In the hotel’s breakfast room, Jamie tucked into a hearty Scottish breakfast of sausages, beans, eggs and tattie scones. There was no sign of Alicia, which was disappointing, Would she know how to keep safe if she headed out in the snow today? Maybe she’d turn up at his lodge and ask him to show her the way.
Fuck’s sake, since when did any woman want you to show her the way? Get a grip man.
After breakfast, Jamie donned his climbing jacket, pulled on a thick woollen hat, and fetched his boots from the porch, where he tried not to look too obviously at Alicia’s lodge. Still no sign. So throwing his backpack across his shoulder, Jamie tramped out of the hotel grounds into an escape from reality. Despite the snow underfoot, conditions were clear and tracks were quiet. This was exactly what he wanted. The chance to be alone with nature. To experience nature unadulterated. To inhale the pristine air and let his worries scatter behind him like fallen snowflakes.
The trail that he followed led away from the hotel, along the base of a small mountain. He’d hiked this route countless times, both as a boy and as a man. The craggy landscape was bathed in white with ragged rock faces and clumps of rose grey heather peeking through. Jamie reached for his camera. It didn’t matter how often he came out here, the scenery always called to be captured permanently. His cottage was filled with framed photographs of Scottish scenery, from winter mountains he’d scaled to summer lochs he’d dived into.
At around twelve thirty, Jamie checked his watch and was surprised that he’d been walking for three hours and not even considered the time – or his stomach? He shrugged off his backpack to retrieve a snack bar. But as he reached for the zip, a tremendous gust of wind blasted a thousand snowflakes into his face. Snowflakes that hit like shards of ice. Last night had been fairy tale stuff compared to this. Why the hell hadn’t he seen it on the weather forecast?
Possibly because you didn’t look at the weather forecast.Too busy thinking about a certain American woman to take your usual sensible measures.What an absolute muppet.Well, there was no chancing it now. Staying here was toomuch of a risk. Conditions could worsen and he might be unable to get home. Turning back was the only option.
Jamie tramped back along the path, relying on minimal visibility and memory to guide his way. Looking behind him, fresh snow quickly filled his footsteps, although it was a miracle the flakes were lying at all, considering the ferocity of the swirling gusts.
An hour later, as a shuffling Jamie was calculating he’d be back at the hotel early afternoon, those gusts ratcheted things up a notch, and visibility dipped from minimal to zero.This was not good. If he tried to blunder on, he could take a wrong turn and wind up lost and rudderless on the mountain.
With about eighty percent certainty, he deduced he was close to a bothy, a small stone hut where hikers could rest. A place he’d visited many times since his childhood, although rarely in conditions as bad as this. If he could find it, he could shelter there until the storm passed. There was enough water and provisions in his backpack to last him overnight, and a grate in which he could light a fire to keep warm.
At last, the barely visible outline of the little hut appeared through the blurred white wall ahead. Jamie looked up to the sky and gave thanks. Wiping his wet face with his arm, he pushed open the door of the bothy and immediately relief came from the dry air. What a blessing to escape that merciless weather. Intense snow could be invigorating, but getting stranded was nobody’s idea of fun.
The smell of damp wood, earthen moss and lingering smoke inside the bothy cast Jamie back to hiking with his family as a child. There was one day in particular when his father had decided they would stop and shelter in here from a rainstorm. What an adventure it had been. Jimmy Butlerhad shown his children how to light the fire, they’d played Snap, trampolined on the box bed and drunk hot chocolate from a Thermos while the rain pelted down outside. Thinking back, he wondered if his dad had orchestrated the event, choosing to give his children an adventure rather than a walk back to the hotel. If so, he’d played a blinder as that time was now one of Jamie’s fondest memories.
It took a few moments for Jamie to register that, as with the sauna, he was not alone in this bothy. At the fireplace there was someone crouching, holding a match to some tinder. A woman in a pale blue jacket and a pink beanie, strands of flaxen blonde hair poking out from under her hat.
Alicia. Of all people. Right in front of him for the… He’d lost count how many times they’d happened to bump into each other on this trip. It was like they kept getting pushed together.
Jamie cleared his throat and Alicia stood up poker straight, stumbling for a moment. As she did so, a bolt of something extraordinary hit him square in the chest – a heady combination of sexual attraction and a primitive desire to protect this woman.
‘Hey, sorry to give you a fright.’ Deliberately, Jamie remained by the door, keen to disabuse Alicia of any notion that he might have followed her here. There was already a glimmer of hesitation on her face. If he could ease that somehow, it might lessen his regret at being a man in the wrong place at the wrong time.
‘It’s okay.’ Alicia threw the used match into the tinder with forced casualness. ‘I just wasn’t expecting anyone else.’
‘Me neither. Doubt there’ll be many other idiots come out today without checking the weather forecast.’
‘Hmm.’ Alicia nodded tersely, and Jamie realised he’d not only suggested she was an idiot but that she was isolatedwith him with a slim to none chance of anyone else joining them.Way to go, Butler.
‘You need a hand lighting that fire?’ he asked, wondering if could make her feel safe by improving conditions inside this little stone hut. If they got the flames going the place might feel more comforting.
‘No, I’m fine, thanks. I’ll light this little bit here and it’ll be good.’ Alicia turned to the fire like it was a security blanket to protect her from this strange man with whom she’d been okay when there was an escape route but didn’t care to be trapped with. She held a match to the tinder and stared dead ahead as a small orange flame ignited and spread. In a few moments, the larger logs would catch alight, and the heat would build.
‘Impressive fire building skills,’ Jamie noted as warmly as possible whilst maintaining his spot by the exit. Was this the right place to stand? Might it be akin to blocking an escape route for her?
‘Well, it was already built, but I like to think I did a good job of getting it going.’ Alicia stared into the grate. Her cheeks were rosy, as if exposed to cold then warmth in quick succession. She was utterly radiant but there was a tension in that graceful neck of hers that bothered Jamie. It reminded him of Katie and he didn’t welcome a reminder of how much she didn’t want to be in a room with him either.
‘Have you been here long?’ he asked, feeling he ought to at least try to put this woman at ease.
‘Ten minutes.’
‘Were you walking a while?’
‘An hour-ish.’
‘Okay, well, the storm will hopefully be over in a few hours.’
‘A few hours?’ Alicia’s eyes gaped wide in horror.
‘I mean, that’s the worst-case scenario.’ Jamie wondered if he should head back through the snow. It was a better alternative to making a woman feel this uncomfortable. But he couldn’t leave her on her own. ‘It’s not ideal,’ he added, ‘but it’s warm and there’s firewood in the basket. You don’t have a health condition, do you?’
‘What? How is that your business?’
