by Maren Smith
Crap in a hat with a muffin on top, Ettie groaned inwardly. She glared at Vance and frowned.
Vance looked at her, and then at Brent. “Are you serious?” he asked, as if he had any reason to disapprove of her!
Ettie frowned again, even harder.
“I saw you the first time,” Vance drawled, giving her the most beautiful opening to let him know what she really thought of being cooped up in a vehicle with him, except that Brent nipped that argument in the bud before she could even get a blossom going.
“If you have any objections, I’m sure I can find someone else to help you, Vance.”
Damn it. Ettie shut her mouth. She looked at Vance, who looked back at her. Her shoulders drooped and in her most neutral tone, she said, “If it won’t be too much of a bother to you, Mr. Foster, I would really appreciate a lift to Brenton. There’s something I need from the store across from Barry’s.”
A corner of Vance’s—well okay, it wasn’t too much of a stretch of imagination to term it handsome—mouth curled upward. “Oh sweetheart, that must have galled like hell to have to ask so nicely.”
It took effort, but she bit her tongue and kept from saying what she really wanted to back at him. “May I please, Mr. Foster, ride with you to Barry’s?”
The other side of his mouth curled, rising up to form a full-on smile. “Why, yes, Miss Thomas. You may.”
Horn dog.
CHAPTER FOUR
With Ettie riding shotgun and Vance behind the wheel, they drove out of the grocery store parking lot behind the Jeep and Outlander. They didn’t even make it as far as Spanking Loop, the main thoroughfare through Corbin’s Bend and out to the highway, when the cellphone in Vance’s cup holder rang.
Checking the screen first, Vance answered. “Hey, Brent. What’s up?”
“Charles just called. He’s on his way home and they’ve already shut down the highway. We can still get where we’re going, but you can’t. Not unless you take the back way out, via the old forest service roads.”
“Got it.” Clicking his phone shut, Vance pulled into the first driveway he came to and turned the truck around.
“What are you doing?” Sitting up a little straighter, Ettie was trying very hard not to glare at him from the passenger seat, but suspicion lurked alive and well in the depths of her baby blue eyes. Funny, how you could live across the street from someone for so many years and never quite realize how short and slight they were, or how blue their eyes could be. Ettie was pretty. Of course, one had to look past all that suspicion, dislike and malcontent in order to see it.
He shook his head at himself. Eyes on the road, Romeo. Mind back on the matter at hand. “What’s the matter? Afraid I’m going to punt you out on the side of the road the minute Brent and the others pull out of sight?” He tossed her a smile to show he was joking, but she didn’t return it.
“Are you?” she countered instead.
“I hadn’t planned on it. Road’s closed. We have to take the back route.”
She hardly blinked. He hadn’t thought it possible, but the suspicion in her hard-as-nails stare doubled. “What back route?”
“The forestry division has roads in and out all over these mountains. Corbin’s Bend owns about thirty-thousand acres, but within those acres there are pockets of land that are private and government owned. Used to be, if you leased the land you could build a cabin and live there, paying only a nominal land fee each year. Instead of coming in on the main highway, those land pockets were accessed through the southern route just off the highway. It was quicker that way.”
“If it’s quicker, why don’t we use the southern route?”
“Quicker for them doesn’t mean quicker for us. Besides, those roads haven’t been maintained in years. Single lanes, unpaved, and probably overgrown in places. But, don’t worry.” He patted the dashboard. “She’s solid. She’ll get us there.”
If anything, Ettie became even more suspicious. “What makes you think I need reassuring?”
Oo, she was a prickly one.
“I’m not trying to offend. You look worried, that’s all.”
“No, I don’t.”
Argumentative, too.
“Okay, I am trying really hard to make polite conversation here.”
“Silence is golden.” Folding her arms across her chest, Ettie turned her face to the side window. “I like silence. I think I prefer it, in fact.”
