“Just a quick word of the ground rules. Should you and Lane bump into one another off camera, we ask that you refrain from any—chemical reactions that might be moved to occur. Save the hot stuff for when you’re miked up and camera ready.”
“Please. As if that will ever happen. The only thing happening is the fact I’m about to own Lane on the slopes.”
“Get ready to own him because that’s exactly where you’ll be spending the day.”
A giddy schoolgirl cry escapes me, and as soon as we park, Seth ushers me into hair and makeup and a tent filled with all the latest and greatest in ski wear. Score! I’ve died and gone to shredding heaven.
An intern helps me pick out a cute, bright red, tight-fitting, flattering in all the right places jacket and matching pants, along with a cool pair of mirrored blue goggles. I put on all the garb and can’t help but admire the fact I look like a firecracker of a snow bunny. I can’t wait until Lane sees me and has a bright red heart attack over the fact he lost me.
Sleep with three skanks will you. This should teach him a red-hot lesson.
After a quick safety briefing—as if I needed it—I collect my skis and poles and am escorted to the entry of Sugar Hill, our beloved tiny ski resort that feels more like an old friend than Lane ever will.
Seth and an entire tribe of interns come at me with a bright white helmet. “Oh no, please don’t,” I lament. “I happen to be having a really good hair day.”
Seth frowns as his minion sinks the helmet over my head. “You agreed to this during the safety portion.”
“I agreed that helmets in general were a good safety feature for those inexperienced on the slopes. In no way was I hoping to score a manmade exoskeleton for myself.”
“Too bad,” he quips while adjusting it over my head. “We’ve attached a Go-Pro to each of you and there will be an entire army of cameramen out there today, but you shouldn’t notice them. The entire point of this exercise is to see the two of you in a natural environment. Remember, the odds are in your favor. And who knows? You might even have some fun.”
“Famous last words.”
Fun is the last thing on the agenda today.
I’m spending the day with Lane Cooper. He sucked the fun out of our lives a long time ago.
Seth points the way, and I slosh my way to the mouth of the ski lift. The mountain doesn’t usually fill up until Saturday, and then the lines are unbearably long. Locals usually avoid Sugar Hill like the snowy plague on weekends because the tourists and the out-of-towners love to swamp the area.
A cool breeze ushers Lane next to me with a whoosh, and even with his helmet and hot as hell tight black pants and jacket, Lane Cooper still has the ability to take my breath away, and I detest him for it all the more.
“Violet.” His eyes widen, and for a moment I fall into the trance of those translucent orbs, and then I remember the fact he saw fit to wash me out of his system with three different girls. Not to mention the girl in question who put our relationship on the chopping block. Who am I kidding? Lane did that himself. He steadies his gaze over mine, and the spiced scent of his cologne transcends the cool breeze, circles me with its warmth. And the fact we’ve layered ourselves in brand new clothes might have something to do with my private heat wave as well. But that heady scent makes me melt a little on the inside. Lane has worn the same cologne for as long as I can remember, and it’s as much a part of him as those obnoxious glowing eyes.
“Lane.” I snap the goggles over my eyes as we scuttle forward and get on the ski lift. Something tells me this is going to be a long, long day.
We ride the ski lift wordlessly to the top. Before disembarking, Lane pulls out his phone and leans in, snapping a picture of the two of us without permission.
“What did you do that for?” I give him a little shove, and the phone goes sailing right over the side. We watch in disbelief as it partially buries itself in the snow. “Oh my God, I’m so sorry!” I look to him in a panic, and those long comma-like dimples of his dig in deep.
“It’s okay. It could have been worse. It could be me flying to my death.”
“Try another funny move and it will be.”
We glide off the lift, and I bolt straight to the area I sent his phone flying and, sure enough, I’m able to fish it out of its temporary dwelling.
“I believe I have something you’re looking for!” I shout as he glides in and takes it from my hand.
His brows twitch as he examines it. “Still works. Screens cracked, though.”
“It is?” I side-step over and cringe as I note he’s right. “Crap. Looks like I owe you a new phone.”
