We marched on for hour after hour. The silence should have made it easier but it just made everything I’d said go round and round in my head. With each step I took through the snow, the pull towards her got stronger. She was the one woman I could maybe have something real with and she was the one woman I could never have. I wanted to scream in fury.

Just get through this. Get her back to JD like a good friend.

The temperature dropped fast. I could see Erin shivering and I pressed tight against her to try to keep her warm, my arm around her waist and my hip rubbing hers. The pull became unbearable. She was all wrapped up in military clothes and a beanie hat but, to me, she was the sexiest woman alive. I had to keep my eyes on the mountain because if I so much as glanced at her, I was just going to grab her and kiss her.

The snow was blown sideways by the wind and plastered us, making our limbs heavy. Visibility shrank and shrank until we couldn’t see anything beyond ten feet. The snowdrifts got deeper and deeper: I was soon up to my knees and Erin was up to her thighs. We trudged on, forcing our way through, bent over against the wind. I could feel my face going numb and that triggered a memory. I spun Erin to face me and put my face close to hers.

Shit. Her nose and ears were already turning red. “We’ve got to wrap ourselves up,” I yelled over the wind. “Or we’re going to get frostbite.”

I dug around in my pack looking for something to use and finally thought of the bandages in the first aid kit. I wrapped them around Erin’s head, protecting her ears and nose, going down to where the high collar of her jacket protected her mouth. She looked like a mummy, just her eyes showing….

I stopped.

Her eyes were so bloody beautiful. That gorgeous shade of pale blue, so vulnerable that I just wanted to hug her and yet so brave that it left me awestruck. There was concern there, too, concern for me, even though it was meant to be me looking after her. And that aching need, nervous and twitchy but overwhelming….

I was crouching in front of her, my hand on her shoulder. I slid it up over her bandaged cheek and stared at her, rubbing my thumb across her cheekbone. The cold had weakened me. I felt my willpower crumbling.

She tilted her head back, moving her mouth out from behind the shelter of the jacket’s collar and took a shaky breath. I looked at her lips.

I couldn’t stop looking at her lips.

And then I was leaning forward to kiss her.

28. Erin

28

ERIN

His head dipped. I drew in my breath, my lips parted….