Right before her world exploded.
Disoriented, heart pounding so hard it felt like it would crack a rib, she rocked back and forth while trying to get her bearings. A sharp pain in her left arm jerked her forcefully back to the present.
Grabbing it with her opposite hand, she held the arm in place and looked around.
The cabin, she thought as she rubbed her aching muscle. You’re at the cabin in Georgia.
The realization should have brought relief, but this reaction, once tripped, tended to roll through her and over her like an incoming wave. When the shaking began, she knew her only option was to ride it out until the adrenaline surge crashed.
The room went bright with that eerie, indescribable light, and she jumped when the thunder came on its heels.
Moments later, a sharp crack suggested that something nearby had been hit.
Breathe, she reminded herself, because she knew from long experience that holding her breath only made it worse.
But she was too far into fight or flight for her body to simply listen to her mind. Lying down on her back, Adeline placed one hand on her stomach and the other on her chest, forcing herself to unclench her fists. Images tried to fill her mind; images so long buried that to unearth them would tear her apart.
Mama.
Ruthlessly banishing the child she’d once been, she clawed her way back into the moment.
Breathe.
Conjuring the technique she’d learned was most effective at short-circuiting an anxiety attack, she drew in air so that her belly pressed against her hand, releasing it in as slow, steady a stream as she could manage. In. She fought to empty her mind. Out.
It wasn’t as quick of a process as she might have liked, but eventually her muscles began to relax.
After maintaining the pattern through several more breath cycles, just to be safe, she allowed her arms and legs to fall to the sides in a sort of Shavasana.
Corpse pose. How appropriate, because she felt mostly dead.
Light flashed outside the window, and Adeline jerked when the thunder came right at its heels, but she no longer felt panicked. Indeed, she’d had to train herself over the course of the past twenty-two years to face this situation. Thunderstorms happened, especially in Florida.
She guessed she just hadn’t been expecting one in the North Georgia Mountains in November.
Normally, she tracked the weather on an app, so that she was prepared for whatever came her way. She obviously couldn’t control the weather, but she could manage her reaction to it, and forewarned was forearmed. But the cell phone service here was sketchy at best. She’d also been sleeping on her right side, which meant her good ear was buried in the pillow. Otherwise, she probably would have heard the storm approaching before it was directly over the cabin.
Transitional seasons like spring and fall contain frequent low-pressure systems. Cold fronts crash into warm, and the resulting unstable air triggers thunderstorms.
Adeline could practically hear her dad’s voice. His method of helping her to overcome her crippling fear was – unsurprisingly – to immerse her in the science of weather. When you have data and verifiable facts and atmospheric physics filling your mind, it leaves little room for unfettered neurosis.
Of course, it hadn’t exactly worked at the time. When you were seven, eight years old, monsters – including those that took the form of deadly weather events – were still real. And that was how they’d both come to meet Sally. To her father’s dismay, and eventual gratitude, Adeline responded better to art therapy than cold, hard facts.
Homesickness filled her, pushing tears to leak from the corners of her eyes. She missed her stepmom, and God, God how she missed her father. At times they’d been like oil and water, but there’d never been a day when she hadn’t known she was loved. And part of her wondered if she’d ever experience that sort of unconditional affection again.
But rather than lie in bed, feeling sorry for herself, she tossed off the heavy quilt. The grey morning air held a chill, but she’d been warm the past several nights as she’d fallen asleep. She really did owe Sutton McCloud another, less awkward thank you.
Shoving her feet into the slippers she’d left by the bed, Adeline stepped to the window and opened the blinds. The back of the cabin faced the lake, and even though a number of trees obstructed the view, she could see that the water mirrored the leaden sky, its surface broken by a series of whitecaps. Colorful leaves, sacrifices to an angry wind, were ripped from twisting limbs to scatter like confetti. Rain beat against the glass, and Adeline marveled again that she hadn’t heard it battering the metal roof.
Apparently, she’d been sleeping more soundly than she had in quite some time.
Lightning flashed again, and she automatically counted the seconds until she heard the responding thunder. Almost five. The storm was already moving away. As difficult as it was to believe, she must have slept through the worst of it.
Restless now, Adeline stepped back from the window. Grabbing her phone from the nightstand, she realized that it was later than she’d thought – close to nine a.m. The dim light had tricked her into sleeping in.
Not like you have anywhere to be.
And she was still getting used to that. She’d given up her full-time job at a graphic design firm a matter of weeks ago, relying on freelance work until she could figure out whether she wanted to go back to Florida, or start fresh someplace else.
New beginnings, all the way around.
And while she knew she needed to chart a different course or risk getting mired in unhappiness, there was no denying that change was scary. Especially when you weren’t exactly sure what direction you were taking.
The ringing sound made her jump, and stare at her darkened phone screen in confusion. And then she realized that it wasn’t her cell she’d heard.
Frowning, she went to the bedroom doorway and looked around, finally spotting the phone on the table beside the sofa. Amazing. She hadn’t even noticed it until now. Outside of office environments, she didn’t think she’d seen a landline in years.
