Jeremy chuckled at the note that Brad had tucked into the coat of his Sunday-go-to-meetin’ suit. “Help! Help!” screamed the message. “Someone left the cage door open. My ferret got out, and my vibrator is missing too!”

The Leveque clan all attended Sunday mass at St. Louis Cathedral in Jackson Square. Jeremy squirmed but took consolation from the fact that the monkey business would soon be over and he could get back to being himself again. Only problem was, he wasn’t quite sure what that was anymore.

*******

“These aren’t the same flowers I sent you in the hospital, are they?”

“No,” laughed Nick, as he handed the bouquet to Patty Murano. “I may be cheap, but I’m not stupid.”

“I’m surprised that you’re out of the hospital already. Are you sure you feel up to going to church?”

“That may be just the medicine I need.”

The minister of the small country church preached about why bad things happen to good people and prayed for all the people in the community who had been touched by the recent rash of crimes. He prayed especially for a speedy recover for Sheriff Scarpelli and for young Randy Dawkins.

It seemed to Nick that every single person in the congregation came up to him after the service to wish him well. He wasn’t used to that kind of attention. “It’s like that here,” said Patty. “People here care about each other as much as they care about their crops and their animals, and that’s saying a lot.”

“I’d like to take you and the kids to dinner if you’d let me,” said Nick. (He had been in Wyoming long enough to know that the midday meal, especially on a Sunday, was called dinner, and the evening meal was called supper. Lunch, he concluded, was what you had when you ate alone.)

“Oh, no,” snapped Patty.

The response threw Nick off guard.

“Why go out when I’ve got homemade biscuits warming in the oven and fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, and beans on the stove?”

“Sounds great,” smiled Nick.

*******

“There’s something I’d like to show you,” said Patty after they had finished their meal. “In Laramie.”

After they dropped the kids off at Patty’s mother’s house, they took Happy Jack Road toward Laramie, riots of wildflowers and the overpowering scent of evergreens accosting them at every turn.

Approaching the University of Wyoming, Nick, ever the lawman, could not help but recall that this was where young Matthew Shepard had been enrolled when he was abducted, dragged into the hills, tied to a fence, pistol-whipped, and left to die—just because he was gay. But this was a new day, and Nick was determined not to let brutal images of the past ruin his Sunday outing with a beautiful woman.

As they approached the university, the Centennial Complex rose up like a giant six-story teepee just east of the main campus. Besides being home to the American Heritage Center, it also houses 7,000 items in the nine galleries of the University of Wyoming Art Museum.

“This is your work?” asked Nick as they walked through the gallery in the Centennial Center.

“Well, just these four pieces here,” replied Patty. The rest were done by other students in the art department here. The faculty selected the best pieces of the past semester, and those are the ones you see here.”

“Well, I’m no art critic,” said Nick, “but these look pretty damn good to me.”

“Thanks,” said Patty, squeezing his hand and giving him a peck on the cheek.

“These rock formations are fascinating,” commented Nick, admiring one of Patty’s landscape paintings.

“That’s the Vedauwoo Recreation Area. If we take the interstate back to Cheyenne, we’ll go right by there.” And so they did, just in time to enjoy the orange glow of the lichen-covered rocks in the late-afternoon sun.

“How about some huckleberry pie?” Patty asked when they got back to her house, after retrieving the children from her mother’s. When Patty returned from putting the kids down for their nap, she found Nick studying a very old photograph of a distinguished-looking woman. “That’s Nellie Tayloe Ross,” said Patty. “She was the first female governor of Wyoming, the first in the country actually.”

“Impressive,” said Nick.

“In fact, Wyoming was the first territory in the country to grant women the right to vote—more than 50 years before ratification of the 19th Amendment. People in Wyoming like to boast that they were the first territory in the world to have women’s suffrage, but that’s really a bit like saying that Columbus discovered America.”

“How so?” asked Nick.

“Well, women governed the Iroquois Confederation long before Wyoming Territory existed and even long before Columbus stumbled across this continent,” explained Patty.

“Very—”

“Excuse me,” said Patty, responding to the cries of her baby in the next room. “Make yourself comfortable. I’ll be right back.”

