After Midnight (5 page)

She opened the door cautiously and heard the low rumble of Carter’s voice.

“Thank you very much.”

He was awake.

He was sitting on the edge of the bed, his back to her, his brown hair tousled and sticking up a little on the left side. He tossed the cordless phone onto the bed and stood. “I ordered breakfast.”

“I actually should probably be going,” she said hastily. “I feel like I’ve—”

“Where do you have to go? I know you’re not working today.”

“You do?” Her eyes widened. “How do you know that?”

“Because you were drinking and partying last night. I know you aren’t the type of person to ski after a night like that,” he said. “Take it from me, your concentration won’t be that great.”

“Have you done that? Snowboarded in that condition?”

“I have. I don’t recommend it.” There was a long pause. “Let me grab a robe and we can have breakfast, okay?”

She didn’t want to get to know Carter any better. Sure, she knew how that sounded, but the truth was, the more she knew him the bigger the chance of her starting to like him was. She didn’t want to change the dynamic between them that had worked so well for so long. She had figured out a way to manage him.

“I’m not sure.”

“Really?
Now
you’re running scared?” Crossing his arms over his bare chest, he flashed a taunting smile her way. “After all that we did to each other last night, this morning you want to retreat?”

She gave him the hardest stare she could muster. Given her headache she suspected it wasn’t as steely as she’d like. “I’m not a child to be swayed by a petty dare.”

“It wasn’t petty, gorgeous. It was a flat-out challenge. Prove you’re not a coward and stay.”

She rolled her eyes. This was the guy she had no chance of ever falling for... The one who needled her and tried to make her— “Fine. I’ll stay for breakfast.”

He nodded. “I’ll be right back.”

She walked over to the table set up in a corner of the suite with chairs that faced the plate-glass windows that provided a perfect panoramic view of the Wasatch Range. The mountains she knew like the palm of her hand. She’d skied all the different runs down that mountain. It was a constant to her. In fact, she’d trained there for so long it was like her home.

But it wasn’t anymore. And she knew that it wasn’t Carter she was angry with this morning. It wasn’t the mountain, either, although that big majestic thing did play a part in it. She was angry with herself. For falling and for failing. She’d never realized how much she’d let herself down. Hadn’t wanted to admit that to herself. As a matter of fact, she hadn’t been able to let those emotions out until this morning.

Coffee and breakfast weren’t going to sweeten her mood now.
That
she understood, so she got dressed as quickly as she could, gathered her clutch and her tiara and walked out the door before Carter came out of the bathroom.

She needed time and distance. Not the distraction that he provided.

5

I
T
DIDN
’
T
TAKE
a Stephen Hawking–level genius to figure out that Lindsey wanted to be left alone. But Carter hadn’t achieved all he had in the world of snowboarding, or in life, by not going after what he wanted. And after last night, it was pretty damned clear to him that he still wanted more from her.

He took a shower, got dressed, ate the breakfast he’d ordered and then went out to find her. She worked at the lodge, and he suspected she must live pretty close to it. They’d both been serious athletes for the majority of their lives—if Lindsey was anything like him, she’d want to be close enough to the mountains to spend all her free time on the slopes.

He texted Will Spalding, the other groomsman from the wedding, whose girlfriend, Penny, was friends with Lindsey, asking if he knew how to get in touch with Lindsey.

He put his head on the steering wheel, feeling like a complete and utter fool.

This was nuts.

Will texted back that he’d ask Penny. A few seconds later he texted a phone number and the word
why
.

Yeah, Shaw, why do you need her number?
he asked himself.

He texted that he wanted to talk to Lindsey about the event they were working on at the lodge and wished Will and Penny safe travels as they headed home later in the day.

He was still sitting in his rented SUV, trying to figure out which of the many slopes she’d been taking a run on this morning, when he caught a glimpse of her walking from her car to the lodge. She was wearing a pair of dark pink ski bibs and a cream-colored puffy jacket. Her Nordic blond hair had been pulled back into a ponytail, her hair held back by a ski band around her head.

She looked for all the world as she always had. As if nothing had changed.

He rubbed the back of his neck, thinking that maybe for her nothing had.

It hadn’t occurred to him until that moment that prim-and-proper Lindsey Collins, darling of the Alpine ski community, might have used him to get her rocks off on New Year’s Eve. It wasn’t the first time he’d been a woman’s illicit thrill, but on every other occasion he’d known what he was getting into. And he’d been prepared for it.

He’d thought Lindsey was different. He shut off his SUV, got out and followed her across the parking lot and up to the ski lodge and the après ski café. She sat at one of the tables nestled near the big fireplace and facing the slopes. The expression on her face wasn’t peaceful or serene.

She looked angry and lost.

Why was Lindsey upset?

