Christmas Blackout

by Maggie K. Black

  If you find and hurt the guy she’s cheating on me with I’ll pay you double.

  Fifty thou for bringing me her. Fifty thou for killing him. Got it?

  Got it?

  You’re starting to make me mad.

  Get to the usual place now and wait for me.

  I’m not texting you again! So you’d better get there. Now. Or you’ll be sorry.

  After the wild flurry of texts, Kodiak’s phone fell silent again. A shiver ran down Benjamin’s neck. Whoever this Alpha was he sounded both psychotic and dangerous.

  And there was only one other young man he’d met recently who had that bad impulse control. Gavin. “I don’t like this.”

  Piper sucked in a deep breath as she wrapped her arms around her body. “Neither do I. It’s all too fresh. It’s like six years ago all over again. Exactly like six years ago. Like I’m twenty again and Charlotte is coming here for Christmas. I feel like I’m stuck in a time loop where history’s repeating itself.”

  “Do you have any idea why she’d come here for Christmas this year? Or what he could possibly mean about Christmas things or bricks?”

  She looked so lost that for a moment it took every impulse in his body not to reach out and hold her. “No. I wish I did. But I don’t.”

  The cell phone began to chime. But this time it wasn’t Kodiak’s with a new text message. It was his phone alarm. He groaned.

  “Piper, I’m sorry. I’m so very sorry. But I have to go. I promised my sister I’d hit the road by two... And I... I didn’t expect to take this long.”

  “Okay. Let’s get the tree off your truck and into the barn. Then you can drop me and Kodiak’s phone off at the police station. I’ll call Dominic to come pick me up from there.”

  Piper jumped out into the snow. It was falling thicker and faster now than the forecast had called for. The door slammed behind her. Seconds later she was hauling the tree off the back of the truck without even waiting for him. He slipped the phone into one of the oversize pockets of his winter jacket, along with his army knife and windup flashlight. Then he hopped out. “Here, let me help with that. You take the top, I’ll take the bottom.”

  “Makes sense.” She stopped. “But then I’ve got another favor to ask you, okay?”

  “All right. Anything.”

  She stood there a moment, under a dark gray sky, her eyes on his face, and his eyes on hers, as if they were tied there by some invisible string.

  “After we take the tree into the barn and you drop me off at the police station, you’re just going to go. Okay? No speeches. No big affectionate gestures. Don’t even say goodbye. Give me a quick hug, like a friend would do, and go. Head to your sister’s wedding. Head off to the other side of the world and enjoy your life.” Piper crossed her arms. “Stop worrying about me. Please. Don’t worry, not about me, or The Downs, or my aunt’s health, or whether I’ll be taking smart precautions to protect myself from Alpha. I know you’re a good guy. I know you want to help me and rescue me. But I’m fine. I promise you. This isn’t some trap I’m stuck in. This is my life. I’ve chosen it and I’m going to manage it. I don’t need saving.”

  He nodded slowly. “Got it.”

  He grabbed the other end of the tree and helped her carry it through the snow and up the stairs. They stepped inside the cold, dark barn and set down the tree. The power was still off so he pulled a windup flashlight from his pocket and shone the beam back and forth over the room. As he did, a cry slipped through Piper’s lips.

  The barn had been trashed. Tables were knocked over. Boxes of decorations were scattered across the floor. Stacks of chairs had been tossed. The cement in the fireplace looked as if someone had taken a couple of whacks at it with a sledgehammer. Even the hay under the wooden loft overhang had been torn into shreds and tossed.

  “I don’t understand!” Piper’s hands rose in exasperation. “I don’t know what I ever did to Charlotte that she decided to trash our Christmas decorations six years ago. I don’t know why she’d ever come back here now! Let alone why she’d drag her abusive former boyfriend into this and some other guy he thinks she’s cheating on him with.” Her arms spun toward the wreckage. “Is this what Alpha meant by checking the ‘Christmas things’? Did Charlotte do this? Did Kodiak or Blondie or someone else Alpha sent after her?”

