Free Fall

_{Chapter 14}

Logan woke up to someone swearing like a sailor. Lily. She tossed her walkie-talkie to a chair and stalked the length of the room naked. From what he gathered, the weather was the "son of a bitch."

He sat up and looked outside. Pure white, halfway up the windows. "Wow."

"It surprised everyone," she said. "Even the weather forecasters. We've got harsh winds, heavy drifts of up to four feet over the icy snow we already had. Of course, the two days' worth of sun we had first didn't help-fresh snow over ice is never good." She came back to the bed and shook her head, looking lean and toned and beautiful. "It's rare, but we're shut down. Totally shut down. Now I've got patrollers worrying about avalanches, people whining about not being able to get here, a chef freaking out because the food didn't get delivered, guests not able to get out-" She broke off and looked at him as it dawned on her-he was one of those people who wouldn't be able to get out. "We'll get you to your flight," she said quickly, and began shimmying into a pair of pants. "Don't worry." She wasn't looking at him now, instead getting dressed as fast as she could.

With a sigh, he got out of the bed and went to her. She stared at his throat, then ran her finger over the skin there. "I left a mark," she said softly. "I bit you and left a mark."

"Then I'll have something to remember you by."

Her face went carefully blank.

He tried to draw her close but she danced back, shaking her head as she finished getting dressed.

"No regrets, right?" She smiled. "Just fun. Look, I've got to go. I have to get out there."

"I can help."

"No, you've done too much for us. For me."

"Maybe I like to." Again, he tried to pull her close but she was having none of it.

"I'll let you know when you can get out." She grabbed her shoes and shut the door behind her.

"So brave." He sank to the bed and pulled on his clothes. "And such a damn coward at the same time." One last time, he looked around at Lily's bedroom, at the rumpled bed where they'd made love. Everything inside him ached, but he left the room without looking back.

In the common room, a fire warmed the hearth. People milled around, talking softly in the early morning, staring out the windows in disbelief at the amount of snow that had fallen the night before.

The light outside had shifted from a dark predawn glow to a sort of gauzy gray light as the sun strained but failed to get through the layer of clouds and snow.

Gwyneth was there, moving through toward the offices with a clipboard in her hand. He stopped her. "Can I help?"

Looking a little frazzled, she managed a smile, a you get Mother Nature to take a nap? No? Then just enjoy."

He pulled on his jacket and headed outside. There he found Lily organizing a crew to clear the walkways and parking lot. Much to her dismay, he grabbed a shovel. "Hey," she said, already shaking her head. "You don't need to-"

"Stop it. I'm here. I'm helping."

She stared at him for a long moment, then apparently decided she couldn't change his mind, and they all got to work. It took hours, removing snow as it continued to come down. They didn't talk, they couldn't, there was no opportunity. But Logan was painfully aware that if it hadn't been for the storm, he'd have been already gone.

By midday, they finally began to get ahead of the snowfall. Exhausted and starving, they took a break for lunch.

Sitting in the cafeteria at a couple of long tables, they all consumed mass quantities of calories to refuel after the heavy work. Lily sat at the table with a clipboard, dividing up new assignments, when Sara came waddling through. Lily lifted her head and glared at her sister. "Why the hell are you here?"

"Last I checked, I work here." Sara smiled, but sighed when Lily didn't give. "Okay, so we never left last night. After Matt's shift, the snow was already too bad, so we just stayed over. Don't worry, Mama, I didn't go out in this."

"See that you don't." Lily pointed at her belly. "And don't even think about going into labor, do you hear me?"

"Aye, aye, Captain!"

"I mean it, Sara."

"So do I." Because Lily was still just scowling at her, Sara moved in and hugged her tight. "Don't worry, no delivering any babies for you, not today. You have enough to worry about with people stuck trying to get here, or stuck trying to get out, Aunt Debbie included. Matt's worried about getting his supplies. Oh, and speaking of my husband, do you know where he is?"

Lily looked over the faces at the table and frowned. "He was helping clear snow, and then said something about Debbie wanting a snowmobile ride. I'll check."

"Don't worry, I'll radio them."

