She swung in and inched down the one-lane drive, scanning both sides for a wide spot where she could maneuver her car around to face the road and be ready to head out the instant visibility improved.

As she crunched along, two hazy, ethereal orbs of light appeared through the mist.

A house?

She cut her headlights and continued forward. The residents might not appreciate a stranger appearing on their doorstep in this remote spot. What if they called the police? That’s what she’d do if it were her house. In today’s crazy world, it was reckless to take chances.

And a trip to the police station in the back of a cruiser was not on her itinerary for this already disastrous trip.

She continued to roll along on the gravel until the fog thickened so much she couldn’t see three feet in front of her. If there was somewhere to turn around, it was cloaked in mist. There was nothing to do but stop where she was and hope the gray shroud lifted before darkness fell.

Christi cut the engine—and utter quiet descended. If the twin lights up ahead were from a house, not a sound seeped through the walls. It was possible the owners weren’t home. Or they could be hunkered down inside beside a cozy fire, enjoying a cup of hot chocolate.

A most appealing prospect, since the temperature had plummeted as fog cloaked the landscape. Her bare-bones car didn’t boast the luxury of a thermometer, but the sixtyish temperature earlier at the wharf must have dropped fifteen degrees.

Suppressing a shiver, she checked the gas tank gauge. The Nissan was running on fumes. One more item to add to her to-do list as soon as the mist dissipated. In the meantime, wasting fuel by turning the engine on and off to activate the heater wouldn’t be smart. If she ran out of gas, she’d have to hoof it back to town.

Christi reached behind her, snagged one of the blankets she’d cuddled up in at the rest stop last night, and lowered her seat. There was no reason to be nervous, despite the isolation and dense fog. If she couldn’t see to get out of here, no one else could see to get in. Might as well try to catch a few z’s while she waited, shake off a bit of the bone-deep fatigue that had plagued her for most of this trip.

Tucking the blanket around her, she let her eyelids drift closed . . . and the world around her faded away.

It took the chattering of her teeth—and the relentless shivers racking her body—to finally jar her awake.

After shaking off her grogginess in the darkness, she worked her arm free from the blanket and twisted her wrist to see the face of her watch. Nine o’clock? She’d slept two full hours without moving a muscle?