Baby, It's Cold Outside

by Jennifer Greene, Merline Lovelace

  “Say what?”

  “You heard me. You’re as loony as I am. You’re up here all alone in the middle of a blizzard, too. So you’re better prepared than I am. Big deal. It’s still nuts. I mean, have you committed murder or robbery or something? Are you running from the IRS? What’s the point of your living up here in complete isolation like this?”

  “What’s the point for you?” he asked right back.

  “I asked first.”

  “So we’re going to argue about this like kids?”

  “No,” she said. “We’re going to have something for lunch. I’m starving.”

  Putting together lunch, they skirted around each other like wary pups in a cage. Except that she wasn’t a pup. God knew the kitchen area was big enough to play B-ball, but every time he turned around, there she was. Those haunted soft eyes, the fluff of hair, those elegant bones, that…something of hers. Defiance. Stubbornness.

  Rick figured it was better to try and label her personality rather than admit she was just plain sexy as hell.

  “Well, considering we don’t know how the stew’s going to work out later, I guess this’ll do for now.” But she rolled her eyes at his choice. He’d thrown together a couple peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, added a bottle of water, heaped on some chips.

  For herself, she’d put together cut wedges of some sandwich with cheese and lettuce and trimmings, added a banana, a napkin, poured her bottled water in a glass.

  They were in a blizzard, for Pete’s sake. There was no easy way to do dishes, no purpose in fussing. But whatever.

  “What are we going to do if the fireplace oven doesn’t work?” she fretted.

  “Work something else out. Although I’m inclined not to use the kitchen stove and oven. We need to conserve generator use for the absolute essentials. Water, for one. But there are lots of things we can cook on the fire—starting with coffee.”

  “Coffee’s a priority beyond food, water or sleep,” she said firmly.

  Damned if she didn’t make him grin. “Got that right. So. Are we actually going to finish that awkward conversation about how we ended up in Alaska?”

  “Yeah. But I want to hear your story first.”

  “Fine.” It was too hot to sit directly on the hearth, but the couches were body-swallowers, so he plunked down on the thick carpet, Indian-style. He had a clear view of her face by firelight from that angle. “I moved here almost two years ago, like I said. Used to be a civil engineer. Got out of school, MIT, made a great friend, and we teamed up, went into business together. Built bridges around the world. Loved it. Traveled to some godforsaken places, worked impossibly long hours in impossibly awful climates, saw a lot of life. Loved it.”

  “Hmm. So far I’m not hearing any criminal history or connections to the Mafia.”

  “Nope. Straight as an arrow. Oh. I got married en route. My partner was my best man. Angie was another dream come true. I worshipped the ground she walked on, and she felt the same way about me. I thought. She traveled with me. Was a teacher. Always found ways to help out, do stuff, wherever we were.”

  “Kids?”

  “No kids. Both of us wanted them. But at first, we were busy seeing the world, not in a good place to have kids. And after that, well, seems she decided she loved Brad more than me.”

  “Brad? Your partner?”

  “Yeah.” He finished the second sandwich, dusted off his hands. “So that’s the deal. I started out hurt. Destroyed-hurt. Then I got mad, as well. I’m still mad. I intend to stay mad until kingdom come. Got a job mapping minerals and water, employed by the kindly state of Alaska, do the hermit thing in the hardcore winter months, trek to some really outback places in the summer. They pay me a fortune.”

  “That’s the whole story?”

  “Basically. Family, friends, kept telling me I had to get over her. Over them. If one more person told me to ‘move on,’ I figured I was going to lose it in a real serious way. I needed and wanted to be alone.” His eyes met hers. “I’m not looking for trouble. From anyone. And for damn sure, I don’t want sympathy or advice or a listening ear. I’ve had enough of that kind of hounding to last me a lifetime.”

  “Gotcha.” She was still on her first triangle wedge. If she took any smaller bites, she’d still be eating that tiny sandwich at midnight. “Well, my story’s a lot more dramatic. I killed someone.”

  He dropped his water bottle. “Say what?”

