The snow had been cleared but the air was freezing, cooling her heated skin in seconds.
Alec was standing behind her and he wrapped her in his arms and rested his chin on her head.
She stared into the darkness, listening to the sound of the ocean, shaken by the realization that she hadn’t been this happy in a long time.
And that was because of Alec. Not just his body, or his family, but him. The man.
Leaning against him, she felt safe and warm.
Alec Hunter was a man who could handle anything life threw in his direction.
Anything, she thought, except a serious relationship.
He wasn’t prepared to handle that again.
“What a perfect night. I feel very Christmassy. It’s time to make plans and wishes for the next year.” She slid her hands over his. “Tell me about your next big adventure, Shipwreck Hunter.”
“Antarctica in January.”
She gave a gasp and half turned. “Antarctica? It happened?” She thought back to the conversation he’d had with his father. How much he’d wanted it. “You weren’t sure. Oh, Alec, I’m so thrilled for you.”
“Are you?” He said it cautiously. “Why?”
“Because it’s what you wanted more than anything.” She turned so that she was facing him properly. “When did you find out?”
“I had an email yesterday.”
“And you didn’t share it with me? We should have opened champagne. We’ll do it when we get home. I have a bottle in the fridge ready.”
“Ready for what?”
She locked her hand in the front of his coat. “For occasions like this one. I happen to agree with your mother that we should celebrate small moments. In the meantime—we’ll toast without the alcohol.” She lifted her hand to his face. “To dreams coming true.”
He looked at her for a long moment and she had a feeling she’d surprised him in some way, but before she could question him he cupped her face in his hands and lowered his mouth to hers.
“To dreams.”
As his mouth touched hers she felt the punch of physical awareness and something else. Something indefinable but equally powerful.
It uncoiled deep inside her, warming all the chilled parts of her body.
It made her heart swell in her chest and her body feel as if she’d had a shot of adrenaline straight into the vein.
She didn’t know what it meant, but she sensed it wasn’t good.
Any feeling that went beyond the superficial wasn’t good.
He’d made it clear this thing they shared would never go deeper and she not only understood but agreed with their arrangement.
Brittany and Zach came out onto the terrace to say that they were leaving and soon after Sky and Alec left, too.
To take her mind off the intimacy of the short car journey, she asked him more about the Antarctica trip.
“The BBC is making a documentary on Ernest Shackleton, the polar explorer. He planned to cross Antarctica via the South Pole, from the Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea. His ship, the Endurance, became trapped by pack ice and they couldn’t free her. Ten months later she sank.”
“Ten months? It took ten months to sink? So he didn’t make it.”
“He didn’t succeed in crossing Antarctica, but he brought his men home. It’s an incredible story. They couldn’t drag their boats and stores, so they camped on the ice and drifted with it until the ice started to break up.”