We are standing on a sheet of snow and ice. Around us everything is being pounded by the blizzard. Aksel’s eyes follow mine in the direction of the ravine. “You didn’t think we’d make it, Sophia?”
Something about the way he says my name catches me off guard. I feel a flutter in my chest, right below my throat.
I shiver. “Who said we’ve made it?”
It’s the first time I hear Aksel laugh. It is deep and sultry, and before I know it, I’m laughing too, although there is a blizzard whirling around us and now we have no protection; we might as well be on an iceberg adrift in the Arctic.
A low humming in the distance causes our laughter to taper off.
Aksel snaps his head left.
I reach into my sock, retrieve the avalanche flare gun, and fire it into the air.
“You go,” I say. “I’ll wait.”
Aksel looks at me, a surprised expression on his face. Then he untethers the snowshoes, throws them down, and clicks in. Above us, a glowing orange ember rises in the sky and explodes in a blast of light.
Barreling through the heavy snowfall, Aksel leaps down the drift and glides across the snow, disappearing into whiteness.
After several long minutes, I contemplate the odds that Aksel has left me here to icicle. Then he emerges with his cheeks flushed and his eyes bright. “You look surprised to see me.”
“I thought perhaps you’d left me.”
His eyebrows lift in astonishment. “Here?”
I shrug. “I am partially responsible for destroying your car.”
Aksel smiles broadly, motioning at the massive avalanche. “A little snow can’t hurt a Defender.”
Behind Aksel’s back, two fluorescent pearls of light round the bend of the canyon, illuminating the sparkling snow and casting a light on Aksel’s silhouette.
Somewhere between relief and euphoria, I step toward the snowplow and sink into the drift.
“Hey, easy,” Aksel says. Reaching one hand behind my back, Aksel hooks the other beneath my knees and draws me into his arms.
“I can walk!” I protest, half-hearted.
“Really?” He points at the loose powder and single pair of snowshoes, “How?”
“I don’t know … I … okay, fine,” I relent, clasping my arms around his neck.
He secures his strong arms around my waist. Whispering into my ear, his lips send tremors across my skin. “You’re sure you’ll let me lift you?”
“Yes,” I murmur, slightly dizzy.
Gallantly carrying me across the snow doesn’t slow Aksel down. I am cognizant of every part of Aksel’s body touching mine: his forearms looped beneath my bare legs, his warm, broad chest against the side of my hip.
I’m frozen, yet blood seems to pulse through every vein of my body in hammering thuds, as if my body is on fire.
Inside the plow truck, I warm my hands at the vent. The hot air thaws my limbs; although my toes sting, pain is good. No frostbite.
The driver begins plowing uphill. “Smart to get under Eagle Peak,” he compliments Aksel. “You’re lucky to have walked away so easily from an avalanche that big.”
Aksel catches my eye—Easily?
“I would have reached you sooner had I not towed another driver out first.” The driver grunts over the rustic country music. “I had to convince him to let me. He seemed more upset I’d found him than pleased I’d offered to help.”
“Who?” Aksel asks the driver casually. With the heater blaring, I’m finally warm.
“Some tourist driving with no chains,” he scoffs. “I told him he couldn’t access the ski resort from Eagle Pass, that most of it was private land. He didn’t seem to care …”
Aksel glances furtively in my direction. In the cramped cab, our bodies are pressed close together. Aksel’s thigh is against mine and his arm draped across the back of my seat; therefore, I feel his body tense, ever so slightly.
“Sure you don’t want me to drop you off now?” the plow driver eventually asks Aksel; we’ve reached a wide turnaround in the road. “It will be hours otherwise.”
“Sophia first,” Aksel answers, pointing at my bare thighs. “She’s frozen.”
The driver eyes me reprovingly. “You’re not from around here either, are you?”
“No, sir.” I smile.
Two Waterford Police cars are parked in my driveway.
“Here.” Aksel offers his hand as I hop down from the truck.
Walking up to my house alongside Aksel, I am certain of only one thing—despite everything that’s happened between us, I trust Aksel Fredricksen.
On the porch, we stand in strained, intimate silence. It’s as