Chapter 13
thirteen
KIT
Snow on the Beach - Taylor Swift, Lana Del Rey
When Jonah had asked if I’d brought swimwear with me on my trip, I immediately delighted at the thought of a spa, a roasting steam room, a bubble jacuzzi.
Not for a measly second did a frozen-over loch in the dead of winter enter my mind.
“You cannot be serious?” I looked back at Jonah, who was wrapped up in his big puffy jacket, the crowd of locals around us chattering with excitement.
He only smiled down at me, every inch gleeful. “What did you think I meant when I said we were going for a Boxing Day dip?”
“I don’t know.” I looked around, scanning the frozen ground around us. “Like, a heated pool. Not a half-frozen-over loch.”
He’d gotten the call after dinner the night before – apparently, Archie was checking in to make sure he’d survived his Christmas in solitude – and I’d never forget that adorable look on Jonah’s face, the handset of the phone pressed into the crook of his neck as he’d grinned and asked, “Can I bring a friend?”
“It’s a tradition,” he added. “A way to wash off the last year and bring in the next with a sense of adventure.”
It wasn’t a tradition back when I visited Gran. “And frozen nips,” I joked, my arms wrapping around his waist, fingers interlacing to trap him. I felt his laugh vibrate through his body, a delightful, warm rumble that chased away the cold.
The rest of Christmas had come and gone like a dream.
Jonah’s cooking was stellar – succulent turkey with all the trimmings – and the rest of my cheese platter came in a treat for dessert.
We retreated to the sofas, the fire roaring as the TV played in the background.
We didn’t watch any of it though, instead talking all the way into the night.
Everything about him was so easy. He was easy to like, to get on with, to talk to. In only these few days we’d spent together, I felt like he knew me better than my closest friend. Even clothed, around him, I felt stripped bare. He saw me, right through, and so far, he hadn’t looked away.
“Come on, it won’t be that bad.” He waved my concern away, twisting his head to look at me, his cheeks pink. At the sight of my raised eyebrows, he relented, “Okay, okay, it might be terrible. It will be fun.”
“We have different definitions of fun.”
“You came here looking to escape, right?” Jonah said. “What better way to kick off the new year than by being a little brave?”
Playfully, I pressed my lips into a straight line, pointing a finger threateningly. “If I freeze to death, or lose a toe to frostbite, I’ll sue your cute little arse.”
“I’ll warm you up when we get home.” The heat in his eyes was almost enough to defrost me there and then.
Closing the small gap between us, my lips met his. Jonah’s reaction was immediate, his hand rising to my jaw, fingers caressing. It was gentle but filled with the fire that had us tumbling back into bed last night, desperate to cling to each other’s naked bodies.
I wasn’t sure how I’d feel returning to London tomorrow, to real life. I could only hope that this would feel like a time capsule, the winter fling I’d once had, never to be repeated, special because of its brevity.
Maybe it was better that way. Short and sweet, not enough time for it to sour.
Jonah pulled away, his gaze soft, almost hesitating as his mouth opened to speak, before he was cut off.
“Merry Christmas, pal!” a Scottish accent rang, a man appearing by Jonah’s side. His grip didn’t loosen on my waist, his hands keeping me close.
The stranger’s eyes found me, a mischievous grin appearing across his lips before returning to Jonah. “I see you had a good one.”
Heat rose to my cheeks at the implication. Jonah didn’t bother to deny, chuckling slightly as he introduced us. “Archie, meet Kit.”
Jonah’s arms released me, giving me space to shake Archie’s extended hand.
“Nice to meet you.” I smiled politely. He returned the greeting, his grin faltering a little, as if the cogs in his brain were trying to place me. I’d gotten lucky with Jonah not instantly recognizing me. Now, with his friend, I could see those familiar cogs of hesitation turning.
“I thought you wanted to spend Christmas alone, Jon?” Archie asked.
