“Because it’s a waste of resources!”
Did people hate their families? Walker hoped not.
The foreman stepped closer to Boone. “Who cares? Dude, you’re so busy playing your little games you haven’t even noticed you already lost! Climate change is happening. Global warming is happening. The seas are going to rise, the storms are going to come, everything’s going to go extinct. Who… fucking… cares? If we’re all going down, why not do it in style? Why not make a few freaking dollars before the apocalypse?”
Boone stared at him a long moment, then shoved him with both hands—hard. While the man stumbled backward, Boone charged past him, straight for the corner stake of the closest mansion marked out nearby. He yanked the stake out of the ground and kept going, the ribbon attached to it fluttering in his wake. He yanked another stake out and another and another until the men caught on to what was happening and went after him.
Walker raced to stop them, bellowing for Clay and Jericho, knowing anyone who heard his voice would come running.
They did, half of them veering off to help him prevent Montague’s men from interfering with Boone’s rampage through the staked-out mansions and half of them starting to rip out stakes on their own.
Soon the camera crew had caught up and started filming the melee. Walker, Jericho, Kai and a couple of others were doing their best not to let the fight devolve into an all-out brawl as the rest of them laid waste to the work Montague’s men had done so far.
“Tell Montague next time he’d better come here himself, and when he does, he’d better be ready to face me!” Boone called.
Walker caught Boone’s arm before he lost all control, and the foreman and his crew retreated the way they’d come, muttering among themselves.
“Feel a little better, Chief?” Clay asked when they were gone.
Boone snorted, then covered his face with his hands. “Hell, I’ve really put my foot in it now, haven’t I?”
“Not sure Montague can let that challenge go,” Jericho said. “Not if he doesn’t want to be a laughingstock around here.”
“In other words, I took a bad situation and made it worse.” Boone dropped his arms and looked to Walker. “What do you think?”
“I think we’d better expect more trouble before this is all over.”
Avery wished she’d been there to see Boone’s rampage, as the incident was named in the days following the event, but she was pleased at how much footage and documentation she’d been able to amass and hand over to Renata and Greg. Having hours at the manor away from Brody made it easy to get the work done.
She trusted Renata to do a good job with it but wished she’d been allowed to stitch the footage together for this episode herself. Instead, she’d get to see it for the first time with everyone else, including Brody, when their preview started in a few minutes.
How would he take it? Last night, as usual, he’d made a big show of bedding down near her, but he hadn’t made a pass at her yet, thank goodness. She thought Eve was right and he was forming an attachment to Jess, a sweet, young thing who really deserved better in Avery’s opinion. Brody had never slipped in her presence and betrayed himself, though.
“Ready for this?” Riley dropped down in the seat beside her. The episode would air nationwide tonight, but like usual they got to see it ahead of time. Boone was huddled with some of the other men by the bunkhouse door, assigning watch duty shifts for the next week. Everyone else was finding seats and chatting.
“I think so. Just wish I knew if it would do any good.”
“Where’s Elizabeth?”
Avery looked around. “There.” She had just emerged from the bathroom and was making her way toward the chairs, studiously avoiding looking at Walker.
“Have you noticed she seems… I don’t know… desperate lately?” Riley asked.
Desperate. That was a good word for the look in Elizabeth’s eyes. Or hunted, Avery thought. That was an even better word. “Something’s going on. I think it has to do with her job. Remember how she was yelling at someone on the phone the other day?”
“Something got postponed, right?”
“That’s right. Wish I knew what it was.” Maybe she’d understand the woman and her motivations better. If Elizabeth made any pretence of being attracted to Walker, Avery would understand perfectly why she was fighting for him, but Elizabeth never did. Unless one of the crew questioned directly about her intention to marry him, at which point she declared her undying love for him in no uncertain terms.
At the front of the room, Renata and Greg set up the laptop and screen and queued up the episode. Sometimes Avery didn’t know if it was better or worse that they got to see it before it went live on television.
As the familiar intro music began to play, Avery clasped her hands in her lap, her fingernails biting into her palms. Walker sat down not far away but didn’t look at her. The episode began with its usual montage of activities around Base Camp, Kai and Addison in the kitchen sweaty from cooking on a hot spring day, Walker and Avery near the bison pasture—that footage must have been captured before Elizabeth or Gabe or Brody came—Jericho and Savannah sitting in front of their tiny house, Jacob asleep in Jericho’s arms.
A recap of the events of the last few weeks came next, even though some of this footage had been shown on previous episodes. Win and Angus’s wedding and Elizabeth’s surprise arrival, caught in excruciating detail. Avery lived her anguish all over again as Elizabeth asked Walker on-screen when he meant to marry her. There was footage of Nora and Clay heading to the hospital. Everyone greeting baby Connie after she was born.
There was an
