“Scoot back,” I tell him, and he does, upright in the sled with his knees wide, both feet planted in the snow outside it.
I guess I sit between his legs, and I can feel my face flush a little more because I hadn’t thought that far ahead, but I’m suddenly nervous about it and even more nervous that I’m subconsciously giving into my newly discovered Gideon-is-attractive thoughts. Which seems rude to Gideon, who’s clearly humoring me until I leave.
“Are you getting in?” he asks, and yes, I am, sitting up ramrod-straight between his legs, trying to touch him as little as possible in this sled that is very much not designed for two adults.
Then Gideon ruins it by wrapping an arm around my waist and pulling our bodies together from hip to shoulder, and even through the layers he’s so warm and solid that I shiver. His arm tightens when I do, so when he says “Ready?” in my ear, voice like rough-hewn wood, all I manage is a wide-eyed, breathy, “Yeah.”
He pushes us off and then we’re hurtling down the hill, and I was right about momentum or whatever because we’re going way faster this time, the ground zooming by. I shout, just for the hell of it, and I could be crazy but I think I can feel Gideon laugh silently behind me, his arm solid around my waist.
Seconds later we’re at the bottom of the hill, flying past all the sticks we stuck in the snow, definitely beating the last record Gideon set—by a lot, actually—and oh, shit, we’re going way too fast and the trees are coming up and—
“Oh shit!” I yelp at the same time as Gideon says “Fucking—” and then we both fling ourselves to one side, landing in the snow in a tangle of limbs and profanity. A moment later, there’s the plasticky clunk of the sled hitting a tree and bouncing off harmlessly. I’m half on Gideon, his arm and one leg under me, and I roll off with all the grace I can muster.
“Sorry,” I gasp. “Are yo—”
“Did you—”
We stop and look at each other, both breathless and snow-covered. It’s stuck in his beard and his hat and his gloves as he rolls onto his back and I push myself onto my knees.
“You okay?” he asks.
“Fine,” I say. “How’s your—”
I cut off because Gideon’s grinning as he sits up, brushing the snow off, and it’s infectious. I can’t help grinning back, and I can’t help wanting to take this moment and bottle it so I can bring it out whenever I want. Gideon does a lot of things, but he doesn’t really grin.
“That was fun for you?” I tease. “Leaping from a moving vehicle?”
“That’s what you think just happened?”
“It sounds better than I talked Gideon into something reckless.”
“It’s not reckless, it’s just sledding,” he says, and reaches toward me. “You’ve got—”
He doesn’t finish the sentence, just runs a gloved hand along the inside of my collar of the fleece I had on under my coat, knocking the snow out. The fabric of his gloves brushes the back of my neck, and it’s not skin on skin, but I get goosebumps anyway.
“Thanks,” I say, but his hand lingers there when I look up and suddenly realize how close we are, my knee brushing his thigh, his face inches from mine. He’s stopped grinning but those telltale crinkles are there around his muddy green eyes, the soft indents that are on their way to becoming laugh lines someday, and there’s a thought. Gideon, with laugh lines.
Gideon’s hand is gentle but firm around my wrist in the dark. The bloom of heat in every point of contact: my knee against his thigh, his elbow over my waist.
I feel like a deer in the headlights, like something huge and maybe catastrophic is barreling toward me, but all I can think about is how beautiful the light is. Gideon’s still looking at me, his pretty eyes still smiling. The crash is inevitable.
“There’s,” I say, and raise one hand to the snow melting in his beard, but my glove’s covered in snow and I only get more on him, and I’m distracted by his mouth, his gloved hand still on the back of my neck, the memory of his arm around my waist and his hand on my wrist and his thumb tracing around my ankle. I shouldn’t, but his eyes flick to my mouth.
I shouldn’t, but I lean in and kiss him before I can think any more.
His mouth is just as soft and warm as it looks. The snow in his beard and the tip of his nose are cold against my cheeks, and it’s sweet and gentle and I can’t believe I’m doing this—
Gideon’s not kissing me back. He’s gone still as a statue, frozen in place. I jolt back like I’ve been scalded.
“Fuck,” I babble, my heart hammering so hard I can feel it in my throat, my face cold and then hot. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I don’t know what—”
I’m mid-apology when his lips hit mine again and the words a mistake disappear into the warmth of his mouth, sweet and tentative and needy, all at once. He kisses me and pauses, lips a millimeter away like he’s thinking, and I close the distance. It’s back and forth like that, each press deeper and warmer and giddier. I can’t believe I’m doing this. I can’t believe I’m getting away with it.
I can’t believe it feels so good, sitting in the snow, both of us a little off-balance as we work out the angles where our mouths fit together best. I scrape his lip with my teeth and mumble an apology. In response, he puts a gloved hand on the side of my neck and I gasp, a rush of cold air against my warm, wet lips.
Gideon grunts, pulls away, and before I can wonder what’s going on he grabs a finger of his glove with his teeth and yanks it off. Then his hand is on me again, cold fingers sliding into my messy hair and his warm palm against my neck.
I make a noise I’m not sure I’ve ever made before. There’s a drop of melted snow from his glove on his lower lip, and when I get close enough I lick it off and then his tongue is sliding against mine, hot and slow, like we can memorize this. I don’t make another noise, but I want to. I do pull a glove off and work my fingers into his unruly dark hair, knocking his hat off as he pulls me closer, mouth never leaving mine.
It’s better than it’s got any right to be, both of us sitting in the snow in the middle of the woods. Gideon kisses me unhurriedly, lazily, like there’s nothing else he’d rather do. He pulls his other glove off and tugs me forward by the waist until I’m half in his lap, tangled on the snowy ground, and it’s dizzyingly warm everywhere we’re touching and cold everywhere else.
Finally, I can’t ignore how numb my butt is, and I pull back, swallowing as if I can mask the way I’m panting for breath.
“I, uh,” I start, and instead of pulling back his mouth traces a line along my jaw, beard tickling my neck as he brushes a kiss against the spot below my ear and I forget what I was going to say. God.
“What,” he murmurs, and I swallow.
“I can’t feel my butt,” I say, and he stops, the tip of his nose cool against my ear. I shiver, my fingers wrapped around the back of his neck. I can feel him breathing.
His lips are still brushing my skin when he says, voice low and scratchy, “We should get back.”
“For sure,” I agree, doing my best to sound normal and failing. “It’s... late?”