Page 27 of Snowed In with Benefits

I wonder if she’s bored out here. She must be, right? It’s not like she has a whole lot to do but stew.

“Emmett and I are clearing the snow off the barn roof so it doesn’t collapse,” Hunter says, smiling at her.

“Oh, wow! Isn’t it dangerous to get up on a roof in the snow?”

“Yeah,” Emmett says. “That’s why we’re going together.”

Nice cover. Sure, it’s dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing. It could even be dangerous for them, knowing what they’re doing, if there was ice under the snow or less snow on the ground. The way it stands, though, they would fall four feet before hitting the snow even if they did manage to slip on thick powder.

Hunter nods somberly. “You always have to think in pairs around here. No telling what can go wrong on the mountain.”

I resist the urge to roll my eyes. He’s playing it up for her sake, Emmett is playing it up for his sake, and if I speak the truth right now the whole stupid house of cards falls down. All of our phones work. It wouldn’t take more than five minutes to get to anywhere on the property. The only reason we’d need a buddy system is if someone was in danger of being knocked unconscious, and the likelihood of that happening is extremely small.

“What will you be doing, Beau?” she asks.

“Checking the house for damage,” I tell her, making my decision in that moment. I was going to read, but I realize it would be annoying to read if she’s wandering around looking for something to do. “What about you, duchess?”

She narrows her eyes at me slightly and I allow myself a small grin. She’ll come up with a comeback eventually, I’m sure. She rolls her eyes and fights her own grin. Perfect.

“I’ll probably be taking pictures,” she says. “That’s what I was going to spend this week doing, anyway.”

“You were gonna be taking pictures? I thought—ow!”

Hunter kicked me under the table. I glare at him and he gives me a warning look.

Josie bites her lip, then sighs. “Yeah, yeah, it was gonna be my honeymoon. But I have a whole brand-new, practically empty SD card, and I fully intend on filling it. Even if it isn’t with exotic beach scenes.”

“Fair enough.” She seems fine. What did he kick me for? I kick him back under the table. He doesn’t react besides giving me a mild look through his glasses.

Whatever. I finish my breakfast and another cup of coffee, then suit up and head out to check the woodpile. It’s a little low, so I get to chopping. Chopping and splitting wood for me is like shoveling for Emmett. It burns off anything that might be bothering me.

Usually it does, anyway. Today, though, it doesn’t seem to help much. I’m still frustrated. I don’t even know what I’m frustrated about anymore, but the feeling is still there, still hot in my chest, even after I’ve piled up enough wood to last us a week.

After stoking the fire inside and doing a few more little chores around the house, I hear them in the kitchen making lunch. Emmett and Hunter are talking about the weather, if the wind has died down enough to make clearing the barn roof bearable. I hear Josie’s voice and decide to find something else to do while they’re eating.

I sit down and open my book. I’m three chapters in when I realize the house has gone quiet. Finally, because my stomach is rumbling, I head to the kitchen to make myself some food. A sandwich will do me fine, although I see from the pans drying next to the sink that Hunter whipped up something more complicated. That’s all him. I’d be fine with the same four things every day.

As I’m rinsing my plate, I look out the window. It’s clearer now than it was last night, which means the temperature must have got above freezing at some point. As I’m looking, scanning the horizon, I notice something out of place. The trees are still, there’s no wind, but the fence down by the creek is swaying wildly.

Frowning, I put my plate in the dish drainer and lean over the sink to get a better look. There. A young buck is fighting for its life, stuck in the fence.

“Damn it,” I mutter. Hurrying to the mudroom, I throw on a coat and boots and grab some wire cutters before heading outside. This isn’t the first animal I’ve saved, and it won’t be the last, but my heart is still pounding. Deer are unpredictable, young bucks more than most, and I could get seriously hurt if I’m not careful.

But I’m not just going to leave it there to die.

12

JOSIE

After lunch, I start doing what I told Beau I was going to do. This home is beautiful and there are so many intricate little carved details on the most surprising things. The banister, for example, has an entire woodland scene carved into the side from top to bottom, and there’s a little circle window at the top of the stairs that makes a perfect frame for winter pictures.

I just wish I was a little taller. It’s above my eye level. There’s a little step stool in the closet up here, so I use that after admiring it for a moment. It, like every other wood thing in this cabin, is lovingly hand-carved. It isn’t quite as even as most of the other things, as if a skilled child carved it, but it’s solid enough to support my weight.

Finally tall enough to see through the window, I start looking around for the right image. A cardinal lands on a branch just outside, and I immediately snap a picture. Beautiful. It flies away and I check to see if I’ve caught it.

I did… but I caught something else too. Frowning, I look out the window again to see Beau tromping across the back yard. Where is he going? Didn’t he say he was doing things around the house today? Maybe he changed his mind. I’m about to go back to taking pictures when I see him slip slightly on the slope near the back of the yard.

That’s when I notice the fence. It’s shaking like crazy, and he’s heading right for it. I can’t see that far, not from up here, not through the branches, so I use my zoom lens instead. There’s something caught in the fence. That’s where the shaking is coming from. Is that a deer?