CHAPTER EIGHT
When I woke up the next morning, I wasn’t surprised to find Dex gone. At first I thought maybe the whole thing had been some crazy dream. I mean, I have had plenty of Dex dreams before, of course those all involved hot, uninhibited sex. Not purely kissing and spooning.
Then I heard a few muffled thumps from his room and I got up, feeling a chill as the morning mountain air seeped in through the thin windows. I pulled on a pair of jeans and slipped on a sweater and knocked lightly at his adjoining door.
“Dex?” I asked.
“Enter,” was his formal response.
I opened the door and poked my head in. The bed was back in its place, covers and bedding looking freshly made. The only sign that something had gone wrong was the mirror. It was shattered in the middle, cracks seeping outward.
Oh, and Dex’s wrist. He was standing at the sink, attempting to wrap a gauze bandage around it.
“Oh my God, what happened to you?” I asked and hustled toward him.
“Can you help me?” he inquired. I looked up at him, and seeing he looked fine, at least better than last night, I held up his wrist, the bandage falling away.
It wasn’t too bad but the outer side of his wrist was bruised and bloody. At least the bleeding had stopped.
“What happened?” I asked again, grabbing for the bandage. “Seriously. Tell me.”
He bit his lip momentarily and his eyes flitted to the mirror.
“I had an accident last night.”
“I saw. You flipped over your bed.”
He nodded. “Yeah, I guess I did.”
“Why did you do that?”
And how?
He looked down at his wrist and the tendons around his neck stiffened. “I told you.”
“You didn’t. Last night you just said that you saw her.”
“And that’s the truth.”
“Who is her?”
“She was in the mirror.”
My mouth gaped and the grip on his wrist became loose. “You saw someone in the mirror?”
He nodded. “So, maybe I’m having a hard time adjusting to being drug-free after all. You think they have a drugstore around here?”
“Did you smash the mirror with your hand?”
He was silent. I took that as a yes.
I sighed. “And then you flipped over the bed. Why?”
He rubbed at his forehead with his spare hand and avoided my eyes. “Perry, I can’t really say.”
“You were trying to keep something out,” I answered for him.
His breath hitched. For a moment I thought he was going to spill the beans. I was wrong.
“Please. I know you’re worried-”
“Of course I’m worried, Dex!” I cried out. His eyes softened at my outburst.
“All right. It’s all right.”
“It’s not.”
“It was a ghost. It was just a ghost. And it’s the first time I’ve ever seen her. It might not mean anything and I don’t need this distraction right now. We have a mythical beast to shoot, I need to focus on that. Sasquatch and ghosts don’t mix.”
“Tell me who the ghost is.”
“If I tell you, will you wrap up my wrist and promise not to ask any more questions about it? Ever?” he pushed.
I didn’t want to promise that. I knew whatever he’d tell me would only bring a billion questions along with it. But I said, “Yes” and began to slowly rewrap his wrist.
“The ghost…” he said reluctantly, face turned away from mine. “The ghost was my mother.”
I froze.
He jerked his attention back to me and gave a hard glance at my hands. “Keep wrapping.”
I didn’t know if I could. His mother. Dex had seen the ghost of his mother last night. In the mirror. And that sight was enough for him to smash it and make a dramatic barricade against it, flip over a f*cking bed. It was enough to make him cower in fear and seek the comfort of my company. Normally I wouldn’t put that past him, but last night Dex didn’t want sex. He just didn’t want to be alone. And that vulnerability, that was a side of him I rarely saw.
He rolled his eyes. “Here, do you want me to do it?”
I shook myself alert, feeling drugged and hazy. My fingers fumbled around the fabric. “Uh no. No I’ve got it.”
“I hope you’re packed, we gotta leave soon,” he said. I looked up at him, so many questions begging to tumble from my lips. But his expression was a warning and I knew I made that promise. I couldn’t push my luck. It would only annoy him and I didn’t want to do that.
I nodded and quickly finished up his wrist, tucking the ends together.
He held it up to his face and examined it. “Nice work, Florence.”