After a comment like that, silence is exactly what filled the cab of his truck. All the way through the small community streets, past the last smattering of houses and a small community garden where the local Boy and Girl Scouts held their meetings, until they reached a yet-to-be-developed dead-end street. The paved road ended at a smaller dirt one no wider than a driveway. Within twenty feet, he came to a gate and stopped, getting out just long enough to open it, drive through onto the service access road, and then shut the gate again. By the time he climbed back behind the wheel, he was ready to try again.
“You know what? I think we’re going about this wrong.” Vance offered up his most charming smile and stuck out his hand. “I’m Vance Foster, your neighbor across the street.”
As if it were diseased, she made no effort to take it. “Trust me, I know who you are.”
Strike one for the new start. The road ahead of him narrowed and began to descend, becoming rocky cliff-face on his left and nothing but sheer mountain drop-off on his right. He put both hands on the wheel again. “I run a little business called Whips and Chains, although I’ve shortened it to just W&C so I don’t freak out the kids or the vanillas. I make—”
“I know what you do, too.”
He almost laughed, except those notes of heavy disapproval in her voice made this anything but funny. He cast her a side-long glance. “All right, I’ll bite. What does that mean?”
She snorted and folded her arms across her chest. “As if you don’t know.”
It was a real struggle not to lose his sense of humor. “If I knew, Miss Thomas, I wouldn’t be asking.”
She glared out the window, muttering under her breath although not quite low enough to prevent his overhearing. “Horn dog.”
This really was anything but funny. He rubbed his eyebrow. “What did you just call me?”
She looked right at him. “I said—”
“I heard you,” he said, cutting her off before she could repeat it. “I just wanted to know if you had the nerve to say it to my face.”
“You think I wouldn’t?” For the first time, she offered a smug little smile of her own. “I have no problem, Mr. Foster, calling it like it is.”
“And you don’t approve?”
“Whether I approve or not doesn’t make any difference.”
He laughed again, but there was zero humor in it. “Apparently, that doesn’t stop you from judging, does it?”
“I’m not judging anything either.” She turned her face back to the window.
“The hell you’re not.” Tiny flecks of white began to fall outside the car, drifting down through the dense growth of evergreen forest growing up and down the mountainside to either side of them. If it got any heavier, it might be concerning, but for now he was far more interested in the problem sitting in the cab with him. “Is that why you keep writing me into your newspaper? Are you pissed because I’m darkening other people’s doorstep, or because I’m not darkening yours? Is that why you keep killing me off?”
“Oh, like I care whose doorstep you darken,” she snapped. “And I’ve only killed you once or twice.”
“Forty-seven times,” he corrected. “I’ve been stabbed, hanged, shot, poisoned…”
“You’re not a subscriber, how would you know?”
“I have a friend who brings me his copy when he’s done. Where was I? Poisoned…decapitated by space toilet—that was interesting, disgusting but interesting—electrocuted…”
“You forgot eaten by mountain shark, and who said you could read my paper?”
“I didn’
t particularly like the shark issue. Or the bomb, for that matter. Picking pieces of me out of trees and bushes—not to mention teeth—doesn’t make for pleasant imagery.”
“No, it doesn’t,” she cheerfully agreed, “but it does sell subscriptions.”
“Well, so long as my many deaths serve a purpose. How many times have you killed me this week?”
“Does mutilation count?” Her smile then was as close to genuine as he’d yet seen.
He waved a hand. “Forget I asked. You know, if you need a spanking that badly, all you have to do is call me. I’m sure I can work you into my very busy death schedule.”
“Nobody needs a spanking that badly.”
“At this very moment, I’d say that’s a matter of personal opinion.” Was it his imagination, or were these flurrying flakes getting bigger and falling faster?
“Is that snow?” Ettie asked, suddenly seeming to notice the weather.
