Chapter 3
By early afternoon, the storm had committed fully to whatever it was doing. Snow came down sideways now, thick enough that the tree line at the edge of the property had gone soft and gray, and the wind had a low, steady howl to it that made the whole house feel smaller than it was.
Alex had unpacked properly, showered, and put on real clothes, the kind that made her feel like herself again instead of someone who’d been ambushed by a stranger in yoga pants.
She found Dani in the living room, cross-legged on the rug with a paperback she must have pulled from the shelf, not reading so much as staring out at the whiteout beyond the windows.
“We may be inside for a while,” Dani said, without looking over. “This storm is insane. I guess I’ll have to wait to break in my new snowshoes.”
“Wonderful.” Alex dropped onto the couch, resisting the urge to fold her arms like a sulking teenager. “Two weeks of quiet, and instead I get trapped with a stranger and an unlimited buffet of nothing to do.”
“There’s a whole house here. I’m sure we’ll find something.”
Alex considered that, considered the long stretch of afternoon in front of her, and felt something competitive flare up in her chest before she could stop it. “There’s a wine cellar.”
That got Dani’s attention. She looked over, one eyebrow raised. “A wine cellar.”
“Behind the pantry. Cass and Marisol collect, it’s not a huge room, but it’s well stocked.
” Alex was already standing, already halfway convinced this was purely a practical suggestion and not, in any way, an excuse to prove she knew this house better than a woman who’d found a jack for an old landline in twenty minutes flat. “There’s a keypad. I have the code.”
“Of course you do.” Dani set the book down, unfolding up off the rug with an ease that Alex was starting to find genuinely irritating, the kind of loose, unbothered grace that made every one of Alex’s own movements feel stiff by comparison.
“Lead the way, then. I’d hate for you to have a secret you couldn’t show off. ”
“It’s not showing off. It’s information relevant to our situation.”
“Sure it is.” Dani was already following her toward the pantry, close enough that Alex could feel her amusement radiating without having to turn around and confirm it. “Very practical. Very unrelated to you wanting me to know you’ve been in this house before.”
Alex didn’t dignify that with a response, mostly because it was true, and she wasn’t ready to admit how transparent she apparently was to a woman she’d met four hours ago.
The cellar door was tucked behind a rolling shelf in the pantry, the kind of hidden-in-plain-sight design Cass had been thrilled about when the renovation finished.
Alex punched in the code, four digits she’d known for years, and the door gave a soft mechanical click before swinging open onto a narrow staircase and a wash of cool, earthy air.
“Fancy,” Dani said, following her down.
The cellar wasn’t large, but it was exactly as well organized as Alex remembered, rows of bottles lit by small recessed lights, temperature gauge glowing steady near the door, a little wooden table in the corner that Marisol had insisted on for “proper tastings,” whatever that meant to a woman who mostly drank wine out of whatever glass was closest.
“Okay,” Dani said, turning in a slow circle, actually impressed now instead of just teasing. “This is a little much for a mountain cabin.”
“It’s not a cabin. It’s a house that looks like a cabin from the outside so people don’t get jealous.”
“That tracks.” Dani ran a finger along a row of bottles, reading labels she clearly didn’t understand and wasn’t going to pretend to. “Any particular ones off limits? Or does the wine cellar knowledge come with an actual system, or is the code just for the vibes?”
“There’s a system.” Alex moved past her, scanning the shelves with the ease of someone who’d stood in this exact spot a dozen times before, usually with a glass already in hand and Cass narrating everything like a sommelier who’d learned everything from wine mom Instagram.
“Cass keeps the good stuff on the top shelf, back left. Stuff she’d actually notice missing. ”
“And the stuff she wouldn’t notice?”
“Is everything else.” Alex pulled a bottle down, turned it over to check the label, more out of habit than actual knowledge. “We’re allowed to drink. She told me that on the phone, more or less. Practically insisted, honestly.”
“Practically insisted,” Dani repeated, deadpan. “Very generous of her, considering she’s not the one who has to deal with the hangover.”
“You say that like you don’t seem like exactly the kind of person who’d have some elaborate morning ritual to cure it. Turmeric shots or something.”
“I do, actually.” Dani grinned, entirely unbothered by being called out. “But that doesn’t mean I’m above a little wine while we’re snowed in with nothing else to do.”
Alex held the bottle out, considering it, considering the whole ridiculous situation, this stranger standing in her best friend’s wine cellar with her arms crossed and an expression that suggested she found the entire day more entertaining than inconvenient.
“Fine,” Alex said. “But we’re not opening anything from the top shelf tonight. We’ve known each other for six hours. I’m not explaining a missing bottle of the good stuff to Cass on top of everything else.”
“Scout’s honor.” Dani held up two fingers, though Alex would have bet real money she’d never been within a mile of an actual scout troop. “Bottom shelf only, until we’ve earned the top shelf.”
“That’s not a real system.”
“It’s the system we’ve got.” Dani took the bottle out of Alex’s hands, checked the label with about as much genuine interest as Alex had, and set it back exactly where she’d found it.
“Come on. If we’re doing this, let’s do it upstairs, where there’s an actual couch and not, you know, a room built entirely out of concrete and regret. ”
Alex laughed before she could stop herself, short and surprised, and Dani looked entirely too pleased about having caused it.
“After you,” Alex said, gesturing toward the stairs, and told herself the flush in her cheeks was just the cellar’s cool air giving way to the warmer house above, and not anything else worth examining just yet.