It was pitch black out when Auggie awoke and discovered she was alone in the bed. Stretching, she took mental category of how she felt. The answer was simple -- she felt great. Maybe, she thought as she threw off the covers, even slightly smug.
Then she tripped on the empty pizza box that Josh had sailed across the room at some point, and the buzz of her post-coital glow dimmed. Practicality reared its ugly head.
Last night really shouldn’t have happened. Josh was here to sign a contract they had still to discuss. Rather than doing her job, she’d spent her time doing… him.
Big oops.
Very big, she reminded herself as images flooded back, and some of the smug returned.
And just where was the big man in question? She’d fallen asleep in his arms, but now the house was silent around her. She stepped into the washroom and when she came out moments later, she was dressed in Josh’s sweater over her favourite jeans.
She liked this sweater. She might just hold it for ransom until that contract was signed.
The door to his room was closed. Auggie stopped and looked at it for a moment before continuing downstairs. She refused to be disappointed that he’d chosen to sleep alone after all they’d shared.
It wasn’t like they were a couple. They’d merely shared a single night. Just because the sex had been so good that it was also a night she knew she was never going to forget didn’t mean he was obligated to spend the entire evening in her bed. That idea was just her being a girl. So, she sighed, and resisted the urge to let herself into his room and climb into the bed beside him.
There were creaky spots in the flooring of a house this old. Still, Auggie knew them all. She avoided them now. In her socks, she was completely silent as she slipped from room to room. The fire had burned itself out she noticed as she passed through the moonlit room. In the kitchen, she flipped on a light then peered into the refrigerator and checked out her options.
She may have eaten half of a pizza not too long ago, but she’d also expended a whole lot of energy she wasn’t in the recent habit of using. The way she was feeling, starvation seemed a real possibility. When she closed the fridge, her hands were full of sandwich fixings. The one she prepped was just massive enough.
She poured herself a glass of juice and carried it and her sandwich into the office. Without bothering to turn on this light, she flicked on the tele. She kept the volume low as she scanned through the Netflix viewing options.
Settling herself into the armchair Mellie liked to use whenever the trio were holding business meetings, Auggie curled her legs underneath her and got comfortable. She snagged a throw blanket and covered her lap. Feeling completely content, she took a big bite of her sandwich.
On the screen, an uber sappy Christmas movie had started to play, the establishing shots taking her to snowy, small-town USA. The downtown streetlights were trimmed in bright red bows, the tree-lined drives sparkled with Christmas lights. It was Christmas crack at its finest, and since it completely suited her mood, Auggie chewed contentedly as the beautiful blond woman in her butt-ugly Christmas sweater bumped -- literally -- into the hot young hero with a bad ‘tude and rugged mountain gear. The flyers the blond held went flying, and mountain dude bent -- reluctantly, it seemed to Auggie -- to help her pick them up.
Auggie took a second bite of her sandwich, then just happened to glance out the window. The reflection of her show danced in muted shades against the glass, so she had to look twice, but she was pretty sure there was someone in her yard. It was impossible to be certain given how dark the night still was, but she thought she saw what looked like the glow of a cell phone.
Scratching her eyebrow in confusion, she stood and walked nearer the darkened window. It was there again, a soft blue glow, as if someone was holding a phone away from their face.
Auggie was more curious than afraid. Her brain was too logical to think that anyone who meant her harm would pause long enough to make a call before attacking. She just wasn’t sure who could be out there. Since there really was only one way to find out, she abandoned her sandwich and prepared to search out a pair of boots.
Whoever it was, they appeared to be standing in the middle of her back yard. Auggie could make out little more than a shadow that was occasionally lit by the flare of blue light.
She didn’t think whoever was out there wanted to hurt her, but that didn’t mean she was investigating without some sort of protection at hand. Glancing around the office, she found very little that might help defend her in a fight. Until, that is, her eyes fell on the shadow of the stapler on Isla’s desk. Auggie palmed it tightly as she left the room.
The side door creaked slightly when Auggie pushed it open, and in the stillness of the night, the noise roared in her ears. If there’d ever been a light in the yard, it was gone now. She was blinded by utter darkness, and she kept one hand on the side of the house in order to keep her bearings.
“Hello?”
Auggie tried her best to keep her voice quiet as she called out. The result was a hissing whisper effect. Even if someone was out there, she doubted they could have heard. Then, from out of the darkness, the snowball pelted against her thigh.
She yelped. And whipped the stapler in the direction the snowball had come from. It was a move that was all reaction, but apparently she hit her target, because there was the sound of a thud and some creative cursing in an Irish accent.
“Josh?”
“You beaned me with a stapler. Why would you do that?”
“You pelted me with a snowball,” she exclaimed. She stood there peering into the dark and listened to the sound of his laughter, then a second snowball sailed past her. It missed by less than an inch to splatter against the wall of the house.
“Hey!”
She ducked and side-stepped to the sound of Josh’s laughter drawing nearer, then she squatted and grabbed up her own fistful of snow. She was pretty sure she could see him now, his shadow looming darker than the rest of the night around them. At least, she figured that was as good a direction as any to pitch the snowball she’d packed in her own chilly fingers. She wasn’t sure she’d hit him, though, until he came running up out of the darkness and she saw the powder on his shoulder.
He also had a wicked grin on his face.
