Dead in Winter

By Deborah D. Moore

The snow storm of the century ushers in mind-bending evil in this thriller from the author of the popular The Journal and EMPulse series.

Hell is hot . . . but Hell, MN, is freezing cold.

Ezra Collins, part-time snow plow driver and reluctant mayor of Hell, Minnesota, thought this winter would be like any other winter: move the snow, drink beer, and help the tourists take pictures to prove they’ve been to Hell and back.

And it was . . .

Until the snow kept falling, the temperatures dropped to the point that Hell really did freeze over, and the tourists weren’t what they seemed to be.

Then the bodies started to pile up.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Oct 20, 2020
• ISBN: 9781682619261

Book preview

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Also by Deborah D. Moore

Shelter in Place

The Journal Series

The EMPulse Series

A Prepper’s Cookbook

Time Shadows

Polar Storm

A PERMUTED PRESS BOOK

ISBN: 978-1-68261-925-4

ISBN (eBook): 978-1-68261-926-1

Dead in Winter

© 2020 by Deborah D. Moore

All Rights Reserved

This book is a work of fiction. People, places, events, and situations are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or historical events, is purely coincidental.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author and publisher.

Permuted Press, LLC

New York • Nashville

permutedpress.com

Published in the United States of America

CONTENTS

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

About the Author

To all the tinfoil-hat wearers:

Keep those hats handy. Maybe you’re not so wrong after all.

It’s true that we don’t know what we’ve got until we lose it, but it’s also true that we don’t know what we’ve been missing until it arrives.

—Stephenie Meyer

Welcome to HELL Minnesota

Where Hell Always Freezes Over

Population 666

CHAPTER ONE

Ezra Collins squinted at the brightness of the lights in the room. Coming in from twilight darkness at 4:15 pm was harsh on the eyes and he paused to let them adjust then made his way to his usual place at the far end of the long, polished bar, facing the door. By the time he sat down, his draft beer was waiting for him.

Thanks, Kate. He took a long pull of the icy brew and sighed, then wiped his mouth with the extra paper napkin she had left. She knew him well.

Rough day? she asked, putting his usual Friday night order in with the kitchen behind her: bacon bleu cheeseburger smothered in cooked onions and waffle fries.

Unless you’re lucky enough to have an inside job, it’s always a rough day at twenty degrees.

I keep telling ya, Ezra, marry me and join me running this joint and you won’t have to run the county plow anymore. She set another beer in front of him and set his empty mug in the soapy dishwater below the bar.

Be careful, Kate, one of these days I just might take you up on that. Ezra grinned between sips of his beer.

She snorted. I should be so lucky.

He eyed her as she turned away. She was a beautiful woman with long, wavy, dark red hair, a firm ass, and shapely legs that filled out her jeans perfectly. She was a few years older than him, maybe a few too many years older, but it was hard to know what that meant these days.

Aren’t I a bit too young for you? he asked, disappointment sincerely lacing his voice.

Horse-feathers! Age is only a number. You’re what, thirty-five? Kate retorted.

Thank you. Actually, I’m thirty-nine, Ezra said shyly, with an almost imperceptible shoulder shrug.

Really? Well, I’m forty-five, and six years isn’t much of a gap these days. She stopped wiping the bar. Wait a minute. If you thought at thirty-nine you were too young for me, how old did you think I was?

I knew you were forty-five. Remember, I’m also the mayor of our frozen paradise; I reviewed your purchase of the liquor license. I thought women liked an older man, that’s all. I meant no offense, Kate, really.

Kate Jones had come to Hell last March, eight months ago, when The Damn Inn went on the market. She paid a hefty price for it—in cash—which to Ezra put her out of his league. It had nothing to do with her age.

I’m curious, Kate—why did you buy this place?

She thought for a moment before answering. I wanted to do something different with my life. I had just come into a lot of money and thought this would be a good investment for some of it and at the same time satisfy that urge to do something new. Why? This was a delicate and uncomfortable territory for her to talk about, for several reasons.

