Midnight Exposure (Midnight #1)(28)
She backed into the shadow of an evergreen, which cut the driving wind in half. A shiver raced from her feet to her nape and lodged in her bones. She needed to keep moving. Snow clung to her hair and clothes, and then melted from diffusing body heat. Water invaded her crewneck and slid down her spine. Her body temperature had already dropped during her long day in the cellar. Wet clothing wasn’t going to help. She needed to find help or shelter—soon. Both would be even better.
Had Mae noticed Jayne never returned to the inn? Was anyone looking for her? Like Reed Kimball? Wishful thinking. He’d bolted from their impromptu “date” like a man with something else on his mind. But she’d had an appointment to meet with the mayor this morning. Maybe he’d get concerned when she missed it. Regardless, at the moment she was on her own.
How far from town was she?
She scanned the wilderness around her. Nothing but trees and white stuff as far as she could see. White obscured everything, including the air. She’d get lost out there in a heartbeat. On the drive up, her GPS had shown a lot of large green blotches all around Huntsville. Even with the risk her assailant would break free and follow her, it would be better to keep to the road than wander aimlessly into thousands of acres of frozen nothing. If she possessed one ounce of luck, the falling snow would fill in her footprints before he broke out of the cellar.
Jayne listened. No sound to indicate her captor had escaped. Yet.
She skirted the house and followed the vehicle tracks down the long driveway. Her boots swished through the fluffy layer of dry powder with little effort. Still, how long could she keep going? Four karate classes a week kept her strong. She’d gotten through a grueling black belt test last fall. Every Sunday she and her brother Conor ran an eight-mile loop along the Schuylkill River. But she’d never run without a jacket in the middle of a winter storm with zero food or water for at least twenty-four hours, maybe longer.
Eating snow would hydrate her, but would also lower her body temperature even more. At the moment, hypothermia was a bigger threat than dehydration.
She pulled the sleeves of her sweater down over her aching hands. Her feet, encased in fashionable but not waterproof boots, turned to blocks of painful ice in minutes. Her toes felt as if they’d break off with each step.
Jayne assessed her surroundings. The road did not appear to have been plowed recently. There were no mounds of snow on the roadsides. Jayne stopped and dug underneath the fresh powder with her boot, but all she found was more packed snow. Nope. This road hadn’t been plowed since the last storm two weeks ago. That would make it a secondary road or private drive with little or no traffic. Not good.
She faltered when the lane ended in a T with another, wider road, wide enough to be an actual public road. Jayne could see the partially filled depressions where multiple sets of tires had traveled not too long ago. Snow banks lined each side of the road. Hope squeezed her chest. She dug through the fresh snow. Pavement! This road must be on the plow route.
Her excitement at finding a more frequently traveled street was dimmed by the next question. Should she go left or right? Which way would take her toward civilization? The road looked completely identical in either direction: long, white, and empty. Tree limbs bowed overhead, forming a tunnel of white-coated lattice.
A gust of wind rocked her. She had to keep moving. Jayne flipped a mental coin and turned right. Her feet stumbled for the first few steps until she fell into an awkward rhythm. Soaked wool and denim weighted her limbs. Her steps felt slower than before, as if she were wading through mud instead of light, fresh powder.
How far did she have to go?
She pushed the question from her head and focused on each individual step.
Swish, swish, swish. Jayne’s legs crumbled under her. Her knees sank into the snow. She wasn’t going to make it. Her chances of surviving this situation were minuscule. She had no idea how to survive in the forest. A groan from the trees startled her. Her head whipped around. Was that the wind moving ice-encased branches or could that have been an animal? Bears hibernated, didn’t they?
She pushed to her feet. A plow or salt truck was bound to come through eventually. If she didn’t get up, it would run right over her collapsed and frozen body. They wouldn’t find her until the spring thaw.
A faint, high-pitched sound drifted through the trees, and Jayne swallowed a whimper. Wind or snowmobile? Fear drove her forward.
Strangely enough, once she progressed beyond numb, the cold faded. Her body actually began to feel warmer. Hypothermia might not be such a bad way to go after all. Definitely preferable to whatever her kidnapper had in store for her.
Jayne thought of her three brothers and took another step. They needed her. She couldn’t abandon them.
The low purr of an engine cut through the storm’s furious howl. It came from in front of her, the opposite direction that her kidnapper would use if he were following her trail.
But was the sound real or an illusion conjured up by her desperate imagination like an oasis mirage to a desert wanderer?
She moved toward the sound and lost her footing. Unable to catch herself with sluggish reflexes, she fell face-first into the foot-deep powder, directly in the path of the oncoming vehicle. White flakes bombarded her face like tiny needles as she lifted her head and squinted at the vision. A set of lights approached. She tried to belly-crawl off the road, but her arms gave out.
The headlights drew closer. From the woods, a buzzing sound, much too high-pitched to be an automobile, sent a fresh wave of panic into her frozen brain. She ordered her body to rise and run but it refused to respond.