21. Knox
KNOX
Digging Out & the Rehearsal Dinner
Storm winding down, thank the Lord!
Supper: June James’s Chicken & dumplings · Green salad · Collard greens · Spicy Cowboy Cider
Apparently, surviving yesterday hadn’t guaranteed I’d make it through this morning.
My neck had a crick in it the size of Montana.
The inside of my mouth felt as if someone had sucked every ounce of moisture from the air.
I sat up, slow, and every muscle I owned hurt, not to mention my churning stomach.
The cold from the day before had gotten down into them and didn’t seem inclined to leave.
And God, I was hungover. My ribs ached, and my ankle was throbbing again from whatever I’d done to it out there in the snow.
But none of it compared to the ache in my heart.
Madeleine had sent me out in the storm.
I rolled over and there was Grant, dead asleep, with one arm flung over his face. Between us was an empty bottle of Jack and a plate with nothing but a slimy looking piece of lettuce smeared with mustard.
The storm had passed. A hard bright winter light peeped out from under the shades.
The howl of wind was gone and in its place were the sounds of engines, shovels, and men.
Outside, the staff seemed to be digging us out.
I heard the deep diesel cough of a tractor turning over somewhere out by the barn, catching, settling into a rhythm.
A steady metal scrape of a plow blade dragging down a road, that long grinding shhhhk and then the softer whump of the snow rolling off to the side.
Ranch hands called to one another across the yard.
A dog barked its fool head off at all the commotion, clearly thrilled.
I went to the window and pulled up the shade, squinting at the bright light. Blue skies. At least two feet of snow. Maybe more.
Grant stirred. “For God’s sake, close the shade.” He sat up, saw the empty bottle, groaned, and dropped his head into his hands.
“Tell me we didn’t drink all of it,” he said. “You poured it out, right?”
“We drank all of it.”
“God.” He didn’t move. “My head.”
“Yeah.”
“How’s yours?”
“Like somebody parked a tractor on it.”
Grant hauled himself upright against the side of the bed. “Sounds like we’ll be out of here sooner than later.”
“The Moons will make sure of it,” I said. “They won’t want Ivy to miss out on any of the wedding stuff.”
“Right. Rehearsal dinner tonight,” Grant said.
By the tone in his voice, it appeared he was dreading it as much as I was.
“There anything to eat in this place?” Grant asked.
“I’ve got some scones in the fridge from the other day. I think.” I limped over to open the mini-fridge. Sure enough, there was a bag of scones, hard as hockey pucks. “They might be stale.”
“Doesn’t matter. We need something to soak up all that whiskey.”
I tossed one to him and then made us a pot of coffee. God willing, we would feel half human shortly.
A knock on the door made me flinch. Would I ever be able to hear a knock without the terrible memory that came with it?
It was Finley at the door, clipboard in one hand and a giant walkie-talkie in the other.
“Hey, Knox, just checking up on you. Making sure you survived the night.”
“Yeah, I’ve got Grant with me too.”
“Excellent. I was worried when no one answered at cabin three.” She spoke into her walkie-talkie. “Grant and Knox are safe in cabin one.” She reached into a box by her feet. “Elliot put together some breakfast pastries if you’d like a bag?”
“Yes, please,” Grant called from the bed.
Finley peered around me, clearly spotted the empty whiskey bottle, and chuckled. “I better leave more than one bag for you two. Looks like a rough night.”
“You have no idea,” I said, grimacing.
She reached down into the box again, coming up with two packets of ibuprofen. “These might come in handy too.”
“God bless you,” I said.
Grant lumbered over to the door. “Any word on the others? Is Luci safe?”
“Yes, just talked to her,” Finley said. “She said she slept through most of it. Took a sleeping pill.”
“And everyone else?” I asked, unable to stop myself from glancing toward Madeleine’s cabin. Was I still clinging to hope that there was an explanation for why she hadn’t answered the door? Had she somehow gone to someone else’s cabin and I hadn’t see her?
“Yes, everyone’s accounted for,” Finley said. “Madeleine said she was scared to death. Poor thing hid in the bathroom all night with her noise cancelling earbuds in.”
“She mention hearing anyone at her door?” Grant asked.