I pretended I wasn’t examining the mirror, having a sick hope of seeing her myself, his infamous mother. Before he could catch me, I gave him a quick smile and took off to my room, throwing my clothes in the bag and remembering to put on a bra and do a quick application of makeup on my face. I wasn’t on camera but I was still meeting people today and needed to look professional.
All the while my thoughts drifted back to Dex and his mother. He had never told me anything about her. I only knew a little bit about his father, that he left them when Dex was a teen and at some point during that whole thing, Pippa ended up being his nanny. He never told me how his mother died. Though, there was a strange feeling at the back of my head, like I was forgetting something. Like I knew something about her without ever knowing it, if that makes any sense.
Then it happened. My eyes filled with a flash of being in Roman’s home, the demon fighting inside me during the exorcism. A feeling of utter hate rolling around in my guts. A French accent that had spoken through me: “Your little secret. You don’t want anyone to know what happened to your dear old mother.”
I nearly collapsed to the floor from that flashback. I could feel the evil slinking off of me like oil. If Dex’s mother brought that kind of vileness and hatred with her in death, no wonder he was so afraid of her.
And no wonder I was suddenly so afraid for him.
A quick knock at the front door snapped me out of my morbid thoughts before I could dwell on them any longer.
“Kiddo?” he called from outside. “I’ll meet you in the car. We were supposed to be at the diner two minutes ago.”
I coughed. “Coming!”
I slipped on my coat, picked up my bag and ran out into the crisp morning.
The parking lot was coated with a thin layer of frost that sparkled underneath a sun that peeked between billowing clouds. My breath froze in the air and the chill nipped at my nose, but judging from how bare the streets and roofs were, winter was on its way out here. Only the mountains remained thick and white halfway up.
My Doc boots made a pleasing crunching sound on the frost as I carefully trotted toward the running Highlander and jumped in the passenger seat, flinging my bag in the back.
“Sorry,” I apologized, eyeing Dex carefully now. But not too carefully. The last thing he’d want would be for me to treat him any differently because of who was haunting him.
Haunted, I corrected myself. It only happened once. It might not happen again.
Dex paid me no attention and brought the car out of the lot and down the main road. We could see the rotating sign for the diner loud and clear.
“I really hope this place is cheap,” he remarked, “because I’m about $200 short now.”
I stared at him, puzzled.
He shot me a sheepish grin. “Apparently motel mirrors are expensive.”
Seconds later we were pulling up to an old-fashioned diner – The Raven’s Nest - done up in log cabin style.
It was surprisingly dark inside, sticking to a whole “cabin in the woods” theme like the whole town seemed to adhere to, complete with walls of stuffed owls and wood carvings. It was also surprisingly busy, as if all of Snow Crest ate breakfast there on a daily basis. We stood at the entrance where the empty hostess stand was, surveying the room and its peculiar patrons.
Dex leaned down and whispered in my ear, hot breath tickling me, “I bet they make a fantastic cherry pie here.”
I chuckled at the reference and shivered from his breath. I spotted a pretty teenage girl getting out of a booth and coming toward us with an expectant look on her face.
“Are you Dex and Perry?” the girl asked us. She was about Ada’s age, with wide brown eyes and dark hair pulled back into a braid. She was wearing the latest distressed skinny jeans, but her feet were wrapped in worn hiking boots and a giant, ill-fitting flannel shirt graced her lithe upper body.
Dex and I exchanged a look.
“That we are,” he said warily. “And you are?”
She stuck out her hand with a wide grin that showed a pleasing gap between her teeth.
“I’m Christina.”
I scrunched up my forehead. “I thought Christina was one of the staff?”
She nodded, still smiling. “I am. I’m Rigby’s daughter. Come on, I’ll explain.”
She turned and it was only then when we followed her back to the table that I noticed she was walking with a very slight limp, favoring her right leg.
We took a seat at the dark wood booth, Dex and I pressed up together on one side and the teen on the other.
“I hope you don’t mind me saying this,” Dex said, “But we thought you were older. Aren’t you a bit too young to be working for your dad?”
She shrugged and proceeded to pour an obscene amount of sugar into her coffee cup. “Probably, but he needs the help. I’m home schooled over the winter by my ma. She lives right in town. Otherwise I help Rigby.” >
“Is he not your real dad?” I asked, noting it was weird she didn’t call him “dad.”
