Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 76647 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76647 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 307(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
But one had arrived, and it was making its presence known.
Crack.
The unbelievably loud sound made my heart skip several beats before resuming its regularly scheduled rhythm.
“Sierra? Are you okay?” The noise had been so loud that my friend Alyssa, over a thousand miles away in Louisiana, had flinched too.
“It’s okay,” I assured her image on the laptop on the desk in front of me. Then I had to tell her the whole story—how the weather had gotten warmer two days ago—warm enough that it had actually started to rain.
“In February? In the mountains?”
It had been hard for me to believe, too. But the warmer temps didn’t last long. As night fell, all the water on the branches and the ground had frozen. Now I could barely set foot on the deck or the front porch, not without my feet slipping out from under me. And the frozen branches were so heavy that several times an hour, I’d hear a sharp crack of one breaking from the weight.
Alyssa looked so concerned that I had to assure her how much I was enjoying the solitude. It was the perfect place to work. The large desk dominated the living room. The window over the desk showed the frozen forest outside. The view was still gorgeous, even if the ice covered everything. I was beginning to see why our mutual friend Kylie was transfixed by mountains.
Still trying to reassure Alyssa, I told her about the guys’ dog, a huge collie that had made its way down here when it was raining. He was a big, friendly guy, and he’d let me dry him off on the front porch. He’d even given me a big grin when I brought a cookie out to him.
But Alyssa, who’d recently met the men of her dreams, was far more interested in the men than the dog. “Hey, next time it comes by, attach a note to its collar saying that you’re single,” she suggested.
“Very funny,” I said, looking away. I liked Alyssa, a lot. She was in her early twenties, like me, but I hadn’t known her all that long. Apparently not long enough for her to realize that I was far more comfortable with a collie than a man. Dogs, I trusted. Men, I didn’t. At least, not most of them. I didn’t understand how any woman who’d spent most of her life in Hollywood could.
A sound from outside like a deep groan caught my attention. It felt like the entire cabin had shuddered. Still, I felt safe and warm inside. The ceiling was low, unlike the high roof on the cabin up the hill. Because my place was small, it kept me nice and cozy.
“Everything okay?” Alyssa asked.
“Yeah.” Ever since the ice had coated every tree in sight, the woods had been anything but quiet. “I just thought I—"
CRACK.
The noise was as loud as a cannon, and it sounded like it was right outside. Instinctively, I ducked down. A roar hit my ears, a terrible sound like a boat crashing ashore and being torn apart on jagged rocks. A shadow crossed over me, and a heavy wooden beam came crashing down, making the wooden floor tremble as it landed. I dropped to my knees as more debris fell. It felt like dozens of icy hands were pushing me down. My rolling chair was knocked to the side as my knees gave out. It felt like the sky itself was falling on me.
Crying out, I covered my head, trying to scramble under the desk, but I couldn’t. Something huge pinned me down. Something huge and heavy and ice cold.
I tried to move out from under it, but it was everywhere. I gasped, trying to draw a breath, but the air was too cold and the branches on me too heavy.
From somewhere far away, I heard Alyssa frantically calling my name before the sound cut off, mid-syllable. There was another noise, far in the distance, but I couldn’t place it.
All I could do was wait. Shivering. Afraid. Pinned down.
I didn’t know what I was waiting for—or if it was coming at all.
2
TRISTAN
“How are we supposed to get anything done with all the noise out there?” Carter grumbled. “I can’t hear myself think.”
“Maybe you’re not,” I offered, just to get a rise out of him, but I knew what he meant. The constant clamor of tree branches snapping under the weight of the ice sounded like gunshots, and it had us all on edge. So much for coming up here to get real work done.
“It’ll melt soon enough,” Drew said. He was the youngest of the three of us, and as far as I knew, had spent his whole life in San Francisco. Not sure how that made him an expert on Colorado mountains.
“Sure, once all the branches are down,” Carter muttered.