Winter Love

by Kennedy Fox

  “That was my old rule, but I’m willing to make an exception,” he said. “Let’s just take this day by day. No worries, no overthinking. Let’s just focus on the simple. Nothing more. Okay?”

  My eyes looked deep within his, and I whispered, “Okay.” I wasn’t sure I could do that, but I nodded in agreement anyway.

  Chapter Five

  “Come on, I have something I want to show you,” Ethan said as he grabbed me by the hand.

  We were taking a walk, side by side on the property, enjoying the brisk air. The last two weeks had been wonderful. Ethan and I had spent a lot of time together. He still gave me time to write while he did work around the resort, but we didn’t go long being out of each other’s sight. We talked, we laughed, and we kissed. I had started to let down my wall. I began to trust Ethan enough to confess my wishes and my dreams. Ethan listened, he advised, and he accepted. He never judged me for being a workaholic writer. He never made me feel like I was anything less than perfect. Ethan had a way of making me feel safe and protected.

  I liked being around him. I liked seeing his rugged, mountain man charm. I didn’t want the next week to end. Each minute of each day, I was falling deeper and harder for this man, and trying my best to simply live in the moment and not overthink. We hadn’t brought up the fact that we lived in different parts of the world and this was temporary. It was messy, complicated and most likely unsustainable. We both knew that, but we didn’t want to face it. Or at least that was how I was seeing it. A winter at the resort to live a fantasy life, and then back to reality. What harm could hiding my head in the sand do?

  But eventually the snow would melt.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  “Over there.” Ethan pointed to a cabin on the top of a snow-covered hill. “That’s my new place. It’s finally completed. I’ve been living in the old family cabin, but always wanted a place that is completely my own.”

  “It’s amazing. You built it?”

  He nodded with a smile of pride on his face.

  I leaned in and kissed him with excitement. “I am so impressed. You never cease to amaze me. Can you show me the inside?”

  We walked hand and hand to the cabin Ethan had put his heart and soul into. I could feel the love he had, the pride of building his home on his own land. I had never found Ethan as attractive and sexy as I did as we approached the door.

  As we walked in, I was shocked to see there was no furniture.

  “It’s empty.”

  Ethan smiled. “Yes… My sister said she would help, but I haven’t taken her up on it. I definitely need a female’s eye. Maybe you should do it.”

  I blushed, unsure of why I found his simple and casual statement so awkward.

  Ethan smiled and wrapped his arms around me. “I know I have said this before, but you are so damn cute when you blush.”

  He kissed my forehead, my cheek, the tip of my nose and then my lips. I pressed my body into his, moving my tongue past his lips to touch, to combine. Something about this man made my body sizzle. His soft, genuine show of affection was like a shot of adrenaline to my libido. He wasn’t cocky or arrogant, but sweet and sincere. Sure, he could be bossy as hell, but the truth of the matter was Ethan was a great guy, and I had never been turned on more.

  I tried to press Ethan back up against the wall. I wanted to take him right there and then. His hard, muscled body wouldn’t budge an inch.

  Ethan shook his head. “Having sex once, and I can keep the relationship casual. The second time means you’re mine.”

  “Really?” I smiled seductively up at him. “Maybe I want to be yours.”

  “Jade…” he warned.

  “Ethan…” I countered, feeling the air sizzle between us.

  He took hold of me and pushed me hard up against the wall. He grabbed my hands and pressed them above my head and held them firm with one hand, while his other began to rip off my clothing. He yanked, he tugged, and he had me naked before I could even take my next breath. His lips pressed against mine with such force, such fierce passion.

  Ethan moved his lips to my neck and began to kiss, suck and bite. With my arms still pinned above my head by his massive hand, I had no choice but to allow Ethan to do as he wished.

  I felt the sting of his teeth on my neck and gasped, “I like the word mine.”

  He stood before me and took off all of his clothes in the same rush and fury that had landed me up against the wall. His ripped, tight body stood before me as he seductively smiled.

