Page 11 of Trapped (Snowbound with a Stranger #2)

Accelerating Doom

Erin

“No one’s coming.”

Staring into the flames, my head ached with despondency.

I had no way of knowing how much time had passed since I’d sent the message to my mum, but it was a few hours at least—time where we’d built a new fire with one of the remaining available logs, reluctantly got dressed, and huddled for additional body heat before starting to watch the blaze dwindle. In all that time, neither one of us had received a response to our appeals.

How can that be right?

The question echoed in my head, heightening my misery. I didn’t know who Eli had messaged or what relationship they had with him, but I’d hoped that my own mother would have responded to my call for help.

Why hasn’t she?

Sure, it had been a while since we’d last talked, but I was her daughter, for fuck’s sake. She should have cared that I was in trouble.

Maybe the message never went through.

I clung to the idea, but deep down, I sensed it was bullshit. I’d watched that message go through and I knew it had been sent into the ether. It was possible Mum hadn’t seen the message, but it had definitely been sent.

“I can’t believe Mum hasn’t replied.”

I turned my face from the fire, the sight of the wood bearing down on me from all directions.

As a general rule, I liked wooden décor and I’d always had a lingering respect for trees, but spending so much time imprisoned by the material had taken its toll. Wherever I looked, there was more of it—endless meters of brown timber jutting out in various forms and stretching in all directions. Somehow, the never-ending nature of it had started to grate, reminding me that while the cabin had been a sanctuary, it had also become a prison, and if something didn’t change soon, it could turn into our tomb.

“Maybe the signal is intermittent.”

Eli glanced out of the window, a direction he increasingly seemed drawn to. I knew he was trying to make me feel better with the explanation, but his attempt didn’t even make sense.

“If mobile data was falling in and out, we should still be receiving replies, sir.”

I studied the fine lines around his eyes as he turned back to me.

I didn’t know how old he was, or really anything of any real consequence about the man. Even after tumultuous hours confined together, the most I could muster about him was how bloody good he looked without his shirt, but despite his ruthless attempts at keeping me as his captive, all I could think was how lucky I’d been to have him with me and how badly things could have gone without him. For a start, I’d never have found the cabin on my own. My navigation skills had always been awful, so finding my way back to safety would have been a challenge. My guess was that I wouldn’t have made it to the tourist office by myself.

A shiver passed through me at the dull certainty. I dreaded to dwell on what my plight might have been but for the man sitting beside me. We might not have always agreed about how to behave, but I knew that he’d saved me.

“I know.”

His clenching jaw conveyed something of the tension he was trying to bury inside. Even then, he was trying to carry the burden himself to relieve the pressure from me.

“I’m sorry, little girl. I don’t mean to bullshit you.”

“It’s okay.”

Reaching for his arm, I tugged him closer.

“You’re doing your best.”

Eli was such a bewildering contradiction. He was my savior, yet at the same time, he’d held me against my will, provoking the kind of rage I’d rarely experienced before. That in itself was confusing enough, but then, in the escalating dread of the wooden lodge, where there was only time, the cold and the absolute knowledge that every resource we needed was running out, something else had grown between us.

Lust, yes—the raw and unadulterated kind I’d only seen in Hollywood movies—but there in front of the fire, I sensed something else, a part of him that might actually give a shit about me beyond the bounds of the deal he’d struck with James and his own ego. Maybe it was the hunger gnawing at my belly or the low-lying trepidation that had never really gone away, but there was something different about him. His touches were lighter, defter, and more tender, and when he stared into my eyes, I saw more than only a man who wanted to conquer me. I thought I saw affection and grace.

“Sadly, I’m not sure that’s going to be good enough.”

Once more, his gaze floated to the window as though he expected to see a SWAT team diving through the glass, but predictably, there was nothing except for miles of snow and icy terrain.

There was no one else.

Only the two of us in the same dusty cabin we’d ridden the rollercoaster in so far.

“If no one’s going to come for us, then we need to plan.”

Glancing at what remained of the fire, he stared into the wispy flames.

“And you need waterproofs to avoid hypothermia.”

“But I only packed a waterproof jacket, sir.”

We’d been through my naivety and nothing had changed. I wish I’d been more prepared and had brought what I needed, but I hadn’t. I’d arrived blindly for the experience, assuming everything would be okay, and I’d been wrong.

“I didn’t think to bring anything else.”

I’d been kicking myself for my short-sighted stupidity ever since.

It was one thing to anticipate a light shower or two—an eventuality I’d packed my jacket for—but quite another to prepare for snowfall of the kind we’d experienced. I didn’t have the right kind of clothing for sub-zero conditions. Aside from a packed lunch and a jacket, I barely had anything with me.

