That was life in a small town, she guessed, and if she was going to stay here any length of time, she’d better get used to being noticed.
While stowing her laptop bag on the passenger seat, her purse fell open, keys spilling onto the pavement. Sighing because she practically had to crawl behind the tire to retrieve them, she realized that she was more worked up than she thought. When her emotions were high, she always turned clumsy.
Adeline climbed into the SUV and backed out of the space, heading down the hill toward the grocery store. She thanked God that the roads weren’t icy yet, because otherwise, given the number of hills and winding roads between here and Lakemont, she would’ve had to stay in Clayton for the night.
If she could find an available vacancy, that is. The inn that was the topic of hushed conversation all afternoon at Clancy’s only had a handful of rooms. And the motel out on the highway basically screamed Norman Bates. Hopefully, whoever bought her grandparents’ inn would use at least part of the building for guest accommodations of some sort. If Beckett Caldwell succeeded in making Clayton the tourist mecca he thought it should be, they’d need more places to house them.
Adeline decided that she’d misjudged him. She’d been put off the first time she met him by… well, by his almost criminal good looks, if she were honest. People that pretty were intimidating to the common folk, no matter what their gender. And then there was his used car salesman demeanor. She didn’t care how expensive the property, or the vision, was, there was still that kneejerk resentment toward someone trying to sell you something. But while he was certainly full of himself, he’d been unquestionably thoughtful in saving the growth chart from her grandparents’ inn. For that alone, she would be forever grateful.
The store parking lot was packed, as she guessed everyone else had the same idea. It reminded her of hurricane season back in Florida, and a wave of homesickness hit her. She’d have to call Sally when she got back to the cabin, and give her updates on the weather. Like Adeline, Sally was a south Florida native, and had only seen snow once before in her life. She’d be tickled pink to know that there was a chance, however small, that Adeline might experience some. Even a few flurries would delight her.
She had to drive around to the far side of the building, where the pavement was less well-maintained, and Adeline winced as she hit a pothole while pulling into a spot. When she opened the car door, a gust of wind blew inside, pelting her with cold drizzle. Reconsidering her enthusiasm for the coming storm, Adeline grabbed her reusable bags and hurried into the store. She wanted to get what she needed and get home as quickly as possible. Watching winter weather through the window of your toasty warm cabin was infinitely preferable to being out in it.
Recalling that Keith had called her previously about the electricity going out, Adeline went hard on the non-perishables in case she wasn’t as lucky this time. Sleet could take out power lines, couldn’t it? Or was that freezing rain? Was there even a difference?
Feeling woefully unprepared all of a sudden, Adeline stared at the items in her cart and was tempted to say screw it. She could check into the Norman Bates. It wasn’t her first choice of accommodation, but at least she wouldn’t be alone if the shit – or ice, in this case – hit the fan.
But damn it, she could do this. She knew how to build a fire, and Sutton had even shown her the secret regarding the stove’s cooktop. If she needed to, say, boil water, she could. And maybe rip her petticoat into bandages while she was at it.
Amused by her own absurdity, Adeline decided that she was blowing this way out of proportion. The storm wasn’t predicted to be that bad. And she wasn’t a helpless idiot.
After paying for her purchases, Adeline dashed back outside, sucking in a breath when the wind hit her. She’d been inside maybe twenty minutes – well, probably thirty, given how crowded it was – but she could swear the temperature had dropped. The low was dipping into the upper twenties overnight, which sounded positively arctic.
Stowing the groceries with her laptop, she turned on the car and cranked the heat, holding her hands in front of the vent. She was going to have to ask Sally to knit her some gloves to go with her hat.
Because she’d parked on the far side of the building, the back exit was closer. While at the stop sign waiting to pull out, she noticed an odd, acrid, smoky smell, but couldn’t determine the source of it.
Maybe something from outside. There was a large truck parked at the loading dock, engine running, exhaust filling the air. Adeline frowned at it, and pushed the button to change the airflow to recirculating. The odor began to fade.
The rear exit dumped onto an access road that ran behind the building, and Adeline followed it onto a secondary street that would take her back to the highway. The rain was beginning to come down harder, and combined with the heavy cloud clover made visibility less than optimal. Her car seemed to struggle a little on the hill, and she hoped the pavement wasn’t already getting icy. Coming around a curve, she noted that the ditch on the right side was clogged by a toppled tree, sending a stream of water cascading across the road. Combined with the grade, it made her nervous, so Adeline slowed to a crawl. She didn’t want to lose control.
But then her dashboard lit up, several symbols flashing in warning before her engine just… died.
In shock, Adeline instinctively hit the brakes. The pedal depressed all the way to the floor, but the car didn’t stop, and the steering wheel had become a lead weight, resisting her attempts to turn it. Panicked, she tried to remember the steps one was supposed to take in such a situation, but her mind went blank.
When she saw the headlights coming around the curve from the opposite direction, Adeline screamed.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“WHAT kind of pie do you want to get?”
When he didn’t get a response, Ethan looked down to see his ten-year-old daughter scuffing her shoe on the vinyl floor.