“Plans change.” He shrugged. “The heating was out in Kit’s cabin, and so I offered her my second bedroom.”
“Ah yes,” his friend replied, not skipping a beat. “How convenient, that spare room.”
“Arch, I think it’s almost time,” a woman said, joining our group.
“Kit, this is my wife, Maddie,” he introduced.
Maddie gave me a quick greeting before her attention momentarily returned to her husband. “The kids are driving me nuts—” She cut herself short and directed a wild look back over to me. “Oh my God! Are you Kit Sinclair?!”
“Um…” I barely managed, my panicked gaze slipping to Jonah, his own brows raised as if caught off guard by the reaction.
To say I’d undersold the weight of my career to Jonah would be an understatement. It was hard. What was I supposed to say? Oh, actually I’m quite a big deal…
I had liked that he didn’t know, that I wasn’t a pretty thing for him to own. The way so many men treated me. I enjoyed being no one for him. Instead, I was a woman he’d met in a bar, somebody to share the holidays with. I didn’t want that to change.
Maddie took a deep breath before speaking again, a little calmer than before. “I’m sorry. That was very uncool. I shouldn’t be so loud, I’ve always admired your work.”
“Thanks.” I grinned, a little thankful she was no longer shouting. “It’s always good to meet a fan.”
I could sense Jonah’s body stiffening next to mine, as if trying to still himself from creating a distance between us. Was he mad at me?
Despite that, his hand still held mine, and slowly the grip began to ease, relaxing.
“I mean, last season’s Vogue spread you did was incredible,” she continued. “You have such power on the catwalk. Every year, I want to come down for London Fashion Week but never actually make the journey.”
“Oh, I promise it’s incredibly overrated.” I shook my head. “Nothing but hangry models and demanding designers. Paris Fashion Week, however, that’s where it’s at.” I winked.
“I’ll keep that in mind. I’ve been on at Arch for us to run off to Paris for the weekend.”
Her husband let out an exasperated sigh. “I told you, I’m more than happy to dump the kids at your mum’s for the weekend. You’re the one that feels bad.”
“Have you met our children? They are three little terrors. They’ll send my mother to an early grave. I don’t know how Jonah survives coaching them.”
I can’t help the grin. “You should do it. It’s a beautiful city.”
I managed to spare another look at Jonah, his expression more collected than it was, like with time he’d put it all together.
“Anyway, maybe we should get ready for the dip?” Archie nodded his head towards the loch.
“Absolutely,” Jonah replied. “We’ll see you over there.”
“Don’t take too long,” Maddie said, her voice playful as they walked away. “It’s so much easier running in as a group than watching everyone turn blue from the shore.” They headed back over, shouting marching orders at a group of three kids and trying to reclaim some control over the mob.
“So, are you ready to freeze?” Jonah asked, his voice lighter than I had expected.
I blinked, looking up at him strangely. Attempting to swallow down my discomfort, I asked, “Don’t you want to talk about what happened?”
He took a moment; for what, I didn’t know. “Do you want to talk about it?”
I stared at him, trying to figure out exactly how he felt, why he was so calm and collected. Why he wasn’t mad or freaking out.
“Is it a problem?” I asked. “About my job?”
He shook his head firmly. “Of course it’s not a problem. Why would it be?”
“I feel like I might have undersold everything,” I said, before joking, “I mean, a little.”
“If we’re talking about supermodel status, which judging from the amount my sister spoke about Vogue growing up, I should already have known,” he said, “perhaps I should be asking why you felt you wanted to hide it from me. If you’re a big deal, you should be proud.
If I made you feel like you had to lie—”
“No that’s not it.” My hand found his. “I thought, if you didn’t already know, maybe it was better. I liked that you didn’t have this preconceived idea of me, and when I told you I modelled, you didn’t judge or tell me my job is useless. You got excited, and that was more than enough.”
