Chapter Nine
Water rained over Lukas and Katherine. Steam billowing around them in the ultra-luxurious bathroom.
He held Katherine to him. His talented fingers playing a melody of moans as if she were his favourite instrument. Each string he plucked had her bowing and arching against him. It was the sweetest music. The very best dance.
Every morning since their talk had started like this. Every moment since he’d tasted her on that pool table, he had craved her more and more and to his great delight, the feeling had been mutual.
Unable to keep their hands off each other, the days had blurred together. Lukas hadn’t even minded that, after the brief moment when the skies cleared enough to see the aurora, they were back to wind and snow.
Until that morning.
They had awoken to blue skies. It was so bright with the blanket of snow magnifying the sunlight. The clear sky looked vivid, as if someone had painted it. And good weather meant rescue.
Their time was up.
Lukas was determined to enjoy what little they had left. And he had been enjoying their time. Once he understood why Katherine hated him, it was only natural that he should apologise because he still wanted her to do the same. He had endangered her dream, and her articles had endangered his.
So, he understood and welcomed the fact that this attraction had no chance of a future, but God, did he want to revel in this passion some more.
‘Turn around,’ he instructed, high on the fact that she obeyed him so readily.
He wrapped an arm around her waist, holding her to him, and kissed her fiercely while turning off the taps.
Bodies dripping, he picked her up and stepped out of the shower, then heard the unmistakable roar of a helicopter overhead.
‘I think help is here,’ Katherine whispered. Her lips pink and full from his kisses.
‘We should get dressed,’ he replied but made no move to put her down.
He watched her stare into his eyes. So much passing between them. Electricity, regret, passion but the thwop thwop of the rotors only got louder and louder.
‘Put me down, Lukas.’
Clutching her tighter at first, he forced his muscles to relax and then set her on her feet. He turned away from her, dried off as fast he could and dressed in the clothes close at hand.
He ran his fingers through his hair and turned to look at Katherine, unsure of what he should say. What he could say. Maybe it was best he said nothing.
He rushed to the lounge, just in time to see Dominic force his way through the door.
‘Lukas.’
He had never heard his manager, his friend, sound so relieved or look older than he did right then.
He watched Dominic stride through the room and Lukas embraced him tightly.
‘I told them you would be fine,’ Dominic said, voice muffled. ‘I made them start here.’
Lukas chuckled as he pulled away. ‘You weren’t worried at all.’
‘Bastard,’ Dominic grumbled.
‘Thank you,’ Lukas said with as much gratitude as he could muster.
‘For knowing you so well or coming to get you?’
‘Both.’ Lukas smiled. He turned in time to see Katherine enter the room, her bag rolling along behind her.
He noticed once again that she was in the cameraman’s jacket.
He wanted so badly to march over to her and rip the jacket off her.
To wrap her in his own and claim her, but that would go against what they had.
A momentary flirtation in private while they were snowbound.
If he showed any interest in her now, rumours about them would get out and spread like wildfire.
If a relationship he had been so committed to had ended because he was unwilling to budge on his privacy, he couldn’t go against his principles for a tryst. So he clenched his hands into fists and stayed where he was.
Katherine noticed. He could tell by her slightly cocked head.
‘Katherine!’ Dominic exclaimed with surprise. His eyes growing wide when he noticed her. ‘How did you… We thought you were…’ He looked back and forth between Lukas and her. ‘Did you two get trapped together?’
‘Yes,’ she replied, coming closer. Lukas could feel the distance between them closing as if she was hooked onto a spool within him and when she joined them a mere foot away, it felt like she was an entire chasm away.
He wanted to touch her. To hold her. To tell everyone to leave them alone for a few more weeks but he bit his tongue instead.
‘Lukas saved me, actually. I hurt my ankle and he found me and then I wasn’t surviving very well on my own so he brought me here.’
He ignored the impressed look on Dominic’s face. He didn’t want to acknowledge the hate that no longer existed between them or explain what the past week had been like.
‘Thank heavens for Lukas.’ Dominic squeezed her in a one-armed hug. ‘I’m very glad you’re okay, Katherine.’
‘Thank you, Dominic.’
‘Your crew will be returning shortly to pick up their stuff,’ Dominic said, ‘But how would you like to leave with us now?’