“Oh he’s real,” she said eyeing her coffee. She slurped it up and wiped the coffee spillage off the top of her lip. “You guys should get the coffee, they are famous for it here.”
Like the waitress had supersonic hearing, a plump lady with purple eyeshadow appeared at the table, hovering with a pot of coffee.
“Hi folks,” she greeted. “Welcome to Snow Crest. Coffee?”
Dex sat back in his seat and beamed at her. “Yes please, Norma. I’d like a cup of coffee and a slice of cherry pie.”
She gave him the stink eye. “I hope you’re being serious because we do have cherry pie. But the name’s Sally.”
“I’m always serious, Sally.” Another grin.
She looked at me and I gave her the I don’t know this guy look. “I’ll have coffee for now.”
She poured the black, steaming liquid in our cups and stalked off.
Christina gave Dex a funny look. “Why did you call her Norma?”
“Ignore him,” I told her. “He thinks we’re in Twin Peaks.”
Her frown continued so I went on, “So you work for your dad. Then you’re the one who was hurt…”
She grimaced and tapped her right leg.
“Yeah. No one would believe me. They thought it was a mountain lion that attacked me, but that was no mountain lion.”
Despite the strange subject matter, she was talking awfully loud, like she wanted everyone in the restaurant to know. I looked around and a few folks were glancing over with faint interest. Their faces said it all. They had heard it all before and they didn’t believe her.
Dex folded his hands in front of him and leaned in across the table.
“Tell us what happened.”
She tilted her head and reached for his face, giving his eyebrow ring a light tug.
“Did that hurt?” she asked, sitting back.
He was nonplussed, as if teenage girls tugged on his eyebrow ring all the time.
“I don’t remember. I was around your age.”
“Things hurt more when you’re my age.”
“You’d be surprised at how untrue that is,” he said solemnly. “So, back to…well, what happened.”
Norma (er, Sally) came by and plunked the pie down for Dex who clapped his hands together. I ordered scrambled eggs and bacon and when the waitress was gone, Christina launched into it.
“We’re not, like, running at the moment, so it’s just this weird in-between stage up at the cabin. I take care of the llamas and horses and stuff, getting them ready for the tourist season, while Rigby goes out and starts clearing trails. He was gone really late one night and there’s still snow up where the cabins are so I was worried cuz you know, it’s a bit sketchy, especially on horseback. I went after him. I knew where he went. We have two cabins, as you’ll find out. There’s the one that we live in, well, when I’m not living in Snow Crest. And the other one is for hunters. We have a guy, Mitch, he’s kind of a weirdo, but helps us out and runs private hunting tours with Rigby. They use the other cabin for that. So I took my horse out along the trail all the way to the cabin. You can do it in less than an hour if you’re really booking it, but there was still snow here and there and so I could only trot in places. Anyway.”
She paused, taking a giant breath and a giant inhale of her coffee. I looked over at Dex who was watching her thoughtfully while shoving the remains of the pie in his mouth. I wondered how he ate it so fast and he gave me a look that said you know how I feel about pie. I did and found myself smirking at the nostalgia.
“Where was I?” Christina said, wiping her lip. “Oh right. I go to the other cabin and it looked like someone was inside, so I thought it was Rigby. I tied up Taffy to the post and the door to cabin was open and everything and there was a very small, dying fire in the fireplace. But, like, no one was there. Then I heard Taffy scream. Like, you know when a horse really whinnies but it’s like a scream? I ran out of the cabin and she was rearing and she just snapped the reins off of the post and galloped off. I didn’t know what to do or what had spooked her. There’s no phone or electricity in there so I was totally stuck. The only thing I could do was make my way back home. I was only a few feet away from the cabin when…”
She trailed off and I realized I was hunched over in suspense. Dex’s hand was on my thigh, squeezing it lightly. I wasn’t sure if he was trying to comfort me or what. I turned my attention back to Christina and prodded her with my eyes for her to continue.
Her gaze ping-ponged between us quizzically. “Are you guys a couple?”
