Page 11 of My UnTrue Love
Chapter Three
From when he was a bright young lad,
She’d been at his side,
Yet with fame’s hunger driving mad,
His love could not abide.
Lyrics from the folk song “Crossroads Coyote”
Dinah Hornblower ran a saloon named “The Kitchen.” Clem’s grandmother had been Dinah’s muse, for a spell. The Kitchen needed a new musician, because the banjo player had run off to become a blacksmith. Clementine wanted Dinah to hire Bill.
That was the gist of the plan, only it had taken Clem the entire forty-minute walk to explain it. Her summary included intricate backgrounds for all the principal characters, a tangent about The Kitchen’s delicious fried onion appetizer, and an in-depth analysis of Dinah’s possible love affair with Clem’s grandmother, which, “must’ve been filled with incredible creativity and passion. It’s lucky they didn’t kill each other.”
Bill could have listened to her happily talk to him all day.
Coyotes were not a species people happily talked to. As a group, they’d earned a dangerous reputation. People whispered they were closer to animals than most shifters. Aggressive and conniving. Small in number, usually Bad, and most always male, coyotes were easy to vilify.
They didn’t play popular sports, like wolves. They weren’t barbarian warriors, like centaurs. No one needed theirmagic, like dragons. Coyotes lived on the outskirts of Good society, peering in and searching for weaknesses.
Plotting. Watchful. Unrepentant… The complaints about them went on and on:
Coyotes were tricksters. (Bill preferred to think of it as being skilled at strategy.)
Coyotes were heartless. (Sure, but Bill argued it was an all-or-nothing world. You had to get all you could and leave your opponents with nothing.)
Coyotes claimed women that fate hadn’t meant for them. (Yeah… Bill couldn’t deny that one. It was true. Coyotes stole happily ever afters.)
The thieving of True Loves was the biggest grievance against his kind. The one that no Good male ever forgot. To Bill, though, it was just straight-up survival. Like most species, coyotes wanted a mate. It drove them. Since some damn curse had denied coyotes a True Love, the only answer was to steal somebody else’s.
If a smug, oblivious bastard took his smug, oblivious eyes off the woman that destiny had handed him…? And if she meandered a little too close to the wild…? And if a coyote snatched her up…? Well, there was really no one to blame but the oblivious bastard himself. Seemed pretty clear-cut to Bill.
Take Johnny for example: A smug and oblivious bastard, upon whom fortune had smiled. He’d been granted a fair-haired, fay little thing with a glowing smile and clear green eyes. Clementine hadn’t been born Johnny’s True Love, but she’d been endlessly devoted to that fuck-wad. She’dbelongedto Johnny.
That just wasn’t gonna work for Bill.
It was an all-or-nothing world. From the very first day, he’d planned to get it all and leave Johnny with nothing. He’d just had to do it in a quiet, indirect way, so the repercussions didn’t blow back on him. There was no sense in disabusing Clem of the notion that Bill was a nice guy. Not when Johnny was there, just begging to be the villain.
Bill didn’t need any credit for destroying his enemies. Of course not. He wasn’t a bragging sort. Let others take the recognition and get the blame. He’d just reap the rewards.
To everyone watching, he spent his first months with The Yellow Roses learning how to read music and just following directions. But mostly he’d been getting a lay of the land. Studying his rival. Strategizing ways to steal Clementine. Then, he’d quietly given Johnny enough rope to hang himself and sat back to watch him swing.
It had happened even faster than he’d anticipated.
While Johnny wasted his time romancing Rosalee, Clementine had been pushed aside. Bill had been the one who’d nudged Rosalee’s resume to the top of the pile of applicants for band manager. He’d sensed that she’d be a real good fit. With Johnny deliberately monopolizing all Rosalee’s time, it only seemed right that Bill keep Clem company on the sidelines. Bill wasn’t much of a talker, but his sunshiny stolen-mate was. All he had to do was sit next to her and bask in her warmth, while she made them inseparable friends.
Check the scoreboard. That was a clear point to Bill.
At the same time, Bill worked to improve his guitar playing, because losing the job meant losing access to Clementine. (He also found he really enjoyed making music,once he focused on it. He hadn’t anticipated that, considering his hatred for his old man.) Clementine had been overjoyed by his efforts. For some damn reason, she thought he was spectacularly talented and that got him another point on the board.
When Clementine tried to feature more of Bill’s guitar playing on the album, Johnny threw a pissy tantrum. Bill didn’t say a word, because what did he care about being on Johnny’s damn record? But Clem was plenty upset on Bill’s behalf. Pretty soon, she’d been taking Bill’s side in everything related to the band, which made Johnny furious, which drove Clem closer to Bill, which made Johnnymorefurious. Another point to Bill.
On and on it went. Every time Johnny had the opportunity to win some points himself, he blew it. He consistently showed Clem how utterly useless he was as a friend and how she couldn’t trust him.
Bill hadn’t really done much of anything. Yet.Johnnyhad been the one to burn his life to ashes. All those points added up, one after another. Until the scoreboard was decisively weighed in Bill’s favor and Johnny had lost his most precious possession.
Never get into an all-or-nothing fight with a coyote. Bill’s kind didn’t start ‘em, unless they already knew they’d win.
