Chapter 10 #2
The ceiling dropped lower with each stride, to barely six feet of clearance in places, forcing me to duck.
My hair brushed against the rock overhead, showering grit onto my head and shoulders.
The air smelled different here—mustier, thicker, with an underlying chemical tang that made my nose itch—old explosives residue, probably.
Dynamite and blasting powder left a signature that lasted decades.
“How are your hands?” I asked as Bella squeezed around a sharp rock outcrop.
“They're okay. The skin stings a bit.” She kept her palms raised, protecting them from the jagged wall.
“I bet they sting more than just a bit.” I'd seen the blisters and angry red welts. Even a small burn was agony, so those would be excruciating.
“I'm used to burns.” She shrugged. “Goes with the territory of being a chef.”
“I guess so, but I'm sure you've never had ones like that before.”
“No,” she admitted as a ghost of a smile crossed her lips. “But it was worth it.”
I couldn't help grinning, picturing Rocco's face under that boiling gravy, his skin bubbling and raw. “Hell yeah. I hope he hurts like hell.”
“I bet he does.” Her smile spread wider, lighting up her dirt-streaked face in a way that made my chest tight. “Ruined my meat pies, though.”
I laughed. “Asshole.”
“Yeah. Asshole.” She giggled, and the sound was like a crack of light breaking through all this darkness and fear. So normal. So her. A fierce protectiveness twisted in my chest that was raw and too big to think about right now.
We kept moving, our shoes finding a rhythm on the wooden crossties.
The tunnel widened as we passed a line of ore carts that had rusted into permanent fixtures, their wheels locked solid, and their beds filled with mineral deposits that looked more like concrete than dirt.
The space opened into what used to be a sorting bay, so big we could actually breathe without hearing it bounce back at us.
Ahead, the tunnel ran straight toward the old drilling gallery, with everything bathed in that sick yellow light that made my skin crawl.
A beam of light cut through the tunnel behind us. Sharp. Deliberate. And a man's silhouette appeared on the upper walkway, weapon raised.
“Shit!”
Bella's breath hitched, her whole body going rigid. “Shit. They found us.”
I grabbed her arm and yanked her forward, my boots pounding against the rock floor. “Quick, down this ladder!”
At the far end of the sorting bay, a rusted ladder descended through a narrow hole in the floor. The maintenance shaft that led to the lower levels was our only option.
Bella grabbed the ladder rails, and her teeth clenched against what must have been searing agony in her hands. Her skirt flared out as she climbed down fast. I followed, hating every screech and groan of the rusted metal beneath my boots. The damn thing was like a megaphone announcing our location.
My feet hit solid ground, and I grabbed Bella's wrist, pulling her away from the ladder just as the flashlight beam swept across the shaft opening above us.
Bloody hell. They’re fast.
The ceiling pressed so close I had to hunch as I ran. A long tunnel stretched ahead, old rail tracks disappearing into shadow. The air was thick and suffocating, reeking of mineral dust with a metallic tang.
“Which way?” Bella whispered, eyes wide with fear.
“There's a ventilation junction up ahead. Three branches. We'll lose them there.”
I took the lead, hunched over, one hand skimming the rough wall while the other hovered overhead. Our footsteps rang out on the rusted tracks, echoing off the walls and announcing our position. So much for stealth.
At least the lights still worked. Without them, we'd be stumbling blind into a shaft or cave-in.
But those bastards were gaining. We needed to hide. Now.
We hit the three-way junction, and I stopped short, my brain scrambling to remember the layout. I'd spent months studying these tunnels while planning the restart and had memorized every branch and shaft.
The left fork dropped into the mine's guts—ancient, unstable death traps that had been off-limits for decades. Several had collapsed. The rest were waiting for an excuse. That way was suicide.
The center tunnel had flooded six years ago when a drainage pipe burst. The official report had blamed “structural failure,” which had been horseshit.
I'd had every pipe inspected and certified safe. The water was probably still sitting there, black and stinking. This mine had its share of bodies, I hoped like hell we weren’t going to be added to that number.
