by B. T. Lord
“Hey,” he greeted.
It was Jace Northcott.
Shit.
It had been almost three months since she’d last seen him. Twelve weeks to bury the pain of their break-up. Too many nights swearing she wouldn’t cry, even as she did cry. The murder investigation that had led to her being shot did more than tear a hole in her shoulder. It tore a huge hole in hers and Jace’s relationship. Her shoulder was healing. Their relationship was not.
Seeing him approach, an image immediately rose up in her mind’s eye -- her standing in the middle of her cabin, watching him walk past her with his stuff. Hearing his truck pull away. Feeling so utterly alone, that she’d dug out her late father’s bottle of single malt scotch and contemplated following dear old dad down a well-worn path to complete oblivion. Jace was the first man in a very long time she’d begun to open her heart to. She’d long ago given up trusting in relationships, but she’d slowly begun to realize Jace was different. There were no head games; Jace was honest and loving, and it took her a while to realize that what he said, he meant.
Unfortunately, at the moment she was finally ready to completely let down her guard and engage 110% in the relationship, he’d stomped on her heart and thrown what they had away. The pain of that betrayal had been so great, she’d taken two large gulps of Dad’s scotch.
Then gagged. And immediately put the bottle away.
The scotch soured her stomach, just as the memories of her father sitting in his sullen, drunken silences soured her mind. No one was worth repeating a pattern that had once caused her so much heartache.
The bitterness of their break-up sent her reeling back into that place of darkness in her soul. However, unlike the past, this time she refused to let it get the better of her. She wasn’t the first human being to be emotionally ravaged by a relationship, nor would she be the last. Shit happens and her relationship with Jace was one of those things that unfortunately happened.
She was a big girl. This was just one more experience in a lifetime of experiences. Once her shoulder healed, she’d get back into her routine, which included getting back to work. Even if things weren’t exactly back to normal, she’d carry on. She’d done it before. She’d do it again.
Now here he was, his tall, lean body skating across the ice towards her. Easy, slow, with no hesitation, while she --? She wasn’t sure how she felt. All she knew was that her palms were sweating inside the heavy gloves she wore, and she was holding onto her hockey stick so tightly, it was a miracle it hadn’t snapped.
He wore his forest green parka with a furry bomber hat over his dark hair. In the pool of light from the halogen lamps, she noticed he was sporting two days growth of bristles on his face.
Damn, he looks good, she thought to herself before realizing it didn’t matter how he looked. They were over. Done with. Kaput. End of story.
“You taking up hockey again?” he asked as he crossed his arms over his upright hockey stick and quietly regarded her with his midnight blue eyes.
She had to answer him. She couldn’t stand there without saying something. Nor could she, in good conscience, beat him over the head with her hockey stick without at least saying hello first.
“It’s good therapy for the arm,” she shrugged.
“How is it?”
She shrugged a second time. “Still a bit stiff, but getting there.” She looked past him into the dark, curiosity getting the better of her. “Did you skate all the way over from the clubhouse?”
Jace was captain of the current roster of Night Hawks team members. They had their shack, euphemistically called the clubhouse, on the other side of Waban Pond. Practice was every other night, though at this late hour, they should have been done hours ago.
“No.”
“Then how did you get here?”
“I parked in Doc’s driveway.”
“I didn’t hear you.”
“I know. You were so pissed at missing the net, you probably wouldn’t have heard Sasquatch crashing through the forest.”
She inwardly fumed. She’d hoped to keep her lousy playing under wraps. The last thing she wanted was anyone, especially Jace, witness her failure in a sport she’d once been so good at.
“Why are you here?” she asked brusquely.
Instead of taking offense at her curt tone, he smiled at her. “I came to help you improve your game.”
She sucked in her breath. “Have you been watching me?”
