Chapter 48 #2
Jesus Christ. Tolbert had been inches away from severing his carotid artery.
“I’m okay,” Tanner said, taking a towel from a ref and holding it to his face. “Rhea, look at me.” He grabbed the front of my jersey and shook me, forcing me to snap out of the shock I was in. “I’m okay, baby.”
“I’m not.” I said, shaking my head and ripping my helmet off in frustration before turning as Tolbert broke free of Thomas’s grip, and lunging across the ice toward us.
He looked like a rabid animal, teeth clenched, laser focus in his eyes as he fought to get to his prey.
Tanner grabbed me as Tolbert swung at me, trying to pull me back, but I had no time to think as I reacted purely on adrenaline and instinct.
Pain erupted across my forehead as I snapped my head forward into his, using my skull to break his nose and as he landed in a heap on the ice at my knees, I realized I knocked him out with that one headbutt.
“Jesus, Dalton.” Eli cursed, grabbing Tolbert and sliding him across the ice away from us. “No one wins in a headbutt.”
“Yep,” I said, grimacing as I tentatively touched the goose egg already forming on my temple. “I remember that now.”
“Come here,” Tanner turned me, looking at me like I had just got into a high-speed wreck, instead of a stupid game of dumb and dumber with a maniac. “Let me see.”
“I’m fine.” I shoved his hands away and forced him to put the towel back on his cheek, which thankfully was bleeding less than it had been. But we were both still covered with it.
“What the fuck got into him?” Tanner asked, standing up and lifting me to my feet at his side as Sweetie, our monster resident firefighter, sat down on Tolbert’s back, keeping him flat on the ice as if he wasn’t already out cold from my hit.
“Things got a little messy right before the game started.” Thomas said with a grimace. “Goldie can fill you in on the specifics,” he nodded down at our chief. “But long story short, he was trying to save his own ass by taking yours out.”
“Taking it out as in—” I stopped, tilting my head down as the words wouldn’t quite form on my tongue.
“Killing me.” Tanner surmised evenly. Far more calmly than any person deserved to be after an assassination attempt.
I opened my mouth to tell him how fucking insane he sounded, but chaos erupted around us. The doors to the rink all burst open, and federal agents dressed in matching black jackets and superiority complexes flooded the space.
“Tanner!” Goldie cried, sliding across the ice in her sneakers, slipping and almost falling on her ass before she caught herself, “Rhea!”
“Easy,” I cursed, catching her before she slipped again. “He’s okay. Tanner’s fine.”
She glared at me with her cute, pissed off puppy dog look before fawning all over him, making a big fuss of the cut to his face before turning to look at me. “You scared the shit out of me!”
“Me?” I reeled back from her accusation as I caught a glimpse of Anastasia Howe walking across the ice toward us, regal as ever. “What about you?” I turned to Goldie, “You knew this was going to happen, and you didn’t say anything to us?”
“He said he was going to do it after the game!” She yelled back, and I shook my head at the absurdity of the situation.
“Wait,” Tanner separated us, and cocked his head at Goldie. “You knew someone was going to try to kill me? And you watched from the box?”
Goldie’s face morphed into full outrage as she grabbed the front of his jersey and pulled him down a full foot to her height.
“I did no such thing, Tanner Brooks! I called in the mother fucking calvary and followed strict instructions not to alert you both to the situation, so he didn’t get away!
Had I known he was going to make a play on the ice for your life, I would have run him over with the motherfucking Zamboni!
How dare you accuse me of something so cruel! ”
I snorted and palmed my forehead, grimacing as I made contact with the goose egg there. Which was a mistake, because that drew Goldie’s fiery eyes my way and she pointed at me, leveling me with a death glare.
“And you!” She accused, “If you ever use your sexy face as a hammer again, I swear to God, Rhea Allister Dalton, I will tie you up and—”
“Children!” Jasper said, clapping his hands and cutting her off as he joined our group, going right to Thomas’s side. “There are children here.”
“Whatever,” she said, releasing Tanner’s jersey, who to his benefit, had stayed folded over at her height while she read us the Riot Act, and stood back up when she released him. “We’ll finish this later.”
“Anyone care to let us know what the hell is going on?” Travis deadpanned, with Emmie on his shoulders as they hovered at the edge of the crowd.
“Allow me.” Anastasia said, unfolding a paper from her hand as three agents circled Sweetie, where he still sat on top of Tolbert’s back. “Care to release my prisoner, Sir?”
Sweetie shrugged, rolling off the man with all his heavy gear and got to his feet.
“Thank you,” Anastasia said with a curt nod as the agents proceeded to handcuff Tolbert.
“This man is not who he’s pretended to be,” she said loudly, as the rink hushed all around, the crowd desperate to hear what was going on.
“He has been working behind the scenes to destroy this town. And he’s been successful at it many other times.
And today, thanks to your incredible community led by Rhea Dalton, Goldie James, and Tanner Brooks, we’ve finally got the proof we needed to close more than three dozen cold cases stemming from arson, malicious intent, assault, fraud, kidnapping, and the worst of all, murder. ”
A collective gasp echoed around the rink as Anastasia turned to a woman who stood at Jasper’s side. She had been up at the railing with them when I first saw Goldie before the game, but I didn’t know who she was.