  “I come from a family of doctors. A dad, a brother, two uncles, my grandfather. Lost my mom when I was little—car crash. Anyway. The deal in my family was that you knew, from grade school on, that you were going into medicine. Oh. And rule number two was that you’d spend at least two weeks every year at the lodge in Alaska. When I was a kid, I came with all my guys. They hunted and fished, and I holed up upstairs with my dolls.” She pointed at him. “But…I was doing surgery on my dolls even then. So don’t be thinking I was a girlie girl.”

  His mouth twitched. “Don’t shoot me, but maybe I did have a passing thought that you weren’t a natural tomboy.”

  “All right, all right. So maybe I was a little on the girlie side. Maybe I still am. Anyway, I didn’t go the surgeon route like my dad and gramps. I went to school, Chicago, became an anesthesiologist. Graduated top of my class, as was expected. Got a job at a terrific hospital—Boston—as was expected. I just turned twenty-nine. Been at the job less than two years.”

  “And…”

  “And there was a little boy. Nine. Big trauma, fell off a trampoline. Going to be a long surgery. Neurosurgeon asked for me specifically, because I’m good. Seriously good. It was going to take a miracle, everyone knew it. It was going to take all of us to bring him through.”

  Something in him stilled. It was unfortunately easy to guess where this was going, no matter how tough she was trying to look. “But the kid didn’t make it?”

  “Yeah. He died.” She put down the second wedge. When it was obvious she wasn’t going to eat it, he reached for it.

  “And this was your fault somehow?”

  “That’s not really a yes or no answer. It wasn’t about fault. He was too little, too damaged to fix. Putting him through seven hours of surgery—there was no way to keep him under that long. He had other health issues. So it was this balance, of keeping him under enough that he didn’t feel anything, but not depress his system so far that he’d quit breathing.” She said quietly, easily, “I did my job. Everything I could. Everything I knew how to do. But he died.”

  “But you were blamed?” He got the haunted eyes now. Got the wounded fragility. But still couldn’t quite put it all together.

  “No. No one blamed me. I’m not a hundred percent positive that anyone could have saved the child. The best surgeon, the best anesthesiologist, though, were the critical parts of the equation. My family, they’ve all had deaths. It’s just the way it is. You can’t save every patient. They were all on me to buck up, put it behind me, get over it, move on.”

  “Okay.”

  “That was…like two and a half weeks ago. The problem…isn’t about blaming myself. It’s about being in the position of God. I don’t know that I want that power, of life and death. I hated it. Hated losing that boy. It’s as if he were mine. As if I were the one grieving as much as his mother.”

  He said nothing, because he was afraid to. Her heart was in her eyes.

  “I never wanted that power. I went into medicine because I was raised to be an obedient daughter who fulfills expectations. I never…made a choice. I just took the ride I was supposed to take. Maybe…I’d rather be a clerk in a clothing store. Or drive a truck. Or sell cosmetics or jewelry or something.”

  Again, he said nothing, but had to bite his tongue. She shut up when he was talking, so now, even if it was killing him, he had to stay shut up for her.

  “The point is…I’m not sure I’m going back to doctoring. And facing the family and friends over the holidays, I just couldn’t do it.” She shook her head. “I’m not de
pressed. I’m not crazy. I just need some time to think. I want to be left alone. No hounding. No advice. No sympathy. I’m not looking for anything from anyone.”

  “Neither am I.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with being alone.”

  “I totally agree.”

  “I’m tired of people interfering. Telling me what’s right for me. I love my family and friends. But I have to live my own life.”

  “You’re singing my song.”

  “I don’t need anyone. Much less anyone telling me what I should do.”

  “Damn right.”

  She hesitated with a sudden frown. “What’s going on here?”

  He hesitated, too. “We’re getting along?”

  She let out a short laugh. “Who’d have thought it?”

  If she was confounded, Rick figured she didn’t know the half of it. He ran from women faster than skunks. No offense to skunks—or women. He just wasn’t going to volunteer to be stabbed in the gut again. Realizing that he felt drawn to Emilie, not just interested but darn well pulled…was enough to make him want to run for the hills.

