Sisters in Love (Snow Sisters, Book One: Love in Bloom Series #1) (3 page)

“Oh yeah, she wasn’t lying,” she purred. She
pulled him against her.

With one hand, he grabbed her ass and lifted
her forward, to the edge of the counter, the tip of his penis
against her opening. She was wet, ready. With one thrust, he was
inside of her. She gasped, digging her fingernails into his
shoulders and sending his erection into overdrive. He pumped hard
and fast. Her head fell back as she arched into him. He kissed her
long neck, twisting out of her fingernails’ grasp and driving even
deeper. The snarky woman’s voice invaded his thoughts.
Are you
done?
Usually Blake waited for the woman to orgasm before
finding his release. Today he had to escape his own thoughts. He
thrust and pumped until he was on the verge of his own orgasm.

Red panted, “Wait. Wait. Go slower.”

Are you done?
There was no waiting.
Anger fed his need. He clung to her ample hips as he pulled her
forward and pushed her back in perfect rhythm with each of his
harsh thrusts, until finally, she squeezed and pulsated around him
and he came hard and forcefully, gritting his teeth and grunting
against her neck until he was spent.

“Fun,” she said, out of breath.

Blake opened his eyes to find his own
reflection staring back at him in the mirror. His cheeks carried
the pink of fresh desire and his lips were smeared with her
lipstick. His jeans hung around his knees, and the
fifty-something-year-old woman he’d just banged was hanging on to
him like he was hers. He didn’t even know her name.
Fun?
He
was a thirty-four-year-old male slut—no better than those girls
everyone teased in high school.
Are you done?
Her voice
echoed in his head. Blake pulled out of Red, grabbed paper towels
from the dispenser, and handed them to her. “Thanks,” he said,
tossing his condom in the trash. Then he snagged his shirt, hiked
up his pants, and escaped with his shame and self-loathing to the
safety of his office.

Saturday evening the moon cast a foggy glow
over the mountaintop. The slopes looked like fluffy clouds that had
fallen to the ground. Blake inhaled the icy, wet smell of the
slopes. He loved night skiing, when the slopes were filled with
more experienced skiers.

“You ready, buddy?” Dave asked as he skied
into place next to Blake. He stood six inches shorter but was every
bit as thick and muscular as Blake. A light snow began to fall.

“Yeah, I’m ready. Listen, I feel kind of
guilty taking you away from your family.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Yeah.” Blake smiled. “I don’t.”

They both laughed.

“I’m glad you came. It’s been a month since
we’ve hit the slopes.”

“I know. You remind me every day.” Dave
raised an eyebrow. “No worries, man. I wouldn’t miss it for the
world. Time goes quick. All this powder will be gone before we know
it.”

“You could’ve brought Rusty if you wanted,”
Blake said.

“Yeah, just what you need, a teenager hanging
around. No way, man. This run is just for us. I need the break,
too. Besides, Rusty has as much interest in skiing as I do in
basketball. He’s a kid. He has the joy of picking and choosing his
addictions.”

They took the ski lift to the top of the
second tallest trail. By the time they reached the peak, the snow
was coming down hard. Adrenaline rushed through Blake as they
stepped from the lift and skied to the crest. He and Dave wore
similar Arc’teryx Stingray jackets and Völkl pants, compliments of
their suppliers. Dave’s were royal blue, and Blake wore black and
red. Free clothing was just one of the many perks of owning a ski
shop.

“I feel great tonight!” Dave said. The cold
night's air was already turning his cheeks pink. He shielded his
eyes from the falling snow with his gloved hand.

“I feel great every night,” Blake said.
“Damn, it’s really coming down. Let’s take the first one easy, warm
up.”

Dave’s cell phone rang.

“You brought that damn thing with you? I love
Sally, but come on.” Blake really did love Sally, and the times
he’d gotten together with Dave’s family had always been
enjoyable—barbeques, dinners out on the town, the fair every summer
—but he would never want to be that accessible to anyone. He
considered his ski time sacred.

