I immediately kicked him in the groin, and he dropped the knife.
“You little bitch.”
“I’m not going to make this easy for you.”
“We like it that way,” Bob chimed in.
I hated both of them, so much. Hated everything about this ridiculous week, so horrible and wild that I could scarcely believe this was my reality.
Jared clumsily grabbed my lower legs.
“Alright, no more fucking around.”
He started to unbuckle his belt when I heard the same Darth Vader noise I’d heard earlier.
“Holy fuck,” Bob said, and I noticed him shaking, and looking in the other direction.
I saw my opening and went for it. I eluded Jared’s grasp and took a few big steps forward, then kicked the gun out of Bob’s hand with my free leg.
“You fucking bitch!”
Jared grabbed me from behind and knocked me down to the ground, and searched for the gun with his headlamp.
“What the fuck is that?!” Bob said, shaking as he looked in the direction of the noise. It was pitch black.
The voice just kept saying, over and over again, seventeen.
My pulse quickened.
“This place isn’t really haunted, is it?” Bob asked.
“You fucking dumbass!” Jared yelled. Bob had grabbed the gun. “Fire, you dipshit! It’s Shane! Can’t you recognize his voice”
Bob fired in the direction of the noise, six times.
I heard, clear as day, Shane’s voice ring out in agony.
“You fuck! I’m bleeding! You didn’t have to kill me!”
My heart sank. My eyes filled up with tears. “You fuckers! Ah!” I spun around and whacked Bob with the chair, then sat on him.
He screamed out in agony. I didn’t know in which body part I had penetrated him, but I didn’t care.
Jared grabbed the gun out of his hand, and stood there in front of me, breathing hard. He wiped his sweaty, dirty face, and I could barely see his eyes illuminated by Bob’s headlamp. Bob wasn’t moving.
“You killed Shane! Isn’t that enough, you asshole!” I screamed.
He looked down at Bob, who was bleeding out, still and lifeless.
“You killed him. He was my only friend. Now, I’m going to kill you first.”
“First?”
“Yes. Kill you first, and then…”
Through the shadows, I could just barely make out the the swinging of an object in the dark.
Jared’s body went limp, he hit the ground, and his figure was replaced by another man.
I could barely make out Shane’s shadowy figure in the dark.
He breathed hard, his skin dirty, holding a shovel in his hand and looking around at the two men lying lifeless on the ground.
My eyes widened and my heart raced, trying to process what had just happened.
“Did they hurt you?” Shane asked, chucking the shovel on the ground and swinging behind me. He couldn’t undo the duct tape with his hands.
“Jared has a knife,” I pointed out.
“Had.”
“Had?”
He took the knife from Jared’s pocket, and felt for his pulse.
“He’s dead.”
“Is Bob?”
“Yes.”
“Holy shit, I killed him! I thought he’d killed you! That yelling…”
“Acting. I figured they’d be easier to sneak up on if they thought I’d went down.”
“How did you navigate through the shaft?”
He finished cutting the duct tape off of me, then turned and looked at me.
“I used to come down here with my dad when I was a kid. I could walk through here with my eyes closed.”
“Oh.”
We paused, looking at each other with the flicker of light available.
“Natalie. I think we can both agree this is a very bad situation,” Shane said after a few moments.
“Yes.”
“We didn’t want to kill them.”
“But we had to.”
He gripped my forearm and nodded. “And now, we’ve got to destroy this place.” He grabbed Jared’s headlamp and put it on. Looking down, I saw him pull two sticks of dynamite out of his back pocket.
He searched in Bob’s pocket and found a lighter.
“You feel okay right now?”
I nodded. “I’m okay.”
“Can you run?”
“If I know where I’m running to.”
“Good.” He lit the dynamite stick, and tossed it on the ground.
Shane took my hand and guided me as we ran as fast as we could toward the elevator shaft.
We got to the top just in time, ran outside and jumped in the snow as we felt the vibrations of the explosions. I was actually surprised at how well the mine contained the explosion, how barely noticeable it was in the fresh air.
I lay on top of Shane as he lay on the ground, feeling his chest rising and falling against mine.
We were snowy. We were cold. We were hot. We were dirty. We were good. We were evil.
But our hearts were still beating.
“Did that all really just happen?”
He nodded. “Feels like it was a dream, doesn’t it?”
“Yes,” I breathed. “I wish it were.”
We lay like that for a minute or so, not saying much.
Finally, he stood up.
The sun was shining, almost blinding the way it reflected off the snow.
“Natalie, I think it’s time to get the fuck out of Black Mountain.”
“I second that.”
“One more thing I need to do first.”
He got into Jared’s truck, and drove it full speed into the mine, jumping out right before it got to the elevator shaft.
“I know—it was an extreme measure but we needed to get rid of the evidence,” he said.
I could barely process what was happening. This all seemed surreal, like a movie. I opened my mouth to say a few words, but nothing came out.
“How do you feel?” he asked as we walked down the street, toward my dad’s house, a mile away from the mine. We were cold, but we would make it. We would get coats and clothes, and bolt.