“That’s okay.” He slips it into his pocket and zips it up. “Rumor has it, I cracked something of yours last year.” He glances to my heart, and I shake my head at his cheesy endeavor at an analogy. He pins me with those eyes and singes my soul in the process. Hey, one cheesy analogy begets the next. “I’m sorry, Violet.” He shakes his head. “I’m hoping one day we can sit down and talk about everything that happened.”
“Please. I don’t need a roadmap. I was there, remember? Your lips hit some blonde bimbo’s, and a breakup ensued, ours. The end. As far as I’m concerned, there’s nothing to talk about. Now, are you ready to get your ass kicked on the slopes today? You may have humiliated me when it comes to love, but I’m going to make sure you eat it on the slopes.”
I take off like a speed demon, snaking my way around the masses, and wait for Lane at the bottom. I’m sweaty and panting, despite the artic chill, and I can’t help but laugh as he rides up next to me, spraying the snow over me like a fan.
“Hey! That’s not nice!” I cry, wiping the slush from my shoulders.
“What?” That goofy grin grows over his face. “You looked hot. I was trying to cool you down.”
I shake my head up at him and marvel at how commanding his features are. “Ever the gentleman.” We queue up for the lift and do run after run, me killing him each and every time. After our third go-round I’m beat, my face is burning, every muscle I own is on fire and, heck, even my scalp hurts from housing this boulder over it.
Lane whooshes in next to me with his skis tight, making a sharp turn and coming to an abrupt stop as if he were vying for Olympic gold. More like a participation trophy.
“What took you so long?” I blow over my fingers. “I had so much time, I gave my nails a fresh coat of polish.”
He howls out a laugh. “Honey, I’m just warming up. Are you done playing on the bunny slopes? Because I’m gonna go hang out with the big boys.” He takes off for the lift to our right with the ominous black diamond symbol next to it, stark and glaring like a warning. I may have hung out on this mountain all my life, but I’ve only ventured onto that sheer cliff once with my dad and Wen. They don’t call it Widow’s Peak for nothing. This mountain has a handful of tragedies each year, and they all coincidentally take place on that infamous run. It took me hours to side-step my way down the steep terrain. And I’m still having nightmares about that incident to this day.
“Ha!” I stupidly follow him to the queue and slide in next to him. “You wish you were a big boy.” I snarl at him for throwing down the black diamond gauntlet. “You know, this is really vindictive of you,” I sputter as we move up next to be seated.
“How so?” he shouts as we glide forward into position, and the lift gently scoops us up on our way to the rim of the world. I take off my gloves and pull the safety restraint down in front of us.
“You know I hate this run with all of my heart!” I scream into the wind, and my voice grows threadbare. My God, it felt good to scream my head off. It feels as if this granite boulder I’ve been hauling around with me this entire last year just fell from my arms and into the waiting snow below. Hey, I know! I should totally scream my head off at Lane for the next few hours. I bet it would make for some seriously great TV. I’d probably win an Emmy and an Oscar—and if I do a little tap-dance, maybe a Tony as well.
He barks out
his signature obnoxious laugh as I contemplate how bad life might actually be in a five by eight cell. I’m pretty sure if I push him off the lift it would count as a homicide. No matter how hard I tried to make it look like an accident, the look of glee on my face as he plummeted to earth would do me in. And in a serendipitous irony, the evidence would most likely be collected from that Go-Pro stuck to his helmet.
“Sweetie, I’m sure snow patrol will be glad to haul you back down the mountain if you’re too chicken to do it yourself.”
I suck in a lungful of icy air and, swear to God, my lungs freeze solid. The sun disappears behind a curtain of soft gray clouds, and a sprinkling of snow begins to fall over us.
“Did you just use the word haul implying that my carcass is too large of a load to simply give a lift?”