  Benjamin ached to go to her, to hold her, to make it right. Yet she’d demanded a promise from him and he’d given it. But, how could he just leave Piper and not try to help her now?

  The barn door slammed shut, plunging the air around them into a deep murky gloom. Piper strode over to the door and pulled. The door didn’t move. She tossed down her gloves, gripped it with her bare hands and pulled harder.

  “Everything okay?”

  She shook her head hard, tossing her hair. “No. I can’t even budge it.”

  A loud crack boomed through the air above them. Then came a creak from above, as if something was trying to split the roof like a giant nutcracker.

  Benjamin grabbed Piper’s arm and pulled her into the soft hay pile under the loft.

  “Get down!”

  An avalanche of wood and snow caved in on top of them.

  ELEVEN

  Piper was so cold. That was the only thought that went through her head as she opened her eyes to survey her surroundings. But she saw only dark blurs. Her glasses were gone. She tried to move, but her frozen legs would not budge. She was wedged in, snow pressing in to the right and left of her legs. Able to move her arms, she felt around in the darkness. Snow formed a wall all around her, and thick wooden planks crossed just inches above her head.

  Fighting panic, her mind scrambled to focus. Memories assailed her, one at a time.

  There had been a loud cracking noise. Benjamin threw her into the hay. The roof caved in on top of them.

  Then the barn had collapsed, burying them alive.

  She closed her eyes again as tears ran down her cheeks. Lord, I’m scared. I’m trapped. I don’t know what to do.

  There was a groan to her right.

  “Benjamin?” She turned toward the sound. Her bare fingers dug in the densely packed snow. “I’m here. Can you hear me? I’m coming to you.”

  The groaning grew louder. She dug furiously, until her fist punched through the snow wall and into another larger air pocket. She scrabbled away at the hole until she could slide her body through. She turned onto her hands and knees and crawled forward in the darkness. Her hand brushed against something soft. Her fingers trailed up the lines of Benjamin’s coat, to his shoulder, then finally onto his soft beard. Then she felt a hand brush hers.

  “Piper.” Benjamin’s fingers looped through hers. “Are you okay?”

  “My body seems to still be in one piece and everything’s moving all right.” She tried to get up, but the ceiling of the pocket was barely a foot above her head. “How about you?”

  “Yeah. I’m okay. Just sore. I think I bumped my head, but I’ve felt worse.”

  She curled into the snow beside him. “I’m sorry you’re going to be late for your sister’s wedding rehearsal.”

  A chuckle slipped through his lips. “Yup. Well, one problem at a time. Right now I’m going to worry about getting us out of here. I’m guessing there are several feet of snow on top of us now, along with a bunch of broken boards and pieces of the barn roof. Hang on, I think I’m sitting on the flashlight.” He dropped her hand. She heard a whirring sound, then a bright light flashed across her eyes, replacing the gray spots with yellow spots. She blinked and saw nothing but splotches.

  “Hey,” his voice dropped. One hand reached up the side of her face, brushing along her skin. “You don’t have your glasses.”

  She shook her head. “They’re gone. Somewhere. I can’t see a thing. Just shadows of light and darkness.”

 
“Don’t worry about that. We’ll figure something out.” He wrapped one arm around her and squeezed her tight. The warm, rough wool of his coat pressed against her cheek. He kissed the top of her head. “Just give me a moment to look around and think, then we’ll come up with a plan. Don’t worry.”

  How could she not worry? She was terrified. As silly as it would probably sound if she admitted it, not being able to see was scaring her more than being crushed by snow and a falling roof.

  She clenched her jaw and told herself to be strong. But still she could feel the tears there, pooling in her eyes. She blinked hard and for a fraction of a moment thought she’d regained control. Then she felt a treacherous tear slip down her cheek.

  No. I won’t cry again. Not in front of Benjamin.

