One kidnapping was enough to make anyone go around armed. Shilloh was no exception. She just preferred a concealed carry when possible and always when around Agnes.

  She really wanted to pistol whip Kora and see how much that dumb heifer liked threatening old women with a bullet in her knee. But that sounded too much like prison time.

  Instead, the short woman stepped forward and clapped her hands inches in front of the other woman's face. Just like she would with a dog, she was trying to train, "Shut up and listen."

  Nikko and Kora both jerked back, and she kept talking before they could interrupt." I don't care about you, Kora. You were nothing but a catty waitress at a restaurant. I have never thought about you beyond wondering if you would spit in my food."

  The vile bitch opened her mouth to interrupt, but a finger appeared under her nose, and Shilloh made a sound that was half shush and half hiss. She had picked it up from watching videos of a pre-M-day show called The Dog Whisperer.

  Be a dumb bitch, she thought, get treated like a dumb bitch.

  " I. Said. Listen. You mean nothing to me. I have never tried to do anything to you because I, like every other person in your life, forget about you the second the smell of your melted candy and imitation lavender perfume fades."

  "Fuck you!" Sheryl said, finding her voice. Though she didn't seem to be pushing against Nikko's grip anymore.

  "Real original."

  “Contrasending bitch. Let me spell things out for you! I—?"

  "Spell it?" Shilloh interrupted with a snort. "I'll believe you can spell when you show me the crayons. Also, it's 'condescending,' not 'contrasending,' you musty fucking moose-knuckle."

  "You're just trying to look smart in front of my man because you're too frumpy to get your own!"

  "First, take an improv class and learn some variety instead of just saying frumpy. Second thing, Let's talk about Nikko," she turned her glare to the gob-struck man-child still wrapped around Sheryl, "He has never mentioned you. I actually didn't know he was being an asshole to you. As a fellow woman, I would have stuck up for you if I did. To me, he was pure networking. I wouldn't have gotten a breath mint with him, let alone a coffee, if he hadn't insisted to the point of making me embarrassed for how lonely it made him look."

  She shifted her glare between the two of them. "Still, I am sorry. He's trash. I never considered that talking to him could offend literally anyone. Because, and this is the great part, I thought his awkward, try-hard bullshit was because he wasn't comfortable coming out of the closet to me."

  "Come out of the closet?" Nikko said, voice nearly cracking.

  "Yes! I thought you were gay and afraid to admit it. We're in the goddamn bible-belt, and some dumbasses take umbrage to that sort of thing. I thought you were trying to over-compensate because we're surrounded by so much insecure, macho bullshit. I tried to be kind because, well, I'm not an asshole. But also because I thought you desperately needed a friend who would talk to you about your garden without judging your masculinity!"

  "You thought I was a fairy!"

  Fury rose in her, "You say that word like it's an insult one more time! I dare you. I'll stick my boot so far up your ass that you'll taste the dog shit I stepped in last week."

  Kora shook herself out of Nikko's arm, "You're lying! Nikko is always taking you out, and he told me that we couldn't meet his parents because you two might—"

  Shilloh held up her hands, "I don't want to hear your voice, let alone your back story. He's trash, and I have no interest in either of you."

  "Oh, so I'm just some idiot now, right!" Kora said, her face red and arms spread in the most classically wanna-be-tough manner she could imagine. It was belied by the glimmer of tears in her eyes." You're just so fucking perfect that you won't bother with trash like us. People who have to work."

  "Work?" Shilloh said, thinking about the hours she had spent in the monster-infested woods after killing an invisible crypto. All so she could cash in monster ears that left blood stains in her pack.

  "Yeah, work!" Kora sneered. "You ever heard of it?"

  Shilloh was about to lay into her when she felt something pressed into her hand. She looked behind her and saw Agnes smiling. She was using two hands to hold something against Shilloh's.

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  "It's alright, Deary. Just take a breath." The old woman said, her white hair twitching in the breeze and her wise eyes twinkling. With a final gentle squeeze, she let go of Shilloh's hand.

  Which made it all the more shocking when Shilloh looked down and saw that she was now holding a distressing large butt plug.

  "What the fuck, Agnes!"

  Birch started cackling. The old woman just cocked her head with polite confusion when the massive purple monster was thrown back at her.

  "What, Deary? It's clean, and I thought the one over there had bad enough breath that this might be appropriate."

  "Why would you put a butt plug in my hands? That's so fucked up!"

  "Well, that's because it was funnier than using my ball gag," the grandmotherly woman said, making one appear from her purse like the world's worst children's magician. "You know, because of the bad breath and all the you-know-what coming out of her mouth."

