Snowblind Read Online Free Page A

and reinforced with broken lengths of ceiling joists. Where the wooden walls appeared most vulnerable, there were already stacks of stones and logs. None of them vocalized what they were all thinking.
    They weren’t the first to find themselves in this position.
    Coburn tried not to think about the hole in the ground in the main room or how long it must have taken to dig if the ground was as cold and hard as it was now. Had an animal dug it as he at first thought, or had it been a man trying to tunnel under the wall or just find a place to hide? If that were the case, then how long had he been trapped in here?
    The wind shifted again and Coburn’s breath caught in his chest.
    His pulse thumped in his temples, causing the edges of his vision to throb as he scanned the tree line. Each breath came faster and harder and he had to consciously ease the pressure of his finger on the trigger before he squeezed off a panicked round.
    Vigil’s body…
    It was gone.
    * * *
    “It must have fallen from the tree,” Baumann said. He’d switched spots with Coburn and was scanning the forest floor through his rifle scope. “It could already be buried with as hard as it’s snowing.”
    “We should still be able to see something,” Coburn said.
    “Not necessarily. Are you sure you didn’t see anyone drag it down? I mean, how closely were you watching?”
    “I was watching that area the entire time.”
    “You sure you didn’t maybe close your eyes for a few—”
    “Tell me you could sleep right now, Todd.”
    “Nothing personal, man. We have to consider every possibility.”
    “Guys,” Shore said from the adjacent room.
    “I didn’t close my eyes and I didn’t look away. I was staring right at it the entire time, but the snow…”
    “Guys.”
    “I’m looking right at the forest now and I can barely see the trees,” Baumann said.
    “So you see what I’m saying. Someone could have waited for a big gust and—”
    “Guys!” Shore shouted.
    Coburn whirled to face Shore, who had crept closer to the barricade against the front door. His head was cocked toward a gap between a weathered board and a chunk of granite. His eyes were so wide that the whites stood out against the darkness.
    “There’s something out there,” he whispered.
    Coburn glanced back at Baumann, who waved him on and turned his attention back to his rifle and the night. Shore stepped back from the door to make room for Coburn beside the barricade.
    “I don’t hear—”
    “Shh!”
    Coburn pressed his hand over his opposite ear—
    A scratching sound on the other side of the door. Faint…almost like an animal clawing at the wood. Or maybe a branch had blown up against the door. It was impossible to tell.
    Coburn eased up against the wall next to the barricade and tried to peer between the slats, but couldn’t see a blasted thing.
    “Keep your rifle trained on the door,” he whispered to Shore, then ran into the other room to join Baumann at the window.
    “What’s out there?” Baumann whispered.
    “I can’t tell. Could be nothing.”
    “Could be something.”
    “Right.”
    “Which means…”
    “I’m going to need you to watch my back,” Coburn said. “I’m going out there.”
    * * *
    Coburn sat on the windowsill, his heart pounding, his frozen breath racing back over his shoulder, while he scrutinized the tree line through his scope. It was impossible to tell if there was anything out there. The snow obscured all but the most generalized details. Even the trees themselves now supported so much accumulation they were nearly indistinguishable from the storm.
    He had to do this before he lost his nerve.
    Coburn took a deep breath, held his rifle across his chest, and dropped down into the drift, which had already nearly resumed its original form. The moment he found his balance, he was moving at a crouch toward the corner of the house, the stock of his rifle flush against his shoulder. He pressed his back against the boards and