Page 58 of A Very Titan Christmas
He let out a slow breath, as if she’d said too much too soon, as if they should have just lain in bed and basked in a heavenly morning afterglow, repercussions be damned. A crack of ice-cold regret chilled her.
“It wasn’t just last night,” he said.
Her eyes cut to his face. Bryce stared at the slanted plank wood ceiling of the bedroom loft. “Putting on the show for your mom…” He turned his head and rested his cheek on the pillow.“It has really taken a lot of work to pretend. Because I’m not pretending.”
The icy chill of regret dissipated in the sunshine rising through her. She wasn’t pretending either. They felt like an actual couple. Getting to know him again as an adult, letting him sweep her off her feet, and working through the silly headaches that came with dealing with Eloise added substance to the roles they had been playing. They were moving fast, but they’d already had a base when they started. “What do we do with that?”
His eyebrows arched as if that was the question he didn’t have an answer to. “I don’t know. Keep doing what we’ve been doing?”
She bit the inside of her cheek. That was the only answer. She lived in Pennsylvania. He went wherever Titan Group sent him. Their time in Silverberry Ridge was temporary, like a beach fling but in the snowy mountains. It couldn’t be replicated and didn’t have staying power. Yet she wanted to believe it did. If not, she simply had to prepare herself for heartbreak again.
Bryce rolled over and caged her against the pillow. He nestled himself between her legs, and the hard heat of him whisked away doubts and worries. His mouth found hers in a sleepy morning kiss that exploded like fireworks.
As greedy as he was, desperate to erase thoughts of the future, Rachel wrapped her arms around his neck. She craved him. His taste. His touch. The way he worked her body until she knew no one and nothing but him.
And she loved him.
Impossible. What she felt was a memory of love. A longing. She might be falling again, but she was wrong to think she was already there.
Bryce held her tightly like she was a Christmas gift that might slip away. He spent the rest of the morning cocooning her awayfrom the world, and she felt like she only existed in his arms and in pleasure as she fell harder and harder for him.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The snowstorm haddelayed Titan Group’s arrival, but now, they were descending upon the Silverberry Ridge Resort en masse.
Jared stood at the entrance of the main lodge—where his children had disappeared into—with his arms crossed, thinking it was a wonder Titan had actually gotten up the mountains with its entire crew. Their arrival had been delayed for days until the small private airstrip and mountain roads could be plowed. Luckily for them, Vermont handled this kind of snow far better than Virginia. Virginia hadn’t received as much snow, but the entire commonwealth had been bracing for the blizzard of the century.
Now, he watched for his team’s arrival, standing on the ramp just outside the warmth of the resort lobby while his wife waited in their snow-blasted, sand-and-salt-covered SUV with the heater running on high. The Christmas commotion was officially beginning. He enjoyed playing Santa Claus with his family and friends, although he didn’t broadcast that information.
The Winters crew was first to park, and tiny Mia popped out like a jack-in-the-box, ready to meet their arriving caravan like a holiday cruise director. She rushed by. “Love the scarf, Boss Man.”
He thought it was a festive touch as he grumbled, “Don’t slip and fall on your ass.”
Colby Winters threw one arm in the air in greeting as he unloaded his dogs from the back of their vehicle and tried tocoax them to take a walk. Jared needed to walk Sarge, but neither the dog nor Sugar seemed ready to venture into the cold.
The electronic door whooshed open and closed behind him, tinging the air with the scent of cinnamon and cloves. Mia returned almost immediately with the keys to the cabins.
“Mr. Grumpy Pants.” She gave him a look as if she were about to scold a child. “Don’t move. I have something for you.”
“Did it look like I was going anywhere?”
Mia clung to the railing as she returned down the ramp to the parking lot, got something from the SUV, and returned with a Santa hat. “Put it on.”
Jared snorted. “Not a snowball’s chance in—”
Sugar opened the door of their idling SUV. Her cherry-red lips pursed, and her eyebrows arched as if to warn him he wouldn’t get any action if he didn’t put on the hat.
He groaned but snatched it from Mia. “Ho, ho, ho. Everyone happy with me?”
A moment later, a smiling Sugar was nestled back inside the warm vehicle, and Mia was cooing over Jared in the hat like he was a toddler in the snow for the first time. “Take it down a notch, you little Christmas elf.”
She clapped her gloved hands as Jax’s wife, Seven, pulled into the spot next to the Winters’ vehicle, followed by Beth behind the wheel of a large SUV with Nicola in the passenger seat, their kids peering out windows that had been rolled down.
“Let the fun begin,” he grumbled.
“You love it, and you know it.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he said, though she was right. He did.
