After Midnight (12 page)

“Hey, is Jeff here? I need to get my board,” Carter said as Lindsey went behind the counter to talk to the other ski instructor.

“He’s going to be bummed you came back while he was gone.”

“Tell him I’ll stop by tomorrow... When does he work?” Carter asked. He found out and made a note in his phone to stop by. It wouldn’t hurt him to chat with the guy. He worked with Lindsey, so it might even help her to see that he was so much more than his bad-boy image.

“Ready?” he asked Lindsey when he noticed she was standing by herself with her skis.

“As I’ll ever be,” she said.

They walked to the ski lift and waited in line to take it to the top. He could tell she was nervous because she kept looking up at the mountain. All he really wanted to do was to hold her in his arms and tell her everything would be okay. But since this probably wasn’t the time or place, he searched his mind for something to distract her.

Then he grinned to himself. Humor. It worked every time.

“Oh, guess what, gorgeous? I’ve added a few things to my resolutions list. I might have to write a thank-you note to the resort for all the ways they are helping me improve.”

She rolled her eyes at him. “What did you add?”

“Kiss Lindsey on the ski lift.”

She wrinkled her nose at him. “That’s too bad, because I just don’t see that happening.”

“That’s odd. I totally do.”

She laughed, but as they got closer he noted she didn’t look worried anymore. When it was their turn, they both got on the lift.

“What was your best ski-lift ride?” he asked curiously.

“First time I was going up for a world event. I was so excited. I’d run the course in my mind and was so ready for it. You?” she asked.

This one.
But he didn’t say it. There hadn’t been many times in his life that he’d done something without wondering what was in it for him. But this thing with Lindsey? Sure, it brought him closer to her and gave him a chance to tease her about kissing and intimacy, but it really was for her. She needed to be skiing, not teaching kids at a resort.

He knew that and had a feeling that she knew it, as well.

“Same. Right after I had this interview with a pretty girl and she gave me the cold shoulder.”

“I guess that was a common reaction to you back in the day,” she said with a grin.

“Only your reaction. I was determined to get to the top and then wow you with my skills.”

She smiled. “You did when you hit the half-pipe. I’ve seen you run moguls, and you are good.”

“Good enough to let me steal a kiss?” he asked, waggling his brows at her.

“Not today, Carter. Maybe if I make it to the bottom of the hill, I’ll
think
about kissing you good-night after we hit the clubs.”

“That’s a long time,” he grumbled. “I’m not sure I can wait.”

“I think you’ll do just fine.”

They’d reached the top and got off the lift. She looked over at him, and he remembered his promise. He’d had no idea it would be so hard to leave her. Especially not with that look in her eyes.

“I’m out of here,” he said, but walked over to her and kissed her quickly on the lips before stepping back and putting his boots in his board. He clicked the buckles and pushed off with a grin. “You’ll have to catch me to yell at me.”

* * *

L
INDSEY
TOOK
HER
time getting her booted feet into her skis. The kiss from Carter... It had been nice and really not much of a surprise. His confession that he’d wanted to impress her hadn’t been, either. They’d been doing that since they’d met.

She’d counted on her own feelings of not wanting to let him see her freak out to get her down the mountain. She thought of all the runs she’d taken in her life, and this one wasn’t nearly the hardest or most dangerous but it was in her head.

She took a deep breath when she realized she’d been breathing in and out too quickly. She remembered New Year’s Eve when he’d sat at her table and she had felt that tingle of excitement. She wanted to be that woman again.

The one who could take on anything and beat it.

She closed her eyes and offered up her little prayer, and then pushed her sticks in the ground at the same moment as she opened her eyes. She froze and forgot to crouch and was kind of awkwardly bumbling along down the slope until everything sort of clicked together.

She felt the wind on her face, and the poles started to feel right in her hands as she adjusted her stance and leaned into her run. She was skiing.
Oh. My. God.
She was on skis again and taking a run.

She didn’t do anything fancy, just kept her wits about her and tried not to think of all the possibilities that were opening up to her after this. This was one of the major things keeping her in limbo, and she felt as if she’d just ripped off her last bandage and found that she didn’t have a scar.

She reached the bottom of the run and skied to a stop next to Carter, who was standing there with his goggles pushed up on his head. Then she pushed hers up, too, and launched herself at him.

She caught him off guard, and he fell back onto the snow as she kissed him. Heart thudding wildly in her chest, she feathered kisses all over his face and then lifted herself up to look down into that intense blue-gray gaze of his.

“I skied.”

“I saw you,” he said, his voice husky.

He hugged her close, and she realized without Carter she might not be here. She looked down at him again and saw the man she’d known for all of her adult life, but she also had the feeling she was seeing him for the first time.

