Stranded: A Winter Romance Duet

by Samantha Chase

  Taking a step back, Beckett took one of her hands in his. “I’m not sorry that we did that, Hope. And I can’t say that it won’t happen again. Soon.” And with that, he led her from the room and began the tour of the lodge.

  Hope only listened with half an ear at first because all she could think about, all that seemed to fill her mind, were thoughts of more kisses.

  Chapter Six

  She was beginning to wonder if she had imagined the kiss.

  They had toured all ten of the guest suites; each was decorated differently so that they had a personality of their own and were all exquisite. She’d already seen the study, the dining room and the kitchen, but on the first floor there was also a large common area that ran the entire length of the back of the house and that’s where they were currently standing. The one wall consisted of floor-to-ceiling windows so you could look out on the property.

  “It’s breathtaking,” she said, stepping close to the glass and looking out. The snow wasn’t falling nearly as hard as it had earlier. Behind her, Beckett walked to the far corner and threw a switch. She gasped. “Oh, my goodness. It’s like…really like a winter wonderland out there.”

  Outside, woven along the branches of many of the trees, were white twinkly lights. No spotlights, no stadium lights, just thousands upon thousands of little white lights. They seemed to go on for miles. Hope pressed even closer and looked from side to side and couldn’t spot where the lights ended. “Oh, Beckett,” she sighed, “it’s so beautiful. Absolutely beautiful.” She almost jumped right out of her skin when he pressed up behind her, his arms wrapping around her waist.

  “Are you feeling adventurous?” he murmured against her ear, his breath warm and enticing.

  “That depends,” she purred, tilting her head in hopes of Beckett’s lips coming back to press against her skin. She smiled when his lips trailed a path down the column of her throat. He pulled back way too soon.

  “How would you like to go for a walk outside?” he asked softly.

  The way Hope was feeling at the moment, she could use the freezing temperatures to cool herself down. There was only one problem. “I don’t think my boots have dried out from my earlier adventure. Besides that, they’re not really meant for the snow.”

  “Not a problem,” he said as he stepped back and took one of her hands in his again. “We have an abundance of boots and coats and hats that we stocked from when we used to open this to the public.”

  Hope shivered. “I’m not really big on wearing other people’s clothes,” she said lightly, but Beckett continued walking.

  “You won’t be. We have a supply closet downstairs that is full of inventory that was never worn. They’re all brand new and still have the tags on them.”

  It was hard not to question him about why he would hold on to this kind of stuff rather than donate it to a local homeless shelter or even sell it, but she was having too much fun with him to say something that may very well lead to a fight.

  They walked down to what would be considered the basement level even though it was above ground. There was a large game room with Ping-Pong tables, air hockey tables, dart boards and pool tables. Hope thought it seemed like a shame that they sat here unused for so many years.

  Again, not a topic to bring up right now.

  Back in the corner of the room, was the supply closet. Beckett opened the door and reached in and turned on a light. Hope stood there in stunned silence. It was a large walk-in closet and the bars were lined with dozens of coats in seemingly every size and color. On the shelves there were boots that were still in their boxes and in bins on the floor were packages of hats and gloves.

  “Take your pick,” Beckett said and stepped aside.

  “Oh…I don’t know. I don’t feel right just taking these,” she said, still frozen to the spot.

  “Hope, it’s not a big deal. Please. They’ve just been sitting here in storage not being used. From what I saw earlier, you didn’t have a heavy coat to wear. Or a hat. Or gloves. Come on. Let’s find you what you need and go out and walk along under our man-made starry sky.”

  When he put it like that, Hope couldn’t say no. Scanning through the rack, she found a coat in her size while Beckett found her a pair of boots. She went through the bins and found a set of matching hat and gloves and stepped out of the closet. Beckett followed and they walked back up the stairs to the study in silence.

  “Why don’t you get those on while I go and get mine from my room,” he said, motioning to her new boots. “I’ll meet you upstairs by the back door.”

  Hope watched him walk away and sighed. Why couldn’t he be like this all the time? Like every day all the time? How much better would everyone feel if Beckett loosened up a little bit and actually treated everyone with kindness?

  Topic number three to keep to herself. It was almost getting painful at this point.

  The boots fit like a dream and as Hope stood up, she couldn’t help but admire them. They didn’t often get snow in her part of North Carolina so snow boots were never a necessity, but she knew that these were top-quality boots and she loved them. As she walked up the stairs, she put on her coat and took the tags off of the hat and gloves. When she arrived at the back door, she admired the view while she waited.

  “How do they fit?” Beckett asked as he walked into the room.

  “Perfectly,” she said with a smile. Without a word, Beckett held out his hand to her and Hope placed hers in it. They walked toward the back of the house and she was almost giddy at the thought of walking in the snow under all those twinkly lights.

  The cold hit them like a sharp slap in the face when Beckett opened the door, but they quickly donned their hats and gloves and looked at each other with huge smiles as they braced themselves to walk outside.

  “You sure you want to do this?” he asked.

  Hope stepped around him and felt her feet crunch through the snow that was beginning to harden and ice over. “A little too late to ask,” she said impishly. “You’re not chickening out are you?”

