Jean and Justin were in town getting groceries, when the Meyers boys approached. "So this is the girl we've heard about. Heard that old man had to hire her to get her to pay any attention to you."
"Well there's a lot of talk, Frank. Doesn't mean it's true," he answered with a smile.
"Seems like it," Derek reached out and fingered her tank top strap.
"Hands off," she stated.
"I do what I like."
"So do I," she answered darkly, giving him a dirty look followed by some mental bullying.
"Got daggers in that stare," Derek rubbed his eyes hard.
"And a real one in my boot," she tapped her heel on the floor. They moved on, but not without muttering some things to Justin that he apologized for later. "Why apologize, you didn't say those things," she loaded the bags into the bed of the truck.
"Because that's what a gentleman does."
"I've heard worse," she rolled her eyes.
"Where have you heard worse, Ford?"
"I'm not perfect, Justin."
Jean got into the truck, slamming the door. He started the hour drive home, thinking hard, and realizing not for the first time that he had never thought so hard about a person before. The last year had been hard, his frustration at her reluctance to talk about herself, or her sisters, or anything other than work. "Where do these moods come from?"
"They just happen, it isn't because of you."
"Does it have to do with him?"
"Not this shit again," she snarled. It was quiet in the truck for awhile, Jean's jaw working hard as she tried to calm down.
"I can't get to you."
"Because you don't need to, Justin."
"Why not?"
"There's nothing to know, nothing you need to know," she lashed out in anger toward him.
"That's what you always say! Jesus, you're in your twenties and you can't say there's nothing to know about you!"
"It's me right now, not my past twenty something years! Let me be!"
"Is Ford even your real name?"
"You know by now it's not, and don't ask me again."
"I can't be with you like this, Ford."
"Then let's fucking end it, because I'm sick of trying to keep my life to myself," Jean muttered, staring out the window.
"Are you serious?"
She gave him a steady look. "We aren't in love, we like each other enough. Please, before we hate each other."
He nodded.

A week later, Jean was lying in bed when she heard the sound of a gunshot. She flung herself out of bed, grabbing her rifle as she ran out the door. The Meyers were finally interested in the livestock Mac had accumulated since they came.
"Get back in the house, Ford!" Mac let off a warning shot, getting a bullet to the leg in retaliation. In only her nightgown and flannel shirt, Jean aimed for Frank and squeezed the trigger. Long built up rage let loose in her as she approached him, kneeling on the ground, wounded shoulder leaving a dark stain on his gray shirt. "Get the fuck off this land."
"Fuck you, bitch."
She swung the gun around, and knocked him on the head with the butt of the rifle. "Take your goddamn brother and get outta here," she yelled to Derek, turning back to go to bed, leaving her back vulnerable.
Derek aimed for the center of her back, and Justin yelled to Jean. She sensed the hammer click, and jammed the gun with her mind, never looking back.
"What happened," Kitty and Jubliee sat on the couch in the dark.
"Go back to bed, girls. I took care of it," she smiled.