Page 19 of Love Below Zero

19

CRIME SCENE

BECKY

Note slipped under Rebecca’s door:

Black holes don’t suck. They are like any other object in space, but with a very strong gravitational field.

I stomp up the stairs, stewing like a pressure cooker that’s about to explode. As soon as we’re out of earshot from the kitchen, I round on James.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Okay, harsh question. But goddammit, he was being absolutely insufferable.

He stops in his tracks, one hand tugging at his hair.

“Rebecca, I would love to hash this out with you, but I cannot think straight covered in cocoa. Please let me change first.”

Blind rage possesses me. I’m also covered in cocoa and egg goo. It’s in my hair. My freshly washed hair. Hair that can only be washed once a week because we have eight minutes of shower time.

He is not going fucking anywhere.

I close the distance between us, grabbing the back of his shirt collar before pulling it over his head and down his arms, dropping it on the floor between us.

“Better?”

His eyes darken, a muscle in his jaw twitching. I’m almost too mad to notice his bare chest. Almost. His stomach is toned and his chest is covered with a light dusting of blond hair. I want to touch him. Run my fingers over his body. Wrap my hands around his neck. I’m not sure if I want to strangle him or kiss him. Maybe both?

His warm breath washes over my face, sending goosebumps down my body.

“Allow me to return the favour,” he says gruffly before catching the hem of my shirt and lifting it over my head. I’m too angry to speak, or even give a thought to what my body looks like. His eyes rake over me like he’s drinking in the pages of his favourite book.

He reaches behind me for the door to my room, yanking it open. His other hand grabs my waist, pushing me backwards as he walks us into the room. The door slams shut behind us, the room quiet except for our heavy breaths. He swings us around, pushing me up against the door. His bare chest presses against mine and all the air leaves my lungs.

“You are the most infuriating woman I’ve ever met,” he growls before his lips crash down on mine.

It only takes a split second for my anger to melt into desire. He’s making an excellent case for kissing instead of arguing at the moment. I still want to do both. My hands trail across his chest, over his neck, and into his hair. I tug hard and he moans against my lips. I’ve wanted to run my fingers through his hair since the day I met him. I pull him closer, gasping as his tongue slides into my mouth.

He kisses me like I’m the last breath of fresh air on a barren planet. Honestly, I shouldn’t be surprised considering he has a tendency to do everything to the fullest. His hands wander over my bare stomach, grabbing my hips and holding me firmly in place against the door. His touch is fire and I want to be burned so badly.

I am still mad at him though, and the kiss is anything but sweet. It’s hot and angry, our tongues clashing, teeth biting.

“Rebecca,” he groans into my mouth and a rush of heat goes straight to my core. I need him closer. I detangle one hand from his hair, raking my fingers down his back. He hisses in pleasure, his hips rolling against mine.

Fuck, he’s already hard.

He runs his hands over my sides, his fingers tracing the undersides of my breasts. I should be self-conscious right now, absolutely dying of mortification at being half naked in front of him, but somehow I feel safe. It’s in the way he touches me, like he’s worshipping every inch of me. Like he can’t believe his luck.

We break apart, our breathing ragged. His lips trail across my cheek, down my neck, and I arch into him.

“You are so unbelievably stunning,” he murmurs, teeth biting into the skin below my ear. I have no other choice but to believe him. This man has never once lied to me. He’s always been brutally honest, even when he doesn’t need to be.

“James,” I groan, pulling his face back to mine and kissing him again. I want more of him. Fuck, I want all of him. I reach for the waistband of his sweats and he stills. I stop, looking at him.

His expression is a mixture of want and doubt. He lets out a long, slow breath before stepping back.

Cold rushes into the space where his body used to be. I wrap my arms around myself in a half-assed attempt to cover up.

“We can’t ...” He tugs at his hair. It’s even messier than before. He looks pained. “This was a mistake, I’m so sorry.”

His words hit me like a meteorite. A mistake. No, a mistake is accidentally setting the kitchen on fire because you dropped a dish towel on an induction plate you forgot to turn off.

He kissed me intentionally, and now he’s too chicken to own up to it.

I lift my chin, glaring at him. “Get out.”

He opens his mouth like he wants to say something else, but thinks better of it. He nods, pulling open the door and stepping out into the corridor. As soon as the door closes behind him, I let out a breath.

Oh my god.

Oh my god.

James Reid just kissed me. His lips were on mine, his hands were on my body. The fucking nerve of this man. Kissing me and then storming off, saying it was a mistake. His face is a mistake.