I snorted, unprepared for that question. “What? No.”
She didn’t look convinced. I gave Dex a disgusted look, and shaking my head, brought the same look over to her. “No. We’re just partners. Why?”
She shrugged. “I can tell he’s touching you under the table.”
“I guess he thinks I’m scared,” I explained slowly and moved an inch away from him.
Meanwhile Dex was smiling openly. “I’m trying to win her over. It only works about half the time.”
I lowered my head toward him. “Oh, this is you trying now?”
He matched my look. “Shall I remove my hand?”
The thing was, I didn’t want him to. I loved the feeling of his hands on me, and would love it more if he moved his hand to my inner thigh and slid it up. But I said, “Yes please.”
“Hand has been removed,” he said in a robotic voice. He took it off and my thigh was left feeling cold.
I tugged down at my sweater sleeves and swallowed. “You should probably ignore us for the time being. Please go on with your story.”
She looked lost in her head for a moment. Man, this girl had the shortest attention span.
“So…yeah,” she started up, finally. “I decided to go back home, you know, my other home. On foot. I could jog it. Anyway, I wasn’t far when I heard branches breaking in the forest. I thought it was Rigby or maybe Bandy, so I stopped. I listened, cuz I wasn’t sure. I mean, there are bears and mountain lions around, even though I swear it wasn’t ether of those. I heard this weird low growl, not like a dog but kind of like if someone was trying to clear their throat hardcore. But it wasn’t my dad. It sounded like bad news. I didn’t want to find out what it was and I was totally about to go when I saw something shift coming around the corner of the cabin. It was so dark but it was low and hunched over like this.”
She got out of her seat and stood in the restaurant, demonstrating. Her knees were bent, her back hunched over, her hands poised beneath her, ready to claw. She looked like a cross between a zombie and a velociraptor.
And considering how much Jurassic Park scared me, that was probably the worst combination on earth.
By now, everyone in the diner was staring at the teen and some were even giving a little laugh. She shot them all haughty looks and sat back down.
“Well that was demented looking,” Dex remarked.
“It was demented looking!” she reiterated. “Jeez. And it was dark, covered in hair, and its eyes were crazy black, like holes. Obviously nothing I should stick around for. So I ran and I made it only a few steps before it knocked me down and clawed at my leg, dragging me backward. I tried to turn around to fight, to get a look at it but before I could, Taffy came screeching out of the woods, like she finally remembered she galloped off without me. The Sasquatch let go of me and took off. Here. Look at what it did.”
Christina stuck her leg out of the booth and was trying to roll up her jeans when the waitress came by with our food and interrupted her.
Even though her story hadn’t really scared me (because how could you be scared of something that wasn’t real), I had lost my appetite. I stuck the bacon in my mouth and pushed my eggs over to Dex, who snatched them up and added a helping of hot sauce.
“So, you called this thing Sasquatch,” I said. “No offense, but this doesn’t sound like Sasquatch. Isn’t he, it, whatever, supposed to be tall and big? I mean, Bigfoot…he has big feet…means that it’s tall.”
“I don’t know, do I look like a monster expert? I’m just saying what I saw.”
“Then you went on the news and told everyone about it, that it was a Sasquatch,” Dex said between chews. “But the doctors said your leg looked like you were scratched up by a mountain lion. Those kind of claws.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Of course I went on the news. People should know it’s out there! And yeah, I’ll show you, they definitely were claws.”
She reached down for her pant leg again but I patted her arm, stopping her.
“That’s OK. We believe you. We’re just trying to get our facts straight before we start filming.”
She blew a loose strand of hair out of her face and crossed her arms in a huff. “Well those are my facts. If you want more, you have to talk to Rigby. He’s the one who has seen this beast thing a bunch of times, and has molds of the footprints. And guess what, what I saw exactly matches what I saw. So explain that.”
Dex put his fork down on the empty plate. “We will explain it. That’s why we’re here.”
Ten minutes went past as Christina went off of the topic of Sasquatch and onto how much she wanted to get out of Snow Crest. Apparently her parents had been saving up for university when she finished her schooling but because of the economy and the rising Canadian dollar, the town and the tourism industry were hit really hard over the last few years. The business was dwindling, but she had no choice but to help out her dad. Despite her headstrong personality, I felt sorry for the girl. She might not have to go to school half the year, but it didn’t sound like she should be working up in the mountains either.