  "Fuck you, granny!" Sheryl screamed," I'll whip your geriatric ass, I don't give a fuck."

  Just like that, Birch was next to Agnes with a very bored-looking Kamora trying to hold her back. "I'll ruin your fucking life if you even breathe on Agnes!"

  "You can't do shit, Birch! I work for Stanley, not you. And it's after hours."

  "Everyone, everyone," The pudgy drug dealer said, moving between them all with a dazed and vaguely panicked look on his face.

  He was high, Shilloh realized. He was stoned out of his ever-loving mind.

  "Calm down," Nikko repeated," I'm sure that Kora is just a little drunk. Don't listen to anything she's saying. And Shilloh, please, I don't know who you were talking to, but it's not like what you think: I'm not gay. We "he gestured between then with a hand," are fine."

  Had the man not heard a single word she had just said?

  Before he could say anything dumber, Agnes reached up and patted his face. Though, after the first pat, it amped up into more of a condescending smack. One made all the more insulting for how slow and deliberate it was.

  "Shhhhh. Shhhh. Yes, there we go. Nice and quiet. Good. You're not pretty enough to get away with saying things that stupid. Ohp, I'm sorry," she faux-frowned like she would at an upset baby. "Did I hurt your feelings? Sorry, Hun. But let's not act surprised. I dare say you ruined your prospects a decade or two ago. None of this shouldn't surprise you."

  "Ma'am?"

  "Op Op Op!" she said, putting a finger over his lips and smiling at him with the sort of condescending yet loving smile that only a grandma used to precocious toddlers could give, "I thought we said it was quiet time for you."

  Then Agnes frowned, took a tissue out of her sizable purse, and wiped her finger clean, "Good lord boy. You apply the chapstick, you don't pleasure it. And why does my finger smell like fruit punch and erection pills!" She winced and shook her hand, "If I drew your key from a bowl, I would use it to open the basement door, go up to your mother's house, and give her a firm talking to."

  Nikko's face fell. Slowly, something ugly passed across it, "Back off. You don't want to mess with me."

  Things started degrading from there.

  Kora shoved away from her manipulative boyfriend to try and sass Birch. Birch leaped in like a prize fighter itching or a scrap. Agnes ignored Nikko in a way that only made him get louder and more insulted. But the old drunk lady was occupied egging on Birch. She kept encouraging the younger woman to 'kick her in the whoo-ha.'

  Kamora stepped away and was taking a variety of duck-faced selfies with a clearly distressed Nick.

  In less than a minute, Shilloh was yelling at Nikko, Agnes was cackling and wagging a butt plug at him. Kora was red-faced and looked like her profound inability to keep up with Birch's shit-talking had pushed her to within an inch of violence.

  "Just back off, Nikko!" Shilloh yelled. "I'm done."

  "Just let me explain," he whined, stepping closer.

  "I don't want you to explain," she said, trying to step away without letting Agnes slip around her. The old bat was jauntily wielding her butt plug like the rapier of a musketeer. The infamous fourth musketeer who had been permanently sent home by HR. She kept edging around Shilloh to poke at Nikko and yell, "En Guard!"

  "I want you to leave," Shilloh said, stepping back even as Nikko stepped forward. An edge of panic slipped under her ribs like a needle.

  He just kept moving forward, hands reaching. Over and over, he tried to invade her personal space. It was impossible to not notice how much bigger he was than her.

  "No, no, no. Honey," he breathed," just listen."

  "I. Said. To. Stop." Her breath went short, like that imaginary needle had shot cold water straight into her lungs.

  "Let me explain!" That same ugly expression flashed across his face, and he lunged forward, his distressingly soft hands closing around her shoulders.

  He started yelling excuses. But Shilloh didn't hear his words.

  It was strange. Something about a grown man yelling could short-circuit every piece of your brain. It could make you feel small. Like a little girl or a rabbit.

  Like you needed to flee.

  If her friends weren't next to her, she probably would have thrashed like a cornered animal and ran. But Agnes needed her.

  She didn't know what to do. Everyone was yelling too much. She just wanted it to be over and to get away.

  Some horrible, suffocating feeling rose in her. It was an icy wash of fear that went from the top of her thighs and up to her collarbone. But just looking at her friend threatened to ignite that fear into rage.

  Her thoughts went to her gun.

  Then, a hand came down on Nikko's shoulder.

  It was sun-tanned, with short fingernails, ugly cuticles, and skin made spotty by the dirt and gun oil permanently working into the pores.

  "What's going on here," Wade Raslow rumbled, looming up behind Nikko and surveying the chaos with dead eyes the color of a matte blade

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