Maybe he’d screwed things up when he’d taken her to his bed last night. Another sin to add to his list where this woman was concerned. He walked over to the bar, ordered two hot chocolates and then went to her table.

He set one down in front of her and took the seat next to her so he, too, could look up at the mountain.

“Carter.”

“Lindsey.”

She pulled the mug closer to her and wrapped her fingers around it, staring down into the whipped cream on the top like a fortune-teller searching for answers.

“What’s this for?”

“I’m not sure.” He raked a hand through his hair and sighed. “I think I might need to apologize.”

“For what? I know
I
should for walking out. But my head’s not in the right place this morning. I might do or say something stupid, so I figured I better clear out until...”

He got it. This he understood. He’d spent most of his life clearing out and searching for answers that he still hadn’t found.

“No need. I get that. Let’s start over,” he said.

“How? Do we pretend we never met at seventeen? Or do we act like last night never happened?”

“None of that. Let’s just start the morning over.” He reached over and clasped her hand in his. “I’m dying to get up on the slopes. You want to go with me?”

“I... Really? I thought you’d want to take it easy.”

“I didn’t anger all the resort owners here by taking them on and demanding they let snowboarders on the slopes just to be a douchebag. I did it because when I look at that mountain I see something I wanted to conquer. Besides, it was elitist to try to keep us out.”

“I never saw it that way,” she admitted, staring down at their entwined fingers. “But then, Alpine skiing is accepted everywhere.”

“So want to take on the slopes? We can race for real this time,” he said. “Not against the clock but against each other.”

She slowly withdrew her hand and took a sip of cocoa. “I can’t.”

He leaned back in his chair and glanced at her. She wasn’t watching him but was staring at the mountains again. “I’ll go easy on you.”

“It doesn’t matter. I can’t go down the mountain.”

“Why not?”

She shook her head. “You were my bit of fun last night, Carter. We’re not friends and I—”

“I don’t see that you have any friends here right now. Not trying to be mean, but it’s obvious—even to this
bit of fun—
that you need someone.” He clenched his jaw, trying to keep his temper in check. “I’d like to think over the years I’ve at least showed you I’m not a total loser.”

“I never think of you that way,” she said, turning to face him.

He saw something in her expression that he’d never glimpsed there before. It was something more than fear, and if he had to define it, he’d say it looked a lot like disappointment.

“I’m scared, Carter. I can’t go down that damned mountain, because every time I’ve taken the ski lift up there I freeze. I’m fine showing kids what to do in their lessons, but I can’t go down a big slope.”

His anger instantly cooled. That wasn’t what he’d been expecting. Lindsey was afraid? It didn’t jive with the bold, fearless woman he’d always known. She’d been throwing herself down the toughest, fastest runs since she’d been ten, or something. She’d gone over sixty miles per hour routinely, and now she was afraid?

“Okay, fair enough,” he said. “But we’re going to get you over your fear.”

She shook her head and took another slip of her hot chocolate. “I don’t think so. You’re sweet to suggest it, but let’s face it, the only thing we’ve ever had between us is an adversarial—”

“We have more now. We spent the night in each other’s arms.”

“That was sex,” she reminded him. “You always act like sex is just a physical thing. Nothing emotional there.”

“Was it for you?” he asked in a low, deceptively calm voice.

“Wasn’t it for you?” she countered.

She gave nothing away. Why was he surprised? This was Lindsey Collins, and she never let him have an inch.

* * *

L
INDSEY
DIDN
’
T
WANT
to talk about her fears with Carter. In fact, the only thing she wanted was a distraction. God knew he provided her with that.

“I’m sorry I feel like I’m not myself this morning. That’s why I left. I can’t explain it very well, not even to myself.”

“What can’t you explain?” he asked, pinning her with his penetrating blue-gray gaze.

“Last night, until the moment you arrived at my table, I was looking at my future and trying to figure out what my next move would be.” She sighed. “Last year at this time I was gearing up for a gold medal and setting my future, you know?”

“I do know. But things changed.”

“They did, and I ended up here in the bosom of some good friends and in the valley where I first learned to ski and started my world-champion path. I thought this was the place to press the reset button, but it didn’t work out that way. I couldn’t handle the slopes... I mean, not even the kiddie ones at first. Even now they still scare me.”

She tried to stop talking, but the words were just flowing out of her as though they wouldn’t be stopped. She’d needed to share this with someone, and Carter, as unlikely as it seemed, was the one person she was finally able to do it with.

“So the reset didn’t work,” he said, tracing the rim of his mug with his finger.

An image of him doing that exact same thing to her nipple popped into her head and made her squirm in her chair. Dammit. She never thought of sex this way. But Carter had changed her.

“No, it didn’t. I have seen a therapist and he suggested it was because reset means I can go back to where I was and that maybe somewhere in my brain is the thought that I don’t want to go back there.”

