She was lying on her front, drifting in and out of consciousness, mind pleasantly numb and body relaxed, her back tingling as Preston ghosted soft kisses down her spine in the soft afterglow of their shared pleasure.

He’d caught her after the shower, dirtying her up again as was quickly becoming his habit, and it was like they both knew they’d struggle to reach another orgasm each but couldn’t keep their hands to themselves anyway. He’d laid her out on the bed and kissed her for what felt like hours, before trailing lips over her body, mapping slow, leisurely paths from mouth to throat, over breasts and across each ridge of her ribs, down her belly and over the rise of her hips. He’d teased the skin along the inside of her thighs but didn’t touch her center, palming her breasts and worshipping her nipples, and she’d sighed and sunk into the mattress, letting her mind drift and her body tingle, losing herself in the exquisite pleasure of his touch.

In the end, when he’d spent so long lighting up every single one of her nerves, she’d asked him to put on a condom, and he did, eyes dark and lips flushed red, entering her in one smooth move from behind, and together, unhurriedly, they rocked their way to soft, breathless orgasms—less intense than all her others, but deeper somehow, leaving her boneless.

“Wish we could stay here all day,” he whispered against her shoulder blade.

She smiled, half of her face squashed into the pillow. “Hmm, we can,” she said lazily.

He huffed a laugh. “If it wasn’t for that pesky murder…”

Damn. The police were making their way over, and Ashley had her own little investigation interrupted by Preston’s insatiable thirst for her—not that she was complaining. But he did have a way of making her forget the world around her.

She rolled over, stretching with it, pulling the sheet up to guard her bare skin against the chill. He was looking at her with glittering eyes, making her feel a little shy.

“What time do you think they’ll be here?”

“Maybe by six?” he said. “The detective I spoke to seemed confident they’d be able to bulldoze through pretty quickly.” He dipped his head to lean his forehead on her shoulder and kissed the top rise of her breast. “And then I can take you home,” he added in a thick murmur, looking back up at her. “Have you all to myself.”

It wasn’t exactly dread that filled her at the intensely significant look in his eyes, but something like it—fear, maybe, about the world beyond this resort, and their place in it as a potential couple. Because this was fun, what they were doing here, but he spoke as if he saw them as something a bit more official, and going all in with him meant trusting him with her heart, and she’d made that mistake once before.

Carefully, she extracted herself from him, shifted to the edge of the bed while he watched her, a confused frown etched into his brow. “I mean, I’ll be busy with work when I go back,” she was saying, babbling almost. “Probably. And so will you.” She yanked the sheet clean off him, leaving him extremely exposed, wrapped herself tight and got up.

“You don’t work twenty-four hours a day,” he said, watching her go.

“I know, but it’s better not to, you know…” She made it to the bathroom and glanced back at him, catching sight of the obvious hurt in his eyes. She finished her thought anyway, even though she knew he wouldn’t want to hear it. “It’s better not to make plans,” she muttered. “Not yet.”

Then she shut herself in the bathroom and leaned back against the door, clutching the sheet to her chest, over her racing heart, wondering what the hell she was freaking out about.

Her mind was a confused mash of thoughts, half filled with her desire to spend all of her time with Preston, and half occupied by rational thoughts that still lingered off the back of her past heartache. Because she’d gotten this far with a man before—she’d gone all in, given her all, thrown caution to the wind and let him possess her whole. And this felt bigger, it felt more, like it had the potential to surpass what she thought was love in her past life, shrink it down to the meaningless mistake it turned out to be.

But that mistake cost her months of her sanity, of her confidence, of her ability to look in the mirror and like herself. It had left her mind a bitter, twisted place full of dark memories and the echoes of a man she loved telling her he didn’t enjoy looking at her anymore. That she was an unappealing woman.

She’d gone in blind to that train wreck; she couldn’t do the same here. This time she had to lead with her head, not her heart. And right now her head was telling her to take it easy, to enjoy him while she had him, to shut away whichever part of her lit up when she saw him, that flooded her whole chest with warmth when he looked at her with adoration.

That was a part of her that ached for Preston when she wasn’t near him, that filled her mind with thoughts of his charming smile and his glittering eyes and the fondness in his voice when he laughed with her, discussing terrible Netflix shows and her favorite ice creams.

Because she’d given that part of herself away before, and had it returned to her broken and battered.

Preston was a nice man—perfect, almost, and turning her knees to jelly with it—but that was her heart speaking, and she’d learned long ago not to trust anything her weak, easily fooled heart told her.

