Chapter Fifteen
BLESSED WINTER – Chapter Five
Page 41, word count = 10,203
Brock’s lips were about to settle on Pandora’s when she sucked in a breath. The hand she had rested on his chest stiffened and held him off. Her brow contorted and she clenched her eyes shut, pursing her lips to pant breaths against his chin.
“Big one?”
She nodded, quick exhalations continuing for more than thirty seconds before gradually tapering off. When she opened her eyes, he was close enough to read the shadows of anxiety lurking in their depths.
“Call your doctor? I’ll just let her know you’re in labor and ask if we should go to the hospital.” When she hesitated, he added wryly, “Pretending it’s not happening won’t make it go away.”
“I know. You’re right. I’m not due for two weeks, though. I’m not ready.” She went to the refrigerator and took a card from under a magnet, bringing it to him.
She went into the bathroom and he placed the call, flicking over to an article on emergency home births while he waited for the call to be answered. In big bold letters, the first instruction said, “Stay calm.” There was a whole paragraph on how natural this process was.
Proof, right there, that the internet was not to be trusted.
A recording came on to say the office was closed and that if this was an emergency, he should call the hospital or an ambulance.
Right. Christmas. Terrific.
He called the hospital’s non-emergency line and explained his situation to the admitting desk. The woman explained hers. A car had failed to stop at an intersection due to ice, taking out a group of drunken carolers. No fatalities, but a lot of serious injuries.
“Is your wife preregistered?”
He didn’t correct her, just read the name of the doctor off the card and gave Pandora’s name, reassured when the woman pronounced Pandora ‘in the system.’
“I’ll notify her doctor’s service. If she’s more comfortable at home, keep timing her contractions and wait until they’re closer together. With any luck, we’ll have this backlog cleared and a bed available when she’s ready to come in.”
Brock ended the call and used his thumbnail to scratch his eyebrow, reminding himself to, Stay calm.
The bathroom door cracked and only Pandora’s eyes peered at him.
“Your doctor isn’t there because it’s Christmas,” he told her.
“I wasn’t worried about this because, I mean, what are the chances of going into labor on Christmas, but… My water just broke.”
“What?” He was on his feet, looking for his car keys. “Let’s get you to the hospital.”
“I want to have a shower first.”
“Pandora—”
“It’ll take five minutes. I haven’t had another contraction since that last one.”
“Okay. Fine. Is there something I can do?”
“Boil water?”
“Haha. I meant pack a bag or something.”
She shook her head. He thought he heard her snicker as the door shut.
He pushed his fingers through his hair and clicked to read the rest of the home birth article, in case she asked him to go into the delivery room with her. Would she? Did he want to? What exactly was he in for? He kept reading and—
Oh.
He was not a squeamish person, but aside from the odd nature program, he’d never seen a birth. What if the umbilical cord was around the baby’s neck? That sounded really worrisome and he wasn’t even the one in labor.
The shower abruptly cut off and she shouted, “Brock!”
He ran to the door, coming up against it, one hand on the knob, wanting to burst through. “Do you want me to come in?”
“Contrac—”
“Contraction. Got it.” He was holding his phone. With his forehead pressed to the hollow door, he listened to her pant, timing it.
“Yes,” she said as it tapered off.
“Yes, what?”
“Come in. I need help.”
He opened the door and found her wet and naked, one foot in the tub, the other out. One hand grasped the edge of the sink, the other had hold of the towel rack.
“Are you okay?”
She shook her head. “Trying not to push.”
“What?!”
“It hit me in the shower and—” She sucked in another breath as a contraction arrived.
He threw a towel over her wet back and eased her to sit on the closed lid of the toilet. “I’m calling an ambulance.”
She nodded, breathing through clenched teeth, eyes tightly closed. She rocked in deep concentration.
He didn’t know the address to give to the dispatcher.
“Tell her not to push,” the male voice in his ear said as Brock waited for the contraction to pass so she could give him her street address.
“I’m really scared,” Pandora said, opening wet eyes. “It really hurts.”
“I know, sweetheart. But I’m staying with you the whole time.” Thank you birth article for telling him reassurance was priority one. “Now let’s give them your address so the ambulance knows where to come.”
She managed to get it out before the next contraction hit. Brock relayed it, then he put the call on speakerphone so he could finish blotting her dry.