He nodded. “My therapist has often said that, for me, I have to keep moving forward. Once I master a skill, I need to find a new one.”

“That’s interesting... Does he have a theory why?” Maybe there was a clue in Carter’s problems that could lead her to a solution of her own.

“He does, but it’s very personal.” There was a glimpse of the real man. The one he kept hidden behind a curtain of sexy charm and outrageous dares.

“Sorry,” she said quietly. “Didn’t mean to pry.”

“I brought it up. Just throwing it out as an option.” Resting an elbow on the table, he turned to face her. “I want to help you get back on the slopes. It will be a way for me to make up for any part of your crash.”

“I told you that wasn’t your fault.”

“I know, but I need to do this. Plus, and if you repeat this to
anyone
I’ll deny it, but when you ski it’s like magic. I love watching you on the slopes, and I’d hate to never see you ski again.”

“Why would you deny that?” she asked, touched more than she wanted to be.

“Because I’m a bad-boy snowboarder and I’ve got a reputation to preserve,” he said with a wink.

“Well, far be it from me to ruin that for you,” she quipped. But deep down inside the freedom she’d felt last night was starting to fade. It made her wistful and wonder how she was going to achieve what had seemed so possible last night. How could she change her life?

“You won’t,” he said slyly. “So let’s see... How’s the knee? Have you taken any runs?”

Lindsey shook her head. She thought of how she sometimes brought her skis here and sat as though she’d just taken a run, even though she clearly hadn’t.

Who the heck was she trying to fool?

“My knee is fine. No runs. I mean, I’m teaching the classes, so I am on the bunny slopes with my kids, but that’s not really skiing.”

“Not for you,” he said.

“No, not for me. But why do you care? I mean, really. Not that BS about feeling guilty about my crash—the real story.”

He leaned in close and shrugged. “Maybe I sense that’s the only way you’ll let me see you again.”

He was right, but she wasn’t about to admit it to him. “We’re on a committee together, Carter. We will have to see each other again.”

He took a sip of his hot chocolate. “I expected better—more from you than this.”

She held the same high expectation for herself. “I’m sorry. I think the combo of too much to drink, a very sexy encounter and confusion left over from last night are making this morning difficult.”

“You think too much,” he said softly. “I’ve had more mornings-after than you. Take it from me, you have to just shake it off.”

She didn’t want to shake it off. A part of her wanted to be the woman she’d been last night. That bold, self-assured, confident woman she’d been with Carter, the woman who’d believed in herself. Surely that hadn’t just been the champagne talking. The seeds of that woman had to be inside her.

She just had to figure out how to sow them.

Carter was offering her something by saying he wanted to see her ski again. He’d always been that devilish rogue who could needle her into doing things she’d otherwise pass on.

“Were you serious about helping me ski again?”

“Yes. Thinking of taking me up on it?” he asked, leaning back and giving her a cocky smile. “I knew you would. Women can’t resist me.”

That was part of her problem. She didn’t want to be one of the masses that had been in Carter’s life. She wanted to be important and special. And she couldn’t. Not right now, because she hardly knew herself anymore.

* * *

C
ARTER
REALIZED
THAT
Lindsey saw him as a bit of fun. And after all the women he’d played around with over the years, a part of him got that it was payback. But another part, the bit where he’d actually thought she was different than all the lovers he’d been with before, bristled. She was looking at him as if he were a stranger. The kind of man that she didn’t know or trust.

“What do you say, gorgeous? Want to give it a shot?”

“I do. I’m just not sure that I should be committing to doing anything more with you because you’re a bad influence.”

He looked at her, amused despite himself by her adorably earnest expression. “How do you figure?”

“Kissing dares. Sex twice in one night... Skiing again.”

He noted that she’d started with the light stuff and ended with what was really worrying her. “I’m not going to push you down the slope, Linds. I just want a chance to help you remember what you loved so much about the sport.”

She cocked her head to one side, her blond ponytail swinging behind her head, and he remembered the feel of her silky-smooth hair against his body. His blood heated, and he realized that he was working so hard to find a reason to stay in her good graces because he wanted her back in his bed.

He hadn’t been finished with her when she’d walked away, and now he had to do whatever was necessary to get her back.

“What do you know about my love of the sport?”

“Only that if I fell and couldn’t snowboard for six months, I’d be devastated. And though I’m retiring from amateur competition, I know I still want to be on the board. I can’t define myself without it.”

She gave him a hard stare. “I hate that you actually get me.”

He laughed, but inside a part of him was hurt by that. “Why?”

“You’re not a serious person. You think dares and games are the way to get what you want—”

“It’s worked for me in the past, hasn’t it?”

“You have a point.” She sighed. “Maybe this
is
what I need. So what do you recommend?”

“You have to get to the root of your fear.”

“How do you know that?” she asked. “Do you have something you’re afraid of?”