Dave took out his phone. “Wifey calls.” He
held up one finger to Blake. “Hi, honey. Yeah, we made it. Yup,
getting ready right now for our first run.” He paused, listening to
Sally. “Put him on.” Dave turned his back, then spoke sternly into
the phone. “Is what your mother said true? What the hell were you
thinking?” Dave paced. “You listen to me. If I come home and—” He
stopped walking. “Rusty? Hello? Hello!” He looked at his phone.
“Damn it.” He shoved the phone in his pocket and, as he made his
way through the thick curtain of snow that fell around them, Blake
noticed him stabbing his poles into the ground and the fine lines
forming around his pinched face.

“Everything okay?” Blake asked.

“Lost connection,” he snapped. “Goddamnit.
You wouldn’t understand. Let’s just go.”

“Okay, if you’re sure.” The last thing Blake
wanted to do was listen to the details of an argument. He was
itching to get onto the slopes.

“I’m takin’ the back.” Dave’s breath came out
in foggy huffs. He pulled his yellow goggles down over his eyes and
turned away.

“Whoa, the back? Dave, come on. You know how
this goes. Warm up. Then, when you’re—” Blake watched Dave stomp,
not ski, in the direction of the back side of the mountain.
Visibility was already an issue. He pulled his goggles down over
his eyes and opened his mouth to call to Dave, but he was nowhere
in sight. “Meet you at the bottom,” he said to himself.

Blake took the front side of the mountain
slow and easy, relishing in the familiar whisking of the cold snow
against his face. His knees knew just where and when to bend; his
body took the turns with practiced memory. Reckless kids sped past
him at racing speeds. He smiled. That’s how he had been at that
age, indestructible.
I still am
, he thought to himself with
pride. He picked up speed. The snow was coming down thick and
fast.

Blake wondered if he should have stopped Dave
from skiing down the back of the mountain. It wasn’t as well lit as
the front, and that side of the mountain had steep cliffs and a
rough terrain interspersed with trees and enormous moguls. He
thought of Sally at home with their son while Dave was here having
fun, and the way Dave had reacted to the phone call. Marriage was a
strange equation to Blake. No matter how he added it up, one plus
one did not equate to a lifetime of happiness and excitement. He
wondered if he’d ever be content with just one woman in his life,
if he’d ever be able to sleep with just one woman—or if he’d ever
want
to.

He slid into the clearing at the bottom of
the hill and saw the rescue team suiting up. He had yet to ski at
night without seeing an accident. The trails were filled with
rookies who thought they could take a high bump and kids who knew
no boundaries. There were five trails at the resort, and he’d skied
them all. The back wasn’t even the toughest terrain. There was one
higher, rougher trail, accessible only by the ski lift that had
dropped them at the crest of the trail. It also went all the way to
the top, to the crest of Little Hellion. Only experienced skiers
were allowed to ski Little Hellion, and they wore special tags on
their jackets. Blake looked down at his tag. He and Dave had passed
the course requirements for taking on Little Hellion three years
earlier. He remembered that afternoon fondly. He and Dave had
ribbed each other about the other one failing to tackle the
pre-Hellion trails, but they both surpassed the expected skill
level. Hot-dog Dave even flipped over a few of the moguls, angering
the instructors. Blake smiled at the memory. When it came to
skiing, Dave had always been a show-off.

The rescue team headed right while Blake
skied to the left, toward the end of the back run, to meet Dave.
One of the rescue team’s snowmobiles was pulling out, and Blake
skied off to the side to let it pass.

“Where’s the fall?” he hollered.

“Little Hellion. Just closed the slope. Be
careful out there.” The snowmobile zoomed away at full
throttle.

Blake knew that if the slope was closed, the
accident was bad. He wondered who’d been dumb enough to ham it up
on Little Hellion on a night like tonight.

The fresh powder made the trek toward the
back take longer than it should. When Blake finally arrived, a
handful of skiers were sliding into the unpacked snow, sending
thick sheets of snow careening into the air. Blake stood off to the
side and waited for Dave.

After fifteen minutes, he wondered if he’d
missed Dave and if he’d already headed back up the lift for another
run. As a twenty-something-year-old guy came to a stop at the
bottom of the hill, Blake asked him if he’d seen Dave.

“He’s about this tall.” Blake held up his
hand to eye level. “Royal-blue jacket, great skier.”

“Nope. Dude, it’s rough up there. I couldn’t
see ten feet in front of me, but I didn’t see anyone stuck or hurt,
if that’s what you mean. I did hear of an accident up on Little
Hellion.”