“Haven’t had much of a choice. You know how I like to practice a bit longer after the guys have packed up and gone. For the past two weeks, I’ve noticed a lonely figure all the way on the other side of the pond. Now, I wouldn’t have given it much thought. Actually tried to ignore it. Unfortunately, I kept hearing a string of curse words echoing across the ice that could only come from you. That, combined with the thwack of your hockey stick, followed by another long string of cursing finally made me curious. So I came over to check it out.” He leaned forward on his stick, resting his chin on his gloves. His eyes glimmered with a mischievous twinkle. “What do you say to a game of pick-up?”
“Won’t Mary Wallis miss you? It’s late.”
As the poisonous words slipped from her lips, her fingers once again tightly gripped her hockey stick. She knew Rick felt terrible for letting it slip that Jace had taken up with Mary barely a month after their break-up. The town was aflame with the news that the two were thinking of moving in together.
Still, the pain she’d been feeling now found its release. She gave him a defiant stare. As if daring him to deny he’d been sleeping with Mary. He looked at her for a long moment. To her surprise, he chuckled.
“She’ll get over it.” He reached across with his stick and expertly flipped up the puck from the icy surface, catching it in his gloved hand. Gliding across the ice, he skated to the right side of the net and dropped the puck. “I promise to go easy on you.”
Cammie bristled. The bastard was goading her. If she were smart, she’d turn around and leave him to freeze his ass out on the ice. She was about to excoriate him for being so presumptuous when she caught sight once again of her massive bulk reflected on the ice. Jeez, she really did look like Moby Dick.
Bouncing between saving her pride or her vanity, vanity won out. She pivoted on her skate and called out over her shoulder, “You’re on.”
They played for 30 minutes. At the fast pace, she was already pushing the limits of her diminished stamina. Yet, playing against a talented opponent, she found her old rhythm resurfacing. Just before she was ready to collapse in an exhausted heap, she finally managed to hit the puck into the net.
“Yes!” she shrieked, pumping the air with her good arm. Jubilant that she’d finally scored, and drained by her efforts, she skated over to the large, flat topped rock near the shore and gratefully plopped down. Despite her fatigue, she felt exhilarated and more alive than she’d felt in a long time.
Jace skated up and sat down next to her. “Not bad,” he said. “A few more nights like this and you’ll be able to rejoin the team.”
He reached behind her and she involuntarily stiffened, expecting him to put his arm around her. To her chagrin, she saw him pull out his backpack from behind the rock. She turned her face so he wouldn’t see the embarrassment burning her cheeks.
“With the way I’m playing, 80 year old Elmer Fontenau could outskate and outshoot me,” she mumbled as she bent down to untie her skates.
“You’re just rusty, that’s all. It’s been –what – fifteen years since you picked up a hockey stick?”
“Yeah. Something like that.”
Slipping out of her skates and pulling on her boots, she felt Jace’s close proximity, the heat of his thigh pressed against hers, his parka sleeve rubbing along her own sleeve. Out on the ice, she’d been so focused on not looking like an idiot, she’d found respite from her tangled emotions regarding her ex-boyfriend. Despite her resolve to throw Jace into the ‘relationships that blew up’ bin and move on with her life,
all those emotions now came tumbling back. Memories of almost dying three months ago. His name on her frozen lips as she bled out onto the snow. Finally shedding years of mistrust to open up to him, only to have him walk past her and out their cabin door. Swearing she’d never, ever leave herself that vulnerable again.
“If you want, I’ll meet you out here same time tomorrow.”
Enraged that he could sound so casual after what had happened between them, she whirled around and glared at him. “What is this all about?”
He blinked at her. “What do you mean?”
“Don’t bullshit me, Jace. You know exactly what I’m talking about. Why are you here?”
She watched as he looked out over the frozen pond for a long moment before heaving a heavy sigh, his steamed breath dissipating above their heads.
“I – um – I wanted to see you. Make sure you were okay.”
“You’ve had three months to make sure I was okay.”
“I know, I know. I just wasn’t sure you wanted to see me.”
