“I never said I’d take it.”
Charlotte sat erect, her breasts jiggling with the movement. “Now, you just hold on. You never said you wouldn’t, either. I took it for granted you accepted. Why else do you think I let you make love to me?”
Fargo cupped himself low down. “You did it for this.” He smiled and made for the door. As he came around the foot of the bed she flew at him, growling like a wildcat. He caught her wrists as she went to rake his face and held firm. She kicked at his knee and he sidestepped. “Enough.”
“You son of a bitch!” Charlotte was nearly beside herself. She drove a knee at his manhood and he twisted so his thigh took the blow. “No one does this to me. Do you hear me? No one.”
Fargo pushed her onto the bed. She immediately began to get back up but he wagged a finger and said, “I wouldn’t.”
“Bastard.”
“Bitch.”
“You don’t dare hurt me!” Charlotte hissed. “I’ll have you arrested.” Her face lit with vicious guile. “That’s it! I’ll tell everyone you raped me. I’ll have you thrown behind bars so you can’t take part in the hunt. All it will take is a scream loud enough to raise the roof.” She opened her mouth wide.
“Go right ahead,” Fargo said. “And while the sheriff is arresting me I’ll tell him about the killers you hired.”
Charlotte froze.
“You’ll have to scream louder than that.”
“What are you talking about?”
Fargo turned and walked to the bedroom door. She called his name and he paused with his hand on the latch.
“I did no such thing. You’re making that up.”
“Am I?” Fargo opened the door.
“You think you’re clever but you’re not. You trust Sam and you shouldn’t. There’s more to this than you can imagine. The truth is, you’re a bumpkin in over his head and it’s going to get you planted six feet under.”
“And you’re a money whore with her tits hanging out.” Fargo shut the door and heard something thud against it. He grinned as he walked down the hall. He’d enjoyed that. But she was right about one thing: he hadbeen only guessing about her hiring killers.
He could only hope she was wrong about that last part.
10
Samantha sat at one end of the long mahogany table, Tom at the other end. Fargo was on Sam’s right, Cletus Brun on Tom’s left. There were plenty of empty chairs; the table could seat forty people. Clockwise after Fargo, a few chairs away, sat Roland, then Theodore Pickleman. On the other side of the table were Charles and his friend from the Hannibal Men’s Club, a man by the name of Bruce Harmon. Charlotte and her cousin Amanda sat across from Fargo and Charlotte glared at him every chance she got.
The meal started with a choice of soup, potato or vegetable. A salad bowl was passed around. Roast venison, beef and ham were the meats. Carrots and green beans the vegetables. In addition, the cook’s staff had prepared simmering hot rolls. Fargo smeared his thick with butter. The coffee was a rich blend from Italy, he was told. The taste was too bitter for his liking so he spooned in enough sugar to sink a canoe. For dessert there was apple pie, cherry pie, or pudding. Fargo chose the pudding.
By six everyone was done eating and they were sitting around making small talk.
Fargo was on his fourth cup of coffee. No one said much to him, which was fine, as he got to eat in peace.
Then Samantha caught his eye. “I trust the meal was to your liking?”
“Kings should eat this well.”
Sam grinned. “For all our father’s faults, he was a stickler for family meals. We were required to eat together. No exceptions. Charles always had to wait to go to his club until after we ate. Roland stayed away more than a few times when he was off hunting, which always made Father furious.”
Charlotte was being her sweet self around the others. She sighed and said with only slight resentment, “Our father always had to do everything his way. He never allowed for our personal wishes.”
“Did you cry at his funeral?” Fargo asked.
“Why, of course I did,” Charlotte answered, sounding shocked. “I loved my father even though he was always mean to me.”
“Maybe he saw you for how you truly are.”
Charlotte forgot herself and bristled. “What exactly is that supposed to mean? I was always the nicest of all of us.”
“Emmett was nice, too,” Samantha said sadly.
“Yes, he was,” Charlotte quickly corrected herself. “I miss him terribly. It’s a shame we can’t give him a proper burial until after the hunt.”
As if that were a cue, Theodore Pickleman rose and tapped his wineglass with a butter knife. The ting-ting-ting got everyone’s attention. They all fell silent save for Tom, who loudly declared, “Finally!”
“We all know why we’re here,” the lawyer began. “It’s yet another condition of your father’s will. He was quite explicit in how this was to be arranged and I have followed his instructions to the letter.”
“Yes, yes, get on with it,” Tom said.
Charles leaned on his elbows. “How is this silly hunt to be handled?”
“I’ll get to that in a moment.” Pickleman hooked his thumbs in his vest. “First I am required to make one thing perfectly clear. Whoever wins the hunt inherits everything. All of your father’s money. All of his many properties. All of his holdings in everything. We are talking millions of dollars.”
“We know that,” Tom said.
“Yes. But what you don’t know is that in your father’s will, he left it up to the winner to decide whether he or she will share any of the inheritance. Whoever prevails can either keep it all or offer the others equal shares.”
“Equal?” Charlotte said.
Pickleman nodded. “It’s a condition of the will. Either the winner shares everything equally or he or she can’t share anything at all.”
Roland said, “How peculiar.”
“Not at all,” Samantha said. “It’s just like Father to force us to be generous whether we want to be or not. Don’t you see? If Tom were to win, for instance, he can’t keep ninety percent of the inheritance for himself and give the rest of us a pittance.”
Tom took exception. “Why use me as your example? The rest of you would do the same.”
“Perhaps. Perhaps not,” Samantha responded. “A moot point since Father doesn’t give us the choice.”
“Even from the grave he controls our lives,” Charles remarked.
“I can’t wait for this to be over with,” Charlotte said. “It’s so morbid.”
Theodore Pickleman cleared his throat. “May I get on with the details, please?” He paused. “The conditions are these. Tomorrow morning at six a.m. the hunt is to begin. You will have twenty-four hours in which to succeed. No more and no less. By six a.m. Monday morning, if none of you have claimed the prize, all of you forfeit any right to the inheritance.”
Tom started to come out of his chair. “What the hell? You never said anything about this.”
“I was required not to.”
“Forfeit?” Charles repeated in stunned amazement. “Father would deny us everything?”
Samantha gestured to get the lawyer’s attention. “What happens to the inheritance? Who gets it if we don’t?”
“All your father’s properties are to be sold off. All the money from the proceeds and all the money in his bank accounts are to be administered to the poor and the needy.”
Now Tom did come out of his chair. He was so incensed, he pounded the table. “We’re to be deprived of what is rightfully ours to feed some dirt farmers? By God, I won’t stand for this.”