“I hope you weren’t thinking about reopening that mine,” Shane said.
I shook my head. “I think you’re the only mine I need now.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re mine, Shane,” I grinned. “Get it?”
He laughed, and I laughed, and our humor was back.
“I’m glad you feel that way. Because you’re mine now.”
30
Shane
7 Months Later, in July
Florida was hot in July. Much hotter than Black Mountain would be this time of year.
And I wasn’t just talking about my girlfriend.
“Babe, would you like another drink?” she grinned. “Mr. Hockey Champion?”
Natalie looked almost unfathomably sexy in her summer wear. She didn’t have to wear anything fancy to be the most gorgeous one at the bar, just a tank top and a pair of very short denim shorts.
“Get me the usual summer cocktail.”
“So, a Cuba Libre?”
“If it was good enough for Hemingway it’s good enough for me,” I paused. “Oh and babe. I’ll take another one of these, please.”
I grinned and tapped my lips.
Natalie leaned in and gave me a kiss that was soft, sensual and teasing rolled into one.
We’d gotten really good at kissing over the last half year. Lots of practice.
I couldn’t keep my eyes off her as she walked to the bar to get us drinks. Hell, every guy in the bar was staring at her. I didn’t blame her for those ridiculously short shorts, either. I was in board shorts, a tank top, and flip flops, and still felt like I was a resident of the pits of hell.
But that was Key West for you: hot as Hades until you were lucky enough to catch a breeze off the Atlantic coast.
We had holed up
in Key West for the summer.
Jordan T’s was our favorite joint to chill out at and get a drink after a long day’s work. Which for me, included weight training and jujitsu. After one month playing minor league hockey, I’d been promoted to the pros.
As for Natalie, she was in the middle of writing her first book, a thriller.
When she was ten she had apparently promised her dad that she would write a full book someday. What with my championship bonus this year I told her I’d be her sugar daddy for the summer while she worked on it.
She didn’t fight me on that one.
Not that she needed it, necessarily. Things had been straightened away with the trust fund her father had set up for her, and she was heir to quite a nice fortune. She’d insisted on folding most of it into a foundation for recovering drug addicts. We didn’t want others to go the way of Jared and Bob and become shells of the people they used to be.
The thing I missed the most about Black Mountain was the kids I coached. But I’d visit them from time to time, and Jeremy was right. With the money I had made this year, I was able to donate generously for improvements to the kids hockey league and make sure it would be around for a long time to come to keep them off the streets.
But that world was far away in this moment. I stared at Natalie at the bar as the bartender chatted her up. Yep, this was normal. I still was a little blown away by the body she was hiding underneath all the coats we wore during our first week together.
As I waited, a couple of sun-kissed brunettes approached me with devious smiles on their faces.
“Hi. You’re Shane North, aren’t you?” one of them said hopefully.
I sighed. This had been happening ever since I got pulled up to the NHL this spring and I’d scored a few key goals.
I was still getting used to being recognized in public.
“Indeed that is me.”
“That’s so cool. Can we like, buy you a drink?”
Natalie appeared holding two drinks, and the devil eyes she exchanged with the two girls couldn’t be much more palpable.
“This is my girlfriend, Natalie.”
“Oh,” the taller one said, trying not to sound disappointed. “Nice to meet you. Have you two been dating for a while?”
Wow. She was bold. I didn’t want to be a total dick, and hey—maybe commitment didn’t mean as much to some of the guys she was seeing.
I slid my hand on top of Natalie’s.
We’d had the craziest start to a relationship possible.
“What kind of relationship would you say we have, babe? A good one or a bad one?”
Natalie bit her lip, playing along. “I don’t know. Let’s check real quick.”
She leaned in and we kissed, long, hard and slow. By the time we opened our eyes, the two girls were gone.
Natalie grinned. “I would give our relationship an eight.”
I held up a hand. “An eight!? That’s blasphemy. I don’t accept eight. I only accept a ten.”
“How can we get to ten? Hmmm…” she tapped her finger on the side of her face. “Let me think.”
We clinked our glasses together and did a cheers. Just then, the saloon style doors rattled and we saw a couple of cops come in.
Natalie gripped my forearm tightly as we watched them.
They headed to the bar, slapped hands with the bartender and exchanged some bro-style greeting.
Natalie scooted her bar stool closer to mine.
“Do you think we’re ever going to see a couple of cops, and not think about what we did last winter?”
The skin prickled on the back of my neck.
In the wake of the events in Black Mountain, we’d talked endlessly about what we did and processed the repercussions, both moral and mental. The cops had looked into the case and as the last witnesses that had seen Jared and Bob had been on every kind of drug, they’d let the case float off. Cases where drug overdoses were involved were known to go unsolved.
Plus, the mine was closed, never to reopen. It was one of the few coal reservoirs in Michigan to begin with, so it wasn’t like prospectors were chomping at the bit to get in and take a look at whatever accident had happened.
In those aspects, we were lucky.
But it still felt odd to go on living normal lives. We silently mourned for the families of Jared and Bob.
