“This strikes me as a little too familiar.”

“If you mean the last time we were run off the road, I believe you’d swerved to avoid one of those.” He waved at Lloergan.

“Yes, but that didn’t cause me to drive your car off the embankment.” The hound had been a warning, one that came too late for me to avoid getting run off the road by a killer.

I continued, “Something darted in front of the car after Lloergan warned us. It disappeared, but not before we went off the shoulder. Now we’re stranded on an empty road in a snowstorm, forced to go looking for help.”

“An omen, then. We’re supposed to search for something.”

“Or it’s a trap. But the possibility we’re stranded here by accident is about zero.”

He peered into the falling snow. Then he turned to the hound. “If there’s something out there that bothers you, this car isn’t going to protect us. We need to find out what it is.”

Lloergan grumbled and glowered at Gabriel. She walked over and nudged his leg, none too gently, as if to say, Well, get on with it, then. It’s your funeral.

As we headed down the road, I said, “What’s the last movie we saw together?”

“We’ve never seen one together.”

“Last one you saw?”

Silence, as he struggled to remember.

“Good enough,” I said, and he nodded. He knew I was trying to determine whether this might be a vision, and I was zoned out in the Jag’s backseat as it roared along.

I shoved my hands into my pockets. We hadn’t officially hit winter yet, so I’d still been dressing for fall, expecting to spend maybe five minutes outside. My cropped leather jacket was more fashionable than practical. Same went for my footwear: Louboutin ankle boots with three-inch heels, which threatened to slide out from under me with each step.

Gabriel kept pulling ahead and then having to slow for me. When I got a particularly severe look, I broke into a jog…and landed on my ass.

Gabriel put out his hand to help me up, but I motioned for him to wait, gritting my teeth against the pain throbbing through my tailbone. Lloergan nudged me and whined concern.

Gabriel glanced at my footwear. “Aren’t those boots?”

“Technically, yes. But for women, boots do not necessarily mean winter wear.”

I took his hand and he tugged me up, saying, “You’re freezing.”

“I’ll be fine.”

He started taking off his coat.

“No, seriously, I’m fine and that would just weigh me down. We must be getting close to a farmhouse or something.” As if on cue, the snow cleared enough for us to spot a laneway. “There. Now let’s just hope someone’s home.”