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She all but ran past Owen’s bedroo "Get up!"

Downstairs, she shoved her arms into her heavy coat and pulled on her war on?" Owen’s sleepy voice accompanied the look of him in flannel pajamas and tired eyes

"Snow Tons of it I need to shovel the driveway to get out"

Owen moved to theand smiled "Is school canceled?"

"How do I know? Do they announce that somewhere?"

"Check your phone I think the school calls with announcements"

She started back up the stairs, yelled behind her, "I knoork isn’t canceled, so get dressed and help e, infor sure all parents knew that a day would be tacked on at the end of the year to make up for it

Oas back in his rooets to play hooky"

"Nice!" Owen beahed "How the hell a, and it had blown up against the house, leaving drifts closer to thirty inches The road hadn’t been plowed yet "Damn, da in the back of her car and found the chains Jason had given her as a thank-you, and re There weren’t any instructions, just warnings that using the right size chains for your car was i told her not to exceed thirtythee door opened and Oalked out "Wow"

She glanced up fro the chains behind her tires so she could drive onto the them

Owen had his cell phone in hand She’d bet ram

"Grab a shovel, dude"

The previous owners had left an old, rusty flat shovel, but not one of those broad ones used for snoen picked it up and dug in

There wasn’t enough room to back onto the chains until some of the snoas cleared

"Why don’t you just call in sick?" Owen said after they’d been shoveling for ten minutes All Rachel had to as a pointy-head shovel that didn’t

"Because I told the to take the train?" Owen leaned on his shovel and pulled out his cell phone

"I can

"I don’t know This looks pretty bad" He turned the screen toward her and showed her all the red on the freeways

"I’m sure it’s not that bad"

Owen blinked at her a few ti flakes

"Why don’t you get ready for work, I’ll do this," he told her

She looked down at the jeans she’d tossed on "Good idea Thanks"

Sitting over a cup of coffee and the newspaper on his tablet, Jason watched the snow from the kitchenhe’d loved the first snow of the season as a kid The land surrounding the house was nothing but a sea of white that screao and sled, build stupid snow black lab that bounced around the the areat memories

The screen on his phone flashed, and Owen’s naht?

Yup, why?

Two seconds later Owen sent a picture of Rachel’s car in her garage, snow piled up around a partially cleared driveway

Jason left his coffee and grabbed his keys

On my way Don’t let her leave

Owen’s response was a thu in to work?

When he arrived, she had backed onto the chains and was atte to secure them around the wheels The task wasn’t easy for a seasoned player; for Rachel, Jason i her driveway and kept the engine going

"Hey, you"

Rachel looked up "What?"