But they didn’t know what monsters the two men had become. They’d let the anger and bitterness consume them until they were shades of the hopeful boys they used to be. I blamed myself in a way. I’d egged them on, and with good reason. I’d lost two of my closest family members. I wanted blood revenge.
But listening to Natalie’s perspective down there in the mine, knowing what they’d planned to do to her—my face began to heat just thinking about it all.
Not to mention the fact that Bob had tried to kill me, and only missed by the grace of God.
“Babe,” Natalie said, running her hand over the back of my neck. “You’re doing it again.”
“Sorry,” I croaked. We’d vowed that we wouldn’t internalize those ruminating thoughts about the sins we committed, but we both were prone to it sometimes. I’d wake Natalie up in the middle of the night, hearing her silent screams she’d voice in her night-terrors. Wanting to call out, but not being heard.
“What were you thinking about?” she asked.
I took a nice long swallow of my Cuba libre. “I can’t get Jared’s expression out of my head. The way he looked before he died.”
“He seemed too human?” Natalie asked in a voice just above a whisper.
I shook my head. “No. He seemed like he knew this was the end and he didn’t care. He seemed like he wanted to die. I wonder if that was the drugs, or…”
A powerful swirl of emotions swelled inside me. “He had nothing to hope for any more. Nothing to hold onto, no future vision. And I know exactly how he felt. He couldn’t get his mind off the past, and off the pain.”
Natalie took a pull of her drink and ran her hand up my arm to my bicep and held it there. She saw me pulling up the text again from my sister, the one that always gutted me.
She slid her hand down my forearm. “Honey. Speaking of getting your mind off the past…Why do you keep torturing yourself? You did the best you could for her.”
“My best wasn’t good enough, though.”
“You were so young. And you learned from it, and your best was for me. And it still is. It always will be.”
I swallowed hard, feeling the emotional pain rip through me that I always felt when I thought of Louisa.
“You’ve got to let go, Shane,” she continued. “Not for her. For you. Do you think Louisa would want you to go on feeling miserable whenever you think of her? No. I like to believe she wants you to remember her fondly. You loved her, and you always will. She knows that.”
Staring at the text, I nodded slowly. Natalie’s lips were quivering as she looked at me. I tensed up, but looking at her, she softened me.
Taking a big breath, I slid my hand over the text and did something I needed to do to move on from the past: I deleted the text.
Natalie nodded, her eyes welling up with tears. I could tell she was trying to hold them back.
I tapped my lips. A smile ran across her face and she leaned in and gave me a kiss.
I felt the warm summer breeze pick up through the bar as she pulled back. It sent a chill down my spine. I swear I could feel Louisa’s presence. And she was happy, I think.
I stared into Natalie’s sparkling eyes. She was an embodiment of the phrase ‘and though she be but little, she is fierce.’ I had the physical strength, but Natalie had taught me so much in the past seven months about mental fortitude. We started dating long distance when I first took the spot on the team in Chicago. Slowly but surely, we became each others’ everything, with long chats about everything without saying directly that we’d, you know, killed two men. That wasn’t something we discussed except when our cell phones were left at the house, like tonig
ht.
“It’s not just her that nips at me, though. It’s Bob and Jared. Crazy thing is, I feel like, given a slightly different set of circumstances, I could have ended up in his spot. Sometimes I worry about the evil I’m capable of, if I go unchecked.”
“I worry about that, too. But never forget that it was self-defense.” She looked at me. “But yes, I wonder how I’ll look into the eyes of my hypothetical kid and tell them that the world is a good place.”
Now that Natalie was feeling culpable, I felt the need to come to her aid. “You did what you had to do to protect yourself.”
“So did you,” She fired back. “And to protect me.”
I gripped the flesh of her knee underneath the bar table. A warm breeze poured in off the ocean.
“You know what?” I leaned toward her and brushed her ear with my lips. “I killed for you. And I’d do it again if you were in danger. You do something to me, Natalie. You turn me into an animal.”
She swallowed, and I noticed her breathing deeper, her chest rising and falling deeply. Her normally pale-ish skin started to blotch red on her cheeks, her neck, her chest.
I slid my hand up her thigh slowly. When I arrived with a finger between her legs, I could feel the heat pooling.
“Does that turn you on, Natalie? To know that I’d kill for you. Knowing that I’m serious about that.”
Natalie closed her eyes and shuddered. As I slid one fingertip onto her clit—she wore no panties per my request tonight—she muttered something unintelligible, *oh God*, maybe.
Her upper body was shaking, convulsing.
“Shane, please. Not here. Too many people…what if they watch? Oh, fuck…”
Her words were in direct opposition with her body.
Needless to say, I didn’t stop. Instead, I hooked one finger inside her and massaged the inside of her pussy just how I knew she liked it.
I’d enjoyed lots of practice with this over the past seven months. Usually not in such a public place, of course.
“You know why that is, Natalie?”
Her eyes shined, maybe from the moonlight reflecting off the water in the night.
Black Ice: A Standalone Enemies to Lovers Romance Page 21