Snatching it from the receiver, she held it up to her right ear. “Hello?”
“Do you have electricity?”
What? “Who wants to know?”
Her question was met with a deep chuckle. “Sorry about that. I guess I should have introduced myself, huh? This is Keith, with Caldwell Property Management. The caretaker?”
“Oh. Right. I was in the shower when you stopped by with the wood the other day.”
“I figured it was something like that when you didn’t answer the door. Anyway, we have a tree down in the area that knocked out some power lines, but I wasn’t sure if the fish camp was affected.”
Since Adeline was standing next to the side table, she reached over to switch on the lamp.
“Seems fine,” she said, when mellow light brightened the gloom.
“Okay great. There can be kind of a lag in response time out that way, so I didn’t want you to be stuck without service and scared or anything.”
Adeline frowned. As if she needed the reminder that she was in the boonies. “Thank you. I appreciate you looking out for me.”
“Is there anything else you need?”
“Not that I can think of at the moment.”
“Well, you have my number if you change your mind. You have a nice day, Adeline.”
She paused. “Thank you. Keith. You do the same.”
When the dial tone sounded in her ear, Adeline glanced at the phone before placing it back on the receiver. It wasn’t weird that he knew her name. She was sure that Bristol had mentioned his, but it had gone in one ear and out the other. Even before her dad died, she’d been terrible with names, but after? The grief counselor termed it “widow’s fog,” although it applied to more than just spouses. And that – the inability to focus – was one of the reasons she’d quit her job and pulled up stakes. Not only wasn’t she delivering her best effort professionally, but it was too easy, i
n a familiar environment, to coast along on autopilot. By completely changing her life, Adeline had no choice but to pay attention.
Thunder rumbled, and she realized that she hadn’t noticed the flash which preceded it. The system must be moving quickly.
Unsettled – probably due to the unexpected storm – she walked to one of the front windows and opened the blinds. The thunder and lightning may have eased off, but the rain was still falling in sheets. A good morning for heating one of Sally’s paleo breakfast muffins that were stored in the freezer, and sitting by the fire with a book.
A flicker caught her eye, and Adeline glanced that direction, the thought of fire so fresh in her mind that for a moment she thought she’d imagined it. But then she recalled the particularly loud crack she’d heard when the storm was at its worst.
Had lightning hit one of the other cabins?
Her heart began to pound again, but then she realized that it was the rain causing the visual distortion. The flicker she’d noticed was just a lamp on in the cabin next door.
Had that been there before? She didn’t remember seeing it, but then she’d been closing the blinds each night just before it got dark. Her bravado hadn’t quite reached the point of leaving herself exposed to… whatever might be passing through the woods.
The three cabins were positioned in a semi-circle, with this one in the middle and closest to the lake. In the center was the firepit, surrounded by an assortment of Adirondack chairs, with parking spaces off to the sides. When looking out the front window, Adeline’s view encompassed the common area, and if she turned her head, parts of the other cabins.
It was reasonable to assume she simply hadn’t noticed the light before. Or it could be one of those security lamps that was programmed to come on at certain times, or in low light conditions. She imagined, that if one of the other cabins were going to be rented, someone – Keith, for example – would have told her. And to that end, the only car in the parking area was hers.
Satisfied that she’d rationalized the mystery, Adeline headed toward the stove, only to realize that she needed to bring in more wood.
She sighed, since this promised to be a process. She’d hoped her arm would be more functional after a few days of taking it easy, but while the very worst of the pain had subsided, it still protested any sudden or strenuous motion. At least there was a carrier. She’d have to transport the logs in small loads that she could carry one-handed.
Heading back toward the bedroom, she went in search of her raincoat. Pulling it on, she found herself thinking of Sutton yet again.
She should definitely call him.
Sometime.
Rain blew onto the porch, but the wood remained dry thanks to a heavy tarp that covered the… whatever you called the metal rack where it was stacked.
Adeline began loading logs onto the canvas tarp before pausing, hunched over. Looking up, she stared at the tarp.
That hadn’t been there yesterday.
Standing, Adeline looked out over the communal space, toward the cabin with the lamp on. The caretaker – Keith – must have come by at some point last evening and covered the wood. He probably checked the weather, and knew a storm was coming.
It was a reasonable assumption.
So, why did she feel sketched out?
“Because you’re all alone in a freaking mountain cabin, with a man you’ve never laid eyes on sneaking around?”
Saying it out loud made her feel ridiculous. The man had covered the firewood he was contractually obligated to bring her, as part of his job. There was nothing sinister about it.
After she finished bringing in the wood, Adeline tossed her raincoat on a nearby chair. She hunkered down in front of the stove, only to realize she’d forgotten the kindling. Cursing, she started to go back out to the porch, but then remembered that Sutton brought all of the kindling he’d split inside.
She stared at the cold ashes of last night’s fire, and weighed her options.
Splitting the wood herself was out, thanks to her bum shoulder. Normally, she’d just go outside and gather up some small sticks and twigs, but even she knew that wet wood wouldn’t ignite.
