I was pleased that she was enjoying the meal I had cooked for her because I wasn’t so sure that she was going to like my next suggestion all that much. “Since the powers off, the heating system will be too,” I announced, hoping that she would in some way guess what it was that I was going to say next. Her blank expression told me otherwise. Fuck. “I would feel better if you stayed over here tonight given the weather and the fact that the power is out. We have a fireplace in each of the three bedrooms, we can keep it burning through the night, and we can stay warm that way.”

I waited for her reaction. “Three bedrooms?”

“This is a three-bedroom house. There’s a fire in each bedroom and in the living room, and the wood burner, Aga stove in the kitchen.”

“So, I can sleep in the living room then?” She asked. Finn glanced at Charlie and me glanced at Finn.

“Well no, the living room has nothing in it as yet, you would have to share with one of us.” Jesus, I sounded like a real creep.

She didn’t know what to say. I was thinking as best I could how I could backtrack and get the hell out of this if I needed to. Before my brain had the chance to come up with anything, she looked at me coyly and agreed.

“We can alternate who I’m in with right? Share the awkwardness around?” She suggested. Again, my brothers and I looked at one another, nodding in agreement to Ellie’s suggestion.

Ellie just agreed to sleep in a bed with me. Fuck. I tried not to let my mind race through all of the things that I would love to be doing with her and to her in a bed, but I’m not sure that anything would ever be able to stop my mind from going there about her. It always had, and it always would.

We tried to make light of the whole situation, Finn promised not to fart when she was sharing with him. Charlie said that he would keep pillows down the middle if that’s what she wanted. I offered to sleep the other way around, so we were head to toes with each other.

Ellie headed back over to the cottage to get some of her things with one of our heavy-duty torches. While she was away my brothers and I decided the fairest way to sort out the sleeping issue was to flip a coin. We each had a coin, flipped it, and heads were Ellie, tails were sleeping alone. The first flip my two brothers ended up with tails, and I ended with heads.

Ellie would be sharing my room first. We all went to our rooms and lit the fires, and the candles on the mantles. Soon enough, she was back over with her stuff and looked at us expectantly. “So, whose room am I sharing?” She asked a flash of colour blooming on her face. Damn, she was cute when she blushed.

“Jude here is your heat companion for the evening.” Charlie smiled at her and nodded in my direction. “I’m going to make hot chocolate, want one?”

Ellie smiled and agreed. “Have you got mini marshmallows?”

Charlie smirked. “As a matter of fact, I do.” He remembered her liking them just as much as I did, and when we heard that she would be here, we bought some just in case.

We took out mugs of liquid heat and headed up to my room. There was a vast sleigh bed in my room, and Ellie told me how awesome she thought it looked. We sat on top of the covers and chatted about pure, innocent bullshit while we sipped our cocoa. How long did we think the snow would last, how long would the power be out? How long she’d been writing, and it was all so very natural with her. When we were both done with our mugs, I showed her where the main bathroom was and took the cups back to the kitchen while she got ready.

When I finally got back to my room, Ellie was snuggled in under the covers, I put another log on the fire, made sure that the guard was in place, blew out the candles and climbed into bed with her.

“I’ll try and keep my hands to myself,” I whispered in the dim firelight.

“Oh, okay.” She whispered back. Was she disappointed? Did she want me to touch her?

“I can’t promise you won’t wake up and find me snuggling in thought.”

I heard the smile in her voice, and she chuckled a little. “Okay, I think I can deal with that.”

Oh, so can I Ellie.

When I woke the next morning, I was indeed snuggled up with Ellie, but this was more on her than on me. I thought about moving and uncurling myself from where she had her arm over me and her head on my chest, but I thought better of it. I liked having her there, I wanted more of having her there.

Instead, I chose to lie there in the silence and enjoy her warmth and her delicious scent against my body. It felt good to have her against me like that, it felt like she had always been destined to be right where she was at that moment.

I was just dozing off again when she started to stir beside me, stretching and creeping in closer. I didn’t want the moment to end, but I knew that it would be and soon when she realised fully where she was and what she was doing. Her leg went over my thigh and slid up to my crotch. I knew that when she was aware of where she was that she would also be very aware of the fact that I was lying here with her in my arms, and my cock hard and ready for more.

I knew the exact moment she was aware of where she was too, I felt her body stiffen, and her leg moved away from mine.

She cleared her throat. “Morning.” She murmured softly, pulling back from me already.

“Morning. Did you sleep well?”

She moved away from me, and I had to admit that I didn’t like it. “Yes, uh, thanks.” She was already getting out of bed. “I need to go to the little girl’s room.” She excused herself and headed out the door. I lay there staring at the ceiling. Fuck I wanted more of Ellie, I needed it. This was going to be almost impossible. The longer I lay there alone missing the touch of her, the more I convinced myself that the only way through this was to make sure that she didn’t end up in my bed for the second time. Yeah, like that would work.