Like I said, just curious is all.

We have more snow coming tonight? she asked, deftly changing the subject and setting his dinner on the bar in front of him on top of a red and white checkered cloth place mat. It didn’t get by Ezra that no one else got that treatment.

I don’t think so. The sky is clear, so that should really drop the temps though. I’d say at least ten below. He picked up a waffle fry and took a bite before adding some salt and going on. Long-range forecast is more of the same: cold but no snow yet. I get to leave the plow in the heated garage for a few more days and it gives me a chance to make sure all the walkways are cleared.

Ezra did odd jobs around the small town: not just plowing in the winter, but maintaining the necessary generators and furnaces; he fixed plumbing and some electrical; he was a decent auto mechanic; and in the summer, he mowed lawns too if needed. The population status on the entrance billboard was a joke. They really had only 207 full-time residents in the entire township and not all of those stayed the entire winter. It just got too cold for most, too damn cold. Still, he stayed busy and being the mayor, because no one else wanted the job, was mostly only a title with little compensation. The other side jobs are what paid his few personal bills. He enjoyed his minimalist life style.

The busiest time of the year was mid-winter, when people came to take their pictures next to the town entrance sign to prove Hell froze over. Only the residents knew that Ezra poured water over the sign whenever needed to keep the icicles fresh and real, and chipping away those that obscured the sign too much.

Ezra washed down a bite of his burger with more well-chilled beer. This is your first winter here. How are your bookings coming along? Any problems?

"With only ten rooms to rent out, a fifty percent capacity would look good but not be good. Of course, I had been advised by the previous owners that things really didn’t pick up until closer to the holidays."

Don’t give up yet. People don’t always stay. They drive in, get their pictures, have lunch or dinner, and drive back home. The food and drink trade should make up for slow room rentals, Ezra tried to encourage her. Then it occurred to him what she’d said. Ten rooms? There’s twelve rooms in the motel, isn’t there? Six up and six down.

"Well, there were twelve, Kate agreed, until I took the two adjoining rooms closest to the bar on the lower level as my quarters. One room, of course, is my bedroom, the other I had the regular furniture removed, and turned it into a living room of sorts, a place to relax when I get some rare time off. Since I’m on call 24/7, it made sense to live here too. So there are six up and four down, and I know that limits the handicapped access to those lower four rooms, but it is what it is. And truthfully, the one over my rooms, I rent out only if the others are full. I figure if the weather is really bad, Jerry and Karl might need a place to stay and having a cook is more important to me than a few bucks."

Ezra eyed her with new appreciation. All that made a great deal of sense, business-wise. And all of it he understood: he had sleeping quarters at the county building where the plow was kept. There were times he started plowing to the county line at 3:00am.

I saw a couple of cars in the back parking lot. Are they overnight guests?

Yes, come to do some ice skating on Lake Osage—ya know, the big pond out back. I think they are here mostly for the peace and quiet. Kate snickered. At breakfast this morning, I heard one of the women talking to their kids on the phone. This is their anniversary weekend and the kids are with her mother. They’re leaving in the morning.

Well, it definitely is quiet right now. I’ve been meaning to ask, are you doing a Thanksgiving buffet this year? Josie always did and it was well attended, Ezra commented.

Of course! In fact, I’ve already got a dozen turkeys in the freezer. I know I won’t need that many for Thanksgiving, but I’ve been working on the weekly specials and turkey is always a good one. She leaned on the bar and stared into Ezra’s dark blue eyes, wondering what she needed to do to get his attention.

What will your new menu look like? He sipped at his beer to hide his grin. He knew she was hitting on him and glanced away.