“Don’t look at me,” she whimpered when she could speak. “I’m fat.”
“You’re cute as hell.” She was all curvy and ripe. Her pale belly had a light brown line from her navel to her bush that he didn’t remember and her nipples had grown bigger and darker. Lowering his voice so the dispatcher wouldn’t hear, he leaned close and said, “I’ve been staring at your chest since the tavern. You’re spectacular.”
“You’re an idiot.” She made as if to press him away, but caught his jaw and dragged him close. She planted a single, brief kiss on his mouth. “Thank you for staying. Thank you for Christmas.”
“Think we can we get you to the bedroom and dressed before the next one?” He put a hand under her elbow.
“No.” She grabbed his hand and squeezed. And squeezed. A keening cry emanated from her, growing louder as the contraction held her in its long grip.
He bit back protesting, but it really freaking hurt.
Finally, she nodded and relaxed, but her breathing stayed labored, as though she was recovering from exertion.
He grabbed his phone and shuffled her to the bedroom where he got her seated on the bed in time for another contraction. She was huddled in the towel, moaning with suffering, face contorted with agony.
“Why are they coming so fast?” she cried when the contraction leveled off. She opened her eyes, but only looked helpless and terrified. “I’m not going to make it. I have to push, Brock. I have to.”
“Okay, okay.” He held their eye contact, trying to transmit a calm he didn’t feel. “I’m going to get some towels and unlock the door. I’ll be right back.”
“She shouldn’t be pushing,” the dispatcher told him.
“I invite you to tell her that,” he bit out. He had never experienced this exact level of trepidation in his life. Protectiveness was dueling with helplessness inside him. A part of him was screaming, I don’t want to deal with this.
But she had no one else.
“How long until the ambulance gets here?” he asked the dispatcher.
“At least twenty minutes. It’s snowing bad out there.”
The word Brock spat out then may or may not have been the verb that had caused this crisis. Either way, it didn’t help one bit.
*
“Oh.” Glory spun to leave after barely setting foot in their office.
Her voice was like a shot of obstbrand after a hard day on the slopes, piercing his bloodstream with heat and sharp sweetness.
Rolf leaned back in his chair. “Stay.”
“I’ve been tied up with Devon all morning or I would have moved my stuff already.” She had a coffee mug in one hand, her phone in the other, quite the sight for bleary, jet-lagged eyes.
Unlike the tailored and coiffed women who occupied the corporate tower in Berlin, she wore her hair in a loose, fat ponytail at her nape with a soft blue T-shirt over peg-legged jeans. He admired the way the T-shirt hugged her torso, accentuating the delicacy of her limbs and narrow shoulders and the gentle mounds of her breasts.
Her nipples had been sweet, rose-tasting pastilles against his tongue. Her hips had filled his palms and she’d taken everything he had to give without restraint. The blind rage that had gripped him from the moment Trigg had woken him was finally falling away, allowing him to remember how intense that night had been before the world blew up.
He hadn’t let himself sink into memories of their passionate clash. It had been a distraction he couldn’t afford, and deep within it lurked an acknowledgment of something bigger than he was comfortable examining.
He had focused on the crisis, on doing what he had done every time a bad fall had threatened his career. He had recovered and pushed himself to the top again, letting no obstacle get in his way, certainly not a bunch of crusty old executives who lacked faith in his depth of determination.
“So, do I do that now or come back later?” Glory asked, gaze scanning the top of his desk rather than meet his.
He was staring, he realized. Gulping her in like he was coming out of the desert and she was a cool, blue oasis. He searched her face, waited until her gaze finally met his—and immediately caught an edge. Whatever win he’d been chasing was suddenly a debris field of gear all over the slope while he came up star-fished against a snow fence, rash-covered and bruised from head to toe.
That was the look, the one he hated. The one that looked through him, rather than at him.
“You’re angry.” Should he have anticipated this? A pang of culpability hit him as he realized she might have expected a call or a text. “You know it’s been a shitty week.”
“I’m fine,” she assured him. “I’ll come back later.” She pivoted to leave.
“Glory.” This woman and her tantrums. “It was a shitty week.”
“I’m aware.”
“Then why are you acting like this?”
“I’m not acting like anything.” The defensiveness in her expression, aimed over her shoulder and barely landing on him, held irritation. She looked up and down the hall as if checking they weren’t being overheard. “I’m sorry your new office burned down. Text me when you go to the base. I’ll come back and clear out.”
