Page 27 of Second Round

“Noooooo,” I pleaded. “I’m goingtofall.”

“You’ll be fine. I can tell you’re steadieralready.”

I began to push off, immediately caught an edge on something, and went splat on the ice. I glared up at him. “Ouch. Some coachyouare.”

He only laughed. “Okay, just for that, I’m not even going to helpyouup.”

“You’re going to be sorry for that.” I scrambled up awkwardly and tried to get at Leo. He skated backwards effortlessly. His legs twisted at the hip but the rest of him barely moved. He was right about one thing: doing something he was so good at made him even more desirable. Did I want him to hold me for support or for the sensation of his muscular armaroundme?

As I chased him, I finally began to get the hang of skating. It wasn’t that much different from in-line skating, except the lack of useful brakes. Skating was fun too, once I stopped worrying about falling. Leo was still skating backwards with that sexy casualness and watching myimprovement.

“See. Easy, right?” He grinned. “I am a goodcoach.”

“Really? Did you deliberately taunt me just to getmemad?”

He shrugged. “You gotta figure out what motivatespeople.”

Okay, great. It only took him five minutes to figure out how to motivate me. This guy wasdangerous.

Now that I wasn’t all Bambi legs, we could skate side-by-side.

“It looks like you were born on skates,” Itoldhim.

“I liked skating from the moment my father put me ontheice.”

“How oldwereyou?”

“I don’tknow.Two?”

We continued to skate around and chat. The beautiful mountain, snow, and lights were like the setting for a heart-warming holiday movie. And finally the movie of my life had anothermalelead.

My legs were jelly and my fingertips were popsicles when Leo suggested we go for dinner. There were a few restaurants up here, and we chose the casual bistro. We snagged a window-side table and ordered dinner. Leo held up his glassofwine.

“Salut, Jacqueline.” Oh boy, French again. Seriously, this was like a schoolgirl crush. I wanted to act mature and sophisticated, so I needed to keep my tongue from hanging out every time he did something attractive. Which was every thirtyseconds.

“So, tell me about your daughter,” I said. That was something I’d never said on a date before, but now it was a natural part of whowewere.

Leo’s eyes widened, then he smiled. “I forgot that you already know all about me. Her name is Charlotte.” He pulled out his phone and handed over a photo of her. She was tiny and blonde with a beamingsmile.

“Oh my gosh, she’s absolutelybeautiful.”

Leo took back the phone. He took a moment to look at the photo and this expression came over his face—a sweet softness. It was only a flash, but the raw emotion struck me. It was so unlike his usual calm and rational manner. Charlotte was clearly the sun that his universe rotatedaround.

“She’s mad at me right now. She was supposed to visit me for her March Break, but that was when I was in Albany and I could drive up and get her. Now she’d have to fly and the airlines won’t let any child under eight years old flyalone.”

“Oh, that’s a shame. Isn’t there anyone who couldbringher?”

“It’s too late now. Besides, I’ll be on a road trip. But she’ll be coming thissummer.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Sophie—her mother, my ex—is getting married in June. Then she and Wes are going on a big sailing trip from Hawaii to San Diego. They’re gonna be gone for a month. So we decided Charlotte could spend July with me. At first, it wasn’t a big deal because I usually go back to Montréal every summer anyway. But now, my boss and I wanna do a lot of preparation for the new season, so rather than flying back and forth all summer, I decided to have Charlotte stay herewithme.”

He shrugged and took a sip of wine. “Sophie’s been kind of stressed lately with the wedding and work. Charlotte’s excited. She’s never been to Vancouver, and she wants to seewhales.”

“Well, the Aquarium hasBelugas.”

“Naw, she wants to see killer whales. I’ll have to find out how todothat.”

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