“What do you expect? It wasn’t me who walked out of our cabin. It wasn’t me who took up with someone else right before Christmas. If you’ve been waiting all this time for me to apologize for what happened, you can get back in your truck and get the hell out of here right now.”
“I don’t want you to apologize. I know you were doing your job.”
When Eli Kelley, the legendary hockey player and Twin Ponds number one son, was found murdered, Jace had unwittingly become caught in the maelstrom of the investigation. Despite Cammie’s efforts to catch the real killer, the mistrust and suspicions had ruptured their relationship. She eyed him now with a wariness that had once been such an integral part of her, and which she thought she’d shed when she took up with the man seated next to her.
“Right. It was ‘doing my job’ that caused you to walk out on us. What’s happened to change your mind? Did you suddenly have an epiphany? Or is Mary so lousy in bed that it made you think you could waltz back here and make me forget what a shit you were?”
The words were ugly. And meant to maim. The darkness that had hovered around her for the last three months burst forth in all its ferocity.
The night air grew chillier as it picked up the frigidness in her soul. Jace opened and closed his mouth several times, but no words came out. Cammie looked away. She was suddenly very tired. And in no mood to continue hacking away at him with cutting remarks and angry words. She wanted nothing more than to distance herself from all of this, from him.
She slowly got to her feet, grabbed her hockey stick, and swinging her skates over her good shoulder, started up the incline towards Doc’s house.
“I thought I could forget you!” Jace shouted, his words echoing over the frozen pond and surrounding forest. “I thought I could move on from that whole mess with you and me and Eli and start over. I thought Mary could help me with that. But I can’t. And she can’t.”
Cammie heard his boots crunch in the snow as he raced up the hill and planted himself squarely in her path. “You’re right. I was a shit. I was worse than a shit. I was so wrapped up in feeling sorry for myself that I didn’t realize what I was doing to you. I’m sorry for all that and maybe you can’t forgive me. Maybe we won’t ever be the way we were before--” he hesitated, then continued “—before what happened. But I want – you see – what I need to say is -- aw crap!”
He grabbed her free hand. “Look, I’m completely messing this up. But the bottom line is that I miss you, Cammie. I miss you so much, it hurts. I can’t stop thinking about you. I love you and I want you back in my life. You’re everything to me.”
Cammie felt the warmth of his touch seeping through her glove, the weight of his hands enveloping hers. She forced herself to meet his gaze as she slipped free of his grasp.
“You’re right, Jace. We won’t ever be the way we were before.”
She sidestepped him and continued up the hill. A moment later, he jumped in front of her again.
“I’m sorry for not coming sooner to see you. I wanted to. I really did. Every time I saw Doc, I asked about you. If you don’t believe me, ask him. He’ll tell you. If you’d needed anything, you know I would have been there for you. I’ve been looking after the cabin. Plowing it out and making sure everything is okay. What happened – it was tough on both of us. You worked so hard to find Eli’s killer. I was just too stupid and stubborn to see it at the time.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Even if you can’t forgive me, don’t hate me.”
She saw the pleading in his eyes, heard the veracity in his words. Her rancor and fury oozed out of her, replaced with a weary resignation. “I don’t hate you,” she responded, a part of her acknowledging the undeniable fact that she didn’t hate him. She thought she had. She’d tried to convince herself that she did.
But she couldn’t.
Angry, yes. Hurt, yes. Disappointed, yes.
But hatred? No.
I must be getting soft in my old age.
Jace saw the flicker of light in her eyes, and pounced on it. “Give me another chance. Give us another chance. We can take it easy. No pressure. I can come back tomorrow and we’ll play a game of pick-up. That’s it. Just a game. If at the end, you just want to be friends, I’ll accept that. I’d rather have you as a friend than not have you in my life at all.”
Cammie couldn’t deny it felt good knocking the puck around with him. At least, it would help her get back in shape. It was either that, or wear sweatpants the rest of her life.
And she hated sweatpants.
