His hand pressed into the small of her back and drew her against him. She felt the warmth of him through the layers and, unmistakably, the fact that he was not as composed as he appeared.
She pressed her palm against his chest to steady herself.
His heartbeat hammered hard beneath her hand. It was powerful and alive, nothing like the controlled stillness the world saw.
She had called him cold so many times she had almost believed it.
She looked up at him.
Something unguarded moved across his face for a fraction of a second.
Then he kissed her.
His mouth claimed hers with hunger that cut through winter air, deep and decisive. The lake hummed beneath them as if echoing the force of it.
The cold disappeared. The mountains disappeared.
There was only him.
When he pulled back, it wasn’t far. His forehead stayed close to hers. The ice beneath them had gone quiet.
Her pulse had not.
She stood at the center of the frozen lake and understood something she had been trying not to.
Whatever she felt for him wasn’t fading.
It was only getting stronger.
???
The kiss left her confused and aching.
She had expected him to say something afterward. He hadn't. He never did.
When he mounted the horse again and lifted her up in front of him, she assumed they were heading back to the palace.
She didn't speak. Neither did he. His arm settled around her waist, steady and firm.
But the horse turned the wrong way.
It climbed higher. Deeper into the mountains. The path narrowed. Snow thickened along the edges. The wind grew sharper. Pine forests stretched in long dark lines across the white slopes. Sunlight hit the peaks above, turning the snow to silver.
She felt him shift slightly behind her. “This isn't the way back.”
“No.”
Nothing more.
She should have demanded he turn around. She didn't.
The palace disappeared completely. There were just mountains rising in layers, white and pale blue. Frozen streams cut through the valleys below like thin pale lines.
The horse climbed a ridge.
Her breath caught when she saw a cabin.
A wooden cabin stood alone in a wide clearing, surrounded by snow-covered pines and backed by a wall of snow-capped mountain peaks.