“Harper?”
“I don’t care.”
“What do you mean you don’t care. There’s cherry, chocolate, peach, banana cream, and pumpkin to choose from. This is a big decision.”
She flicked a glance at the pies in question. “Get whatever you want. I’m not going to eat any.”
Nonplussed, he frowned at his offspring. “Why not?”
She shrugged, and went back to scuffing her shoe, making a squeaking sound designed to irritate.
“Harper. Harper, cut that out and look at me. Now,” he added, when it seemed like she was going to ignore him.
The very picture of long-suffering, she heaved a sigh. But she did raise her head.
Dark hair framed bright blue eyes in a face that was just starting to lose its’ little girl roundness, showing a hint of the young woman she would become. It hit him the way it always did when he realized she was growing up, but because he was trying to get to the bottom of her bad attitude, he ignored the sentiment that wanted to turn him to mush.
“Do you not feel well?”
“I feel fine. Can we go before it starts snowing? Aunt Willow said she’d take me sledding tomorrow if we get stuck at her house.”
“We aren’t getting snowed in, Harper.”
“You don’t know that.”
Yeah, he kind of did, but it wasn’t worth arguing over at the moment. He turned his attention back to the grocery store’s pie offerings, snagging one from the top.
“You’re getting peach?”
He arched a brow at his daughter. “Should I get something else?”
She shrugged. “The banana cream one looks better. But you should get what you want.”
“Because you’re not eating any.”
Her jaw set in a stubborn line. “No.”
Ethan hesitated. This was one of those times when he sensed there was more at issue than the matter at hand, but he wasn’t emotionally intelligent enough, as Caroline liked to tell him, to figure it out.
Because he wasn’t a damn mind reader.
“How about we get both?�
�
Her eyes lit up, but then she shook her head. “That’s too much pie for four people.”
Four, because Harper’s mother wasn’t coming. She had a headache.
She’d had a lot of headaches lately.
“I thought you weren’t having any?”
“I’m not.”
“Then it’ll only be three people eating pie.”
“Oh. Right.” She frowned at the second bakery box. “Definitely too much pie.”
“I’ll just get this one, I guess.” He replaced the peach with a banana cream. “Because you’re right. It does look better.”
Harper nodded. “Good decision.”
They started toward the checkout lanes, which were all filled due to everyone panicking over the incoming storm. He’d lived in North Georgia his whole life, as had most of the people standing in line. They got snow or sleet or ice at least a few times every year, but you’d think everyone hailed from Guam or something based on how they were acting. It was some sort of weird southern group psychosis triggered by the words winter weather advisory.
He’d gone home after wrapping up the workday in order to change clothes and pick up Harper, but despite his lack of uniform, several people still recognized him. One person asked about salting the roads, and another about the unfortunate accident at the Black Walnut Inn.
The first question he answered, because it was reasonable and expected. The second, he declined to discuss for both professional and personal reasons. He tried not to talk about the less pleasant aspects of his job in front of Harper.
However, she wasn’t dumb.
“What happened at the hotel?” she asked, when they were on their way out to the car with their purchases. “Did somebody get hurt?”
“Yeah,” he said, because he also tried not to lie to her. “A woman died.”
“Did she choke to death?”
He shot her a look as he unlocked his SUV with the remote. “No. Why would you think that?”
She shrugged, and huddled deeper inside the hood of her raincoat.
Ethan opened her door, waited for her to climb inside, and then handed her the boxed pie. She stared at it glumly.
Frowning, he came around to the driver’s side and climbed in, placing the other bags on the backseat. He looked at Harper.
“You want to tell me what’s up?”
Even with her hood up, he could see her jaw setting again. It was a mannerism she got from him. “Nothing.”
He debated, but decided not to push. “Okay. Just remember that you can tell me anything. Even if you think it’ll make me mad.”
He turned the key in the ignition.
“What happened to the woman? The one who died?”
“She fell,” Ethan said after he backed out, “over a porch railing.”
“Oh.” Harper was quiet for a moment. “Mom said I shouldn’t be eating so much junk or else I’m going to get fat. Like you’re getting fat.”
Ethan froze, his gaze fixed straight ahead, his hands locked around the steering wheel. It took him a couple of deep breaths, but when he thought he could speak in an even tone, he glanced her way.
“I don’t think that’s something you need to be worrying about. You should eat healthy because you want your body to be healthy and strong, but that doesn’t mean you can’t treat yourself now and again. A slice of that pie there isn’t going to hurt you. Especially after eating at Aunt Willow’s. You know how she likes to serve rabbit food.”
Harper’s smile was tentative. “She does love her vegetables.”
“She sure does.”
Harper looked like she was waiting for him to say something else, probably in regards to Caroline’s dig about his weight. But he wasn’t going to do that. His and Caroline’s issues were between the two of them, and their daughter didn’t deserve to be dragged into the middle.
