“God almighty, the new bride's trying to run down her mother-in-law!”
The driver slammed on the brakes, dead white in the face as he stared back at me.
A few of the village thugs used the chance to rush up on both sides, jamming hoes under the tires and pinning the car in place.
Another one swung a hoe overhead and brought it down on the hood with a crash, leaving a dent.
Egbert pressed his face to the window glass, triumph written all over it.
“Lucretia, the bride price is paid, the invitations went out, the relatives are all here.”
“You walk away now, that's marriage fraud. You want your mom and dad back in the city not able to hold their heads up?”
More and more people crowded in, the laughter getting louder, not one of them thinking any of this was wrong.
The way they looked at me was the way you'd look at a beast that had finally been herded into its pen.
The road ahead blocked, the way back cut off, nothing outside the car but villagers with murder in their faces.
I sat there, palms slick with sweat, and had just lowered my head to find my phone, meaning to call for help.
Then, with a click, all four doors unlocked at once.
Egbert had reached in through the window while no one was watching and popped the lock.
The moment the door was yanked open,
two of the thugs grabbed the driver by the collar and hauled him out of his seat.
He was a young guy the rental company had sent, thin and tall, no match for them at all.
Before he could even react they threw him on the ground, and the whole pack started kicking him.
“You think you can roll into our village in some fancy foreign car and act like a big shot?”
“And you've got the nerve to drive off with one of our village women? You got a death wish?”
Vivian was shaking with rage. She shoved the door open and charged out in her heels.
“What do you think you're doing? Let go of him, now.”
She pushed through the crowd, put herself between them and the driver, and held her phone up high.
“This is against the law. You don't think I'll call the cops right now?”
Egbert's cousin shoved his way out of the mob.
Well over six feet, a slab of a face, half a cigarette hanging off the corner of his mouth.
He gave a low snickering laugh and clamped a hand around Vivian's wrist, the one holding the phone.
“Well now, this the maid of honor? Pretty little thing, and a temper on her too.”
His eyes crawled over her, top to bottom.
“Don't be in such a hurry. In a minute your big brother here'll get a rope on you too, walk you around a couple of laps.”
Vivian's hand came back around and cracked across his face hard enough to snap his head sideways.
Mervyn Swanson froze for a second, but the grin on his mouth only spread wider.
He flicked a glance, and two more men shot out from behind him and pinned Vivian down between them.
Big hands roamed all over the maid of honor's dress.
A moment later the skirt was torn open, baring the slip underneath.
Vivian fought for everything she was worth, her knee driving into one man's gut, and got only rougher hands for it.
“Look how white this skin is. Bet she'd look even better with all this off, huh?”
My eyes burned red, and I already had one foot out the door.
Egbert threw his body across the opening, one hand slamming down on the frame, and shoved me back in.
“What's your hurry?”
He tilted his head at me, a mocking little smile still hanging on his lips.
“Doesn't she know what being a maid of honor's about? Dressing like that, she's asking to be touched. Whose fault is that?”
But what Vivian had on today was the dress I'd picked out for her myself, as proper and modest as a dress could be.
I looked at Egbert's face.
Those eyes that once used to look at me so gently held nothing now but naked filth and satisfaction.
Something hot shot straight up into my skull.
I swung my arm all the way back and, through the half-open window, slapped him across the face with everything I had.
My nail caught the corner of his mouth and left a streak of blood.
