Sleigh Bells in the Snow(73)
The frozen air bit through clothing and sank its teeth into skin.
She shivered. “It’s cold.”
“Wicked cold. Typical Vermont winter. There are folks who spend most of it indoors. There are days when I don’t blame them. Are you warm enough?” He put his arm around her and pulled her close. For once she didn’t resist.
“Just toasty.” Her teeth were chattering. “Never been warmer.”
“Did you buy any of that thermal underwear Alice mentioned?”
“Are you asking me about my underwear?” The look she sent him sent lust slamming into him.
“Just looking out for your welfare. Don’t want to send you back to Brett frozen like the ice pack.”
“As long as I’m still able to work, Brett wouldn’t care.”
“Doesn’t that bother you?”
“Why would it bother me? He employs me to do a job for him. It’s perfectly reasonable of him to expect me to do that job.”
Jackson decided not to point out that it was also reasonable to care about the welfare of your employees. “You like him?”
“I respect him.” She peered at some tracks that disappeared into the trees.
“Squirrel.” He answered her question before she asked it. “There are lots of them here. Sometimes you see snowshoe hare, although not so much in this part of the forest. Tell me more about Brett.”
“What do you want to know? Innovation is one of the fastest-growing PR firms in the U.S. and a lot of that is down to him. He’s driven. Focused. Can be visionary and inspirational at times. Drives you mad at others.”
“So you’re planning on staying with them for a while?”
“Yes. I only came over this summer and I’m enjoying the work. I’ll do a couple of years. Then I suppose I’ll move on.”
“Move on to what?”
She shrugged. “Different company. It’s what I do.”
“Ever wanted to do anything else?”
“Like what?”
“If you’re going to work that hard, you could start your own company.”
“I’ve thought about it. I suppose most people do at some point or another. You did.”
“That’s right. I did.”
“It must have felt good—creating something from the ground up. What made you decide to do that and not just work here?”
“Mixture of things.” He hauled her out of range as a branch deposited its mantle of snow on the ground. “Ambition. Curiosity. Ideas. I had so many ideas I didn’t know what to do with them all. There was no space for them here.” Still wasn’t. “Frustration.”
“And rebellion? A desire to show Walter and your father that anything they could do you could do better?”
“Yeah, there was that, too.” He acknowledged it and felt the guilt kick. “I should have come back sooner. Should have asked more questions. My father hated it, you know.”
“Snow Crystal?”
“Not the place. The business. He felt the business stopped him from enjoying the place. He resented the time it took to run it when he could have just been ripping up the slopes.”
“So why didn’t he do something else?”
Jackson had asked himself the same question repeatedly. “Only son. I suppose people just assumed he’d go into the family business. But he spent almost all his time skiing.” Pain punched him beneath the ribs. “He was in New Zealand when he crashed the car. You could ask what he was doing in New Zealand when this place was in so much trouble, but that was my dad. He went where the snow was. I got the call in the middle of the night and flew back as soon as I could. Arrived back in time to collect his body from the airport.” He felt her hand curl into his and squeeze.
“I’m sorry.”
“It was tough. Still is, particularly on my mother. But the cooking was an inspired idea. Just the prospect of it has lifted her mood.”
“I’m pleased.” She tilted her head and looked at the trees. “It’s so beautiful here.” She was wearing the hat he’d given her, but beneath it her hair was loose. He noticed she’d stopped pinning it up. Sleek and smooth had given way to soft waves.
“You’re only a couple of miles from The Long Trail, the oldest hiking trail in the U.S. It follows the main ridge of the Green Mountains from the Massachusetts-Vermont line all the way to Canada.”
“I’ve always lived in cities. The nearest I got to hiking was walking through Hyde Park in London and Central Park in New York. This is—” She breathed deeply and gasped as the cold air tickled her lungs. “This feels like a snowy wilderness.”