Chapter 11

Levi

I was so caught up in trying to get the remote from Frankie that it took me longer than it should have to realize the compromising position we ended up in. Her beneath me, our hands between us as we held onto the remote for dear life, our faces merely an inch apart.

For the first time, I noticed that her eyes weren’t just green, they had a thin starburst of hazel around the pupil like nothing I’d ever seen before. She glanced down, and at first I thought she was looking at the remote, but a second later comprehension flashed in my mind. She was looking at my lips.

Desire shot through my veins. It would be so easy to kiss her, to ease this ache that had been burning in me since the first time I saw her. And if Frankie’s panting breaths and pink cheeks were any indication, she would let me. Visions of us tangled naked on the couch flooded my mind, and my cock stiffened.

No.

I let go of the remote and shot backward, breathing heavily. My head was spinning.

“Fine,” I said. “Have it. Crazy person.”

“I’m the crazy person?” Irritation flooded Frankie’s features, and she scrambled upright. She pointed the remote at the TV, flicked it off, then wheeled it back around to shake it at me. “You’re an asshole, Levi.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.” I got to my feet but kept my distance from the angry girl. I could still feel her legs wrapped around me, and the temptation to finish what we started was fogging my brain.

I began walking to my bedroom, but Frankie ran around the back of the couch to intercept me. “No. You’re not going anywhere until you and I have a little chat.”

“I’m not in the mood.”

I sidestepped her, but she jammed her way back into my path a heartbeat later. I glared down at her but she simply glared back.

“We wouldn’t have to go through all this if you’d just be a decent human being for once,” Frankie said. “You think you’re tough shit, but you’re just a bully.” She stepped forward and poked the remote into my chest like an accusing finger, her jaw tight. “You need to get your act together before the people in your life decide that being around you isn’t worth the headache.”

“Yeah?” I knocked the remote away and rolled my eyes. “Why don’t you go write a blog post about it?”

Frankie’s forehead creased in confusion. “You read my blog?”

“Enough to know that I don’t need to take life advice from you. Don’t you get tired of being so saccharine all the time?”

If Frankie wanted a bully, she was going to get a bully. Maybe then she’d leave me alone.

“They eat it up though, don’t they?” I continued. “It’s pathetic. What I don’t understand is how none of your readers or your clients can see how fake you are. I may be an asshole, but at least I don’t pretend to be someone that I’m not.”

Frankie’s nose twitched up into a snarl. “It’s no wonder your fiancé left you. The fact that anybody was able to stand you for as long as she did is incredible. That woman deserves an award.”

Something cold lanced my chest and ice spread through my veins.

“Right back at you, sweetheart. I can’t imagine what kind of idiot would want to marry the likes of you, so good luck finding someone to fulfill your stupid wedding fantasy.”

We stared at each other for a moment before Frankie stepped back, shaking her head. “I need a drink.”

She left without another word, grabbing her room key from the table and slamming the door behind her. The slam reverberated through my bones.

Come to think of it, I could use a drink too. I went over to the bar and cracked one of the small bottles of whiskey, tossing it back without bothering to pour it into a glass. I walked to the window at the other side of the room and stared out. The snow was falling in thick heaps, and I could barely see the distant trees in the white haze. When I turned from the window, my eye caught on the window seat, which was piled with blankets and pillows. I could picture Frankie curled up there with a book and a contented little smile. She would be there right now if I hadn’t refused to turn the volume down on the TV. A pang of guilt crept in alongside all the anger, but I pushed it down.

I grabbed my phone from the coffee table and walked back over to the window to call Garrick.

“Hey,” he answered. “I was just about to call you. How’s it going?”

“I’ve had better vacations,” I replied. “Isn’t there any way you could get up here tonight? We could always go down for Valerie in the morning. It’s not that long a drive.”

“Yeah...” Garrick’s voice sounded pained. “That was why I was about to call you. I guess you haven’t heard?”

“Haven’t heard what?” My hand clenched around my phone.

“They just closed the road both ways on the mountain.”

“You’re joking me.” I stuck my face closer to the window and frowned up at the sky. Was it snowing hard enough to close the roads?

“Not joking,” Garrick said. “You can check the weather reports for yourself. There’s a snowstorm on the way.”

“That’s bullshit!” I took a breath, trying to put a cap on my frustration. It wasn’t Garrick’s fault that the weather had gone to shit. “When are they going to open the roads again?”

