Chapter 11

Tyson’s promise stayed with Bernadette all day. Enough so that she didn’t check her cell. Once.

The very notion was astonishing, but at that moment, she didn’t give a goddamn hoot about Grafix.

The impossible had happened.

Tyson was…

Well, she wasn’t sure what he was doing. Courting her?

Small touches, intimate hand holds. They linked arms now, whereas yesterday, they’d stood apart. They bumped hips, and shared soft touches… Lazy looks filled with promises that would be kept tonight.

It was something she’d never imagined happening, and something that made her dreams look crappy in comparison.

This was the best day of her life. Bar none.

And yeah, her company going public had earned her close to two hundred million dollars. Sure, she was one of the youngest CEOs in the city.

None of that mattered, not in the face of her lifelong crush coming to a head.

She squealed as he let go of her hand to let her board down the soft, supple curves on the snowscape ahead of her.

They couldn’t even be considered hills. They were more like ripples. Probably manufactured by tractors for the hotel’s guests. But she squealed nonetheless at doing it herself.

She’d always imagined she’d have an affinity with skiing. Bernadette had no idea why, just that she’d always thought that way.

It was like Em, she guessed. Her best friend had always thought she’d find Italian easy because she could speak fluent Spanish thanks to her paternal Grandmother. Yet, when she spoke Italian, butchered wasn’t the word.

She was ‘store bought lasagna' compared to 'lasagna that Nona used to make’ bad.

And Bernadette wasn’t doing much better on the slopes.

Tyson chuckled as her arms pinwheeled, and she turned around to glower at him - he was finding all of this far too funny.

Of course, the move shifted her center of gravity - something she’d forgotten rested precariously on two thin sticks - and she fell ass over head, slamming hard into the snow.

He stopped chuckling as his boots crunched near her. Hauling her up to her feet, he looked into her eyes, mesmerizing her into forgetting he was being a jerk by laughing at her baby steps, and asked, “Concede defeat yet?”

She pouted. “No.”

He waved a hand. “Carry on, MacDuff.”

Bernadette eyed the rest of the slope ahead of her and winced. She rubbed her butt, which was cushioned thanks to the ski gear she’d hired for the day but, padding aside, her butt still ached. Then, looking back at him, she confessed, “Can we do the après ski bit now?”

He snickered and folded his arms across his chest. “You have to ski to do the ‘après’ bit.”

She frowned at him. “I’ll get you back.”

He snorted. “I’m sure you will.”

Huffing, she stacked her hands on her hips, and said, “I don’t think I was made for skiing.”

“Nobody is at first,” he argued.

“No. I mean, I’m just not. I’m not like you. I bet you were going down the expert slopes two hours after putting skis on for the first damn time,” she complained. “Me, I’ve always been vertically challenged.”

Tyson sheepishly rubbed his chin. “I have to admit, watching you do hurdles was always a sight.”

She rolled her eyes. “God, I hated gym class.”

“I wasn’t that fond of it myself.”

“You’d never have known,” she scoffed, with all the natural dislike of someone who’d never been good at sports, to someone who was a born natural.

His gaze softened, and he reached up to trace a glove-covered thumb across her rosy cheek. It was surprisingly cold. She wasn't sure why she was surprised considering snow was everywhere.

“My dad. Remember?”

“He sucked,” she conceded then began to rock her hips forward, trying to jerk into action.

“What the fuck are you doing?” he asked hoarsely, reaching for her hips, and stilling them… of course, that move had their pelvises bumping together.

Where he had a rather nice bump of his own growing.

“Trying to get some momentum going to keep moving forward. I know you. If I make it to the end of this course, you’ll let me concede defeat gracefully.”

“Jesus, I’ll push you. Don’t do that.”

She frowned, confused. “Why not?”

“You look like you’re fucking the air, Birdie.”

Chortling, she patted his cheek. “Pervert.”

His eyes sparkled. “You know it.”