Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 89093 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89093 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Before moving to Florida, I spent the majority of my schooling years between California and Australia. I didn’t understand the complications that come from a snowstorm until I got stuck in the middle of one. I thought snow days were about marshmallows floating in hot chocolate and an endless number of hours to read. I didn’t consider the isolation, power outages, and the damage little snowflakes can cause.
The ground doesn’t just get suffocated by it. It causes accidents—bad ones—and proof of this stares me in the face when the stranger carefully guides us down a terrain significantly damaged by something plowing through it.
My stomach launches into my throat when he skims us past a large pine tree. There’s a massive graze down one side. The paint embedded into the gouge deep enough for me to lay in it matches the color of my once beloved car.
This must be the tree that flipped my car around, forcing me to finish my travels in reverse.
My heart that I’ve only just coerced back into my chest cavity beats erratically when the twisted remains of the vehicle I once thought displayed my importance to the world sneaks into my peripheral vision. It is a twisted mess of metal and glass and proves without a doubt that the envy of others will never come close to feeling loved and protected.
It is as ugly as my heart became after witnessing Cedric’s betrayal.
After taking a moment to reel my emotions in, I survey the area. There are no flashing lights in the distance or the frantic calls of volunteers searching the dense woodland for me. It’s just the stranger who saved me and me, and for some insane reason, the acknowledgment of that doesn’t scare me as much as it once did.
I should be dead.
The charred remains of my car leave no doubt to this.
And the person I have to thank for that not being the case is the man I’m accusing as being my captor.
God, I’ve never felt more stupid.
“Thank you,” I praise when the stranger peels me off his back like a father would a child riding on their shoulders. My voice is more sincere than the one I’ve utilized on him the past thirty-plus hours.
After removing the deer skin he once again used as a cloak, he fans it over an exposed stump, then plants my backside on top of the snow-dampened fur. I peer up at him when he snorts out two short, breathy grunts.
When our eyes lock, he grunts again, announcing that he wants me to stay put. He has no reason to believe me, but the sincerity in my eyes must get me over the line because when I jerk up my chin, he pushes back the bangs I’m endeavoring to grow out, then stalks to my car.
I almost tell him to be careful—just because a flame has been extinguished doesn’t mean it can’t be relit—but it dawns on me that my worry is pointless when he lifts the back quarter panel of my car as if it’s a toy.
I watch him in utter silence, stunned when the same beast-like strength sees him pulling at a length of steel trapped beneath the charred wreckage. His seemingly inhumane strength already has me mesmerized, but the quickest glimpse of a patch of mottled skin on his nape is far more distracting.
From a distance, it appears to be a birthmark, but the gurgling of my stomach when he angles his head to ensure his hair hides it has me worried it is something far more sinister. Birthmarks are rarely textured like the skin on his nape. It has multiple grooves and lesions associated with it, oddly similar to skin burned by an intense flame.
I know the markings of a burn better than anyone, and I didn’t specialize in dermatology during my studies. My findings didn’t come until after my internship.
When the stranger strongarms a strip of steel out from beneath the back tires of my ruined vehicle, I wretch my eyes away from him like I wasn’t ogling him with a pair not belonging to a medical professional.
“What is that?” My interrogation is more out of curiosity than evidentiary purposes. I recognize the straight line of steel Xs with nails poking out the top. I’m just lost as to why a set of road spikes would be lodged under my car. “I veered to miss a deer and her fawn.”
There’s no confidence in my declaration whatsoever. The particulars of my accident are described as hazy at best, but even someone with a Grade 3 concussion couldn’t deny this evidence.
Needing answers, I hiss through the pain of placing weight onto my bung foot before attempting to hobble toward the wreckage. I don’t even get two steps away from the stump when the stranger grunts, lifts me from the ground by my underarms, then plants my backside back onto the deer hide.