Page 46 of The Unlikely Pair

“We need to get warm quickly. Your wet clothes will wick the heat away from you. You need to remove them.”

Toby shrugs off his coat and blazer, then starts to pull off his shirt, but his hands don’t seem to work properly. Without thinking, I reach over and help him unbutton his shirt.

I never thought I’d be undressing Toby Webley, but now isn’t the time to dwell on the peculiarity of this situation.

I hesitate when I get to his underwear, but Toby doesn’t seem modest, pulling down his boxers like he’s simply discarding another layer.

My mouth goes dry at the sight of the rounded curves of his buttocks and the light dusting of hair on his upper thighs.

I make myself swallow, dragging my eyes away.

This is a survival situation. Nothing more, nothing less.

I repeat that mantra as I remove my own clothes. There’s no point in being a modest corpse. I need to get warm. Fast.

The survival kit lies remarkably unscathed at Toby’s feet. I have to rub my hands together frantically before my fingers regain the dexterity to unzip it. But once I manage to open it, I discover that, thankfully, it appears to be waterproof, and I grab the survival blankets like they are the holy grail. I spread one on the ground to provide some insulation from the coldness of the rock, then wrap one around Toby’s shoulders.

It’s probably a testament to how freezing Toby is and the fact he recognizes our dangerous predicament that he makes no comment when I slide in next to him under the blanket. We’re both completely naked, but I’m refusing to think about that now.

His skin is cold and clammy against mine. Goosepimples prickle across his flesh as shivers wrack his body. His curls are plastered to his forehead and droplets of water cling to his eyelashes and drip down his cheeks. I reach forward to grab two energy bars out of the kit.

The only way to ensure Toby can hear me over the noise of the water is to lean my mouth close to his ear. “Here, you need to eat.”

“I thought we were going to conserve them,” he replies through the rattling of his teeth.

“It’s more imperative that we get sustenance into our bodies now,” I say.

I wonder if Toby gets my subtext. There’s no point in dying from hypothermia while conserving energy bars we’re never going to consume.

It’s hard to eat through clattering teeth, but I force myself. Chew. Chew. Swallow. Chew. Chew. Swallow.

Toby has closed his eyes and seems to also be focusing all his effort on chewing and swallowing. I lean over to rub his arms, trying to help get circulation back into them. His skin is like ice beneath my palms, the fine hairs on his arms standing on end.

His eyes open. His pupils are large, swallowing the color of his irises.

He takes another bite of his energy bar as I continue to rub his arms. He doesn’t pull away.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the temperature inside the blanket warms up. The small flicker of heat growing between us feels mystical, something I don’t want to focus on in case it turns out to be an illusion.

Toby’s shivers subside into the occasional tremor as I work my hands over his arms. His skin begins to lose its icy pallor, a hint of color returning to his flesh.

He leans into my touch, his head drooping forward, his chin nearly resting on his chest.

“Feeling better?” I ask, my voice coming out husky.

Toby snaps his head up. He’s so close that even in the dimness, I can see the flecks of green in his hazel irises.

A shiver runs through me, but I know it’s not from the cold.

The air between us feels thick, filled with tension.

When Toby finally speaks, his voice is barely above a whisper over the noise of the water. “Thank you.”

I’m at a loss for words. Having Toby’s eyes this close to me, fixed on me, seems to have stolen my ability to speak.

I have to swallow twice before I can reply.

“Well, I don’t believe Oliver Hartwell would speak to me again if you perished out here, and given I’m going to be the next prime minister, that could make any interactions with the royal family rather awkward,” I finally manage to say.