Chapter 12 Gus

Empty sheets. Again. Again.

I shouldn't be surprised, and therefore, I shouldn't be angry either. I knew exactly what I was getting into when I pursued Julia Ridgeway. A pampered princess. A spoiled heiress. Too hot for her own good. Too smart to be well-adjusted, but too pretty for anyone to realize it—even her. Of course she would run away. I should have seen this coming. Hell, I've lived this before.

I knew better.

As I rest on my elbow, lingering beside the empty space on my bed that smells like Julia's perfume, I'm furious. Not at her, but at myself for toying with the idea of brewing a pot of coffee, sitting with her in my heated backyard patio, and watching the ice melt off the tree branches. The fantasy is so patently idiotic now.

This was a business deal. I've made hundreds of deals in my life, and I know how they go. They're not personal—they're just business. The cliché stands because it's true: Not personal, just business.

I rotate onto my back and stare at the dark wooden beams crossing my ceiling. It's for the best. I repeat it in my head until it feels true. I re-familiarize myself with the facts: She's twenty-eight, phenomenal in bed, dangerously attractive, and accustomed to the world tripping and fighting to fall at her feet.

She doesn't want to drink coffee and watch ice melt, you idiot.

Several minutes pass and I'm still counting slats in the darkness of the pre-sunrise hours.

This is pathetic.

I'm a goddamn billionaire. I can sleep with any woman I want. I could send three text messages and have two blond, twenty-eight-year-old models in my bed before noon if I wanted. Hell, I could have five insatiable women literally named Julia in my bed before noon if I wanted—yes, in the middle of a snowstorm.

And yet I'm lying here, recalling the sound of her voice. The scent of her hair. Her soft skin. The clench of her warm pussy around my cock. Being with her was different than anything I've ever experienced carnally. I've been with plenty of women in my life, some demure, some wild, and some downright kinky. None—not even one—affected me the way Julia did. There's sex, and then there's fucking. Julia and I…that was fucking. It was raw and unbridled and surprisingly daring given we don't know a damn thing about each other.

"Get out of my head." I say that part aloud before I shift onto my side and get out of the bed. I pause with my bare feet on the heated floors and I lean over, elbows on my knees, before exhaling heavily. A quick check on my phone (no messages from Julia—not surprising) tells me it's five in the morning. A good enough time as any to start the day before the storm comes in.

Downstairs, the cabin is quiet. I head to the kitchen and turn on the coffee pot, opting for a regular cup rather than something more complicated from my espresso machine. I can already tell today is going to be a long, contemplative sipping kind of day, so I'll need a steady drip if I'm going to make it through.

Once the sun rises, I'll get one last hike in and wrap up the chores in the greenhouse. Chances are, when there are a few feet of snow outside I won't want to trek out there no matter how warm the greenhouse is. I just need to make sure the generator is all set in case anything goes wrong in the storm.

For now, I've got time to kill.

The US markets aren't open yet, so I'll have to wait to check my stocks. Not a problem. I've got a stack of books up to my knee that I planned on reading over the holidays. I may as well start now.

I grab my coffee and head to the living room, where I stop in my tracks.

It's already snowing.

Thick sheets plummet, occasionally colliding against the spanning windows. Snow piles along the cabin's foundation, four or five inches already, with no signs of stopping.

Like hell are any flights taking off.

My hand goes to my phone in the pocket of my pants and lingers there. When did Julia leave? If she left a couple hours ago, she outran the weather. But if she's still on the road…shit.

I take the stairs two at a time, heart thudding as I go.

My truck rumbles down the highway, speeding recklessly, but I can't seem to ease off the gas. The worst could have happened. Hell, I shouldn't even be out here, and I've got 4WD and huge ground clearance. The snow is practically flowing in a murky wall; visibility is shit.

It takes me ten minutes to stumble upon it: a black spot in a sea of white dotting the ominous blue of the rising morning. Immediately, unbridled urgency strikes me, but I resist the urge to slam on the gas any more than I already have.

My heart pounds when I approach and finally see the angle of the car—how it has tilted off the road and into a dip alongside the highway. The hazard lights flash, barely visible until I'm less than ten feet away.

No. God damn it, no.

