“Hi, you’ve reached Lu—” Static ate away the rest of Lucy’s greeting. “Leave a mess—” More aural fuzz. “Call you back.”

The beep came through loud and clear.

“Lucy, I’m at the cabin and Ian Petrov showed up—but you know that already. Long story but the power just went out. Our cars are buried in all this snow. If anyone can figure a way to get us out of here, it’s you. And you owe us for setting this up.”

In an effort to block the icy wind blowing in all directions that sent the quicker-falling snow swirling around her, she turned and ended up facing the large living room window. Ian stood on the other side, his feet planted hip-width apart and his arms crossed over his muscular chest, glaring straight at her. Again. What was with this guy? He rushes to pluck her out of the snow and carries her back to the house like something straight out of a movie but then gets sulky the moment she says her arm isn’t about to fall off? Did he want to play hero or watch her writhe in pain? Falling back on the skills she learned as an angry, disaffected teenager, she itched her nose with her middle finger while scowling right back at him. Mature? Nope. Satisfying? Yes.

“If we kill each other, I’m going to come back as a ghost just to haunt you,” Shelby said into her phone as she turned away from the man who totally discombobulated her. “Call back and send help, please.”

Sending up a prayer that the message wouldn’t be totally garbled, she squared her shoulders and walked back into the cabin. The heat from the now-crackling-to-life fire hit her as soon as she walked in the door, a welcome blast of comfort after the frigid ice fingers of the wind reaching through her sweater. It was like getting out of the shower and wrapping a fresh-from-the-dryer towel around herself.

Closing her eyes, she let out a long, satisfied sigh. When she opened them again, Ian was staring straight at her, and she would have sworn she’d caught a glimpse of something softer for a whole half a second before his body tensed and he went back to his usual lump-of-stone posture.

Okay, then.

“I left a message for Lucy,” she said, taking off her boots and heading straight toward the fireplace, hands tingling in anticipation of the heat. “The connection wasn’t the greatest, but hopefully enough of it got through.”