Chapter 29
The snow in the Achterhoek didn't fall; it descended, a thick, white shroud that muffled the world and turned the farmhouse into an island in a frozen sea. Inside, the fire had burned down to a steady, rhythmic pulse of orange light. Casper and Elisa were still tangled together on the rug, the silence between them comfortable and heavy with the salt-sweet scent of their recent intimacy. The sound of the car engine was a low, alien vibration before it was an audible noise. It cut through the pastoral quiet like a serrated blade. Casper sat up abruptly, his muscles tensing, his eyes instantly losing their soft, post-coital haze. "Casper?" Elisa asked, pulling a wool throw around her shoulders. "One car," Casper whispered, his ears tuned to the crunch of tires on frozen gravel. "Slow.
- Writer
