A Slippery Slope (18 page)

 ‘A dog in a kitchen in a ski chalet!’ Verity said, giggling.
‘Josh, how could you? There are rules about that, so I’m told.’

He grinned at her. ‘Some rules can be broken, and as much as I
want you, I can’t concentrate with Mistral nuzzling your feet. Don’t move. I’ll
be back in one second.’

Mistral barked and headed towards the kitchen.

‘You’ve taught her to understand English!’ Verity quipped as Josh
disappeared into the hall.

‘I’ve taught her a few things,’ he said, returning just a few
seconds later. ‘Now where were we?’

‘I was trying to apologise but you wouldn’t stop kissing me long
enough for me to get a–’

He kissed her again and she savoured the taste of his lips, the
feel of his tongue, the thrill that shot through her as his hand went to her
hair, removed the clips from it and let it fall around her shoulders.

He pulled her closer as his kiss deepened and she felt his fingers
slowly undo the zip of her dress. She wanted to shout at the top of her lungs,
‘HURRY UP! I need YOU!’ But she refrained. Instead, she kissed him back with a
longing that surprised her.

When he slid one hand inside her dress, undid her strapless bra and
moved his hand around to cup her breast, her fingers tightened in his hair and
she arched her back to push herself into him.

He kissed her throat and shoulders, her décolletage and
collarbone. When his mouth replaced his hand, she moaned his name, tugging at
his shirt so that she could feel his bare flesh against hers.

‘Oh, Josh!’ she said. ‘Please! I want you so badly that it hurts.
It actually hurts!’

He smiled longingly up at her. ‘I know exactly what you mean. But
I think we’re forgetting who’s the boss here.’ He laughed throatily and his
eyes were alight with desire.

Verity sucked in a breath as he kissed her stomach and, summoning
every ounce of her strength, she pushed him onto his back.

‘I am,’ she said with a smile, ‘and you’d better get used to it.’

He quickly sat upright, a broad grin on his face. ‘Perhaps we
should compromise.’ He looked her directly in the eye and, putting his hands
either side of her waist, he lifted her onto his lap.

‘Compromise is good,’ she said, wrapping her legs around him as he
kissed her again.

Verity didn’t get a chance to apologise. Every time she began,
Josh kissed her or caressed her and she forgot everything other than his touch
and the immense pleasure he gave her, time and time again. She had never
experienced sex like this. She’d always thought sex with Tony had been good,
but this was heart-stopping, even earth-shattering. And neither of them seemed
to want it to end.

‘I really have got to go,’ she said at seven the next morning
after several earlier attempts to leave – and very little sleep. ‘I’ve got to
help Lucy with breakfast and I’ve got to have a shower first. Josh! No! Stop
it! Oh! ... No. I mean it. I
must
go.’

He popped his head from beneath the covers and grinned.
‘Spoilsport!’ Okay, let’s compromise ... again. You have a shower here with me
and I’ll take you back to the chalet. I’ll even help with breakfast. I think
you’ll have to agree that’s fair.’

She laughed as she jumped out of bed and pulled him into the
shower.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Verity
and Josh didn’t arrive back at
Chalet Marianne
until five minutes to
eight and Verity had to quickly change whilst Josh started breakfast. There was
no sign of Lucy until five minutes later when she and Etienne arrived, looking
flushed and just as sleep deprived but as equally happy as Verity and Josh.

They
all grinned at each other.

‘Well,’ Etienne said, ‘it looks as though we all had a very happy
Christmas night and that we all finally got what we wanted.’

‘I know I didn’t get much sleep,’ Josh said, ‘and now I’m slaving
over a hot stove. And Verity says
I’m
the slave-driver!’

Verity hit him with a tea towel. ‘Less of the cheek, skivvy! Get
on with your chores.’

‘I’ve got to go soon,’ Etienne said. ‘I promised to show the new
guy, Francois some of the off piste areas because with all this sun and the
recent heavy falls, it’s really important that he knows where it’s safe and
where to avoid. There’re quite a few areas cordoned off as high risk and
there’ll be more, I’m sure. We’re heading out with the piste bashers before the
lifts open.’

‘It looks like it’s going to be a glorious day,’ Lucy said. ‘I may
see if I can hit the slopes later. Fancy that, Mum?’

‘Sorry, darling but I think I may be spending my free time in my
bed. Josh isn’t the only one who is sleep deprived and I’m not as young as you.
I can’t take the pace.’

Josh pulled her into his arms and whispered in her ear. ‘Come and
spend your free time in my bed instead.’

She smiled and pushed him away. ‘I need sleep!’

‘I can sleep!’

‘Get a room, will you,’ Lucy said shaking her head and grinning at
both Verity and Josh. ‘I’ll just get changed and then I’ll come and help.’

