This is me, attempting to make What Happens In Vegas Gets A Courier Shot In The Head less of a re-telling, and more of an actual fanfic. I wasn't sure if I could fit this into the newest chapter, so I'm posting it here.
Jeannie May doesn't consider herself a bad person. She did what she had to. Carla was a stain that had to be cleaned, a threat that had to be eliminated. Honestly, Jeannie May couldn't think of a better fate for her. Sold into the Legion, becoming the wife of a soldier for the opposing side. Forced to slave and obey for the rest of her natural days. It is the perfect way to break the haughty.
Jeannie May has always had an eye for irony, and it isn't lost on her in this situation.
She hears the door to the lobby open, and in waltzes in the traveler from this morning. Jeannie May has to work to keep her lip from curling in disgust. She's a pretty little thing, just like Carla, if a little more wasteland worn and bloodied. She smiles tiredly at Jeannie May, and says a misspoken greeting. The traveler trusts her, just as all of Novac trusts her. It thrills her enough to push her distaste aside. She asks about Carla, and Jeannie May plays the sympathetic card well. Talks about how Carla preferred the city, how she was beautiful like a cactus flower, and Nothing that wouldn't be wrong with any man who loses a wife, poor dear.
Hah. Poor dear. Boone should be thanking her. Carla was poison, sure as the day is long.
The girl listens dutifully, and thanks her kindly before leaving. Another person deceived.
Jeannie May follows the girl out for a smoke, and watches as she breaks into Manny's room. Hmm. Hopefully she'll think Manny was the one who sold Carla, and leave Novac in peace. She isn't sure what sort of deal the girl had made with Boone, but she seems too incompetent to find anything useful. Girl couldn't even talk right, for heaven's sake. Must be slower than a baby bighorner. Her eyes narrow when she comes out, and knocks on the door to Boone's room. He pulls her in quickly and shuts the door, and she doesn't exit for quite a while.
Looks like another woman trying to get Boone to come away with her, and leave Novac unprotected. Jeannie May throws her cigarette on the ground, stomping it out and wishing it were that woman underneath her heel. She'll deal with her in the morning. Maybe make her disappear like another meddling woman Jeannie May could think of.
Tomorrow never comes. The woman knocks frantically on Jeannie May's door, calling her name, and Jeannie May rushes to the door. She composes herself, and holsters her .32 pistol. There's no need to shoot her.
Yet.
"What is it, darlin'?" she asks, affecting her sweetest southern drawl. "It's awful late to be having visitors." The girl is pale and visibly shaking. She looks afraid, and that catches Jeannie May's interest.
"Jeannie," she says in a small voice. "There's some one here to see you. A m-man. Calls himself Crassus." Jeannie May bites back a swear, and fumbles with her glasses.
"Where?" she demands.
"In front of the dinosaur." Jeannie May takes off running past her. That damned man! How dare he come to talk to her where anyone could see! If Carla was being too unruly, he wasn't getting his damned money back. She hears the imbecile following close behind. Maybe she can make a deal with him.
If he didn't like Carla, he could take the girl, free of charge.
When she reaches the dinosaur, there isn't anyone there. She looks around, confused.
"Where the hell-" her blood runs cold when she sees the familiar red beret sitting crookedly on top of her head, and understanding comes too little, too late. "Oh God. Oh God no-"
The harbinger of death for Jeannie May had been a girl who had trouble speaking wearing a borrowed red beret.