Cooper’s jaw was stubbornly set in a way that suggested she’d be arguing about this all night. “It’s not going to kill me to be out in the cold for a minute. You’ve done enough.”
She decided to pick her battles. “Okay. But grab everything you can, anything that you think might even be the tiniest bit useful. The last thing we want is to keep having to make supply runs—even if they’re just to the back of the car. It’s too easy to get turned around in this snow. Be careful.”
She didn’t like the idea of the two of them being separated.
“I’ll be quick,” Cooper promised. He seemed to lean just a little closer to her.
She felt that crackling intensity between the two of them again, like her inner compass had just spun around to point straight at him.
She’d never felt anything like this before. Sexual chemistry, sure. But it had always been just... fun. Enticing. It hadn’t made her feel like her whole body was coming undone. She hadn’t been so aware of the guy she was with, to the point where it felt like everything about him—the faint laugh-lines at the corners of his eyes, the sharpness of his cheekbones, the barest sign of stubble beneath his skin—was like a music note coming together to form some incredibly beautiful song.
Then he leaned back and put his hand up, like he was blocking the kiss neither one of them had—exactly—leaned in for. He rubbed at his throat, giving her a rueful look.
“I’m getting a little hoarse. I’ve talked more in the last twelve hours, with you, than I have in the last six months.”
“I like talking to you,” Gretchen said. Her voice sounded strange to her too.
Cooper’s breath ghosted over her, stirring her hair. “I like talking to you too.”
Gretchen felt her eyes drop closed. They would kiss now, she thought, and it was about time. Somehow she felt like she’d been waiting for him forever.
But then there was just a blast of freezing air against her face.
Well, that wasn’t romantic at all. It did a number on the arousal building up in her, too. Not much could survive a faceful of wind and snow.
The passenger side door clunked closed, and she could see the shadow of Cooper going around the car. The windows were so thickly coated with snow that he was nothing but a dark, mysterious blur.
Right now, that was what he felt like to her. She wished she knew what he was thinking.
She knew that what was between them wasn’t just in her head. Maybe she’d been doubting a lot of things today, but there was no way to doubt that. The pull between them felt as strong and natural as gravity, and she knew he felt it too. He’d all but admitted it to her—multiple times, even.
So why had he turned away?
11
Why hadn’t he kissed her?
“What are you,” Cooper said to himself, “an idiot?” The icy wind stole the words right out of his mouth—literally—and whipped them away into nothingness, so he couldn’t even hear his own question. Which was just as well, since he had no idea how to answer it.
Leaning towards her had felt as natural as breathing. Maybe even more natural.
I’d die without air, but I’d fight to stay alive. If I didn’t have her—
If I didn’t have her, I don’t know what I could think of that would be worth fighting for. I don’t know that I could stand to live in this world another second if it didn’t have her in it.
He’d never felt like that before, but as strange and unexpected as it was, feeling like that didn’t scare him. He hadn’t run away from her out of fear.
The real answer slid into place, even colder than the wind around him.
He wanted to kiss her, but he didn’t want to hurt her. And he couldn’t think of a single way he could kiss her without hurting her eventually.
For most of the day, he’d been trying to convince himself that he needed to let go of his feelings for her, that there was no chance that anything could happen between them. Now he knew there was a chance. Gretchen knew he was innocent, and she wanted to help him get his freedom. And she had to be single, because she’d wanted him the same way he’d wanted her, and she wasn’t the kind
of person to mess around.
What was between them was real—or it could be real, if they both gave in to their feelings.
If the only cost of pursuing it had been his own broken heart, Cooper would have done it in a second. It would have been worth it.