Slippery Slopes by Emily Franklin Read Free Book Online

e-mail?”
    Defensive, Dove stands up, trying to leave the office and Max behind. “I’m late for cooking. I have to go.” She can not only see but feel him shake, his sweatshirt sending tiny rivers of water down his wrists. Dove fights the instinct to hold him, to try and warm him up.
    “Les Trois.”
    Dove stops. “What?” Maybe the water has frozen his brain — obviously we’re at Les Trois, but what does that have to do with anything?
    “The password.” Max’s eyes flash, but his voice remains steady. “I happened to be here when Matron threw a bit of a computer fit last week.” Max’s lips are ringed with blue, the shaking now infecting his whole body. “I don’t know who you needed to get in touch with …” Max gives Dove a look that lets her know he’s completely aware of what she was going to do online. “… But you must really have wanted to—you know—to break in here and all.”
    “I didn’t break in.” Dove feels a lump rising in her throat. Am I upset about being caught? Or upset that Max knows about William? “And just so you know, I wasn’t e-mailing. I was just trying to change my …”
    Max shakes his head and holds up his palms like a traffic cop. “You don’t have to explain.” Dove feels frozen, knowing if she immediately types in the password she’ll send a direct message to Max, but if she doesn’t, she’ll miss her chance to switch her plane ticket, to redirect the downward spiral holiday week has sent her way. “So?”
    “So.” Dove wishes she had the guts to make a move one way or the other. “You need a blanket. Or at the very least, a hot shower.” For a second, she wonders if this sounds flirty rather than like concern for his well-being, then she decides he probably doesn’t care. That Claire will be more than happy to lather him up if need be. From down in the village, the church bells sound into the winter air, sending noise that undulates around the buildings, up toward the mountains.
    “I’m so late.” Dove looks at the clock behind Max’s head. “So, so late.”
    “Me, too,” Max says, his voice softer and slightly shaky.
    “For what?” Dove flashes to any number of things Max could be late for: shopping with Claire as she gives her parent’s charge card a beating, ice skating with her on the large pond, or perhaps writing about her in his thick leather journal.
    “For this.” Max puts his cold hands on the back of Dove’s neck, where both the chill and the touch send her reeling. He’s about to kiss her; in fact, he’s leaning down, in a pre-kiss position and she isn’t stopping him, when Matron appears.
    Furious, her voice is shrill. “What in heaven’s name is happening here? You’ve ruined the rugs—it’s worse than snow damage.” She furrows her brow at Max. “And you, Miss de Rothschild, aren’t you meant to be in the middle of a proper lunch?”
    Dove hasn’t heard her last name used in a long time. She glances at Max, who is paralyzed from the interrupted kiss, his dropping body temperature, and from Matron’s demanding presence. “I’m on my way now. Of course I made paninis in advance—roasted pepper with three cheeses, prosciutto and fig….” Dove rattles on about the food while disappearing out the door.
    Only after she gets outside and starts to run toward the chalet does she realize she, too, is shaking. Shaking, and with neither a changed plane ticket nor a kiss to show for it.
    The quiet in the room is interrupted only by a steady-paced but quiet beeping. Am I dreaming? Startled, Melissa bolts upright, thinking that the beeping sound is her alarm clock informing her it’s time yet again to be a host for the masses. But when she sits up and checks out her surroundings, the first thing that hits her is the stinging pain in her side.
    “Ah …” She doubles over, clutching her rib cage.
    “You broke two of ’em,” Gabe Schroeder says. Late-afternoon sunlight streams from the window, casting a glow onto