CHAPTER 2
Brevin
I wason my way back into my log cabin house for one last bag when a stray St. Bernard came trotting up to me through the thickening snow. For a second I thought about jumping into the car and locking the door. I’d just streamed “Cujo” last week, and seeing the same breed of dog that was in the film kind of spooked me. But I decided to brave it out and walk back to the house, letting the dog catch up.
“What’s up, boy?” I asked the dog. It nudged me and then ran away again.
“Who are you talking to?” my assistant called from just inside the door as she put her boots on.
I watched the dog go, then stop and look back. “A St. Bernard,” I answered as I stepped inside and closed the door. “Are you sure you want to drive in this? You can come back to the city with me in my car.”
Having Sandy work with me at my cabin wasn’t a usual thing, but I’d planned to be here for the week, and she’d needed me to sign something, so she drove up. Even with the pendingsnowmageddon, she’d still make it home to pick her kids up from school and feed them and her husband her apparently famous lasagna.
“If anything, you should be coming back with me,” she said. “I’m the one with the four-wheel-drive.”
“I have snow tires,” I said defensively. “I’ll be fine as long as we get out of here in the next half an hour.” I looked out the window—it was really starting to come down. “Do you have everything?”
“Yep, I’m good to go. Now promise me you won’t come into the office even though you’re coming back to the city three days early. This is supposed to be your vacation time.”
I gave her my most withering look. “You know me better than that.”
“Which means?” she asked, her eyebrows raised.
“Which means any work I do I can do from home,” I said with a shrug.
“You’re freaking incorrigible.”
She was right. I’d been a workaholic since kindergarten, and that was never going to change. A quality my father had drummed into me from the time I was able to make my own bed, I believed there was nothing more important than getting ahead of the game, whatever the game was. If I didn’t fix it, no one would. It had taken everything in me just to get myself an assistant in the first place.
Sandy hefted her laptop bag onto her shoulder alongside her purse and opened the door. There, sitting on the stoop, was the dog. She closed the door again. “That’s a big dog,” she said, looking up at me.
“He seems friendly enough.” I opened the door again and walked through, only to be nudged before the St. Bernard took off again. “Are you scared of dogs?” I asked Sandy.
“Not … really?”
“Just get to your truck and I’ll run interference for you,” I suggested, picking up the last of my own bags. I escorted Sandy to her pickup and said goodbye as the dog trotted up to me again. This time, he barked.
I put my bag into the back of my car and closed the door. “What do you want, buddy?” I asked the animal, and again, he ran away. Not down the driveway toward the road, but up the trail that cut through my property toward the hiking path up the hill.
Shaking my head, I got into my car. I started it and put on the rear defrost to do most of the work for me, back there at least. While I waited for it to heat up, I pulled out my phone. There was no cell signal today what with the snow, but I had a satellite installed in the house so I wouldn’t have to do without internet when I was here. I used my Wi-Fi to check my emails. Not something I should have been doing, according to Sandy. She was convinced I needed to slow down if I wanted to live to fifty. I knew it was true, at least the slowing down part. I’d formed a team to work for me just for that reason. But it wasn’t in my nature to slow down. I needed to be on top of everything all the time.
I had three new emails since I’d left the house, but getting out of here was more important than answering them. I dropped my phone onto the seat beside me and grabbed the snow brush out of the back seat.
When I opened the door, the St. Bernard was still there, waiting. I ignored it while I cleared off the car, and I got back in. When I looked in the rearview mirror to back up, there was the damned dog again, sitting in the middle of the driveway.
I tried honking, but the animal just cocked its head as though telling me I was an idiot for imagining that would move him. So I got out. The moment I stood up beside the car, the dog ran for the trail up the hill.
Thinking this was my chance, I dove back into the car and put it in reverse. But there in my backup camera, the dog stood once again.
I jumped out of the car. “What the hell do you want from me?” I yelled at the St. Bernard.
Again, it moved toward the trail, only this time it didn’t go as far. It stood on three legs, the right front paw up at its chest, and I could swear it pointed like a hound.
“Fine!” I said to the beast. I got back into the car to turn it off—the dog didn’t take any chances. It stood behind me again in case I was faking it.
With a deep sigh, I shut off the ignition, pocketed my phone, and got out, closing the door behind me. Half a mind to just go back into the cabin, I considered what the dog might be trying to lead me to. If it was someone who’d been hurt and was stuck out here, I probably didn’t have time to answer my emails before theyfroze to death.
“This had better be good,” I mumbled half to myself and half to the dog as I traipsed off into the snow, following it. “And you’d better not get us lost!”