  As far as Rick could tell, she had the same reaction to their storytelling. Just too much personal sharing, too quickly. Both of them ran around for a while, not specifically avoiding each other, so much as easily finding things to do that required no contact or conversation. She brought clothes and books and personal things down from the upstairs, so they could completely close up the loft rooms and conserve heat. He scouted around for the location of batteries, emergency supplies, food stock, then did chore stuff like closing doors, blocking air leaks in windows and door edges.

  Eventually, though, he found her standing at a north window at the same time he was standing at a west one. There was nothing outside to see but snow and more snow. Truth to tell, it was downright breathtaking. Treacherous, but breathtaking. The view was an ever-changing dance of swirls and heaps and spangles of snow shapes…but the relentlessly screaming wind could drive anyone crazy.

  “You got a deck of cards around here?” he asked.

  She came through. He volunteered to play Crazy Eights, but she was the one who suggested poker, so he figured hey, whatever happened after that wasn’t his fault. She’d chosen the game.

  First hand, he drew a pair of aces. Still, he kept the betting down to five toothpicks, because he didn’t want to discourage her right off the bat—it was going to be a long afternoon.

  She showed him three tens, scooped up the toothpicks.

  He searched her face, looking for signs of guile or cunning. Found nothing but delighted surprise at winning in her expression.

  He hunkered down and dealt the cards. Because he was good at the game—downright great, if he said so himself—he had ample time to reflect on all the stuff she’d told him.

  Man, she was so wrong.

  So much about her made sense, now that he knew she was a doctor. The sharp intelligence in her eyes, yet the survival naïveté. Her believing herself to be so prepared, because she was, in her life; she just didn’t have skills that were relevant in this environment. Still, the truth of her situation was obvious, would have been obvious to a stone.

  She needed to be what she was. A healer. A doctor. He was sorry about the kid that died, but Emilie wasn’t dumb. She should get it. The death wasn’t on her. Bad stuff happened, to everyone and everything.

  His sympathy for her slowly, methodically decreased—exponentially the longer they played cards.

  “What,” he said, “do you always have luck like this?”

  “Luck?” she hooted. “Luck! This is skill, boy. Either put your bet in the pot or fold, youngster.”

  “This time,” he said patiently, “you have to be bluffing.”

  “You’ll have to pay to find out.”

  His eyes narrowed. “I’ll pay. But since I’m running out of toothpicks, I think we should make the stakes just a little more interesting.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  “STRIP,” EMILIE ORDERED HIM, and had to chuckle when his jaw dropped in shock. Who’d have thought she’d have the feminine power to make him feel off balance? Or that her big-guy pirate could suddenly clear his throat because of nerves.

  “Now just hold your horses. I’m not out of toothpicks yet. Close, yeah. But this time I’ve got a good hand.”

  “I’m not talking about the poker game. I’m talking about the way you wince every time you twist your left arm and shoulder a certain way.”

  There. His nerve level immediately simmered down. His expression changed from sudden sexual awareness—to plain old annoyance. “It’s nothing. Play your cards.”

  “Fine. But that’s my bet. If I win, you take off your shirt.”

  “Don’t hold your breath, counting on winning,” he grumped, and held his cards closer than diamonds.

  Emilie wanted to chuckle again…yet felt her smile softening. The whole time they’d been playing poker, she kept recalling the story he’d told her. What a stupid wife he’d had. The woman had thrown out a man who loved her—loved, trusted, bared his soul with, appreciated, the whole serious ball of wax. Good men, men who really knew how to love, were darned hard to find. And yeah, he was scruffy-looking. But now it made more sense, why he chose to go around looking like a disreputable, dangerous pirate.

  He’d felt betrayed.

  He’d been betrayed.

  He wasn’t encouraging anyone—man, woman or child—to get too close again.

  Calmly she laid down her hand. Three sixes. Two twos.

