September Snow (eBook)

Misty Warner (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
264 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-3509-9500-8 (ISBN)

Infos

Sometimes the worst part of an avalanche is surviving it.

Misty Warner's roots are blue collar and the yield of that is nothing short of pure literary havoc. She lives in Missoula, Montana, where she is a truck driver by day and an author/photographer by night. She also runs a small writer's group at the local library. 'September Snow' is not the first book she has written, but it is the first to be published. To learn more about the author, please visit her website at https://writersynacity.com.

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John has the perfect spot picked out: the top of Spur Mountain. This is where he wants to take Mackenzie so he can get down on one knee and propose to her. Never mind the fact that Mackenzie isn't exactly a willing participant in this little jaunt into the forest. Once he gets her up there, it will all be worth it. All he has to do is get her past a few obstacles, like her dislike of hiking, the recent snowfall that has left more than a few inches on the mountain, and the fight that ensues when she learns that he brought his gun along for protection. As John knows, relationships are all about compromises, so he does what he has to do to stick with his plan. It's only when they're a mile shy of John's goal that they hit an obstacle that can't be bent to anyone's will. The avalanche hits hard and fast, and takes both of them down the mountain in a gut of snow and debris. John is the first to make it to the surface... Mackenzie follows... Neither survive.

Textauszug

Chapter 1

I have the place all picked out: the top of Spur Mountain. It’s perfect. A person can’t get closer to heaven without going six feet under. I have been up there a few times myself. Eight, to be exact. And for each and every solo march, the view has never failed to polish and renew my strength in everything. So, for me, there can be no better place to ask Mackenzie Liermann to be my wife. The only problem is getting her up there.

Chewing on the inside of my cheek, I slide a small blue box from my pack and open it. Nestled inside is a one-carat, princess-cut diamond set in a platinum band. Even now, I cringe at the price tag the jeweler expertly kept hidden until an unyielding bond had formed between man and ring. Seven thousand dollars. Both my ass and wallet had puckered under the amount. That much money could buy a lot of shit. A decent truck with a few miles beaten into it, enough tools to open a small construction business, or even a village in Mexico.

With care, I had handed the ring back to the trim, upswept sales lady and taken three steps in reverse, towards the other options that didn’t boast of cuts requiring a possible split credit card payment plan. But my eyes kept roaming back to that first glass case; to the only rock I wanted to see on Mackenzie’s left hand as it rested on my chest with the smell of our sex soaking into the sheets or perched on the window sill of the kitchen as we did dishes together in the evening. No, it was that ring or no ring, so I had sucked up the cost and walked out of Dalton Jewelers far poorer than I had gone in.

One hurdle down. Nine hundred and ninety-nine to go.

Again, I think of what I will be asking of Mackenzie today.

For me, a decent hike is fifteen to twenty miles. For her, a long, drawn-out one is about five or six. After that, her humor drops off, and no amount of Red Vine Licorice can keep her in good spirits. To reach the spot where I intend to drop down to one knee, we will have to trek twelve miles, six up and six down. And they will not be easy miles. The forest service information panel at the trailhead declares the route to be “challenging,” and it is, given some of its long pulls. But with us in our prime—me at thirty-four and Mackenzie at twenty-eight—and both of us in decent shape, my due being exercise and flawless genetics from her, I deemed the distance and terrain to be bearable.

Of course, all of that was before Mother Nature decided to add a little extra knot to the cluster and dump a hefty amount of snow both in the mountains and on the valley floor last night. And while all the weather men agree that small flurries aren’t unusual for Montana in September—we’ve already had several in the last few weeks—the depth of this latest one is definitely noteworthy. I want to kick every living thing on Earth. Why couldn’t winter wait just one more weekend before visiting?

It crosses my mind for the hundredth time that I could just postpone the whole trip and do the marital solicit later. Only, carrying around Mackenzie’s ring is killing me; largely because I’m anxious to see the whole thing through and hear her say yes. And partly because I’m scared to death that I’ll lose the ring itself somehow. And how exactly might this happen?

Yesterday, I ridiculously feared floods, sink drains, and lightning strikes. Today, I assume a bear attack will sever the two of us. Skip the part that if a bear claws at my face, the least of my problems will be an adrift piece of jewelry. That, and the fact that there hasn’t been a bear attack on Spur Mountain for years, if ever. Okay, so no bear attack, but what if I reach in my red North Face for something and it falls out. It’s a small box. It could easily vanish into a thatch of forest. Or, worse yet, Mackenzie could witness the tumble, pry in, and send all my plans afloat.

Of course, none of that will happen if she bails on me even before the trip starts.