‘I would love to.’
The helicopter ride from the cabin to Rovaniemi was uncomfortable.
Lukas said nothing the entire flight but every time he looked at her she could feel the heat in his gaze.
Her body reacted to him but no relief would come now.
He wouldn’t kiss her or take her to bed.
All those touches lived only in her memory now.
Katherine knew she would compare anyone in her future to Lukas and they would always fail in comparison.
But they were over. They were rescued and it didn’t matter that her heart was imploding for whatever ridiculous reason, they had an agreement.
As soon as they landed, she and Lukas were bundled into separate vehicles. She didn’t even get the chance to say thank you or goodbye.
‘Hei,’ she greeted the driver. As soon as she buckled herself in she switched on her phone, which still had battery life having spent the week powered down in her suitcase.
A series of vibrations went through her phone.
One of them being an email with a plane ticket out of Rovaniemi Airport straight to Heathrow.
‘Perfect.’
She closed her emails, wishing she could be home already. In those walls she could safely let herself miss Lukas. She could replay the night by the fireplace and think about how different a man he actually was to the one she reported about.
Like in the feature article she’d written. The things she’d said wouldn’t reflect the man Lukas really was, so it wouldn’t be true. She couldn’t let it run after all he’d told her.
Katherine dialled her editor, drumming her fingers on the door-handle as she waited for her to pick up.
‘Katherine! It’s such a relief to hear your voice! I was so worried—’
‘I need you to pull the feature,’ she said.
‘What?’
‘Jennifer, I know what I’m asking and that feature on Lukas J?ger can’t run. I’m begging you.’ Her palms grew sweaty. Katherine had never once asked to pull a story before. ‘I’ll write something else in its place. Please.’
‘Why?’
‘I don’t think it’s true anymore.’ Katherine scrunched her eyes shut, assaulted with images of Lukas talking to her, taking care of her, pleasuring her, cooking. But she couldn’t say any of that. She forced herself to sound more in control. Rational. ‘It doesn’t accurately reflect who Lukas is.’
‘It’s a great piece though, Kat. What’s brought on this change of heart?’
‘Being stuck in a snowstorm.’ Jennifer wasn’t going to respond to an emotional appeal.
The story came first so there was only one thing she could say to make her editor change her mind and agree.
‘I’ve just had the opportunity no one else will ever have.
Full access to Lukas J?ger. I’ve got to know the man behind the persona and if we print the article I first gave you, we wouldn’t be printing the truth. ’
‘I’ll see what I can do…but this means I want a new article covering what you’ve learnt about him or we’ll come up with something else to get us those clicks.’
‘Thanks, Jen.’
‘You owe me,’ her editor said and then added, ‘I really am happy you’re okay. You had us all worried there.’
‘I’m okay. See you soon.’
Katherine never had a reason to doubt Jennifer Harrison, but somehow, she didn’t feel reassured. Maybe she had grown a little protective of Lukas, but all she could do was hope Jennifer kept her word.
To distract herself, Katherine opened her socials. Going a week without checking in was alien to her and she needed to know what was going on. As soon as she opened the first app, she was greeted by thousands of notifications all tagging her and Lukas.
‘What the…’ She looked at a few of them, closed the app, opened another but it was the same.
Another app…the same result. Thousands of posts covering her and Lukas missing in Lapland.
That she’d expected, because Lukas had been right.
With the way she had run off, that was what the crew would have reported.
What she hadn’t expected was the explosion of speculation about her relationship with Lukas.
There were always posts like that, but this was different.
#Lukat was trending on several sites. Theories ranged from the believable—that they got caught in a snowstorm—to the absurd—they’d deliberately run off before the storm to have a secret affair and being missing gave them uninterrupted time alone.
Would Lukas see this? How would he react?
She was still scrolling, unsure of how she felt about being the subject of internet speculation, when her phone rang.
‘Hi, Robert,’ she answered.
‘It’s good to know that you survived. Did J?ger?’
‘If you’re asking if I murdered him, I did not.’ But it was a miracle she was alive with the number of times he’d robbed her of breath. Stopped her heart. Had her writhing and panting and begging.
‘I’m very proud of you. The reason I called is that there’s going to be a meeting tomorrow, at 10 a.m. Make sure you’re there.’