After we paid the bill, we went outside and waited for Rigby to show up. My body still wasn’t used to the cold, and I rubbed my hands together fast, wishing I had brought my gloves out of the duffel bag.
“He should be here,” Christina said absently, looking around. “He’ll be in a green truck. I’m just going to call my mom and see if he’s left the house yet.”
She ran back into the diner to use their phone.
“No cell phone,” I noted, thinking it was odd for a teen.
“No service,” said Dex, showing me his iPhone. He was right. I took my phone out of the pocket and it read the same.
“There was some reception at the motel.”
“Maybe it comes and goes.” He looked around him, at the majestic peaks that soared high above the main street. “So what do you think, kiddo?”
“About?”
He kept his hands in his pockets and gestured at the diner with his shoulder. “About all that. Christina. What do you think? Is she full of shit or is she telling the truth?”
I wiggled my lips. “Well, I don’t think it’s either, to be honest. I believe something attacked her but the creature she described isn’t a Sasquatch. Even if she said it was 7 feet tall and as hairy as Robin Williams, I still wouldn’t believe it’s a Sasquatch. There’s obviously some animal out there. I mean, look where we are. And it’s the end of winter, times are tough, food is hard to come by. Maybe a mangy bear went after her because it was desperate.”
“Ah, always blame the mangy bear,” he said, amused.
“You believe her?”
“Not really,” he admitted. “Just playing devil’s advocate. I think we need that whole dynamic now if I’m going to be in front of the camera.”
“Are you nervous about that?”
“Do I look nervous?”
No. I thought. You look ridiculously handsome.
He grinned and nodded to himself. “Are you nervous? First time handling the camera and all?”
“Oh, I’ll be fine. I like a challenge.”
“Is that why you like me?”
“Who said I liked you?”
His eyes shone playfully, turning his irises a deep cocoa. “That’s why I like you, you’re a challenge.”
I folded my arms and leaned back on one leg. “Oh, so that’s why…”
“Well, that and your ass.”
My cheeks flamed. “Thanks.”
“And your breasts.”
“Got it.”
“And what’s between your-”
“Dex,” I warned, cutting him off.
He grinned and stepped toward me. He took his hand out of his pocket and ran his finger down the length of my nose. “What’s between your gorgeous eyes…your cute little nose.”
I tried not to flinch, knowing I had powdered my nose that morning.
“I have a vague recollection of you comparing me to a sexy bunny once,” I mumbled, scrunching it up.
He raised his brows in mock surprise. “Did I say that? Boy, I sure am a charmer sometimes, it’s a wonder I even used to get laid. Must have been the big dick.”
I glared at him. “You think way too much of your dick.”
“So do you,” he replied with a smile. And God damn it, I wished I hadn’t been staring at his crotch right then.
“Dex!” I barked at him, noting that Christina was running back toward us. “There are children here.”
He opened his mouth to retort something back but thankfully shut it as Christina joined our side.
“There he is,” she said and we turned to see a rusted green cab with black exhaust fumes rumbling around the corner. The truck pulled up next to us and a middle-aged man stuck his head out the window. His cheeks were dusted with pock-marks and a red knit cap was pulled down until it met his bushy brown eyebrows. He had an impressive handlebar mustache which I hoped wouldn’t inspire Dex. His mustache had been barely there lately and I liked it that way. It tickled less when I kissed him. >
“I’m Rigby,” the man said in a voice that sounded like his throat was filled with rocks. “Do you guys want to hop in your car and follow us? It’s about an hour drive to the cabin. Do you have chains?”
Dex looked back at the Highlander. “I have snow tires on.”
“That’ll do,” he said. He tapped the side of the door. “Hurry up Christina, we don’t have all day.”
She ran around and popped in the passenger side. Then the truck began to pull away.
“Uh, Dex!” I exclaimed. We exchanged a look and both started running for the Highlander before Rigby’s truck was gone and out of our sight.