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About the Author

After growing up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, David Estes moved to Sydney, Australia, where he met his wife, Adele. Now they travel the world writing and reading and taking photographs.

A SNEAK PEEK

ICE COUNTRY

BOOK 2 OF THE COUNTRY SAGA

Available anywhere e-books are sold April 2013!

Chapter One

It all starts with a girl. Nay, more like a witch. An evil witch, disguised as a princess, complete with a cute button nose, full, red lips, long, dark eyelashes, and deep, mesmerizing baby blues.

Oh yah, and a really good throwing arm. “Get out!” she screams, flinging yet another ceramic vase in my general direction.

I duck and it rebounds off the wall, not shattering until it hits the shiny marble floor. Thousands of vase-crumbles crunch under my feet as I scramble for the door. I fling it open and slip through, slamming it hard behind me. Just in time, too, as I hear the crash of something heavy on the other side. Evidently she’s taken to throwing something new, maybe boots or perhaps herself.

Taking a deep breath, I cringe as a spout of obscenities shrieks through the door and whirls around my head, stinging me in a dozen places. You’d think I was the one who ran around with a four-toed womanizer named LaRoy—that’s LaRoy with a “La”, as he likes to say. As it turns out, I think LaRoy had softer hands than she did.

As I slink away from the witch’s upscale residence licking my wounds, I try to figure out where the chill I went wrong. Despite her constant insults, narrow-mindedness, and niggling reminders of how I was nothing more than a lazy, liquid-ice-drinking, no good scoundrel, I think I managed to treat her pretty well. I was faithful, always there for her—not once was I employed while courting her—and known on occasion to show up at her door with gifts, like snowflake flowers or frosty delights from Gobbler’s Bakery down the road. She said the flowers made her feel inadequate, on account of them being too beautiful—as if there was such a thing—and the frosty’s, well, she said I gave them to her to make her fat. Which, if I’m being honest, was partially true. Now I wish I hadn’t wasted my gambling winnings on the likes of her.

In fact it was just yesterday morning when I last stopped by to deliver some sweet treats, only to hear the obvious sounds of passionate lovemaking wafting through the black stone of her elegant front door. Needless to say I was on the wrong side of things, and much to my frustration the door was barred by something heavy.

So I waited. And waited. After about three rounds of the love-noises, soft-hands LaRoy emerged looking more pleased with himself than a young child taking its first step. In much less time than it took for the witch to put the smile on his face, I wiped it off, using a couple of handfuls of ever-present snow and my rougher-than-bark hands. I capped him off with matching black eyes and a slightly crooked, heavily bleeding nose. He screamed like a girl and ran away crying tears that froze on his cheeks well before they made it to his chin.

Hence the bigtime breakup today.

Best of luck, witch, I hope crooked-nosed LaRoy makes you very happy.

Why do I always pick the wrong kinds of women? Answer: because the wrong kinds of women usually pick me.

Walking down the snow-covered street, I mumble curses at the beautiful stone houses on either side. The White District, full of the best and the richest people in ice country. And the witch, too, of course, the latest woman to add to my so-not-worth-the-time-and-effort list.

I pull my collar tight against the icy wind, and head for my other girlfriend’s place, Fro-Yo’s, a local pub with less atmosphere than booze, where a mug of liquid ice will cost you less than a minute’s pay and the rest of your day. Okay, the pub’s not really my girlfriend, but sometimes I wish it was.

Although it’s barely midmorning, Fro’s is open and full of customers. But then again, the pub is always open and full of customers. We might not have jobs, but we’ll support Yo, the pub owner, just the same.

Snow is piled up in drifts against the gray block-cut stone of the pubhouse, recently shoveled after last night’s dumping. Yo’s handiman, Grimes, is hunched against the wind with a shovel, clearing away the last of it along the side, leaving a slip-free path to the outhouse, which will be essential later on, when half the joint gets up at the same time to relieve themselves. There are two things that don’t mix: liquid ice and real ice. I’ve seen more broken bones and near broken necks than I’d like around this place.

“Mornin’, Grimes,” I say as I pass.

Grimes doesn’t look up, his matted gray hair a dangling mess of moisture and grease, but mumbles something that sounds a lot like, “Icin’ neverendin’ colder’n chill night storms…” I think there’s more but I stop listening when he starts swearing. I’ve had enough of that for one day. And yet, I push through the door of the obscenity capital of ice country.

“Dazz! I was wondering when you’d freezin’ show up,” my best friend says when I enter. Following protocol, I stamp the snow off my boots on the mat that says Stamp Here, and tromp across the liquid-ice-stained floorboards. Buff kicks out a stool at the bar as I approach. He’s grinning like an icin’ fool.

For a moment the place goes silent, as half the patrons stare at me, but as soon as they recognize me as one of the regulars, the dull drone of conversation continues, mixing with the clink of tin jugs and gulps of amber liquid ice.

“Get a ’quiddy for Dazz,” Buff shouts to Yo above the din. The grizzled pub owner and bartender sloshes the contents of a dirty, old pitcher into a tinny and slides it along the bar. Well practiced bar sitters dodge the frothing jug as it skates to a stop directly in front of me. As always, Yo’s aim is perfect.

“Thanks,” I shout. Yo nods his pockmarked forehead in my direction and strokes his gray-streaked brown beard thoughtfully, as if I’ve just said something filled with wisdom, before heading off to refill another customer’s jug. He doesn’t get many thanks around this place.

“Out with it,” Buff says, slapping me on the shoulder. His sharp green eyes are reflecting even the miniscule shreds of daylight that manage to sneak through the dirt-smudged windows.

“Out with what?”

Shaking his head, he runs a hand through his dirty-blonde hair. “Uh, the big breakup with her highness, Queen Witch-Bitch herself. It’s all everyone’s been talking about all morning. Where’ve you been? I’ve been dying to get all the the details.”

Elbows on the bar, I lean my head against my fist. “It just happened! How the chill do you know already?”

Buff laughs. “You know as well as anyone that word travels freezin’ fast in this town.”

I do. Normally, though, the gossip’s about me getting broken up with after having done something freeze-brained, not the other way around. “What are they saying?” I ask, taking a sip of ’quiddy and relishing the warmth in my throat and chest.

Buff’s excitement seems to wane. He stares at his half-empty mug. “You don’t wanna know,” he says, and then finishes off the last half of his tinny in a series of throat-bobbing gulps.