I pace the small confines of my room, hands gripped tightly behind my back. This is not good on so many levels. First, what the hell am I doing kissing the man who doesn’t have any nice things to say about me? He’s got a stick so far up his ass, I’m surprised you can’t see it when he opens his mouth. Second, he’s our first officer, technically my supervisor. You can’t just go around kissing commanding officers. I’ve written this exact scenario, and it never works out for anyone.

Somewhere in the Traverse Galaxy my own book characters are laughing at me. It’s karma for the hell I put them through. Now they’re giving me a taste of my own medicine. There is so much irony in the room I can build a spaceship.

I flop down onto the bed, my heart still hammering in my ears. It feels like I can run a marathon, which is very out of character. I wouldn’t run a marathon even if a horde of aliens were chasing me. I would just succumb to the probing.

Okay, maybe I shouldn’t think about probing and James Reid at the same time. I’m already so confused.

The kiss just felt so good. Right.

And then he ruined it.

I don’t believe in fate, or some higher power that makes the perfect person for each of us. And while I might write about these things, I don’t really believe that such a potent and intrinsic connection between two people can exist naturally. Sure, I am physically attracted to James, but that kiss made me want more. More than just his body. It’s the kind of kiss that has me picking out baby names. And I don’t even want children.

Good grief, girl, get a fucking grip.

I groan, rubbing my eyes. I need to check the CO2 filters in here, because I’m sure fantasising about your arch-nemesis is a symptom of hypoxia.

It doesn’t matter anyway, considering he made it clear how he feels about all of this .

“This was a mistake.”

The words still ring in my ears, their meaning morphing into you are a mistake .

Girls like me never get the guy. He’s a conventionally attractive, well-to-do scientist with a respectable career. I’m just a frumpy almost-washed-out romance author.

Of course he doesn’t want me. Who could ever want me? I barely remember to brush my teeth most days and I can’t resist chocolate to the point where it’s detrimental to my health. This is a proximity thing, that’s all. His options are limited in the dome. It’s the astronaut equivalent of beer goggles. Or is it just Stockholm syndrome at this point? Either way, neither of us are in our right minds. This is the kind of stress this experiment was designed to put us under. So we folded once, no big deal. I’m sure astronauts on the space station get into this sort of dilemma all the time.

But he called you stunning, and he kissed you like it mattered , my traitorous brain whispers. He did do those things, and I believe him. I look down at my still naked torso. Maybe he isn’t the type to care that I don’t have the perfect body. Could it be that my body has nothing to do with his feelings in the first place? I’m too frazzled to try and puzzle that out.

I get up again. Pace. Pull on some new clothes and try to get the goo out of my hair. Next week’s shower time cannot come fast enough.

I’m about to go back downstairs when the book James gave me catches my eye. I reach for it, flipping it open. Several of his stupid sticky notes fall out, the ones he had been shoving under my door every morning. I’m sure he meant for the notes to help me with my writer’s block, but they are having the opposite effect. I feel more blocked and conflicted than ever.

I should burn this fucking book and all of his fucking notes.

I don’t.

Instead, I read through them all again, grinning at some of the more ridiculous space facts. Why did he have to be so damned contradictory?

Sighing, I close the book, putting it back in its place before going back to the scene of the crime.

I can’t concentrate on the cleanup or dinner, and I barely even taste the chocolate cake before excusing myself and heading to bed. My dreams are not free of James Reid, and by the time my alarm goes off the next morning, I’m hanging on by a thread. I bolt upright, eyes immediately zeroing in on the ground in front of the door. There lies a blue rectangular note. Relief washes over me, and I scramble out of bed to grab it.

I was convinced I would wake up and there would be nothing under my door. I wasn’t sure I could handle that. Whatever is going on between us is not dire enough that he stopped. I shouldn’t feel the tiniest tingle of hope in my chest, but I do. As long as there are still notes, everything will be fine.

I slip the note in with the rest before getting dressed for gym. By the time Joanna knocks on my door, I’m semi-composed.

The urge to tell her everything bubbles up as soon as I see her, but I tamp it down. I can’t let anyone know what happened last night. Even though I hate to admit it, James is right. We can’t compromise this mission. Serious scientists do not kiss other scientists, and I have things to prove. To him and to myself.

In fact, I came to the same conclusion he did, after much tossing and turning. We should just pretend the kiss never happened.

I work out all of my pent-up sexual frustration on the weights, and collapse into a puddle of sweat afterwards. Joanna eyes me suspiciously.

“Are you okay?”

No. I accidentally on purpose made out with James Reid last night after almost burning a hole in the dome. Then I had a dirty dream about him and couldn’t sleep for the rest of the night. And now I’m lusting after a man I can’t have.

