Page 40 of Collision of Winters
Until now.
The dogs took notice when I stepped out onto the porch, and it made Kayden look up as well.
I adjusted my beanie and zipped up my parka.
While Atlas moseyed over to me, Kayden hid from me and went back to building his stack of snowballs by the bridge, and I had half a mind to tell him to have his fun farther away from the stream. If he got distracted and fell into the water, it was going to get very cold very quickly.
I wasn’t a fusser or anything.
I patted Atlas on the head and scratched him behind the ears. He looked happy and active, tongue hanging out, pale brown eyes brimming with readiness and energy.
“You like him too, don’t you?” I murmured.
Atlas huffed and headbutted my hand.
He gave me an idea. With the storm finally having moved on—and it wasn’t snowing as much anymore—I should give the dogs a proper workout to tire them out after a few days of waiting around. Maybe it would bring me back into Kayden’s good graces too. He was a little daredevil, so I knew he’d enjoy a bumpy ride on an ATV straight out on the tundra.
I climbed down the steps, snow and ice crunching underneath my boots, and I walked toward whatever Kayden was building. A wall? A new border?
“Is he coming closer, Prince?” he asked quietly. “You gotta tell me. You’re wagging your tail. He’s coming closer, isn’t he? Darn it.”
Prince jumped into his playtime pose and barked.
“Anybody home behind the Great Wall of Alaska?” I asked, only about ten feet away now.
“No!” he called out. He instantly balled himself up on the ground. Unfortunately for him, the wall was just a bit too small, so he only came off as cute as fuck. “You text before you call, dammit!”
I stifled a chuckle. “Kinda difficult when we only have one phone.”
“That’s a you problem,” he griped. “I’m busy.”
“Too busy to head out on a four-wheeler with me and the dogs?”
Oh, he was quick to poke his head up.
I smiled. Christ, he was addictively adorable and sexy. Cheeks flushed from the cold, eyes extra blue against the snow…
“Where would we go?” he asked.
I pointed out at the vast nothingness to the east. “Out there, where speed limits don’t exist.”
It was the best way to lure him out, even though I had no intention of driving like a maniac.
He looked out over the tundra and chewed on his lip.
Time to bring out the big guns.
“There might be Push Pops and a hot tub waiting for us when we get back,” I mentioned. We were both sick of washing up in a basin or an ice-cold stream, so if I prepared the tub on the porch before we left, the water would be hot in a couple of hours when we returned.
Kayden scrambled to his feet and brushed some snow off his pants. “You have Push Pops here?!”
I inclined my head. “Last time I checked, it was your birthday tomorrow. Did you think I wouldn’t come prepared?”
I had him now. He couldn’t possibly have thought my idea of celebrating his birthday was to eat a steak, could he? His favorite dinner was going to come with his favorite dessert. I wasn’t new here. The lollipops were extras, in case I needed them for whatever reason—and I clearly did. Same with the cheese.
Look at yourself. You’ve shared a platonic version of a DD/lb dynamic for years already.
A sobering thought, but Kayden’s smile—that he was trying to fight—tugged at his lips, and he glanced over at the two ATVs.