  “I like the word mine as well,” he said. “And that’s exactly what you are about to become.”

  Ethan kissed one breast and then the other. He sucked each nipple, slightly nipping with his teeth. I gasped, I moaned but he ignored my sounds and continued his descent down my abdomen with kisses. He reached his final destination, kissing every ounce of flesh, licking my entire mound until I was hungry with desire. I was dying to feel his tongue delve into me. I wanted to feel the invasion, the penetration.

  I was practically climbing the wall.

  My body frantically searched for release.

  Finally, he lowered me to the ground, moved his body on top of mine, and captured my gaze and never released it. He stared deep into my eyes, joining our souls, linking our energy.

  Ethan pressed deep within and stopped moving. Taking that moment did something to me. I felt a connection and closeness I had never felt before. I looked into Ethan’s eyes and just watched. I watched the man as we became one.

  “I’m yours, Ethan,” I softly admitted.

  “I wanted nothing more than to hear those words.”

  I moved my lips to his and kissed him until I felt that our lips had melted together. His breath was mine; my breath was his. I felt his tongue lightly move along mine, his hands caressed, we embraced.

  Ethan moved his body in and out of mine in a slow, sensual pace. He caressed my hair and smiled softly while looking into my eyes.

  Without saying a single word, he kissed one breast then the other. He sucked one nipple and quickly moved to the next. He kissed, and he licked every part of my stomach. I couldn’t get enough. I couldn’t get enough of his touch. I needed more. I needed Ethan like I had never needed anyone in my life.

  He positioned his body so that he could thrust his cock inside of me once more, driving his sex deep within me. He pulled out quickly, only to drive back in with a force of pure lust.

  “Look into my eyes,” he said.

  Ethan’s gaze penetrated my soul, demanding for me to stare into his eyes, never looking away.

  I reached for his face and slowly traced the edge of his jaw with my fingertips as he brought my orgasm closer and closer.

  Ethan pressed harder into me once again and began to kiss a trail of soft kisses along my neck. “Mine. Mine.”

  The animalistic fire burned deep within my core. I whispered into Ethan’s ear, “Yours.”

  Ethan flipped over, allowing me to straddle him. My lean thighs on each side of his body made me anxious for more. My hair cascading around my face made me feel sexy and seductive. I felt perfect in his eyes. In his eyes, my breasts were firm, my stomach flat and I could see in his eyes the desire he felt. Never had I felt so beautiful.

  I closed my eyes and began to rock my body in a rhythmic motion. My hips sensually pulsated to the music created by the heavy breathing of two lovers. We rocked, we turned, and we moved with each gasp, with each moan, with each passionate word.

  The fire worked its way throughout my entire body. I felt the inferno build, hotter with each driving force, hotter than I could ever have imagined. The heat caused each moan to get louder, each gasp to grow more ragged. I flung my head back and reached for Ethan’s hands. I placed them on my breasts as I began to ride with wild abandon. I went down as he went up. I moved my body faster, stoking the fire until I finally screamed out his name.

  We rocked our hips together until every last bit of completion was removed from our bodies. I collapsed on
to Ethan’s chest and could barely breathe. Ethan rubbed my back as our heartbeats struggled to regain a normal cadence as the snow blanketed the cabin around us.

  I relaxed into Ethan’s warm embrace. His arms wrapped around me completely. I snuggled into his body and inhaled slowly, imprinting his scent mixed with the cedar of the log cabin onto my heart, hoping never to forget it. We had started out as erotic and wild, it but had ended soft and romantic. The sex had turned so loving, so full of… love.

  I felt my heart rate speed up and my stomach flipped. Instantly, my once satiated body became tense and stiff. Panic was setting in. My wall had slowly come down the last week, leaving me vulnerable.

  “I’m not going to let you do this again, Jade,” Ethan murmured sleepily as he wrapped his arms tighter to secure my body to his.