“That’s not necessary. We can share.”
“I’m fine.”
“Is this really what we’re doing?” Fuck. This was why he hadn’t wanted to sleep with her. He had known that if—“No. Fuck it.” He stood, freshly infuriated and with something sharp digging into his gut. His chair rolled backward to hit the cabinet behind him.
She shot him a look like he was the one throwing a hissy fit.
“It was a shitty week. If you expected a goddamned love note—”
Her eyes went so wide they were dots of horrified blue-green in a sea of white. She stepped in and slammed the door. “Shut up! I don’t want people to know,” she hissed.
It was his turn to be taken aback.
“Are you serious right now? You’re embarrassed?” Ashamed? The prickling coil chewing up the pit of his gut turned cold and sour.
“I don’t need people speculating when it was a one-off thing, all right? A notch on your bed post is a scarlet A on my reputation.”
Had she really just said that to him?
He became aware his jaw was aching from a hard clench of his teeth. He folded his arms, stood taller. Tried to figure out why he could feel steam coming out his ears. How did she get to him like this? He’d kept himself to a few jabs of sarcasm while talking millions of dollars and arson, insurance claims, and his brother’s occasional lapses of judgment.
Yet he was one heartbeat from fully losing his shit right now, two words ricocheting like bullets in his head. One. Off.
No. He didn’t know why that was such an intolerable suggestion, but he wasn’t standing for it.
While she grew redder and redder, like she was holding her breath in some kind of pointless sulk.
“If you wanted me to call, say that you’re mad I didn’t call. But it was a shitty week—”
“I know it was a shitty week,” she burst out. “No, I was not waiting for any fucking poetry from you. All I really needed to hear was that you weren’t walking away from this place, leaving us with a dead white elephant rotting out our net worth. Bless your brother and what passes for a conscience in him because he pulled his head out of his ass long enough to tell me yesterday that you had straightened things away in Berlin three days ago. Only because Devon was packing up to leave, though, quite sure I wasn’t going to be able to pay her. But whatever. It’s not like my mother’s hard-earned income and my father’s future were on the line. Whatever shitty week you were having is far bigger and more important than any pesky little worries of mine.”
“Done?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Don’t do that. Don’t make out like I’m overreacting. It may not be a big deal to you, compared to what you’ve invested, but this lodge is everything we have.”
“Are you angry that I didn’t reassure you? Or that I didn’t make a point of going out of my way to reassure you?”
The flush on her cheeks deepened. “I don’t expect special treatment, if that’s what you’re asking. Just common courtesy for a business associate.”
“Is that what we are?”
“Well, I’m not a fucking mint on your pillow that can be picked up or discarded depending on your mood.”
“And there it is.” He leaned on the edge of his desk. “That was my pillow, by the way. You came to me.”
She flinched, then spoke with quiet dignity. “And you haven’t come looking for me. Complete radio silence, so, message received. And that’s fine,” she insisted. “You were right. It’s stupid to fuck someone you have to see every day. We’ll pretend it never happened and get on with our lives.” She reached for the door latch.
“Glory.” With his heart leaping out his throat, he shot over to shut the door before she’d pulled it open more than a centimeter.
She jerked back from him, spilling coffee on the floor between them, coming up against the filing cabinet and catching a hand against it to keep her balance.
Fuck. He stood there with his hand over the crack of the door, sealing her in here, facing that he’d fucked up again. Big time. No one set him on his back foot the way she did.
“Point taken, all right?” he muttered. “To my mind, I owed explanations to shareholders, not you.”
“Fine. I’m over it.”
“You’re really not.”
“I really am.”
“I don’t play these sorts of games. Understand me?” he bit out.
“Great. Me, neither.”
His hands itched to strangle her. “What are you expecting from me, then?”
“Nothing.” She turned her face away, toward the slant of sunshine creeping down the mountainside beyond the window. “Literally nothing. Which is why we should forget it happened.”
That wasn’t possible. He might have tried to sublimate their night for a week, but the memory had been simmering in his subconscious. Driving him to some extent, if he was honest. Hurry. Get the hell back here.
He ran his hand down his face, ending with a scratch into the beard he hadn’t cleaned up in two days.
She wasn’t going to bend. If he knew one thing about this woman, it was that if she was hurt, she damned well pulled up the drawbridge and started pouring boiling oil.
