Page 57 of Wood Riddance
“You said you checked.”
“I did. I’ve checked every day this week, including this morning, and everything looked good.”
Adele planted her hands on her hips and shot me her signature glare. “What the hell?”
“I’m not Thor. I just look like him. I can’t control the weather, no matter what you might think.”
Her glare only deepened into a scowl. She did not enjoy my joke. “You wish you looked like Thor. You’re like Thor’s dollar store second cousin. The one everyone dreads having to invite to Thanksgiving.”
“Doesn’t matter.” I shrugged, zooming in on the doppler radar for a better look. “What matters is that a big storm is coming.”
“Do not tell me we’re gonna fly that tin can in a lightning storm.”
I shook my head, my heart picking up speed only a fraction. “I could do it, but I’d rather not. Looks like it’ll last a few hours. We can wait it out.”
She eyed me from head to toe, that mouth still turned down, until an earsplitting crack made both of us jump. Not fifty yards from where we stood, a tree split, and branches and splinters were falling to the ground.
“Shit.” Adele shuffled back until she was sheltered by the roof of the building. “Lightning.”
Still a bit shaken, I assessed her. Her eyes were wide, and her skin had gone ghostly. Dammit, she was scared.
“We’ll be okay. We’ve got plenty of shelter.”
“I’m not afraid of lightning, dumbass,” she said, closing her eyes like she truly couldn’t handle my idiocy. “I’m afraid of being stuck in the woods with your useless ass.”
“C’mon. Let’s grab supplies from the plane,” I said, turning on my heel and taking off toward the makeshift runway where I had landed. She followed, keeping pace as I jogged.
I climbed onto the wing to access the rear of the fuselage and threw down a large duffel and a heavy waterproof trunk.
When I hopped back down, she was already holding the duffel, so I grabbed the trunk and nodded toward the building, signaling that I’d follow her lead.
Once we crossed the threshold, I dropped the trunk and grasped the bottom edge of the industrial garage door. It resisted at first, but I gave it a strong tug, using all my weight, and finally, it budged, letting out a screech on its way down.
She flicked on her headlamp as I unzipped the duffel and pulled out a pink lantern that belonged to Merry.
“What is this stuff?” Adele asked from behind me.
“All bush pilots are legally required to carry certain survival supplies,” I explained, peering over my shoulder at her. “This trunk is equipped with a medic kit, a raft, an axe, some MREs, a water purifier, and a sleeping bag.” I punched in the code to unlock it and threw open the lid. “The duffel has snacks, batteries, more flashlights and a blanket.”
I flipped on my headlamp and sifted through the contents of the duffel next. Once I’d found a granola bar for each of us, I pulled an old wooden bench over to sit on.
She took the granola bar I held out to her and studied the wrapper like it held the secrets to the universe.
“Why are you so relaxed?” Her hair was bunched up around the strap of her headlamp. It was adorable. “We’re stranded in the woods in the middle of a fucking lightning storm. A tree could fall and crush us.”
I took a bite of my granola bar and studied her for a long moment before responding. “We’re in a building.”
“An old, shitty building with a metal roof. There are probably more mice in residence here than there are people in the state of Maine.”
I couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped. “Didn’t figure you for the high-maintenance type.”
Beside me, her eyes narrowed. God, I loved to rile her up. “I’m not high maintenance. I’m concerned. You flew us to the middle of nowhere in the middle of a biblical fucking storm. Why wouldn’t I be a little worried?”
I leaned forward, resting my forearms on my thighs, and dropped my head between my shoulders. Damn, all of a sudden, I was tired. It had already been a long day, and now I had to contend with two equally terrifying adversaries: Mother Nature and Adele Gagnon. Given the choice, I’d take my chances with the former, but I had no such luck today.
“I’m not happy about this either. Do you think I want to be here? Hell no. You act like I planned this.”
“You said you were tracking the weather,” she snapped.
