She moans at the contact, raising her hips to meet mine again. “Just give it to me,” she begs, arching her back further.
I flip her onto her belly and flatten my palm right above her pussy, raising her ass up in the air. She looks at me over her shoulder, a glimmer in her eye that goes straight to my cock.
“Hold on, baby,” I say, touching the tip of my dick against the opening of her pussy. “This is gonna be one helluva ride.”
TY
Pulling up to the Bath House, the little building miners use to change from street clothes to work clothes, I flip off the lights to the truck and sit in the spot marked “Second Shift Boss” without getting out.
My breath billows in front of me, hitting the quickly chilling windows and causing them to fog up.
There’s a sense of familiarity in the routine of doing this, my first day back to work. I’ve done it for years, after all. But the last time I saw this place I was being carted out in an ambulance. Even though I know it’ll be fine and I really do believe everything I said to Elin, it still has my stomach a little twisted.
I watch as a car pulls up a few spots down and Pettis climbs out. He walks in front of my truck, never looking up at me, and enters the House. The light streams out the door, cutting a slice of halogen-induced sunshine over the mine mud that saturates the ground.
“How’d I get so fucking lucky?” I mutter to myself, grabbing my lunchbox off the passenger’s seat. I get out and lock up and head inside the Bath House. The atmosphere is somber as I enter, my twelve-man crew, counting me, all present.
The walls are a dingy yellow color that looks like piss. The floor is cement, chipped and stained and probably grey when it was poured decades ago. With the years of coal mud being trekked over it, it’s now the color of tobacco spit.
Cord looks up and smiles, fastening the last snap of his bibs. The mine tape that lays horizontally across the material reflects the lights above. “About time you showed up,” he jokes. “Someone’s gonna have to play nice with Pettis. They don’t pay me enough for that.”
“Fuck off,” I say, swallowing hard. I stick my lunch in my locker and start going through my gear.
“The Pre-Shift Report is in your inbox,” Jiggs says, testing the batteries on his flashlight and helmet. They last one ten-hour shift, maybe a little more. We learned the hard way to make sure they’re good and bright before you head to the shaft, otherwise you’re fighting a shitty light for ten hours in a place that’s as dark and damp as your worst childhood nightmare.
I nod, acknowledging the existence of the report, and step into my bibs. The guys chatter around me, easing into a role we’ve played most of our adult lives, good naturedly ribbing each other, and I say a little prayer that it holds. Pettis isn’t usually on our crew and I’m not sure why he is this time. He’s a poison to every team he’s on, and nearly every Foreman, myself included, has demanded he be removed at one point or another.
“How long is he gonna make it?” Jiggs mumbles as he walks by. I shrug, knowing he means Pettis, but I don’t know. I wonder the same thing. After this shit at Thoroughbreds, there’s no way I’m keeping him with me.
The crackle of my radio breaks my concentration. It brings a bolt of realism to the moment.
“Whitt, this is Percora. You get the report?”
“Yeah,” I say into the radio. I swipe it out of my box and scan it quickly. “I see the equipment locations. Ceilings are bolted for the first half mile. We’re mining the top and south ends.”
“Yup,” Percora confirms. “Good to have ya back, Whitt. Try not to get crushed tonight, will ya?”
“Go to hell, Percora,” I say, shaking my head.
The radio falls silent and I grab my flashlight. “You boys ready?”
A chorus of mumbles rings out and we all make our way to the door. The wind picks up, a cold undertone to the breeze shearing across the parking lot as we head to the opening of the slope.
Cord takes a big breath of air. “Ah, there’s nothing like the smell of shit in the evening.”
Jiggs laughs. “The smell of that direct deposit next Friday is gonna be worth it.”
“The things we do for money,” Pettis chimes in.
“Pettis,” Cord says, looking at me and waiting for some indication that he should be quiet. I don’t give it to him. “The next ten hours are gonna go a whole lot fuckin’ easier if you shut the fuck up.”
“I didn’t say anything to you, McCurry,” Pettis fires back.
“See, that’s the thing,” Cord says, standing tall over Pettis. “It doesn’t matter if you speak to me. Just hearing your voice is enough to make me want to break you in half. So until Ty figures out how to get you off this crew, let’s operate under the understanding that I have no problem busting you in the face. Again. And you won’t do shit back.”
Pettis straightens his shoulders, but wobbles. “What the fuck did I do to you?”