With a long stick, he prodded the fire, stoking. "So why did you marry me?" "My biological clock was ticking." Partial truth.
His incredulous look shouted a louder answer than any he could have shot her way. Okay, so she'd delayed having children. Again. And again, even though originally they'd agreed to start a family right away, both of them impatient.
Then their final explosive argument while unpacking in their new apartment had ended everything. She'd turned the spare bedroom into an office. He'd been planning more along the lines of a nursery.
She couldn't stop thinking how damned scared she was to take that final commitment step, because someday he would demand answers to questions she saw crowding his eyes about her past. She hadn't told him, but she suspected he knew at least a part of the story thanks to her blabbermouth younger sister.
Josh pitched a final branch into the fire. With deliberate, predatory intent, he leaned forward. She should move away, but couldn't find the will. No surprise around Josh.
He stroked aside her hood, exposing her face to the grazing knuckles of his caress. "It's a damned shame we couldn't get our clocks in synch, because you know there's nothing I would have enjoyed more than giving you a baby for Christmas."
Alicia held herself still under his touch, unable to pull away, unable to move forward. Her heart twisted with longing. She'd had such hopes for their first holiday season as husband and wife. Her gift for him remained wrapped, hidden, an antique sextant for her navigator husband.
The heat of his fingers scorched her chilled face, stirring the hunger that simmered inside her anytime he touched her. She couldn't ignore it, but she refused to act on that hunger. "You really need to stop with the sexual innuendos. It's going to be uncomfortable enough sleeping next to each other tonight."
He stared back at her, inscrutable thoughts scrolling across his eyes. Would he push?
Finally, he just smiled, letting her off the hook for now. "I'd much rather sleep beside you than a bear." "Thanks, I think."
His hand fell away. "But you're right. This sucks, being stuck out here together. I'm sorry it had to be this way."
She didn't want him to be nice, especially not now when they faced a final night together. She'd already cheated him of so much. He deserved better.
From the start, she'd known he was only getting half a person after what happened eight years ago. She'd hoped that maybe if she loved him enough, went through the motions of normalcy, everything would work. He would never know that she couldn't give him a hundred percent of herself.
She'd been wrong.
Alicia rocked back on her heels, suddenly certain she could not curl up next to him and hold firm to her resolve. "Maybe we shouldn't sleep at the same time after all. Once we finish eating, we could take turns sitting guard to keep the fire going. You should sleep first since you walked the lead."
With some luck, they could take turns sleeping until morning, never awake at the same time for long. And somehow forget that they were stranded together during one of the longest nights of the Alaskan winter.
Ten hours later on the longest night of his life, Josh held a branch-rigged torch overhead to add to the flashlight rays. Still, the beams barely pierced a dark deeper than outside. While Alicia slept, he wanted to scout around the cave. He needed to work off restless energy after his four-hour power nap.
They'd eaten, drunk melted ice, all silently. The talk of babies for the holidays had axed right through any hope of joking away the evening.
So her biological clock was ticking, which meant she just didn't want his babies. That delivered a kick in the seat of the pants harder than an afterburner.
He focused on the task at hand, surveying their surroundings, scouring for anything that might help their survival situation, like animal furs or food. So far, he'd only found an empty rabbit's nest and a few rats.
And a surprising lack of anything else.
Other wildlife should have taken up residence in this shelter. Yet he couldn't find so much as a footprint.
The cave floor looked as immaculate as his mother's fresh-mopped kitchen.
No one was here now, but his instincts blared that someone had been recently. And that someone didn't want anyone else to know.
"Hello?"
He jerked to look over his shoulder, torch swooshing around to light an empty corridor.
"Josh? It's just me." Alicia's voice bounced around a corner a second before her flashlight beam
ricocheted off the wall.
He turned before she could draw closer. "Careful about sneaking up on me." "Sorry."
Soft regret carried on her single word, the sentiment obviously for so many more things between them.