She grabbed her phone and distracted herself with her daily morning chore—checking her email for a response to one of her resumes. Any response at all would do. But, like yesterday and all the days before that, she had zip.

Sucking in a breath, she braced herself for the rush of cold before sliding out of bed. The early light drew her to the window, where the mountains backdropping the resort seemed to mock her.

She yanked the shade down.

Yesterday she’d unloaded her suitcases from her car but hadn’t unpacked. So she dug through them until she found a sweatshirt and pulled that on over her PJs. She added wool socks and then stood in the middle of her apartment hugging herself. There was no central heater in the place, just a woodstove.

With no wood.

The welcome letter on the counter read:

Utilities come with the rent. The stacked wood by the dumpsters is free. So is the Internet.

We hope you’ll take advantage of some of the recreation the resort offers this summer season; biking, climbing, rafting, kayaking, a ropes course … the sky’s the limit.

Enjoy your stay.

That would be easier to do if she were back in San Diego, where it didn’t get cold at night. Or ever. Where she could insulate herself from her past with a nice, solid thousand miles between herself and Cedar Ridge with all its memories.

Including Aidan Kincaid.

Shivering again, she stomped into her Uggs. Then she opened her front door to peer out and see how far away the woodpile was. At least a hundred feet away off to the left, she discovered, next to two large dumpsters. She looked down at herself; oversized sweatshirt, hood up, PJ shorts in pink plaid with KISS IT on her butt, wool knee socks, and her Uggs. Own it, she decided, and ran down the stairs to the woodpile.

The first piece weighed far more than she remembered it would. She grabbed two more pieces and then the worst possible thing happened.

Something slithered out from behind one of the logs in her hands. At the way she screamed, one might assume that a bear had come trolling along looking to eat her up. But no, not a bear.

Worse.

It was a snake, and it touched her arm.

Tossing the wood away from herself, Lily gave another scream and did the snake dance, the one that looked like maybe she was having a seizure. This lasted a full minute before she got ahold of herself.

Torn between the snake willies and possible humiliation if anyone saw her, she decided humiliation was worse and forced herself to calmly smooth down her clothes. Nope, nothing to see here … Casually she turned to send a glare to the snake.

It was gone.