He flips up his goggles, and those pale citrine eyes gawk at me stunned. “All kidding aside, Vi—you are beautiful, and I would never disparage your body that way.” His eyes dip down over me, raking over me, slow and easy, and my entire being ignites with heat as he traces my every curve. “You’re perfect, Vi. I’m sorry if I made you feel otherwise.” He flips back on those mirrored lenses, and his chest puffs out as he takes in a breath. “But you know this isn’t for you. Why don’t you wave the white flag of surrender? Head home and play with that doll collection of yours. By the way, I’ve been wondering how your roommate sleeps at night with all of those plastic eyes watching over the two of you.”
I swat him over the arm, and he catches me by the hand and warms it. I yank my fingers back, but I can still feel him there as I pull my gloves back on.
“My doll collection is safely tucked in my old bedroom at my mom’s house, thank you very much. And for your information, my roommate sleeps quite well at night. She has a boyfriend, by the way—not like that’s ever stopped you. It would be just like you to pursue an interest in someone who’s taken. Is that the turn-on? Forbidden fruit?” Collette Jameson was hot and heavy with Mitchell Woods at the time of the infamous hookup. Lane swore they didn’t sleep together, but he was already a liar to me at that point.
He bows his head a moment and flicks his goggles back once again, his eyes pinned on mine. “I will have this conversation with you, Vi. I will have it anywhere but here because the last thing I want is for you to launch the two of us into those boulders waiting below.” His jaw tightens as he shoots a quick glance down the mountain. “And I’d love to do so in private.” His features dull as he pulls his goggles back on. Lane doesn’t really want to air out all of our dirty laundry to the public, and a part of me doesn’t want that either, but we’re here, committed, already on the long, thorny trail that will take four more weeks to army crawl through.
“It’s too late to shelter the dirty details from the world, Lane.” I swallow hard as I keep my focus on the sky as the evergreens grow shockingly small beneath us, the mountain seems to rise impossibly high, and my heart bounces in my chest like a rubber ball. “We’ve already reduced ourselves to nothing but a dirty detail.” A mean shiver rides through me, and it has nothing to do with the fact the snow is coming down blindly fast, covering our thighs with a pile of dust deep enough to bury a finger in.
Lane writhes in his seat a moment, causing us to wobble, and I let out an unadulterated yelp. I glance down and note how miniaturized the world looks from this impossible vantage point. The evergreens look as tall as Barbies, and the people whizzing down the mountain look like flies buzzing by.
“Whoa.” He wraps an arm around me, warm and solid, and I close my eyes, trying to force myself to relax. “Forget the snow patrol. Maybe I should call in for a helicopter rescue and get you down before we hit the top.”
I open my left eye and glare over at him. “You really are full of yourself, you know.” I shrug him off me, and our seat gives another wild swing.
“Easy, sweetie. I’d like to live to beat you down this mountain.”
“Did you just issue a challenge?” My stomach knots up dangerously taut, and vomiting up those waffles I wolfed down this morning seems like a very real option.
“I’d never do that. We both know I’m going to lap you on this one.” Those killer dimples of his dig in deep as he presses out a smile. “Face it, Vi. You’ve met your match on the mountain this afternoon, and he just so happens to be sitting right next to you.”
“Oh my God.” I tip my head back and let out a primal animalistic cry that ripples through my body like a deep tissue massage. Honest to God, I think half the creatures on this mountaintop just howled back.
Lane leans to his left to get a better look at me. “Is that something new you picked up in bed? Because if it is, I kind of like it. Did he teach you that? The guy you cheated on me with? What was his name again?”
“No, no, no. This is all one big nightmare, and any minute now I’m going to wake up and scream your name like a curse.” I moan as my body rocks the stupid pencil we’re currently flying through space in. “Can’t this thing move faster?” I lament as I glare at the upcoming depository. “Finally.” I lift the safety bar and gird myself for what lies ahead. “And don’t think for a minute you’re going to beat me down this mountain. Get ready to eat my dust, Cooper.”
We hit the turnstile, and I glide right out and make the hairpin turn to head down the mountain. My skis turn hard to the left, stopping me cold from moving.
