Chapter 16 #2
I turned the handle on the door and yanked. Nothing. No give, as if the door had fused to the frame. I laid my palm against it and pulled my hand back sharply at the icy burn—far too cold and wet. I stared. Frost. Crystalline blooms of frost across the white wood.
“What the fuck?” I whispered.
The chair in the corner creaked, and then Ford was beside me, running a finger down the door.
“This isn’t just the heat being out, Paige.
Someone locked us in here.” He shook his head, clearly bewildered.
“The cold doesn’t make any sense. I don’t know how, but this is…
” Gently nudging me aside, he yanked at the door again.
Still nothing. “I think we should try yelling.”
“I don’t think anyone can hear us,” I said.
He eyed the door, pounding it with the side of his fist over and over. Between strikes, he shouted, “Help! Help! Is anyone out there?”
But there was no response. Tenn and Scarlett lived in this wing of the house, along with August, and Thatcher. So did Ford’s Aunt Ophelia, though she was out of town, but someone should have caught Ford’s pounding on the door. Heartstone Manor was big, but it wasn’t that big.
I turned to look around my room, searching for anything that would break the door down. It wasn’t like I kept a fireman’s axe in my closet, and these doors were solid wood. I didn’t have a screwdriver to go for the hinges. We were stuck until whoever was holding us here decided to let us go.
“I don’t think we can get that door open,” I said. “And I don’t understand why, but I don’t think anyone can hear us.”
Ford dropped his hands to his sides. “You’re right.” He eyed the door and then looked back at his phone.
“Still nothing?” I asked.
“Nothing. SOS, no Wi-Fi. I don’t think this is someone locking us in, Paige. I think this is something…else.”
I didn’t want to acknowledge the possibility of else. It freaked me out. “What are we going to do?” I asked, watching more frost bloom over the door.
“You’re shaking,” he said, reaching out to lay a cold palm against my cheek.
He turned toward the bathroom, reaching for the taps, and shut them off within a minute.
“No hot water. It was worth a try.” He crossed back to me. “Clothes off, and get under the covers.”
“Clothes off?” I asked. The prospect of getting naked with Ford normally would have sent heat spiraling through me, but at that moment, in the icy air of my bedroom, watching frost grow on the door, I shook my head vigorously. “No way. Too cold.”
“Body heat,” he said. “Give me the blanket.”
He took the blanket from around my shoulders and spread it across my bed, grabbing a throw from the back of the armchair and spreading that on top.
“Come on. In the bed.” He reached for the hem of his sweater and pulled it over his head, baring his chest. “It’s too cold to argue about this.”
“Fine,” I agreed, knowing next to nothing about surviving in frigid temperatures.
I wasn’t sure Ford knew anything either, but if I was going to freeze to death, I’d rather do it tangled up with Ford than standing here arguing.
The second my shirt was over my head, my body shuddered from the frigid cold.
The rest of my clothes came off faster, and I dove under the covers, Ford following, wrapping his long, icy limbs around me.
I shook as his hands moved up and down my arms, the friction generating the tiniest spark of heat.
“I’m pissed off that you lied,” he said, his voice soft, without a hint of anger.
“I know,” I choked out. “I’m sorry.”
“I don’t want your apologies, Paige,” he said.
Warmth seeped from his body to mine, and I trembled harder. “I can’t stop shivering. It’s so cold.”
“I know, I’ve got you.” His arms tightened around me. “I’m angry that you lied, but I think I understand.”
“I didn’t want to hurt you. I wasn’t—by the time I realized I would, I didn’t know how to tell you. It didn’t seem like there was anything to find out anyway, so I just thought I could let it go.”
I turned in his arms, hooking a leg over his hip to stay as close as I could, the connection of our bodies creating a bubble of warmth under the covers.
My face was ice-cold, but the rest of me was starting to feel a little more human.
His erection pressed against the heat between my legs.
Some parts of me were feeling a lot more human.
“I’m sorry,” I said, looking up, pressing my palm to the side of his face, loving the scruff, the thawing in his cool green eyes as he looked back at me. “I didn’t know you before. And now that I do, the last thing I’d ever want is to hurt you. I wish more than anything I hadn’t lied.”
The side of his mouth quirked, sending heat through my heart. “If you’d told the truth, I doubt we’d be right here. I have to think about that too. But for now…” His fingers speared through my hair, cupping the back of my head, pulling me closer until his cold lips met mine.
And I was suddenly so grateful for however we’d gotten locked in my frozen room.
Maybe the end goal was to freeze us to death.
Maybe this was another attempt on Ford’s life, though I couldn’t figure out how anyone could have arranged to jam the door and turn the room into an icebox.
Still, crazier things had happened to the Sawyer family in the last few years.
I’d probably be booted out on my ass if I didn’t freeze to death overnight. And in that case, I was going to make the most of the time I had left. I reached up, wrapping my arms around Ford, rolling to pull him on top of me. He settled between my thighs.
“Not cold here,” Ford murmured, sliding a finger in the slick heat between my legs, dipping inside.
“Not there,” I agreed.
With his chest pressed against me, skin to skin, the cold was easing away, chased out of our nest under the covers.
He shifted, letting in a wisp of frozen air as he slid open the bedside table.
I wasn’t sure I was glad he’d found the envelope in my drawer, but I was definitely happy he’d thought to bring over the strip of condoms. A giggle escaped me.
“What?” he asked, tearing open the package.
“You brought a whole strip. So maybe we won’t freeze to death.”
“We’re not going to freeze to death,” he muttered, rolling the condom down the length of his erection under the covers and settling between my legs. “Not if I have to fuck you all night to keep us both alive.”
“I’m so glad you’re willing to sacrifice yourself like that,” I said through another giggle.
“That’s the kind of guy I am,” he said, pressing inside me, sending a different kind of shudder up my spine.
I pulled his face to mine, wrapped my legs around his hips, and rocked up, taking him deeper, wanting to absorb him. If this was all I’d have of him, I was going to make the most of it.