Page 89 of The Mating Game
I can only hope she can’t make out my sheepish expression in the glow of the flashlight. “I didn’t think you’d want me to bring it into the bathroom. Didn’t think you’d want me shining it on you when you were naked.”
The flashlight is pointed right at her, so I clearly see the way her lips part slightly and her eyes go wide, no doubt realizing that fact herself. If the sudden burst of her scent is any indication, I almost think she might not have minded.
Hopefully the bright light of the flashlight is washing me out enough that she doesn’t see my face flushing.
I move the beam to the floor in search of her socks, quickly finding them under the edge of the bed where they’ve fallen. I grab them before I set the flashlight upright on the ground beside me, looking at her from where I’ve knelt and holding out my hand in a quiet request. She gives me her foot while I barely breathe, unsure how putting on her socks could be so hard on my heart. It’s practically dancing in my chest right now.
I slide one sock over her good foot before moving to the sprained one, cradling her heel gently as I carefully pull the material over her toes and upward to slide it onto her foot. Again, the backside of my finger teases her skin as I work, but there’s an added bonus of my palm half curving against her calf as I tug the long sock all the way up.
“Done,” I tell her, looking up at her from the floor.
There’s probably something wrong with my face—maybe it’s blue or something, given that I stopped breathing about thirty seconds ago. Maybe that’s why I linger on the floor for a moment, just staring at her and breathing in her sweet scent. It’s brighter like this, fresh from the shower, and the urge to rise and press my tongue against her skin is stronger than it should be. I don’t know how long it is before I remember myself, clearing my throat and pushing up from the floor to return to a standing position before grabbing her towel from where she dropped it on the bed and handing it back to her.
“Dry your hair,” I order gently. “Don’t want you to get sick.”
“Right,” she answers, taking the terry cloth from me. “What about the power?”
I shake my head. “I texted my friend at the co-op. He hasn’t texted me back yet.”
“Are we going to freeze to death? Is this how we die?”
I can’t help but chuckle.
“I’m going to build a fire downstairs. It’ll warm the room right up, don’t worry.”
“My hero,” she laughs.
I reach to rub at my neck. “But…we’ll probably need to sleep down there. This upstairs is going to freeze after a bit.”
“Together?”
It’s an innocent question, but what it does to me is less so.
“There are extra blankets and pillows in the storage closet downstairs. We can make pallets near the fire.”
It’s not quite an answer to what she was inadvertently asking, but only slightly, as far as I’m concerned.
“My phone,” she says suddenly. “It’s on the bathroom counter. Can you grab it?”
“No way to charge it,” I point out.
“I just want to let my brothers and my friend Ada know what’s going on,” she tells me. She laughs then. “Want to make sure she knows who to blame if you murder me out here.”
I snort out a laugh of my own. “More likely that a bear finds its way in looking for warmth and makes a meal out of you.”
“What?”
I flash her a sly grin in the glow of the flashlight. “Kidding.”
“Hysterical,” she grumbles.
“Come on,” I say, reaching out my hand to help her stand after picking the flashlight off the floor. “Let’s get you downstairs and warmed up.”
I don’t think it really hits me, not until she’s once again tucked against my side with her arm around my neck and her hand clasped around my waist to steady herself as we work our way out of her room toward the stairs. It takes that long, at least, to fully sink in.
That we’re all alone. That we’re trapped in the lodge without power and with only each other for warmth.
Okay, maybe that last bit was a stretch…but tell that to the sense of anticipation clenching in my gut.