  “I can’t do this. This was supposed to be casual, and right now I’m not feeling very… casual. Whether we like it or not, getting close will only make me leaving difficult. I’m just a guest for a short time. I wish that fact was different. I so wish that we could explore the option of being together, but we can’t.”

  I was surprised with my honesty. Although at this point, what did I really have to lose? This didn’t feel like a winter love affair. It felt like more, and the realization of that made the vise on my heart tighten even more.

  “Nothing about what I’m feeling right now is casual. I warned you what having sex twice meant. You’re mine whether you want to admit it or not.”

  I continued to panic. “This is a dangerous road to go down.”

  Ethan brushed his lips lightly against mine. “This is a road I want to go down together.”

  I gasped in shock. “What? Are you crazy? This road ends! This road ends as soon as the snow melts!”

  I grabbed my clothes that had been haphazardly thrown around in passion. I dressed in a hurry and was out the front door before Ethan could even wrap his head around what just happened.

  In the safety of my cabin, I busied my mind with checking in with work. I returned emails that had been piling up ever since Ethan had set his mandate of mandatory mountain living and taking time to enjoy myself. I smirked to myself, amused that I’d let a man tell me what to do. Never again, never again would I let my shield down. Anger flashed through me for allowing myself to feel vulnerable.

  I didn’t do flings.

  This was going to end up ugly and painful unless I did something to stop this now. I didn’t want my memories of Mill Creek Resort be that of a love affair gone wrong.

  I stopped typing to look out the window at the beautiful snowy landscape before me. I looked at the land that Ethan loved so much.

  I could see Ethan.

  I could feel Ethan, and if I tried, I could smell Ethan.

  What was it about Ethan that made me swoon? What power did he have that made my thoughts be consumed by him? I had no answers for why I felt so… in love in such a short time. I loved his swagger, his way. I loved… I loved him.

  A knock on the door snapped me out of my deep thoughts. I rushed to the door and opened it to find Ethan standing before me. His Mill Creek baseball cap shadowed his eyes, making it hard for me to read his emotions. The uncertainty of his mood made me feel uncomfortable. We stood in silence for what seemed like a lifetime. I decided to make the first move by wrapping my arms around his neck.

  “I’m sorry. I run. I get scared, and I run. It’s what I do. I’m sorry.”

  Ethan wrapped his arms around my lower back and slightly lifted me off the floor and carried me back into the room. Placing me down softly, he just looked at me in silence. The quiet made me uneasy. I looked down at my toes, praying that Ethan wasn’t about to end it all.

  He lightly lifted my chin so I was looking into his eyes. Very slowly, he kissed me. He kissed me tenderly, his touch sensual and full of love. His lips were soft. His tongue was light. The kiss was beyond anything I had ever felt. It was a kiss of acceptance, of understanding. Ethan embraced my face with his work-roughened hands. The texture of hard mixed with the gentle kiss, sent shivers through my body.

  “I don’t want this to end. Not now, and not when the snow melts,” Ethan confessed as he wrapped his arms tightly around me. “Yes, we live apart. I have no intentions of leaving Mill Creek, and I can’t expect for you to give up your life to move here. But I think we can work past it. I feel it deep in my gut that we can overcome that obstacle. And I definitely don’t want to stop now because we’re afraid of tomorrow or the next day.”

  I turned my body into his. “I don’t want it to stop either. I know it seems like I do because I keep putting the brakes on… but it’s because I’m scared.”

  “Which isn’t what I want,” he said. “I don’t want to scare you. But I want to see what this road has in store for us for what’s left of the winter. I want to see if we can continue down the road even beyond. I want to work on us for the time we have. I want to work hard to make the road go on.” He smiled. “And one thing about the both of us is that we’re hard workers.”

  “I’ve never worked on a relationship or on anything that involves someone else. I’ve always been a solo workaholic,” I confessed as I pressed my body closer to his.

  “Me too. But that’s okay. I don’t mind a little turbulence along the way. Just as long as I get a happy ending.” Ethan kissed my neck and then softly whispered in my ear, “I love you, Jade. I’m not going to hold that feeling back.”

