Elise Campbell power-walked home, the cold wind whipping at her face, but her feet were so, so comfortable in her boots. She would figure out how to skate this winter. She was determined to do it. She’d go several times a week until she was speeding around the rink like Zach.
And Zach…
Well.
He was part of the reason she kept on falling. Looking at him did a number on her concentration. Tall with cropped brown hair—she’d finally seen his hair when they’d taken off their skates—gray-blue eyes, strong jaw. And when he’d pulled her around and around, she had an overwhelming sensation of his power—she bet that navy winter jacket hid large muscles.
Once or twice, he’d looked at her peculiarly, and she had the feeling he rather liked the look of her, too. Which made her heart skitter in her chest and her legs feel all wobbly.
In short, Zach made her ass attracted to the ice. It was hard to skate in his presence. But if she could master skating with him around…
She’d probably never see him again. Thinking he was attracted to her—that was just wishful thinking. She’d gathered her courage and asked him to have coffee, only to be shot down. But it shouldn’t have been surprising. Men who looked like Zach would never say yes to her.
Damn, she felt like a fool for asking.
But she felt better once she was home and had an enormous mug of hot chocolate in hand. With mini marshmallows. This year she was going to have the childhood she’d never had. She was going to learn all the things she’d never learned and have a ton of fun.
»»•««
“How was your date?” Elise asked Marissa in the lunch room the next day.
“I might go out with him again,” Marissa said. “Better than the other men I’ve met online.”
“Resounding praise.”
“Yeah.” Marissa laughed. “Unlike the last guy I went out with, he didn’t fancy himself a poet and tell me repeatedly that my eyes reminded him of an endless desert of sparkling sand. What does that even mean? And unlike the guy before that, he didn’t text me an hour after our first date to declare his undying love for me.”
“That was a little creepy.”
“You’re telling me. So yeah, this guy was refreshingly normal. Perhaps he’s waiting for the second date to bring out his crazy side.” Marissa shrugged.
Elise and Marissa were both structural engineers at Barlow. Elise had been there for two years, and in that time, she’d seen Marissa bring only two different lunches: cheese, spinach, and salami sandwich; or green salad with chicken. Today she had the latter.
Marissa had a bite of her salad. “No more first dates with strange men, not for a little while. But I could go for another girls’ night in.”
“Me too,” Elise said.
“I can’t do this weekend, but maybe two weeks from now? Does that work?”
“Sounds good.”
“Awesome. I’ll see if Jill’s around.”
Girls’ night in meant beer, board games, and Brit pop. And occasionally talking about men. Though it was usually just Marissa who talked about men. Jill was married and Elise rarely dated. She considered bringing up Zach now, as Marissa munched away at her salad. But there was nothing to tell, really. Why did she keep thinking about him?
“You know what else I never did when I was young?” Elise said. “Tobogganing.”
“You never went tobogganing?” Marissa’s fork paused halfway to her mouth, and she looked at Elise in horror.
“Maybe we could do that as well.”
“I should be able to find some old sleds at my mom’s. It’ll be a bit weird though, a bunch of grown women going tobogganing. We should steal a kid for an hour or two—then it’ll be more normal.”
“Because stealing a kid is a totally normal thing to do,” Elise said.
“Why not?” Marissa adjusted her glasses. “I steal kids all the time. Well, borrow. Babysit. Same difference.”
Elise nodded toward the door. One of the project managers had just entered the lunch room.
Marissa coughed—it looked like she was suppressing a laugh. “So how was skating?” she asked. “You went, didn’t you?”
“It was good, I guess. Though I’ve got a long ways to go. A very long ways.” But I’m determined to do it. Also I met this cute guy, and he helped me and held my hand. And then he shot me down for coffee. Do you think he might show up again next week?
But Elise didn’t say any of that.
»»•««
Elise went to the rink that Wednesday. Zach wasn’t there, but she didn’t expect him to be.
On Sunday morning she went again, at exactly the same time as last week. Her heart pounded in anticipation as she neared the ice. Was she a total fool for thinking there was a chance he’d come?
Apparently not.
Zach was stepping onto the ice—he made it look so easy!—just as she got there. He waved at her, and she waved back and grinned. If she tried to wave while skating, she’d lose her balance. Yeah, that would probably go as well as her attempt to shake hands last week. Though he’d put his arms around her afterward, so it had turned out okay. More than okay.
As she laced up her skates, she tried to get her excitement under control. He doesn’t like you. It’s not going anywhere. And this led her on a downward spiral of negative thoughts: It never goes anywhere for you. You’ll never be close to anyone.
She knew this was a fucked up way to think. She knew she needed more therapy, but it was expensive. And the way she thought was, unfortunately, based on experience—she’d never had a serious relationship, never had a best friend. Her mother…well, that’s why she had so many problems. She hadn’t heard from her dad in over two decades. She didn’t have a normal relationship with her siblings because she’d been more of a parent than an older sister.
It was also a coping mechanism. If she didn’t hope, she couldn’t be disappointed. And she’d been disappointed a lot in the past.
So she tried to tone down both her excitement over seeing Zach and her negative self-talk. She would work on her skating and try not to get an enormous bruise this time. She would have fun. Just focus on that.
It was much nicer today, just below freezing, and there were maybe a dozen people on the ice. Although she was glad the weather wasn’t so brutal, she was a little disappointed they wouldn’t have the rink to themselves.
Zach came over and helped her onto the ice. Beneath her red wool mitten, her skin tingled slightly at his touch.
“Fancy seeing you here,” she said, trying to sound casual despite her racing heart and the gorgeous specimen of man before her.
He merely smiled. Well, perhaps “merely” wasn’t the right word. It wasn’t a mere smile—it was a knee-weakening smile. She didn’t remember him smiling last week. No, he’d seemed rather somber.
