Page 24 of Ice Melts

Her phone vibrated again. She tried not to let it penetrate her bubble of peace in Travis’ arms.

Jess was furious with Sarah’s lack of response. Travis’ team was going down, and Travis was missing, and in her eyes it was the story of a lifetime. She wanted Sarah on it three hours ago.

But Sarah just wanted to stay right where she was, not thinking about it.

If she wrote the article that exposed Travis’ team and Travis himself for being missing, she would lose him forever. But if she didn’t, she would lose her job.

And her self-respect.

Wasn’t she supposed to be exposing the athletes? Didn’t this exactly fit her mission and purpose these past two years, attempting to clean up the athlete’s lives? Their dangerous actions had consequences, at least that’s what she hoped to communicate.

Her assistant had even texted, ready with some of the details. She’d celebrated with, “This is the moment we’ve been waiting for!”

Sarah ran her hands up Travis’ back, held on for a few more seconds and then stepped back. She kept her face down, not daring to look into his eyes, but he lifted her chin. “Sarah.”

With a deep breath, she opened her eyes. “Travis.”

“This is nice.”

She nodded, made an attempt at a very weak smile and then looked away.

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know Travis. I don’t know. Okay. I just don’t know.” She walked away. “It’s time to go.”

“Wait, what? Aren’t you sleeping here?”

“Not any more. I…This is too hard Travis.”

He shook his head and hurried to her side, reaching for her hand. “Stay.”

Her heart shook with the tenderness in his tone.

“Stay. Let tomorrow be tomorrow. Tonight. It’s not tomorrow yet.”

She smiled and lifted her lashes again, daring a look into his eyes.

His were so full of light and hope, and dare she suspect, caring? Love? Something deeper than just what she’d always seen in his face, the interest of a good friend. This was more than that.

She couldn’t help let some of her hope show in return. Her mouth lifted in the corner and then she bumped him with her shoulder.

His grin grew so big it made her laugh.

“I’m staying. We have some serious movie time ahead of us you know.”

“Oh, believe me. I have not forgotten.” He tugged her toward the couch where he fell into its depth and pulled her down with him.

She was situated as close to him as she could be. He put his arm around her back and lifted the remote to pull up their options.

She snuggled into his side and couldn’t believe any of this was happening, but she wasn’t going to do a single thing to ruin it, not yet anyway. Tonight was tonight. Tomorrow would come soon enough.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Travis breathed out a huge silent victory breath. She’d agreed to stay. What she didn’t know was that they were already snowed in. The roads were a disaster out here lakeside and with a sheet of ice under the snow, everything was deemed really treacherous even for Michigan. The flights tomorrow had all already been cancelled. But he wanted her to choose to stay. And she had. That made everything different.

Travis was in some serious trouble for his silence. Coach was shouting by text. He had all kinds of voicemails. He had texted Tatum, told her he was okay. Didn’t tell her he was with Sarah though. For some reason, he got the impression that Sarah wasn’t telling her either. That was interesting. He’d unpack that later.

He pulled her even closer and almost kissed the top of her head before he stopped himself.Steady there Travis.

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