  “Me? Never.” He closed the door to the house and took her hand again so they could slowly make their way across the massive back deck to the stairs that would lead them down to the ground.

  “Do you have someone to come out here and shovel or do the snow-blower thing or do you do it yourself?” she asked.

  Beckett shrugged. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been up here during a storm. Norma usually handles it all so I’m guessing that she hires someone. She’s great at many things, but I don’t see her as the type to be out here clearing the decks, porches, stairs and walkways in the freezing temps.”

  “That would be something to see.” They both laughed and carefully made their way down the dozen steps that led to the ground below. The snow was deep, a little over a foot, so they were going to be walking slowly no matter where they went.

  “I can’t even remember the last time I went for a walk in the snow,” Beckett said, looking around in wonder.

  “Me either. You know how it is back home; if it snows even an inch or two, everything shuts down. I tend to just stay inside and wait it out until it starts to melt.”

  He chuckled. “Not that we get this kind of snow often by us. I park my car in my garage and then I get to the office and park in that garage, so I pretty much stay out of it. Now I see that it’s actually not all that bad.”

  “Well, I think part of that feeling is because of what you created here. I mean, look around you! The sky is cloudy because of the snow and yet it looks like a clear, star-filled night. You can just barely make out the moon over there.” She pointed up toward the sky as some clouds were slowly making their way across the light of the moon. “It’s just…amazing. I know I keep saying that but I can’t help it. If there were music playing out here, it really would be a winter wonderland.”

  “Why music?”

  “To set the mood even more. Something Christmas-y,” she said with a grin. “Nothing with lyrics, something instr
umental that just puts you in the mood.”

  “For what?” he asked thickly from beside her.

  Hope blushed at the implications. She glanced over at him. “For the holidays. For Santa. For…dancing in the moonlight.” And before she knew it, Beckett had spun her around and she was wrapped in his arms and swaying to an imaginary song in his head.

  “You mean like this?” he asked as he rested his forehead against hers.

  She sighed and snuggled closer, swaying slowly along with him. “Yes. Exactly like this.”

  And then suddenly it wasn’t an imaginary song in anyone’s head, Beckett was humming. Hope smiled against his chest as he hummed out the melody to “Winter Wonderland.” And it didn’t surprise her one bit to find that he did it perfectly. There seemed to be no end to the man’s talents.

  They stayed like that, with the snow falling around them, swaying under the lights and the moon for a long time. Hope felt Beckett occasionally place a kiss on her temple and she softly hummed her approval. It was perfect. No one had ever done anything like this with her…or for her. If anyone had said that she’d be dancing in the middle of a snowstorm, in the moonlight, with a man that she couldn’t quite figure out, she would have said they were crazy.

  Now? Not so much.

  Beckett leaned in and rubbed his nose against hers and she shivered. “I think we should go in. You’re cold.”

  “It’s cold out,” she replied quietly, not wanting this moment to ever end.

  “That it is,” he chuckled. “But maybe we can get Norma to whip up a little more hot chocolate before she goes to bed.”

  Well, maybe the moment could end – for now. “That sounds wonderful.”

  “Your winter wonderland will still be here tomorrow. We can come out again if you’d like and maybe, just maybe, we can arrange some real music.”

  Reaching up on her tip-toes, Hope kissed him gently on the cheek. “I think tonight’s music was wonderful.” Then she reached for his hand, and was the one to lead them back to the stairs, up to the deck and back into the house.

  ***

  A girl could get used to this.

  That’s what was going through Hope’s mind as she and Beckett once again sat in front of the fire in the study. They were each in their own chair, but Beckett had positioned them so they were closer together. Norma had prepared hot chocolate for them to warm them up and Hope was feeling very warm and content overall. If only…

  “Too bad there isn’t a couch here,” she said wistfully.

  “What?”

  “You know, instead of the chairs. It would be nice if there was a big, overstuffed couch here in front of the fire.” Looking over at him, Hope couldn’t quite determine what he was thinking. His expression was fairly neutral, so that meant there were at least a thousand possibilities of what was going on in his mind.

  “Back when we used to have this open as a resort, it was smarter to have more single-seating options in here. Even when we were here as a family, this room wasn’t used very much. We tended to either gather down in the game room or in the back room or even the dining room.” He shrugged. “I never gave the décor much of a thought for this place. It’s just always…been.”

  “I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with this; these chairs are very comfortable. It’s just another possibility, you know, like you have up in some of the suites.” Earlier when they were touring the rooms, there were two suites on the top floor that had large sitting areas with a sofa in front of their fireplace. They were the only rooms that seemed to have them and it made for a very inviting space.

  Beckett looked over at her and grinned. “Up for moving some furniture?”

  Was she? It was getting late, almost ten, and it had been a long and exhausting day. But still…

  “Not from the third floor,” she said, returning his smile.

  “I would never ask that of you.” Standing, Beckett placed his mug down and walked across the room.

  Hope watched him and there was a doorway that she hadn’t noticed before. Beckett opened it and stepped inside, pretty much assuring her that it wasn’t a closet. She stood and followed him and stopped in the doorway.

