Cabin Fever

by Felicity Heaton

  "My father named me after a boat he owned ... one that sunk.” She didn't bother hiding the fact that she didn't like her father.

  Jack gave her a questioning look.

  "Everyone calls me Kate."

  He cocked his head to one side and narrowed his eyes softly on her. “Like ‘kiss me, Kate'?"

  Her stomach flipped, and she tried to ignore the butterflies that danced with anticipation in it as she found herself trapped in his gaze.

  "Something like that.” She dragged her eyes away from his and reminded herself to breathe.

  Staring down at her knees, she desperately searched for something to say as silence descended on the room.

  Chapter 4

  Kate was still staring at her knees a few minutes later when Jack sniffled again. She watched him as he pulled a tissue out of his pocket and held it against his nose as he closed his eyes, pausing for a second before sneezing.

  "You okay?” She gave him a concerned look and blinked as his eyes met hers.

  "Not dead yet, but I do think I'm coming down with something. It must be this healthy clear mountain air.” Jack gave her a smirk that turned into a smile when she giggled.

  "How about a warm brandy? My dad used to make us drink them whenever we got sick up here,” she said as she stood with a little effort and hobbled towards the bar.

  He followed her lead and stood. She looked over her shoulder at him and saw he was frowning.

  "You're the sister?"

  "Stepsister, thank you very much. I am in no way related by blood to that idiot,” she corrected him as she opened the drinks cabinet.

  "So what's the relationship then?"

  "Bitter,” she said and when he smiled at her comment, she mused that he had a nice smile. “My dad left me, mom and my sisters a few years ago and shacked up with his mom in England. He's a total pain. It was hate at first sight."

  "My mistake,” Jack said as he filed the information away and then moved around to couch, leaning his backside against the rear of it as she frowned at the bottles in front of her. “Let's try this again then. You're the stepsister?"

  She smiled and he found it was contagious as he grinned at her.

  "One of them,” she said as she rifled through the bottles, searching for the right one.

  "And there's another one down in town with Nick?"

  "Yeah. I have another, too. My youngest sister is at home with mom. There's just me here ... stupid ankle,” she muttered and then turned to face him with a wide smile as she held up a bottle of brandy. “Aha!"

  "Indeed.” He watched her closely as she disappeared into the next room and when she didn't come back out again after a few moments, he followed her.

  She was gently warming the brandy in a pan on the stove when he walked into the kitchen. Her eyes were fixed on it, an intense look of concentration on her face. She moved her wrist the slightest amount, making the brandy whirl around the base of the pan.

  An absent smile wound its way onto her lips.

  "Looks like happy thoughts to me,” Jack said as he leaned against the counter next to her.

  "Just thinking about my dad,” she said with a sigh that revealed to him that there was something more to the tale of her father leaving for another woman.

  Something that she wouldn't want to talk about, no matter who was pressing the subject.

  But then everyone had dark times.

  Even him.

  His were blacker than the midnight skies.

  Kate pulled the curtain aside enough for her to see out into the night. She frowned as snow swirled past the window and listened to the wind howling in the rafters.

  "Sounds like a wolf,” he said with a wide grin that made her think of one as she looked at him.

  "Creepy...” she murmured and hoped that he didn't hear. The last thing she wanted was to sound as though she was scared.

  She'd never been up here without her family before and even though she had company, she was starting to feel very much alone. Her earlier thoughts on the mountain came back to her and she realised that it was true—the mountain felt cold and lonely without her friends and family. Not even Jack was making her feel any better. Telling herself that she was just feeling like this because she was worrying about her sister and her friends, she looked at Jack where he was standing only a few feet from her.

  "It's all right. I think the beasties will be tucked up in bed in this weather.” He flashed her a smile.

  She took the pan off the stove and placed it on the side to let it cool.

  As she heaved another sigh, Jack started wondering what her story was. She didn't seem at all like Nick had described her. She was far prettier for starters and there was a sparkle in her eyes that told him she could be quick witted when given the opportunity.

  There was also an edge to her sigh that said that she had too much concern for someone so young.

  He stifled his desire to reach out and place his hand over hers where it was resting on the counter. Instead he swallowed down the confused emotions in his throat and tried to maintain a level head, because feelings clouding judgement was never a good thing.

  He'd learnt that the hard way.

  Pushing away from that thought, he remembered that she had every right to be anxious about the storm because of her sister and took a step towards her.

  "I'm sure everything is okay,” he said in what he hoped was a gentle, reassuring tone. When she nodded solemnly, he relaxed again. His previous thoughts swept back in and engulfed him.

  Kate glanced over at him as he looked down at his feet, and she ran over his words in her head. There was something suddenly melancholy about his body language. His arm was wrapped tightly around himself and his eyes were downcast, staring at the tiled floor with furrowed brows.

  When he looked like that, she found herself wanting to wrap her arms about him and hold him until whatever was bothering him went away.