  He stared at it in disbelief. But he didn’t move.

  “Now come on,” she said teasingly. “This is no big deal. I just want to see the burn on your shoulder, that’s all. I told you I’m a doctor. You don’t need to be modest around me—”

  “Modest? Of course I’m not modest!”

  You’d think she’d accused him of kicking a puppy; he sounded that outraged. “I’m just asking you to take off the top layers around your left shoulder for a couple minutes. Even if you were modest, it’s no big thing, you know? I promise I won’t look at anything embarrassing—”

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake.” With a disgusted look, he started peeling.

  Which, of course, was precisely what she wanted him to do. Before he could balk again, she hustled into the kitchen to wash her hands and fetch the first aid supplies.

  Even with the tall, bright fire, there wasn’t enough light, so she added a lantern on the mantel.

  “It’s not worth all this fuss,” he said. “It’s a burn. Burns hurt. That’s life. It’s nothing.”

  It wasn’t “nothing.” He’d told her what happened, but now she could see it. Something burning had fallen on his shoulder—a branch, part of the roof or ceiling, whatever. The spot was a couple inches wide and several inches long. A spattering of burn “freckles” sprayed along his arm, as well, but the only sore likely to cause him trouble was the one burn. “You took good care of it,” she said seriously. “It’s clean. Not infected.”

  “What? Did you think I was an idiot?”

  “Rick.”

  “What?”

  “Shut up. I’m looking right at it. I know it hurts like hell. And it’s in a spot that has to be almost impossible for you to reach. So quit being a jerk. You’re right, it’s fine, likely to heal with no sweat as long as you keep taking care of it. But I can put something on it, to both protect it and make it hurt less. And it’s easier for me to reach it than it is for you, so it’s pretty darn ridiculous for you to keep arguing.”

  He shut up, just like that.

  She finished the job, in less than five minutes. Switched off the lantern, carted the first aid kit back to the kitchen, washed her hands again. By the time she ambled back into the living area, he’d pulled on both his tech layer and flannel shirt.

  It struck her as funny…how right then, out of the complete blue, she felt a sexual pull with the power of a bullet. It didn’t make sense. Moments before, she’d had her hands on his bare s
kin. Seen the golden orbs of his shoulders by firelight. Felt the warmth of his flesh, felt the sinew and muscle in his back and arms, felt him tense under her gentlest touch.

  But she’d been a doctor, looking at the wound. And now she wasn’t a doctor.

  She was just walking into a firelit room with a stranger whose eyes met hers. This time, though, their connection packed a wallop. His gaze distinctly conveyed a man’s experience, a man’s sexual awareness, a man’s blunt way of communicating that touching between them could have repercussions. Interesting repercussions. Frightening repercussions. Explosive repercussions.

  “So,” she said, and then completely forgot what she’d been about to say. There seemed to be nothing in her mind but froth.

  “I forgot to say thanks,” he said. “You really did something. I can’t even feel the burn on my back now.”

  “Good.”

  “You still want to play poker?”

  “Maybe after a while. For right now…to be honest, I just feel beat. I’m inclined to read, just crash early.”

  Her voice was casual, she was sure, the way friendly strangers would naturally talk together. That was the thing. All she had to do was ignore this unexpected awareness of him, treat him just as she would an acquaintance or neighbor.

  That was the plan—and it worked that way. Eventually they tested her oven stew, which wasn’t going to win any culinary contests, but at least it didn’t poison them. He didn’t know about her lack of skills in a kitchen. She did. They shared the cleanup, paid attention to the generator, the fire, discussed how they were going to set up sleeping, took turns in the bathroom.

  She didn’t know how much time passed after that. Minutes. Hours.

  He’d taken the cushions off one couch, plopped them on the carpet on one side of the hearth, apparently felt more comfortable sleeping on ground level. She’d layered blankets on the far couch. Although he couldn’t be farther than seven feet away, she could barely see him. The firelight was bright enough, but both of them were so completely heaped in covers that their best friends likely couldn’t identify them, she thought humorously.