  He said the words that would have made me run.

  He said the words that would have made me tense up and seek escape.

  But he also said the words that I had always wanted to hear.

  I turned my head so I could look into Ethan’s eyes. I decided that I would fight against my urge to flee. I would allow myself to say the words I’d never wanted to say. I decided to stand on the edge of the icy cliff. I needed to have trust that Ethan wouldn’t let me slip and fall. I needed to have trust… and I needed to feel love.

  “I love you, Ethan. No matter what, no matter our circumstances, I know that I do love you. And I don’t want to live my life in fear for when the mountain snow melts.”

  Chapter Six

  The knock on the door gave me the flip in my stomach I had grown to love. I hated being away from Ethan and was always happy to have him back with me. I ran to the door and flung my arms around his neck the minute I saw him.

  Ethan kissed my cheek. “Well hello. I sure do love those types of greetings.”

  I smiled flirtatiously. “Come on in here, and I may just give you a greeting like no other.”

  Ethan smiled and reached for my coat and handed it to me. “Later. I’ve got dinner ready back at my place. We don’t want it to get cold.”

  We walked in the cold faster than normal. The chill in the air had a bite as a new storm was supposed to hit us that night, and both of us were anxious to get back into a warm house. As we walked in the door, I smiled to see a blanket spread out on the floor in front of the fireplace, with the fire already going. There was a large pizza and a bottle of red wine with two glasses. The romantic image was so sweet, and so touching.

  “Pizza!”

  “It’s too cold to use the brick oven in the back of the main restaurant, but I managed with the one in the kitchen. Pizza is one of my specialties. Since you haven’t picked out any furniture for me yet, we have to resort to the floor.” Ethan smirked mischievously.

  I giggled. “Oh really? And how exactly am I supposed to go shopping to add that lady’s touch? Last I checked, we were snowed in.”

  Ethan grew serious. “I can’t believe I’m saying it, but I hope the snow never stops.” Ethan grabbed me by the hand and led us to the blanket. “Let’s eat before this gets colder than it is.”

  Dinner was spent talking about the resort. We laughed over stories about our childhood and our parents. We talked about our memories of playing together, trying to not avoid the topic of what was our reality. We also talked about his business. Ethan beamed with pr
ide whenever the resort was discussed. His love and his passion for his land were remarkable. I watched and listened. The man before me was more than I could ever dream of. He was masculine, lovely, sexy, rugged, charming and so full of life.

  “So, do you really want me to pick out furniture for you?” I asked. “I mean, when we can dig ourselves out.”

  “Well, unless you want to eat on the floor for the rest of our lives.” Ethan smirked.

  I looked at my wine glass and then looked up slowly. “How do you talk about the rest of our lives like it’s actually a reality? You make it seem so simple and obtainable.”

  Ethan looked at the fire and shrugged. “Isn’t it? The way I see it, the hard part is over. We found each other; we love each other. Rest is pretty easy.”

  “What about when I leave?” I asked as I felt panic work its way into my heart.

  Ethan looked deep into my eyes. “Well… let’s start with option number one and the one I hope you choose. Don’t leave. I want you to stay.”

  “You do?”

  “I do. I understand if you don’t want this, and I would never hold it against you, but… I think you could write some amazing books here… with me as inspiration.” Ethan smiled with a wink.

  I chuckled. “You definitely are inspiring me.” I went solemn and took a deep breath. “But are you really serious? Stay at Mill Creek… permanently?”

  “I could be wrong, but I get the feeling that you weren’t exactly happy where you were. Or why spend an entire winter here? Most people plan to be with loved ones during the holidays, and as we approach that time, you haven’t even hinted about being sad or lonely. You said you were trying to figure out the next chapter in your life. Well... Help me with the resort. Help me make this our dream and not just mine. Write and create like you’ve been doing. Start the new chapter here with me.”