  He shifted sideways, as if changing his angle, and pushed her back into the snow. “Oh, I’m sorry. I should have warned you before moving.”

  “Just focus on finding us a way out.”

  “I remember from spelunking over the summer how being in tight spaces kind of bothers you.”

  Bothered her? She could feel a sob building in the back of her throat and hoped he hadn’t been able to hear it in her voice. She felt far more than bothered. She felt helpless. What’s more she hated that this was probably how Benjamin would remember her now: blind, trapped, scared—and kissing him back in the truck when she should have been strong enough to push him away.

  “Charlotte locked me in the kindling box.” The words were out before she could rethink them. “At least, I think it was her.”

  “What?” Benjamin’s body froze. “That’s terrible.”

  “Yeah, it really was.” She couldn’t make out the features of his face without her glasses. But she could feel him there, his breath on her face and his chest rising and falling softly. “I’d been in this barn, with Uncle Des, Aunt Cass and everyone celebrating Christmas Eve. I should’ve stayed. But I saw Charlotte slip out and tried to follow her. I didn’t even make it back to the house before someone—and I’ve always been pretty sure it was Charlotte—hit me on the head, shoved me into the box and locked me in. It was half an hour probably before Dominic found me. I’m just thankful he noticed I’d left and went looking for me. I don’t know if I was more scared or angry. But ever since then I panic in closed spaces.”

  Benjamin pulled her tighter. “I was terrified in traction after the snowmobile accident because doctors didn’t know at first how I’d recover. But I was livid with myself, too. I was so angry with myself for putting the people I loved through that. I promised myself that I would never put myself in a situation where I could break someone’s heart like that, and that once I was able to run I’d never let myself get trapped ever again.” His hand brushed her back. “But as much as I hate being trapped right now, at least I’m trapped with you.”

  She let out a long breath. Funny, as much as she liked Benjamin, right now, if she had a choice of whom to be trapped with it wouldn’t be someone who’d be sprinting to their truck the moment they broke through the snow.

  “How big is the hole we’re trapped in?” she asked.

  The flashlight started to whirr again. “I’d say four feet high, eight feet long and about six feet wide.”

  That meant they probably had thirty minutes of air, maybe more, depending on whether they could find a ventilation hole. It was now a question of whether accidentally causing a cave-in by rushing to dig a way out was more or less dangerous than taking their time and maybe running out of air.

  She wondered how it all happened. “Did a tree fall through the roof?”

  “Maybe,” he said. “We’re under a pile of broken wood right now. There’s a solid wall of wood to our right, which has kind of splintered in. On the other side there’s a lot of snow, with a hole.”

  “Yeah, that’s where I was buried.”

  He shifted away from her. “I’ve got to be careful, otherwise this whole thing could come toppling in on us.”

  Light and dark shapes and shadows swam in front of her eyes. She had backup glasses back at The Downs, but for now she might as well be blind. Frustration screamed inside her, but she swallowed it back. She might not be able to help Benjamin, but at the very least, she didn’t need to make things harder for him.

  “Hang on,” he said. “There’s what looks like a branch just above us to the left. I’m going to try to move it an inch or two and see what happens. We might be able to create a small ventilation pocket. Also, it might give us an idea of just how deep this mess is. We might even be able to just dig a hole and climb straight up. Just stay back and out of the way.”

  She couldn’t see well enough to even know what constituted “out of the way.” Still, she curled into a ball and slid back until she felt snow against her back.

  “Okay...it’s moving. Which is good. I’m just going to try to— Oh, Lord, please help us!”

  His sudden, shouted prayer was swallowed by the rush of falling wood and snow. Piper tucked her head into her knees and cradled her arms above it. Benjamin’s arms flew around her, sheltering her body with his. Silent prayers flew from her lips, mingled with the pleas for safety coming from Benjamin’s.

  Finally the rushing of snow stopped. When silence fell, Benjamin sat back and loosened his arms. “I’m really, really sorry about that. You okay?”