"Please be okay. Please be okay." I spring out of my truck, barely remembering to shut the door behind me.

Ankle deep in snow, I trudge over to the driver's side of Julia's car and am about to wrench it open when the door swings towards me. Julia emerges, her cheeks pink and her face contorted into a look of anguish. She doesn't hesitate to fling herself into my arms, and I catch her.

Relief strikes me when I hold her, wishing I could check her for injuries, but her grip tells me she doesn't want me to let her go. Panting, she buries her face into my chest and clenches the sides of my jacket in her fists.

"Are you okay?" I'm practically spitting the question. "Are you okay? Did you hurt yourself?"

She doesn't answer. She just tightens her hands around my jacket like she wants to hold me tighter, even though it would be impossible.

"I'm so glad I found you," I finally admit, allowing myself to relax when I realize she's fine—physically, at least.

I kiss the top of her head. It's an impulsive decision, and the cold sensation of her hair against my lips is a brutal reality check: She was running away from me.

But Julia isn't running now. On the contrary, she squeezes me tighter before she cranes her neck to look at me. Her lips find my chin first. My jaw. My cheek. My own lips.

We kiss briefly; it's too blisteringly cold to be anything but brief. Her body shivers, and I force myself to pull away so I can lead her to my truck.

I help her into the passenger seat before I return to the driver's side. Once we're both seated, the silence in the vehicle cuts through the moment and brings me back to reality. Wordlessly, I increase the heat a notch before I look over at Julia. She concentrates on the abandoned Corolla, like she's cursing it for ending up in a ditch even though she was the one who drove it there.

"My luggage," she mentions.

Still without a word, I brave the cold once again to retrieve her suitcase and carry-on from the car. She doesn't thank me when I place them both in the truck's back row, but her attention lingers on me when I return to my seat.

We remain in silence again. The words aren't coming to me, and Julia should have nothing to say but an apology—which she's incapable of offering.

"Look," she finally begins, breathing out and facing me, "I get it. It was a deal."

"Doesn't make it less shitty."

Her face tightens and she narrows her eyes. "How am I the shitty one? If you wanted hugs and goodbyes kisses, you should have put them in the contract."

"I thought…" I trail off, the rest of it dancing on the tip of my tongue. But then I look at Julia and see how furious she is to be in the passenger seat—like being here with me is so unbearable.

"What did you think?" she presses, tired of waiting for my response.

Nice. I want to say, I thought it was nice. It's a simple, stupid word, but it's true. Last night was nice. Taunting each other. Kissing without planning to. All of it was so different from my experiences with women over the last twenty years. Once I became a billionaire, women started tiptoeing around me like they were so afraid of fumbling their one shot with me. They never disagreed or played hard to get or even told me how to please them in bed. Then Julia came along—a woman who doesn't give a shit about my money and power. Last night, she reminded me what it feels like to be myself with someone. And it was…nice.

In her defense, she was clear though: She's been with a lot of men—and she's proud of it. What was a meaningful, rare night for me was likely par for the course for her. After all, she didn't bat an eye when I grabbed her. Tied her hands. Choked her. Fucked down into her so hard that her body slid up the mattress.

"Glad you're not dead," I finally say, choosing to ignore her. I don't wait for her response, and put the truck into drive. "I'll deal with the car after the storm passes. Let's get back to the cabin now though. It's freezing."

"The cabin? No, you need to take me to the airport."

I let out a scoff. "Look around you, honey. Does it look like any planes are flying today?"

"What are you, an aviator? Take me to the airport and let a professional decide."

"I'm not keeping us on these roads to fulfill your whims," I counter sharply. "We're going to the cabin."

"I'm going to Boston," she insists, folding her arms. "Aren't you a billionaire? You can't get me a flight?"

"Aren't you a billionaire too? Get your own goddamn flight." I'm driving now, trying to ignore her death glare. It's hard though. Julia Ridgeway is exceptionally pretty when she's angry.

She settles into her seat and directs her vitriolic stare out the window. "You planned this, didn't you? You brought me to bumfuck Montana because you knew I'd get snowed in with you."

I snicker. "You're asking me if I can control the weather."

"You knew there would be a snowstorm."

"Didn't you? You didn't check the ten-day when you packed? Maybe you wanted to get snowed in with me."