“Right, thanks.” Blake headed back toward the
front of the mountain. When he reached the lift, he decided to wait
a little longer. Dave had been upset. Maybe he just wanted to be
alone for a while. Hell, he’d take one more quick trip down the
mountain and then look for Dave. What could it hurt? Dave was a big
boy.

The ski lift bumped over each of the pole
junctions. The skiers below Blake became tiny specs amid a sea of
white as he ascended the mountain. At the top, he skied off the
lift and stood at the crest, admiring the magnificent view. Blake
was five when he first began skiing with his father, and by the
time he was seven, he was already catching air. As a teen, he’d
joined a weekend ski team. The older kids hung out together before
and after practice. They’d spent practically all day on Saturdays
and Sundays on the slopes. What had started as a dare between
friends—flip over the biggest mogul you can find—turned into a
competition, then a passion, and later, into a full-blown
obsession. From then on, Blake was hooked. He’d even taken private
lessons and learned to acroski better than anyone he’d ever met,
with the exception of Dave.

They’d met as adults, on the slopes. Dave had
just finished a big jump; he'd spun off of a cliff, landed
perfectly, and zoomed the rest of the way down the slope. Blake had
complimented him
. Man, you sure hurled your carcass up
there
.
Nice.
Dave said thanks, but walked away and
totally blew him off. So Blake took to the cliff. He wasn’t one to
be ignored—or outdone. Dave acted like he wasn’t watching, but
Blake knew better. To be an acroskier you had to be competitive.
After Blake’s perfect, corked spin, Dave approached and offered to
teach him how to straighten it out. It took a minute for Blake to
realize that Dave was joking, and when he had, they’d become fast
friends. Dave Tuft was a master. Truly gifted. He could catch more
air, perform masterful flips, and twist in ways that Blake still
couldn’t replicate. Dave knew it, too, and at times that confidence
made him reckless. He’d broken his fair share of bones.

A helicopter flew in low overhead.
This
can’t be good.
Blake watched it descend toward the Little
Hellion run. The snowmobile came down the mountain and pulled onto
the crest where Blake stood.

“We’re closing the slopes. Take your last
run.” It was the same rescue team member that Blake had seen at the
bottom of the hill.

“That was fast. Bad one, huh?” he asked.

The man took off his goggles and looked at
Blake with serious, dark eyes. “Nothing we could do. The guy didn’t
make it.”

Blake had a sinking feeling in his
stomach.

“Near as we can tell, the guy must've
misjudged his direction. Landed in the trees along the edge of the
first cliff. Broken neck on impact.”

The hair on the back of Blake’s neck stood on
end. “Jesus. Was he tagged for the mountain?”

“Yeah, he was tagged. Guy was wearing
Arc’teryx and Völkl. He wasn’t a novice.”

The world spun around him. Blake’s body went
numb. “Yellow goggles?”

“You’ve seen him before?”

Dave
.

Danica sat in front of her television set in
her favorite baggy, blue sweatpants and T-shirt, reviewing Belinda
Trenton’s file. A typical Saturday night for Danica. Danica knew
Belinda’s story all too well. Daddy didn’t pay enough attention to
her. She reached out for sex, hoping for love, and couldn’t figure
out why she was treated poorly. She had to make sure she wasn’t
missing anything from their earlier sessions. She could help this
girl; there was no doubt about it. It’s what she did best—helping
pull the insecure and needy up by their bootstraps and start anew,
with some semblance of confidence and willpower.

When her cell phone rang, she set the file
down on her perfectly organized coffee table and glanced at the
time.

“Hi, Kay.”

“What’s up, sis?” Her younger sister, Kaylie,
was far too chipper for eleven o’clock at night. “Wait. Don’t tell
me. You’re sitting in your living room poring over client files to
figure out how you can help some poor sap who can’t get it up.”

“I wish it were that easy,” she answered,
thinking of Belinda. “Viagra works wonders. Unfortunately, it’s not
what this client needs.” Danica laughed. Her younger sister knew
how to get her head out of the office.

“Yeah, you’re tellin’ me?” Kaylie
laughed.

Danica rolled her eyes. She’d long ago
stopped trying to help Kaylie figure out that she didn’t need to
sleep with any man who happened to strike her fancy. “Are you
drunk?”