Page 29 of Winter Chills

I saw the reason that everyone left me.

Chose to go away.

It was because I was cold. I always had been.

The ice queen strikes again.

Don’t get too close, I’ll freeze you, like that queen in Emma’s favorite Disney movie.

I glanced around the restaurant, seeing all the people around me, and I wanted to bolt. To get out of there, away from everyone.

From the possibility that they’d get frozen too—

“I can always light a fire,” Shaun said, interrupting the crazy train my thoughts had leaped on.

I blinked.

The sorrow that had been in his eyes over his wife was gone, replaced by a stark, well, knowledge.

I could see it.

And it made me shiver.

Because I was pretty sure he knew exactly where my mind had been going. And I wondered what tells I’d given him.

“You can’t burn ice.”

“You can if you do it right.”

* * *

After the meal,we headed outside, and normally I would have walked away and got in my car, happy to be over this.

But I couldn’t bring myself to walk away right away.

“Walk you to your car?” Shaun asked.

I shivered as a gust of wind hit me. “You don’t have to.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“Actually, you kinda did. When your voice raises like that at the end of a sentence, that means it’s a question.”

“Well, I changed my mind. I just will.”

I should have been offended.

Some part of my independent woman thought I should be. But that part was stamped down by the little part inside me that was glad I had someone to grab onto if the ground got too slick.

The only lighting outside was the streetlights, and the wind howled.

Cars crunched over the snow- and ice-packed parking lot, making a noisy backdrop to the world.

Shaun put his hand on my arm—not in a horribly possessive way, but in that, “here, let me help you” way.

Odd, because I wasn’t used to that. I couldn’t even remember my husband doing that very often. Hell, I think my son did it more than my husband did.

One of the side effects of being the oldest—you’re expected to help take care of everyone else.