Chapter 10

Ten

HANNAH

“ P ut me down, Jake Ashley!” I shouted once we were outside. My words were carried away with a gust of wind, and I shivered. I’d bundled up when I left the cabin, but we were intending to get right in a shuttle, then on an airplane before taking another airplane and landing in Southern Italy, where it was nice and warm. Which meant the heavy snow was already soaking through my clothes.

“Fuck,” Jake muttered. He swung me down into his arms and pressed my face into his chest and wrapped his scarf around my head before he broke out into a jog. “What the fuck are you doing dressed like this in a blizzard?”

I didn’t bother to answer, preferring to wait until we were inside somewhere before I gave him hell. Besides, he wouldn’t hear me with my mouth muffled by his clothing.

After a minute, he sat down, and I heard the purr of an engine starting. I tried to pull back, but his arm was like a band of steel around me. When we started moving, I guessed we were on a snowmobile. It didn’t take long before he was slowing down, then finally came to a stop.

I peeked out when he climbed off the vehicle and saw that we were surrounded by cabins, but they weren’t in the same area as the ones we’d been in last night.

It was tough to see more than a few feet in front of us, but I could just barely make out a path beneath his feet. The walkway had obviously been shoveled and salted at one point, but the snow was coming down too fast and thick for the salt to melt it before it piled up again.

Jake trudged through it until he reached the porch of the first cabin, then quickly unlocked the door and shoved it open with his shoulder. I waited until he’d kicked it shut with his foot before I started wiggling and demanding to be put down.

“Hannah, if you don’t settle down, so help me, I will spank your ass until you can’t sit tomorrow,” he growled. “I’m still considering it.”

“What?” I gasped. “You can’t…can’t…you can’t do that!” I sputtered over the words, shocked by them and by my body's reaction. Was that turning me on? Seriously??

“I sure as fuck can, baby,” Jake muttered as he toed off his boots, then stomped across the cabin to the bedroom and into the en suite bathroom. “I should blister your pretty little ass for what you’ve put me through the past year.”

I stiffened as he gently set me on the ground and tugged my phone out of my hand, setting it on the bathroom sink. He pulled off my gloves and hat, tossing them over his shoulder. Then his hands went to the zipper on my coat, and I batted them away before trying to put distance between us. Only to realize I had nowhere to go when I backed into a wall. “I didn’t put you through anything,” I protested. “I tried to let you out of this…this…”

“Marriage?” he supplied with a sardonic lilt.

“It’s not a marriage, Jake. This is two people who made a huge mistake while they were drunk.”

Jake crossed his arms over his chest, the muscles in his biceps bulging, making my hands itch to feel them. I forced myself to meet his gaze rather than ogle his body like I wanted to. Throughout the year, I’d tortured myself by collecting any articles or ads that showed his picture and watching any TV clips I could find multiple times. He’d been gorgeous, as always, but I’d somehow forgotten how different he was in person.

He took up all the space with his dominating presence, filled the air with his delicious scent, and his body was even sexier.

Why? Why did he have to be so tempting?

My breath got caught in my throat when he came to stand toe-to-toe with me.

“You’re so very wrong, baby,” he said in a low tone. “We got married, then spent two days consummating it. You are my wife. Even if I’d been willing to sign the damn papers, you had no grounds for an annulment.”

“Then why did you ask for divorce papers?” I huffed, slapping at his hands when he tried to unzip my coat again. “Would you stop that?”

“No,” he snapped. “You need to get out of these wet clothes before you get sick.”

“I can undress myself!”

“Yes, but then you would be distracted when I’m talking. Also, I haven’t touched you in a year, Hannah. Unless you want me to rip your pants and fuck you against this wall, I’m going to try to remain calm by undressing you.”

My mouth opened and closed like a fish while I absorbed his threat. I honestly wasn’t sure which option I was hoping for.

“Now, be still like a good little wife and listen to me.”

My eyes narrowed, but his scowl kept me from speaking.

“Good girl. First, I didn’t then, nor do I now, have any intention of divorcing you. If you’d taken my fucking call when you left Vegas, you would have known that before spending a year making us both miserable.” He opened my coat and pushed it off my shoulders as he talked. “I realize that things with us went at lightning speed, and choosing to spend your life with someone you met hours before seems like a rash decision.”

I cleared my throat, preparing to agree. And because it had gone bone-dry when his fingers brushed the skin of my stomach as he grasped the hem of my shirt.

“I don’t believe I asked for your input, baby,” Jake grunted, gazing at me.

My lips pressed together, and I glared daggers. But he either didn’t notice or didn’t care.

“Before I met you, that’s exactly how I would have looked at it.” He leaned over and flipped the levers on the shower, turning on the spray before refocusing on me. “But life has a way of fucking with you.” He slowly pulled my sweater over my head and tossed it away. My pulse skyrocketed as his heated eyes roamed hungrily over my breasts. They bounced a little from my panting breaths, and the lace of my bra scraped over my taut nipples.

A twinge of disappointment hit me when he didn’t touch them, but it got lost in a haze of desire as his fingers dipped into the waistband of my wool leggings.

“I can’t say I knew from the moment we met I wanted you to be mine, but it sure as fuck didn’t take long. Waking up with you in my arms was the best Christmas present I’ve ever received.”

He dropped to his knees, grabbed one of my feet, and removed my boot before doing the same thing with the other. “And I knew I wanted to try to make it work.”

Jake looked up at me, his blue orbs dark with desire, and I repressed the need to touch him. I told myself to stop him. There were so many reasons this wouldn’t work. But I’d missed his touch more than I realized, and I was powerless to do more than stand there and watch.

His fingers hooked into my pants, and he slowly drew them down my legs, then tapped my foot, watching me expectantly. I raised my foot, and he removed the clothing, tapped the other, and did the same.

The room was filling with steam, but I was already burning hot as I stood there in nothing but my bra and panties. Jake stood, never taking his eyes off me. Everywhere he looked, my skin felt scorched. When they finally locked on my face, I sucked in a fast breath seconds before his mouth crashed down on mine.