“Yeah.” They probably ought to drop the snippiness and just concentrate on the driving. They had at least two hours of lousy weather and steep mountain back roads to go. Either one by itself would make this journey hard enough without combining the two, and then adding in their apparent inability to be civil with one another… His jaw clenched. “You know, maybe you’re right. Silence is golden.”
Unfortunately, no sooner did those words pop out of his mouth than did he change his mind.
“So, is that the reason then?” he demanded, and she looked at him again. “You don’t like the fact that I have dominant/submissive relations with some of the people around the Bend, so you’ve set out to malign me in every possible way via your paper? And here, I thought I’d left that kind of small-minded mentality when I left Chicago. What happened to the acceptance of like-minded individuals? That’s supposed to be what Corbin’s Bend is founded on, right?”
Her blue eyes flashed, but at least she had the grace to blush. “Like-minded individuals? You’re a predator, Mr. Foster. You take advantage of the needs of desperate women—”
“Take advantage?” His eyes widened. “Oh, now hold it right there, lady! You have a lot of nerve—”
“I have a lot of nerve?” Her eyes widened even more. “How about you hold it, buster! The truth is hard to hear, I’m sure. You take advantage of women, getting your cheap thrills off while they are at the mercy of their submissive tendencies and too weak to tell you to go bugger off!”
“You don’t seem to have that difficulty.”
“Darn straight, I don’t!”
“I’m sure I’ll read all about it in your paper. In the meantime, you’re doing me an incredible disservice.”
“Personally, I don’t think I’m disserving you enough. If I was, you wouldn’t still be here.”
Vance shot her a startled look across the cab, one that quickly turned disgruntled and then annoyed. The flurries were accumulating on the hard-packed dirt, but it wasn’t icy yet by any means. Still, the narrowness of the road made him nervous, the company in his truck left a lot to be desired, and the weather was steadily worsening.
He swore under his breath. He wasn’t a masochist and he wasn’t going to do this to himself. Applying the brakes, he slowed to a gradual stop.
“What are you doing?” Ettie asked, frowning as she straightened to see out the front window. “Is there a problem with the road?”
“Nope. There’s a problem inside this truck.” He slung his arm over the back of the seat and craned to see out the back window. “I’m turning around.”
She startled, seeming honestly surprised. “Why?”
“Because you’re a bitch, Miss Thomas, and I’d just as soon go back than to go the rest of the way to Brenton with you.”
Her eyebrows shot all the way up to her hairline. “You think I’m a bitch?”
“I not only think you’re a bitch, Miss Thomas, I think you’re a judgmental, close-minded, snotty pain in the ass, and I’ll be damned if I let you be a pain in mine. So, thanks for clarifying exactly how I got to be on your shit list. Here I thought maybe we could get to know one another and maybe perhaps move beyond all this unnecessary animosity, but apparently you’ve got other plans. So, oh fucking well.”
The road was really narrow, with trees and overgrowth all around, a mountain to his left and a wooded drop off to his right. He backed all the way into the bushes, cranking the wheel as much as he could, but there was no way this was going to be a three-point turn. He’d be lucky if he got his full-sized, extended cab truck turned around in six points.
Ettie waited until he was almost horizontal across the road and only inches of progress at a time—forget six, this was going to be eighteen or twenty points—before she offered a vaguely disgruntled, “I really need my toner.”
“Isn’t that just too damned bad?” He cranked the wheel and tried to back up again. He had a big tree in front of him and rock big enough to kill his bumper directly behind. Bushes and tree branches were scraping both ends of his truck with every few inches of movement he managed. This was embarrassing. He couldn’t help the denseness of the mountain terrain, but it was starting to look like he didn’t know how to drive.
Damn it. He couldn’t get fully turned around without pulling too far forward and that risked the drop off. He was stuck.
Unfolding her arms and dropping her hands to her knees, Ettie cleared her throat. “I’m sorry, Mr…” she huffed, then caught herself. Trying again, this time she managed to wedge a smidgen of sincerity into her halfhearted apology. “Vance, I’m sorry.”