Unable to shake this vex, I shut the ring box, place it securely in a side pocket of my pack, and pick up my cell phone. Going to the call app, I find her profile pic—a beautiful shot of her long, dark hair and blue eyes—and hit the dial icon.

She picks up on the third ring and skips such pleasantries as “Hi, how are you?” and/or “Good morning.” Instead, she goes straight for the obvious and nettling.

“It snowed, John.”

My shoulders sag under the declaration. I knew this would be an issue because she doesn’t understand and can’t fathom what I have planned, but once we get up there, once she sees why, all will be forgiven, the trek will be worth it, and happiness will abound. I just have to get her up there. “Yeah, I saw, but it’ll be fine.”

“I’ll freeze to death,” she states as if this were a fact and not a concern.

“You won’t freeze. It’s supposed to get up into the fifties with plenty of sunshine. Plus, you’ve got me. I’ll keep you warm.” I think of the thick socks and gloves I’ve tossed into my pack. Of her in my arms, naked, folded in tight. Okay, so it’ll probably be a little too cold up there for celebratory sex, but later, at my place or hers, after I’ve placed that seven-thousand-dollar ring on her finger, we can leave a nice trail of packs, pants, and hats straight to the bedroom. Forget about showering, our hands will be all over each other, our skin still cool from being outside.

“I’ll freeze,” Mackenzie repeats.

Three more shots of blood course through my body before my mind manages to drag itself from where it wants to be to where it needs to be. Unfortunately, my dick doesn’t follow, and my jaw clenches. Deep breaths, I tell myself. Remember patience, give and take, and all that crap that married people spew that no one ever listens to until they’re on the cuff of popping a very important question. “Mackenzie.” I hear the bark in my voice and dial it back. After all, I love this woman and, in the long run, this is for her. I start anew. “Mackenzie, I promise you won’t freeze. I’ve packed extra socks and gloves. The weather is supposed to be—” She groans and I groan back. “What?”

“Extra socks and gloves?”

I don’t see the problem. “Yes, in case you get wet or need the extra layers.” Hiking 101: always carry additional warm gear. This, of course, is pushed higher up on the priority list when weather conditions such as a light rain or a recent snowfall have sodden, or buried, the very spot I have picked out. Without thinking, I unzip the pocket of my bag again and extract the ring box. She is going to say yes, right? I can’t imagine her saying no, but what if she does? What if we go all the way up there, I pour out my heart and soul, and she says no?

Suddenly aware that I haven’t heard Mackenzie say anything in a while, I retrace our conversation to where we left off. The socks and her comfort. “Okay, Mackenzie. What is it? What’s wrong?” I can practically hear her chewing on her lower lip, debating whether or not to tell me. She does this a lot: chew on her lip. When she does it at a restaurant, it’s because she can’t decide between a vanilla shake and fries or a chocolate shake and onion rings, and it’s cute as hell. But when I’m the object of her indecision? Not so much. “Come on. Just tell me.” I wait for the list. The miles she doesn’t want to do. The early start I’m demanding of her this morning. Her mother weighing in to declare the whole trip unsafe.

“It’s my pack,” she says.

Oh yes. The boulder of torture. The form we fight about every time I ask her to put it on. I just can’t get her to understand the pivotal part of each individual having their own survival gear. Perhaps it’s my lack of experience that challenges her. With only about three years of hiking under my belt, it’s not like I can boast of having scaled the Everest, but still. Shit can happen. I want her to be prepared.

But I also want her to hike with me today and in the future, so I must tread lightly, which requires me to take a deep breath before addressing her forever annoyance. “What about it, babe?” Mackenzie hates the term “babe,” but I forget occasionally. I keep talking, trying to cover the fraught endearment. “I get that you don’t like carrying it, but it’s kind of important. Especially on days like today—”

She cuts me off. “I know. I know.”

Her tone suggests that I have perhaps used this speech one too many times. I am going to have to quit saying it. She gets it. It is important. “Then what?” I ask.

“It’s just that . . .”

She’s going to cancel. I can hear it in her dissolving tone, which means I’m going to need a plan B. Rifted but not bleeding, I start brooding over the alternate venues I have in mind.

There’s the place we first met: the Open Table Steakhouse. Great place, prime rib every day. And open late enough on the weekends for drunks to come in and slurp up some cheese fries slathered in brown gravy before going home. Because nothing says forever-love like a soused man with lumps of food stuck in his beard sitting just a few feet away from the action. Plus, Mackenzie waitresses there, so I would be a star asshole if I dragged her to those salt mines on her day off.

The next location I’ve pondered and tossed is the...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 1.4.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• ISBN-13: 979-8-3509-9500-8 / 9798350995008