He had warned her, though. He wasn’t a sensitive man.
In the past, however, if a woman wanted to cut things off because she didn’t like his level of self-interest and wanted him to change, he let her go.
That wasn’t something he was prepared to do with Glory, which scared the hell out of him.
“Would you—”
A knock on the door interrupted him, extra irritating because he was so focused on fixing this. “Busy,” he barked.
“Rolf?” It was Marvin. “You have a visitor.”
Rolf scowled, drawing a tense breath, figuring it would be an insurance adjuster or something. He started to say something about telling them to wait with a coffee in the dining room, but another voice came through the door, a female one he recognized.
“And where does this one go? Oh, that’s the kitchen. Hello.”
“Oh, fuck.” He managed to keep it under his breath, but jerked the door inward.
Marvin was all flushed with male captivation and magnanimity. “Rolf! Your mother is here.” Like this was a delightful surprise, not a giant kick in die hoden.
“Step,” he corrected in a mutter, leaving his teeth showing in an approximation of a smile. “Vivien. I thought you were traveling.”
“There’s my bärchen.” Trigg’s mother flowed toward him in a wave of perfume, his father’s money, and unsolicited affection. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
*
Not a single, white-blonde hair was out of place on the middle-aged woman’s head. Her makeup was flawless, her figure like that of a sexpot in her twenties. Perhaps some of it was owed to the spectacular tailoring in her white jacket over a low-cut cami and dark blue, silk pants, but she was also naturally built really, really well. Tall, like a model, with great skin and natural grace.
That had to be genuine designer wear made by a designer for her. Her diamond earrings and necklace were just modest enough to be real, just ostentatious enough to be a statement of abundant wealth. She looked like something out of an old Dynasty rerun.
Glory was reluctantly fascinated, partly by her glamour, partly by the way her features were the beautiful, feminine version of Trigg’s, and mostly by the way she cupped Rolf’s head and forced him to bend so she could kiss him on both cheeks.
He looked deeply pained, like Murphy did when Aiden crawled all over him. His fur was ruffled, his ears inside out, but he endured it without so much as a disgruntled curl of his lip.
Maybe that’s all he’d been doing when she had loved him up.
Glory derailed that train of thought with a sharp mental twist. She’d passed from piqued, to offended, to outright abandoned days ago. By the time she had bumped into him today, she had swept the whole thing into her ‘dumb ideas’ folder and hit delete.
She was still angry about his not keeping her informed about the hill, though, and had a right to be. The fact he hadn’t given one iota of thought to how the arson had affected the lodge told her everything about how much regard he had for her and what she had thought might be the beginning of a relationship. A friendship, anyway.
She was truly, thoroughly, over him. No longer interested.
This time she meant it.
“I had to come see for myself how things were coming along,” Vivien was saying. “Trigg kept saying it’s too rustic, that the roads were dreadful and covered in snow, but this little chalet is going to be charming.” Her nose twitched as she glanced at the bare floor of the office and the cheap blinds that had been installed for the days when the sun put too sharp a glare on the computer monitor. “Ilke was kind enough to do all the driving. We had no trouble finding it.”
That’s when Glory tore her attention from Vivien and saw another woman closer to her own age, one who had been studying her while hanging back in the hall.
“Guten tag,” Ilke said with a cool smile.
Glory tallied the woman’s assets and hated her on sight. She was perfect in a far more threatening way than Vivien could ever be. Ilke was athletic and blonde with perfect teeth and, worst of all, confidence. She knew she was gorgeous and wore it as easily as she wore her dove-gray cashmere wrap sweater, the knit so delicate her lace demi-cup showed through. Her narrow skirt had a slit cut to mid-thigh, showing off a peek of tanned skin above her beautifully crafted, lace-up, knee-high boots.
Glory hated her for nothing else than her ability to pull off stripper boots clearly priced in the thousands of dollars and make them look classy.
Ilke met Rolf’s gaze without flinching, in a way that was faintly amused.
Rolf looked at her like, Oh, shit. Like he knew her biblically.
Glory’s neck muscles strained to hold back a cry of agony. She was trapped here in the office by the crowd of bodies by the door, forced to keep a pleasant smile pinned on her face while she died a thousand deaths.
“Danke schön,” Rolf said flatly. “You were in Queenstown?”
