“Whenwasthe first time you saw another person naked in a sexual context? Just curious.”
“Do you know where we’re going?”
“Wherearewe going?”
“Are you sure this is a road?”
“Are we lost? And is it my fault?”
“Wow, this is a pretty steep downhill!”
“Wow, we’re going pretty fast!”
“Tree! Fuck. TREE!”
Except I say that last one out loud, because: TREE. We slide to an abrupt halt about half an inch in front of a huge oak tree, all the stuff in the back of the truck sliding and slamming around with some ugly metal-on-metal screeches.
Then there’s a long moment of complete, utter silence, the only movement the snow falling outside and a tree-shaped air freshener swinging from the rear-view mirror. I reach out and stop it.
“Sorry,” Gideon says after a long, tense silence. We’re so close to the tree that only the sides are lit by the headlights, the center of the tree darker, then nothing else but the glow of the snow beyond. “You okay?”
“Yep,” I tell him. My voice is about an octave too high, and I’m probably going to have a seatbelt bruise tomorrow, but I’ll live. At least I’ve stopped shaking with cold, thanks to the heat and the sleeping bag and my several layers. “I’m buckled in. You okay?”
“Fine,” he says, and lets out a long, shaky breath. His face doesn’t change as he shifts into reverse, drapes his hand over the back of my seat, looks through the rear window, and revs the engine.
We don’t move.
Actually, that’s not accurate. The truck rocks back and forth a little, like it’s trying very hard. Gideon frowns. The engine gets louder. Nothing happens, but I’m sure it’ll just take another second, any second now the tires will find some traction and we’ll start moving and get around this tree and then we’ll be on our way.
Nope.
Gideon is perfectly silent, face blank, as he checks the gearshift, putting the truck into neutral and then back into reverse, then looks at his feet on the pedals as though they might somehow be the problem.
He tries it again. It doesn’t work again, and now I’m starting to full-blown panic, sweating a little, my hands in fists in my lap because we’re stuck in a vehicle in a blizzard and this is very much all my fault forchaining myself to a tree. Who even does that? What is this, 1972? I couldn’t make a viral video or something?
“Here, I can get out,” I offer, hand on my seatbelt. “And.”
Andwhat? Push? Gideon just grunts, easing off the gas, letting the truck rock back, and then hitting it pretty hard.
“Maybe it’ll be easier if the truck’s lighter,” I say, and Gideon says nothing, fully focused on reversing this truck. The next time it rocks forward, it bumps into the tree and we both jump a little.
“Fuck,” he mutters, then heaves a deep breath and jerks the gearshift into park so hard I think I hear something crunch. “Stay there,” he says, and gets out of the truck.
CHAPTERTHREE
GIDEON
“I can’t believeyou don’t have snow chains,” Andi says, and I swear all the hairs on the back of my neck rise at the sentence. “You have bolt cutters but no snow chains?”
She doesn’t even say it like it’s an accusation, just a conversation. As though we are having a regular conversation here, in the dark, in the middle of a snowstorm, next to a truck that shows no sign of moving any time soon.
“There are supposed to be snow chains,” I explain, crouching down again. Of course, Andi didn’t stay in the truck like I told her to. Of course, she’s been flitting around, hiking boots crunching the snow, for the last forty-five minutes. She has, at last count, offered twenty-two suggestions and offered her help no fewer than thirty-one times, and I swear all I want in the world is sixty seconds of silence to think and also contemplate the many mistakes that led me to this point.
I get about three seconds. I use it to be glad she’s got appropriate cold-weather gear on, at least, and that she’s stomping around and keeping her body temperature up.
“You should have an inventory checklist,” Andi says, on her tiptoes, peering over the side of the truck as though maybe snow chains have magically appeared in the back. Her strawberry blonde hair is in a braid that slithers over one shoulder. For half a second I think of how it felt on my fingertips, back in the truck. “So that when you—”
“Andi,” I snap, and it comes out more forcefully than I mean for it to. She stops mid-sentence, and then we stare at each other for a moment, her blue eyes wide in her round face, cheeks mottled pink from the cold. Fuck.
