The Table in the Window by Elaine Cantrell

Author:Elaine Cantrell [Cantrell, Elaine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Astraea Press

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Oh, the weather outside is frightful…

Rob wondered if they’d make it home or not. They were only halfway back to town, but the roads were terrible. “It’s worse than ever,” he muttered.

He caught the look of fear on Marley’s face and changed the subject. “Tell me about the bakery where you work, Marley. You haven’t said anything about your job.”

Marley shrugged, distracted as he’d intended. “I work at Pace’s. You know…it’s the bakery in the old Claussen building.”

Rob sucked in his breath as he made what should have been an easy curve. “What do you do over there?”

“I do most of the wedding cakes. I’ll have to show you the pictures of the ones I’ve decorated.”

Rob never answered. Marley screamed as he swerved to avoid a fallen, ice-covered branch that blocked the road. She screamed again when the car started spinning. He tried to regain control of the Toyota and failed. The car came out of the spin, and to Rob it seemed to accelerate as it charged sideways toward the trees on the side of the road.

His fingers clamped down on the steering wheel, and he gripped it so tightly his knuckles turned white. The trees rushed toward them, faster and faster. He bit his tongue and tasted blood when the car landed in a ditch with a bone-jarring thump.

“Marley! Are you alright?”

“I’m f...f…fine. What happened? Why couldn’t you stop the car?”

“Black ice, I think. Hang on, and let me have a look.”

He turned his coat collar up and got out of the car, gasping as an icy gust of wind struck him. Man, it was bitter tonight.

A quick examination convinced him that he couldn’t move the car himself. He jumped back inside the warm vehicle to report to Marley. “We’re stuck. I can’t get out of the ditch.”

Marley shifted in her seat and bit her lip. “Er, how far are we from civilization?”

Rob tried not to laugh, but he did anyway. “Not too far. I’ll have to call a wrecker to pull us out.”

Marley smacked his shoulder. “Don’t laugh at me, mister.”

That made Rob laugh again, but he stopped laughing after trying in vain to find a wrecker to get them out of the ditch. “Everyone is either closed or out on other calls,” he explained.

Marley’s eyes looked as big as saucers. “Will we be okay out here until daylight?”

They would if they had gas to keep the heater going but he had been in such a big hurry to get to his grandmother’s house he hadn’t bothered to go by the gas station. He had intended to stop at a truck stop on the way back home.

Marley took the news better than he thought she would. She groped for his hand in the dark. “I don’t think it’s snowing as hard now so I guess we can walk to the nearest truck stop. They aren’t far apart on the interstate.”

“I don’t know. It’s awfully cold out there.”

In the end, they decided to walk. “Walking will warm us up,” Marley argued, “and I really don’t want to stay here all night.

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