She’d had sex with this man, but lying in the snow on top of him after taking a run that she’d never thought she’d be able to again, she finally realized that she’d had him pegged all wrong. This was intimacy. This sharing of something that went beyond the physical.

It scared her, but it also exhilarated her, and there was no way she was going to keep him at arm’s length after this. She wasn’t sure how long the magic of having Carter with her was going to last, but she intended to ride it for as long as she could.

She lowered her head and brushed her lips against his—a soft sort of thank-you to the man who’d pushed her and forced his way past all of her barriers until he got her to do the very thing that had been scaring her for way too long.

He smiled up at her, looking smug, as though he knew that he’d done something for her that she couldn’t have done for herself.

“Caught ya,” she said at last, reaching past him and scooping up a handful of snow.

“Dang it. Now I’m going to have to put up with more kisses,” he complained.

“Not just kisses, Carter. I’m afraid you stepped over the line. I did warn you,” she said, rolling over and shoving the handful of snow into the crook between his neck and shoulder.

He yelped and scooted back from her. He grabbed a handful of snow and lobbed it at her. She laughed as she unbuckled her skis and gathered more ammo to hurl at him. She kept throwing snowballs and ducking his until he rushed her. Scooping her up into his arms, he kissed her, and this time it felt real. Not a dare, not a thank-you, but that red-hot lust that always lurked beneath the surface whenever he was around.

“Enough, gorgeous,” he said, letting her slide down his body and lacing his fingers through hers. “I’m proud of you. I knew you could do it, and you proved yourself.”

She swallowed hard. “I didn’t know I could. Thank you, Carter. You always know just what to do to nudge me out of my comfort zone.”

“I intend to do a lot more nudging tonight when we are out with my friends,” he warned her softly. “I think you’ve been the Ice Queen for too long and you’re overdue for a thaw.”

She arched a brow. “I think you know that I’m not always icy.”

“I do, and I like it.”

They walked back to the rental building and Carter said goodbye to her. She watched him walk away, and this time he glanced back over his shoulder and winked at her before he disappeared around the corner.

12

T
HERE
WAS
ONE
more week of the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, so the bars were crowded with some celebrities and a lot of film industry insiders. There were a few people she had met at the big winter games last year but Lindsey mostly avoided them. Instead she sat nestled on a high bar stool at a table jammed with people. Carter sat next to her with his arm casually draped over her shoulder.

She tried to be cool and casual, but this wasn’t her kind of place and she felt uncomfortable. Plus, Carter was different here. It was as if he was aware of an image he had to project, or maybe a person he had to be, and he wasn’t acting like himself.

If she’d been aware of that, she would have turned him down when he’d invited her to come along with him today.

Oh, who was she kidding? She would have been here anyway, because this afternoon after she’d skied she would have said yes to anything. There had been such a rush of adrenaline flooding through her, making her feel lighter than air.

That she could do anything.

“Another drink?” the cocktail waitress asked.

“Manhattan, please,” Lindsey said.

“Vodka and Thunderbolt,” Carter said. “A round for the table.”

The waitress nodded and moved away. She turned to look at Carter, who wore an Oxford shirt with some sort of graffiti-style art on the left side of a snowboarder doing a “crippler”—an inverted 540 spin. He hadn’t shaved, but that little bit of stubble on his jaw made him look roguish, and his hair was styled in that messy, casual way he always wore it.

“We have to show the sponsors some love,” he said.

“I’m not drinking an energy drink and vodka. That kind of thing makes me feel weird. I mean inside.”

He leaned in close to her. In his eyes she saw a hint of the guy who’d sat in her kitchen and played cards with her, but it was just a glimpse. “Don’t tell, but me, too. I just order them and then leave mine on the table.”

“Why?” she asked.

He tugged her to him as he leaned back from the table. It was as if they were cocooned together with the cacophony of noise around them.

“I have to order them. It’s my image.”

“But kids might buy into it. And they think you love those drinks, so they try it...”

“Damn. You’re right.” He winced. “But I can’t change who I am now.”

“Why not?”

“Because Stan and his company pay me a lot of money to do what I do. And I like it.”

“So money makes it okay?” She was pushing because she was uncomfortable, she knew that. Maybe she should just let it go. Smile and be like the scantily clad energy drink girls, but she couldn’t.

“Do you get off on being a buzz kill?” he asked.

“No. Sorry if my pointing out the truth is messing with your fun.” She huffed.

“It’s not,” he said. “I’m just having a hard time being my usual self tonight.”