“You have died of exposure,” she muttered. She never would have lasted on the Oregon Trail.
Shivering, she went to the thermostat and turned it as high as it would go. Waiting for the sound of the fan to come on, she walked to the wall unit and placed her hands in front of the vent before yanking them back.
Damn it. The air coming out not only wasn’t warm, but it felt downright cold.
She could call Keith back, she guessed. Wait for him to come out and make repairs, or maybe ask him to bring her kindling. In the meantime, she could bundle up and spend the rest of the morning in bed.
Adeline started to pick up the phone again, and then sighed. While the thought of staying in bed held considerable appeal, and she had any number of solid excuses for doing so, she recognized that she was backsliding. She hadn’t gone out in days. Yes, the weather was shitty, and she had indeed hurt her arm, but isolating herself in this cabin was little different than isolating herself in her apartment back home. And here, she didn’t even have friends or co-workers or Sally to drag her out of her depression bubble.
The whole point of this trip was to force herself out of it, to engage with life again, and to make her physical and mental health a priority. Sitting in this cabin wasn’t engaging, and it certainly wasn’t healthy. She needed to put on her big girl pants – and her raincoat – and finally visit Clayton. She could admit that she’d been avoiding it, because there, she did have memories. Her grandparents had owned an inn at the edge of town, and she and her parents and younger sister stayed there every year when they came to visit over the holidays. Every year, that is, until her mom and Jacey died. Her grandparents then sold the inn, and moved to Florida to be close to Adeline. Their only surviving granddaughter.
Suck it up, buttercup.
That particular saying was a favorite of her grandpa’s, and the thought of it – and him – made her smile. There were good memories in that town. Memories that it was foolish to try to avoid. Not to mention that she had some work to do for one of her freelance clients, and the internet here sucked. She’d be able to get much more accomplished much more quickly if she took her grandpa’s advice.
Feeling better – or more proactive, at least – Adeline climbed to her feet.
By the time she was dressed and headed out the door, the last of the storm had passed.
CHAPTER SIX
“MY, what a big ass you have, Grandma.”
Perched on a ladder, paint roller in hand, Sutton turned to look down at his baby sister. Although baby wasn’t exactly an apt description. At just a couple of inches shy of six feet, her dark blonde hair hanging in two thick braids over her rugged flannel and jeans, Willow was closer to a female Paul Bunyon.
“I realize this is a veterinary office, but I’m afraid we don’t allow jackals in here.”
“Salty,” Willow said, and then gestured toward the front desk. “Yet you apparently allow hyenas.”
Colonel Mustard, who’d been sleeping on the upper counter, twitched his tail.
“I’m going to tell Mom you said that.”
“She knows her demon cat and I don’t get along.” Snatching the apple he’d left sitting beside his travel mug, Willow took a healthy bite.
“That was my mid-morning snack,” he pointed out.
“Was being the key component of that sentence. I didn’t have time for breakfast.” She flashed a beguiling smile. “You wouldn’t want your favorite sister to starve, now would you?”
“I have a backup sibling.”
She pointed at him with the apple. “You were supposed to acknowledge that I’m your only sister.”
“Thank God.” He ducked when she lifted her arm to chuck the apple at him.
“Made you look.”
Sutton rolled his eyes. “To what do I owe the honor of my only sister dropping in a
nd stealing my food on this…” he paused while thunder rumbled the glass in the front windows “lovely autumn morning?”
“Maybe I missed you over the past several years, and wish to bask in your presence.”
“As a veterinary professional who has worked with large bovine populations, I’m well-acquainted with the smell of bullshit.”
Willow frowned, and then tossed the apple core into the trash can. “I need you to lead a hike for me this weekend.”
“No.” Sutton turned back to the wall he was painting.
“Sutton, please.”
“Get someone else.”
“The guide who was supposed to do it had a death in the family, and it’s too short notice to get someone else.”
“Why can’t you do it?”
“Because I have a recertification course for my wilderness first responder certificate. And,” she added before he could voice another objection “this is the last session they offer until after the holidays. If I miss it, I’ll be wandering around, basically lying to people who think my credentials are current. What if I lose someone, Sutton, because I’ve forgotten critical skills for handling backcountry emergencies? You wouldn’t want that weight on your shoulders, would you?”
“That pitch would be more effective if you weren’t the most competent outdoorsperson I know.”
Willow sighed, and dropped into one of the newly assembled swivel chairs. “Fine. I already paid, and the course is non-refundable. I don’t feel like losing three hundred and fifty bucks.”
“See?” He gestured with the roller. “You could have saved us both the headache and told the truth to begin with.”
“You’re usually a sucker for emotional appeals.”
“Sure, from someone who actually has emotions.”
“Hardee har har.”
Sutton grinned, and then rested the roller in the paint tray attached to the ladder. “Hypothetically speaking, if I were to agree, where would this hike take place?”
“Rabun Bald. And stop making that face. The hike to the summit is barely three miles.”
“Three miles straight up.”
Slow Burn (Rabun County Book 1) Page 8