Page 42 of Elijah's Hope
I knew that shriek.
It looked like we were going to have some entertainment tonight.
“Prepare yourself, babe. There is going to be nothing peaceful about dinner tonight. Olivia has arrived in town.”
“What does that mean?”
“You’ll see.”
Sure enough, Ark and Olivia were facing off at the bar with most everyone else looking on. Jackson and Caleb were sitting at a table together, beers in each hand, unabashedly watching the show.
I spotted Zeke and Eve with the baby in the corner of the bar also paying attention to the ensuing battle playing out in front of everyone.
“Ooh, Eve is here with the baby! I’ll be right back.” Shelby was obviously more into the baby than she was in the battle because she made a beeline for their table. I was still in shock Zeke actually allowed the hand off of his offspring to someone else. But right there in front of my eyes, Eve handed the boy over and Shelby bounced him on her hip like she’d been doing that her whole life.
I saw the kid grab for her breasts and I thought,buddy, you have no idea what she’s hiding underneath that large flannel shirt. I knew. I knew all her secrets now. That thought made me smile.
I made my way over to Jackson and Cal’s table and sat. “When did she get here?”
“Like, fifteen minutes ago,” Cal said. “Breezed in and headed to the bar like it was the most normal thing in the world she was in Hope’s Point.”
“How long did Ark last before confronting her?” I asked.
Jackson and Cal looked at each other, shrugged. Jack said, “About three seconds? Maybe four.”
“Good,” I said, rubbing my hands together. “That means they’re just getting started.”
“Good trip in Nome?” Cal asked.
“The best,” I told him with a smile, not even a little ashamed to admit how I was feeling about Shelby. “Shelby is a helluva fisherman. A real Alaskan woman.”
I knew Jackson was watching me. I turned to him and could see his deep scowl. I might have been perturbed by it, but that was his normal expression. Still, I knew he was thinking of saying something.
“What?” I challenged him. “You got a problem?”
“Shit,” he said, shaking his head. But that was it. I glanced over to the side of the bar and Shelby was still chatting it up with Eve, still fussing with the boy who was now trying to pull streams of her hair out.
Then I checked on Ark and Olivia. They were back to the hushed-tones stage of their argument. That’s usually how it started. Modified voices, harsh whispers as if we all didn’t know they were fighting. Until Olivia would lose her temper and start shrieking. Which must have already happened once tonight as that was the sound that greeted me when I opened the door.
“You guys need a beer?”
Cal held his empty up.
Jackson nodded. “Yeah, might as well. Looks like it’s going to be an entertaining evening all the way around.”
I didn’t know what to say to that so I said nothing. I walked over to the bar giving Ark and Olivia as much space as I could, but their hushed tone voices were starting to rise.
“How many times do I have to say this?” Ark asked her. “My rigs, my business. My control.”
“And how many times do I have to say it back? I don’t answer to you. I answer to corporate. So they are notyourrigs. They areourrigs. I’m going out tomorrow to inspect them and you can’t stop me.”
“You have seen the operation three times already. You know how efficient it is,” Ark countered.
“Yes, but just because it is efficient doesn’t mean it can’t be mademoreefficient. It’s bad enough we’re still relying on pulling black goo out of the earth, if we’re going to do that on my watch, we’re making sure it’s the most energy-efficient process I can come up with.”
And that did it, I thought. Olivia just alluded to the fact that Ark was not a conservationist of the environment, which never failed to get him riled up because he absolutely believed he was. I nodded to Bud and held up four fingers to indicate the number of beers I wanted. While Bud started to pull some out of the ice trough, I leaned on the bar to see how this was going to play out.
“Oh, here we go,” Ark said. “That’s right. The Miss High-and-Mighty Environmentalist, the one who works for a fucking oil company, is here to tell me how I’m polluting the earth. When if you actually studied what I was doing, you would realize I’m taking oil out of the ground in the least obtrusive way so as to not upset the natural ecosystem up here.”
