He was no longer a cocky teenager with the world at his feet; he was a grown man, a widower with a son, as she’d heard during one of her trips to Wilson Creek. Becoming a father and losing his wife were life-changing events; no way could he be the same person he was when they were in school. She wasn’t, and she hadn’t been through anything as traumatic as losing a spouse. There was nothing traumatic in her life at all. Instead she’d quietly made her way, made a settled life for herself, shed a lot of her insecurities and shyness.
She had butted heads with him for as long as she could remember, and right now … she wasn’t sure why. Was it because she’d always had such a ferocious crush on him, and never expected him to like her in any way, so she’d protected herself by developing a shield of hostility? Teenagers were such tangled pits of angst and emotion, anything was possible. Looking back, she felt slightly bemused by their teenage selves.
If there would ever be any time for putting the past behind them, that time was now. She leaned slightly toward him and said, “Thank you,” her voice raised so he could hear her over the rain and the wind.
“Thank me if those psychos don’t come after us and we get off the mountain before the trees start to fall,” he said without looking at her.
Okay, that sounded a little abrupt, but she did something that, fifteen years ago, she could never have done: she mentally shrugged and let it go. Under the circumstances, he was allowed to feel testy.
They were walking right into the wind now, which gave her some bearings. Lolly glanced up, but not for long; the rain stung her face like icy pellets, the wind stole her breath with its chill. The wind was from the north, so if it was in her face then they were walking north, which meant they were on the long slope before a very sharp curve that would take them southeast.
They weren’t that far from the house at all.
They had some time before the ice that coated everything was so heavy these old trees started to come down … she hoped. How long would the dead trees hold up with this wind and ice? she wondered. Their fragile limbs would come down first. The side of the road was littered with limbs that had fallen in one storm or another and been left to lie, giving her a hint as to the length and breadth of what might come crashing down.
The wind picked up a bit just then and the trees creaked, literally, as if their very fabric was groaning. Lolly shuddered. They had one option, and it wasn’t a good one. Darwin and Niki were behind them, ice-covered limbs hovered above their heads and could come crashing down at any time, and the ground was increasingly slick beneath her feet. There was no place to go except forward, toward the safety and warmth that seemed so very far away.
She slipped, her sneakers giving her no purchase at all. The Vaseline definitely helped, but some moisture had seeped into her shoes and socks and her feet were painfully numb. She’d grown up in Maine; she knew the dangers of frostbite. She knew what the outcome of the night was likely to be, and a sense of fatalism seized her. Better to lose her toes than let herself get caught by Darwin again.
She adjusted the sleeves of the flannel shirt tied over her head, pulling them over her nose and mouth, but the sleeves were wet and icy and she didn’t know if that would do much good. Thank goodness Gabriel was there, steady as a rock, plowing forward with the determination of a pit bull. His grip was solid, a comfort in a decidedly uncomfortable world. He was that kind of man, she supposed, the kind who would go out in an ice storm to make sure a neighbor was all right, a man who would throw himself between danger and a woman even if she was nothing to him, even if she was a girl he’d once known and hadn’t liked.
She hadn’t had a chance to tell him everything that had happened back at the house and after a moment of reflection she decided she wouldn’t. Not only did she not want to talk about Darwin’s attempted rape, she wasn’t sure how Gabriel would react to the news. Would he feel as if he had to turn back? Would he care at all? She suspected he would care, just because of who he was, and she didn’t want to go back to the house. She didn’t want Gabriel going back there either, and for now she was sticking by his side. Her sights were set firmly away from the house and the nightmare there. No matter what the conditions, she was moving forward.
There was silence behind them—at least human silence. Mother Nature was making a racket, with the patter of falling rain, the wind, the ghostly rustling and creaking of the trees. Maybe they’d given up. Maybe they hadn’t given chase at all. Maybe Niki and Darwin were unwilling to leave a nice warm house in this weather, just to chase her and Gabriel.
She glanced up once more, at the tall man towing her along. “So … how’ve you been?” she asked.
Gabriel snorted. “You want to chitchat now?”
“Maybe talking will keep my face from freezing.”
He nodded once. “I’ve been okay. You?”
So much for dragging him into conversation. “Fine.” What else could she say? Still single. Job’s good, if unexciting. Mom and Dad are in good health, but they lost a good bit of their retirement money in the latest financial disaster, so keeping a house they no longer use is ridiculous. I didn’t want to sell it, but I can’t afford to buy it from them, and now I don’t want to. I loved that house, and now I don’t care if I never see it again. The sense of loss was surprisingly sharp; she took it in, accepted that she would never again feel the same about the house, then she resolutely put the house in the past where it belonged and mentally faced forward.
She should have been paying attention to what she was doing, rather than wool-gathering. She slipped again, and once more Gabriel caught her.