Snow Brides

by Webb, Peggy

  “It’s going to be okay, Mags.”

  “Yes.” She stood on tiptoe and kissed the side of Joe’s cheek. “Jefferson is never wrong.”

  “Wish I could say the same for myself.”

  “You’re too hard on yourself, Joe.”

  The roaring of moving snow subsided as quickly as it had started. A last hanging timber hit the pile of debris at the back of the store and everything became quiet. The door at the back of the front room was still standing. The pocket rocket burner he’d left on the floor was still there. Their tent remained untouched. Except for a sprinkling of snow that had catapulted through the door during the sluff avalanche, the front room in the trading post looked exactly as it had when they’d set up camp.

  Joe felt the hard shiver that ran through his wife. “Let’s get inside the tent,” he said. “You need to rest.”

  “So do you.”

  “I’ve had my turn. You’ve got to be sharp so we can find Kate.”

  Thankfully, she didn’t argue. Once they were back inside the close confines of the tent, settled into sleeping bags in the warm glow of the Candoil lamp, Maggie fell asleep quickly.

  Joe studied the curve of her long lashes, the way her black hair lay in ringlets against her fine cheekbones, the way she slept with her hands folded and tucked under one cheek, like a child at prayer.

  She looked peaceful in sleep. Was it true? Had she disappeared into a dream world where their daughter was asleep in her own bed and Maggie had never found two dead girls in the snow? Where there had never been a psychopath chasing Kate through a blizzard in the wilderness?

  His wife sighed, a soft sound that made her smile in her sleep.

  What was that all about? Was Joe in her dreams? Were they young again and so much in love she’d couldn’t imagine life without him?

  “I’m going to make this work, Mags,” he said, softly so as not wake her. “As soon as we find Kate, I’m going to make us good together again. I promise.”

  The blizzard howled around the trading post and the darkness seemed never-ending. He said a prayer for his daughter, somewhere out there in the middle of a nightmare.

  Then he said a prayer that he could keep his promise.

  * * *

  11:00 p.m.

  It was quiet downstairs. Too quiet.

  Kate huddled in her cocoon in the cold dark attic, fighting her growing worry and her need for sleep. Storms still raged around her, inside the cabin and out. And both of them were capable of killing.

  How long before the maniac would come after her again? How long would she remain strong and alert enough to keep him out of the attic?

  She drank some of her water and ate a piece of beef jerky. Temporarily revived, she shone her small flashlight around her hiding place. Had she done enough to prepare for his next assault?

  Don’t second guess yourself.

  This time she had no doubt that Coach was with her only in her mind. This time she didn’t even have to hear the sound of her own voice to believe she was still capable of fighting off Jonathan.

  Kate stretched out and consciously relaxed, starting with her toes and moving upward. Her eyes grew heavy…

  The clanging of a buoy bell shot her out of sleep. She sat a moment, disoriented. And cold. She was so cold.

  The buoy bell started clanging again, and it all came flooding back. Her flight through the wilderness and into the attic. Her desperate measures to protect her hideaway.

  She’d rigged both entrances—a rope to secure the attic door and a buoy bell to alarm her if anyone tried to climb the fallen tree and come through the window.

  Jonathan was in the tree, and he was coming after her. He was close, too.

  Even as tall as she was, Kate’s reach hadn’t extended far out the window. Earlier she’d managed to attach the buoy bell, but it was in the topmost branches.

  She jumped out of her nest of blankets to grab her ice ax and her penlight. Her heart racing, she crept across the attic and stationed herself on the left side of the window.

  When she heard him on the roof, she tightened her grip on the ax. Could she do it? Could she strike hard and fast? She would wound him badly, possibly even kill him. Did she have it in her to take another person’s life?

  Don’t think that way, she told herself. This is life or death.

  Focus.

  “I’ve got this, Coach,” she whispered.

  Suddenly Jonathan rammed the window and glass flew everywhere.

