Page 1 of Trig
1
ELLIE
I thought dying would be betterthan marrying Conrad Trout, but I might’ve been wrong. I’d wanted to escape his evil clutches and the plans he had for me–I made him sound like a comic book villain–and those of my father at the same time. I’d been naive and stupid about so many things lately, including the intensity of the storm and the closeness of the light I’d seen from my broken down car. Also, my ability to stay warm.
There was a very good chance I wasn’t going to survive the night. Hell, the next hour. I couldn’t feel my toes. Or my fingers. Or my cheeks.
The snow had picked up to the point where I could no longer see the light from the house I’d been walking toward. I was unprepared. I hadn’t thought when I drove off in the maid’s car that the falling snow would turn into the storm of the season.
Turning around, I couldn’t see the car. Shit. I hadn’t had a choice but to get out and try for the house and the safety it offered. No traffic had come by in the hour after the car died. With no gas, there was no heat. I’d freeze if I stayed inside itovernight. Dry, but still dead. The place I saw was real shelter. I would be warm and safe until it let up. So I climbed out and started walking. I’d been out in it for minutes, probably, although it felt like hours. There was at least a foot of snow on the ground now, accumulating too quickly. The night was dark, the blizzard so heavy I felt like I’d been put into a shaken snowglobe. Or were those shivers wracking me?
With my arms crossed over my chest, I tipped my head down, the snow seeping down the back of my neck. With a glance over my shoulder, I knew I couldn’t turn back. My footsteps to follow were quickly disappearing and if I got back in the car, I’d be wet and freezing and still stuck. I swiped snow from my face. I had to trudge on. Hope for a miracle. Because I really didn’t want to die. I just didn’t want to be Mrs. Conrad Trout.
2
TRIG
“Lookslike this is gonna be a big one,” I said, glancing through the windshield at all the snow. Based on how fast it was falling–and sticking–the weatherman might’ve underestimated this spring storm.
“Sure does,” my friend Beau replied.
While I still wore my cowboy hat, he’d abandoned his for a thick wool beanie. With all the snow on the road, he kept the pace of his pickup at a slow, consistent speed and didn’t plan to brake, only let off the gas and coast. While we rode on a bull’s back for a living, it didn’t mean we were stupid. The last thing we needed to do was to get stuck in one of the massive snow berms. Not that any one of my brothers couldn’t be called out for a winch.
We were on a road that fronted the east side of my family ranch and there were no other cars. Just us, the road, and a shit ton of snow.
“Good thing I’m heading south.” He ran a hand over his bristly jaw. “I should be able to get ahead of it once I get to the highway.”
Beau was driving through on his way to Bozeman. Since the small town I lived in, Devil’s Ditch, was on the way–if thirty miles off the highway counted–he’d picked me up to grab dinner at the Sip N’ Serv, the local diner.
Listening to the weather reports coming from the radio, it didn’t sound like it was gonna be lettin’ up anytime soon. Not that it mattered. Mother Nature did her thing and we went along with it. April in Montana wasn’t for the weak–warm one day, three feet of snow the next.
The snow had started when we got into Devil’s Ditch to eat, but it had picked up heavily on the way home.
Beau tipped his chin to look out into the darkness. There was nothing to see but falling snow in the headlights. The land was flat, the roads straight.
“You sure you don’t want to spend the night?” I asked.
“Nah, I’ll be fine. You heard the reports, this storm’s caught on the mountains, so south of here’s gonna be nothing but flurries. I can–shit!” he yelled. While he didn’t slam on the brakes, the truck fishtailed before coming to a sliding stop.
There, blocking the right side of the road was a car. It was white and had a few inches of snow on it. It had been impossible to see until we were almost on top of it.
I braced my hand on the dash.
“Who the fuck would leave a car there?” Beau asked, his voice angry.
“No one on purpose,” I replied. “Let’s go see what’s up.”
Beau put the pickup in park, but kept it running before climbing out.
The air was brittle, the wind making it fucking freezing. I squinted into the snow, only the truck’s headlights lighting our way.
As I trudged to the car, I pulled my cowboy hat down lower, the wide brim shielding my face and neck.
I noticed the tire tracks behind it were mostly filled in, meaning it’d been there for a bit. Same went for the pile coating on the windows.
Wearing my leather work gloves, I swiped my hand over the driver’s window, then pulled on the handle. It opened. Beau was beside me, staring into the empty interior.
I glanced around, but only saw white.