  Her eyes widened a little as she realised what she was thinking about. She barely knew him; she shouldn't be having thoughts like that, especially when she'd never had thoughts like that about men in the past. She pressed her hand against her head. Everything was happening so fast that it was making her feel dizzy. Whenever she let go of her reservations, she felt so comfortable around him. It was as though she'd known him for years. For a split second, she wondered if he somehow had the elusive ‘it’ she'd been searching for.

  A beat.

  She laughed internally over how ridiculous she was acting. She was caught up in a storm with a man that she barely knew and thinking that there was something happening between them other than companionship. It was probably just the stress and craziness of the situation that was making her feel this way. Tomorrow morning, she would wake up and everything would be less confusing and a lot clearer. She was going to realise that he was just another guy and there was no ‘it'. No friend of Nick's could possibly have what she was searching for.

  He arched a brow as he looked at her.

  She found her gaze locked with his again and smiled awkwardly when his eyes shone with concern.

  His look caused a feeling of warmth to spread through her. She quickly turned her attention to the pan and brought it around to the glasses, filling them with equal quantities of the drink.

  "Here.” Kate pushed one of the glasses towards him, too scared of her own feelings to pass it to him and risk touching his hand as he took it from her.

  Jack picked up the glass and went to thank her but she was already disappearing from view again.

  Following her into the living room, he slumped into the chair by the fire and looked at her where she sat opposite him. She was staring into the fire. He looked there also and realised that it was starting to burn low, causing the shadows in the room to grow long.

  He sipped his drink as his gaze shifted until he was watching her out of the corner of his eye. In the low light, she wouldn't be able to see well enough to know that he was studying her. His brows knit as it dawned on h
im that since arriving he'd done nothing but look at her.

  He couldn't take his eyes off her.

  When she was sleeping.

  When she was in his arms.

  When she was leaning in so close to him that he could smell the sweet fragrance of her shampoo.

  He was completely enthralled with the girl. The fact he was following her everywhere was testament to that.

  Mentally berating himself for getting caught up with Nick's stepsister, he tried to drag his eyes away from her. He managed to get them to rest on the fire for all of a few seconds before they found their way back to her.

  Kate could feel him watching her; she could feel his eyes boring into her face as she kept hers fixed on the flames and tried to resist looking at him. She didn't know what had gotten into her. He was beginning to get her more jumpy than the idea of her sister being down in town without her, or the snowstorm outside. Something about him drew her in and made her want to look at him, and it was something that she was powerless to resist.

  Raising her eyes, she avoided meeting his and roughly took in his face, trying to search out the reason behind why she was feeling so nervous around him.

  He was cute.

  No, handsome.

  He was clearly older than her brother and his friends but it was difficult to say how old. His lower lip was fuller than his top and she remembered just how alluring it had been earlier in the evening. His eyes and his brows seemed darker in the fading firelight than they had been in the bright kitchen, and there was a twinkle of intelligence and confidence in them. He had a well-sculptured face. His cheeks and jaw were strong but not overly defined. From what she'd seen of him in the kitchen, he didn't have a broad build. He was slimmer and more athletic than she'd expected him to be.

  And strong.

  Warmth spread through her as she remembered the way he'd picked her up outside, carrying her back to the safety of the cabin and holding her tightly against him.

  "So what are you and your sister doing up here? Nick said we'd have the place to ourselves.” He broke the silence and swirled the brandy in the glass as she looked at him.

  "Did he?” She frowned at the mention of her stepbrother and put her glass down on the little side table. It seemed to break her mood and change her view of Jack, making him suddenly seem as bad as Nick. “Well ... he should have arranged with dad, because we had booked the cabin for these two weeks. If it hadn't been for Jayne—"

  "Jayne?” Jack asked with a questioning frown. The last he'd heard her sisters were Connie and Jemima.

  Taking another sip of the warm liquor, he surmised that she had been right about it; he felt as though it was chasing away his cold already.

  "Two of my friends came up with us. This was all their idea. They were trying to get me out of the office.” Kate sighed. “It was supposed to be two weeks of perfect blue skies and ski. Then Nick shows up ... then this happens..."

  His gaze dropped to her ankle as she pointed at it and wriggled her foot the tiniest amount.

  "Then you happened.” Her voice was a quiet whisper as he met her eyes.

  "It sounds to me as though I was the icing on the cake. Is this why you're bitter about Nick?” He placed a few pieces of wood onto the fire when the room became too dark to make out her face and when the flames caught them, he found that she was smiling at him.

  "No, I'm always like this about him. He's a jerk. He'll do something so nice, like carrying me down the mountain this afternoon, and then he'll counter it by convincing everyone to go into town with him tonight and leaving me here alone ... and then mentioning that this other guy is yet to show up."

  He smiled awkwardly. “I had to get some kit."

  "He said. Ski kit?"

  "No. Just some stuff for my job.” His expression became more awkward and he settled back in the armchair.

  Kate read his look and decided that he really didn't want to talk about his job. She couldn't blame him; she didn't want to talk about her job either. They were on vacation, that mystical time where your job doesn't exist.

  She wished life could always be like this.

