I found myself leaning in to him sooner each night. Sometimes, when he shifted an arm beneath my shoulders as we settled, my pulse didn’t even spike; it simply felt…right. In an encampment filled with my enemies, I felt safe. He warmed me in a way the fire could never manage.
My favorite moments usually came just before slumber claimed me, when I listened to the steady thrum of his heartbeat beneath my cheek, lulling me to sleep each night.
Eventually, fear faded into comfort. Comfort faded into familiarity. And familiarity into something dangerous that I didn’t want to examine.
By the time winter was drawing to a close, I no longer crawled toward Baron for warmth out of necessity.
I did it because I wanted to.
I wasn’t sure exactly how it had happened, but at some point between nearly drowning in the lake and surviving those long winter nights side by side, I had stopped seeing him as my captor.
One day,after Baron had completed his short rounds to assess supply levels, we set off for the mouth of the Crags to gather freshly fallen snow to melt into drinking water. No men patrolled out here and I filled my lungs with the fresh air, glad for a bit of respite from the stench of unwashed, sweaty men that permeated the gorge.
We made our way up the slope, looking for fresh, untouched snow to gather in our kettles. The best kind of packing snow crunched beneath our boots, dangerously tempting. On a whim, I scooped up a handful, shaped it into a ball, and aimed for the back of Baron’s head. It splatted in an explosion of powder, coating his dark hair.
“Hey!” He turned around, and by then I had packed another ball. I lobbed it in his direction, this time hitting him squarely in face. I couldn’t throw very hard, with only six feet between us, but I scooped snowballs one after another, pelting him furiously and even nimbly shoving one down his shirt when he tried to come close enough to knock my snowballs from my hands.
Baron retreated and threw up his hands to block my attack, kicking snow at me in return. Flakes showered into my eyes and I had to turn and blink my vision clear again. He began an assault of his own, shaking the trunk of the tree we were under and sending what felt like a blizzard of snow down on both of us. I yelped and tried to dodge the deluge, but the chain tethered me to him, and the best I could do was dash around the tree trunk, which only brought me right back to Baron.
He caught me.
“Ha! Can’t get away now!” he laughed, pulling me in as I squirmed and pushed at his chest, which, annoyingly, didn’t budge in the slightest. We were both red-cheeked from the cold and breathless from our snowball fight, and his arms looped behind me, holding me captive so I couldn’t dart off and gather more ammunition.
I finally gave up my useless struggling and looked up at him.
That was my mistake.
The world suddenly felt very quiet. His arms were still locked around me, but something in his grip shifted, moving from playful restraint to something entirely different. His face was only inches from mine, our breaths swirling in small clouds between us. I noticed, for the first time, the color of his eyes. They weren’t black, as I’d originally thought, but a deep, warm brown.
And those eyes were wholly focused on me.
Something fluttered low in my stomach, startling with its intensity, and I became painfully aware of how close we were, of the solid warmth of him while everything around us was ice and snow. The feeling swelled, refusing to be pushed aside.
I suddenly wasn’t sure if I wanted to get away at all.
Baron’s hold around my waist tightened just slightly, almost unconsciously, and his gaze flicked from my eyes to my mouth then back again.
We had been close before, so why didthismoment feel different?
His eyes dipped to my neckline, and he lifted one hand, hesitating as though giving me one last chance to move away. I didn’t. His fingers brushed my skin, so lightly I almost doubted it happened. “The scar’s gone,” he murmured, his broad thumb sweeping gently over the place where the sheriff’s blade had cut into my throat. Then his knuckles glided along my jaw, slow andcareful, as though he was memorizing the shape of it. His hand slid into the back of my hair.
The fluttering in my stomach changed rapidly, first warming, then flaring into full and terrifying heat. I half expected the snow at my feet to steam, and wondered how Baron wasn’t yanking his hand away from the temperature my skin must have reached. I didn’t know what to do or what I was supposed to say. My body went still, breath locked somewhere between my ribs where I couldn’t access it. My gaze flickered helplessly between his eyes, my palms still pressed to his chest as if I had forgotten how to move them.
He didn’t look away. His entire focus stayed fixed on my face, one hand steady at my waist, the other cradling my neck like he was afraid I might vanish. And just as the wild, reckless part of me began to hope that he wouldn’t let go, something in his expression shifted.
He blinked hard, like shaking off a dream, and released me, stepping back as though distance alone could break whatever had passed between us. Then he ducked, scooped up a handful of snow, and tossed it halfheartedly in my direction, but the playfulness we’d shared moments before didn’t return.
We remained silent as we collected our snow-filled kettles and wended our way back down into the gorge, then we avoided each other’s gaze for the rest of the day. For the first time, I allowed myself to think about how things had changed, and I began to wonder if I had feelings beyond friendship for Baron. I had never once experienced emotions likethat before now. And as the memory of his hands at my waist, his fingers tightening just slightly, and his unwavering gaze replayed in my mind, I couldn’t help but wonder if he had felt it, too.
The next day,we pretended that nothing unusual had happened between us in the snow. Baron greeted me in the morning with his usual smile, and I made sure to say the same things I always did, but everything felt slightly off-kilter. We shared snarky banter as we always had, worked side by side collecting firewood and snow to melt, and neither of us made a single reference to the moment when we had been so close to kissing.
I did my best to smother the growing desire I felt for him, but it clawed its way through every barrier I tried to build. As the last winter days trudged by, I found myself savoring even the smallest details about him, from the way he hummed tunelessly when he cooked, to how he blew warm air into his hands before tightening his grip on a rope or tool. Without meaning to, I caught myself glancing toward him whenever something amusing happened, eager to share the moment withhimspecifically.
At night, things became even harder to ignore. Each evening, Baron settled behind me, arms wrapped securely around my middle to ward off the frigid air through the night. The closeness had begun as purely practical. Now, it felt as dangerous as it did comforting.
There were mornings when I woke up before he did, his chin hooked over my head. Instead of slithering away, I remained perfectly still, hoping he wouldn’t notice I was awake and soaking in his intoxicating presence. I simply let myself exist in that warmth with him, relishing every second. The steady rhythm of his breathing always calmed me and the slow, firmrise and fall of his chest against my back made me feel protected in a way I had never known I would crave.
Sometimes, when he stirred but hadn’t fully woken, he would tighten his arms around me instinctively, as if drawing me closer without realizing it. I pretended not to notice, but I always absolutely did.
