dress quickly and turn to see Aksel slipping on his coat. He strides over to me, shaking out his hair. Looking down at me, he takes off his coat and places it around me. I shiver when he zips it, his hands dangerously close to my chest.
For a moment, we stare at each other in silence. His brooding, deep-set eyes search my face. Is he looking for permission? He has it. He has had it. For, like, weeks.
“I should get you home,” he says, dropping his gaze. “Let’s hope the grizzlies are hibernating,” he adds with a wry smile, “because I don’t have a weapon.”
I pat the waistband of my pants. “I do.”
Aksel’s mouth twitches. “You should at least carry bear spray when you’re running. Your knife might make her angrier—even if you’re accurate.”
“I am not defending myself with a can of aerosol,” I respond. “Besides, Charlotte says bear spray doesn’t work.”
“People often use it incorrectly. You have to wait until the grizzly is less than thirty feet away before spraying.”
I stare at him, confounded. “While a grizzly is charging me, I’m supposed to stand still and casually calculate the distance between us?”
“Technically, you should play dead. If you can’t, bear spray works.”
“How many times have you been charged?”
Aksel smirks. “Once too many.”
I shake my head, laughing. I have lived in a lot of dangerous places, but none of them involved fighting off a charging grizzly with a can of spicy hairspray.
Standing to clip into our snowshoes, Aksel reaches down to help me from the boulder. I place my hand in his, but as I stand, my snowshoe catches an edge. I stumble forward into Aksel, clinging to his sleeve and landing with a soft thump against his chest.
I smell his clean skin, feel his warm torso against mine.
His arm is braced firmly around my waist to keep me from falling. He stares down at me, and my cheeks go blisteringly hot. I feel light-headed. Snow and starlight envelop me in a bright wave.
I’ve forgotten how to breathe, how to talk.
Aksel contracts his arm around my lower back. My breath quickens. I’m torn between embarrassment and a thrilling desire to be closer to him.
Reaching my other hand forward, I place my palm against Aksel’s chest. I feel his heartbeat—steady, not charging like mine.
Aksel gently nudges the wet hair back from my face. Gliding his hand down, he cradles the back of my neck; his thumbs graze the skin below my ear, like matches lighting my skin in flames.
Our eyes lock. Our faces are centimeters apart. Our lips, millimeters. His forearm tightens against me, drawing me into him. His palm settling into the concave of my lower back. I want him to kiss me—I want him to kiss me so badly I feel like I might explode.
Aksel’s lips press against mine. His fingertips trace my cheek, my jawline, before returning to the nape of my neck. My fingers weave into his. His lips are against mine, and mine are against his.
Then Aksel pulls away. His eyes catch mine, and there is a flash of intriguing vulnerability.
We stare at each other in protracted silence. Emotions filter through me—as if the hesitation between us has finally been obliterated.
Then our lips are meeting again and every nerve in my body is electrified.
In the cold winter air, I discover the one word in English that adequately describes what it’s like to be near Aksel Fredricksen—consuming.
CHAPTER 24
“How was your night?” my father calls to me from down the hall.
Thirty seconds ago, I’d been standing on my porch with Aksel. Now, I call out to my father. “Good,” I answer.
“Sophia, come in here.”
Grudgingly, I step away from the banister and walk to the den.
My father is seated at his pine desk, which is cluttered with papers. His voice is calm, but his eyes have gray lines beneath them.
Shoving aside a box of envelopes, I sit down in a cozy leather chair in the corner.
I don’t want to discuss Aksel with my parents. Not yet. Apparently, the freedom I’ve had in Waterford is going to take some getting used to—for all of us.
My father must see my wet hair, my chilled face—
“What’s that?” I point over his shoulder.
“Analysis,” he answers.
On the far wall, a new whiteboard is tacked up. Six whiteboards, actually, assembled in a grid pattern to form one large wall of writing space. “Thinking space,” he calls it.
Taped in the center of one whiteboard is a map. Cobwebbing across the map are pushpins and sticky notes