Out past the master bedroom, to the side was a sliding door which I had to admit I hadn’t even noticed. We hadn’t exactly been whiling away long, boring hours in the bedroom for me to study all the features. When I’d been in the bedroom, I’d either been tied up and having the best sex of my life, or passed out cold after having had the best sex of my life. It didn’t exactly hone my powers of observation.
Ash flicked on exterior lighting and I could barely make out the shape of a large, white mound surrounded by other, smaller mounds of things. What was it exactly?
“I’m going to need a shovel,” he declared, and dropped my hand to start heading somewhere.
“Get one for me, too!” I called after him. I put on some sweatpants and a sweater I found in a drawer, both too big for me but they’d work. What I didn’t have were snow boots. He’d managed to bring my bags when he’d kidnapped me, but inside I didn’t exactly have snow gear. The best I had was sneakers, the cute kind with neon pink laces.
Ash came back up looking like he’d gotten attacked by a giant coat. He wore massive snow boots up to his knees and wild tufts of fur framed the hood around his face.
“Are you in there?” I asked.
“You laugh,” he told me. “But just you wait. I’m going to shovel you out a hot tub.”
“That’s my man.” I patted him on the back and sent him out into the snow. Just opening up the sliding glass door took some doing, and it became my job just sweeping up the snow that billowed into the bedroom. Ash got to work, shoveling load after load of snow until, slowly, a large circle emerged, then wooden benches, then, the hot tub, itself. He pried off the top, flicked on a few buttons and lights came on inside the tub.
“Victory is mine!” He exclaimed, holding the shovel up above his head like a gladiator.
“You did it!”
He came in and swept me into a huge, snowy embrace and kiss. “What’s my reward, wench?”
I laughed. “Naked hot tubbing?”
“Arg!” He began stripping off his clothes. I followed suit.
“Wait, were you being a pirate just then?”
“With the ‘arg’?” he asked and I nodded. “Not entirely sure.” He helped me out of the sweater and took my hand. “This tub gets hot fast, but we’ll have to give it a few minutes. The caretaker only had it set to 75.
“It’s already warmed up?” I asked, astonished.
“I’m prepared for every scenario.” Ash winked at me, giving me another “arg,” for good measure. He disappeared into the kitchen and came back with a bottle of red wine and two glasses. I grabbed a couple of towels and jammed my feet into a pair of slippers I found in the closet.
Outside, steam rose thick and fast out of the tub. Ash pressed a button that set it to a low bubble and it looked like a witch’s cauldron, hissing and spewing into the night air.
“Are you sure this is OK?”
“Are you afraid I’m trying to cook you? This is like a Hansel and Gretel thing?” He stretched out his hand and said with a grin, “I can’t promise I won’t eat you.”
“At least you’re being honest.” I took his hand and we both took a few tentative steps out into the cold. Make that freezing. And I wasn’t wearing anything. But in a few more steps, we reached the tub and we hustled in as quickly as we could.
The shock of the heat mingled with the chill of the cold air had my senses whirling faster than the hot tub, itself. But slowly, I adjusted, letting the peaceful hum of the water lull my senses. Up above, a crystal clear night sky expanded limitless and promising, countless start twinkling down on us.
“It’s so gorgeous here.” I exhaled, sinking down into the water. I guessed some city people would consider where I’d grown up rural, but honestly it was pretty suburban. We had plenty of traffic lights and stores that stayed open all night and you were hard-pressed to find any part of town where you felt all alone. Out here in the mountains, it felt different. The silence, the darkness at night, the mountains rising in the distance. Days could pass without any interruptions. We’d just experienced it. I didn’t want it to end.
As if he were reading my mind, Ash cleared his throat and said, “This doesn’t have to end, you know.”
I looked up at him, not sure what he meant. Of course our time up in this cabin had to end. Roads would be cleared. Planes would take off. The future would descend upon us whether we liked it or not.
“This between us,” he went on, seeming uncharacteristically hesitant. “I know we signed that contract. That this was a fake thing between us, for a month.”
I swallowed, wondering if he was saying what I thought he was saying.
“We don’t have to, you know…” He swallowed, too, and I realized he was nervous. Ash Black was nervous, talking to me. My heart swelled.
I reached over to him. “We’ve already kind of done things we said we wouldn’t in that contract.”
“Yeah.” He wrapped an arm around me, drawing me close. “The no-sex clause didn’t exactly happen.”
“We ripped that right up,” I agreed.
“So, about what we have going here.” I could feel his heart beating fast. “Do you, ah, want it to end in a week?”
“No,” I answered, quickly and honestly.
I felt him exhale. But he still held himself tense. “I thought you might, that night in Vegas.”
“You mean the night you kidnapped me?”
“Yeah, that one.” He sounded sheepish.
“I’m glad you did,” I reassured him. “But, you’re right. I was thinking about breaking things off. Fake or real or whatever this is.” Now I was stammering a bit, too. “Because, the thing is, Ash, I can’t really do that whole scene in L.A.”
“No, I can’t either,” he agreed with me urgently.
“Really?” I looked up at him. “Because that’s pretty much your scene.”
“No,” he protested, but I kept looking up at him, waiting for more. “OK, yes, it was. It used to be.”
“Until you met me?” I couldn’t help it, my question was laced with doubt. It wasn’t that I didn’t think much of myself. I had a pretty good sense of what I was bringing to the table, both great and not-so-great. But Ash had lived a hard-partying life all his 26 years. A flash romance with me wasn’t going to change all that.
“It sounds like rubbish, I know,” Ash admitted, shaking his head. “But I’ve been tired of this crazy life I’m in for ages. A couple years now, if I’m honest. I’m done with it.”
I wanted to believe it, take it at face value and just let it make me feel good. But the pragmatic part of me had to interfere. “That’s pretty easy to say when you’re snowed in here with no one but me to keep you company. What about when we’re back?”
“I don’t want to go back,” Ash answered, holding me close.
“Neither do I,” I confessed. “But at some point we have to go back.”
“Not to the way I was living. I’m not going to do it. I want to figure out something new.”
“You do?” I looked into his eyes, so dark and sexy.
His lips parted, full and red. “I do. I know it sounds like bullshit. But you have to remember, it’s like show and tell in school.”
“Like show and tell?” Sometimes it got hard to follow exactly what he was saying, he was so freaking hot. His shoulders so broad and muscled, rising above the bubbling heat. His jaw so strong, that stubble dark and rough. I wanted to feel it on me. Between my legs.
“Show and tell,” at least he continued the conversation. “You’d bring something in from home and talk about it?”
“Yes.” I remembered show and tell.
“I’m better at showing how I feel than telling.”
“Yeah?” My question came out breathy. I really wanted him to show me.
“Yeah.” His voice sounded deep and husky and he brought a hand to my neck, slowly trailing a thumb down my skin to the hollow at the base of my throat. “Can I show you how I feel?” he asked.