God, she loved the weight of him when he rested on her. She lifted her head to kiss him lightly, then laughed. She kissed his cheeks, his eyelashes, his temple, and his lips. His leg slipped between hers, eased his weight a fraction. Frost seeped through her jeans, but he heated her from above.
Resting her head against the pillow of snow, feeling the stuff work its way beneath her collar, she searched his eyes. “You make me feel safe,” she murmured. “Will you sleep in my room tonight?”
He backed off, framing her face with his hands. “Are you really ready for that?”
Irritation flashed through her. She squashed it. After all the crap she’d pulled over the last couple of months, after the ways she’d fought him at every turn of their relationship, after she’d sneaked from his bed the other morning, he had a right to doubt her. “I’m really, really ready.”
“I need you to be ready. I want you so ready you don’t give a damn whether I’m beneath, behind, or on top, as long as I’m inside you. So ready, you beg, and it’s between us, no ghosts, not the living nor the dead. Just us.”
She sucked her inner cheek between her teeth. What they’d accomplished wasn’t enough for him. The backs of her eyes ached as if tears had clogged there. She asked him for time last night. Asked him to stay. He’d agreed. But he wouldn’t give her all of himself until she was willing to let go of ... the past.
He put his thumbs beneath her chin, lifted, trailed his cold nose down her cheek, then dropped a kiss on her lips. “I said I’d be around and I will be. Keep giving me these moments of sheer bliss and I’ll probably wait for freaking ever. I do know how hard you’re trying for me. You get full brownie points for that.” So many words, so many full sentences, completely serious and sincere.
God, she felt like crying then. “My butt’s cold and wet.”
He smiled, understanding that she was beyond giving him any real answer, then pulled her to her feet and into the circle of his arms. “That’s romantic.”
“I know.” She’d never felt so romantic. Witt made her feel that way. He’d understood. He’d realized her effort. He hadn’t rushed her or pushed her. He’d simply accepted.
“Got one more question,” he said, his mouth against her ear.
“What?” She could stay like this forever, wasn’t even cold though she’d claimed she was. No, she was warm against him. Warm and safe with his arms around her.
“Who was on the phone last night?”
Her ears, cheeks, and nose burned. The bitter air froze her damp pants to her legs. Her toes, despite two layers of socks, deadened in her boots. She could no longer feel her hands at the ends of her arms. And when Witt stepped away, she seemed to wither and die like the bare winter trees.
Max drew in a breath, her lungs wanting to burst against the icy bite of it. “Bud Traynor.”
Witt swore.
“I was going to tell you.”
“When?”
Damn, it was back to that trust issue. Holding things in seemed as natural as breathing, as natural as talking to her dead husband ... at least before she’d found out about Izzie’s letters.
She couldn’t say she hadn’t intended to tell Witt at all. “Well ... at dinner.”
“Why not at breakfast? Or on the drive here?”
“I was going to tell you when I figured out what he wanted.”
He shook his head. Clearly he didn’t believe her. He was a smart guy. “And naturally you haven’t figured anything out yet.”
She shivered. “Can we talk about this somewhere warm?”
Gone was the lover as he watched her with that enigmatic blue gaze. “Tell me now.”
She did, told him about Sunny’s call the Friday night and everything Bud had said. Well, everything except that part about semen on her breath. Even she couldn’t say that. Witt’s eyes narrowed and his lips thinned with each new bit of information. He didn’t speak until she’d finished. “He’s afraid. Why?”
Why? A rhetorical question neither of them knew the answer to, and worried Bud was, despite his seeming domination of that call. He’d admitted he was scared, and there had been that something in his tone she couldn’t identify. “Maybe he didn’t like me being out of his sphere of control.”
Witt stilled. Tiny flakes of white began to fall and caught on his lashes. She clenched her stomach against his dangerous tone. “Why would he think he controls you, Max?”
“He doesn’t.” She almost stammered. “But he wants to.”
His lips thinned. “Why do I get the feeling you haven’t told me near enough about your encounters with him?”
Because she hadn’t. And she hadn’t told him about all of them, couldn’t remember how much she had told him. No point in lying about it, though. “Maybe I haven’t said everything I should.”
He put his head back and stared at the sky. “Just when I think we’re making progress.”
She forced her feet to move, stepped close to him, and put her hand on his arm. “We have. We are.” She was.
His gaze shot her to her face. “What about your memories of this place?”
“Cameron’s memories,” she was quick to say.