The heavens opened up and snow started to dump on me.
It came down so hard that I could barely see the trail in front of my eyes. I picked up the pace, heading for the brush of trees to get out of the snow. My hair was getting wet and my coat was no longer protecting me from the freezing temperatures. As I made my way through the shadowed trail, tears rose in my eyes.
My toes were getting cold and my body was trembling uncontrollably. I felt out of control. I felt like I was spiraling. I’d put myself in this position because of my cocky attitude about wanting to control my life and my destiny and now I was going to die in the mountains of Gatlinburg without anyone knowing I was out there.
I picked up my pace and began running but, just as the trees broke, I stepped onto a rock and fell off to the side.
I shrieked as my ankle popped and a searing pain ricocheted up my leg. I rolled down a small hill and connected with another tree. My back ached while tears streamed down my face. It was hard to breathe; I couldn’t take in enough air. The snow was coming down around me in buckets, slinking down my back and threatening my body with hypothermia. My ankle was throbbing and my leg was aching. I still couldn’t catch my breath and my tears seemed to be freezing against my skin. I was woozy from smacking into the tree and panic was starting to overtake me.
I took in great gulps of cold air to try and calm myself down, but all I did was cause myself to have a coughing jag that sucked the oxygen right from my lungs. Just as the edges of my vision started to darken and my head started to feel floaty, I felt my body being lifted from the ground.
Feeling suddenly safe, I closed my eyes and gave up fighting.
CHAPTER 7
LIAM
I saw the woman take a tumble from my window and I went charging out the front door. I didn’t know what the fuck a woman like her was doing out in weather like this but I saw the way her ankle caught. At best, she’d sprained it, but it was more likely she’d dislocated it. I hopped down the steps and went charging for the hill she rolled down. When I got to the edge, I saw her gasping for air.
It was the same woman I’d seen walking across the road earlier that day, with the long blonde hair and the put-together clothing. Her eyes were a striking blue that almost halted me in my tracks but it was her gasping that ripped me from my trance before I made my way down to her.
She’d tumbled her way into a tree and lost her breath. She was struggling to catch it and I knew if I didn’t get her inside, I’d be looking at a very serious situation. I lifted her up into my arms just as she passed out and I scaled the hill quickly before I ran back inside with her. I had to make sure I could get her lungs and her diaphragm to sync back up before I could even touch her ankle, which was definitely dislocated.
I felt for her pulse and it was faint. I saw her stomach jolting but her chest wasn’t rising. I settled my hand onto her stomach and pressed down before I blew steadily into her mouth. The moment she gasped for air, I pulled away and looked at her ankle. Tears were streaming down her face while she tried to grasp at anything around her and I knew I had a narrow window to pop her ankle back in before shock set in.
So, I grabbed her ankle, steadied her leg, and twisted.
She groaned and her back arched while tears continued to stream down her face. I propped her foot up with some pillows before I walked back to retrieve a first aid kit. I dug out the ace bandage, as well as some heating and cooling gel. Then I settled back down beside her and started to take care of her ankle.
It was going to swell up and hurt for a while but, if no ligaments had been torn, it should subside within a few days.
I heard her breathing steady out while I applied the gel. She sighed with relief once the cooling sensation kicked in. Then, I began covering her ankle with gauze and an ace bandage. She had to keep it as still as she could manage until the joint itself could heal.
I chanced a look outside. The snow was piling up much faster than I’d anticipated and now there was this strange fucking woman in my cabin.
“What are you doing out in this weather?” I asked.
Her wild eyes hooked onto me but I kept my gaze steady on her ankle.
“What?” she asked.
“What possessed you to go on a hike during this storm?”
“I just wanted to see the sights before the storm set in,” she said.
“You saw that tree up close. Get enough?”
I lifted my gaze to her as her eyes widened at my statement.
“Yes, I’ve seen enough. Thank you.”
She pulled her ankle from my hands and immediately hissed in pain. She tried to place her foot on the floor, no doubt seeing if she could walk on it, but the moment her ass hit the couch, I leaned over to pick up her foot.
“Enjoy the trial run?” I asked.
“I knew the storm was coming,” she said. “But I figured I could get back before it actually started. The clouds didn’t look that gray when I left.”
“And you got lost,” I said.
“No shit, Sherlock.”
I flicked my gaze up to her while my hands finished wrapping up her ankle. I could see she was still shivering and the last thing I needed was for this woman to catch a damn chill. I got up and helped her out of her jacket, even as she continued to give me suspicious little side glances. Then, I gathered up some blankets and brought them back to her.
“I’ll get a fire going in a second but ,if you get any colder, your ankle’s the least of your worries.”
“What happened to it?” she asked.
“You dislocated it when you did your little dance down the hill,” I said.
“Are you always such a dick?”
I looked back up into her eyes that were sparkling with anger and I sighed.
“Sorry,” I said.
“You should be.”
She wrapped herself up in the blankets while I propped her leg back up on some pillows. For now, the swelling would be kept at bay if she kept her ankle elevated. The ace bandage would work not only as a stabilizer but as a compression sock and, hopefully, no more damage could come to her joints and tendons. I got up and headed to the fireplace, stocking it with kindling before I got a flame going.
Then, I tossed a few logs onto it and allowed the heat to permeate the room.
I looked back at the strange woman and watched her shivering finally die down. The flames of the fire were flickering off her features and, for a moment, I could only stand and stare. What the fuck was I going to do with this woman in this storm? She couldn’t get back to the resort. Not in weather like this. It was dumping by the buckets and that side road would already be snowed out.
And I still hadn’t gotten out with my chainsaw to remove that fucking tree from the road.
“You shouldn’t have been out in this weather,” I said, again.
“Thanks, Dad.”
“You hurt yourself,” I said.
“Look, once I get warm, I’m gonna go back, okay? So just leave the fucking attitude over there for now.”
“You can’t go back in a storm like this,” I said. “I know these back roads. They’ll already be snowed out. And the main road that might still be open has a massive tree blocking it.”
“And no one thought to move it?” she asked.
“No one cares about people up here,” I said. “I was gonna move it when I got back home from town today.”
“You’re too late.”
“Excuse me for not knowing someone would be out prancing around in the storm of the century for fun.”
She huffed, turning her back to me while she hunkered down on the couch. She was feisty. She couldn’t go back in this snow and we had no chance of getting her back anywhere until it let up, which I knew wouldn’t be for a few days.
“I’ll get you some more pillows and you can sleep on the couch,” I said.
“How nice of you,” she said sarcastically. “Thanks.”