  Wait. Wait.

  “Did you think I wouldn’t get you?” he yelled. He whacked the window again and splinters of glass rained onto the floor. “There’s no escape now, girly. I tore up the stairs.”

  His maniacal laughter was followed by a large shadow creeping through the window.

  Adrenaline pumped through her, and still she waited.

  “You’re going to be sorry, Kate!”

  One of his feet touched the floor, and the small animal spring trap snapped with a satisfying thump.

  Bingo.

  Howling, Jonathan scrambled through. When his other foot hit the marbles she’d scattered on the floor underneath the window, he went down, sprawling in every direction.

  His furious screeches were cut short by a loud thump as his head slammed against the windowsill.

  Kate flicked on her light and pinpointed her target. He was on the floor, one foot caught in the trap, knocked out cold. Cold being the operative word. Snow flew through the window as if the blizzard were intent on burying him alive.

  Kate held the penlight in her mouth and lifted the ax. One whack. That’s all it would take. His carotid artery would open and he’d bleed to death. He’d die a slow, torturous death, just like Jennifer and Linda.

  Her mother hadn’t talked about finding the dead girls. She never talked about any of her grisly SAR missions.

  But there had been plenty of details on the news and all over the internet. Kate and her girlfriends knew them all, talked about the murders in hushed whispers at pajama parties and on lazy Saturday afternoons when they’d gather at the Dog and Suds.

  They couldn’t stop themselves. They were alive and the girls, who could have been any one of them except for a twist of fate, had been raped and killed in the most brutal way possible. Then they’d been found naked in the snow with wedding veils on their heads. They’d probably been chased down like animals.

  The attic suddenly felt surreal. Kate’s hands shook and tears streamed down her face.

  She was strong. One strike would do it. She’d be safe and the dead girls would be avenged.

  All her girlfriends had said they’d kill the murderer if they could.

  They’d even discussed the ways. Sally said she’d shoot him without thinking twice. She had a permit to carry, and she regularly practiced at the shooting range. Teresa kept mace in her purse. Not surprising since her dad was a detective. She said she was going to put some brass knuckles in there, too. Once the killer was down, she’d beat him so badly he’d wish he were dead. Teresa was already enrolled in a local self-defense course, and her skills put her at the top of her class.

  Now the madman lay at Kate’s feet, helpless.

  She drew back to strike. Her hands shook. Once she killed him, she could never go back. She could never again look in the mirror and see herself without the stain of brutality on her soul.

  Slowly, she lowered the ax. She couldn’t do it. Not like this, cold-blooded and calculating.

  Maybe in the heat of moment, she could.

  She hoped she’d never have to find out.

  She lashed the ax to her backpack and searched the attic for something to tie him up. Her rope was there, but she needed it to rappel down to the first floor. Jonathan’s table was still under what was left of the attic trap door, but what if she made a misstep trying to jump and land there?

  Kate couldn’t afford to break her leg, or even twist an ankle. After the storm, she might have to hike back—and she was a very long way from home. />
  She found some old pants and used the legs to tie Jonathan’s wrists and ankles. Then she shoved a ratty wing chair into place and tied him to the legs with the sleeves of a button-down shirt.

  She considered removing the spring trap from his foot, but images of the other captive girls popped into her mind. She left the trap on.

  Kate quickly gathered her supplies and dropped them though the hole to the floor below. One last look told her Jonathan was still out cold. Already he was covered with a blanket of snow.

  How long before that same snow woke him?

  “Sleep tight, sucker.”

  She rappelled down, grabbed her supplies and raced into the front room. The fire was nothing more than a few sputtering embers.

  She hurried off for more wood and built it back to a fine roar, then went into the hall to listen. All was quiet in the attic.

  Had he come to? Was he lying there plotting, working himself free?

  Had the blow to his head killed him? He’d gone down hard. Considering his other falls, it could have been the last straw--a killing blow.