When she'd gone, Lily used her phone to get the latest weather report, then stood up and addressed her staff. "Okay, listen up. The highways are still closed, including the 80 from the summit to Verdi. Snow's still coming down, obviously, thick and wet. Sierra cement, our favorite. According to the radar, we should get a break in an hour or so for a while, enough to open the 80 for a bit, anyway." She looked at Logan, and he knew she was thinking about him getting to the airport. "At that time, people will be able to get out, and the new guests in. Expect mass confusion and grumpiness from all corners."

"Even yours?"

Lily lifted a brow at Chris. "Want a double shift?"

"Jeez, just kidding." Chris lowered his cap and went back to shoveling in food.

Lily pushed away her untouched tray and moved to leave, but Logan grabbed her hand. "Come on, sit down and eat."

"I'm too busy-"

"Eat." Not taking no for an answer, he tugged her down next to him and put her tray back in front of her.

On the pretense of stroking back a strand of hair, he outlined her ear with his finger. She'd run a Sno-Cat today, operated a huge snowblower and shoveled as much snow as he had. "You're pushing yourself pretty hard."

A shoulder jerked. "Not really."

"Lily."

Her eyes closed a moment, and then she looked at him, really looked at him, and he saw what he'd been looking for. A devastating flash of emotion that would have brought him to his knees if he'd been standing. "Ah, Lily-"

"Don't," she whispered furiously. "Damn it, don't say a word or I'll lose it. I mean it." She shoved another bite in and looked straight ahead as she chewed, chasing the food down with his water. Then she shoved the tray back and stood. "Let's go, ace. We have more snow removal to do."

He figured that was the only invitation he was going to get to stick close. Together they took one of the Sno-Cats and worked on clearing the closed section of the entrance road, inside the cat, they were high above the ground, in two bucket seats, surrounded by controls that he knew nothing about but that Lily worked as if she'd been born to it. The air was warm and close, the heater blasting, the windows half-fogged. They stripped out of their jackets and gloves, then Lily went back to working the controls with the same quiet, fierce intensity with which she'd made love to him only hours before.

"You know, much as you keep clearing, it's going to keep falling," he said lightly, hoping for a smile.

She just shot him a long glance before going back to clearing as if her life depended on it. They'd already rescued no less than six stranded cars and were working on clearing the parking lot to unstrand a whole bunch more when the radio chirped with word that the 80 had just opened and wasn't expected to stay that way for long.

"This is your chance to get out," she said to the window.

Outside, the snow had stopped falling, for now, but everything around them-the roads, the trees, the signs-was a solid, frozen white wonderland, clear and ice-cold. Lily pulled to a hut in the parking lot, and though she hit the brake, she did not turn off the cat. "Better hurry." There was a hint of impatience in her voice.

He looked at her, astonished. "You want me to hurry and leave?"

"You have a flight, damn it. You need to go. Now. I cleared a path for your rental car."

"So this whole damn thing, the whole last six hours of mind-numbing work and effort, was so that you could get me out?"

"Yes."

He was stunned.

"Well, what's so strange about that? You have to go."

"Yeah, I do. You know, 1 figure there's two possible reasons for this. You're either tired of me…" She didn't move, didn't even blink, "…or you're more terrified of what we've shared than I thought."

She stared at him for another beat, then turned straight ahead again, giving away nothing except the fact she was chewing on her lower lip. "This is a bad time to discuss this."

"Scared," he decided, lifting a brow when she whipped her head to him, piercing him with a look.

"I'm not." She said this through her teeth. "I've told you, nothing scares me."

Uh-huh. Except, he was guessing, anything that even remotely resembled matters of the heart. Well, welcome to the club, sweetheart. He hadn't been lonely before he'd met her, and hadn't felt particularly unfulfilled.

But even after just a week with this woman, he knew he'd been changed forever. "Something this good isn't worth doing only halfway, Lily." The words and the intent behind them no longer surprised him. Having feelings for someone didn't have to be a burden.

Not with someone like Lily.

"Tell me you haven't forgotten this was just for fun," she said.

"Why? So you can walk away from this, no regrets? Just chalk it up to another fun time had by all?"

"Logan…what choice do we have?"

