She couldn’t remember ever seeing so much snow, or ever being happier to see it. The elements had trapped her inside the confines of Hawk’s Roost, surrounded by a world turned white, and there was no place on the entire earth she’d rather be, because Vincent Mayhew was locked up here as well. She looked up at the sky, hoping to see banks of gray clouds rolling in from the west with the promise of even more of the fluffy confection, but the sky was depressingly clear. Refusing to be downcast, she wrinkled her nose, dismissing the need for another storm for, after all, the snow of the high drifts was already tumbling into her boots. “Besides, it’s so cold none of it will begin to melt for days and days,” she assured herself as she struggled to make her way through a particularly high drift. “And then, once the thaw does come, the roads will be far too muddy for a carriage. Why, it could be four or five weeks before Aunt Nellis and I can remove ourselves to London.” Lazarus was standing up against the wall of Hawk’s Roost, trying to hide his thin body from the wind, his arms wrapped tightly about himself, three long woolen mufflers in danger of cutting off his supply of frigid air.
