Chapter 24
Joel
“We’re lost!” Ellyn yells as she looks here and there, as if searching for the right path to take.
Trouble is, there is no path. All that surrounds us are multiple tracks left by snowmobiles, footprints, and the occasional sled trail. Everything else is pine trees, snow, and mountains as far as the eye can see.
“I told you we should’ve followed that other couple. Now we’re lost,” Ellyn continues.
I squeeze my lips together to keep them from twitching. I suspect she would have a problem with me laughing right now.
Or with me reminding her of how beautiful she looks when angry.
“We’re fine,” I finally reply.
“How can you say that? I just heard you mutter ‘where is it?’”
The slight panic in her voice is what does me in. I approach Ellyn and take her hand in mine, tugging her to me. She stumbles a few steps right into my chest, just as I’d anticipated.
I catch her with my free arm around her waist.
“We’re not lost,” I say before looking over at the large pine tree that I’d been searching for.
“Behind that tree line is what I wanted to show you. It’s a little tricky to find, depending on how deep the snow is this time of year.”
She peers up at me, her eyes narrowed at first, but as she looks in, her gaze meeting mine, the tension in between her eyebrows relaxes.
“Oh, well why didn’t you say that?” she gripes, making me chuckle.
I lean in and kiss the tip of her reddened nose. “Because I didn’t want to.”
A bark of laughter passes my lips before I leap away from her swatting hand.
“This way, darlin’,” I say, swooping her up in my arms and fireman carrying her in the direction of the trees.
“Joel Townsend, what in the world do you think you’re doing?” she protests and squirms.
I don’t say anything as I carry her. The words ‘I like touching you too much to put you down’ gets stuck in my throat. Possibly because I recognize how true they are.
Or maybe it’s because I realize the depth of the emotions for the woman in my arms coursing through me for the.
The thought of separating from her for any length of time causes a literal ache in my chest.
“There,” I finally grunt out, placing Ellyn back onto her feet. I have to turn away to blink away the water in my eyes, not wanting her to see it.
“Pictures of you under this tree would look great to post along with the other pictures I took before our ride.”
Ellyn’s expression shifts from slight irritation to happiness in an instant, making my heart soar.
“Oh.” She glances around, taking in the beauty around us, while I take in the beauty right in front of me. I can’t take my eyes off of her.
And it’s not just because she does look like a goddess in her new white parka with the white fur neckline, which hugs her waistline perfectly, or the black leggings that cling to her legs before disappearing into the black and white snow boots.
The redness of her cheeks and nose create a perfect mix of toughness mixed with vulnerability.
“How’s this?” She poses against the tree, probably completely oblivious to the fact that I’m falling deeper for her with each passing moment.
“That’s it,” I say, taking her phone to snap a few photos of her with her right hand perched against one of the lower branches of the tree.
“Shake the branch so some of the snow will fall,” I direct.
Her eyes sparkle with renewed energy, and I take a photo with my phone, deciding to keep this one just for my private collection.
I spend the next ten minutes taking photos of her as the snow trickles down over her from shaking the tree’s branches and with the backdrop of the mountains from a different angle.
“This is what I wanted to show you,” I tell Ellyn, her hand in mine, as I walk her a little farther from the tree line.
From a distance, the hidden majestic can’t be seen. To the unknowing eye, it appears as if we’re walking toward the edge of a cliff. Ellyn’s hand in mine tightens, but the fact that she continues to follow me, this time no longer arguing or questioning, tells me she’s conceded to trust me.
There aren’t enough letters in the English language to form words to express what that means to me.
Ellyn gasps the second we come up on the little stream that flows, unbidden, through the snowbanks.
“This is probably the purest water you’ll ever find on this side,” I tell her. Then I jut my head toward the other side of the bank where a second stream flows into the first.
“They’re different colors,” she says, awe filling her voice. “Why?” The curiosity in her eyes calls to me.
I take her hand and bring us closer to the converging streams.
“They come from separate glaciers. That one,” I point at the darker colored water on the left, farthest from us, “comes from farther up the mountain. It has to travel a greater distance to get here and over a different kind of rock. This one,” I point at the clearer water, “flows from just a couple of miles up but the sentiment is a different kind, making its water clear.
“They combine here and then flow toward the river together, making them one.”
Ellyn peers over at me. “You’ve got the camera ready, right?”
“What do you think I brought you here for?”
She laughs and then starts posing. I take at least fifty more shots of her. So many that even she’s telling me that’s more than enough.
“We need some together.” She pulls at my arm when I hold her phone just out of reach. “Oh shoot, I think I forgot my selfie stick at the house,” she gripes.
“My arm’s long enough to get the job done.” I throw my free arm around her shoulders, and she curls into my body. We take a few with her phone before I pull out mine to take more.
Years ago, when Aiden was still in high school, he had a serious girlfriend. One day while he was over at the house, I saw his phone. The home screen was a picture of him and the girl he was dating.
I teased the hell out of him for being so addicted to a girl that he made her his home screen. He said it was because he wanted to see her as much as possible, even when they were a part.
I chalked it up to the heightened emotions of a sixteen year old.
Now, as I swipe through the photos of Ellyn and me, I know that one of them is going to end up as my home screen image. I just can’t figure out which one.
“Ah man, I had no idea snowmobiling and taking pictures for Instagram could make me so hungry,” Ellyn groans as we make our way back to the snowmobile. “How long until we get back to the house?”
“It’s a thirty-minute ride on the snowmobile from here.”
She nods. “I can hold out until then.”
“But you don’t have to,” I say, while lifting the back compartment I’d had added on when I had this snowmobile built a few years ago.
“Is that a trunk?” she asks, surprised.
“Not only a trunk.” I pull out a handful of smoked turkey and beef sticks, some dried fruit, crackers and cheese that I’d manage to pack.
“Looks like you brought enough for an army.” Ellyn laughs before she raises on her tiptoes to press her lips to my cheek. “Thank you for thinking ahead.”
Her voice comes out as a sultry whisper. The words are simple, but the emotional note in her tone reaches my heart, making it gallop.
I lean in and brush my lips across hers.
Ellyn pulls away, snatching one of the chunks of cheese out of the Ziploc bag, and holds it up to my lips.
“Open.”
I do as told, allowing her to pop the cheese into my mouth. It’s my turn to feed her a dried apricot.
A wicked jolt of electricity zaps its way through my body when the tip of her tongue grazes across my thumb. The glint in her eyes tells me she did that on purpose.
I growl at the back of my throat, making her laugh.
We feed one another for I don’t know how long, making a meal out of the food, hungry gazes and explicit innuendos, with very few words exchanged. The air between us becomes charged with a fire and electricity that’s probably enough to melt the snow away.
Finally, after an extended period of time, we pack up the remaining food and climb back onto the snowmobile to head home.
I can barely see straight from how much I want this woman.