Page 87 of Promises to Keep

Beaty called from the couch, “It all sounds verra ugly. I hae an Insta account, M’fans canna see me in ugly clothes.”

Quentin said, “Beaty, love, you can’t go on Insta right now. We’re in level-four hiding again.”

“I ken, Quennie, but... but... I hae tae hae cuteness, I hae tae.” She burst into tears.

He comforted her on the couch, while the last of the bags were carried in. Hayley said, “You’re lucky I didn’t let Sophie pick out the clothes, she settled on long prairie skirts.”

Sophie laughed. “I thought they would be practical, if we are tae jump by surprise we might want tae be wearin’ skirts.”

Hayley said, “I get the practicality, but Ireallythink we would look like sister wives and I am not down with that. This ain’t no sister wives cult thing we have going here, just a loose conglomeration of families who love each other and wear sweats a lot and live in a compound.”

James joked, “No kool-aid.”

Lochie said, turning a pair of jeans around to look at the other side, “What is kool-aid?”

James said, “There is too much to explain in that sentence, but hopefully those will fit. We had to guess, everyone else had been measured already.”

Magnus held his jeans in front of him and they looked a little wide because he was still thin.

After we had passed out the clothes to everyone, and most of us had changed into jeans and new shoes, Quentin went back to business, “Boss, can I show you the shooting range? We could use the practice.”

We left the kids with Sophie and Emma and Beaty and loaded up in the big truck and drove down the dirt road. I rode in the cab with Quentin and Hayley. “All this land is ours?”

He said, “Hundreds of acres, yep, all ours, we can go hunting, but I thought maybe we’d brush up on shooting... I don’t know, I think we need an attitude adjustment.”

“Well, this is the place.”

When we came to a stop Magnus, Zach, Fraoch, James, and Lochie all piled from the bed of the truck.

We were in a long field with targets at one end. Quentin passed out rifles and handguns. Lochie was fascinated by all of it. We practiced shooting for a while, with so much ammo, then held a shooting competition.

The top three were Quentin, James, Magnus, then Fraoch, Hayley, me, Lochie and Zach who said he was not going to let it bother him. He joked, “I am going to try and focus on the fact that everyone still at the house would be behind me.”

Quentin said, “I don’t know, Zach, Beaty’s a pretty good shot.”

Zach groaned. “Well, shit, now I don’t know if I’m in a good enough mood to make dinner.”

Magnus said, “Och nae, Chef Zach, if ye want tae go again I will let you win. I dinna ken dinner was on the line.”

We all laughed.

Quentin brought out a bow, “Katie, you wanna show off?”

“I’d love to.” I carried the bow to the line.

In the meantime Fraoch reached in the back of the truck, and pulled out a battle hammer. “I haena seen one of these since we played with them back at Kilchurn.”

Magnus said, “Ye were verra good if I remember correctly.”

“Aye, tis nae as useful as a gun, but tis a good skill.”

Quentin said, “That’s why I put some in the truck, I thought you might have fun—”

While they were talking, I aimed, and let the arrow fly — thwak! Direct into the center of the target. Everyone cheered. I bowed. “Thank you, thank you, as Fraoch said about the battle hammer, a bow is ‘not as useful as a gun’ and not good for hand-to-hand combat, but if unarmored men are standing at a distance, and I have time to aim… they aredead.”

“My turn.” Fraoch wound up and slung the hammer. It roared down the field, smashed against my arrow, and struck the center of the target.

He put up a finger and said, “One.”

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