Chapter 15 - The Summer Storm
July brought a ferocious mountain storm that rolled in from the west with black, churning clouds and distant, rumbling thunder that rattled the windowpanes on the south road.
We had spent the afternoon securing the loose equipment around the barns, bringing the young calves under the heavy timber lean-tos, and battening down the coop doors. By dusk, the sky had turned the color of bruised slate, and the wind began howling through the valley, snapping dead cedar branches and sending sheets of rain sideways across the gravel lane.
As I stood on the porch watching the lightning fork across the jagged peaks of the ridge, headlights flickered weakly down the lane.
A battered, mud-splattered sedan crept forward through the sheets of blinding rain, its engine sputtering and knocking like it was about to give out entirely. The car stalled a dozen yards from the gate, its hazard lights blinking a pathetic, erratic orange against the dark wall of the storm.
I grabbed my heavy oilskin slicker from the peg by the door, pulled the wide-brimmed hat down over my forehead, and stepped out into the blinding downpour.
The rain hit my face like buckshot as I splashed through the puddles toward the stalled car. I pulled the driver's side door open against the howling wind.
Inside, soaked to the bone and shivering violently, sat Daniel Voss.
He looked like a ghost—his skin gray and waxy, his eyes sunken deep into dark, hollow sockets. His cheap motel clothes were ruined, plastered against his skin by the freezing rain pouring through a blown-out passenger window.
May you like
“Sam...” he choked out, his teeth chattering so hard he could barely form the syllables. “The... the engine died. I didn't mean... I just wanted to see—”
“Get out of the car, Daniel,” I commanded, my voice cutting easily through the roar of the thunder.
