When he sat again, he directed his full attention to her. “If you remember your life, do you know if someone is waiting for you to come home. If someone is looking for you.”
She offered him a small smile, trying to give the impression of a hint of the happiness that smiles were supposed to mirror. Though she’d spent a lifetime faking happiness, she found it difficult to do that now.
Her smile dropped.
Hunt’s warm oak-brown eyes were fixed on her.
“No one is looking for me, Hunt.”
Chapter Five
“I’ll take the couch. You take the bed.” Hunt waved toward the bedroom.
“I can’t do that. I’ve already taken enough from you. I’ll be fine on the couch.” Freya twisted to look at the sofa piled with plaid pillows in all the green shades of the forest.
Hunt’s gaze latched on to her.
When she turned back to him, she caught him staring. For the second time, a pretty pink flush covered her cheeks. Only this time he knew it had nothing to do with the heat coming off the fire.
“I insist.” His voice came out as a rough rasp.
“All right. But only because I don’t have the energy to argue with you.”
He peered closer at her, taking in how pale she still was and the blue shadows underneath each remarkable eye. “I’ll just double check the electric blanket. Make sure there’s no frayed cord or anything. Those things worry me.”
He hurried into the bedroom, catching a whiff of apple as he strode by her. When she drifted into the room behind him, he was bent over inspecting the cord from the blanket to the wall outlet.
Out of the corner of his eye, he peeked at her standing close to him. Wearing his shirt and socks that swallowed her smaller frame, right this second she looked far too appealing to his deprived libido.
Especially when his shirt was unbuttoned at the throat, revealing a small, two-inch triangle of skin that no other man on Earth would find sexy. But to him, on Freya? It was.
Then there was the hem of the shirt swirling around her bare thighs.
He straightened, holding himself stiffly. “Cord’s safe.”
“Thanks for checking. I’m surprised the place even has electricity, given how remote it is.”
“It’s solar. There are panels behind the cabin.”
“Nice.”
He bobbed his head, feeling the urge to run outside into the raging storm and gasp for air that wasn’t scented like apples.
“Well…goodnight.” He patted her arm awkwardly.
She stared up at him.
He didn’t stick around for her reply, though her much softer reply of “goodnight” drifted to him after he got a few steps out of the room.
He strode to the fireplace and gripped the stone mantel, staring into the flames. Aries came to stand beside him. “Why don’t we go outside, boy?” he said to the dog.
He wagged his tail and followed Hunt to the door. When he opened it to a blast of wind, he glanced back, hoping the draft didn’t reach Freya and uncaring if the wind was cutting through the fibers of his sweatshirt.
Aries ran down to the snow and chomped a mouthful. Hunt snorted in amusement. That crazy dog loved to eat snow.
Hunt sucked in the air through his nostrils and forced himself to get a grip. Freya was at a low point, not someone to take advantage of. Not that Hunt ever would. But staring at her too long wasn’t acceptable behavior either.
On the other hand, he hadn’t prepared to share his cabin or vacation with a woman.
A beautiful woman with eyes that cut through him and made him think crazy things.
Like how she felt in his arms when he carried her to his SUV. Or when she shook in bed while he warmed her with his own body heat.
Aries did his business and then frolicked back to the porch steps, tail wagging against the fierce wind.
Back in the cabin, Hunt quickly made sure the fire was banked and a spark wasn’t going to light them all on fire. Then he made a bed on the couch using the spare blanket and a pile of plaid throw pillows.
Only the howl of the wind outside could be heard, but Aries soon added his snore to that.
Hunt flipped onto his side to watch the flames flicker over the logs.
His mind wouldn’t shut down. The mystery of Freya was too intriguing. He’d seen odd stuff in his time with Alaska Search and Rescue. People trapped on frozen mountain passes for days, starving, going crazy. Maybe that happened to Freya.
The holes in her memory made sense to him. His teammate had been in a car accident a couple years back, and he had no memory of driving through the intersection where he was T-boned. In fact, he only remembered walking out the front door of his house that morning to come to work. Everything after that was wiped out.
He believed Freya’s story, but he still thought it best to take her into the clinic and get her scanned at the first opportunity.
No one is looking for me, Hunt.
Those softly spoken words rang with a sadness that her eyes didn’t show.
It touched him deeply.
His inner hero always responded to stories like hers. It started when he was a kid, and his favorite older cousin, Derrick, had gone on a ski trip with friends for spring break. The family got notice within hours that he was missing. Days passed with rescue teams combing over that mountain. After the first twenty-four hours, the family lost all hope of finding Derrick alive.
And when his body was found, the family had never been the same.
From that day forward, Hunt set his sights on being on those mountains, searching for other people’s missing loved ones. In short, Hunt rescued so the world didn’t have to hear more sad stories and families didn’t have to endure them.
Freya’s sad but matter-of-fact tale about being a foster kid tugged at his protector instincts. Add that to the fact she’d been close to death’s door when he found her, and he was already far too invested in the woman’s welfare.
But what was he supposed to do? Throw her out in the snow?
He stared through the darkness toward the bedroom.
Was the electric blanket all right? What if it shorted out and caught fire?
He whipped off his own blanket, prepared to storm into the bedroom and give Freya his own blanket in exchange. Aries lifted his head to blink at him.
“I’m acting crazy,” he whispered to the dog.
Aries’s eyebrows wiggled as if in agreement.
Hunt flopped down on the couch again to stare at the ceiling.
So he’d saved Freya’s life. He saved a lot of people.
He just wasn’t attracted to them.
Or faced with being snowed in for days with them.
And they weren’t wearing my shirt.
He focused on his reason for taking this vacation in the first place—to rest his mind and rekindle his passion for his job so he could be at the top of his game.
This fixation with Freya must be due to how overworked he was. How many hours had he spent on duty this past month?
Christmas was drawing near. He’d slapped on a cheerful face and told his buddies he was glad to have some downtime to drink beer and watch the game. But deep down, he wished he had a love like Vivian and Broshears did.
As the storm raged outside and tree branches scraped at the roof, he realized three things.
First, he’d gotten sidetracked several times and completely forgotten to call the authorities. Though now that he knew no one was searching for Freya, calling seemed less pressing.