“Training, yes. And visiting my mother. She lives there now.”
“She invited me to a little cocktail party. Ilke and I got to chatting. I told her about your new venture here.”
“I’d heard rumors. I was curious. Couldn’t wait to see it,” Ilke said, keeping that distantly amused smile on her face.
“Not much to see. In fact, we just had a fire—”
“Marvin told us!” Vivien gave Glory’s father’s arm a little squeeze, then did it again with a flirtier look, as if she was impressed with what she had found.
Glory’s father blushed.
I’m out.
“I’ll let you all catch up,” Glory announced. “I’ll move the lodge computer back to my old office later this afternoon,” she added in Rolf’s direction, skimming her gaze past everyone without making direct eye contact with anyone. “Excuse me. I have an appointment.”
She barreled through the bodies in a five-pin strike.
“My daughter, Glory,” Marvin said as a belated introduction behind her. “If you need anything at all, find one of us. Can I bring you coffee? Why don’t you go into the lounge where it’s more comfortable?”
*
BLESSED WINTER – Chapter Five (cont’d)
Page 45, word count = 11,041
Pandora had read a million words on labor and delivery, trying to prepare herself. None had described it accurately. It was more pain than she expected. It was also relentless. Fear took hold in her at how intense it was, which made her both defensive and aggressive.
“You’re supposed to lie down with a pillow under your left hip,” Brock said.
She snarled and glared at him, pacing in the tight confines of her too small bedroom, naked and too crazed by anxiety to care. There was no escaping this force that gripped her.
“Okay. That’s okay. Whenever you’re ready is fine.”
She could tell he was lying. This wasn’t okay. She had honestly believed he would go through that door, rather than unlock it for the paramedics who weren’t even here yet. Instead, he was hurriedly setting out towels across the bed. He had a clean sheet handy and kept talking to that disembodied voice on the speakerphone who sounded like Morgan Freeman, both reassuring and unnerving at the same time.
Another contraction hit and she paused to brace her hands on the night table, certain she would tear the top off the little wooden cabinet as she gritted her way through the contraction. She really couldn’t take fighting it anymore—
It changed.
For a moment, she felt incredible relief. Suddenly the pain felt productive. This was it.
She sank onto her knees, suffering a growing stretch, a burning. She could feel—
“Pandora? Oh, God.”
She touched the top of the baby’s head and was dimly aware of Brock’s voice and another one, but someone was screaming too loud for her to hear.
The baby was crowning. She couldn’t stop it. It had to happen. She wanted it to happen. She pushed through the pain, pushed and pushed, making it happen.
“That’s the head. Oh, my God. Good job, sweetheart.” Brock’s voice was shaken, but gentle and, reassuringly, right behind her, crammed into this little stall between the wall and the edge of the bed. “I just need to see if the cord—It’s okay. You’re okay. Good job, Pandora. Do it again. I’m right here. I’m going to catch it.”
“I can’t,” she moaned. Shoulders. This kid was a linebacker, she was sure of it. She couldn’t… But here came another contraction and she had to.
She screamed again, gripping into the wood with all her strength while the shoulders passed. She felt her baby falling then, but her teeth were locked and she couldn’t tell Brock—
“I’ve got him, I’ve got him,” Brock was yelling, as if he was the freaking football hero. “It’s a boy!”
A boy who let out a cranky little wail that grew into lusty unhappiness at being cold and wet and forced into the light of day.
Brock laughed in relief. “That’s good, right? When she stops screaming and he starts?”
“That’s perfect,” the deep voice from the speakerphone said, sounding amused. “Nice job, Mama. You too, Brock. Make sure you dry him and keep them both warm. Put him on her chest, skin to skin. See if he wants to suckle.”
Pandora was shaking, in shock maybe.
Brock had the baby in a loose towel and looped an arm under her wilted ones. He gently shoved her onto the towel-covered bed. It wasn’t elegant, but it did the trick. She was still trembling and panting, exhausted, but finally began to relax. He opened the towel and set the baby on her, taking care to dry him with gentle strokes of the towel, hands shaking. Then he tucked a clean one around the boy before he draped a clean sheet over both of them. Finally, a warmer blanket.
She followed the dispatcher’s instructions on how to clear the baby’s nose, then coaxed him to latch while Brock played orderly, tidying up the towels from the floor.