  “Don’t count on it. Move!”

  Her pep talk sent her into the kitchen where she set to work gathering the things she needed for her new line of defense. She had no idea whether any of it would work. But she didn’t dare sit in front of the warm fire, helpless and hoping he’d remain in the attic trussed up like a turkey.

  Kate grabbed the mop, then lugged it along with her arsenal into the hall. A sound stopped her in her tracks.

  She stood perfectly still, listening. Outside, Holly felled trees, moaned around the cabin and rattled the eaves. But this sound was different. Creepy. The kind that raised chill bumps along her arms.

  Kate strained to separate the new sound from the storm. Finally she heard it. A thumping in the attic. Then, groans.

  She didn’t have a minute to lose. The monster was awake, the indestructible madman who refused to give up. The flimsy bonds she’d fashioned with old clothes would never hold him.

  Soon, he’d be coming to kill her.

  Grand Marsais News 9

  The Doppler Radar map behind Stanley had everybody at Channel 9 breathing a sigh of relief. The reflectivity of the snowstorm, evident in the glowing red mass on the map, showed Holly was done with Grand Marsais and moving rapidly out of northern Minnesota.

  Hyped on coffee and nerves, Stan the weatherman was proud of the way he maintained his outward cool as he moved his pointer over the path of the storm. He was even proud to be standing on his feet, awake. Being at the station during weather disasters was his job, and he congratulated himself on doing it well.

  No, not just well. He’d excelled.

  “Holly turned her brutal eye southward this morning at three a.m.,” he said, proud of how his hands didn’t shake.

  Inside, he was a wreck. The last he’d heard from Jean, she was screaming with contractions, the ambulance was trying to get to her and he had to go on the air.

  “The monster snowstorm is cutting a straight path over Lake Superior and will graze the western side of Wisconsin before she picks up force and turns her deadly eye here.” He let his pointer hover over Iowa.

  “Cedar Rapids will be the hardest hit, with sustained winds exceeding forty miles an hour. Gusts topping seventy-five miles an hour have pounded northern Minnesota for the last fourteen hours, and Iowa can expect the same.”

  He paused to let the statistic sink in. Reports of houses collapsing all over northern Minnesota and people trapped inside had been coming in since last night around seven. Reporters were scurrying around, trying to put statistics together for the morning news. Only three hours from now.

  Stan didn’t envy their job.

  “Grand Marsais will feel the effects of snowstorm Holly for several more days. It’s still not safe to be on the roads. The roads on your screen are closed.”

  The list scrolled on the screen behind him as he talked. “These nurseries, day care centers and businesses are shut down until further notice.”

  The list was shorter because school kids were out for the Christmas holidays, and public schools had closed days earlier. A real blessing in weather like this. There were always foolish parents who didn’t check the news and spun over icy embankments trying to get their kids to school.

  “Until we dig our way out of this snowstorm, be safe, be smart. As always, Stan the weatherman is here in Grand Marsais, Channel 9 News, looking out for you!”

  He jerked off his microphone and grabbed his handkerchief out of his pocket to swab off his stage makeup.

  “Stan!” Larry Goddard, one of the VPs of the station, hurried toward him. “The ambulance got your wife to the hospital, and we’ve got a wrecker out front to take you there.”

  “Thanks, Larry. I owe you one.”

  “No, we owe you, Stan. Great weather coverage.”

  Stan hurried out of the TV station and nearly lost his footing on the front steps. He caught the railing and held on for dear life. He didn’t have time to fall.

  When he got into the wrecker, he said, “How fast can you get me to the hospital?”

  “Not fast, not in this weather. But I can get you there in one piece.”

  True to his word, the driver of the wrecker, who turned out to be the father of three and the grandfather of six, delivered Stan to the hospital just in time to wash up, robe up and watch his daughter being born.

  “She’s beautiful.” He leaned down to kiss his wife.