She sighed as he turned his eyes from hers and back to his meal. I’m trying to simplify things. Breakfast, of course, is only for the motel guests; lunch will stay with sandwiches, burgers, and a daily soup; dinner will be only one item, plus burgers. I’ve decided that’s the easiest on my cooking team, so it will be meatloaf, spaghetti, tacos, turkey, fried chicken, and Friday will be fish fry as usual, with Monday being a surprise: maybe a pizza night. She handed him a mockup of the menu. Across the top it read: Damn Good Food with flames as the border.

That sounds great, especially since I don’t cook much, he confessed, though she already knew that by how often he came in. He grinned at the new logo and set it aside.

Will you be coming for Thanksgiving dinner? she asked softly.

I wouldn’t miss it, he answered, and on impulse, leaned forward and kissed her cheek before slapping down a twenty and leaving.

Well, that’s a start, she said with a lopsided grin when he was out the door.

CHAPTER TWO

Ezra sat down at his desk, wishing he had a real home office, one he didn’t have to get fully dressed for just to use the computer. His official office faced the street; behind that was the doorway to his living quarters with a couch, TV, and a kitchenette and behind that was his bedroom: shotgun style. Both his office and living quarters had a door that also led into the cavernous area that held the county plow, pickup truck, and various other pieces of machinery plus workshop. It was exceptionally convenient to get into the garage area without going through the office in the middle of the night.

He pulled up the weather program on the desktop computer and shifted over to the long-range radar on the special app he’d been granted access to and studied it for a few minutes. One of Ezra’s perks as mayor and the sole member of road maintenance was having certain classes paid for and he took everything that came up weather-related, and basic record-keeping and the ins and outs of running a small town. It seemed he was always in school. He zoomed out to get a broader picture of the radar.

Now what’s going on over there? he murmured aloud. He studied a slow-moving system coming down from Canada heading in their general direction. If it kept building and got as far as Lake Superior, those in the path could be getting some serious lake-effect snow in a few days. Ezra was never one to wait for the weather to arrive to make plans about it. He pulled out a note pad and started jotting things down.

Hi, Ezra, Jake Nettles said shyly. He quickly closed the door behind him to keep the cold out, but still stood just inside. Jake, with pale hazel eyes and light brown hair, was a twenty-year-old, high-functioning autistic. He was brilliant in some areas, but lacked people skills so had a hard time holding down a job. Do you have any work I can do?

Yes, I do. I’m glad you stopped in. Ezra had a soft spot for the kind boy and hired him to do menial jobs whenever he could. Although he was sure the boy could handle more complicated tasks, he wanted Jake to first gain self confidence that came with not being constantly supervised. The electric heater posts along the street need shoveling out. Is that something you would like to do for me? The pay is the same as always, and this would be just in time for the next payroll, so you can have a check tomorrow. There were several places along Main Street that had heater hitching posts for those with diesel trucks, which was a necessary thing for keeping the engine block warm enough to restart when the weather dipped below zero. If someone had a diesel with a mounted heater in the engine compartment, all they had to do was take their plug from the heater, and insert it into the post instead of leaving the vehicle running all the time. The merchants didn’t mind the extra power bill if it brought customers into their businesses and it was especially handy at the only bar in town—the Damn Inn.

Oh, and when you get to the motel, ask Kate if she wants you to shovel the upper deck and the steps while you’re there. Ezra was sure she would; she liked the boy too. It seemed everyone liked Jake and would go out of their way to find something he could do to earn a few dollars. He lived with his grandmother ever since his mother died in a car accident. Jake liked to say he took care of her, when in reality, they took care of each other.

Jake nodded his head a couple of times, stopped to slide his timecard into the clock, and then let himself into the maintenance garage to get a shovel.

Ezra shut down the computer and grabbing his new list followed Jake. The first thing on the list was to check the propane level. The county kept a thousand-gallon tank behind the building, right behind his rooms and out of the way of the plow egress door. That gas kept the garage at fifty degrees; not warm, but warm enough for the diesels. It also supplied fuel for the furnace in his office and quarters and the furnace for the post office that was part of the municipal building on the