During the next half-hour, we slowed because it was hard to see through the falling curtain of white. Soon the road was covered with snow. Chick stopped at a gas station in Fawnskin and paid the attendant twenty bucks to put the rear chains on the car for us.
I asked to use the phone, but the attendant told me that the storm yesterday had taken down the lines and cellpod communications. The phone crews were working on it, but it wasn't back in service yet. I was now feeling very cut off and uneasy.
We got the chains on and pulled out. The cold air was freezing the snowflakes on the side window. The landscape was quickly becoming a Christmas card of white jagged mountain peaks and snow-covered pines. I could hear the chains crunching and ringing on the concrete under us as we cut through the wet, drifting snow, always moving further up toward the mountain summit.
The cabin wasn't in Big Bear proper, but in a smaller, more remote area called Sugarloaf, a few miles off Highway 18 on 1-38.
Finally, around three-thirty, we turned left off the interstate and pulled up a long drive.
"Where are we?" I asked.
"Casa Best," hegrinned. "This is my driveway. The cabin's about two miles up ahead. It's nice up here. No neighbors, real peaceful… " Great, I thought, no neighbors, what a break.
I finally saw the outline of his cabin in a shard of afternoon light that was streaming through a hole in the clouds, lighting the curtain of fast-falling snow. It was an A-frame at the end of a line of snow-covered pine trees facing back toward the narrow road.
"There she blows," he said with hearty good cheer.
He pulled up in front of the cabin and turned off the engine. Then while I sat in the car, not wanting to get out, he hurried up the walkway to the porch, opened the front door, and went into the house.
My next thought chilled me. Now I'm stuck with this asshole in the middle of a blizzard.
Chapter 36
THE PASSENGER DOOR WAS YANKED OPEN. I ALMOST shrieked, but managed to choke it back.
"What's wrong?" Chick was saying, standing over me.
"I, uh… look, Chick, I think it's a little remote up here with all this weather coming in. Maybe we should go back to L. A. and tackle this another time."
"We'll never make it down the mountain. That road will be closed soon."
"Then we should go back to the Bear Mountain Lodge in town." "Never get in during ski season. It'll be booked solid. Come on inside."
"It didn't look too full to me, when we passed. Almost no cars. Why don't you call? Maybe the lines are back up now."
"Look, Paige, if you're feeling funny about being here alone with me, I'll try and get us some rooms in town. In the meantime, come on in. I'll get a fire going. You look like you're freezing, sitting there. At least you can get warm." He was holding the door open, as the cold, snowy air whipped around my shoulders.
Reluctantly, I grabbed my sweater and purse, got out of the car, and followed him into the cabin.
The house was impressive. Chick turned on the gas fire in the huge stone fireplace. The flames crackled, licking the edges of some preset pine logs. The living room was decorated Southwestern style with rough-hewn furnishings and lots of Navajo rugs. A few stuffed heads of mountain lions, deer, and Kodiak bears hung on the walls, their sightless glass eyes flickering in the reflected firelight. Chick saw me looking at the animal heads.
"Shot most of those puppies myself," he bragged.
Great, I thought.
"Close the door there. I'll see if I can get through to the lodge." He crossed to the phone and picked it up. "Good deal, I got a dial tone." Then he punched in a number he seemed to know by heart, and waited for an answer. "Yes, may I speak to the front desk?" He smiled at me while he was waiting. "Reservations, please." Then: "Yes, this is Charles Best. I live up on Sugarloaf. It's a little blizzardy up here right now and a lady friend of mine and I were wondering if you have any space in the lodge?" Then he looked right at me to emphasize his next point. "Since the road just got closed I guess we'll need two rooms for tonight."
He listened, frowning before he spoke again. "I see. Well, when will you know, exactly?" Another long pause. "Can I give you my number so you can call me if they don't get up the mountain? Okay, good… I'm at 555-3769. In an hour then." He hung up and turned to me.
"They're sold out. They have two rooms reserved for a family of four coming up from L. A., but they said the county plow team just lost the road, so those people probably won't make it. If they don't show up in an hour, the rooms are ours."
I sat there trying to figure out what else I should do. I was getting so many mixed messages I still didn't have a real sense of how much jeopardy I might be in.
I decided that the best way to get through this was to turn to the job at hand. Find the things that Evelyn's sister wanted for her mother, get them out of storage as fast as possible, and then get the hell out of here. If the storm lightened, or the roads cleared, we might still be able to drive back to Los Angeles tonight using the chains. Failing that, we could stay at the lodge and drive down tomorrow.
"Why don't we go get a look at the storage room, see how big a project this is going to be?" I suggested.
"Wouldn't you rather have a glass of wine first?" Chick countered.
"If we get this done now, maybe we can still drive out of here tonight. I really have things to do in L. A. If we drive slowly, I'm sure we can make it back to Fawnskin. The roads are probably still okay from there on down:'
"Good idea," he said, but he was frowning slightly. "I have a nice red Bordeaux… My wine broker is the same guy who sells to Jack Nicholson. This Chateau Gruaud-Larose is very rare. Supposedly only five cases in L. A. I got three bottles at two thousand apiece. It's a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Not too oakie… Got a nice little smoky quality to it. What do y'think? Or, I have two bottles of 1997 Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon. Right now, it's some of the hottest wine on Planet Earth. Cost about three grand a bottle."
"Whatever you want, if we can drink while we work."
"Deal."
He went to the bar and started looking around in his built-in wine cooler for the bottles. Then he pulled one out and uncorked the Screaming Eagle Cab. "You're supposed to let it breathe for half an hour first, but let's cheat and have a glass now." He poured some into two wine goblets, then picked his up and swirled it around, watching it hang on the side of the glass, doing the whole wine connoisseur thing. "Good consistency." He sniffed the glass. "Great nose, not too sweet or acidic… A great little wine for three grand a pop."
He handed me a glass and clinked against mine. "To new beginnings."
Shit, I thought. New beginnings? What the hell does that mean? We'd both just lost our spouses. For me, it was hardly a beginning. It was a vast, unacceptable ending. But I held myself in check, didn't respond, and took a small sip of the wine, which was remarkable. Then I looked up at him. "Let's see the list."
"I'm sorry?"
"The list. Let me have a look."
He seemed puzzled.
"The list of things your sister-in-law wanted you to find for Evelyn's mother."
He reached into his pockets and started pulling things out. "I know I have that damn list someplace." He grinned and started patting his pockets like a guy trying to dodge a dinner check. Then he looked at me sheepishly and shrugged.
No list, I thought. Great.
My panic alarms were all blaring. If there was no list, then the whole trip up here was bullshit.
I was now beginning to think I might actually be in some physical jeopardy, when he suddenly snapped his fingers and crossed the room, picked up the car keys on the hall table, and opened the door.