Twisted Hate (Twisted 3)

JULES

God was punishingme for wrongs I’d committed in my past life. That was the only explanation I could think of for why I’d been subjected to my predicament.

Josh and I both refused to back down and take the couch, so we were stuck in the same room, the same bed, for the next two nights. A gentleman would’ve offered to sleep elsewhere, but Josh wasn’t a gentleman. He was the spawn of Satan…one who was currently staring at me with narrowed eyes as I tried to finesse my way out of skiing.

“You guys go ahead,” I told Ava, making a pointed effort to ignore Josh’s suspicious gaze. “I just remembered I left something at the cabin.”

“You sure? I can go with you.”

“Nah. We already wasted enough time with the room situation, and I might hang in the lodge for a bit first.” I waved a breezy hand in the air. “You go ahead. I’ll be fine.”

“Okay.” Ava sounded doubtful. “We’ll be here.”

I held my breath and waited until Alex and Ava disappeared on the ski lifts before releasing it. A prickle of anxiety wormed in its way into my system as I eyed the vast expanse of snow before me.

I didn’t think I would be this affected, considering it’d been seven years since my last ski weekend, but that trip had spawned so many awful memories. Plus, there was the tape—

Don’t go there.

“What the hell did you leave at the cabin?” Josh interrupted my reverie. For someone who’d been so excited about skiing, he didn’t seem in much of a hurry to hit the slopes.

He was fully decked out in top-of-the-line ski gear—black pants, a blue jacket that stretched across his broad shoulders, and ski goggles he’d pushed up so they sat on top of his gray cap. The outfit lent him a rugged, athletic charm that had half the woman in the vicinity eyeing him with interest.

“I left my phone.” I shoved my hands in my pockets and gripped the phone nestled at the bottom of the right pocket.

“You had it in your hand on our walk here.”

Dammit. “Why are you so concerned with what I left behind?” I deflected. “Don’t you have a black diamond to attend to?”

“Triple black diamond,” Josh corrected. “And I’m working my way up to it.”

“Well, don’t let me stop you.”

His gaze turned assessing. “Wait,” he said slowly, his eyes raking over my form in a way that made my skin itch. “Do you know how to ski?”

“Of course I do.” Josh’s eyebrows rose further as monuments to his skepticism, and I added grudgingly, “Depending on how you define know.”

My ex-boyfriend Max taught me during that weekend when I was eighteen. I hadn’t touched a pair of skis since.

The anxiety expanded and ate at my nerves, but that didn’t stop me from glaring at Josh when he burst into laughter.

Instead of dignifying his mockery with a response, I turned and stalked away the best I could in my stupid ski boots. Angry puffs of snow sprayed up with each step.

“C’mon Jules. You love me, right?” Max kissed me and squeezed my ass. “If you loved me, you’d do this for me. For us.”

“It’s for security reasons, babe. In case he decides to press charges.”

“I promise I’ll never show anyone.”

Sweat trickled down my spine at the memories, but I forced them back into the box where they belonged before they could replay further. I’d already lived them once; I didn’t need to do so again.

“Wait.” Josh caught up with me, still laughing. The sound chased off the vestiges of my unwanted trip down memory lane, and for once, it didn’t make me want to slap him, though the next words out of his mouth did. “You’re telling me you dressed up in a ski outfit, rented skis, and came all the way down here…but you can’t ski? Why the hell didn’t you say anything earlier? You could’ve signed up for lessons or something.”

“I thought I could wing it.” It wasn’t the best plan, but it was a plan. Sort of.

“You thought you could wing skiing?”

My cheeks blazed. “Obviously, I changed my mind.”

“Yeah, good thing you did, or you would’ve probably died.” Josh’s laugh finally tapered off, but amusement lingered at the corners of his mouth and teased the dimple making a half appearance.

My stomach dipped. I’d never faced genuine amusement from Josh before. His smile, absent of sarcasm and maliciousness, was…disconcerting, even when it was only a quarter of a smile.

“I’m spending the rest of the day in the lodge, so don’t worry about me dying.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Maybe I’ll find a guy who can teach me how to ski.”

“Like the one you were eye fucking in the lobby?” he asked, his tone dry.

“Perhaps.” I didn’t deign to acknowledge the eye fucking part of Josh’s statement. He seemed strangely fixated on my brief interaction with a stranger, though the guy had been cute. Maybe I could track him down later. Flirting always perked me up, and I could use some action that didn’t come courtesy of my hand or battery-operated friends.

Josh rubbed a hand over his jaw, his brows tight and his cheekbones like slashes against the snowy background. “I’ll teach you how to ski.”

“Right.”

“I’m serious.”

I paused, waiting for him to crack and gloat about how he’d fooled me, and how I didn’t really think he’d teach me, did I?

But the moment never came.

“Why would you do that?” My stomach swooped low again for no reason. “What about your beloved triple black diamond?”

Josh offering to help me made no sense, especially since he’d been going on about that freaking ski run all morning. If he taught me how to ski, we’d have to stick to the beginner’s bunny slope.

“I’m doing it because I’m a nice person. I love helping my sister’s friends,” Josh said smoothly. Right. And I was the Queen of fucking England. “Besides, skiing is skiing. Doesn’t matter the slope.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not true.” Even I, a novice, knew that.

Josh let out a long-suffering sigh. “Look, do you want to learn or not?”