He looked at her, but didn’t believe it for a second.
Turning slightly toward him, she tried a little harder. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I am…I’m being a bitch. Judgmental. Close-minded. Maybe even snotty.”
Vance opened his mouth to say there was no ‘maybe’ about it, but he stopped himself. He could see no trace of sarcasm anywhere in her expression. She was being serious, and if she was willing to offer a branch of peace, then there was no reason to continue embarrassing the hell out of his driving abilities. “All right.”
“Can we start over?” she offered.
He knew she was saying it only because she needed him to take her to Brenton, but let it not be said that Vance ever held an unreasonable grudge. “Okay, we can do that.”
“Okay.” She rubbed her hands upon her knees. “In a completely non-bitchy, non-judgmental, and non-close-minded way, I’m wondering if you’re going to be able to get this truck pointed back down toward the bottom of the mountain.”
It still wasn’t funny, but he couldn’t help laughing. Chuckling, really. A very dry ‘ha-ha’. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I can.”
“Just curious.”
“I got this.” He started to crank the wheel back the way he’d come.
“Because I think we’re very close to falling off the mountain on this side.”
“I said, I’ve got it.”
She held up her hands in wordless surrender. “I was just asking.”
“And I was just saying.”
This was going to be a long, long…long ride down the mountain.
CHAPTER FIVE
The flurries were gone. What could only be called a blizzard had taken its place with fast, fat snowflakes and blisteringly cold winds that all but obscured the trees to either side of them. Ettie couldn’t imagine how Vance kept the truck on the road. Both his hands were on the wheel, and it hadn’t escaped her notice just how tightly he gripped it. For the last twenty miles, neither one of them had said a word. Not that she missed the man-slut’s conversation, but she wasn’t blind to what was most concerning here. These were white-out conditions. The snow build up was incredible and although the temperature hadn’t warmed up enough to melt the snow and create ice, exactly where the edge of that drop-off to their right began was becoming seriously obscured. She could only see it in snowy bits and shadows if she looked out her side window. She couldn’t see anything out ahead of them. Vance probably couldn’t either, which was why they
were crawling down the mountain at mileage that barely even registered as a digital number on the speedometer.
“I don’t think we’re going to make this,” Vance said, and not for the first time. “If I can find a widening in the road, I think we’re going to turn around.”
Also not for the first time, Ettie protested, “But we’re almost halfway there!”
“No we’re not. We’re not even close to halfway, and at this rate, we’ll be lucky to be there by midnight.”
“So long as there’s no ice, I don’t see the problem. You said you could drive this thing.”
“I can drive this thing,” Vance said dryly. “Any minute now I’m afraid you might see me drive this thing right off the side of the mountain. It’s almost a foot deep out there already. I can barely see where the road is. And newsflash, but we don’t need ice to slide. All we need is a lack of traction. This isn’t safe.”
“I think it’s slowing down.” She tried to see the sky through the snow, then the road out ahead of them. No matter where she looked, everything was blanketed in swirling gusts of snow. “People are depending on us to bring back water, food, gas, generators—”
“Toner?” he added, even more drily.
“My paper is just as important to the people of Corbin’s Bend as anything else on Brent’s list. We’re a township of neighbors first and foremost. If someone runs out of something, all they have to do is ask. My paper brings something you can’t buy in stores!”
“Local gossip, while fanciful and imaginatively presented, doesn’t quench thirst—”
“Oh please, like there’s even one of us who’s never melted snow on the stove before.”
“—or fill bellies—” he drawled.
Her cheeks flushed angrily. “I happen to know for a fact Kelli Stevens has canned enough out of her garden to feed everybody for weeks!”
“—or heat a house, unless of course it’s used as fire starter.”
She snapped around on the seat so fast she nearly cracked her head against the window. “How dare you even suggest burning my paper, you—you—you…loathsome, detestable…ignoramus!”