More worrying was the wall of snow looming dangerously over his head. The way the snow machine had fallen with the trees and snow had left a small bubble of air that he could partially sit up in. He spotted Riley’s helmet along with an arm of her red jacket amidst the mottled greens, browns, and white.
“Riley!” he screamed, dragging himself toward her and starting to dig around her. Please be okay, please be okay.
Uncovering enough of her at last, he dragged her unmoving body out of the hole and pulled her helmet off to examine her.
She smiled weakly at him. “You really…” She coughed, but then smiled again. “You really know how to show a girl a time she won’t soon be forgetting.”
She laughed, but he could only stare at her. He didn’t know whether to be annoyed at her light mood or simply relieved that she was okay.
“I’ll never picture ‘dashing in the snow’ quite the same way again.” She chuckled and brought herself to a sitting position. Despite a few scrapes and bumps, she seemed okay.
Thank you, God. Finally, his very own Christmas miracle. Now he just needed one more to get them back to the chalet safely.
Riley’s heart played faster than “Carol of the Bells” inside her chest. Every moment was the giant crescendo. There were no breaks, no pauses, only da-da-da-duh, da-da-da-duh over and over again, the panic rising with each new reprieve.
She smiled at Sebastian and tried to make a joke, but it did nothing to silence the frenzied song rushing through her veins.
“Riley?” he asked, looking up at her. That’s when she realized that while she was able to sit within their tiny cave, he was not. She’d been so worried about herself, she’d forgotten to check on Sebastian.
“Hmm?” she responded, trying so hard to sound light and fluffy, the way snow was supposed to feel. The snow around them now was dark, heavy, and suffocating.
Her lungs screamed. It felt as if a weight was strapped to her chest, making each breath heavy, hard. Then there was her pulse. Da-da-da-duh, da-da-da-duh, da-da-da-duh!
Her head swirled. She needed to get out of here.
She needed to get out now!
Even within her mittens, Riley’s hands were impossibly cold. Everything was cold, but if she worked hard enough, perhaps she could dig them out. What was Sebastian doing? Why wasn’t he helping her? She couldn’t wait for an explanation, didn’t have time for a fight, would handle this on her own if that’s the way it had to be.
A new sense of determination coursed through her trembling body, and she twisted away from the body of the snow machine that lay behind them, creating one of the cavern’s walls. She reached up and clawed at the dome above them.
Ouch!
Sebastian grabbed her by the wrists and yanked them back. “Riley, stop it! Are you crazy?” he demanded.
“Let me go,” she said, struggling against him, the bells in her brain ringing even more crazily than before.
But he didn’t give in to her request. Instead he pulled her into him and wrapped his arms around her like a straight jacket. “Stop fighting me,” he growled.
“What are you doing? We have to dig our way out! We’ll freeze to death in here.”
“Stop, shh, stop,” he coaxed, making her wonder if he had some kind of experience with horses or other barn animals and was using it on her now.
“Let me go!” she shouted again.
“Let me talk!” he shot back, startling her into silence. Not a trace of the light-hearted Jim Carrey charmer remained in the man beside her now.
“Thank you,” he said as he loosened his hold on her slightly, but not enough to allow her to break free. “I know it’s scary. I’m scared, too. But you have to understand, I’m a trained professional. I know what to do to make sure we get out safely.”
“Then do it already,” she argued, then softening, she added, “Please get us out of here, Sebastian.”
“I will, but first, I need you to stop panicking and let me handle things. If you dig like that, you could cause the rest of the snow above to come crashing down and bury us alive. I’m pretty sure that’s the exact thing you want to avoid happening, right?”
She let out a choked sob. How had she been so stupid?
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” he said, his breath moistened against her neck—not warm, not cold, but comforting all the same. “Keep talking to me,” he continued. “Keep talking to me, focus on our words, and try to calm your mind. Bring your breathing back to a steady pace. It’s scary, but it’s going to be okay. We’re going to be okay. I’ll take care of you.”
And just like that, she was reminded of how much she’d wanted to run into this man’s arms and stay for a good, long time. She remembered cuddling up against him on the snowmobile ride, picturing what it would mean to be on a proper date with him, to come home to him after a long day’s work, to stay with Sebastian Rockwell maybe forever.
She’d liked him instinctively, and now she had to trust him, too. It was the only way they’d both get out of here in one piece.
In, out. In, out.
She’d never had a panic attack before, but she’d also never been trapped by an avalanche before, either.
“Has this happened to you before?” she asked.
“No. I mean, not really. There were training scenarios as part of my certification, but this is the first time it’s happened for real.”
“You say first as if you know it won’t be the last.”
“Well, it probably won’t be. I’ve got a long career ahead of me. Because we’re going to make it out of here just fine, and you’ll go on selling houses, and resorts, and making all sorts of giant sales. I’ll keep doing this because it’s what I love and it’s what I was born for.”
She smiled at Sebastian’s vision of the future. It comforted her that he was not worried enough to give this up, even in the immediate wake of disaster. He might not be a festive guy, but he sure was brave.