"Oh, please. Why would I want that?"

"I told you to come in two days. You're the one who came in three. If you had come a day earlier, this wouldn't be happening."

"So this is my fault?"

"Jesus Christ. It's nobody's fault, Julia. What, is this the first time you haven't gotten what you wanted? Grow up. And while you're at it, stop being so damn prideful and admit you enjoyed last night."

Her jaw drops. "You're delusional."

"Says the woman who accused me of controlling the weather," I retort, chuckling with disbelief. "You're welcome, by the way, for waking up in the middle of the night and coming to your rescue."

"Please. You were chasing me."

"Chasing you? Julia, if I wanted to spend another minute with you, I wouldn't have to chase you. You'd be in my bed begging for it."

She curls her lip. "I detest you."

"The feeling is mutual. At least we agree on one thing."

I can tell she's dying to get the last word in, but this has gone on for too long. We both know it. She stares out the window instead, refusing to acknowledge me. I decide that's fine. She's better to look at than to talk to anyway.

When we get back to the cabin, Julia heads straight to her bedroom without a word like a surly teenager. I consider picking a fight, but it's still so early, and I don't have the energy. I leave her suitcases by the door to her room and head back downstairs, where my coffee is still waiting for me.

Clearly, being snowed in with Julia Ridgeway is going to be a fucking treat.

Four hours later, we're up to a foot of snowfall with no sign of stopping. The last time I saw a storm like this, I was thirteen. Back then, Grandpa and I sat in the living room and watched it together, while Grandma panicked in the background about boiling water and making sure the pipes wouldn't freeze.

I remember Grandpa laughing at her when her back was turned. "Crazy old girl," he said while shaking his head, but he still stared at her like she hung the moon.

Now, I'm sitting in my living room and watching the storm again—except I'm on a three-thousand-acre compound. There's no need to run the taps; the pipes won't freeze no matter how cold it gets. I have PEX pipes running through the place, not to mention a solid heating system that hasn't failed me yet. Grandma and Grandpa would have been blown away.

It's after ten, and I start to wonder if Julia is going to spend the rest of the storm locked in her bedroom. If so, that's her problem. I'm not going to beg her to spend time with me. I got what I wanted—what I was owed. Sure, we briefly toyed with the idea of doing it again. But that was just drowsy sex talk, I now realize. Didn't mean anything. If it had, she wouldn't have run away.

I read for a few more hours, periodically watching the snow falling, but mostly trying to get through a book on Toyota's manufacturing philosophy, which is a much hotter read than it sounds.

"Hey, August."

Julia stands in the doorway to the living room. Her blonde hair is in a loose ponytail, and I immediately think about pulling on her ponytail in Milan. The memory heats me. And treated to the sight of her in skintight black leggings, I'm suddenly not so annoyed to have her lurking around my house.

"What are you doing?"

"Reading," I answer before flicking the page I'm on and glancing up to find her eyes fixed firmly on my face. "This is a book."

She studies the cover. "Lean production. I didn't take you for a just-in-time kind of guy," she replies.

Apparently, she already knows all about Toyota's production system—although I have no idea how and why she would.

Nonchalantly, she falls into a seat on the adjacent sofa. "And just so you know, your snark isn't half as cute as you think it is."

"Luckily, I have no interest in being cute." I turn the page. "What do you want, Ridgeway?"

"Nothing."

I scoff. "What have I said about lying?"

When I look up again, she's staring out the window at the rising snowfall. She breathes out, surely trying to measure the height of the snow surrounding us, and I wonder if she has finally accepted the situation: She's going to be here, with me, for a while.

When she faces me, she bites her lower lip. Not in a desirous way, but reluctant. "I get stir crazy," she admits. I know her admission must be a severe understatement when she asks, "Can I go outside?"

Immediately, I wonder if we're looking out of the same windows. "You want to go outside?"

"The snow is slowing."

"It's a quiet moment. It'll come back."

For once, she's silent. She has no snarky response or witty quips about me being a weather demigod or a cloud warlock. Gentle disappointment passes over her instead; I can see it in her slumped shoulders. She's telling the truth—and I'm struck by how much her disappointment dissatisfies me.