“Let’s go,” he said, starting to skate with her hand still in his.
“But there are other people on the ice.” Of course she wanted him to pull her like he had last week. She just didn’t want to collide with anyone. And if she fell, she wasn’t going to make snow angels on the ice surrounded by other people.
But for some reason, she’d done it in front of Zach. Who now ignored her protests and dragged her along a little less recklessly than last week. She knew they weren’t going very fast, but it felt like she was whizzing across the ice.
She laughed the whole time.
Unlike last week, he stayed at one end of the ice with her as she practiced all the things YouTube videos and how-to articles told her she should be doing. He gave her advice and encouragement as she attempted penguin marching, two-foot gliding, and one-foot gliding—that one wasn’t going so well. She decided to leave it alone for now and try swizzles.
“I don’t know what those are,” Zach said.
“You push your feet apart from a vee, then bring them back together.”
He nodded and then executed a bunch perfectly, just like in the videos. He made everything look so easy.
If Elise had learned as a kid, it would probably be easy for her as well. But she wasn’t bitter about that anymore. She’d gotten over it. Mostly. And it wasn’t like she could blame it all on her childhood. For most of her adult life, she’d been afraid to try anything. Afraid to do something as simple as ride a damn bike.
She attempted a swizzle. It didn’t go well. Her feet got stuck when she spread them apart. She knew she was supposed to point them toward each other now, but it seemed like she was headed toward the splits instead. And she couldn’t do the splits.
But then Zach’s hands were on her waist, and he lifted her up. When he set her back down, she turned to face him. She was very, very close to him. His chin nearly brushed her forehead. His arms were still around her. A thrill sizzled through her body, from her helmet-covered head to her toes. He has his arms around me.
“Not like that,” he said quietly, pulling away from her.
“I know.” She missed the heat of his body. “That was horrible.”
She was about to try again, but he put a hand on her shoulder.
“They’re clearing the ice for the Zamboni,” he said.
She’d been oblivious to the rest of the rink. It was hard to concentrate on anything but trying not to topple over. And being close to Zach.
They sat on one of the benches outside. Zach rested his forearms on his knees and clasped his hands tightly. He hadn’t shaved for a day or two, and she found his stubble incredibly sexy. She couldn’t help wondering what it would feel like against her skin. What it would feel like to kiss him.
“So what do you do?” he asked.
It took her a moment to remember the answer to that question. “I’m a structural engineer.”
“Which firm?”
She told him. He hadn’t heard of it, which surprised him but not her. It wasn’t a very big company.
“I work for my dad—he’s a developer—so I know a lot of engineering companies,” he said.
“Going to take over one day?”
“In a few years.”
Zach was probably quite well off. Better off than she was, anyway. Elise was one paycheck away from paying off her student loans, and normally that made her feel rich.
She turned toward him. He was looking at the Zamboni, his arms still on his knees, and he looked…haunted. Her thoughts slid back to kissing him, to wondering if a little make-out session would wipe that look off his face.
When they were allowed back on the ice a minute later, he grabbed her hand and took her for a spin again. Faster this time, but he still kept her safe, expertly weaving his way between other skaters.
She didn’t ask him out for coffee, but he offered to walk her home. She agreed. Of course she agreed. But at the same time, she reminded herself not to think this meant anything.
They passed a small park on the way up to Finch, and in an effort to cheer him up, she made a snowball and threw it at him. It hit him in the back.
“Oh really,” he said. “You want to start that?”
She ran into the park as he made a snowball of his own, which she managed to dodge. And the next two as well—he was probably trying not to hit her, gentleman that he was.
“You have terrible aim,” she said, ducking behind a tree as she packed another snowball.
He was ready for her when she emerged from behind the tree, and a snowball hit her square in the chest before she could throw her own. She fell to the ground. Honestly, she didn’t need to fall, but she wanted to catch him off guard.
He stood motionless for a second—perhaps he was sorry he’d actually hit her—but then she sat up and threw her snowball. It hit his jaw. He rubbed the spot where she’d hit him and smiled faintly. Yes. That’s what she wanted.
He lobbed another snowball, which hit her shoulder, and then two more. One hit her arm, and the other hit her chest. How could he make snowballs so fast? Was this another skill she’d missed out on, like biking and skating, by spending her childhood in the library? She finally managed to throw one, hitting the back of his bare neck. He grimaced slightly, probably more from the cold than anything else since she hadn’t thrown it very hard.
“That hurt,” he said, eyes crinkling.
“You’re a big baby,” she shot back.
He threw another one and it hit her chin. Yeah, that sure was cold.
“That’ll teach you.”
Under the guise of having him pull her up, she held out her hands. And when he’d taken them, she pulled him down with her.
He was strong. He could have resisted. But he didn’t.
So for the second time, they ended up lying on their backs in the cold, staring up at the sky. Again, she fantasized about him rolling on top of her, caressing her cold face, slipping his tongue between her lips. And then…
Well, she had quite the active imagination where Zach was concerned.
He didn’t stay on the ground long though, and he soon stood and helped her up. For a few seconds, they were very, very close once again. And this time she wasn’t wearing skates, so she was in no danger of falling.
Oh wait. Maybe she was. Her legs were awfully weak.
He stepped back, and his lips curled into a smile that made her heart skip a beat. Or two. Hopefully no more than that.
“I haven’t done that in ages,” he said.
“Neither have I.” She brushed the snow off her ass, wishing he would do it for her. God, she was pathetic. “You going to be there again next week?”
“I will. And you’ll be sorry you pulled me into the snowbank.”
Now she could think of nothing but all the ways he could make her sorry. Mmmm.
“I look forward to it,” she said.