THE RISE AND FALL OF A MIDWEST PRINCESS

[ 04 ] The Diamondback Way

CHAPTER FOUR
The Diamondback Way

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THE FALSE WIDOWS' PEACE AND QUIET evanescences from between their fingertips in the span of a few days, the tranquil life out on the open plains they had been building promptly swept out from underneath them. A new tension has drawn taut around their necks and guilt hangs over them like a thundercloud ready to burst, their wrongdoings echoed in the silence where Brandy should be thriving. They've been resigned to their little camp since the robbery, only ever straying from their tents to pick herbs or hunt small game so that they're spared from the jaws of their own hunger.

   After all, with the capture of Brandy weighing down heavily on their minds, it's been hard to get anything done. It's at times like this when they find themselves yearning for that little nuisance and all her annoyances. The morale around camp is at an all time low as everyone grows sick with nerves, chasing any leads that so much as hint at her whereabouts only to be met with dozens of dead-ends.

   Although everyone's struggling after the run-in, the consequences seem to be hitting Dakota the hardest. She hasn't calmed down from her hysterics since the robbery, up all day and night worrying after poor Brandy. Her nails have practically been bitten down to the cuticle and her under eyes have formed purple craters from how little rest she's been allowing herself, resigning herself to guard duty so that she can get consumed by her destructive thoughts.

They all offer her comfort where they can, even if they know it's not enough. It's not like she'll listen to them when they plead with her to rest — that, however, has always been the case with Dakota Castillo. The rest of them have come to terms with that by now.

As the Southern weather begins to boil, it becomes clear to the False Widows that sun hasn't paused to mourn Brandy's capture. It beats down on the gang mercilessly, the rays scorching and their skin blistering beneath the heat as they potter around in the midst of chores that wouldn't complete themselves. Even the breeze that brushes on past is warm to the touch and rustles the dry grass with a fleeting brutality, patches of the russet land cracking from the crescendoing drought that sweeps through Scarlett Meadows.

  If there's one thing Winona won't miss when she leaves the Lemoyne, hopefully for good, it's the unbearable heat.

She fiddles with the top buttons of her shirt to give herself more room to breathe in the muggy weather, her sleeves rolled up to the elbow and her hat discarded on her unmade cot. It's stifling no matter where she cowers, the overcast shadows serving her little solace. Sunlight dapples the worn ivory canvas of Winona's tent, shining through to illuminate the emerald grass and the mismatched furniture crammed inside.

   Despite all the trinkets that she's gathered in her time as an outlaw, there's only a single picture to crown the boxes that make up her bedside; a sepia portrait of all the girls taken by one of their associates several years ago. The photograph has been weathered by time and yet they all stay captured in a stagnant youth, some of the girls having been buried since it was taken.

Her hair looks neater in it, her smile brighter. There aren't as many holes in her clothes and eye can detect a twinkle of something she hasn't felt in years within her irises. She's less freckled, her skin still pale and her muscles undefined from when she'd lived as a trophy wife in the confines of an asphyxiating manor house. It feels odd to see herself in such a light after being different for so long.