Chill Factor Read Online Free Page A

and then supporting him
until he said, "Thanks. I think I'm all right."
    He reached beneath his coat, and when he withdrew his hand, he
was
holding a cell phone, which evidently had been clipped to his belt. He
looked down at it and frowned. She read the curse word on his lips. He
wasn't getting service either. He motioned toward the wrecked car. "Is
there anything in your car we should take back to your cabin?"
    Lilly looked at him with surprise. "You know about my cabin?"

    Scott Hamer clenched his teeth against the strain.
    "Almost there, son. Come on. You can do it. One more."
    Scott's arms trembled with the effort. Veins bulged to a
grotesque
extent. Sweat rolled off him and dripped from the weight bench onto the
gym mat, making small splats against the rubber.
    "I can't do one more," he groaned.
    "Yes you can. Give me a hundred and ten percent."
    Wes Hamer's voice echoed in the high school gymnasium. Except
for
them, the building was deserted. Everyone else had been allowed to go
home more than an hour ago. Scott was required to stay, long after
classes were dismissed, long after all the other athletes had gone
through their after-school workouts as setout
by
their coach, Scott's father, Wes.
    "I want to see maximum effort."
    It felt to Scott like his blood vessels were on the verge of
bursting. He blinked sweat from his eyes and expelled several puffs of
breath through his mouth, spraying spittle. Tremors of overexertion
seized his biceps and triceps. His chest seemed about to explode.
    But his dad wasn't going to let him stop until he had pressed
four
hundred twenty-five pounds, more than double Scott's body weight. Five
reps had been the goal set for him today. His dad was big on setting
goals. He was even bigger on achieving them.
    "Stop screwing around, Scott," Wes said impatiently.
    "I'm not."
    "Breathe. Send the oxygen into those muscles. You can do this."
    Scott inhaled deeply, then expelled the air in short pants,
demanding the impossible of his arm and chest muscles.
    "That's it!" his dad said. "You raised it another inch. Maybe
two."
    God, please let it be two.
    "Give me one more effort. One more push, Scott."
    Involuntarily, a low growl issued out of
his throat as he
channeled all his strength into his quivering arms. But he got the
weight bar up another inch, enough to lock his elbows for a millisecond
before his dad reached over and guided it into the brackets.
    Scott's arms dropped lifelessly to his sides. His shoulders
slumped
into the bench. His chest heaved in an attempt to regain his breath.
His entire body trembled with fatigue.
    "Good job. Tomorrow we'll try for six." Wes passed him a towel
before he turned away and moved toward his office, where the telephone
had begun to ring. "You shower. I'll get this, then start locking up."
    Scott heard his father answer the phone with a brusque
"Hamer," then
ask, "What do you want, Dora?" in the deprecating tone he always used
with Scott's mother.
    Scott sat up and ran the towel over his face and head. He was
whipped, absolutely spent. He dreaded even the walk to the locker room.
Only the promise of a hot shower got him off the bench.
    "That was your mother," Wes called to him through the open
door of
his office.
    It was a messy space that only the brave dared enter. On the
desk
were stacks of paperwork which Wes considered a waste of time and
therefore avoided doing for as long as possible. The walls were covered
with season schedules for numerous sport teams. A two-month calendar
was filled with his handwritten hieroglyphics, which only he could read.
    Also taped to the wall was a topographical map of Cleary and
the
surrounding area. His favorite hunting and fishing spots had been
highlighted with a red marker. In framed photos of the last three
years' football teams, Head Coach Wes Hamer stood proudly in the center
of the front row.
    "She said it's beginning to sleet," he told Scott. "Get a move
on."
    The pungent odor of the high school locker room was