Page 54 of When the Ice Melts

“Addisyn.” He gazed at her. For an instant, his soul, so long dead and denied, quivered with life and hope and faith.

Then it all crashed back in. And with it rushed the riptide of a blind panic. What was he doing? Hadn’t he sworn not to let his emotions get involved? Why was he sitting on the edge of Whistler Mountain intentionally breaking his heart?

Get a grip!A wave of guilt crashed over his soul. Pure, black, suffocating guilt. Darius’s stomach tightened into a knot. What had he just done? He jerked away, pulling back the few inches the narrow ledge allowed.

“Darius?” Addisyn was staring at him.

He couldn’t listen to anything except the anxiety screaming inside his head. “I’m sorry.”

“Darius...it’s okay.” Addisyn looked unsure, as though she sensed the darkness that had enshrouded his soul, but her words rang with sincerity. “If we feel that way about each other, then—”

“No.” His teeth were chattering. He caught his breath around the lump in his throat. “No way.”

It was like watching a flower die, like seeing a dream be crushed. The light fled from Addisyn’s face. “What?”

She recoiled as if he’d slapped her. And in a way, he had.

“I’m sorry.” It was all he could say. Anything else, and the explanations he couldn’t hint at would be unearthed. He edged farther away, tears slipping down his cheeks, his lips. The hungry hound of shame was chasing him down.

And then the pain began. An exploding pain that wrenched at his soul and made it impossible to take a deep breath. A pain that transported him directly back to the darkest moment of his life—slamming into the wall of that Olympic ice rink. Except the pain was even more intense than it had been then. And now, he realized, that was no longer the worst moment of his life.

This was.

ADDISYN COULDN’T BEGINto understand what was going on. She’d endured a rollercoaster of emotions today, but she could never have foreseen this conclusion to the ride. She stared in confusion as Darius hastily grabbed his backpack.

“Darius, wait!” What had happened to completely alter his demeanor? His whole personality seemed to have flipped.

“I’m not that guy, Addisyn, that’s all!” She’d never seen, never imagined, calm, collected Darius so upset. Angrily he flung his goggles into his backpack and fought with the obstinate zipper.

“What guy?” Nothing he was saying was making sense.

“The guy you think I am.” Darius’s voice was high, thin, as if his emotions might make it suddenly snap like a stretched rubber band. “The big hero all decorated with Olympic gold.”

Olympic gold.And right on cue, there was that desperate look on his face again, the hunted expression of a trapped animal.

Tears were rolling down his cheeks, or maybe it was only the rain. “Just leave me alone.” The words sounded more pitiful than angry.

Leave him alone?As though she had initiated the kiss. Anger surged within her, fighting to make sense of the moment. “Wait!” She was furious now, ready to slap him, kick him, send him rolling down the mountainside the way she had done. “You can’t just—just kiss me and then run off!” The bile of betrayal rose in her spirit. She couldn’t decide who made her angrier—Darius for the way he was acting now, or herself for being that vulnerable anyway.

How could the flower of their perfect moment have borne such bitter seeds?