I shot off a text to Gretchen and hoped we’d hear back soon.
“I just hope I don’t freeze to death before they get this relic of the past moving again,” Winnie said through a shiver.
I could practically hear her teeth chattering. Some Tarzan-like urge inside of my brain said,MUST KEEP WINNIE WARM. I slithered out of the fleece-lined puffer jacket I wore and held it out for her. “Here,” I said. “Take this.”
“What about you?” she asked.
“I’m a pizza oven, baby.”
She burrowed even deeper into me, pulling the jacket up to her chin. “This is just about survival, by the way. I don’t want you to think that, like, I always expect you to save the day... or night... but I am freezing, so thank you.”
“I don’t know how else to say this to make you understand, so I’m just going to be perfectly blunt here. Last night was the hottest thing I’ve ever seen in my life, and I’ve seen... just about everything, Winnie Baker.”
“But I didn’t...Youdidn’t—”
“Oh,” I said with a rueful smile. “I did. Back in my room.”
She tried not to smile. “Good.”
“I don’t think you understand what seeing you watch my sex tape did for my ego. My head can barely fit through the door at the inn.”
She began to pull the coat up over her face.
“Oh no you don’t,” I told her as I tugged it back down.
She sat up straight, and I felt her absence immediately in every bone in my body. Her face shifted to serious and determined. “I just—I’ve never watched porn before. And you’re the only person I know with a—a sex tape. So it felt somehow safe for my first experience with pornographic material to be with someone I knew. And I thought...” She paused to clear her throat. “I just thought that if it was you who turned me on that maybe I could use that in our scenes.”
My pride swelled so much I had to stop myself from puffing my chest out. “I’m honored,” I said. “Relieved, in fact, that my sex tape is finally being used for good.”
“Finally?” she asked. “I’m pretty sure that tape is bringing happy endings to people all over the world. I mean, judging from your Instagram comments, it’s pretty safe to say I’m right.”
“I guess that’s one way to look at it,” I said. “And it has been weirdly good for business at Slice, Slice, Baby. Which is nice, because I wasn’t even the one who leaked it. Reagan, the bridesmaid, drunkenly put it online to get back at her fiancé for cheating on her.”
She gasped. “Oh my gosh, that’s awful. I—I assumed it was a PR stunt. You had no idea?”
I shook my head. “It’s okay. I wish she’d talked to me first, of course. And she apologized profusely. If I’m being honest, Ithink she’s single-handedly funded the payroll at my Overland Park location with the amount of guilt-trip pizza she’s ordered. And we split the licensing deal, which helped her get on her feet and leave that dumpster-fire fiancé, but according to my sister, I’m an embarrassment to my family.”
A sad smile. “I may not have a sex tape, but I do know what it means to disappoint your family.”
“You? Winnie Baker? An embarrassment? How is that even possible?”
“I threw it all away when I left my husband,” she said simply. “They thought I should mend things, but I just couldn’t.”
“I’m glad you didn’t,” I said a little too quickly. “Not that I wanted you to get a divorce. But that guy didn’t deserve you. So I’m sorry, but also congratulations, because you’re better off without him.”
She leaned her head against my shoulder again, her chin tilted up to me. “How can you be so sure?” she asked.
“Well, last night was pretty good proof, if you ask me.” My voice grated in my throat. There were a lot of things I could do to Winnie Baker on a bench in the sky with a skirt this short.
She blinked slowly, like she was savoring the memory of it. “I feel like a fourteen-year-old boy,” she admitted. “I woke up soaked all over again.”
I bent down toward her, and she tilted her face up to me in response, so bright and wide-eyed. Slowly, taking my time, I dragged the pad of my thumb across her lower lip, eventually letting my hand cradle her cheek as my fingers braced the back of her neck. Somehow the cold white puffs of air between us felt hot and needy.
Just then, the ski lift jerked to life, dragging us up the mountain once again.
My phone began to ring.
“Hello?” I answered.
