Adam felt Maddie’s determination dissolve as she returned her gaze back to him. She didn’t look angry anymore. On impulse, he leaned closer and gently kissed her cheek where the tear had been. She quietly sighed and closed her eyes, but didn’t try to resist. He brushed his lips against hers. The slightest moan escaped her lips as they parted. He pressed his lips to hers as he took a step closer to her and kissed her softly at first and then more passionately as she gave in to his kisses. He felt her give in to passion as her body arched closer into his and she started to kiss him back. Her tongue met his as the kiss deepened, causing his stomach to flip as he became aroused. He was so hurt and angry with her, but he still loved her. Kissing her again stirred up the feelings that he had tried to stuff away. He had to have an explanation. He deserved one.
Moments passed as they melded together in the familiar embrace. Lips moving, hands stroking, bodies pressed close together. And then he tasted the saltiness of her tears.
Chapter 19
Adam pulled back, looked at Maddie’s face, and saw that tears streamed down her cheeks. She looked defeated and angry at the same time.
Her voice cracked as she said, “You don’t even know what you’re doing, Adam.”
His determination was renewed. “I want an explanation. I’ve had a lot of time to think since you left me in the hospital, and I’m not leaving here until I get one.”
He crossed his arms. She shook her head.
Then his words frantically spilled out. “We should’ve died that night on the mountain. We should’ve frozen to death up there, but something unexplainable happened, something miraculous. At first, I thought you were just being brave and trying to comfort me when you told me that we weren’t going to die. But then you told me to think warm thoughts and everything changed. I thought I was really dying because suddenly it felt like I was on a hot beach in ninety-degree weather. I thought I was in heaven. And then there was the fact that neither one of us got frostbite, not even the slightest bit. That’s impossible, Maddie. I’ve thought about it a lot.”
She hung her head as she continued to cry.
“And then there were all the little things. Look, the scar on your arm and the marks from the stitches are completely gone. How do you explain that?”
She absentmindedly rubbed her arm where the wound had once been.
“And what about the fire in the nightclub? You claimed to have never been to that club, but you just happened to find a door that nobody else knew about. Coincidence? I don’t think so. And what about on our first date when I cooked dinner for you? I know that I didn’t have a corkscrew in the drawer, but you found one. How convenient. And you just happened to show up at rehearsal the first night with Shark Fin beer, and you didn’t even know us at all. There is no way you could’ve just randomly picked that out. You told me the avalanche was your fault. You told me that being with you puts me in danger. How can that be? And most of all, how could you tell me that you love me and then just leave?”
She wiped the tears with the back of her hand, sighed, and said in a low, defeated voice, “I told you that you wouldn’t understand. I was trying to save your life, Adam. Being around me is dangerous. Don’t you see?”
He stood there with his arms crossed and stared at her. There was no holding back now.
“No, I don’t see. Don’t I get a choice in this, Maddie? Did it ever occur to you that maybe I would rather have died on that mountain than live without you?”
Her eyes met his and she winced almost imperceptibly.
“What is going on with you? What is it from your past that you are not telling me? Why were you afraid to be intimate? In some ways I feel so close to you, like I’ve known you forever, and in other ways I feel like I don’t know you at all. Who the hell are you, Madeline Smith?”
Her face was unreadable. Maybe she finally believed he was not leaving. Maybe she was just tired of fighting. She stood there silently with a look of ambivalence. She had stopped crying.
Adam suddenly realized the room was cold and shivered involuntarily. Maddie noticed him shudder.
“Are you cold, Adam? How about a fire?” she said stoically.
Before he could respond, she pointed to the fireplace while never taking her eyes off him. Instantly, he heard a whoosh like the sound of a fire being lit with an accelerant, and a fire sprang to life. Adam was stunned. How had she done that?
He tried to recall if she had gas logs with a remote starter. No, it was a wood-burning fireplace. He remembered stacking the logs and lighting the fire on the cold nights they had spent together at her place. The hairs rose on the back of his neck. Wide-eyed, he looked at her expectantly and waited for an explanation.
She stared at him without any emotion as she said, “You might want to sit down and get comfortable. How about a beer?”
She pointed to the couch. As he robotically turned to move toward the couch, he noticed a Shark Fin beer on the coffee table, as if she had just placed it there for him. But she hadn’t moved. He was pretty certain the beer had not been there before. Goose bumps rose on his arms, and not from the cold. He sat down slowly, looked at the beer in amazement, and then looked back at her. There was a glass of wine in her hand where there hadn’t been one before. He grabbed the beer and noticed that it was ice cold.