"Fine," I relent, trying not to enjoy how her eyebrows gleefully shoot up when I give in. "But bundle up. We go as far as the porch. That's it."

Julia is beaming. "Really?"

"Yes, really. Hurry up."

She practically leaps up and jogs out of the room, and by the time I've placed a bookmark in my book and put on a sweater, she's already standing at the front door and fastening her boots.

Once we're both sufficiently bundled and layered, I open the door to the cabin and we step outside. Immediately, the brutal chill slams into us, but Julia doesn't seem to mind. She crosses her arms and walks to the railing, where a thick layer of snow has gathered on the wood.

Curious, I watch her from my spot by the door. I've stared at enough pictures of this woman to know she favors hot and humid places—the kind where she can take off her clothes and leave as little to the imagination as possible. And yet here she is, standing on my front porch and looking at the snow like the world is coated in diamonds.

When I join her by the railing, she glances in my direction, but quickly returns her focus to the storm around us.

"It's so quiet," she mentions. "I've never been somewhere so quiet in my life."

I wait for her to insult it—as usual—but the scorn doesn't come. In fact, she gives her head a small shake, like she's not quite sure she believes what she's seeing.

"You should put a chair out here," she suggests, giving me her attention again. "Better yet, a swing."

"A swing?"

"A porch swing," she clarifies. "That's a thing, right?"

"Sure. That's a thing."

"You definitely need one," she continues. "Right over there. You could hang a porch swing and put an end table on each side so there's somewhere to put drinks, phones, whatever."

"Always thinking about that phone," I murmur.

She rolls her eyes. "When you get paid more than thirty thousand dollars for posting a single picture of yourself, you can tell me to stop thinking about my phone," she retorts.

"Thirty thousand? Not bad," I admit. "Not that you need the money."

"I don't."

"Then why do you do it?" I motion for her to move back to the front door.

To my surprise, she follows me without objection. "I like making my own money," she replies, shrugging. "It's liberating to buy something with money I earned, not money I inherited by…existing."

"Have you ever thought about getting a job?"

"Go suck a dick, August."

Her comment makes me laugh. "I'm not trying to insult you," I explain. "I'm serious—like a job at Davenport-Ridgeway."

"Me?"

"Who the hell else would I be referring to?"

Julia, in the process of removing her boots, clears her throat. "Sorry," she practically whispers. "I've thought about getting a job. Emphasis on ‘thought.' My father isn't enthused by the idea, but I want to."

"You could do anything you want," I say before I grab her coat and bring it to the closet along with my own. "You've got a degree, you're sharp, and you're not intimidated by anyone. That's all a job is. Confidence."

"What a cute, male take on the workplace."

"I'm just saying, you could do well in a lot of jobs. Forget your father. He doesn't know."

"You don't know what he's like."

Surprised, I look over at her and find her expression serious. Confusion flashes through me. No way. It's impossible for anyone in Julia's sphere to believe she's incapable of anything. But apparently her father underestimates her—and apparently she believes him.

"I know you don't take shit from anyone, so why is he allowed to bring you down?" I question, shaking my head.

She folds her lips over like she's masking a smile before she regroups and says, "He's very successful, if you haven't noticed."

"So am I, and I'm telling you—your father doesn't know shit."

"Words that could only come from the pride and joy of MIT."

I know a deflection when I hear one. Fine. If she doesn't want to talk, I won't force her.

"So you do know what MIT is," I point out instead.

Her silent smirk shouldn't be as adorable as it is—in fact, nothing about this woman should be adorable because she's got motherfucking ice in her veins. But I can't deny it, no matter how hard I try.

She clears her throat. "So, what's for lunch—and dinner, for that matter?"

"Whatever we make. I have some frozen meals that Brent flew in."

Her expression is pure disgust. "Frozen food? Frozen food? You have a chef's kitchen and a La Cornue stove, and you want to reheat a frozen meal?"

"Not like a Lean Cuisine," I clarify. "He had my chef back in London make them and freeze them."

"Why in god's name would I assume you were going to feed me a Lean Cuisine, August?" she inquires, frowning hard. "I know you have countless fancy frozen meals piled up—and there's no way in hell we're eating them."

Before I can protest, Julia goes to the kitchen, where she opens the fridge like she owns the place.

