Read Online Bedding Down, A Collection of Winter Erotica by Rachel Krame Bussel - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Rachel Krame Bussel
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Fletcher meant, but he couldn’t bring him-
self to ask the question he really wanted to ask: Was there a man who missed her? Was there someone special back home?
“Do you miss New York?”
“Manhattan. My offices are within shouting distance of my
apartment. Sometimes I think the two are interchangeable.”
“I know exactly what you mean.”
Janine nodded. “Do you ever miss your work?”
“I miss the fun of it. When I was in college, I would spend
days on end just figuring out code. Numbers are fun to me, like blocks to a baby. It holds my attention like little else can.”
“What else holds your attention?”
Despite his admonitions to himself to be the perfect gentle-
men, Fletcher glanced at Janine’s long legs. Her rakish grin said he was caught in the act. He leaned closer to the fire to hide the blush on his face, but now that he had been caught, it was easy to steal another glance.
“The wilderness holds my attention,” he said. “Trying to
fight Heisenberg.”
“Huh?”
“The Heisenberg uncertainty principle. It’s a little nugget of
quantum physics. It states that simply by observing the world,
you influence it. I like trying to influence the world as little as possible.”
Janine stared at him as if he had grown two heads.
66
G wen M asters
“What?”
“I’m starting to see the geek inside.”
Fletcher laughed. Logs dropped in the fire, sending up a hiss
and a shower of embers. They looked at each other in the fire-
light until one of them either had to look away, or do something they both might regret.
Fletcher was the one who looked away first.
“Hey,” she said.
“What?”
She reached over and took his hand. Her palm was smooth as
silk and warm, almost hot, with the steam from the mug of cof-
fee. He looked down at their joined hands. As he watched, she
laced her fingers between his, their palms pressing hard against each other. His thumb brushed her wrist, and he could feel the
heartbeat.
“I’m sorry about you and Amanda,” she said. “I don’t know
what it was like to go through the constant hounding you had
to endure, but I do know what it is like to lose someone you
love, over circumstances you can’t control. I know how it hurts, and I’m sorry it happened to you.”
Fletcher nodded, not daring to look up at her. He was afraid
of what kind of openness he would see in her eyes, and scared of what would happen if he did. He tried to remind himself that
she was a reporter, one of those who had been instrumental in
following him and Amanda to get the story for the front page,
but he found it difficult to put Janine in that category.
“Thank you,” he said, the simplest thing he could think of
to say, the only thing that wouldn’t spark more conversation.
He felt her gaze on him, as obvious as the flickering light from
S ix W eeks on S unrise M ountain, C olorado 67
the fireplace. When she sensed nothing more would come, she
sighed and looked back at the fire.
But neither of them pulled their hands away.
In the light of day, things seemed a lot less complicated on the romance front, but maybe more complicated in other areas.
Fletcher realized this when Janine’s litany of frustrated sighs turned into curses. She was tired of being snowed in, angry at
the cookstove for something he couldn’t guess, and mad as hell
at the world.
“Shit!”
The wooden spoon flew across the room. It bounced against
the wall of the cabin and landed on the rug in front of the
hearth.
Fletcher looked up from the shirt in his hands. He was stitch-
ing with a needle and stout thread, mending a tear he had gotten while carrying in an armload of wood. He pulled the needle
through and watched as Janine stormed about the kitchen.
They had checked off days on the old, faded calendar. Yesterday marked two weeks of being snowed in.
It was the longest two weeks of Fletcher’s life, for so many
reasons.
“What’s wrong with you?”
She whirled to
self to ask the question he really wanted to ask: Was there a man who missed her? Was there someone special back home?
“Do you miss New York?”
“Manhattan. My offices are within shouting distance of my
apartment. Sometimes I think the two are interchangeable.”
“I know exactly what you mean.”
Janine nodded. “Do you ever miss your work?”
“I miss the fun of it. When I was in college, I would spend
days on end just figuring out code. Numbers are fun to me, like blocks to a baby. It holds my attention like little else can.”
“What else holds your attention?”
Despite his admonitions to himself to be the perfect gentle-
men, Fletcher glanced at Janine’s long legs. Her rakish grin said he was caught in the act. He leaned closer to the fire to hide the blush on his face, but now that he had been caught, it was easy to steal another glance.
“The wilderness holds my attention,” he said. “Trying to
fight Heisenberg.”
“Huh?”
“The Heisenberg uncertainty principle. It’s a little nugget of
quantum physics. It states that simply by observing the world,
you influence it. I like trying to influence the world as little as possible.”
Janine stared at him as if he had grown two heads.
66
G wen M asters
“What?”
“I’m starting to see the geek inside.”
Fletcher laughed. Logs dropped in the fire, sending up a hiss
and a shower of embers. They looked at each other in the fire-
light until one of them either had to look away, or do something they both might regret.
Fletcher was the one who looked away first.
“Hey,” she said.
“What?”
She reached over and took his hand. Her palm was smooth as
silk and warm, almost hot, with the steam from the mug of cof-
fee. He looked down at their joined hands. As he watched, she
laced her fingers between his, their palms pressing hard against each other. His thumb brushed her wrist, and he could feel the
heartbeat.
“I’m sorry about you and Amanda,” she said. “I don’t know
what it was like to go through the constant hounding you had
to endure, but I do know what it is like to lose someone you
love, over circumstances you can’t control. I know how it hurts, and I’m sorry it happened to you.”
Fletcher nodded, not daring to look up at her. He was afraid
of what kind of openness he would see in her eyes, and scared of what would happen if he did. He tried to remind himself that
she was a reporter, one of those who had been instrumental in
following him and Amanda to get the story for the front page,
but he found it difficult to put Janine in that category.
“Thank you,” he said, the simplest thing he could think of
to say, the only thing that wouldn’t spark more conversation.
He felt her gaze on him, as obvious as the flickering light from
S ix W eeks on S unrise M ountain, C olorado 67
the fireplace. When she sensed nothing more would come, she
sighed and looked back at the fire.
But neither of them pulled their hands away.
In the light of day, things seemed a lot less complicated on the romance front, but maybe more complicated in other areas.
Fletcher realized this when Janine’s litany of frustrated sighs turned into curses. She was tired of being snowed in, angry at
the cookstove for something he couldn’t guess, and mad as hell
at the world.
“Shit!”
The wooden spoon flew across the room. It bounced against
the wall of the cabin and landed on the rug in front of the
hearth.
Fletcher looked up from the shirt in his hands. He was stitch-
ing with a needle and stout thread, mending a tear he had gotten while carrying in an armload of wood. He pulled the needle
through and watched as Janine stormed about the kitchen.
They had checked off days on the old, faded calendar. Yesterday marked two weeks of being snowed in.
It was the longest two weeks of Fletcher’s life, for so many
reasons.
“What’s wrong with you?”
She whirled to
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