He’d disappeared by the time she gathered the courage to leave the bathroom, and sighing at her own conflicting behavior that no doubt had left him reeling in confusion, she got dressed back into the shirt-and-pants combo that was starting to feel a little gross and went out looking for him.

Freak-outs aside, she didn’t feel entirely safe here on her own, and she would rather risk venturing out to find him than sit here in the silence, alone, letting her fear and paranoia run wild. She might’ve allowed herself to get distracted whenever Preston was in her vicinity, but she couldn’t forget that there was a murderer on the loose somewhere in this building—one supposedly big and strong enough to overpower Larry Rohan, a complete mountain of a man. She would be no match in comparison, no matter how much she could usually take care of herself.

The corridor seemed darker to her as she walked it, and it took her a few footsteps to realize that one of the alcove lights had gone out. Stomach churning at the idea of walking through a shadowy corridor, in the exact spot Karen had seen the unidentified man with the cold eyes, she headed over to the light to test the bulb, to try to get it going again.

Peering behind the green glass of the shade, she had a look at the bulb, trying to see if it had blown. But that didn’t seem to be the problem. The bulb was at an angle, like it had been knocked out of its socket, and she groped behind the shade to grab the bulb, trying to twist it back into position. But it wouldn’t go, something beneath it preventing the way—almost as if put there deliberately to mark this spot, some kind of signal…

It was a slip of paper, folded into the tiniest square, only big enough to fit a handful of scribbled words. She held it up against the light of the alcove down a ways and read it.

She let out the smallest of gasps.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

F was Frank, no doubt about that, and if he was tiptoeing around leaving notes, then it was possible that he’d—

Oh god, was Preston with him right now?

And who was M? Maude?

Maude and Frank, working together? She’d had her suspicions earlier, but…

She had to check this handwriting against the note Frank brought to her earlier, and if they matched, she had her killer. She was sure of it, a certainty that made her feel like she was soaring with exhilaration.

Except…

A killer who could be anywhere right now, even right behind her—

“Ash?”

She leapt ten feet out of her skin at the sound of her name, letting out a little squeak she would be embarrassed about later, heart in her throat and note crumpling in her fist.

“Sorry, sorry! Didn’t mean to scare you.”

Ashley could hardly believe what she was seeing—Cami was here?

Cami grinned at her, and Ashley, a powerful sort of delight thundering through her, pulled her friend in for a tight hug.

“I can’t—what are you doing here? How?”

“Drew’s helicopter,” Cami said, pulling back. “The snow’s melting pretty quickly. Oh! We flew over all these police cars and a bulldozer making their way up here—what’s going on?”

God, where to even begin. She opened her mouth to give Cami the cliff notes, but something Cami said registered with her, and she stopped, an idea slamming into her brain.

“Did you say you guys have a private helicopter?”

“Yeah. Are you all right? I’ve been so worried ab—”

“Cami, is it still here? Can it take people back?”

“Sure,” Cami said, drawing her brows together at Ashley’s one-track questioning. “It only fits four passengers, though. Maggie’s here too, and the boys. Everyone’s downsta—where are you going?”

“I need to do something,” she called over her shoulder, marching away, Cami hot on her heels and wholly confused.

She stopped by her room—Preston’s room—first and dug out the suicide note. Held it against the alcove note and studied the curves of the letters.

Cami stopped beside her, breathless. “What the hell—”

“It’s the same writing,” Ashley said. “Isn’t it? Look at the A.”

“I—what?” Cami frowned at the notes, clearly at a total loss. “The A?”

“Is it? It is.” Frank Germaine had written both of these notes—a fake suicide note from Larry, and a message to an M. Everything that had happened here had been him all along.

“Ash, seriously.”

“I have to do something,” Ashley said, keeping a tight hold of both notes and hurrying out of the room.

“You already said that! Where are you—for god’s sake.”

She kept Cami trailing after her, high heels competing with fluffy-socked feet, as she jogged down the corridor, heartbeat slamming against her ribs, ears buzzing with white noise. “Where’s the helicopter, Cam? On the roof?”

“Yeah—surprised you didn’t hear us land—so weirdly silent here—”

She might’ve heard it, if she hadn’t been mid-orgasm with Preston. Not that any of that was important right now.

Finally reaching her destination, she hammered on the door and waited, trying to control her panted breaths.

Cami stopped beside her and didn’t even bother asking this time, just made a jerky sort of what the hell? motion with her hands.

Bao Xing opened the door, and Maggie said, “I’ve found a way for you to get out of here. Right now.”

The grin Bao beamed at her was the brightest thing Ashley had ever seen.