She rubbed her finger over his stubble, liking the way it abraded her skin. She sat there thinking about her life and this year. Three weeks into January and already it felt as though things were changing.

“Maybe that’s not a bad thing,” she murmured. “I wasn’t trying to slam your choices, Carter. Lord knows I’ve made a few of them that haven’t been the best. I guess I’m feeling out of place so I’m not being my nicest.”

He had the prettiest eyes, she thought. Especially when he leaned even closer and she noticed those little blue flecks in his irises.

“I like it when you’re not all nicey-nice,” he admitted. “And when have you ever made a bad choice? My entire amateur career I’ve heard how perfect Lindsey Collins is.”

She doubted that. Her coach had pointed out every little flaw she had on every run she’d ever taken. Her mother thought her hair was too long. Her sponsor—a manufacturer of a beeswax-based lip balm—thought she needed to look Nordic and had asked her to wear blue contacts for her last photo shoot.

“Well, I’m far from perfect,” she informed him. “And I have many regrets.”

“Like what? Name one.”

She sighed. “The things I regret most are maybe not living as much as I should have. I mean, I’m almost thirty, and my twenties were spent training every day.”

“I can’t believe you regret that. Maybe because of the way your career ended you think you should have done something different...” Carter said.

Their conversation was just starting to get interesting, but their drinks arrived and he got pulled into a conversation with a Thunderbolt energy drink representative.

“Carter Shaw is hot, isn’t he?” a tall, svelte redhead said as she sat next to her at the table.

“Yeah, he is. He knows it, too,” Lindsey replied, turning toward the other woman. “You’re Georgina Poirier, right? Stan’s wife? I’m Lindsey, by the way. I saw you with Stan earlier but you and I haven’t had a chance to meet.”

They shook hands. “Nice to finally meet you,” Georgina said. “And you’re right—Carter does know how good-looking he is. I think that’s part of his appeal.”

Lindsey had to agree. Confidence was very attractive.

The rest of their group filed in, and Georgina left to chat with one of the Hollywood starlets who’d had the lead in the film screened at the film festival earlier today.

Lindsey slowly sipped her cocktail, feeling oddly out of sorts. Truth was, she wasn’t enjoying this party as much as she had the one on New Year’s Eve. It suddenly dawned on her that the reason was that she didn’t have Carter’s undivided attention. Then the band started playing, and the song was that catchy Pharrell Williams’ tune “Happy.”

She grabbed Carter’s hand before she could think twice about it. “Dance with me.”

He smiled at her and followed her out onto the dance floor. Moments later, when he pulled her close and they swayed to the music, moving their bodies together, Lindsey finally knew why she was here tonight. Finally, she admitted to herself that this was what she’d missed and what she craved.

She wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders and told herself that it was the only the music and the nighttime influencing her, but she had a feeling that she was lying to herself. Knew that she wanted Carter all the time, not just after midnight.

* * *

C
ARTER
WAS
FLYING
HIGH
on energy, and not the kind supplied by the Thunderbolt energy drink company. Stan and Georgina had left and he was free to do whatever he wanted. Lindsey was in his arms, the club was jumping and, as far as he was concerned, life was about as good as it could be.

He thought of what she’d said earlier about missing out on her twenties. In a way he’d done the same thing, but he wouldn’t trade it for anything. Without that decade of really hard work he wouldn’t know Lindsey and wouldn’t be holding her tantalizingly close at this moment.

And she felt so good.

The music played on, and the two of them stayed on the dance floor for most of the night. She seemed lost in the music, and the moment they gyrated to the hip-hop beat until he couldn’t resist her for another second. He pulled her off the dance floor and into the first quiet corner he could find.

He trapped her between the wall and his body. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him closer to her until they were pressed together. Her breasts rubbed his chest; her thigh twisted around his leg. Her mouth under his, she kissed him in a way that made every other high he’d experienced in his life pale in comparison.

There was magic in her kiss, and he felt caught under her spell. She was tall, so he didn’t have to bend to meet her mouth, and she never left any doubt that this embrace was hers. To the world it might seem as though he was surrounding her, but she’d been invading him body and soul. She’d taken up residence in those empty places inside him and he didn’t question it.

Only wanted to let her have her way with him. Not just physically but emotionally, too. She made him want to be a better man. The kind of man that she’d be proud to call her own.

He knew they weren’t close to being a couple, but he also knew that until he made a few changes she’d never want him to be her man.

But for tonight he was happy enough to let that go. To just let his hands slide up and down her torso, caressing her through the blouse she wore. She moaned and bit his lip with delicate force.

He groaned as all of his blood rushed to his groin, and he knew that every shred of logical thought was gone. Gone for the night at least, but maybe longer because this was Lindsey and all she had to do was to crook her little finger and he would follow her wherever she led.

