Part 7: Any Old Time, You Keep Me Waitin'

That night at the Red Pony was going smoothly in Echo's eyes. Her presence was known, but she stayed on her bar stool at the end of the bar while everyone else talked, laughed, and danced. No one pressured her into joining in on the party, her just being there made them happy enough. Which made her happy, cause as much as she liked everyone, she still wasn't sure how close she wanted to get to them.

"Mind if I sit here?"

Echo looked up from her glass of tequila to see Mathias standing there in another flannel and jeans.

"Nope, I was just leaving anyway." Echo threw back the rest of the tequila and stood up, tossing money onto the bar and grabbing her coat.

"What is your problem with me?" Mathias asked, stepping in front of her.

"Excuse me," she said as she walked around him anyway and headed out of the bar.

At first, Mathias just stood there, but then Henry cleared his throat beside of him. When Mathias looked at him, Henry just nodded his head towards the door. Mathias assumed encouraging him to follow, so he did.

Echo was almost to her truck when she heard him yell for her, "Deputy Aven!" She just kept walking and yanked the door open on her truck, and before she could jump in the door slammed shut. "Why are you avoiding me?" Mathias asked as he then stepped in between her and her truck.

"Why are you following me around? Do you have a problem? Are you a stalker? Unless I am under arrest, leave me alone Officer." she said as she tried to push past him to open her door.

Mathias stepped in front of her again, "No, you're avoiding me and I want to know why."

"Because you're a giant pain in my ass."

"Oh bullshit, there is something between us and you know it. That's why you saved me, why you told me your story, everything. Just stop lying."

"Get out of my way, Officer." Echo said and this time pushed him to try and get him out of the way of her truck.

However, Mathias caught her hands and pushed her up against the truck. "Stop and just talk to me!" he said as he had her pinned to the side.

It seemed like at the exact same time Echo and Mathias both realized how close they were. Echo could smell the sun in his hair, on his skin, she could feel the heat radiate off his body. When she slowly looked up into eyes, she noticed that she was holding her breath, and so was he. It was like time stopped and the only noise she could hear was her heartbeat in her ears.

Slowly Mathias leaned town, Echo felt like her whole body was going to explode. Right as his lips got close enough to hers she could almost feel them, a car came into the parking lot and the headlights flashed over them. When it did, Mathias released the hold he had on her to turn and look at it. She took that as her opportunity and jumped in her truck and fled from the parking lot.

Mathias watched her go, his hands shaking by his side. Once he could no longer see her tail lights, he turned and kicked the dirt up and ran his hands through his hair, cussing himself. What was he doing?

The next day at the office Echo was browsing around on her computer, looking at recipes and how to get knots out of horses tails easily. Ferg and Vic were both so hungover they just sat quietly at their desks sharing pots of coffee with each other. It was a slow day, only one call so far about a neighbor's cat that kept using the bathroom in their yard. Luckily Ruby handled that call and told them to get over it. They were calling for a really heavy snow any time now, Echo kept looking out the window excited, but so far nothing. It would be the first snow she would get to see since she had been home, and she always loved the snow.

The phone started ringing, Vic and Ferg groaned as Ruby answered it. Walt appeared out of his office for the first time the whole day, Echo had started to think he wasn't even there. "We have a single vehicle accident, who wants it?"

Vic and Ferg got so quiet that you could've heard a pin drop, so Echo spoke up. "I'll go."

Walt shook his head at the other two and then turned to her. "It's at the bottom of the mountain, be careful, be quick. You don't want to get stuck in the snow out there."

Echo shook her head as she jumped up and grabbed her jacket and headed for the door.

When she arrived where Walt said the crash was supposed to be, she didn't see anything. No tire marks or broken glass. She decided to drive a little further up the mountain to see if maybe they had just given him the wrong place. The further up the mountain she went, she still didn't see anything, but then finally snow flakes started coming down. Echo did a little squeal of excitement and decided to go up just a little further and enjoy the snow.

Finally she comes to a pull off on the side of the road, she pulled in and turned her truck around to start going back down the mountain. She threw the truck in park and jumped out, the crisp cold air hitting her face took her breath. Turning her head up to the sky she let the snowflakes land on her face, and stuck her tongue out as well. She started laughing and gave one good spin before she could feel the hair on the back of her neck rise. Something wasn't right, someone was watching her. She immediately turned and looked around, but wasn't seeing anything. The snow was coming down hard and heavy at that point, which was making it hard to see too far. Deciding that she needed to just get in her truck and leave, she looked around one last time and then turned towards the truck.

Everything at that point happened so fast it was a blur. She felt something slam into her hard from the side, knocking her down into the snow. She threw her hands up to fight back to find this mountain of a man on top of her. "Thanks for the ride, bitch."

He pulled his arm back to hit her, but she managed to throw her arm up and stop it. Bringing her other elbow up, she hit him as hard as she could in the side of his head. It knocked him off her, so she rolled onto her belly to push herself up off the ground, the snow biting into her hands. As she got to her feet and tried to get to the truck and her gun, he grabbed her by her hair and jerked her back. She threw her other elbow around hoping to connect to him again, but he caught it this time and turned her towards him and punched her in the face. The blow stunned her and she stumbled back away from him, towards the edge of the road that was a drop off down a sharp cliff and into the river that followed along the mountain. Managing to catch herself, she lunged back at her attacker taking him to the ground. She wrapped her arms around his neck, hoping to put him to sleep, but it just made him madder. He threw himself onto his back, slamming her into the ground, but she refused to let go of him.

They rolled around like that for what felt like forever, but it had only been a few minutes, and then she was free falling. That was the last thing she remembered before everything went black.