  “It’s not your fault. You had no way of knowing.” But now she was buried in snow up to her waist. “I’m fine. Cold, though. Feels like my legs are frozen.”

  “The bad news is we’re now in a lot smaller space,” he said. “The good news is we still have the flashlight. I’d suggest we climb straight up, but there are broken boards and nails everywhere. Not to mention there’s probably a big heavy tree somewhere over our heads.” He sighed loudly. “It’s like being trapped inside one of those wooden puzzles where if you pull the wrong thing it all crashes down, with us inside, and I pulled the wrong piece. In the meantime, let’s focus on keeping warm while I figure this out.”

  He unzipped his coat and pulled her into his chest. Warmth radiated from his body into hers. The flashlight started up again. She waited, curled against his chest, tucked in the strength of his arms and battling the urge to cry. Her mind yelled at her to be stronger than this. She should be figuring a way out of this, not lying buried in the snow, in the arms of the man she’d fought so hard not to let herself fall in love with.

  But what good am I right now if all I can see are blobs of light and shadows?

  She took a deep breath. “Turn off the flashlight, please. I want to give my eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness and look for something.”

  The whirring stopped. “But I thought you couldn’t see anything.”

  “Yeah,” she said. “But when you’ve spent your entire life figuring out one set of blobs from another every time you’re in the dark and need to find your glasses, you also get surprisingly good at telling shadows apart.”

  The light slowly dimmed to black. Slowly she turned her head, scanning every inch of the infuriatingly indistinct shades of light and dark gray that swam past her eyes.

  Lord, help me now. If there’s something I’m supposed to see, help me see it.

  “There!” She pointed. “There’s a light source over there. It’s like the change you see behind your eyelids when you turn toward a light with your eyes closed. We need to dig in that direction.”

  There was a long pause. Then he said, “Okay. We dig in that direction. We tried it my way earlier. Now we’ll try yours.”

  He started to dig. She closed her eyes and prayed not to feel another rush of snow caving in on top of them.

  “Okay,” he said after a long moment. ‘I’ve got a bit of a tunnel dug now. I’m going to crawl in and keep digging. Just feel for my foot, and you can follow me out.”

  She didn’t miss the irony. She’d distanced herself
from Benjamin after the summer because she didn’t want to foolishly chase after a man who’d just end up breaking her heart. Now she was literally following him blindly.

  “Quiet.” His hand brushed her arm to still her. “Listen.”

  She focused her ears on the silence. Then she heard it—barking and then Dominic shouting her name.

  “Hey! Hey! We’re in here!” they shouted back.

  As Benjamin dug faster, hope leaped in her chest. After a few moments light burst through her vision, then a large bundle of fur landed on her chest. Thank You, God!

  “Hey, you okay?” Dominic’s voice came from above her.

  “Yeah,” was all she could manage to say.

  Benjamin stood up. “We were in the barn and the roof caved in. Piper, it looks like a pretty major tree fell.”

  “That’s some dog you’ve got,” Dominic said to her. “Practically dragged me out of the house and then wouldn’t let me rest until I found you two.”

  She felt his hand on her arm ready to help her up. Instead, she stayed on her knees for a moment and wrapped her arms around Harry. The dog licked her face.

  She was out. She was alive. She was safe.

  Benjamin might even make it back to the island before the wedding rehearsal was over.

  “Hey.” Benjamin’s voice floated over the air. “What happened to my truck?”

  TWELVE

  Benjamin looked down onto the living room from the second-story balcony as he dialed his sister’s cell phone number. Below him, Piper was curled up on the sofa in front of the fire, blue backup glasses on her nose and a blue-and-white Maple Leafs hockey jersey draped over her frame. A police officer and Dominic flanked her on either side and the dog was curled in a ball at her feet. The grandfather clock read four thirty.

  Meg answered on the first ring. “Benji?”

  He turned his back on the scene below. There was no easy way to say this. “My truck’s been stolen. I’m not going to make it to the rehearsal.”