By the time the paramedics tromped their heavy feet up her stairs, her son had latched and she had passed the placenta. They took care of cutting the cord, checked her vitals along with the baby’s, and shook Brock’s hand.
“I don’t know how you guys do this. I was sure I was going to faint. Twice,” Brock admitted, making them laugh.
One of the EMTs, a new father himself, showed Brock how to diaper and swaddle the boy, obviously mistaking him for the baby’s father, which made Pandora’s heart pang.
“Do I have to go to the hospital?” she asked as they began talking transport. “It’s Christmas. We didn’t even finish opening our presents.”
Brock tugged his earlobe and glanced at the paramedics. Honestly, the hard part was done. He was kind of siding with her. “What should we watch for?”
They wrote out a list of signs that would necessitate a visit to the hospital and made her promise to get checked out as soon as possible. But, since her delivery seemed to have been straightforward and she hadn’t even torn, and the baby was already nursing, they wished them a Merry Christmas and went home to their own families.
*
Glory’s head was still very much in Tahoe as her feet climbed her up the service stairs of Blue Spruce Lodge, then down the hall to her room.
She would have to research the rules on home births in California, to see if it was plausible that Pandora was allowed to stay home. Part of her wanted to just say, Screw it. Artistic license. It would risk alienating readers who were sticklers for believability, but she wanted to keep the story in Pandora’s apartment, maintaining the intimacy between Pandora and Brock as they greeted Pandora’s unnamed son and reacted to the birth.
What would happen with their relationship now? What name would Pandora give the boy?
The clink of glass penetrated her thoughts. Someone had come up the main stairs after she had passed them. No one occupied the top floor except her and Rolf. She glanced back, tense as she reached her door, expecting to see him.
Ilke was coming toward her with a bottle of wine and two glasses.
Lovely. Just fucking lovely. Glory had stayed in Haven all afternoon, burying her head in Pandora’s agony so she wouldn’t dwell on her own. She had even brought back one of Suzanne’s take-away meals so she wouldn’t have to see Rolf or his guests by going down to the dining room.
But wasn’t that nice. Ilke delivered, just like she had.
And, in case Glory wasn’t sure if Rolf was the target, Ilke smiled and asked, “Am I going the right way? I understood Rolf’s room was up here.”
It was a total punch in the gut.
“Yeah.” She looked across at his closed door, thinking, You piece of shit.
*
Rolf had been watching for Glory’s car and saw her go into the back of the lodge as he was dressing after his shower.
When he heard voices in the hall, he snapped the door open to see Glory lobbing a contemptuous look his direction. It hit like a cannon ball, right in the middle of his chest.
She turned her head and narrowed her eyes. “Did my dad give you that bottle?”
Ilke had stopped halfway to his room and looked disconcerted for probably the first time in her life. She was a seriously tough, competitive, bright woman. Beautiful, too, for that matter. She took care of herself and no one else. Rolf knew her in passing and once, very briefly, in a more intimate sense. Until this moment, he’d never had reason to dislike her.
“From his private reserve, he said,” Ilke answered Glory, recovering with a cool smile. “I’m sensing it would be better to leave it for you two, though.” Very bright.
“Oh, fuck no.” Glory huffed out a noise of disgust and pushed into her room, slamming the door.
The top of Rolf’s head nearly came off. He didn’t understand why this felt like a career-ending rip of a ligament, but fuck did it ever. He snapped a furious look at Ilke.
She held out the glasses and bottle. “Peace offering. You’re not happy I brought Vivien—”
He wasn’t happy about a lot of things, including that flash in the corner of his eye that told him Glory was escaping through her exterior door, past the window at the end of the hall, and trying to duck down the exterior stairs.
“Oh, no, you don’t.” He pushed through his own room and out his side door, catching her before she got her foot on the first step.
She wasn’t having it and tried to shake him off, nearly falling down the stairs in the process.
He lost it. He grabbed her, heaved her over his shoulder, and carried her like he was a Neanderthal taking his mate back into his cave. Her bag knocked into his kidney and she called him some really nasty things along with whacking of her fist against his spine. He set her on her feet when they were inside his room.
As he reached to slam the door, she went through the inside door and shot across to her own room again.
He was right on her heels, entering her room in time to see her opening her exterior door.
“If you run out that door, I will tie you up. I swear to God. We are going to stand here and talk like grown-ups.”
