He took another bite of oatmeal, all the bitterness in his brain affecting the taste and turning the strawberries sour, as he watched Shelby—her hood down now—try to shovel out a subcompact. The wind pushed back her hood, whipped at her short hair, and turned the tips of her ears red. The snow went past the tops of her snow boots and nearly up to her knees as she worked to clear a path for her itty-bitty car.
How in the hell had that speck of a car managed to make it up the mountain in the first place? There was no way with all the additional snow, which was starting to come down in ever faster waves, it would be safe for her to attempt the twisty roads. He couldn’t let her do that. It was too dangerous. He was up and out of his seat before he knew what in the hell he could do about the situation. Then a gust of wind strong enough to make the roof rattle blasted the mountain. The falling snow went sideways, the trees bent under the pressure, and a large limb snapped off, slicing through a power line before hitting Shelby and sending her flying back onto her ass in the snow.
He was out the door before her shocked scream sounded, racing toward her like he was on a breakaway.
…
One second Shelby was lost in a snowdrift, her upper arm aching, and the next she was tucked securely against Ian’s chest as he carried her inside the cabin. Even with as fast as they were hustling up the steps to the porch, her being buffeted by unyielding biceps and pecs, she didn’t move a millimeter.
“What are you doing?” The words were barely out of her mouth before her brain clocked how dumb they were, but Ian smelled good, like, really good, and it was distracting as hell.
Her senses must be heightened by her near brush with getting beaned by a tree limb the size of a Louisville Slugger. Why else would she be noticing that warm, spicy scent that clung to him? Or that he had a very nice chin under his dark scruff, and his eyelashes were a billion miles long? The tingly, breathy thing she had going on right now, making her chest tight, was no doubt left over from the adrenaline rush of dodging the limb mixed with the oh-shit-that’s-cold jolt from landing in the snowbank. That had to be the reason why she didn’t demand to be put down and instead had asked such a duh question.
“I’m helping you,” he said, gaze forward, body stiff.
“Why?”
He turned sideways and used his hip to nudge the front door the rest of the way open. “Because I’m not a total dick, and you’re hurt.”
She lifted her arm, testing it as they crossed the threshold, passed the kitchen, and hustled straight into the living room with its ginormous stone fireplace that looked like it just might have been here centuries before the house. The clock on the microwave had gone dark, the lightbulbs in the deer-antler chandelier were off, and the heat that had been pumping out of the vents was no more. Oh shit. Any hope that the wire the limb had taken out before landing on her wasn’t the power line vanished.
“I’m okay,” she said under her breath, willing it to be true.
“Well, then,” Ian said, unceremoniously dumped her onto the couch, and kept walking, flexing his hands as if carrying her had stung. “I’ll get started on the fire.”
Okay, obviously Ian did not take that the way she’d meant it. She sat up, slipped off her boots, then clutched a pillow to her chest and practiced her deep breathing. Panic attacks weren’t really her thing, but neither was being trapped without power in a cabin with someone who seemed to hate her even as he rushed to her aid.
While her annoyed knight-in-ass-hugging-jeans squatted down in front of the fireplace, Shelby took off her coat and pulled her arm out of the sleeve of her sweater to get a better look at where the limb had hit. A purple bruise was already starting to bloom, but that seemed to be the worst of it.
Finally, something was going right. Really, at this point something had to land on her side of the ledger.
“Why are you getting undressed?” Ian asked, his voice gruff.
Glancing up from the monster bruise forming on her arm, she rolled her eyes at him. “I’m not.”
He gestured at her bare arm.
Oh for the love of— “I’m wearing a tank top under my sweater and it’s literally just my arm. Why are you being weird?”
Instead of answering, he just grunted and turned back to the fire.
Okay, Mr. Chatty.
After slipping her arm back in her sweater, she took her phone out of her coat pocket and swiped the screen. Just as she had the night before, she only had half a bar. Well, it was worth a try. She dialed Lucy’s number and waited as a message reading “connecting” appeared above the keypad and stayed there. Moving the phone in hopes of catching the elusive second bar, she walked around the living room with no luck. Without giving Ian a second look—okay, much of a second look, he was wearing a Henley for God’s sake and had biceps for days—she stuffed her feet into her unlaced snow boots and went out onto the porch. She got as far as the railing before the call started to ring through.
Thank you, snow fairies.
“Hi, you’ve reached Lu—” Static ate away the rest of Lucy’s greeting. “Leave a mess—” More aural fuzz. “Call you back.”
The beep came through loud and clear.
“Lucy, I’m at the cabin and Ian Petrov showed up—but you know that already. Long