Then she remembered.
“The sale! Oh, what about Mr. Evers? What about the tour of the property? I can’t possibly—“
“Slow down. Breathe,” he reminded her. “Panicking gets us nowhere, so you may as well relax and enjoy the… well, enjoy the cuddles.” He laughed and waited for her to join in.
Which she reluctantly did.
“He’s with my boss, Roman Petrov. Roman will know what to do, both about your client and about seeing to our rescue. You’ve got nothing to worry about.”
“Except the possibility of being crushed alive by a mountain of snow?”
He stopped laughing at once. “Does that kind of joke help you to stop panicking? No? Yeah. Listen, it’s okay. Really. I wouldn’t lie to you. We had a great meal last night. Obviously, we have plenty of water because we’ve got all this snow. If you stop to think about it, we lucked out with how we’re situated. We’ve got a nice little bubble of protection around us from the way snow machine crashed up against these trees.”
“But—”
He held up a hand to cut off any further protest. She hadn’t known what she was going to say anyway, so she let him continue.
“There’s a small emergency kit in the back of the snow machine here. It’s right underneath the seat if I can just dig a bit out around it. I’m trusting you now. I’m going to let go, but you have to stay put, okay?”
She nodded and then watched as he twisted away from her and dug carefully at the base of the snow machine that served as the key structural support of their fortress.
“Got it!” he shouted with glee just as the snow began to rumble from above, unleashing a fresh torrent from above.
Riley screamed.
Chapter 8
Sebastian grabbed Riley again and pulled her into his chest. She elbowed him hard in the gut, knocking the wind out of them both.
“Sorry!” she shouted, probably louder than she realized.
“Like I said, we can’t dig our way out without burying ourselves under who-knows-how-much snow. It’s not very
bright in here, so I’m guessing it’s a lot. But look at this.” He held the emergency kit up proudly. “We’ve got some supplies now.”
Riley grabbed the case from him and opened it up to take stock.
“No Altoids,” he joked. “But grab that flashlight.”
She switched it on and handed it to him, and he could now see just how much she was shivering as the cold continued to seep into their makeshift domicile.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but I need you to take off your clothes now.” He’d tried to take any hint of humor from his voice, but the look of disgust that crossed Riley’s face told him he’d failed.
“Excuse me?” she demanded, that old flame igniting in her eyes again. If only her sass was enough to keep them warm. All this snow would have melted by now and they’d be home free.
He couldn’t help but laugh, which only deepened the grimace that pinched across her face. “I know we just met and all, but the best way to maintain body heat is to strip down and then wrap up together so we can share body heat.”
At last she relaxed, but her teeth began to chatter from the violent cold. She attempted a smile, but couldn’t keep it on her frozen face. “I’ll bet you say that to all the girls.”
“Only the ones who survive an avalanche with me,” he said, removing his jacket and hoping it would encourage her to do the same.
“Why am I so cold?” she asked, tearing her gloves off with her teeth, then fumbling with her coat’s zipper.
“Besides the snow? Well, the adrenaline is wearing off now. You’re going to feel tired soon, too. But remember to stay calm. The biggest danger right now is going into shock.”
“And getting crushed under the mountain of snow above us,” she reminded him as she shrugged out of her jacket shyly.
He’d already moved on to his boots. It was difficult to work the laces with such stiff fingers, but somehow he managed. “Nah, I’d worry about the snow spiders before that.”
“Snow spiders?” She stopped and looked up at him with impossibly wide eyes.
“Kidding. Only kidding.” He really needed to keep his jokes in check or risk sending her into another spiral of crazed panic.
“You’re seriously going to make jokes right now?”
He shrugged as he wriggled his way free of his pants. Now he was down to only his boxer briefs, and modesty prevented him from taking those off, too. “Just trying to lighten the mood.”
She snorted, keeping her eyes on the ground ahead as she hesitated with her hands on the hem of her shirt. “Right, that’s going to get us out of here. Jokes.”
“Riley, look at me. I’m a professional, okay? I know all about winter survival and the like. We can’t dig out, so the best option for us is to stay put and wait for rescue.”
“But how will they know where to look for us? How long until they could even get here? And would you please look somewhere else, so I can…” Her cheeks were already red from the cold, but he could have sworn they shone an even deeper shade of crimson now.
He put a hand over his eyes, hoping she would hurry. Now that he’d lost his clothes, he needed her more than ever. “Tell me when it’s safe to open my eyes again. Until then, you have your privacy.”
“You didn’t answer my question.” Her voice came out muffled and he tried not to think about what her tanned skin must look like against the purity of the snow. He was simultaneously living a nightmare and every guy’s greatest fantasy—when taken together, did they even out to a normal day?
“How will they find us?” Riley repeated, forcing him to focus on her voice once more.
“Believe it or not, there’s a GPS transponder in the snow machine to help find the way back home if I get lost, but it also helps people find us, too. We put them in a couple years back on all the resort’s machines just in case something like this happened.”