While Patty was busy taking care of her little boy, Nick continued to study the various objects displayed on her mantle. One photograph stopped him cold.

“I’m sorry,” said Nick when Patty returned to the room. “I really must be going.”

“Oh,” replied Patty, startled by Nick’s sudden change of mood. “Is something wrong? Did I say someth—”

“No, it’s just…I’m sorry. I really have to go,” he sputtered, his words trailing behind him as he rushed toward his car.

“But what about the huckle—”. Huh! And he seemed like such a nice guy.

*******

The wedding rehearsal on Sunday evening went off without a hitch. Mrs. Leveque made sure of that. All the principals attended except Brandon, who had not yet returned from Texas, but Jeremy spoke to him on the phone, and he, too, happily accepted the invitation to be a groomsman. Having worked all day, Ford was able to get off for the rehearsal dinner, where he made a gracious toast to the bride and groom. Everyone commented on what a perfect couple Jeremy and Amy made and how well he and Ford had seemed to hit it off. The guys wanted to give Jeremy a wild bachelor party after the dinner, but in deference to Ford, they kept it relatively tame: just a few drinks (well, maybe more than just a few), some porn flicks (gay, straight, and bi), and a circle jerk to top off the evening.
 

Monday, Wedding Day

The wedding was held in the palatial ballroom at Whispering Pines. Yes, the Leveque estate actually had a name, and the antebellum mansion actually had a ballroom that was used for Mardi Gras balls, debutante cotillions, music recitals, and a host of fundraisers for political and charitable causes. Marie Bouvier Leveque came from “old money,” and the estate had been passed down from generation to generation of Bouviers. Pete Leveque, on the other hand, had risen from almost nothing to make a killing in the export-import business. He was now one of New Orleans’ richest and most highly respected citizens. Neither Amy nor Ford had to work, and Mrs. Leveque disapproved of their career choices, but their father encouraged them to “follow their bliss,” as the anthropologist Joseph Campbell would say.

The ceremony was conducted by no less than the Archbishop of New Orleans. The bride wore a Valentino Garavani original. Standing up with her were two cousins and three of her closest friends from college. Ford, of course, served as Jeremy’s best man, and Brandon, Red, Kenny, and Kyle served as groomsmen, a most dashing entourage in their black tuxedos. Music was provided by a select group of musicians from the New Orleans Symphony Orchestra and the Loyola University Choir. The reception was catered by Emeril Legasse. The entire affair was more than Amy had wanted and certainly more than Jeremy would have planned, but Mrs. Leveque insisted that the Bouviers had a reputation to uphold.

Everything went smoothly...at first. And then the archbishop came to that standard line, “If anyone knows why this man and this woman should not be joined together in holy matrimony, let him speak now or forever hold his peace.”

“I do! I can’t let you marry this man, Amy!” The shout from the back of the ballroom stunned everyone.

“Paul?” Amy gasped, before she collapsed in Jeremy’s arms.
 

Topeka, 7 years earlier

“What the hell did you do to Becky?” the kid demanded to know.

“Whoa, kid. Calm down.”

“She wasn’t at school today, so I called her, and she wouldn’t stop crying. She said she never wants to see me again as long as she lives. I know it was you. What did you do to her?”

“Well, punk, you didn’t man up and give her what she needed, so I did it for you. You should be thanking me.”

“How could you do that to my girl?”

“Hell,” laughed the bully, “she ain’t no girl no more.”

“You goddam sonofabitch, I’ll fuckin’ kill you!” screamed the kid as he lunged at the older boy, but the bully was quicker. He sidestepped the kid and tripped him, sending him crashing into the wall. The kid tried again, but the older boy, bigger and stronger, beat him to a pulp and then pinned him to the floor.

“You wanna know what I did to Becky? Huh? Do ya? Well, I’ll show you, you fuckin’ little shit.” And when he was done, he grabbed the kid by the throat and growled into his face, “That little cunt may have been your bitch, but now you’re mine, ya hear? And if either one of you breathes a word of this to anybody, I’ll fuckin’ kill ya both.”