He hesitated. “Uh, they say maybe tomorrow.”

“Maybe?”

“It depends on how quickly the storm moves through. Maybe tomorrow, maybe the day after.”

“No. Not happening.” I shook my head and went to grab my bag from my room. “I’m coming back down tonight.”

“Levi, you can’t. The roads are closed. They’re not letting anybody through.”

“So you’re saying I’m stranded here?”

With her.

Garrick sighed. “It’s a luxury resort, Levi. It’s not like you’re on some deserted island with nothing but a volleyball to keep you company. I’m sure you’ll make it.”

He had a point, but that didn’t make the reality any easier to swallow. I was stuck in this hotel for the whole weekend with Frankie, the person who probably hated me most in the world.

“How’s Frankie doing?” Garrick asked a moment later.

“Fine, except for the fact that she’s going to skin me while I sleep,” I muttered.

“What did you do?”

I frowned at his accusation. As far as I was concerned, Frankie was just as at fault as I was. She started it. Sort of.

“We had a disagreement,” I said. “She’s gone off somewhere to lick her wounds and plan a painful death for me.”

“A disagreement about what?”

“Not important.”

I wasn’t willing to admit that we’d initially fought about the volume level on TV. I was even less willing to admit where the fight had gone from there.

“Why can’t you just leave the poor girl alone?” Garrick asked, irritation creeping into his voice. “What was the one thing I asked you to do before you left?”

“Hey, she wasn’t nice either.”

“I wish you two would just fuck and get it over with already,” Garrick said

I thought about her trapped beneath me on the couch again, and my cock throbbed uncomfortably.

“If you don’t have anything a little more useful to suggest, I’m going to hang up now,” I said.

“Listen, I feel bad,” Garrick replied. “I’m going to see what I can do to set you guys up for the weekend. I’ll get the hotel staff to rustle up a care package.”

“Sure, whatever.” I sighed and glanced back out the window. The wind whipped the snow into swirls in the air and whistled past the windowpane. I supposed I could see how driving home right now might not be an option.

“I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” Garrick said. “If I were you, I’d try to patch things up with Frankie.”

“Talk to you then.”

I hung up and tossed my phone onto the couch. A frustrated scream built in my throat but I pushed it down. I thought about going outside and kicking the snow, but that wouldn’t clear the roads and the last thing I needed on top of this dumpster fire of a situation was cold feet.

I grabbed another mini-bottle off the bar instead. Gin, this time. Maybe being drunk all weekend was a viable option. It was easier to stomach than the thought of going to apologize to Frankie, which I knew was the right thing to do. I didn’t apologize to anyone. I’d made a name for myself in my family’s business as a hardline negotiator who didn’t give a shit what anybody else thought of me, and I carried that with me everywhere.

Why did I feel bad for Frankie? I didn’t know anything about her. She didn’t know anything about me, except apparently the most interesting thing there was to know. She was probably sitting in the bar right now congratulating herself for giving me a taste of my own venom, and I couldn’t blame her for it. By all rights that made us even. Didn’t it?

I let the empty bottle clatter into the trash and hoped that Garrick’s care package contained booze. Lots of it. And in normal sized bottles, too.

My answer came around twenty minutes later. I was lying on the couch, staring at the dark TV screen. I tried putting the football back on, but all it did was aggravate the knot of guilt in my stomach. So I watched nothing instead. I couldn’t decide whether I was waiting until Frankie got back or waiting until I dared to go talk to her. I knew I needed to go tell her about the roads at least, unless she and Val had already had a similar conversation.

Just as I was deciding whether to storm the minibar for more spirits or head out to find Frankie, someone knocked on the door. I got up to answer it and was surprised to see a bellhop standing there with a big plastic bag in one hand and a shit-eating grin on his face.

“Mr. Wheeler?” he said.

“Yeah.”

“Your brother called and requested we bring some items up to the room.” He thrust the bag toward me.

“Thanks.” I took the bag from him and wrestled a bill out of my pocket to tip him. He accepted it gratefully and hurried off back down the hall.

I emptied the bag on the kitchen table, and my curiosity soon hardened into frustration. This was my brother’s grand solution for making the weekend bearable? There was wine, at least, though Garrick hadn’t stopped there. I wished he had. I couldn’t tell what pissed me off more—the game of Monopoly, or the box of condoms.