“Oh, it’s on now, fine thing,” he said, and tossed another snowball her way. This one hit the top of her shoulder and enough of it sprayed up that she shrieked and stiffened momentarily as freezing cold snowflakes slid down the collar of Josh’s sweater. The next moment, she was in motion. Laughing hysterically, she dodged and ducked, and tossed snow in his direction.
The powder exploded in his face, coating his brows and lashes, but it didn’t slow him down. She bent, made another quick grab for a fistful of snow, and turned it into a weapon on the run. Pivoting, she tossed it, and had the satisfaction of seeing it explode off the top of Josh’s forehead.
“Nice shot, fine thing,” Josh said.
Next thing she knew, the man was moving at a sprint straight for her. Shrieking, she did her best to evade, but it was a lost cause. The man was fast.
He was on her in minutes, his laughing face looming out of the darkness as he snagged her waist and lifted the hand full of snow in the direction of her face.
“Don’t you dare.”
It was like waving a red cape at a bull. Of course he dared. Pressing his palm to her face, he twisted his wrist, and gave her a thorough face washing. For good measure, he shook a sizeable clump of snow down the back of his sweater, too, and smushed it into the skin of her back.
He couldn’t stop laughing as her face turned pink from the chill while she spluttered with laughter and shock at the same time. She struggled in his arms, doing her best to evade him. When the slow slide of icy snow tracked down her spine, though, she jerked, and hissed in a breath.
When she pointed a very pink-looking finger in his face, he only laughed harder. Which was, of course, his undoing.
“You are seriously going to pay for that, McLaughlin,” Auggie announced. Hooking her leg behind his knee, she pushed him until he toppled backward. Dropping down to her knees, she pounced. With a leg on either side of him, she tossed dumps of snow into his face. Underneath her legs, his body twisted and before she knew what was happening, she was flat on her back and he was on top of her.
When he’d flipped their positions, his sweater had slid up her back and now her bare skin pressed into the freezing snow. Yelping, she bucked up and yanked the wool down to cover her body. Josh obviously interpreted that as more aggression, because she’d no sooner slid the sweater down than he grabbed her wrists.
He lifted her arms above her head. With just a slight alteration in his body weight, he pinned her there. No matter of wiggling or laughing underneath him made him relent.
“Joshua McLaughlin,” Auggie sputtered, “Let me up, right now.”
“I think no,” Josh said. When in response, she started to curse him out in colourful and imaginative ways, Josh simply tisked at her. “Such language, Mo Cuishle.”
“I’m freezing my arse off here,” Auggie complained. Her eyes flashed up at him with a mixture of laughter and frustration, and something Josh thought looked a lot like arousal.
“Well, now, that would be a shame,” Josh said, his eyes full of teasing laughter.
It had her bucking against him some more, and this time, she managed to dislodge him. Laughter spilled out of her, and she started to scramble away, tossing snow in his direction as she went. She didn’t get far, though. He had her tackled and pinned again in seconds, his laughter matching her own, even as snow melted and dripped off his chin.
“I’m Catholic, fine thing. I’m a big believer in punishment. And you haven’t had yours yet.”
“Oh no, you don’t.”
She started shaking her head back and forth in the snow. Laughing, he scooped up a handful of snow. He lifted his arm high. She was laughing and squirming, flushed and alive and so unbelievably beautiful underneath him. He knew she expected him to toss the snow in her face, was braced for it, but at the last moment, he released the grip he had on her hands, scooped open the collar on his sweater, and deposited the mound of snow on her chest.
She shrieked and started batting at herself frantically while he sat back on his knees and laughed like a loon. She launched herself at him, and this time, he caught her, wrapped his arms around her back and crushed her to him.
“Kiss me, fine thing.”
She blinked at the sudden change of mood. Play time over. Sexy time beginning? She could roll with that. Her lips met his, found his chilled and wet from the snow. Satisfaction had her lips lifting. She’d given as good as she’d gotten. As her lips quested over his, she knew she could do the same in his arms.
Her tongue slid into the heat of his mouth and the chill of the snow they sat in faded from her mind. Her hands slid under his clothes to stroke down the skin of his back. In response, he grunted and arched away from her touch.
“Your hands are frozen,” he said.
“I know. Want to take them indoors and warm them up?”
A man would have to be a complete eejit to say no to an invitation like that. Josh was no eejit. In a single, smooth motion, he stood and leaned down to offer her his hand. When she took it, he hauled her up out of the snow.
She smiled at him when his arm went around her waist and pulled her into his side.
“I can’t remember the last time I had a snowball fight,” Augusta said. “You know, you’re kind of a fun time, McLaughlin.”
“And, I’m not done yet, fine thing.”
He held open the door for her, then waited as, standing framed in the doorway, Auggie turned to face him.
“What were you even doing outside?”
He shrugged. “I couldn’t sleep. It seemed a good time to call back to home.” Standing on the step above him, she was almost at eye level, and Josh reached out to slide his hands underneath the hem of her sweater.
Her skin jumped under his fingers and she hissed at the feel of his cold hand at her waist.
“That sweater is soaked,” Josh said. “We need to get you out of it.”
There was a smile on his face that widened when his words had her sucking in a breath in anticipation. His hands tightened against her, and he lifted her effortlessly until there was room for him to step inside. He kicked the door shut behind them, and let his fingers roam across her skin, enjoying the way it shivered under his touch.
“The couch or the bed?” Josh asked her. “Lady’s choice.”
“The shower,” Auggie replied. “I’m freezing.”
Josh smiled at her in response. “Good thing I know just how to warm you up.”