
He whistles with his two fingers between his lips and some guys drag Marley out. There's a bag over her head. Her wrists are tied behind her back, and she's shouting. My heart breaks at the sight.
"Don't give him the money, don't! Don't play by his rules," she begs.
But I don't listen. I can't listen because my vision is blurred. When I see her in trouble like this, she's all that matters. All that's ever mattered.
I drop the duffel bag in the middle of the field, and Father John walks over, ripping it open. "It's all there," I say, "accounted for."
He pulls Marley's bag off of her head, and her face is streaked with tears, her eyes wild. Her freckled face filled with fear, pleading with me, desperate and scared.
"It's okay, baby," I tell her. "It's all going to be okay."
"We good?" I ask Father John. “You’re a fucking bastard, you know that? You can take all my money, but you will not take my girl."
Father John cackles grotesquely, and I lift Marley into my arms, pulling her to me tight.
"You're just going to walk away?” she asks. “You're going to give him all that money and… let him go free?”
"Trust me," I say into her ear, carrying her back toward the helicopter. Into the mic strapped to my clothes, I tell the Feds that are on the helicopter, "It's go time. I got her. If they're armed, it's not by much."
I run with Marley towards the helicopter, towards safety as another helicopter lands. I get in the first one with the love of my life as more federal agents land on Father John's property, rushing from the helicopter towards his home, guns raised, ready to fight. Ready to put that man behind bars.
"The police?" Marley asks as our pilot takes off.
I nod. "That was a part of the deal. Father John is a wanted criminal throughout the state, not only for his drug trafficking and his sex cult, but he's been trafficking women. I gave the Feds the coordinates, agreed to wear a wire, and they would get us out before the shooting started. And the money, don’t worry, they’ll get it back.”
She cries against me as we ascend, the helicopter flying into the Alaskan sky. "You worked with the cops for me?" she whispers in shock.
"What, you didn't think I had it in me?"
"No, I just thought cops always screwed you over. I thought…"
"Look," I tell her, cupping her cheek with my hand. "I love you, Marley Grove, with all that I am and all that I could be. I've learned a thing or two