At the entrance to the right tunnel, cool air licked my skin.
The ventilation was still running. Thank Christ.
“This way.” I grabbed Bella's wrist and pulled her into the right tunnel.
The passage sloped upward, and my legs ached as we ran along the hard-packed clay. At least our footsteps didn't echo here—the clay swallowed the sound. My thighs burned, and I couldn't drag in enough air. Christ, I was out of shape.
The walls widened as we climbed. Bella moved like she could keep this pace all day. Made sense. She'd been running for her life for weeks. There was nothing like fear and adrenaline to whip you into shape.
The tunnel opened into a massive chamber.
Even though I'd been down here countless times, the size still knocked the air from my lungs.
The ceiling shot up thirty feet before darkness swallowed it.
The lights barely scratched the surface of all that black.
This space was too damn big for how deep we were, hollowed out over generations by miners chasing diamond veins, swinging pickaxes until their bodies had given out, all for stones that had made other men rich while they had died poor.
I know where we are.
Rusted ore carts lined the old track that curved around the chamber's edge like a broken necklace.
In the center stood the wooden structure I'd studied in a hundred planning documents.
With massive double beams wrapped in rope and steel cable that looked older than God, the whole thing held up an elaborate pulley system.
Ore buckets dangled in the air like dead fruit, and a huge metal ore hopper hung directly over the pit, like the giant bin had been stopped in the middle of a work shift.
I’d mapped every inch of this place and had planned how to restore it during those fevered months when I'd convinced myself I could bring this mine back to life.
Before everything had gone to shit.
“Which way?” Bella asked, spinning slowly as she took in the scale of the chasm.
Scanning the chamber, my brain ran through options and discarded them just as fast. The old excavation platforms jutted out at different heights above us, connected by wooden stairs and walkways that looked ready to collapse under their own weight.
Tunnel openings ringed the chamber at various levels, and I could see at least six from down here, barely lit, with probably more hiding in the shadows.
We could hide in one of those tunnels. But if they kept chasing us, we'd end up trapped in a dead end, a cave-in, or one of the flooded shafts.
Our only option was to kill those bastards.
And this chamber was the perfect location to do it. I could lead those assholes onto one of those rotted platforms and let gravity do my work for me.
I scanned the overhead pulley system that I'd flagged for demolition in my safety reports.
Massive wooden beams crisscrossed above us, and hanging from them like a giant, cubed wrecking ball was a metal ore hopper the size of a small car.
It had to weigh a thousand pounds, maybe more, and was suspended by ropes that looked like they'd been rotting since the day I was born.
If that thing dropped, it would flatten anything beneath it.
I worked through the mechanics. The hopper was rigged to an old release system, but the mechanism was twenty feet up on a platform that should've collapsed years ago. There was no way to reach it directly.
But one of the support ropes stretched along a lower beam, running above what used to be the sorting tables, maybe twenty feet up. Too high to reach.
Unless...
I scanned the walls, searching for the fire safety cabinet bolted to the rock face.
“Over there.” I grabbed Bella's wrist and ran toward the wall.
Most of that fire equipment would be useless down here. If this place went up in flames, a fire extinguisher and an ax wouldn't save anyone from the smoke and toxic fumes.
But an ax could cut a rope.
I ripped open the cabinet. The ax was there. The blade was rusted, but hopefully still sharp enough. I hefted it, and the weight felt wrong in my hands. Heavier than the one I’d used for target practice that missed every damn time.
“Jesus, Declan. They'll shoot you before you get close enough to swing that thing.”
“I'm not swinging it.” I pointed up at the pulley system. “If I can hit that rope, the hopper drops like a stone. It’ll crush anything underneath, including those two bastards.”
Her eyes widened as she understood. “That's—”
“Insane. I know.” And one hell of an if. But the plan was all we had.
I just needed to get Bella to safety first, then double back and—
Voices echoed through the tunnel behind us. Boots pounded stone, each footfall hammering closer through the chamber.
“They're coming.” Terror flooded Bella's eyes.
I looked at her, then back at the hopper overhead.
Fuck.
I’m out of time to get her to safety.