"I'm so underwhelmed. Christmas is in a few days, and the only things you have in your fridge are, like, eggs and butter. What was the plan here?"

I shut the fridge door. "I have other fridges." I raise my chin towards the other side of the kitchen. "Frozen meat is in the chest freezer in the pantry. Root vegetables too—not in the fridge. In crates."

She lets out a humming sound before she heads over to the pantry and rifles through the chest freezer. Five minutes later, she emerges with a couple packs of frozen meat, some of my root vegetables, and a jar of beef stock. I'm about to ask her what she's up to, but she disappears into the pantry once again and returns with a half dozen spice jars.

"I'm assuming you have wine somewhere around here." Deftly, she gathers her hair into a new ponytail—like she means business.

"I've got a cellar," I respond, which I know excites her because she lowers her jaw a fraction and quickly shuts her mouth when she realizes she's about to drop her chilly fa?ade.

"I'll need a Burgundy," she states, raising an eyebrow in challenge.

"Pinot noir work?"

It apparently passes muster because she nods without a word. Silently, I thank Brent for arranging three months of weekly calls with one of the best sommeliers in London, per my request, after I discerned from Julia's Instagram that she lives and dies for wine.

When I return with the bottle from the cellar, Julia has laid out her ingredients in groups on my kitchen island.

"Do you have any fresh herbs?" She opens the bottle of paprika and sniffs it. "Even as I say that aloud, I know the answer is going to be no."

I nod though. "In the greenhouse."

"You have a greenhouse?"

"No, I just said there were herbs in a greenhouse I don't actually have," I return mordantly, enjoying the way she rolls her eyes. Before she can dissect me with one of her quips, I motion for her to follow me.

We bundle and head towards the cabin's west exit, which is closest to the greenhouse and the pond. Before we go, I do a quick check-over to see if she'll be warm enough. Her clothes are too fashionable to be element-appropriate, but it'll do for a quick walk.

She sees me studying her and she scoffs. "Oh, don't tell me you're worried about me out there in the storm, Mr. Winter."

"Stay close," I advise. "When you're walking in the snow, you have to lean forward and shorten your steps."

"Should I learn some bird calls so they can rescue me if I fall into a drift?"

Screw me for caring. I don't validate her question with a response. I just shoot her a chastising look and lead the way outside.

The snow has picked up in the last hour, and now that the sun is setting, the atmosphere has darkened to a somber gray. A couple feet out, I start to regret this. I should have asked her what she wanted and gone by myself to retrieve it. But when I glance back, I'm pleasantly surprised to see her grinning while we trudge forward, like she too recognizes how ridiculous the situation is.

The greenhouse isn't far from the cabin, but in these conditions the trip is an Everest summit. It takes us a couple of minutes, but we do eventually reach the door. With unwieldy, gloved-fingers, I type in the code and usher her inside. Her expression betrays her cool. She takes in the rows of herbs filling the tables and shelves with undeniable awe.

"You grew all this?" she finally asks as she pulls her hood away from her face and shakes snow out of her hair.

Nod.

"Even the tomatoes?" She bends to examine a cherry tomato plant. "I tried to grow tomatoes once. I had a windowsill plant back at my house in Boston, but then it died when I went to southeast Asia for a month."

"It's not hard. You could do it if you were around."

Julia continues up the row, reading the labels for the different plants. When she reaches the end of the row, she weaves around to the other side and continues. What I thought would be a quick trip is steadily evolving into a twenty-minute ordeal—but I'm not angry about it.

She pokes at a cucumber plant. "Wow. It's strange to see this here when it's so…"

"So fucking cold," I fill in.

"Exactly. Can I grab one of these too?"

"Take whatever you want." I hand her a wicker basket.

For the next few minutes, Julia travels along the rows of plants, grabbing things here and there and adding them to her basket. A cucumber. Herbs. Arugula and some other greens. She has more than the two of us will need for tonight, but I don't stop her. Her expression has shifted into something at the intersection of glee and calm, and I must admit, it's a welcome change of pace.

When she's done, I notice her glancing between her little basket and the worsening storm outside.

"I'll carry it," I offer.

Smiling, she hands me the basket and begins to re-bundle herself.