The man who had tried to frame me for the crimes here in Cedar Bluff started to come to, groaning in confusion before he started fighting his binds. “What the hell—” He cursed, rolling to see who all stood over him, and his face blanched when he saw the agents around him.
“James Walker,” One of the agents began, calling the chief a name I didn’t recognize, as it all started to click to me. “You have the right to remain silent—”
The rink watched in silence as the agents marched him off the ice, reading him his rights. I would have thought that the reversal of roles between him and I would have felt better. Maybe even justified.
But I just felt—tired.
Anastasia turned to Goldie with a smile. “We’ve got one of them, thanks to you.”
“Martin got away?” Goldie grimaced and leaned into my side, looking defeated.
“Oh no, he didn’t.” Jasper called excitedly, “There! Look!”
Collectively, the entire rink turned to where Martin Lister ran along the top railing, trying to make it toward the exit through the crowd.
“Someone stop him!” Anastasia called out.
“I got it!” A little voice echoed over the railing, and instantly Eli and Travis yelled back.
“Toby, no!”
We all watched as the cute, chaos-filled little boy took the cup in his hand and threw it right at Martin’s face as he ran by in his attempt to escape.
I had expected soda, or maybe even hot chocolate to cover the man as the cup made perfect contact in the center of his face.
But what I wasn’t expecting was a volcano of what looked suspiciously like liquid nacho cheese to erupt, covering his entire upper body and face, sticking to every inch.
“Oh my God,” I cringed, as the bastard that had tried to intimidate Goldie and ruin our town ran blindly, nacho cheese covering every inch of his face, straight into the railing over the upper bleachers, tumble-weeding himself over the top and down into the crowd, effectively catching himself.
“Woo-hoo!” Toby cheered, jumping up and fist-pumping the air in excitement. “Three points for me!”
Everything else happened in pure Cedar Bluff comedic fashion after that.
Martin and Tolbert, or whatever his name was, were arrested, facing enough felony charges to write a book with. Jasper took all the credit for keeping Goldie sane during the game while they waited for the feds to show up and updating Thomas on the situation, giving Tanner and me an ally on the ice.
And as we all started making our way toward the boards, ready to call it a day after the overwhelming excitement of the day, one furious and outraged voice cut out across the noise in the rink.
“You have to be shitting me all the way to the toilet and back.” Emmie screeched in frustration.
“Do any of you know how many chores I had to do to convince my mom to let me play against a bunch of smelly, hairy, old men?” She struggled against her dad’s grip to get to the ice on her skates, but when she got down, she stood in the center of us all and yelled even louder.
“And you’re going to let some wacko nozzle nut ruin it for me!
” Turning to Eli, she held her hand up before he could chide her for using the snarky name for firefighters, “He’s wacko.
You can’t get mad at me for saying that. ”
Tanner snorted and Goldie giggled where she stood between us as Emmie went on, missing the whole thing.
“You can’t just leave now! I won’t get another opportunity to prove I can do this! They’ll lock me down in kiddie hockey hell for the next five years, minimum. I’ll be driving before I get this chance again!”
“I am not equipped to handle this,” Travis said with a grimace as Eli chuckled.
“I want to play this dang game!” Emmie finished, staring at me. “You have to help me finish this!”
“Me?” I stammered, looking around at everyone. The agents had cleared off the ice, leaving just us players and Goldie and her friends. “I’m not sure—”
“She’s right,” Goldie said with a curt nod of her head and a pointed look my way. “She earned her spot on this ice. You can’t cut it short.”
“Ah, hell,” I laughed, “What’s one murder attempt, a concussion, and some spilled nacho cheese got against a hockey game? Why not?” I turned to Tanner, eyeing up his cut check. “You up for it, Scarface?”
Tanner flipped the towel over his shoulder and put his helmet back on. “Oh, hell yes. But we’re switching the teams up.” He skated up to me, nose to nose, and lowered his voice. “Because I don’t want to play unless I’m fighting you for the puck.”
“Game on, Officer Golden Boy.” I said smugly, skating backward to the opposite side of the ice as everyone got geared back up.
“Let’s play ball!” Toby shrieked from the boards, slamming his palms against the glass, making everyone laugh and his mom shake her head in pure defeat.
Emmie whooped, jumping up for a high five with me as she pulled her goalie mask down over her face and headed to our new side of the ice. “Let’s kick their asses.”
“Emmie Hayes!” Eli groaned and then stopped short when Travis skated with us to the other side of the ice with a mischievous glint in his eye. “Wait a second, you’re jumping ship too?”
Travis shrugged, fist-bumping Emmie and slapping his stick against the ice. “Show us what you’ve got, Sunshine.”
“Just remember, you asked for it.” Eli grinned cockily.
And just like that, Cedar Bluff found its footing amidst all the chaos and danger. Because of course we did. Who else was going to spin the rumor mill if we didn’t?