Snowbound Hearts (5 page)

The guilt came on quicker than she’d expected, but the source wasn’t her fractured vow. The beautiful man holding her wasn’t just a hard piece of meat for her to enjoy at her whim with no regards for his needs. Using him that way wasn’t fair to him, but the alternative meant crossing a line she could never come back from.

***

Stephen sat holding Audrey until his legs were tingling and his butt went numb. The hard wooden chair was totally unforgiving. At some point his discomfort had morphed into pain, but even so he could hardly bring himself to ask her to get up. He gave her a little squeeze and patted her back. “Audrey?”

She twitched as if he had startled her, then raised her head and blinked her eyes. She took a deep breath and yawned. “Stephen—I guess I fell asleep. How long have we been sitting here?”

“Two hours, give or take.”

She quickly got out of his lap. “I am
so
sorry. I’ll let you get up.”

Stephen moved a leg and sharp tingles shot up and down the length. “That’ll be a problem. I’ll have to sit here and get the blood flowing into my legs again.”

“Why didn’t you tell me to get up?”

“I didn’t want you to get up. I’m sorry I can’t hold you like that forever.”

Audrey quickly turned away from him and brushed her hands across her face. He couldn’t tell what she was doing, but he had his suspicions. His little confession had touched a sensitive spot, hopefully in a good way. Audrey’s emotions were close to the surface. He had no way of knowing if she was always like that or if some recent event had shaken her up. When she turned back to face him, she kept her gaze down, obviously avoiding eye contact. Even so he could tell her eyes were misty.

She squatted in front of him, grasped a leg, and began massaging. “Let me help get the blood flowing.”

Stephen watched as she rubbed his legs and tried to keep from jerking with each tingling jolt that coursed through them. “Do you care to tell me why a woman who is engaged would sit in a strange man’s lap?”

She kept her head down, apparently too embarrassed to face at him. “Oh, please don’t spoil the beautiful moment we shared with a moral debate. I’m not a cheater, I swear.”

“If that were my ring on your finger and you were doing this with another man, I’d call it cheating. If it’s not, tell me why it’s not.”

“Please, Stephen, just stop.”

He was impatient for the answers that she refused to give, but trying to force them out of her would only drive her away. The best he could do was wait for her to decide she was ready to explain. A hard gust of wind pelted the cabin with snow. Stephen glanced at the window but couldn’t see out. “I wonder when the snow will stop.”

Audrey looked up at him, still massaging his leg. “What if it never stops?”

“Of course it’ll stop.”

“Yeah, but suppose it didn’t?”

“Well, we’d have to hike back to civilization before the food ran out.”

“What if we had enough supplies to last forever and no one else in the whole world knew we were here?”

Her question was obviously hypothetical, but the sincerity of her voice warmed his heart, as much as the loneliness in her eyes chilled his soul. She wasn’t willing to open up and explain what was going on in her head, but wanting to hide away from the rest of the world gave him a clue that someone had hurt her, maybe recently, and that could be why she refused to talk about it. Stephen took her hands from his leg and stood, pulling her into his arms. She came to him without hesitation and sank into his embrace as if she never wanted to let him go.

She pressed her cheek to his chest and took a deep breath. “Did you mean it when you said you were sorry you couldn’t hold me forever?”

Stephen kissed the top of her head. “I know we just met and that was a stupid thing for me to say, but sometimes I say what I’m thinking without giving any thought to what I’m saying, if that makes any...”

“Stop explaining and answer me honestly, Stephen. Did you mean it?”

“Yes.”

“What if...” She squeezed him tighter.

“You’re seriously shaking, Audrey.”

“Stop interrupting. What if”—she paused again apparently unable to decide if she wanted to ask her question, but started over—”What if I said you could hold me as much as you wanted until the snow stops?” She raised her head so he could see her face.

“If that’s true then”—he kissed her cheek and whispered—”I hope it never stops snowing.”

Chapter Three

The afternoon ticked slowly away, and Stephen found himself worrying that the snowstorm would blow over and his temporary heaven would evaporate. Every check of the window reassured him for a few moments until his imagination convinced him that the sun was shining and he had to check again. He shifted his position, sitting up a little straighter against the sofa armrest. Audrey flipped over, put her chin on his chest, and grinned at him.