‘Lucy,’ Etienne said, ‘if you do go out today, go early rather
than later. There’s another weather front coming in, and it should be hitting
us this evening but the reports are off sometimes so it may arrive early. And
stay on the main pistes, okay? And wear the helmets I bought you both.’

‘Yes sir,’ she said, ‘and I still think that was
so
romantic. What girl doesn’t want a ski helmet for Christmas?’ But she smiled
and kissed him on the lips. ‘It was a good thing that helmet wasn’t the only
thing you bought me though, otherwise you’d have had to wait until Valentine’s
Day to get me into bed!’

‘If I remember correctly it was
you
who got
me
into
bed last night! Oops. Sorry, Verity, I don’t suppose you wanted to hear that.’

‘Don’t mind me,’ Verity replied, laughing.

‘Like mother, like daughter,’ Josh whispered into Verity’s ear and
kissed it.

Lucy giggled. ‘And I’ll probably be doing the same thing tonight.
Catch you later, Etienne. Have a good day.’ She skipped through into the
hallway towards the bedroom.

Etienne watched her go and smiled lovingly. ‘I can’t believe how
much she means to me,’ he said almost to himself. ‘Right. I’m sorry you two but
I’ve got to love you and leave you. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’

Josh pulled Verity into his arms when Etienne had gone. ‘And I
can’t believe how much you mean to me,’ he said, kissing her so deeply that she
forgot everything.

She even forgot that she had just lit the stove and put a pan of
oil on it. It was purely the smell of burning fat and the whoosh of flames that
alerted her to the fact that she was just about to set the kitchen on fire.

‘Oh my God!’ she yelled, searching frantically for something to
extinguish the flames.

Josh pulled her away, immediately turned off the stove and grabbed
the metal lid of the frying pan to cover the rising flames. He glanced at
Verity but kept the frying pan in focus.

‘Are you okay?’

She nodded. ‘I ... I didn’t know what to do! I’m so sorry, Josh.
If you hadn’t been here ...’ her voice trailed off.

‘If I hadn’t been here, it wouldn’t have happened. I was kissing
you so it was my fault. Don’t worry about it. The lid will put the fire out.
Fires can’t survive without oxygen. And when I’m sure it’s out and the pan has
cooled, I’ll take it outside in the snow just to be sure it doesn’t start up
again. If it should ever happen again though and I’m not around, turn the heat
off and cover the pan, if you can do so safely, with something metal – never
glass or material. If you’re not sure, there’s a fire extinguisher on the wall
just there. They do contaminate kitchens but I’d rather that than you take a
risk so just use it.’

‘God! What’s happened?’ Lucy asked, dashing in from the hallway.
‘I can smell burning.’

‘I nearly burnt the place down!’ Verity exclaimed.

‘No, you didn’t,’ Josh said, putting his arm around her and
pulling her to him. ‘Lucy, I was just telling Verity that if there’s a fire,
don’t ever try to be a hero. If the flames are higher than a couple of inches
or it looks like it may get out of control, just get out and call the emergency
services on 112. I mean it. There’s an alarm – which would have gone off just a
couple of seconds later. All the guests would be able to hear that because it’s
loud enough to raise the dead.’

‘So it was just the pan then?’ Lucy asked.

Josh nodded. ‘Yep. No harm done. I’ll take it outside now.

Verity shook her head and smiled wanly. ‘I’ve got a dreadful
feeling it’s going to be one of those days.’

‘Nonsense,’ Lucy said, smiling brightly. ‘It’s a glorious day and
it’s just going to get better and better despite what Etienne says about the
weather.’

But Verity saw the look in her daughter’s eyes which, for some
reason, seemed to reflect her own feelings.

***

Josh stayed to help Verity and Lucy with their chores before going
home to take Mistral for her walk. He had only told Etienne and no one else
that he was taking Mistral to different parts of the mountains each day so that
she could get a feel for the terrain. She may no longer be a rescue dog but
that didn’t mean she shouldn’t be able to find her way around. He’d never owned
a dog before so he had no idea how such things worked.

‘I’m still not sure I follow your logic,’ Etienne said when he
bumped into Josh in Meribel Village and they stopped for a quick beer. ‘If
she’s going to go in search of Claude, she’ll remember that she needs to head
in the direction of Val Thorens.’

Josh shrugged. ‘Possibly, but it certainly isn’t doing her any
harm to get to know her new territory. I’ve also bought a GPS tracking collar
so if she does wander off, at least I’ll know where she’s gone.’

Etienne shook his head and laughed. ‘So anyway, how did it go with
Verity? Obviously very well by the look of the pair of you this morning.’

Josh beamed at him. ‘Unbelievably well! Although for a minute
there, when we were at Louis’, I thought I’d lost all hope. She was acting
really strangely and I still don’t know why. She was going to tell me but ...
we got sidetracked.’

