My Hockey Alpha novel Chapter 58

Nina

“Man,” Matt said, huffing as we slowly made our way up the mountain, “who knew hiking was such a workout?”

“I’ll say,” Lori chimed in. By this point, she had piled her black hair on top of her head and was flapping her ratty black band t-shirt to cool herself off as we climbed.

“You guys are a couple of wimps,” Jessica said, her long and slender legs allowing her to climb the mountain with ease. She was wearing tight leggings and an even tighter long-sleeved workout top that zipped up the front, and didn’t have a bead of sweat on her entire body. Her ponytail swung back and forth, its curls from the day before still somehow perfect after a night of sleeping on the ground.

“Says you,” Lori grumbled. “You’re built like a gazelle.”

It wasn’t often that Jessica’s nerdy side came out in front of other people, but this was one of those rare times. “Actually,” she said, sounding somewhat full of herself and making everyone groan, “gazelles are better suited for flat terrain, like plains. If anything, you should be the one who’s best at climbing like this, because you’re short and muscular. Like a mountain goat.”

There was a collective silence.

Finally, Matt was the first to burst out laughing, which started the chain; I even heard Enzo chuckle behind me, and thought I saw a smirk on James’ face in the front while Lori fumed, clearly trying not to laugh.

Lori folded her arms across her chest and stuck out her tongue.

We kept climbing, taking breaks here and there for water and to catch our breath as the climb slowly got more difficult. An hour later, we were all getting annoyed at James for claiming that the hike was “easy” -- except for Enzo, who stayed mostly quiet behind me, his brown eyes focused on me the entire time -- but he kept promising that we were almost there.

Finally, just as we were considering turning back, we reached the peak.

We climbed up one last large rock face, having to help each other climb up. Enzo quickly came over as I tried to climb up the rock and boosted me up while James scrambled to be the one to take my hand, making me blush at the two of them practically competing for my affection.

When I finally got up, however, the last thing on my mind was guys.

The view was absolutely stunning. The way that the afternoon light shone across the colorful autumn leaves, mixed with the deep green of the pine trees, took my breath away. No matter how much we groaned on the way up, the view made it all worth it.

“You can see everything from here!” Jessica exclaimed, throwing her arms up and running over to the edge excitedly.

“Hey, be careful,” James shouted after her. “You shouldn’t get so close to the edge.”

“Oh, it’s fine,” Jessica said. “Hey, can someone take a picture for me? I have got to post this to I*******m.”

No one else volunteered, so I sighed and pulled out my phone to snap a picture of Jessica. She grinned and struck a pose with one foot up behind herself and two peace signs with her hands.

I snapped a few pictures and was putting away my phone when, all of a sudden, a strong gust of wind blew across the summit and made Jessica lose her balance.

It all happened so quickly, but felt like slow motion at the same time. She started to fall backwards over the edge of the cliff, her arms windmilling wildly as her face filled with panic. Lori and I both screamed, running for her, but we were too far away. We wouldn’t make it in time.

Suddenly, there was a flash to our right.

Enzo moved so quickly he was like a lightning bolt. He shot forward and grabbed Jessica around the waist just before she fell.

Everyone let out a collective sigh of relief, too grateful that Jessica hadn’t fallen to her death to notice that Enzo had moved at an inhuman speed to save her. Jessica practically swooned in his arms, throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him tightly.

“Thank you!” she cried, tears streaming down her cheeks. “You saved me.”

Enzo put her down -- away from the cliff this time -- and shook his head.

“Listen to people next time,” he said sternly.

Jessica blushed and nodded.

“You IDIOT!” Lori shouted, storming over to Jessica with her hands balled up into fists. “You could’ve died!” She took the whimpering Jessica by both shoulders and shook her, shouting obscenities… But then she did something else that none of us expected.