Chapter 10

The ladies walked down to the fire arm in arm, as Inara was not sure Maggie could make it on her own.

Mal came to greet them “Got some more papers for you to sign, annulment papers.” He handed Maggie a sheaf of papers “Jayne has already signed, just need you to and then this whole mess will be over.”

“Jayne signed annulment papers?” Maggie whispered looking from Mal to Inara.

“Yeah, not sure he knew what they where, but he signed them.” Mal looked at Inara and wondered why they both looked so upset. “Any reason he shouldn’t have?” Mal questioned the ladies reaction.

“No, just all happening a little fast.” Inara took the papers and led Maggie back to the house “She’ll sign them and get them back to you.”

“Why would Jayne sign?” Maggie was very close to tears, had it really meant that little to him. Then she got angry “He’s just like the others. Oh God what have I done.”

Taking the papers from Inara she signed them “Kaylee told me how much he liked women, I just thought… oh Inara, I’m such a fool. I let another man just use me. I thought I was learning, I kept Marco at bay for three years. It took Jayne just one day to get to me.” Maggie moved over to the stove and fingered Betty “Think I need to talk to Him.” With that she walked out the door, paper in one hand, Betty in the other.

Maggie found Mal and Jayne near the fire, drinking with Book, Zoë and Wash, they waited for Kaylee, Simon and River to finish dinner. She walked up to Mal and handed him the papers.

Mal took the papers, cleared his throat and raised his glass. Everyone stopped talking and looked at him. “Time to celebrate that this whole mess is almost behind us, let’s drink to the shortest marriage on record.”

“Shortest marriage?” Wash asked looking around.

“These here are the annulment papers. Sorry I couldn’t stop the marriage, Jayne, but I did make it painlessly short.” Mal laughed.

“What are you talking about? What’s an annulment?” Jayne was looking down right scared, he had seen Betty in Maggie’s hand and had the fee