Diving into the zipper pocket of her jacket, she pulled out her cell phone. “Of course. No signal,” she muttered under her breath as she fumbled to slip the phone back into her pocket. If she was in a no signal area, it should pick up as she got closer to the lodge. If the weather caused the outage, she was screwed.
Wishing like hell she hadn’t stopped at the sports shop near the resort on her way out to the trails, she limped back toward the snowmobile route. She had a warmer hat, a scarf, and thicker gloves, but a whole lot of good those items were going to do for her now that she was stuck in a blizzard. She would have been better off leaving immediately instead of making the stop for warmer outer gear and then making a phone call to her boss. Those two things had lost her time, and it would have been a valuable hour and a half considering the winter storm had just started. She could have been at Marcus Colter’s home by now.
With her scarf over her face to protect it from the brutal wind and snow, Lara made her way painfully back toward the area where she’d left the trail, stopping way too often because her leg was killing her.
Keep going. Just keep moving.
It was too damn cold for her to slow down. And it was getting almost impossible for her to see a damn thing. The landmarks she’d taken note of during her ride were no longer visible. She put her helmet back on, hoping to get better vision with the visor to protect her eyes, but it didn’t help.
She was stuck in a total whiteout and stopped to attempt to get her bearings. Refusing to panic, she leaned against a tree and squinted into the swirling mass of white that blocked her vision. That was when she thought she heard the sound of a motor blending with the howling wind.
I’m hearing things. Nobody else is going to be out in this weather.
But the noise got stronger, closer, and Lara waved her arms in the hope that whoever was crazy enough to be out here with her would see her. Fortunately, she wore mostly black snow gear. She should stand out in the whiteout conditions.
Somebody did see her, and Lara was astounded as a powerful, black snowmobile came to a stop right beside her. The person piloting the vehicle was large, probably male, but she couldn’t make out any facial features. All she could see was his helmet and the goggles that protected his eyes.
“Get the fuck on the back, Lara. Now.”
The mystery of who was out in the storm was solved as she heard the angry male bellow of Tate Colter, his voice loud enough to be heard over the brutal, wailing force of the wind.
She didn’t hesitate to admit her relief as she swung her leg over the back of the powerful machine and put her arms gingerly around the powerful body on the snowmobile. It didn’t matter that he annoyed her. She was grateful to see anybody on a working vehicle at the moment.
“Hold on tight,” he growled in a voice loud enough for her to hear him.
In the end, she didn’t have any choice but to hold onto him, nor did she have the opportunity to look for passenger holds to hang onto instead of clinging to Tate. He took off like a bat out of hell the moment she was seated and her feet were in place. The snowmobile he drove was a lot more powerful than the one she had rented. She clung to him; her heartrate accelerated as she wondered whether the guy had a death wish and he would take her along with him. He flew through the blizzard at breakneck speeds that might have been exhilarating if she hadn’t been terrified.
How could he see where he was going? All Lara could see was pure white everywhere and she finally ducked her head behind him and lowered it to his back to block the wind, unable to do anything except trust him and keep her death grip around his waist. She tried not to hamper his driving. She attempted to lean with him when she needed to, but it was almost impossible to anticipate his moves until he’d already made them. His lightning-quick actions on the powerful machine were already completed before she could even react.
After the first few minutes, her heartbeat slowed, and her erratic breathing began to normalize as she realized that Tate seemed to know exactly what he was doing.
If we aren’t dead yet, he obviously knows what he’s doing.
They were surrounded by trees, and they flew up and down slopes without a single mishap. Tate handled the drive as though he’d done it a million times before. She still thought he was insane for traveling so fast in adverse conditions, but he was obviously comfortable with it, completely familiar with the terrain.
Lara shivered, her body half frozen from the intensity of the cold winds.
Her breath hitched as the skis of the snowmobile left the ground and flew over a narrow ditch. Lara finally exhaled as they landed deftly and surprisingly lightly on the other side. They flew downhill for what seemed like the millionth time, and Tate turned the machine onto what was probably a road, a flat tract of land that wasn’t covered in as much snow. He gunned the engine and opened the snowmobile up to full throttle as they careened down the flat, open space of land devoid of trees.
She didn’t even see the house until they were nearly on top of it. Tate slowed and came to a stop in front of a large log home.
“Get inside and get warm. The front door is open. I have to put up the sled.” His voice was powerful and no-nonsense.
Lara didn’t argue. She clambered off the back of the machine, hanging onto Tate to compensate for her gimpy leg. As she staggered to the door, she saw him disappear into the haze of white almost immediately.
She turned the knob on the beautiful front door, and it gave easily. She stepped onto the gorgeous wood floor in the foyer, and stripped off her snow gear as quickly as possible. Lara frowned; she wished she had entered in a mud room of some kind. After she gathered up her wet boots, socks, snow pants, jacket, and other saturated winter gear, she veered toward what looked like a kitchen, and passed a lovely, rustic living room with antique fire equipment that decorated the walls and shelves on her way. With her arms full of wet gear, she didn’t have time to admire the kitchen, although it was definitely large and looked like any cook’s dream. Relieved, she located the laundry room and mud room to the garage off the kitchen. She hung her wet things on the hooks provided and searched the kitchen for a towel. The house was gorgeous, and she didn’t want to leave water on the beautiful wood floors. It might be a log home, but it was more of a mansion than a little cabin in the woods. Everything was custom, the detail put into the construction evident in every wooden beam adorning the ceiling to the luxurious wood floors. It was interesting how the builder had managed to make the home feel rustic…yet elegant.