"There are always choices. Always," he said softly, looking right at her, through her, to the scared woman inside. "All you have to do is want it bad enough. Deep down you know that, you've lived like that. Lily." Squeezing her fingers with his, he reached up and touched her face with his free hand. "I don't want to let this go."

She squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them. "It's only been a week."

"Exactly. I want more. Let's go with this thing, see where it takes us."

"You're going back to Ohio. A very long way away."

"That's not a good enough reason to walk away."

"It is for me." And she hopped out of the cat.

Lily took two steps out of the cat, sank deep into the snow up to her thighs, swore lavishly, then got back into the machine and met Logan's gaze. He didn't want to let this go, she thought in panic. Oh, my God, he really didn't. "This is crazy. Stupid."

She marveled at that for a moment as she warmed back up. She'd let him see the real her this week. She'd let him because she hadn't seen the danger in it. And now he'd seen her, faults and all, and he still wanted her. The unbelievable draw of that began to lure her in, and her breath hitched. "This isn't a nice joke."

"It's not a joke at all. I know what's eating you."

"Do you? Do you really?"

"You think you have to keep everything fun and light. You think you have to fight all emotional ties because they bind, they restrict. But 1 don't want to hold you back or tell you what you should and shouldn't do. You're a grown woman, a beautiful, smart, incredible woman, and I want you just the way you are."

"Why?"

He blinked. "Why?"

"You've told me yourself you don't do deep relationships. After raising your siblings and then doing the sort of work you do, having someone want you on a daily basis is too much like a burden."

"I didn't say that," he said. "I never called love a burden."

"It was implied."

"Okay, I'll agree, it can be, if it's done one-sided. I've seen too much of that, Lily. Too many of my close friends burned because of unrealistic expectations. But that's not what I'm interested in here. I want a strong, independent woman who has her own goals and dreams, ones that don't depend on mine but can mesh with them."

"My life wouldn't mesh with anyone's."

"It would if you wanted it to."

And wasn't that just the crux. Her heart was beating hard and unnaturally heavy. "I've never wanted it to."

"Me, either. Before you."

Oh, God. The oddest feeling came over her, as if someone was dangling this big, fat, beautiful carrot in front of her, close enough to reach.

But what if it was poisonous? What if it grew teeth and bit her?

Then he capped her panic. "I think I'm falling in love with you, Lily."

Her mouth fell open. But it was the oddest thing, she still couldn't breathe.

"I wasn't looking for you, but it doesn't seem to matter. I found you."

Her throat burned and she shook her head, trying one last time to reason with him. "Easy words."

"You think so?" His eyes glittered with temper now. "You think they're just flying out of my mouth? "

"Okay, maybe easy was the wrong word. Dangerous."

"No, my job is dangerous. Your job is dangerous. That's just a fact. What I'm feeling for you has nothing to do with any of that. You can't die from it."

Then why did her heart ache so badly she felt as though she was going to?

"Look, Lily, I came here feeling restless. Like maybe I was floundering a bit, but I didn't know why. I know now."

He was killing her slowly. Torturously. Doing exactly what he'd said he wouldn't. She covered her face with her hands. He was hurting her. "It's only been six nights. Seven days." And a thousand memories.

"Long enough. Something was missing in me before. The most important part. The heart. You, Lily. You were missing."

"I don't want this responsibility." She had too much already.

"My feelings aren't your responsibility, and you know it. Stop finding excuses."

She dropped her hands from her face. "What happened? Why couldn't we keep it light and easy and fun like we wanted?"

He lifted a shoulder. A guy's response.

"This is asinine."

"Not exactly the reaction I was going for."

"I know that," she said to his grim face. "I'm sorry. Give me a minute, my heart is in my throat."

But before she got her minute, her radio squawked.

Sara's voice filled the compartment. "Lily. Oh, my God, Lily. Matt's missing."

"What?"

There were panicked tears in Sara's voice. "He and Debbie went out on snowmobiles. Debbie came back for lunch, thinking Matt was right behind her, but he didn't show up. No one's seen him, and he's not answering his radio."

"We'll be right there." Lily shoved the cat into gear for the short journey to the lodge entrance, not realizing until she put her foot on the accelerator that she'd automatically united her and Logan as a unit by saying "we."