“I get it. That’s why it’s not a problem.” His words lifted a weight I hadn’t known I was carrying, and my heart felt immediately lighter, a comfort for which I was grateful in face of the messy situation I’d found myself in. “I mean, I might actually Google you now.”
I pressed both hands against my face, almost groaning at the thought.
Nothing could be worse. All those late nights stumbling out of Isabelle’s; rail-thin, pupils blown wide, clutching a packet of cigarettes like my life depending on it.
There’d be no erasing the damning tabloids once he saw them.
I wouldn’t be the woman he’d chatted up in a bar.
Instead, I’d become all the worst things one human could write about another.
I’d become the gritty pictures, the slanderous gossip, the cutthroat headlines.
And, worse yet, most of it was true.
Even if he understood my side of things, that this was my past, there would be a before he knew and an after. There’d be no erasing that version of me once he saw her.
“I won’t, if you don’t want me to,” Jonah added, one of his hands wrapping around my waist, pulling my chest against his.
I rested my head there, breathing in his comforting scent. “I just…I like being Kit. Just me, not the model.”
“Supermodel,” he corrected. I winced at his words. “You don’t owe me any explanation. Not anything more than what you want.”
The surprise leaked into my voice, my hands linking around his waist. “It’s okay?”
“It’s more than,” he said. “You trusted me not to be a serial killer. I think I can have faith in you too.”
I laughed dryly. “I didn’t really think you were a serial killer.”
“It did take a lot of convincing to get you in the car.”
“I was trying to be smart. You know, after accidentally getting myself stranded in the middle of nowhere.”
A horn went off behind us, and I lifted my head to watch people group at the shoreline. Some were stripped down to only swimming costumes, others were dressed up like Santa and a few as popular cartoon characters, all in the name of a charity they were sponsoring.
“Ready to get wet?” Jonah wiggled his eyebrows. I let him pull me across the busy beach, finding a spot where we could pull off the clothes covering our swimming costumes, before standing hand in hand at the shore, looking out towards the depths of the freezing loch.
“I can’t believe you’re making me do this,” I said, my teeth chattering as we joined the crowd.
“It will be fun,” he said, as my bare feet began to sink into the cold sand, a chill running through my body.
I looked around the crowd, everyone counting down the final moments until we could get this over with.
“I can’t wait to make you eat your words,” I grumbled, as somebody with a megaphone began the countdown, the crowd joining in around us.
As they reached one, Jonah’s hand squeezed tightly against mine before dragging me into the water.
The shocking temperature of the water chased away any and all thoughts from my brain, overwhelming my body as the shock of the cold permeated down to my bones.
I would’ve turned and run if it wasn’t for Jonah dragging me, deeper and deeper, until we were both at waist height.
My heart raced in my chest, thumping quickly as adrenaline began to course through my veins.
“Be brave, Kit!” he urged, his gaze catching on mine.
I didn’t want to be brave. I wanted to run back to shore and find the nearest fire and throw myself in. That felt like the only way I would ever experience true warmth again.
But his words sparked me into action. All the times I’d been too afraid; all the things I’d lost because I couldn’t believe in myself.
How I let the arseholes in my industry use my body however they needed.
How I’d hidden from the tabloids, letting them shame me, selling and exploiting my youth and weakness.
How I’d let Matteo walk all over me and take the only real thing in my life.
I realized that I wanted all of that to stop. That I needed to take control. And somehow, this was supposed to be that. Washing away the past years, finding a fresh version of myself to take into the new.
With that in mind, I pushed forward, thrashing further into the water, his fingers interlaced with mine as I walked ahead of him, swimming out until the water was up past my chest.
“You did it!” he shouted, his face etched with pride and joy.
Stepping closer to him, I could feel his body heat radiating through the water, drawing me closer.
I managed a wobbly smile, looking out around the crowd as I began to shiver almost violently. “I did,” I managed, pressing my lips to his cheek. “Now please carry me out of this water. I think my legs have frozen off.”