When I wake up again, Cole is huddled next to me, an arm slung protectively over my waist. Outside the tent, I can still hear the heavy fall of snow. I try to sit up, but I’m wrapped in about fifty layers of blanket. My arms are pinned to my sides by a bright orange sleeping bag. Frowning, I try to tug free.
“Don’t,” a low voice rumbles at my side. I look across at Cole. I thought he was sleeping, but his eyes are alert. “You need to stay warm,” he mutters, reaching across to pull at the tapes tying the sleeping bag shut.
I feel plenty warm at the moment. If anything, I feel too warm; sweaty and gross and claustrophobic under all the insulating layers. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine.”
“I can’t breathe in here.” I try to yank my hands free.
“You’d be dead without it.”
“Please take it off? I’m really fine—”
“You’re not fucking FINE!” He roars suddenly, sitting up. My eyes widen. He looks furious. “You almost died, Daisy. If I found you any later, we would’ve spent tomorrow digging your fucking body out of a snowdrift. So don’t tell me that you’re fine!”
The wind howls outside like a dying animal. The nylon walls of the tent flap violently.
“I’m sorry,” I say quietly.
“Fan.” He shakes his head. “I’m not mad,” he mutters. “Not at you.”
“You should be. I was stupid.”
“None of us saw the storm coming,” he says gruffly. “Me and Eli almost got caught in it. Sometimes there’s no warning.”
I try to smile. “Sure you don’t want to call me an idiot? That’s your usual go-to. Don’t go soft on me just because I almost died.”
It’s supposed to be a joke, but he wipes a hand over his mouth and swears again. “You really feel better?”
I nod. “Pretty much back to normal.”
“Pretty much?”
“I feel kind of weak. But apart from that, I’m good.”
He sighs. “Sit up, then.”
I do, letting him unstrap me from my straitjacket. He leaves the blankets draped around me. I look down at myself. “You stripped me.”
“Wet clothes will kill you.” He fumbles around in his pack, pulling out a chocolate bar. He peels back the yellow wrapping and shoves it into my hand. “Eat.”
“I’m not really hungry.”
“You need energy to stay warm. Eat.”
So I do. I snap the chocolate bar into pieces and cram it into my mouth. “Can I have some water?” I mumble.
He hands me a can, and I thirstily suck it up, watching him narrowly. He’s huddled in the corner of the tent, hunched over. Every so often, a flurry of shivers wracks his body, and he grits his teeth hard until they stop. I think he’s trying to hide it, but he’s freezing his balls off.
“Come share.” I lift up the flap of my blanket. “There’s enough room for two.”
He shakes his head. “You should wrap back up. The temp might drop again.”
For someone who spends so much time calling me dumb, he really is pretty thick. “You know it’ll be good for me,” I try. “Sharing body heat, and all that. I think this heated blanket is out of juice.”
He sighs. “I’m going to have to take off my clothes,” he warns. “Or it’ll fuck with the insulation.”
“I hoped you would.”
He glares at me, quickly pulling off his coat, then the layers of sweaters and thermals underneath. I rake my eyes over his naked torso, drinking in the sight of his solid abs and thick, muscled arms. “You could always take your pants off too,” I encourage, my gaze drifting to his boxers. I thought dicks were supposed to get smaller when it’s cold. Trust Cole’s penis to defy the laws of physics. “I really wouldn’t mind.”
He ignores my blatant come on, slipping under the blanket and opening his arms. “Here,” he says gruffly. I obediently roll into him, and he pulls me closer, his chest against my back. I feel his sigh of relief brush through my hair as he relaxes slightly.
“I’m sorry,” he says after a few heartbeats. “That I’ve been such an asshole to you.”
“What do you mean?”
“You think I’ll call you an idiot for this? For being scared and hurt?” His voice is grim. “I must have been really shitty to you for you to think that.”
“Just following the pattern,” I mumble.
He shakes his head. “I’ve been too harsh on you, ever since we met you. I should have trusted you more. I’m sorry.”
I take a breath. “Was it because of Johanna?”
He tenses. “What?”
“The other two told me about her,” I pause. “And about Rickard.”
“They’re nothing,” he spits out. “They don’t matter.”
I twist around so we’re facing each other. My breasts press against his muscled chest. He closes his eyes as the bulge in his boxers rubs between my legs. “That’s not true,” I say quietly. “You can tell me.”
“It seems like you already know the story.”
“Not from you. I imagine you’re the best person to tell it.” He doesn’t say anything, and I raise an eyebrow. “You have something better to do?”
He growls. I feel the sound rumbling through his chest, and press even closer. He hugs me tighter automatically, and sighs. “There’s… not much to say. When we met Johanna—it was like she put a spell on us all. It was shitty when she got engaged to Riven, but I couldn’t be mad at him for wanting to settle down with her. I would’ve, if she’d asked me instead.” He swallows. “When she told me about the kid, though. That felt different.”
“You loved him.”