“Then you’ll wear mine.”

Resolve echoed in his tone as though I’d missed the middle part of the conversation where we’d debated the logic of his case.

“What?”

My brow creased.

“Wear your waterproofs? But won’t you need them, sir?”

And wasn’t he considerably larger than I was?

“I’ll be okay.”

He offered me what looked like a well-practiced smile.

“It might have been a while, but once upon a time, I did train for this kind of eventuality, little girl.”

He trained for this?

“When you were a spy, you mean?”

I probed cheekily, unsure what sort of job would require someone to freeze for a paycheck.

He laughed at my quip, a sincere sound that seemed to lighten the mood somehow.

“Nice try, little girl, but discovering my big, bad past won’t be that easy.”

“Shucks!”

I shook my head playfully.

“Guess I’ll have to keep trying.”

“You do that.”

Shrugging me free of his bicep, he wrapped his arm around my shoulder and eased me closer.

“But you’ll also wear my waterproofs, Erin. They’ll help to protect you from the snow if we have to head out there.”

‘When’ we have to…

He never said the word, but I sensed the inevitability in his tone. We would run out of wood and food, and then we wouldn’t have a choice.

“I can get us back to the bridge in around ninety minutes.”

He inhaled, his fingers tightening at my shoulder.

“From there, we have to hope the roads are clear enough for us to get away from the area.”

Get away?

Shit, I hadn’t even thought of that, but he was right. Such an enormous and unexpected heap of snow would have created ramifications across the entire local infrastructure. Being trapped in the cabin had limited my sphere of reference to the narrow field of vision we had from the windows, but the truth was, we had no idea what it was like beyond them.

“Don’t look so worried,”

he consoled.

“If the roads are blocked, at least there are facilities there—toilets, and hopefully, places with electricity and heating. We’ll still be better off than we are up here.”

He was still using the word ‘we’ as though we were a couple, and peering up at him, I couldn’t decide how I felt about the assumption. The Erin I’d been before the trip wouldn’t have appreciated having a man around, but so much had transpired since the hike began. He’d helped me to discover unrealized things about myself. Could I truly contemplate any sort of a future without him?

Between the upset of losing Chelle, the stress of the storm, and every complicated emotion that had stirred between us, I didn’t know what I was feeling anymore. I was like a pebble on a beach, kicked around by one traumatic event to the next without any agency over where I landed.

“You’re right.”

It was all I could think to say in the end. My head had started to throb, the pain goading me into subdued compliance. Better that I stay with him and let him save me. Perhaps not better, but definitely easier.

“But I’m kinda hoping someone comes for us first.”

“I second that.”

He leaned closer, grazing his mouth over my right shoulder.

“I’m not giving up hope, but I’m planning for the worst-case scenario.”

“I hope they come soon.”

My laughter was nervous.

“No offense to you, sir, but this place is starting to overwhelm me.”

“The cabin?”

He stared around the place as though he couldn’t believe I’d dared to criticize the innocuous wooden structure.

“I feel like the walls are closing in.”

The pain in my head was exacerbating, throbbing in intense waves that made me want to throw up.

“It’s like literal cabin fever.”

I forced the feigned laughter from my lips, wincing at its empty tone.

“It’s okay.”

His arm stiffened around me.

“I know this has all been a lot for you.”

“For us,”

I corrected him.

“If there is an ‘us’?”

He paused, his body stilling as he stared at me.

“I’d like for there to be.”

Me too.

Gazing into his eyes, I yearned to say the words, but I held them back, too afraid to process his truth until I’d reconciled my own. I could imagine a life with Eli and all his masculine authority; a world where he put me front and center, and my backside regularly took the brunt of my errors. Oddly, that alternative universe wasn’t so disconcerting. I just didn’t know whether I could be the Erin he needed.

“Yeah, I…”

Hesitating, I wondered how I’d managed to maneuver myself into the latest labyrinth of words. I didn’t know how I felt about the idea of a relationship beyond the crazy cabin fever, but I feared the idea that he would walk away, and I’d spend the rest of my life looking for another man who made me feel the same way.

“You, what?”

he prompted.

“I want that too, but I just don’t know how this…”

I motioned between us.

“...thing works outside of here.”

“We’ll figure that out.”

He chuckled as though I was a pretty little puzzle he needed to fix, and even though a part of the woman I’d once been sensed she was infuriated by his tone, I couldn’t help but smile. He made everything sound so easy.

“That’s the fun part.”