“Okay, Stephen, sitting together on the sofa is nice, but what else are we going to do for fun?”

“We could play wilderness explorer.”

Audrey scowled suspiciously. “What’s that?”

“Pretend you’re the wilderness and I’ll explore all your mountains and valleys.”

She just glared at him.

“Sorry, that sounded funny in my head. You could come with me to gas up the generator so it doesn’t run out in the middle of the night.”

“And that’s fun how?”

“We’ll get really cold and have to warm up each other when we get back inside. The best way to get warm after being out in the snow is to get naked and take a hot bath. If we get in together, it’ll be loads of fun.” Stephen knew he should shut up before he said something too out of line, but where a beautiful woman is concerned, the logical side of a man’s mind rarely wins out over the emotional side.

“What happened to respecting me as a woman who is engaged to be married?”

Stephen stroked her silky auburn hair and watched as her smooth, freckle-covered cheeks rose with a grin that spread into her beautiful brown eyes. Her pouty red lips beckoned for him to kiss them, but she was too far away. Changing position to reach her lips would kill the spontaneity, and he didn’t think she’d let a kiss that was obviously premeditated slide. “That flew out the window when you said I could hold you as much as I wanted.”

“I did say that, but I didn’t say we could do it in the bath. That’s taking things a little too far.”

They had damn near had sex with their clothes on sitting in a chair. Getting a little skin-to-skin contact was the logical next step, but he didn’t want to rush her and risk scaring her away. Still, a little reminder couldn’t hurt. “Have you forgotten about sitting in my lap, grinding on my...”

“Okay.” She stood and turned around to face him.

“Okay what?”

“I’ll help you gas up the generator, and if we get excessively cold, we can get each other warm.”

Stephen raised an eyebrow and grinned seductively at her, wondering how far she was willing to go. “In the bath?”

Audrey hesitated for just an instant before answering, like she might be considering his suggestion. “No, but we can share a blanket.”

“Naked?”

She cocked her head to one side and shot him a little grimace. “No. But if you promise to be good, I might consider...”

“Stripping down to your underwear, crawling under the blanket, and writhing on top of me like a snake?”

Her grimace morphed into a full on glare. “No!”

“Letting me slather your body from head to toe with baby oil and give you a massage?”

“No!
Um”—
she screwed up her face, cutting her eyes toward the ceiling—”do you have baby oil?”

Stephen flung his arms into the air and slapped a hand to his forehead. “Damn it all to hell. I
knew
there was something I forgot. If you’re up for that, I brought vegetable oil for cooking.”

She let her shoulders slump, shaking her head. “No, that wasn’t what I was going to say. You’re getting me all sidetracked.”

He raised his eyebrows twice. “You’re thinking about an oil massage, aren’t you?” An image of Audrey lying naked, facedown on his bed, her skin glistening with oil, flashed into his mind. Stephen breathed deeply as his heart began to pound.

“No, of course not.” She huffed loudly, turned around, and took a few steps away, then spun on her heel to face him. “Okay, maybe I was thinking about it a little.” She raised a hand into their line of sight and held her thumb and forefinger an inch apart. “But just a little.” She shrugged and dropped her gaze to the floor. “All right, a lot actually, but you can’t do that, so stop making suggestions. Got it?”

Stephen nodded, having run out of inappropriate suggestions for the moment.

“I was going to say I might consider stretching out under a blanket with you and snuggling in our...” Audrey started, but Stephen cut her off.

“
Mmm
, you’ve got a deal. Snuggling it is. Naked?”

Audrey strolled over to him and poked his shoulder with her index finger. “Don’t push your luck, pal.”

Stephen gave her an apologetic grin. “I cut you off. You were about to say something else.”

She nodded. “Yes, I was. Too bad that you couldn’t stop your nonsense long enough to listen.”

He cupped a hand to his ear and stood quietly waiting.

“Oh, no. You can forget it now. Maybe, if you’re
really
lucky, I’ll tell you when we come back in.”

“It was better than just snuggling, wasn’t it? We’ve been doing that already.”