Willow’s house was on a road that sat behind the grocery store, so Ethan went out the back exit. Through the steady swish of the windshield wipers, he watched the taillights of the car in front of him, debating as to whether he should say anything else. It was difficult enough to know what to say to kids in the best of times, but when you added tension between the parents, it became a minefield. He hated that Harper was aware of that tension, because he’d been trying hard to keep things as normal as possible for her.
Obviously, Caroline didn’t suffer the same compunction.
Resentment bloomed, but he tried not to show it because he was hyperaware that Harper was watching his every move, even though she pretended to be absorbed in the scenery out her window. However, he remembered all too well one period in his parents’ marriage when they hadn’t been getting along, and how vigilant he and Sutton had been in observing every nuance of their interactions. They may not have always understood what everything meant, but they sure as hell knew it didn’t mean anything good for them. It was a tense several months until whatever the problem had been seemed to have worked itself out. Or more specifically, his parents worked it out. He wasn’t entirely sure that he wanted to work things out with Caroline, but he imagined every couple going through a rough patch felt the same way.
In the meantime, he wanted to keep Harper from worrying more than she needed to.
At the stop sign, he turned on his left blinker and fished around for something to say that didn’t involve diets, weight, or dead women. But he had to be crafty, because Harper could smell a smokescreen faster than any ten-year-old had a right to.
He’d just decided upon turning the topic back to the weather when they heard an enormous crash.
“Dad,” Harper said, reaching out to grab his leg. “What was that?”
A car accident, if he had to guess. And right up around the corner. “Hang on honey, okay? Dad has to go look.”
Flipping his lights on but not his siren, he radioed in to let them know he was en route to a likely eleven-eighty-three, details incoming. Harper’s hand stayed on his leg, and he reached down to pat it before they came around the curve.
Sure enough, the vehicle that had been in front of them was in the ditch on the opposite side of the road. And a sedan sat crossways in the middle of it. Seeing that the SUV had significant damage, he went ahead and requested an ambulance and a wrecker.
He looked at Harper. “I want you to stay right here, okay?”
“Are the people okay?”
“That’s what I’m going to go find out. Right here, honey.”
She was so bug-eyed that he didn’t think she would disobey, but he wanted to make sure she understood.
“Harper?”
She pulled her gaze away from the wrecked cars. “Okay.”
Ethan grabbed his high-visibility raincoat from the rear of the SUV.
Shit, he thought, seeing the blocked ditch and the water running across the pavement in a steady stream. Probably hydroplaned.
He went to the driver’s side window of the sedan first. The man sitting there looked shocked, but when he saw Ethan, he was able to manually roll down the window.
“Are you hurt?”
“She crossed the line. Came right at me.”
“We’ll get to that in a minute,” he said, noting the abrasion on his nose. Likely a result of the airbag deploying. The pungent, smoky smell of it hung in the air, and Ethan leaned in to make sure the engine had cut off. When he did, his eyes narrowed. He was pretty sure he smelled alcohol. “Right now, I just want to ascertain the extent of your injuries, if you have any.”
“I…’m fine,” he said, seeming to snap out of his stupor. “Just fine.”
“Put your emergency brake on and take your keys out of the ignition.”
“Why?”
“Because you were just in an accident and your car is disabled and sitting on a hill?”
The man’s hands shook while he followed Ethan’s instructions. Ethan gave him a long look, took a quick scan of the backseat, and the other man swallowed hard.
But the second driver was the priority a
t the moment, and so he slapped a hand on the roof of the car. “You sit tight. The ambulance is on the way, and the paramedics will check you out.”
His gaze darted to the side. “Yessir.”
Ethan frowned, glanced back to where Harper sat in the SUV, watching him through the rain, and then trotted across the road.
The ditch was more of an embankment, and as he came to the top of it, he saw that the woman appeared to be alert. She lifted a hand to acknowledge she’d seen him. There was minimal damage to the driver’s side, although the front end of the SUV was crumpled from where it had smacked into a small tree. Water rushed beneath the wreckage, and Ethan realized that it was more creek than drainage ditch. Careful of his footing on the wet ground, he descended the embankment and approached the driver’s side door.
“Are you okay?”
She hesitated, and then nodded. “I can’t roll down my window,” she called through the glass, her voice shaking. “The engine died.”
Which was a good thing. Most cars featured a switch designed to stop feeding electricity to the fuel pump following a collision in order to prevent fires.
Since her vehicle wasn’t going anywhere without a tow, he didn’t worry about telling her to engage the parking brake, but he did crack the door open to ask her to remove her keys. The seatbelt had locked into place, so she had to undo it to reach them.
“Were you the only person in the vehicle at the time of the collision?” he asked, because even though she appeared to be alone, sometimes people were thrown clear or took off for one reason or another.
She nodded, and then reached up with a shaking hand to touch her face. “I lost my glasses.”
Probably flew off, which was better than being hit by the airbag. He’d seen any number of lacerations from frames being pushed into someone’s face. Ethan was just about to tell her that help was on the way when he considered that thought. “Your airbag didn’t deploy.”
She looked confused, staring at the spot where it normally would have come out. “My engine died,” she repeated.
Slow Burn (Rabun County Book 1) Page 20