“Just in case? What prompted that?”
“An avalanche. Four of five snow machiners in Hatcher’s Pass got lost.”
“And what happened to them?”
He shook his head, refusing to give her anything more to worry over. Why did she have to ask all the wrong questions?
He took a deep breath before answering. “Look, they didn’t have the equipment we have. We’re not out here alone, and my boss knows what to do. Right now, there are people gearing up. About one in every hundred Alaskans is a pilot, and several of them volunteer for search and rescue operations. They may even be airborne right now, looking for our signal. There are others getting onto snow machines with shovels and ropes and snowshoes. No matter how bleak things may be right here, we’re in a good spot. We made it through the hard part. Now we just wait. Okay? We’ll get you home for Christmas.”
“Promise?” she asked with a quaver in her voice.
“I promise,” he answered, knowing he would do whatever it took to make this woman’s dreams come true, especially the dream of survival.
Riley hardly recognized her own voice as it escaped her mouth in icy puffs. “You can look now,” she said after removing her shirt.
Sebastian reached forward with one arm, motioning for her to come to him. The other hand he kept firmly over his eyes as a shield from her near nakedness. Since he had opted to leave his underwear on, she had done the same. “I don’t need to look,” he answered. “I want to, but more than that, I want you to be comfortable. Lean back against me. Ease into it slowly so as not to upset the snow.”
She did as told. An immediate flame sprung to life the moment their skin made contact. Somehow her icy body plus his made for generous, life-sustaining warmth.
“Mmm, isn’t that better?” he asked, uncovering his eyes at last and wrapping a second arm around her.
“It wasn’t just a pick up line.”
“Of course it wasn’t. My material’s a bit better than that.”
“I don’t know,” she said with a small laugh, then jumped back when he laid his face against her chest. She understood why he needed to. She understood that with her able to sit and him not, this was the best possible position for them.
But it didn’t make the extreme intimacy any easier to handle.
“Sebastian, I…” she began. This was the type of moment you shared with a husband, not a guy you just met and happened to have a small—okay, huge—crush on.
“Shh, I know. I promise, I know.”
“Can you hear my heart?” she asked.
“Yes, it’s going a million miles a moment. What can I do to help you relax?”
Stop being so close? So handsome? So irresistible? Get us out of here alive? Get us out of here now? None of the answers that pranced through her head were good ones, so she didn’t provide one.
“I promise to be the perfect gentleman.”
“I know. I trust you,” she answered, and it was true. She was having a hard time trusting herself in these moments. What would happen after they were rescued? Would she think of this moment in the future and feel ashamed? Would this make it even harder to go back home and force all thoughts of Sebastian Rockwell from her mind forever?
“It’s too intimate, isn’t it?” he whispered, reading her thoughts yet still managing to make the moment even more delicate.
“It’s not you,” she stuttered from the cold. “It’s—”
“You don’t need to explain. I understand, and I have an idea that I think will help.”
Dear God, please get us through this and past this, and please let his idea be a good one, Riley prayed, waiting for whatever happened next.
Chapter 9
Something in Sebastian stirred when Riley bent her head down to look at him. They were entwined in such a way that his head was on her chest while her hip was pressed up against his…
“Ahem, could you not wiggle there?” he asked, embarrassed to the core but knowing he’d be even more embarrassed if nature decided to intervene on their morning once again.
“Okay. Oh… I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to—“
Th
ere was only one way he could save them from this awkward dance. Luckily, despite being a single guy in his late twenties, Sebastian happened to be well practiced in the art of the dad joke. “Hey,” he said, poking her in the arm and cutting off her seemingly endless string of apologies.
She stopped mid-sentence and waited for him to speak. The time had come to put his plan into action. “I was just wondering,” he began, playing the part perfectly. “I mean, if it would be okay with you… Well, when we get out of here, want to grab dinner with me?”
“Sebastian, I don’t think this is the time to—“
“I know this great restaurant on the moon,” he continued.
“What?” He couldn’t read her reaction, but he hadn’t made it to the hook yet, either.
“Yeah, the food’s great but there’s no atmosphere,” he finished proudly.
“That’s awful,” she said, her voice catching from the cold.
No laughter yet. He needed to keep going. If there was one way guaranteed to kill the sexual tension, this would do it. As much as it pained him to actively turn off a gorgeous, intelligent, all-around amazing woman like Riley McKinley, it was what he had to do.
He let out a dramatic sigh. “Better than jokes about German sausages. Those are the wurst.”
“Bah dum tiss.” Riley laughed, her chest heaving as she did. Oh, it would take a lot more dad jokes to bury his attraction to this particular woman. Luckily, he had a hefty supply at his disposal.
“You never stop, do you?” Riley continued to laugh. Her chest continued to shake. He continued to try his best to ignore it. “Where did you learn these horrible jokes?”
The Alaska Sunrise Romances: A 9-Book Sweet Romance Collection Page 18