That was dangerous. But it didn’t matter. All he wanted to do was to keep kissing and caressing her. To do whatever he had to do to stay right there in her arms.

He lifted his mouth from hers, buried his fingers in her soft, silky hair and dropped kisses on her neck. He felt her fingers moving over the tattoo on his neck, and then her mouth was there, her tongue tracing the lines, and then she suckled at the base of his neck as she arched her body against his.

He thrust back before realizing that things were getting out of hand. This was Lindsey, not the kind of girl he wanted to screw in the hallway of a bar. He pulled back but she held on to him.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said.

She seemed startled when she realized they were still in the club. She nodded, and they went back to the table to grab their coats before weaving through the crowd to get outside. He thought the cold January air would help cool him down, but it didn’t.

Not for Lindsey, either. As soon as they were out of the doorway and in the puddle of darkness between the streetlamps, she pulled him back into her arms.

He went willingly, holding her to him with his hands on her butt, anchoring her firmly to his growing erection. Her mouth moved over his, her tongue rubbing over him, and he couldn’t help but rub sinuously against her in the same motion.

These weeks without Lindsey had been too long. He was trying to remember his plan. He wanted to be more than a hot lay for her, but right now his body didn’t care and his mind was outvoted.

He braced his hands on the wall on either side of her head and seduced her slowly with his mouth. She pushed her hands inside his coat, caressing his chest and moving lower. She stroked him through the fabric of his jeans, her hand moving up and down, and she tore her mouth from his to look up at him with eyes dilated with passion.

“I want you,” she said. “You make me forget everything except what you feel like inside me.”

He shuddered and almost came right then. He needed her desperately. But not out here on the street. He stepped back, grabbed her hand and led her to the parking lot where he’d left his SUV. He opened the door and lifted her onto the seat. She pulled him into her arms, wrapped her legs around his hips, and he thrust against her once.

“Get your seat belt on, gorgeous. We need to get home in record time.”

She nodded and he closed the door, going around to the driver’s side as quickly as he could. He stood there for a minute, looking up at the stars as he took several calming breaths. But the fire she’d started in him wasn’t about to be abated.

He got behind the wheel and she put her hand on his thigh, moving closer to his erection. Pulsating with need, he let her caress him as he drove through the town, thankful the traffic was light.

* * *

L
INDSEY
FOLLOWED
C
ARTER
into his hotel room. He held her hand loosely, but the drive from the town to the lodge hadn’t lessened her passion. Today had been another one of those points where she knew there was no going back to her old life. They’d happened at different times—the first when she’d been invited to train with the national team and had move out of her family home at twelve.

But this was different. This was Carter and that hot, hard sexy body of his. She wanted to make it about sex. To balance out the developing feelings she had with him and try to manage it. To lessen the impact of what he was coming to mean to her.

He dropped his keys on a table near the door and hauled her against him. She stopped thinking. Instead she felt as though she was right back in his arms with the electric pulse of the music surrounding them. She grabbed the sides of his shirt and pulled him closer to her, arched her body against his as she had earlier and lifted her head to meet his mouth, which was coming down to claim hers.

He let her take control just as he had before, and she felt a trickle of warmth flow inside her. Felt everything feminine that had once been buried beneath being an athlete now rising up and taking over. She devoured his mouth as she rubbed her hands over his chest and found the buttons of his shirt. She had it undone and pushed off his shoulders in less than a minute.

She caressed his shoulders and down his arms, feeling them flex as he wrapped an arm around her waist and lifted her off her feet. He was strong. Stronger than she’d expected him to be. She wrapped her fingers around his biceps as he set her on her feet and flexed his muscles again.

“Like my guns?”

She nodded. She continued caressing his bare chest as he flicked on a lamp on the nightstand and she realized they were in his bedroom. She undid his jeans and pushed them down his legs, wanting him naked. Needing to keep this in the context that she’d tried to assign it. She didn’t want to notice the picture on his nightstand of the two of them from New Year’s Eve. Didn’t want to admit that this was so much more than just sex.

But it was too late. A flood of emotion washed over her. Gratitude for how he’d seen past her ice-queen facade and lust at seeing his face harden with desire for her. He wanted her. He made her feel as if she was the only girl in the world. And that shouldn’t make her heart feel fuller...but somehow it did.

She pushed him backward and he fell onto the bed. She pulled her shirt up over her head and tossed it aside, then shimmied out of her jeans and underwear. He lay on the bed naked and staring at her. There was something on his face; a quiet emotion that she couldn’t identify. She knew that he was used to women.