Page 107 of Wedlocked

“Stop telling people I kidnapped you.”

We stopped at a side door that I was pretty sure led outside.

“Here we are,” the man said. “Just right out this door and up the hill there. You will see?—”

“I remember,” Jason said.

“You’ve been here?” I asked.

“Take your time.” The man went on. “Just let us know when you’re done.”

That odd sort of tension was back around Jason, humming just beneath his skin. “Thank you.”

“Good luck,” the man said, pushing open the door to reveal and all-white landscape.

Jason didn’t acknowledge what he said, but I wondered about it. That was until we stepped outside and the door to the lodge closed behind us. My breath caught, not just from the cold but from the sudden feeling of being in a snow globe someone had just shaken up. White was everywhere, so bright against the inky star-filled sky.

Snowflakes gusted around, covering our coats and catching in Jay’s scarf. I lifted my face and stuck out my tongue, trying to catch a few. The instant they landed, it was with a brief spark of cold that instantly dissolved in the heat of my mouth.

“You should try one!” I told Jay as he started up the small hill.

“I’d rather use my tongue for something else.”

I smacked his shoulder. “It’s a crime to not catch snowflakes on your tongue in the winter, Jason Glenn Rush!”

“Ahhh,” he sang, tossing his head back while sticking out his tongue.

He was overly dramatic about it, which was just so rude, but telling him what an itchy sweater he was being completely fled my mind when I saw what was at the top of the hill.

Gasping, I leaned farther over his shoulder to stare at the lighted lift yards away. “Look at that,” I said, pointing.

“You like it?” he asked.

“Is that for us?”

“You think I’d carry you out here for any other reason?”

I patted his shoulder. “I can walk.”

“I like having you in my arms.”

I was so easy for this man. Smiling, I dropped my chin onto his shoulder and hugged him a little tighter as he carried me closer.

“Oh, it’s a gondola,” I said, realizing it was enclosed. White Pine Summit had both styles of lifts: the regular open-air ones and then a few of the enclosed ones called gondolas. There were less of these here on the mountain. All the ones we’d been on before were regular chairlifts. I saw in the brochure at our lodge that the enclosed gondolas offered longer tours of the mountain landscape.

“Are we going on a tour?” I asked.

“Something like that,” he said, lowering so I could stand in the snow. My boots sank a little, making me feel small as Jason somehow still towered over me.

Holding out his hand, he asked, “Will you go for a ride with me?”

Nodding enthusiastically, I surrendered my hand and then gasped when we approached the door. “Oh my gosh, Jay!”

Smiling, his feet kicked up snow as he jogged to the door and swung it open.

My hand flew up to my mouth as I gazed around the interior. “You did this?” I whispered, practically tiptoeing through the snow as if I were afraid I would disturb what was inside.

It was completely decorated.