“Is that how grown-ups act, you BDSM freak?”
“Shut the fucking door.”
She slammed it. “Happy, you fucking animal?”
“No!” He slammed the interior one. “But I am not having you take off when we’ve had a fight, then you wind up dead and I’m throwing up because I have such a shitty last memory on my conscience. You stay where I can see you until we’ve sorted this out.” He pointed at the floor, shaking, damn it. His chest was heaving and his arteries were carrying more adrenaline than blood. He rubbed a hand down his face, trying to get himself back under control.
She made a noise through gritted teeth as if she was beyond words. She showed him her finger instead. Held it out so hard her hand shook.
“If I had a nickel, hitzkopf, I’d be twice as rich as I already am.”
She narrowed her eyes, maybe suspecting that wasn’t exactly an endearment. Hothead.
“Where were you today?” he demanded. He’d been worried sick even before this cock-up in the hall with Ilke and a second attempt at running away from home.
“Haven.”
“Doing what?”
“Living my life.”
“Stop it, all right? We’re not doing this.”
“Agreed. So kindly…” She waved at her inside door. “Go drink my mother’s wine with your little friend.”
“I didn’t invite her. Do you understand that? I didn’t ask her to come here, or invite her to my room.”
“I genuinely don’t care beyond the fact that she’s drinking my mother’s wine. That happens to be special to me and my father is giving it away like—Fuck it. You don’t give a shit. I know you don’t, so…” She waved at her door again, lips white.
“Where am I right now? Hmm? Across the hall getting laid? Or in here, enjoying your warm fucking personality? What does that tell you about where my give-a-shit lies?”
“Cut me a break. You’re here to tell me you’re right and I’m wrong. The only thing that ever matters to you is winning. Champion.”
He hung his hands off his hips and looked away from her, laughing in disbelief at how brutal she was. At how badly he was not winning. Why was he even bothering?
“I should have spoken to you, all right?” He had concluded that much while waiting for her to come back today. “I don’t answer to anyone. Haven’t for years. It wasn’t even on my radar that I should check in with you.” And here came the part that was rubbing like a blister wanting to burst. “But I don’t like you taking off. You didn’t answer my text. If you were trying to show me how the silent treatment feels, message received. Don’t do it again.”
“Did you text? I didn’t see it.” She lied right to his face, boldly staring directly into his eyes.
“It’s always the hard way with you, isn’t it?” He drew a breath, gathering his patience. “Ilke skis. I was in my last year as she was coming up. When you’re competing at that level, the pressure is intense. Healthy, peak-performing athletes are crammed together and wound up tight. When you actually get through your events, when you’ve done all you can, but you have to wait and see if it was good enough, that energy needs a release valve. We gave each other a quarter-turn. That’s all it was.”
“Charming.”
“Truth. I haven’t seen her since.”
“You must be anxious to get reacquainted then.” She dropped her bag onto the chair by her desk, hair falling forward to hide her expression. She kicked off her shoes beside the exterior door and flicked the bolt to lock it, keeping her back to him.
“What do you want, Glory? I’m being honest, trying to clear the air.”
“I want my father to quit giving my mother’s wine to strangers who don’t care why she bought it.” She swung around, color high. “But it’s his. Everything is his, so I can lump it, even when he gets into bed with your brother and sells our home and drags me here so some a-hole who doesn’t like what you’re doing can try to burn down everything my mother worked so hard to earn. I want Dad to have an income into his retirement so I don’t have to worry about him, but haha, he’s never going to be in a secure position because he lives in a dream world, not reality.”
She collapsed in a lean against her desk, pushing the heels of her hands into her eye sockets.
“I want to figure out my own life and go live it and I don’t want to get worked over by you in the process. I don’t want a boyfriend, Rolf. You keep accusing me of having designs on you, but I really don’t. I can’t afford this kind of angst and distraction. I sure as hell don’t want to be the daily entertainment for everyone downstairs while I try to make something work with a man who, frankly, sucks at being a neighbor, let alone something more intimate.”
Boiling oil and flaming fucking arrows. Every word was stabbing and burning.
“You don’t even say, ‘Good morning.’” Her head came up. “You know what the first thing you said to me was, when you saw me today? ‘Stay.’ Like I’m the fucking dog.”
He closed his eyes. “That wasn’t what I meant by it.”