  “What would you think if we named her Holly?”

  He thought it was the worst idea he’d ever heard. After the storm watch marathon he’d been through, he didn’t want to hear that name again as long as he lived. Besides, he and Jean had already decided if they had a girl she’d be called Marianne.

  Jean beamed at him. “I just think it would be appropriate, Stan. And so cute.”

  “The name’s perfect, hon.”

  He glanced down at his red-faced daughter. Already, the name was growing on him.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  December 23

  6:00 a.m.

  It would soon be daylight, and Joe was already squatted beside the burner making breakfast. He looked up and smiled when Maggie came out of the tent with Jefferson. In the dim light coming from the burner and the Candoil lamp inside the tent, he appeared to be the Joe of old, keeping his own turmoil at bay while trying to shore up her courage. She felt both comforted and filled with renewed promise.

  “I’ve got coffee, Mags.”

  “Great.”

  She fed and watered Jefferson while he poured her a cup. Then she sat beside him and held one hand out to the heat coming from the burner.

  It was completely dark outside, but the cessation of howling winds and falling trees meant the blizzard was over. Still it was impossible for Maggie to see the terrain she’d be facing when they set out to find Kate. She knew from experience that, post-snowstorm, it would be treacherous. Thirty-foot drifts. Crusts of snow covering deep hidden pockets where you could sink up to your neck or over your head. Shifting slabs underneath the snow, just waiting for some small movement to create a deadly avalanche.

  Plus, after nature’s massive display of fury, it would be harder to find any of the signs Kate might have left to mark her trail. Though Jefferson was perfectly capable of seeing in the dark and picking up scents impossible to humans, particularly in the early morning hours when those scents lay closer to the ground, she didn’t dare take him out post-blizzard before daylight. There was too much risk she and Joe would fail to see one of the many new traps Holly had laid for them.

  As Maggie sipped her coffee and mentally prepared herself for the search ahead, she reached into her left pocket to close her hand around Kate’s lucky buckeye.

  “Do you think she survived the storm, Joe?”

  “I’d bet money on it. Kate’s one of the smartest and mentally toughest young women I’ve ever known. She’s just like you, Mags.”

  There’d been a
time when Maggie would say, Flattery will get you everywhere. When she and Joe would come together as naturally as sunflowers seeking the sun. When their joining would transcend the physical and become the closest thing to spiritual Maggie could imagine--with the exception of rare moments when you allowed yourself to be an innocent child, climbing into the lap of God.

  Her sudden need for something beyond the physical realm overwhelmed her. Support. Strength. Hope.

  Please.

  Her silent, desperate plea was a prayer, a mother’s heart yearning for the safety of her child.

  She reached for Joe’s hand. “Thank you for saying that.”

  “I mean it. You’re a rock star, Mags. And I haven’t been the best of fathers. I don’t pretend to be.”

  “Don’t say that. There’s no yardstick for parenthood.”

  He squeezed her hand, and the look he sent her was pure, unfathomable gratitude.

  “There’s one thing I know about our daughter, Mags. We taught her how to survive in the wilderness.”

  Even in a storm like Holly? Maggie squelched the thought before she could say it aloud. Let Joe have his hope. Hadn’t she been reaching for the same thing? Maybe together they could hang on long enough to get through the brutal day that lay ahead.

  * * *

  7:15 a.m.

  The three of them stood in front of the trading post, gear stowed in their backpacks, Jefferson in his SAR harness and still on the lead.

  Joe assessed the terrain. Fallen trees littered what had once been a parking lot. The avalanche had caved in the entire back of the store, and the bluff behind it had a treacherous snowdrift leading up to it. The scene was daunting, and only an inkling of what lay ahead.

  He mentally geared himself for the search while he studied his wife and her SAR dog. Jefferson was straining against his leash, his nose pointing toward the bluff.

  Made sense. His daughter would seek the high ground so she could get her bearings.