Chains of Fire (14 page)

Huffily, she said, “You’re making fun of me.” She started to flounce off the window seat.

He lunged, wrapped his arm around her waist, rolled, and put her under him. He stared into her indignant eyes and with slow emphasis said, “I am so not laughing at you.”

I don’t know what you mean.
But abruptly, she did. She was young, she was a virgin, but she wasn’t stupid. She’d read the books. She’d checked out the Internet. She’d talked to her friends. And even if she hadn’t done all that stuff, her instincts jingled insistently. Her voice quavered as she said, “Well . . . good. Because I don’t like to be laughed at.”

She and Samuel, they hadn’t ever made out. In fact, after they got to be teenagers, their early, easy affection had changed, become a distance that didn’t encourage contact. When their eyes met, her gaze slid away. When they bumped into each other, she leaped back. She thought people—people like her mother and father—saw how uncomfortable she was, because they never allowed them time to be alone anymore. Having anyone see her discomfort . . . well, that just embarrassed her. So did the dreams she had sometimes.

Now Samuel’s body was hard against hers, his skin warmed by the sun. He pushed her hair off her forehead, tucked it behind her ear, yet his brown eyes were hot, intense, focused on her as if he wanted to dive into her soul.

He made her nervous. He made her aware of every breath she took, of every breath he took, of the way their chests moved against each other.

She wanted to look away. She wanted to push him away. She wanted to pull him close. She didn’t dare move, except to chew at her lower lip.

His gaze dropped to that betraying little movement. His head dipped. Paused.

He was thinking about kissing her.

Her heart thundered in her ears.

She wanted him to kiss her.

She lifted her head a little.

Their lips met in the middle.

Samuel. Her first kiss. Samuel. First kiss. With Samuel.

She didn’t remember a time when she hadn’t known him. Loved him. Now this . . . her first kiss. Their two mouths, pressed together . . .

Lifting his head, he smiled at her, darkly satisfied. “There. That’s done.”

Wait.
“We’re
done
?”

“Do you want to be done?”

“No! Yes! No!” She frowned at him. “Did you do it wrong?”

“Kiss you? I don’t think so.”

“You’ve kissed other girls?”

“A few.”

She didn’t like knowing that. But he had experience, so she guessed he knew what he was doing. So it was her. “Is there something wrong with me? I . . . wasn’t I supposed to . . . ?”

“Supposed to do what?”

“You know . . . experience overwhelming passion?”

All of a sudden, he was fighting a grin.

Which made her mad. He didn’t need to act like she was dumb. “I’m just saying, in the books, when a guy grabs a girl and kisses her, the girl always experiences overwhelming passion.”

He lowered his head again, until his mouth was barely above hers, so she felt his breath and the brush of his lips as he spoke. “Let’s see if we can find out about that.”

This time when he kissed her, he pressed his lips to hers more firmly, then used his tongue to tease her with little wet touches that made her stiffen in alarm because that felt really, really . . . real. She wasn’t hearing the music swell. She wasn’t behind a camera watching, or holding a book reading; she was here, on the familiar window seat, with Samuel, whom she had known forever, and his mouth was opening over hers, and she was opening her mouth back, and there was no overwhelming passion, just this shaky kind of panic. . . .

Then.

Wow.

It was weird, but she remembered kissing him when she was little. She remembered the taste of him. This was Samuel. She hadn’t simply known him forever. Long ago, she had healed his fears and absorbed a part of him.

And she relaxed.

He smelled good: clean brown skin and muscles over strong man bones.

As she let his tongue move freely in her mouth, a faint scent of sweat or something so intimately Samuel made her press her knees together. Not because he was making any moves on her—his fingers were tangled in her hair—but because sensations rushed at her: hurried breathing, heart pounding, blood thundering in her veins, and
need
, burning need.

This was just like the books. Overwhelming passion . . .

Which was . . . overwhelming. It wasn’t what she expected. Being swept away sounded romantic. It felt . . . frightening. She hadn’t realized that she would want to . . . to forget the morals her mother had so carefully instilled in her and
do
things with him. Almost of their own volition, her hands stroked his neck, his shoulders, his arms. She explored his muscles rippling under his shirt. Rubbed her legs against his.

His whole body became so rigid she might have thought it was rejection.

But she could feel his heart slamming against his chest, taste his hurried breath, and he kissed her as if he wished to feed her his whole self.

Never in her life had she felt so much a part of another person.

Then he broke it off. Simply lifted his head and stared down at her, his eyes wide.

“Don’t stop.” Then she was embarrassed. She had whimpered.

“Your mother’s calling you.”

“What?” Isabelle wasn’t quite processing his words.

“Your mother’s calling you.”

“I didn’t hear her.”

“Trust me. I have good ears.”

She did trust him. But she didn’t want it to be the truth.

“Come on.” He got onto his knees, pulled her into a sitting position. “You don’t want her to catch us.”

“Right!” He was so right. She didn’t even know what her mother would do if she realized Isabelle had been kissing Samuel.

Make Isabelle feel guilty.

Make Samuel leave the house.

No!

“Right.” She catapulted off the window seat, then discovered she had to steady her legs. They were shaking.
She w
as shaking. With anxiety, with sexual need.

How had she come so far so quickly?

Had she been ready? And waiting for Samuel? Was he all she needed?

She whirled and looked at him.

He stared at her, so much passion in his gaze her knees buckled again.

She backed away from the window seat, then turned and stalked to the door. Yanking it open, she yelled, “Coming, Mother!” Then she turned back to him. Her chin trembled with nerves, but she spoke clearly. “White cotton panties.”

He froze in place, staring at her as if the three words had scrambled his brain.

Then she saw him remember his earlier question.

What are you wearing under that extremely hot skirt?

“White cotton panties,” she repeated.

Color surged in his face. His long, dark lashes fluttered closed. He groaned as if he were in pain.

She walked out the door, slammed it behind her, and smiled.

Quit school, would he? Leave Boston, would he?

She had given him something else to think about.

“Then scootch your bag over.”

“There is no
over
. It’s a two-man tent.”

“What two men could fit in here?”

Neither Samuel nor Isabelle slept very well. They weren’t as tired as the night before. It wasn’t her dreams of Samuel that kept waking her. No, not at all. The lingering pain from Samuel’s injury made them restless. That was it.

And five and a half years ago, when they had slept together . . . they
slept together
. So for Isabelle, the forced proximity proved irritating and . . . tempting. If there was one thing she knew from past experience, being tempted by Samuel led to two things. Great sex. And heartbreak.

So no.
No.
And no.

“What are you muttering about?” he asked.

“Is it time to get up yet?”

“What difference does it make? If you want to get up, we’ll get up.”

“True. It’s not like we have a full schedule.”

“Actually, I have an idea. . . .”

Which was why Isabelle found herself side by side with Samuel at the double doors, digging a tunnel through the snow toward the surface.

Samuel and Isabelle slept
that
night.

And she didn’t dream of him at all. Not at all.

When day three was over, they had created a tunnel that burrowed into the avalanche until it reached the stone steps built into the earth, then followed them to ground level and from there took a gradual slope toward the surface. Toward freedom.

They went to bed exhausted—and hopeful.