‘Ah. I think I may be able to help you with that. Lucy kept asking
me if you had a thing for chalet girls. Don’t look at me like that. Jo told her
that you’d been out with a few and Verity and Lucy got it into their heads that
you saw it as your life’s work to get every chalet girl who works for you, into
bed. I know that’s crazy but that’s women for you.’

‘So ... you told them it isn’t? My life’s work, I mean.’

‘Yep. I told Lucy, not Verity, but Lucy went off to find her later
and tell her. You’d left by then, I think. Why did you leave?’

‘Verity and I had a bit of a misunderstanding.’

‘Hmm. Not for the first time. Anyway, I told Lucy that you’d only
slept with about eleven women and only a few of those were chalet girls and
even that was pure coincidence.’

‘Thanks. It’s nice to know that everyone’s discussing my sex life!
Did you tell her about ...’ His voice trailed off.

‘Marianne?’

Josh nodded.

‘Only in passing. I said that the only girl you’d been out who was
a chalet girl
and
worked for you, was the last one and that when you
ended it, she went berserk and smashed up the chalet. I told her that if she
wanted details, she’d have to ask you – and I really don’t think she’ll do
that.’

Josh sighed with relief. ‘That’s good because I don’t think I come
out of that story smelling of roses exactly.’

‘Bullshit! It wasn’t your fault. None of it was your fault. You
just did what you felt was right at the time. Nothing more, nothing less. Don’t
keep beating yourself up about it and forget it now. You’ve got Verity. You can
be happy at last.’

‘Can I?’ Josh said, running a hand through his hair. ‘Her husband
of more than twenty years has just left her for another woman. I think she
likes me but am I just the ‘rebound’ guy? And does she still love her husband?
What does she want out of this? And can I give it to her? I’m absolutely
besotted with her – you know that but you also know that marriage and
commitment isn’t my thing. What if that’s what she wants?’

‘Er ... that’s an awful lot of questions and I don’t have the
answers to any of them. You’ll have to wait and see, I guess. And let’s not
forget. Marriage may not be your thing but commitment is. You committed to
Marianne when you thought you had to.’

Josh smirked. ‘And look what good that did me. But, I’d never do
that again. Love shouldn’t be an uphill struggle. Unless I’m one hundred per
cent convinced that I want to spend the rest of my life with someone, I’m not
going down that path again.’

‘Yeah, but at least Verity doesn’t seem to be the type who would
wreck a chalet because you dumped her.’

Josh let out a heartfelt laugh. ‘You should have stayed a little
longer this morning. She almost burnt the place down – and that was when I was
kissing her. Although to be honest, that was my fault, not hers.’

Josh’s phone rang. It was his sister Chloe. He listened to her for
fifteen minutes, wanting to suggest he’d call her later but he was unable to
get a word in edgeways. When he rang off, he saw he had a message from Verity.

‘Hi Josh. I just wanted to tell you that I’m going skiing with
Lucy for an hour. She really wants to go and for some absurd reason, I don’t
want her to go on her own. I’ll catch up with you later, if that’s okay? I
would very much like to continue our conversation of last night. Bye.’

He called her straight back but she didn’t pick up and it went to
voicemail.

‘Hi gorgeous, I’d like that too but I don’t think we actually had
a conversation, did we? I’m assuming you mean more rampant sex. I’ll go home
and get some rest in that case. Come round whenever you want to, or call me and
I’ll come and get you. Looking forward to it already. Bye for now.’

When he rang off, the strangest feeling came over him – as if
someone had just walked over his grave.

He simply smiled at Etienne. ‘She’s going skiing with Lucy for an
hour or so.’

‘I’m glad about that. I’m sorry you’ll miss out on an hour’s ...
rampant sex and I know this is silly, but I had a strange feeling this morning
when Lucy said she wanted to hit the slopes. It was as if someone was running
an ice cube down the length of my spine.’

‘Shit, Etienne! I just had something similar happen to me a few
seconds ago!’

‘I suppose that’s what falling madly in love with someone does to
you,’ Etienne said. ‘You start worrying about the silliest things.’

Josh wasn’t sure what worried him the most – the eerie feeling he
and Etienne had both had – or the thought that he might actually have fallen
madly in love. That was until he remembered Verity’s message about not wanting
Lucy to ski alone for some absurd reason.

‘Etienne! Phone Lucy, will you? Find out where they are and tell
them not to go anywhere without either you or me, and preferably both of us.’
He redialled Verity’s number, got the message service again and left a message:
‘Verity, it’s me again. Etienne and I want to ski with you so don’t go anywhere
without us. Call one of us as soon as you get this message.’

‘I’m getting Lucy’s voicemail too,’ Etienne said. ‘I’ve left her a
similar message. What’s up, Josh?’

Josh shook his head. ‘It’s probably nothing, but all three of us
can’t be wrong.’