“Fine, but I don’t want to spend a week trying to dissect what you did mean, or how you really feel, only to find out you feel nothing. I get it. I’m convenient. I have no regrets. You made it worth my while. Thanks,” she added with a flat smile that hit like a penalty kick between the thighs. “But at the end of the day, you’re high risk and no reward. That is not me asking for commitment or any other considerations. I am well aware of your limitations. But I’m not like you. I don’t compartmentalize. It cuts me to the bone every time you act like I don’t exist so I’d rather not expect to exist. Let’s pretend it didn’t happen and go back to whatever passes for civility between us. Okay?”
Had he heard variations of this speech in the past? So many times. But never with a look like that. Resentment and frustration were the tones he usually heard when he was reminded of his shortcomings. Not red eyes and a hollow husk of resignation and a sadness around her mouth that made him want to gather her up and squeeze her into himself so she could feel what the hell she was doing to him. How could he put it into words? The depth and breadth of it made his lungs hurt.
“I don’t like it when you act ‘civil,’” he admitted, squeezing the back of his neck in a hard grip. “It’s a cold shoulder and I hate it.”
She sighed and looked to the ceiling.
“That is not my fucking ego saying that. I can’t stand it when you pull back from me.” He clenched his hands into fists, mirroring the knot that tightened in his gut. He never talked like this to anyone.
“I’m not trying to make myself into a challenge or something. I just don’t want to get hurt, Rolf. I already am hurt.” She flinched and looked away.
“I know. I’m not good at this. I know that. I’ve never even tried, okay? Relationships are work. I’ve always preferred to direct my energy elsewhere.”
She snorted and she shook her head. “I’m work. Do you realize that? I’m not any easier than you are.”
“So aware. I still don’t want to walk away.” The willingness to apply himself was settling into his psyche. He was here, wasn’t he?
“You want to walk across the hall whenever it suits you.” She met his gaze for one of those heart-stopping seconds where he glimpsed into her soul and saw nothing but agony. “I can’t, Rolf. I won’t.”
“You better believe I want the right to walk in here.” An uncomfortable truth clawed its way up his sternum and into his throat. “Because I don’t want to sleep with anyone else. All right? I had a couple of texts from women I used to see while I was in Germany. I didn’t answer. I had it in my head I’m with you now.” He flexed his hands, so frustrated by her. By the fact she had him digging into the back of the closet where he stored emotions he had convinced himself he’d outgrown decades ago. “I wanted to focus on getting things wrapped up so I could get back here.”
“To work on the hill.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Don’t make me think I’m more important than I am.”
“Fine,” he bit out, tone so hard her head came up and her eyes blinked warily. “You need your full pound of flesh? Fine. That—” he pointed toward his room “—was more than I was sure I was up for. I knew sleeping with you would complicate things, which is why I tried to avoid it. I wanted to believe we could be a one-off. I used a perfectly valid excuse to push some space between us and discovered that, as it turns out, no. This is not a one-off. You’re in my head and we have to see where it goes.”
“Is that what Emperor Rolf has decided and decrees?”
“I enjoy the sarcasm almost as much as the sex, so yes, that is what is happening.”
“You’re astonishing.”
“Thanks. I thought you were fantastic, too.”
She looked away again, cheeks red.
He sighed. “I fucked up by not talking to you. I’ll own that. Full disclosure, I’ll probably fuck up again. But we’re still going to see where this goes.”
“Yeah, well, I’ll review your request and get back to you. If you don’t hear from me in two weeks, assume I’ve declined your generous offer.”
“Now you’re just flirting. I’m not someone who gives up. You understand that, right? I know what kind of pig-headed single-mindedness it takes to get something I want. That’s why I pick and choose what I go after.”
“Can’t you just be happy you were right?” Her brows pulled and she looked so vulnerable, his heart grew weighted and gave a pang. “We’re a dumb idea, Rolf. At no point are you going to be the one who loses in this situation. That will be me and I’m not up for it.”
Solid ground to quicksand, just like that. He moved to pick up her hands because, damn it, he was dying to touch her and she felt a long way out of reach, despite the overturn of every rock inside him.
He turned her palms up and stroked his thumbs across them. “If you think you’re going to fail at something, and that stops you from trying, then for sure you fail. You have to at least try, Glory.”
“And you’re going to try?” she said, voice strained, as if she thought it was beyond him.
“I am,” he vowed.