  Finishing her drink, she looked at the fire and then at Jack. He was staring at his brandy, his brows raised and his expression blank. There was something about him that didn't fit with the type of guy her stepbrother usually hung around with.

  "Pretty bad weather out there.” He glanced at the drawn curtains as the wind blasted against the house, making the fire dance as a gust came down the chimney and into the room.

  "Yeah. The rangers said it was going to be clear for a few weeks yet. Guess they were wrong.” Her eyes moved to fix on the window as she listened to the wind outside. It was howling in the roof again, pushing against the windowpanes and rattling the loose ones.

  "The snow was falling fast. I barely made it up the mountain in my Hummer."

  Kate just stared at him slack jawed. “Hummer?"

  He definitely wasn't the kind of guy her stepbrother usually made friends with.

  "Is that a problem? I mean, I saw your Jeep ... it's a nice little vehicle."

  "Little? My Jeep is a perfectly respectable size. You drive a monster. I'm surprised it made it up here at all. The road isn't wide enough.” She gave him an incredulous look as he chuckled at her.

  "It's not a monster and it did get me up here. Which is a good thing for you."

  "It is?” she said with an air of sarcasm and a small smile.

  He laughed again. She decided that she liked the sound of it. It made her want to laugh along with him.

  "I couldn't imagine you all alone in this cabin in this weather.” His look turned serious.

  She stopped dead mid-giggle.

  She just looked at him as he silently conveyed how appalling that idea was to him. He'd barely known her a few hours, but the look he was giving her made her again feel like they'd known each other for years.

  "I would've been fine. There's food and the rangers would've dropped by once my sister contacted them."

  "If you ran out of food you could've gone out and killed something with your pen.” He chuckled.

  She giggled for a while and then shook her head.

  "I have a rifle.” She smiled at him. “It would be much more effective than my pen."

  Something in her eyes told Jack that not only did she have a rifle somewhere in the cabin but she also knew how to use it.

  "Good to hear,” he said and thought about the idea of her having a gun in the house. It was probably a good thing. If anything happened, they would have a way of defending themselves.

  He pulled his mobile phone out of his pocket and raised a brow at it. There was no signal. He looked at Kate and found she was staring with wide eyes at her own phone. The lingering trace of hope in her expression faded and she slipped the phone back into her pocket. Clearly, hers wasn't getting a signal either.

  Listening to the storm outside, he decided that he should've brought his kit in from the car. He'd been in such a hurry to get inside and had meant to go back out to get the rest of his luggage but then he'd seen Kate sleeping and it had been game over. The task of bringing his kit in had drifted to the back of his mind and he'd only remembered it when she'd mentioned him having to pick up some things before coming to the cabin.

  He couldn't bring it in now. There had to be at least two feet of snow outside and he would barely be able to see in the blizzard, let alone find his Hummer in the drifts.

  Kate sighed heavily as she thought over what he'd said earlier about her being alone up in the cabin during the storm. Part of her was thankful for his company because she'd never liked being alone. That was most of the reason behind why she still lived at home with her sisters and her mother. Her imagination always seemed to run away with her, making her hear and see things that weren't actually in the house, especially when it was dark.

  Looking across at him, she gave him a little smile as he looked at her and then found herself again trying to picture him with her stepbroth
er. He just didn't seem to fit.

  "So how'd you know Nick?” She inclined her head to one side as she looked at him, studying his face as she tried to figure out the connection for herself, as though he wasn't about to tell her.

  "Similar interests,” he said in a flat tone and kept his face impassive. He never had liked being scrutinised and there was something about the way that she was doing it that made his guard finally go up. She looked as though she was searching for something deeper than the answer that he was willing to give her.

  She looked as though she could see right through it to the real reason.

  "We met in London, in a pub. Got talking."

  She nodded as though she was accepting it was a viable way of meeting her stepbrother.

  "How long have you known him?"

  "Little over a year,” he answered without pausing to think.

  He frowned as he wondered just how many questions she was going to ask. He felt as though he was on trial for some crime that he knew nothing about, unless she counted knowing her stepbrother as a crime.

  "Not long then,” she said and his frown intensified. Her teeth teased her bottom lip as her look turned awkward under his scrutiny and she quickly smiled. “I don't mean to be rude ... it's just you really don't seem like the usual idiots he hangs around with. Ryan and Jonathon are dumb enough ... but you ... you seem too smart."

  He wondered if she was always this suspicious of new people and tried not to let his anxiety show in his face. He couldn't mess this up and he certainly wasn't going to let her mess it up for him. He'd worked too long and too hard.

  "Maybe I am...” he said with a chuckle and relaxed into his chair again as he pushed all the tension out of his body. “Nick's a breath of fresh air. You never know what he's going to do next. Well, sometimes you don't know anyway."

  Kate thought that was an odd reason to be friends with Nick but realised that it was all the answer she was going to get from Jack, at least for now.

  Staring at the fire, she sighed as she watched it popping and crackling as the wind made it dance. She propped her head up on her hand as she yawned and her eyes began to feel heavy again now that her mind wasn't racing through questions and theories on Jack and her stepbrother.