As to the appeal for friendship…she’d make no promises. Number one priority was shedding the weight. She’d concentrate on that. Mention of any kind of relationship, including friendship, would be put on the backburner.
Just as she was about to tell him her decision, her cellphone buzzed in her parka pocket. Digging it out, she saw it was Rick.
“Hey, what’s--” She was swiftly interrupted.
“We’ve got a situation here,” Rick barked over the phone.
The alarm in his voice instantly alerted her. “Situation?” she repeated.
“Yes. As in one huge shitstorm sized, ji-normous situation.”
In the background Cammie heard sounds that made her blood run cold. “Is that gun fire I’m hearing?”
“Damned straight it is. I’m over on the Pine Street cul-de-sac. One of the residents here - Marcy Audet - has gone completely berserko. She’s shooting up the neighborhood. My cousin lives down the street and called me when the shooting started. If you don’t get down here ASAP, there won’t be anything left of Pine Street.”
“On my way.” Cammie swiftly shoved her cell into her pocket, and started up the hill when she felt a hand on her sleeve.
“I’m going with you,” Jace said.
“I can handle it.”
“I’m not saying you can’t. But there may be people who need help. I’m trained in CPR and I’m good at dressing wounds. I can assist Doc if need be.”
She stared at him for a moment before giving a sharp nod of her head. “Go tell Doc we need him while I get my weapon.”
“Will do.”
As Cammie took off up the hill towards Doc’s house, she failed to see the small, satisfied smile on Jace’s face. I guess maybe she does need me a little bit after all.
And Jace failed to see the small satisfied smile on her face.
I guess they do need me around here after all.
CHAPTER TWO
Despite the whooping of her siren, Cammie heard the crack of rifle shots almost a mile before arriving at Pine Street. She was immediately thrown back into a memory she never thought she’d have to relive again.
The last time she’d been in a shootout was five years before when she worked as a police officer in Seattle. Her unit lost two men that day, one of whom Cammie had been quietly sleeping with. She really couldn’t call it a relationship. It was more of a friendship with benefits. But his loss ripped at her. That, and witnessing
the killing of an eight year old boy who’d been caught in the crossfire, caused Cammie to turn in her badge, get in her car and keep driving until Boston and the Atlantic Ocean made her stop.
She shook off the images of blood splattered on rain soaked sidewalks, and drew her attention towards Rick’s vehicle parked at the entrance to the cul-de-sac.
There was something off about the street. It took her a moment to realize that Marcy had shot out all the street lights, leaving the cul-de-sac lit only by the bright moonlight. In the blue light thrown off by her siren, she saw the remnants of some of the mailboxes lying on the ground. Apparently Marcy didn’t like mailboxes either.
There were five houses set around the cul-de-sac. They were all dark, which was wise if anyone was still inside. It was suicidal to make yourself a target if you were silhouetted by background light. The only residence with lights on was Marcy’s. Her house was in the center of the horseshoe. It was a small, two story clapboard with a rickety front porch and peeling paint. From where she sat, Cammie watched the stout woman frantically pace back and forth in the large picture window of her living room. Between every third or fourth step, she’d throw her head back and scream at the top of her lungs. She’d then turn the rifle upwards and shoot at the ceiling.
Already feeling overweight, the heavy bulletproof jacket she wore under her parka made her feel like a blimp. Still, there was no way she was walking into this situation without protection.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Jace replied as he got out of his vehicle and approached them. They were met by Doc, who’d followed in his own car. He was holding his medical bag, and his hair was still askew after being roused unceremoniously out of bed.
“Any idea why Marcy suddenly decided to abandon her sanity?” Doc asked.
“Maybe Rick can clue us in,” Cammie answered as the tall, slender deputy quickly ran up to them. By the bulkiness in his parka, she knew he was wearing his vest as well. As was his habit, Rick’s long raven black hair was tied back in a ponytail whenever he was on duty. He saw Jace standing behind Cammie, did a double take, but wisely refrained from commenting on it.
