Something hits me full in the face, and I scramble back, clawing. A bag. There’s a plastic bag over my head, and I can’t breathe, and I can’t pull it away, and my gloves keep slipping on the plastic, and I’m panicking too much to take them off.
I manage to catch a fold in the plastic, and I yank and find myself holding the emergency blanket that formed my shelter. I fight my way back, but there’s no way this blanket is staying on again. Not with this wind.
I need to take shelter, even if shelter is no more than hunkering down behind a fallen tree and wrapping the blanket around me.
I turn to leave the clearing, and he’s there. The man in the snowmobile suit. Standing less than a meter away. I can’t run in snow. He’s too close for me to pull my gun. I swing at him. It’s all I can do. I drop the emergency blanket and swing. He grabs my arm in an aikido hold, but it’s not quite right; his grasp is a little too high.
Lower, Eric. You can’t get a proper fulcrum point there. All I have to do is …
I twist, as I did then, and I break free, and there’s no thrill of victory, no follow-up swing. I know it’s no coincidence that I’m thinking of Dalton. As I break away, I catch a glimpse of his face, lit with a fury that makes me suspect I’d be better off facing the guy in the snowmobile suit.
“Eric.”
NINE
Dalton propels me from the clearing like I’m a five-year-old being marched from the mall after a tantrum. Four months ago, I’d have thrown him off and warned him against ever laying a hand on me again. Then I’d have added it to the list of “Things That Prove Sheriff Eric Dalton Is an Asshole.”
That list included locking residents in the cell, tossing them into the horse trough, and marching them through town, arm behind their back. A power-drunk bully with a badge, who fancied himself some kind of Wild West sheriff, two seconds from ordering miscreants to a noon showdown in the town square.
That’s what I used to think. Some residents still do. But most know better, and they understand that’s how he maintains order in a town where he is the only law. Today, I see the sheen of sweat on his face, hear him still catching his breath, and I know he saw that flare and came running full speed from wherever he’d been searching. He’s still in a panic, and anger is how he channels that. No “thank God I found you, Casey,” but “Goddamn it, Butler, this was the fucking stupidest stunt you’ve pulled yet.”
He marches me through the forest, not a glance at his surroundings, not a glance at his compass, knowing exactly where to find the sled. He strong-arms me onto the back of it and then takes the front and clicks the ignition. The engine roars to life … and the snowmobile goes nowhere. He gives it gas. The tread spins.
I get words then. A string of expletives barely audible over the wind. He climbs off. I try to do the same, but his hand slams down on my shoulder, as if he might lose me again. I give him a look, lift his hand, and climb off the sled.
There’s at least two feet of snow on the path. Heavy snow from the earlier downfall with a layer of lighter stuff from the new storm. Our combined weight is too much to make it through that.
He turns the sled around to use the tracks he made coming out. We climb on, but the treads just grind deeper into the snow.
Dalton hands me the keys and points. I hand them back. He glowers. I shake my head. He reaches out, as if to put my ass on that sled, whether I want to go or not.
“It’s too slick,” I say, shouting to be heard over the wind. “I’m not a good enough sled driver, and I’ll ride right off the path and then we’ll be back where we started, me stranded in the forest in a snowstorm.”
He glares, knowing I’m playing into his fears. Then he looks up and down the path, hand shading his eyes.
“We need to find shelter,” I say. “It’ll be dark soon.”
He gives me a no-shit look, but I’m still not getting conversation. If he opens his mouth, he’ll want to ream me out for leaving Rockton against his orders, and that’s hardly productive.