“You did? Which one?”
She gave him a smile that cut him all the way to his soul. So much joy and pride in her look that he knew he was falling for her. That her joy could be his was the first indication. But it wasn’t the only one. How he’d planned to stay here until he could get back in her good graces was another one.
“A moderate one. Not a world-class trail, but it was close, and I wasn’t scared this time. I mean, I was at the top, but once I started skiing it was like old times. I got into my stance and just sort of felt everything fade away.”
“Gorgeous, that’s great! Tomorrow morning we’re going up the mountain.”
* * *
LINDSEY LEFT A note for Carter to meet her and left early to meet Elizabeth for breakfast. They’d started the tradition when Lindsey had first started working at the resort and had kept it up even through the holidays and new relationships. Last night in the bar, she’d been so out of control with her feelings that she hadn’t really been able to talk.
They sat in the main dining room at the lodge, the Wasatch Range standing majestically in the distance. Lindsey was playing with her food more than eating it.
“I don’t think a night’s sleep has helped you,” Elizabeth said.
“It hasn’t. If anything I’m more confused now than ever,” she admitted. It was hard to talk about her feelings. She just wasn’t the kind of woman who had ever done a lot of sharing.
On the team where she’d spent most of her life, everyone had been focused on their own goals. Sure, they’d discussed good runs or new products, but they’d never really talked about their real lives. Elizabeth reached over and squeezed her hand. “What’s on your mind?”
“Stuff,” Lindsey said. “Honestly, I can’t make any sense of it. There’s a part of me that wants to believe that Carter has changed, and I’ve changed enough to give him a shot, but then there’s this other part that’s too afraid to believe it. And I’m stuck not knowing which is right.”
Elizabeth took a sip of her coffee. “I’m betting the truth is somewhere in between all of that. Maybe you are looking for an easy answer where there isn’t one. I’m far from an expert on relationships—believe me, Bradley would be the first to say that—but I have discovered that you have to be honest with yourself, with your heart. Otherwise you will be miserable.”
Lindsey took a bite of her omelet and wondered what her heart wanted. She knew she cared for Carter. She couldn’t deny it after the blind panic she’d felt the day before when she couldn’t find him. But love? She was afraid to admit to it. In her life she’d loved two things: her family and skiing.
Right now she was struggling to find her way back to skiing and felt as though she was on the right path. What she felt for Carter wasn’t really like that. She had no idea how to define it or him. She just knew that when he’d showed up at her place last night, she’d felt a sense of relief mixed with joy.
“How do you know what the heart wants?” she asked Elizabeth. If there was one woman in the world who seemed to have it all, it was her friend. She needed some guidance here. Because she’d been out of the game of love for too long.
“Only you can say. When Bradley called me, even before we were dating, I’d get really excited. I couldn’t wait to talk to him, and I pretended we were just friends and that was all I wanted, but I knew I needed more from him.”
It was different for her and Carter. She’d never felt anything toward him except for faint amusement and a little bit of irritation before New Year’s Eve. She’d needed this year to be different. Vastly different from last year, which, if she was completely honest, she could say was happening.
The problem was, as much as she wanted to change, she kept getting tripped up on the fact that she had no idea how to really handle it. How to handle Carter. Jealousy would have been easier to deal with, but the truth was that it had been more than jealousy she’d felt at those other women. Something deep inside her had been awakened and she’d wanted to claim him. To tell those girls and everyone else that he was hers.
And that was far from the truth.
“Thanks,” she said.
“I didn’t help, did I?” Elizabeth replied with a very kind smile.
“No. But I’m beginning to believe this is something that I have to figure out for myself.”
“The toughest decisions are. But that’s the way it should be, since you’re the one who has to live with the consequences.”
Consequences. She had left him this morning, and it had been hard. He was leaving soon to get back to his touring schedule and his new professional life. He’d said last night that he didn’t want to lose her, but she knew him better than that.
Eventually he would move on.
And where would that leave her?
Lindsey took a sip of orange juice to wash away the parched feeling in her throat. She should put some distance between them now, instead of skiing with him and asking him to stay the night at her place.
“I guess you must really like him,” Elizabeth said, “if you are that confused about what to do.”
She did like him. A lot. But as with all the other things in her life that she wanted, he was right out of her grasp. He wasn’t like skiing, something she could train for and master. He was always going to keep her guessing and trying to keep up with her own feelings.
She had to cut her ties to him, and she had to start doing it now.
“Sure, what’s not to like? Carter is sexy, charming and just the sort of guy a woman uses as a distraction.”
CARTER WOKE UP feeling pretty good. He’d done just enough to get Lindsey back in his bed where he wanted her. Or, as it was in this case, his bed. He saw her note and swung by his place to shower, change and collect his snowboard. Hitting the slopes with Lindsey was going to be fun.
It felt right in his bones to be doing this with her, and after yesterday’s setback, he was ready to move forward. He hoped that he didn’t have to talk about his emotions ever again.
That had easily been the scariest moment of his life. He smiled at the valet as he tossed his keys to him and stopped by the little counter-service café off the lobby for a coffee before heading into the main dining room to find Lindsey.
He saw her sitting with Elizabeth near one of the windows. They were talking intently, and he felt something shift and settle in his soul. She was his. Lindsey looked pretty with her long blond hair hanging loose around her shoulders. She wore a pair of leggings and a long sweater, and when she talked she gestured with her hands.
He stood there in the shadows, just watching her, almost afraid to believe that he’d somehow convinced her to take a chance on him. The guy that the world saw as never serious about anything had a very serious crush on her.
His ice queen.
He’d melted her, and in return found that she had melted him. A part of that would never be the same again.
He took a sip of his coffee as the maître d’ came over to see if he wanted breakfast.
“Nah, I’m fine. I’m going to surprise those ladies.”
The other man nodded, and slowly Carter made his way through the tables. There weren’t that many people in the restaurant this morning. He noticed Georgina and Stan were sitting quietly together, and he thought of how it took all types of relationships. That there wasn’t just one kind of relationship or one answer to how