One Hot Forty-Five

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“Ready?” He pulled on his gloves, reached over and turned the key to put down his window. Snow cascaded in. He dug through the snow until he could see daylight and falling snow. “Come on.”

“IS EVERYTHING ALL RIGHT?” Roberta asked as Violet tossed an armload of clothing into the backseat, handed her a couple boxes of crackers and some salami and cheese, and slid behind the wheel.

“Perfect.”

“Are those your clothes?”

“They’re my mother’s, if you must know. I had to borrow a few of her things.” Violet gave her a look, daring her to ask what had happened to her own clothes.

Roberta eyed her but was smart enough not to cross that line. “So what now?”

“We hang out until it’s time to go to my mother’s wedding shower, what else?” Violet snapped.

“Cool,” Roberta said. “I love wedding showers.”

Violet cut her eyes to her fellow escapee and questioned her own sanity for bringing Roberta along. True, Roberta had helped get the Santa costumes, since they weren’t allowed real clothing on the criminally insane ward, and she had stood guard while Violet had stolen the SUV.

It had been Roberta’s idea that they steal the Santa costumes for the upcoming Christmas show. “They will be warmer than our regulation hospital scrubs, and who is going to pull over three women dressed as Santas?” But Violet was beginning to think it was about time to ditch Roberta. All that kept her from it as she drove away from her former home was the fact that she might need Roberta in the near future.

“They say you’re the company you keep,” her dead grandmother said from the backseat with a chuckle. “In this case, two crazy peas in a pod.”

“Shut up,” Violet snapped.

Roberta looked over at her. “Your dead grandmother again?”

“That Roberta’s a sharp one, all right,” Grandma said. “Sharper than you, since going to your mother’s shower is one of the dumbest things you’ve ever come up with. What’s the point?”

Violet glared into the rearview mirror at her grandmother for a moment, then concentrated on the road. The snow was coming down so hard now that if she hadn’t known the road, she would have ended up in the ditch.

She drove back to Whitehorse and turned onto the road to the Tin Cup. It surprised her how many cars were parked in the lot. She parked on the highway side on a small hill facing the large pond just off the road and cut the lights.

In the restaurant, she could see decorations hanging in front of the windows and people moving around behind the thin drapes.

“I thought we were going to a shower?” Roberta said.

Violet shot her a look. “We wait here for my mother.”

“Then we follow her and run her off the road, drag her out of her car and beat her senseless,” Roberta said with a smile. “How does that sound?”

Violet didn’t answer as she helped herself to some of the neatly cut cheese and salami. It had been wrapped in the refrigerator, the boxes of crackers on the table with the note propped up against one of the boxes.

I’m sorry. The cheese and salami was all I had on hand.

Her mother had left her food, knowing she would come by the house. Knowing she would be hungry.

“Don’t get all sentimental,” her grandmother said from the backseat. “You should be in there at that party, eating that good food, not out here eating cheese and crackers.”

The bite in her mouth turned to sawdust. Violet swallowed, hating that her grandmother was right. The unfairness of it all made her want to strike out at someone. That someone would have to be her mother.

DEDE DIDN’T TRUST LANTRY, BUT she didn’t want to freeze to death in his pickup in a snowbank, either. She had little choice but to follow him. Lantry had the gun and, for the time being, she would have to go along with whatever he said.

She slithered out the window, crawling across the top of the wind-crusted drift to the edge of the road where Lantry lifted her up onto the more solid ground of the roadbed.

It was snowing harder than ever. The wind whipped the stinging icy flakes around her, freezing air biting at any bare flesh it could find.

“Cover your face and stay close,” Lantry yelled over the wind as he motioned for her to follow him.

She squinted into the falling snow, then drew the costume up so only her eyes were uncovered. The cold and wind made her eyes tear. The boots on her feet made walking difficult.

Keeping to the tracks the pickup had made, she followed Lantry. But within a dozen yards, the wind had blown in the tracks and she found herself plowing through the drifts behind him, thankful for the moment that she wasn’t alone out here in this storm.

Ducking her head against the bite of the snow and wind, she was at least glad for the thickness of the plush Santa suit and her hospital-issued cotton scrubs underneath. Following him, she put one foot in front of the other, trying not to think about the cold or her fear of what would happen once they reached the house he’d said would be back up the road.

Just as she’d done as a young girl, she counted her blessings to keep her mind off the cold and exhaustion that made each step a trial. At least she wasn’t locked in a cage, and the men after her hadn’t caught her. Yet.

That was as far as she could get on blessings. She was cold, tired, hungry, thirsty and scared. As badly as she couldn’t wait to reach the house and get out of the bitter cold and snow, she dreaded getting anywhere that had a phone.

She didn’t know how far they’d walked. She’d lost track of time, concentrating only on putting one foot in front of the other. The cold had numbed her senses, and she was beginning to believe Lantry had lied about seeing a mailbox, when he touched her arm, startling her since she hadn’t realized he’d stopped.

He motioned for her to follow as he held two strands of barbed wire apart so she could climb through the fence. Then he broke a trail through the snow. Ahead, she caught a glimpse of a house through the driving snow and thought she might burst into tears with relief.

No lights glowed behind the windows of the two-story house. No Christmas decorations adorned the front yard or hung from the eaves. Was it possible the house was deserted? Just as she started to latch on to that hope, she heard a horse snort and saw three ghostlike shapes appear out of the storm next to a wooden corral fence.

The horses had a layer of snow on the quilted blankets covering their backs. As they trotted off, she saw that the road into the house was drifted in and didn’t look as if it had been used for a while. Maybe the home- owners had only gone away for the holidays, leaving enough water and hay for the horses until they returned.

She slogged through the snow, the drifts to her thighs, the cold seeping into her bones. Just a little farther. She stumbled, her legs no longer willing to take another step.