“Just fine,” I wheeze, still out of breath from the workout. Joanna drops down on the floor next to me, holding out a water bottle.

“Rough night?”

“You could say that.” I gulp down the water, my heart rate finally slowing.

“Do you want to talk about what happened?”

Desperately. But I can’t. I can’t even put it into an email for Mac, because our comms are monitored and I don’t want this getting out. We’re already under a lot of media scrutiny and I don’t need to add more fuel to the fire.

But I also desperately want to unpack this whole situation with a friend. I need to know if James kissed me because he actually likes me, or because his options are limited. I can’t trust my own feelings anymore and I need to work through them.

“I’m having trouble with my book,” I say, turning on the mat to face her. “My character’s motivations are unclear.”

Joanna’s face lights up and she lies down on her stomach next to me. It feels like we’re two girls at a slumber party, talking about boys. Indirectly we are, I guess, if I find a way to spin this properly.

“I’ve been dying to hear more about your book.” She grins. “Please tell me more. No, scratch that. Tell me everything.”

“Okay so my main characters are stuck on a spaceship,” I start, and then realise that I actually don’t have to make up much of a story for me and James. The fourth book I’m procrastinating on writing actually follows a similar plot. “They never liked each other, but now they’re stuck and about to die, so they kiss.”

Joanna gasps. “Talk about a slow burn, woman. We’ve been waiting for this kiss since they met two books ago!”

“Yes, but now I’m wondering if it’s the right time. Trapped in a situation like that, are their feelings even real? What if they get out and realise they really do hate each other?” I don’t think I’d survive that. If I let myself believe in here that James wants me, cares for me, and we get out in two and a half months and he goes back to disliking me and my work, I would never recover. I didn’t think I would already be in this deep, but maybe I’ve been in it since the beginning. I like him, despite the way we butt heads. I think. Do I only like him because he’s the first person to kiss me in a while? Am I being Stockholm-syndromed?

God, now is not the time to have several existential crises .

Joanna eyes me, wiping a bead of sweat from her forehead.

“They like each other, I’m sure of that. Look at his behaviour from before they were stuck. He’s been obsessed with her since the beginning.”

I mean, yes. But I wrote those characters. I wrote him to be obsessed. James is a different story. I think back to the last few months. He held my hand on the plane ride over. He brought me snacks, the kinds I don’t have to worry about eating. He bought my book, and that was almost a year ago. He’s clearly read it many times since then. Are all of these things proof of his feelings?

“Why are you doubting your work?” Joanna asks, and the question hits closer to home than I want it to. It’s all become so tangled up. My writer’s block, my feelings for James, this mission.

“I have a bad case of writer’s block,” I say. I don’t mention how it’s because of James. That no matter how many times I read the praises he wrote in his annotations, I still can’t get his first review out of my head. I’ve been holding this grudge for so long I don’t know how to not carry it. Plus, I am still a little angry at him for just leaving like that last night.

“I see.” Joanna nudges my shoulder. “You’re all twisted up because of James.”

“I am not,” I instantly protest.

“Oh please, the International Space Station can see the tension between the two of you from orbit,” she scoffs. “And I saw the way he looked at you last night. You two sure took your sweet time getting cleaned up after the fireball.”

“I had to get egg goo out of my hair. That takes time,” I grumble. “There is nothing between us. He doesn’t even like me as a person.”

“He likes you. Trust me on that.” She’s quiet for a moment before adding, “Maybe he’s struggling with those feelings too.”

“Doesn’t mean he can be an asshole about it,” I groan, rubbing my eyes with the palms of my hands.

“I’m not making excuses for his behaviour,” Joanna says. “But I think it’s important to understand the whole of a person before judging their actions. It doesn’t have to change anything between you two.”

“No, it doesn’t,” I agree. “But maybe it puts things into perspective.”

“So will you two kiss and make up now?”

I can feel my cheeks heating up at the mention of kissing James.

“There will be no kissing.” Well, no further kissing. Of that I’m sure. I saw it in his eyes last night—he’s not going to step out of line again. “That would be extremely unprofessional given the circumstances, and it would negatively impact the mission.”

Now I sound like James. Those were probably the exact thoughts he had while kissing me last night, only his brain got to them faster than mine did.

“So you’ve thought about kissing him?” Joanna smirks. “Maybe I will win my bet with Eli.”

“You know what, I don’t even want to know about it.” I check my watch, sighing. “We should get a move on, breakfast starts soon.”

“Fine, but we will continue the kissing conversation. I’m going to need so many more details.”

I get to my feet, stretching out a hand to help her up.

“Don’t hold your breath.”