Chapter 4 - Shadows and Gunsmoke
The drive back to Blackwood Manor was pitch-black.
The storm that had been brewing over the Gros Ventre range had finally broken, dumping sheets of heavy, wet snow across Highway 390. The Escalade’s wipers fought a losing battle against the whiteout, the heavy vehicle navigating the winding mountain curves at a cautious twenty miles per hour.
Inside the cabin, the air was charged with a heavy, suffocating silence.
My lips still burned from Nathaniel’s kiss. My heart was racing at a speed that had nothing to do with Julian Cross or Daniel Reeves. Every time Nathaniel shifted in the seat beside me, the scent of his cologne—cedarwood and rain—filled my senses.
“You didn't have to kiss me like that,” I said softly, looking out at the blizzard whipping against the tinted glass.
Nathaniel didn't look at me immediately. He sat with his head tilted back against the leather headrest, his profile sharp against the passing glare of the snow.
“Would you have preferred I let Daniel believe it was an arrangement?” he asked, his voice low and raspy.
“Wasn't it?” I turned to him, my voice barely above a whisper. “You paid my mother’s hospital bills. You gave me a dress and a choker. You used me to blindside Julian Cross. It’s business, Mr. Mercer. Isn't that what you told me?”
Nathaniel turned his head. In the dim light, his gray eyes were like molten silver.
“If it were just business, Emma, I would have sent my lawyers to buy your testimony,” he murmured. “I wouldn't have brought you under my roof. And I sure as hell wouldn't have touched you like that.”
My breath caught in my throat.
Before I could process what he had just admitted, the night exploded into chaos.
A deafening *CRACK* shattered the silence.
The Escalade violently jerked to the left, the heavy tires screeching against the frozen asphalt as the lead SUV in our convoy was broadsided by an unmarked snowplow barreling out of a logging road.
“Ambush!” the driver yelled, his hands fighting the steering wheel.
Gunfire erupted. Heavy, automatic rounds slammed into the armored side panels of our vehicle like a hail of iron sledgehammers. The bulletproof glass spiderwebbed into opaque, fractured white sheets.
“Down!” Nathaniel roared.
Before I could scream, Nathaniel’s massive frame slammed over me, shoving me down onto the floorboards between the seats. His body covered mine completely, shielding my head and spine with the broad expanse of his back.
The heat of him, the absolute, immovable weight of his frame, was the only thing between me and the storm of lead outside.
*Clang! Clang! Thud!*
The vehicle lurched again, skidding off the shoulder and slamming into a snowbank with a bone-jarring crunch. The engine died, coughing a cloud of white steam into the blizzard.
“Marcus!” Nathaniel barked, his voice steady despite the chaos. “Status!”
“Lead car is disabled, boss!” the driver shouted from behind the steering wheel, pulling a Glock from beneath his armpit. “Two shooters on the embankment, three closing in from the trees! It’s Cross’s private muscle!”
Nathaniel didn't hesitate. He reached beneath the passenger seat and pulled out a sleek, matte-black submachine gun.
He looked down at me on the floorboards. His face was inches from mine, his jaw clenched, his eyes burning with a lethal, terrifying intensity.
“Stay down, Emma,” he commanded, his voice tight. “Do not move. Do not look out the window. If anyone opens this door who isn't me, you pull this trigger.”
He shoved a heavy, compact pistol into my shaking hands. The metal was freezing cold against my bare skin.
“Nathaniel, wait—” I cried, terror for him suddenly eclipsing the terror for myself.
He didn't listen. He kicked the passenger door open, using it as a shield, and stepped out into the blizzard.
The sound of gunfire tripled in volume.
The sharp, rhythmic *pop-pop-pop* of Nathaniel’s weapon cut through the roar of the wind. I curled into a ball on the floorboards, holding the pistol against my chest, listening to the shouts, the wet thuds of bodies hitting the frozen snow, and the terrifying crack of rifles echoing off the mountain walls.
For three minutes, the world was fire and blood.
Then, silence fell over the highway.
Only the howling wind and the hissing steam from the radiator remained.
“Nathaniel?” I whispered, tears pricking my eyes. My hands were shaking so hard the safety on the pistol clicked against my ring. “Nathaniel!”
The door handle clicked.
The door swung open.
Nathaniel stood there, framed by the swirling snow. His tuxedo jacket was torn at the shoulder, covered in dirt and slush. His face was streaked with soot, and his knuckles were bloody.
He dropped his weapon into the snow and reached for me with his uninjured hand, pulling me up from the floorboards.
“I'm here,” he breathed, his voice ragged. “I'm here, Emma. You're safe.”
I threw my arms around his neck, burying my face in the crook of his collarbone, uncaring about the soot or the blood. The terror of the last ten minutes broke, and I sobbed against his chest.
Nathaniel wrapped his arms around me, pulling me out into the sub-zero air, holding me so tightly against his chest that my feet barely touched the slush.
“It’s over,” he murmured into my hair, his lips pressing against my temple. “They're done. Julian just signed his own death warrant.”
Then, I felt something warm and sticky soaking through the thin velvet of my red dress.
I pulled back, looking down.
A dark, spreading stain of crimson was blooming across Nathaniel’s left side, just below his ribs.
My breath hitched in horror. “Nathaniel... you’re shot.”
Nathaniel glanced down at the wound with total indifference, then looked back up at my terrified face.
May you like
“Just a graze,” he said, though his jaw tightened in pain. “Get in the chase vehicle, Emma. We’re going home.”
***