Lane glides down about twenty feet ahead of me before turning around and holding up his poles. “What’s going on? I was just working up an appetite to eat your dust!” he belts it out with a laugh.
I’d give him the finger, but I’m too paralyzed to move. My God, you really can’t see the bottom from here. I’m pretty sure you can’t even see the middle. Hell, it’s so steep, I can’t see the next ten feet. A steady stream of people dive down the side, and for the life of me I can’t see where they went. I’d swear on a stack of Bibles that they just flew off the side of this mountain like a bunch of snow hungry lemmings.
Lane chops his way back up to me, panting while those dimples dig in and out with each breath. “You don’t have to do this, Vi.” Each word comes out in a vat of white smoke. He reaches out with a gloved hand as if offering me an olive branch, and every last part of me wants to take the out. “I get it. This is a bear of a slope. It’s not for the weak or the weary.”
I suck in a quick breath at the audacity, and I’m quick to slap his hand away with my pole. “How dare you call me weak and weary!” I lean in close with my blood set to a boil. “The only moment in my life I consider weak was when I dated you. And you’re the one who’s going to be weary just trying to catch up to me. Get out of my way.” I jump past him and give a little scream as I go airborne for three solid, eternally hellish seconds, and as soon as my skis make contact with the ground, I’m slipping and sliding with the best of them. I try to cut my way down, but the snow feels slick and icy. My heart ratchets up to unsafe levels as I try to mind the trail and keep away from the evergreens just beckoning for me to impale myself into one of their branches.
“Oh shit,” I hiss as I pick up unimaginable speeds, my skis growing ever so wild beneath me. I try my hardest to squat and narrow my toes, but the mountain seems to have given way and I’m left to navigate what feels like a sheer drop. Before I know it, I’m going straight down, top speed. The wind hits my face so hard each snowflake beating against me feels like a razor cutting into my skin.
My skis lift unexpectedly in a soft roll as I go over a bump, and my left pole flies right out of my hand.
“Oh God.” I glance back—a fatal error, and I know it. My speed picks up another million miles an hour as I try my best to keep from eating it. A series of obstacles comes at me fast, a bevy of pines to my left, a set of mini moguls to my right, and I have no choice but to take one. Up I go—and holy crap… My left ski touches down, but my right hooks onto the ground in an unfriendly manner and I cartwheel. My life flashes before my eyes—my arms, my legs snapping in all sorts of directions at once as the
world turns upside down, the sky, the snowy white earth quickly reverse their places, and I give one elongated serrated scream as I land hard against a boulder, slamming into the side of it with a thud as I crash back to earth on my back.
Can’t breathe. Can’t feel anything. Oh my God, please let me live. Please let me keep my arms and my legs right where they’re supposed to be.
I knew that I knew that I knew messing with Lane Cooper once again would not end well. I just didn’t think it would end me, too.
A sharp pain rips up the side of my body, and I open my mouth to a silent scream.
“Violet!” a booming voice roars from above as a spray of snow washes over me. “Shit!” Lane falls to my side and flicks off his goggles and helmet in a fury. His face is rife with worry as he pants like mad while getting in close. “Vi,” he barks as his voice breaks. His thumbs brush over my cheeks in one quick motion as he pulls off my goggles. “You’re going to be okay, I promise.” He leans in and brushes a careful kiss to my forehead as if I were made of glass. “I’m going to remove your helmet.” He works it off quickly. “Your right binding didn’t give.” He glides down my body, and I can feel him doing something behind me. A white-hot fireball of pain races up my leg, and I give another bloodcurdling scream. “I’m sorry,” he says as something loosens on my right side, and I watch as the ski falls to the ground. My God, it must have been staked in the ground behind me.
“My leg!” I cry out as Lane wraps his arms around me. “Lane, I’m so scared.”
“You’re going to be okay.” He pulls back, and his eyes darken as if they know I’m not. An entire infantry of snowmobiles glides in around us, and I tense up at the thought of riding down like a mummy strapped to a tennis racket. “Don’t worry. I’m not leaving your side, Vi.”