“I was a dad, for a bit. Or I thought I was.” He squeezes my arm. “That was the hardest part. It wasn’t losing a woman I loved. It wasn’t even losing a baby. It was losing a—” he trails off.
“Family,” I say softly. “For a while there, you had a family.” A really weird one, where his baby-momma was married to his best friend; but a family all the same.
He doesn’t say anything.
“It’s okay to be upset,” I tell him, tipping my face up to look at him. “It’s cruel that it was taken away from you.”
He shrugs a broad shoulder. “It is what it is.”
“How philosophical.” I poke him. “And, what? That’s why you were so hostile towards me? You thought I was going to come between you all and destroy everything again?”
“Took me decades to reach a point where I made a home. And I thought you were gonna screw with it. I thought you’d hurt Riven and Eli.” He cups my cheek, blue eyes meeting mine. “I’m sorry.”
I consider, then sniff haughtily. “Well. I don’t forgive you.”
He looks down, dropping his hand. “That’s fair.”
“You’re gonna have to make it up to me,” I decide.
“How?”
“Kiss me.”
His eyes darken. “What?”
“Kiss me.”
“No.” His gaze flicks to my mouth. “I told you. I don’t kiss.”
“Why not?”
“It’s unnecessary. When I fuck a girl, it’s about release. Not playing-acting romance.”
“I know you want to. Riven told me. He said that you’d talked about dating me. He said that you agreed.”
Cole snorts. “That doesn’t mean I want to kiss you.”
“That’s kind of exactly what it means.”
He scowls. “You think because I saved you from freezing to death, I want to kiss you? It’s my job to help weak creatures that can’t handle the snow.”
I refuse to be offended by his tone. “You’re doing it again. Pushing me away, because you’re scared. I’m not falling for it again. You can be as grumpy as you want.” I slide closer to him, pressing my body against his, and put my head on his shoulder. “You know why I think you don’t kiss?”
“I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”
“I think you’re just scared of falling for someone. You’re scared of romance, and love.” I reach up and trace a fingertip down his cheekbone. “It’s easier to just have sex, isn’t it? That’s just mindless fucking. But when you look a woman in the face and kiss her, you’re opening yourself up to her. You’re treating her like you really care about her. And that means that she can hurt you.”
“Very astute,” he grinds out.
I press even closer. “But you don’t need to be scared anymore. Johanna has moved on. It’s time you did, too.”
He bristles. “I don’t want to talk about her.”
“Too bad.”
“Excuse me?”
I shrug. “I’m going to talk about her. And you’re kind of stuck with me at the moment, aren’t you? Unless you’d rather throw yourself into a snowdrift to avoid confronting your traumatic past.”
“I should’ve let you die in that bush,” he mutters.
“Hindsight is 20/20,” I say sweetly.
“I can still throw you back out there.”
“No. You can’t.” This man would hurt himself before he hurt anyone else, and we both know it.
I put my hands on his cheeks, forcing him to look at me. “I get it. She hurt you. You lost your family, and everyone you love. That doesn’t mean you’ll never love anyone again. The only person who’s keeping you from having a family is you, now, Cole. You, pushing everyone away, trying to scare off people that care about you, isolating yourself in the damn Arctic Circle just so you never have to make eye contact with a woman again.”
His eyes flash. He opens his mouth. I put my hand over it. “You can have a kid. You can have a wife, and a family. And yes, they might hurt you. We eventually lose everyone we love. That doesn’t mean we should just stop trying.”
He shakes his head slowly. “You don’t know anything.”
“I know you,” I insist. “You don’t hate people, not really. Deep down, you’re kind, and gentle. So why not just give in to—”
“I can’t do it again!” He snaps, cutting me off. “Did Riven tell you how he found me, after I realised the kid wasn’t mine? I was living in a flat in Stockholm’s red light district, getting the shit beat out of me every single night for fun.”
I blink. “What?”
“I was in the underground fighting circuit. It was the only way I felt anything at all. If I’d kept at it, I would’ve died. I wanted to die.”
Anger, twisted up with pain, rips through me. I drop my eyes to the scars stroking his chest. “These are from—”
“Yes.” A muscle tics in his jaw. “I can’t survive it again. I can’t.”
My nostrils flare. I get right in his face. “Yes. You. Can,” I growl, practically baring my teeth. “For God’s sake, you wrestle with moose and wolves and trek through storms for a living, and you think you’re not strong enough to get your heart broken a few times? If the rest of the world can do it, you can. You’re the strongest man I ever met.” I’m so close to him, my tits are crushed against his chest. His heart is battering under the muscle, and I can feel his cock hardening against my stomach. His icy eyes pierce mine as his hand slides down to my hip, squeezing. I push it away. “No. I’m not going to fuck you. You think I want to sleep with a guy who’s too much of a fucking coward to kiss me on the mouth?”
His grip tightens on me. “I’m not a coward,” he says, his voice dangerously low.
“So prove it! Pull yourself together and move on! Let yourself get out of this relationship with a ghost! There are people all over the planet who would want you in their family. Who would love you, Cole, if you just let them in—”
He cuts me off with his mouth.