Audrey shrugged and headed toward the coat rack with Stephen tagging along behind her like a puppy. They bundled up and stepped out onto the back porch of the cabin. The wind had made a snowdrift in the corner of the open porch that reached all the way to the ceiling. In a few more hours, it might even block the door. The storage shed that housed the generator stood fifty feet away and was half-buried. The handle of a shovel protruded out from a smaller snowdrift in the opposite corner of the porch. Stephen grabbed it with one hand, Audrey with the other, and they trudged together through the knee-deep powder out to the shed. He stepped up to the door and began digging.

“Stephen!” Audrey called.

He spun around to see what she wanted and caught a loosely packed clump of snow with his face. It fell straight down his jacket into his shirt. He gasped loudly and brushed it away, shaking as much as he could out of his clothing. Stephen thrust the shovel into the snow, leaving it sticking upright, and stalked slowly toward Audrey.

“Oh my God, Stephen. I’m so sorry. I wasn’t aiming for your face, I swear.”

He scooped up a handful of snow and formed it into a ball as she backed away.

She held her hands up, poised to block any inbound snowballs. “Wait! Please don’t hit me in the face with that. I didn’t mean it.”

“Oh, I’d never throw it at your pretty face.”

Audrey turned and tried to run, but lost her footing just as he caught her. They tumbled together, landing facedown in the snow. She got to her knees and scampered away, but he caught her and flipped her onto her back. She dug her heels in and pushed to get out from under him, but he scooted up and pinned her down. He grabbed another handful of snow and laughed maniacally.

“Now, Stephen, let’s be reasonable about this. I really don’t want that shoved into my face. I was aiming for your chest. I haven’t thrown a snowball in years. I’m a little rusty.”

He grasped the collar of her sweater, pulled it out, and dumped the snow inside.

“Oh, you asshole!” Audrey squealed. “Was that really necessary?”

He nodded and shot her a smug grin. “Absolutely.”

“Holy crap. Now my tits really are freezing off. You do realize that you’ll pay for that?”

“Hey, you got me first.” Stephen stood and helped her up. “Come on, let’s refuel the generator and get back inside. It’s too cold to play in the snow. My hands are already frozen.” He turned and headed toward the shed to finish digging out the door.

“That’s not all that’ll be frozen.” She jumped onto his back, causing him to lose his footing and collapse with her on top. She quickly stuffed as much snow as she could down the back of his pants, then rolled off and tried to get away. He grabbed her ankle, and she flopped down. Stephen crawled onto her and pressed her shoulders into the snow. “What are you going to do now, Stephen?”

“Your pants are way too tight for me to stuff snow into them, so I’ll make you a deal. Kiss me and I’ll let you up before we both freeze.”

“I don’t kiss strangers, so tell me something about yourself.”

“Well...”

She put her finger to his lips before he could finish. “Tell me something personal. Something no one else knows.”

“Okay, snow is sliding down my ass and freezing my nuts.”

Audrey laughed and shook her head. “I’m not interested in current events. Something from your past.”

Stephen gazed into her eyes for a moment, racking his brain for something to tell her. “
Um
, okay. My first grade teacher would make the class take a nap on these foam mats every day. One day I was lying there, gazing at the ceiling, and she stepped right over my face, wearing a short skirt. I had a huge crush on her after that.”

“Gross. How old was she?”

“Midtwenties, I suppose.”

“Well, maybe not
so
gross.” Audrey wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her lips to his. She opened her mouth and met his tongue for one all-too-brief moment. “How was that?”

Stephen raised his head, allowing his gaze to fall on her moist lips. “
Um,
yeah. You know that snow in my pants? It just turned into steam.” He lowered his face toward hers, but she turned away.

“One kiss, that’s it. Now let me up.” Stephen helped her to her feet. They slogged together back to the shed, finished digging out, and topped off the generator in total silence. Audrey kept her face turned away from him no matter how he maneuvered to get a look at her. Kissing her had been a mistake; she made that obvious to him now. Either she hadn’t liked it, or she was upset that he made her do it, or she was feeling guilty about kissing a man who wasn’t her fiancé. Whatever the reason, he couldn’t undo his screw up. All he could do was apologize and hope for the best.