  It was his bedroom.

  “Oh,” she whispered. It was bigger than all of the rooms she’d seen already, even the suites on the top floor. He had a full wall of windows along the back wall that looked out onto the property. How had she not noticed that when they were walking around outside? Everything in this room, however, was new and updated. Fresh paint, new plush carpeting and even without knowing anything about high-end furniture, Hope could tell that everything in this room was top of the line.

  It wasn’t surprising, but she couldn’t help but step into the room and look around. Beckett was standing beside a sofa that sat in front of a large stone fireplace that was almost as large as the one in the study.

  “I was thinking we could move this out into the study,” he said and placed a hand on the sofa.

  “What? Why?”

  “It sounded like a good idea.”

  “But…it’s already in front of a fireplace. Why move it?”

  Slowly, Beckett stepped around the sofa and came to stand in front of her. “Hope, if I had said ‘Oh, I have a couch in my bedroom, why don’t we go and sit in there?’ are you telling me you wouldn’t have been offended?”

  Would she? Hope wanted to think that on some level she might have been but the reality was that the thought of sitting in front of a fire in Beckett’s bedroom was very appealing.

  Maybe even too appealing.

  Becket stepped in closer and put his hands on her waist. “Hope?”

  What could she say? If she said she wouldn’t have been offended, did that make her sound too anxious? Too easy? On the other hand, if she said that she would have been, then they’d go back to sitting in their separate chairs and that was just…well, it wasn’t the most exciting option she could think of.

  “I…,” she looked up and met his gaze. Beckett’s eyes were dark, his expression serious and if possible, Hope was beyond caring about everything she knew about him before. She wanted to live right here, right now with the man she was coming to know tonight. “I wouldn’t have minded.”

  A slow smile crept across Beckett’s face as his head lowered toward hers. “We could always start a fire in here.”

  “I think we already have,” she whispered and went up on her toes to close the distance between them.

  There was no slow start to the kiss, once their lips touched it was explosive. Hope was surprised that the fireplace didn’t simultaneously burst into flames from the heat they were generating. Beckett's arms banded around her middle as her own wound up around his shoulders as they pressed closer together.

  There were no warning bells in her head. Her subconscious was suspiciously quiet. If Hope had to venture a guess she would have to say that this was right. Her being here with Beckett – in his home, in his bedroom – was exactly where she was supposed to be. And as her hands raked up into his raven-colored hair and she heard a growl from deep in his throat, she’d have to say that Beckett felt the same way.

  Over and over his lips moved over hers. They kept moving against one another as if trying to find a position that was perfect for them. Beckett began to move them toward the couch and once they were beside it, he carefully began to sit down and pulled Hope with him until she was straddling his lap. And still they didn’t break the kiss. Hope wiggled in his lap and that’s when she felt it, the proof that he was just as turned on as she was. Beckett’s strong hands grasped her hips and held her firmly against him and Hope almost cried out at the contact.

  It was exactly the position she had been trying to get to.

  When they finally broke apart, they were breathless. Hope slowly licked at her lips and smiled when Beckett growled again. She leaned forward, her forehead against his and sighed. “What are we doing?” she asked quietly and then could have kicked herself. She would have been perfectly okay
moving forward without uttering a single word. They had a terrible tendency to argue as soon as one of them spoke.

  “I thought we were just going to move some furniture, but I like what we’re doing way better,” he teased softly and placed a gentle kiss on the tip of her nose.

  Hope chuckled. “Beckett…”

  “I know, I know.” Reaching up, he cupped her face in his hands and put a little space between them. “I want you, Hope. I’ve wanted you since the first moment I saw you.” He paused and studied her face. “I never expected to have the chance to, not after the way things were going back home. I knew how you felt about me, the real me, and I knew that if you ever found out the truth, you’d hate me. And you did.”

  “Beckett…”

  “It’s the truth, Hope,” he said simply. “But you’re here now.” His hands made a slow path across her cheeks, down her throat, over her shoulders, down her arms until they were resting on her hips again. “And I really want you to get to know me, not the person that you think you know or the person that you’ve heard other people talk about, but me.”

  “I want that,” she admitted. “And I think you know that I want you too. It was the same for me. That night at the office was a great night for me. Meeting you wasn’t something I ever expected and I was pretty devastated earlier today when I realized who you are.” She swallowed hard. “But…I’m willing to take a chance here and not let what I thought I knew about you affect what I’m feeling about you right now.” Her eyes met his and held.

  “Are you sure?”

  Hope nodded. “I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow, but I know how I feel right now, Beckett, and what I want.”

  “And what’s that?” he asked thickly.

  “I know that I don’t want to move furniture,” she said with a sexy grin. “At least, I don’t want to move it to another room. I’m pretty content with staying right here in this one and seeing how we can maybe make some of this furniture move.”

  For a minute, she thought she’d been too bold, too obvious and that maybe Beckett had gotten turned off by her silly banter. She was just about to apologize, to try to take it all back when she noticed the heat in his gaze. “Beckett?”