Marinette Dupain-Cheng, the only daughter of the wealthy mayor, is merely a young woman who wants to live life one adventure at a time. But when a man dressed in all black actually grants her that wish, she's torn on whether to explore the world wit...
"The world will tell you that in order to solve your problems, you gotta find the solution. What they don't say is that all the solutions they provide usually only cause more problems."
— Forbidden Fruits
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CHAPTER TWO
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Marinette got herself a glass of what the bartender liked to call wild west whiskey. Well, she hadn't actually gotten it herself because she needed to keep her identity a secret, but she was still able to choose the drink—even though Elias instantly recommended she get something else. But Marinette had always been too stubborn for her own good.
Her brother was right, of course. The drink was absolutely disgusting and burned her throat like hell, but that was beside the point. The point was that she wasn't even allowed to drink, simply because she was the mayor's daughter, and her father was totally okay with drinking so long as his daughter never partook in it. The point was that she wasn't allowed to do something that her brothers had all been allowed to do when they turned twenty-one.
The point was that she, as a woman, deserved the same perks her brothers received simply for being the opposite gender. And she was tired of allowing her father to control her life.
"I bet if mother was still alive, she would have brought me here herself." Marinette said as she twirled the leftover whiskey around in her glass. From across the table, Elias had a glass of his own which he'd barely touched. In fact, he seemed to be frowning into his glass more than he cared to be drinking what was in it.
"Ma was never a drinker." Elias said absently. "You woulda never seen her in the saloon."
"And I suppose that's because father told her she couldn't?"
"You supposed right."
"The fact that he thinks he could control his wife and now his daughter like that is just so wrong." Marinette gruffly spoke before she downed the last of her drink. "Like he has some kind of... authority over me where he thinks that gives him the right to control my life."
"Hmm, I think you might be forgettin' somethin'," her brother pointed out, "He does got authority over you." For the first time that evening, she watched as Elias took a long sip of his whiskey. Her eyes widened slightly at how easily he downed it. "But if you got hitched, you and I both know Pops wouldn't be able to tell you what to do anymore."
Marinette rolled her eyes at that. "You think marriage would be my freedom? I'd only be taking orders from another man, especially if the marriage was arranged. Father would have a say in it if that were the case."
"Then marry a man of your choosin'."
"There ain't any good fellas here worth my hand."
A slight smile pulled at her brother's lips as he took another swig. There was no argument on his end, so she could only assume that he seemed to agree with her assessment. "Then maybe your best bet would be to leave this god-forsaken town."