Finley shook her head. “No. No one would have been foolish enough to go out in that blizzard. Right?”
Grant gave me a sideways glance.
Had she not heard me? A sliver of hope entered my heart. Was Grant right?
“The rehearsal dinner’s still on for tonight,” Finley said.
“But instead of outside where the wedding will be tomorrow, we have to do it in the lodge. Our entire staff will do whatever it takes to make sure it’s a special evening.
And now, I have to go. You guys stay put until we’ve got everything cleared, okay? ”
“Yes, ma’am,” Grant said.
“Are cell phones working yet?” I asked.
“No. Sounds like the towers are out but they should be back up by late tonight if all goes well.” Finley smiled. “Off I go. Enjoy your breakfast.”
I shut the door behind her. Grant raised the shade on the window that looked into Madeleine’s cabin. Her shade was still down.
Typical.
By evening, the Moons had performed a miracle.
You’d never have known, walking up to the lodge that night, that a storm had darn near taken the whole ranch off the map twelve hours before.
The paths were plowed clean and lined with luminaries, little bags with candles glowing gold in the blue dark.
Every window of the lodge was lit, making the snow appear silver-blue under a clear sky, the first stars out bright over the mountains.
And the moon. I clocked it before I could stop myself—fat and swelling, most of the way there, a night shy of full.
Tomorrow, I thought. Full tomorrow. No, I was not allowed to think about that ever again. I’d be kissing no one but the bottom of a whiskey glass tomorrow.
But what if she hadn’t heard me knocking? Even if that was true, she’d still walked past me that afternoon, leaving me to stand waving like I expected her to come back to me. She’d walked away. That much I knew and maybe that was all I needed to know.
I arrived at the wedding rehearsal right on time, despite wishing I could skip the whole thing. Sammie Moon already had the rehearsal running like a drill sergeant with a clipboard and a smile.
“Okay, okay, listen up, my beautiful people—” she said in her soft voice, clapping her hands, herding us all into the big front room of the lodge where chairs set up in rows now with an aisle down the middle.
“We’re gonna walk it once, maybe twice, and then you’ll be rewarded with a delicious wedding party dinner.
Knox and Beck, we’re going to skip the music today since Ivy wants it to be fresh.
But I’ll walk you through what you’re to do and when. ”
Sammie had me sit on a stool, just like the one tomorrow, and went through when I would play each of the songs Ivy had chosen for the ceremony.
I tuned my guitar to distract myself from watching Madeleine.
Regardless, my gaze drifted her way without permission, like touching a bruise to see if it still hurt.
It still hurt. She had on jeans that hugged her just right and a soft cream-colored sweater.
Her hair was down. Make-up perfect. Still, there was something different about her tonight.
Deep smudges of purple under her eyes that makeup couldn’t fully hide.
And she looked sad and nervous. Jittery.
In the ten years I’d known her, I’d never seen her nervous.
Don’t forget, I reminded myself. She walked away from you and quite possibly sent you into a storm where you nearly died. Don’t go soft now.
Sammie walked everyone through the ceremony. Jasper Moon would officiate the real thing, but for now he just said a few words. Sammie told Jack where to stand and where the bride would enter from. Rhett walked Madeleine down the aisle, best man and maid of honor, her hand tucked in his elbow.
When they reached the front, Rhett handed her off to her spot opposite where the groom would stand. And for just a second, Madeleine looked my way and held my gaze. One second. Two. I looked at the floor. When I looked back up, she’d turned away.
For the rehearsal dinner supper, Ivy had asked for chicken and dumplings. Apparently Jack had tried to make it for her on their first date and it had been a disaster. Just the meal, not the date. Obviously. There were great steaming pans of it, plus a green salad and collard greens.
The cocktail of the night was a Spicy Cowboy Cider, which was essentially bourbon, hot cider, and cinnamon. It went down easy and warmed me from the inside, all memories of my headache from that morning already forgotten.
Everyone was in a festive mood. We’d survived a storm and were now safe and warm, surrounded by friends to celebrate the marriage of two of our own. Normally, I would have loved every minute of it. Tonight, however, my heart was too bruised and bloodied. All I could think about was Madeleine.