A Little Too Late (Madigan Mountain #1)(77)

“It’s a black diamond,” Reed says with a smile. “Are you sure you’re up for it?”

I can see my own irritation in the reflection of his goggles. “Reed Madigan, do you honestly doubt that I can ski every trail on this hill? I’ve got ten years of practice. It’s you who won’t be able to keep up.”

“We’ll just see about that,” he says, his grin teasing. “Lead the way, girl.”

I ski off the lift to the left and whip down the slope toward the trail’s entrance. Then I don’t even slow down—I hop the lip and carve down the steep terrain at a fast clip.

Fine. I’m showing off a little.

When the fall line flattens out a little, I slow down, looking over my shoulder to see that Reed is right on my heels. When I swing to a stop, his grin is exactly the same one I fell in love with all those years ago.

“Somebody learned a few things.”

“Pfft,” I say. “Let me know if I’m skiing too fast for you.” Then I take off again.

Reed must have something to prove, too, because he straight-lines the next swath of the hill. Before the next lip, he makes a sharp turn to the left and beckons to me before scooting into the treeline.

It takes me a minute to get there, and I’m breathing hard by the time I ease into the trees. I find his skis and poles tucked into the snow at the base of a giant tree.

Reed is seated on a broad branch about four feet off the ground. It forks to the side like an L, making an easy perch. “This is what I wanted to show you. I wondered if it was still here.” He pats the branch, indicating that I should join him up there.

“What is this?” I ask, using my ski pole to disengage the bindings on my skis. “Your high school make-out spot?”

“You know it.” He lifts his goggles and smiles at me. “Three brothers, one car. A guy had to get creative.”

Laughing, I approach the tree. It’s not clear how I’m going to get up there with bulky ski boots weighing me down.

“Come here, sweetheart. We got this.” Spreading his legs for stability, Reed leans over and offers me his arms.

He hoists me up beside him, tucking me into his embrace. For a few moments, we sit quietly and enjoy the vista of snowy mountain peaks all around us.

“You know how the rhyme goes, right?” he asks. “Reed and Ava, sitting in a tree? K-I-S-S-I-N-G?” We both laugh, and then he gives me a quick kiss. “This was a silly ploy to get you alone,” he says. “But I have serious questions for you.”

“Okay?” I ask, leaning closer. He smells like spicy aftershave and clean mountain air.

“Is it all right with you if I come back to Colorado?”

“Of course it is,” I say immediately. “This is your home.”

“But it’s also yours,” he says, his voice turning serious. “And if I come back, we’ll see each other every day.”

My heart gives a nervous shimmy, because I don’t understand the problem. “I hope we’ll see each other every day, Reed. What are you asking?”

He turns me in his arms until we’re nose to nose. Then he gently lifts my goggles up onto my helmet, so he can look right into my eyes. “I love you. And I’m coming back here for you, Ava. The resort is secondary. If you don’t see a future for us, I won’t come back. I’ll help my dad find a better buyer, and I’ll leave you alone. If you need me to.”

“Oh,” I say so softly that I might not have actually said anything at all. His brown eyes are so serious and so beautiful to me. I can’t believe he’d even doubt that I want that future, too.

“I want to be here with you. I want what my parents had, even if they didn’t have it as long as they hoped. I ruined things once. But if you’ll let me, I’ll spend the rest of my life making it up to you.”

“Please stay,” I whisper. “I never stopped loving you, and I don’t think I ever will.”

He smiles. “Do you love me enough to work with me every day as well as stay with me every night? That’s a lot.”

“It depends,” I ask. “Am I still getting a vacation?”

His smile widens. “Somehow, yes. But—sorry—you’re still getting promoted. You’ll run the resort, and I’ll work on development. Sheila will be your number two, right?”

My heart lifts. “That sounds like a dream.”

“I want that for you.” He squeezes my knee and looks out at the view. “I spent a lot of the last twenty-four hours thinking about it. If you have other ideas, I’m here for that. But I won’t pretend to know how you run the place…”

“And I won’t pretend I know how commercial development works,” I add. “We can do this, Reed. Planning the future wasn’t ever our problem.”

“I was our problem,” he mutters.

“Terrible luck was our problem,” I insist. “And who knows? Maybe we’ll even have more of it. And that would suck, but we can’t let it break us the same way twice.”

“No way,” he agrees. “I love you, and I won’t ever stop. I lost you once, and I won’t let it happen again.”

“And I won’t either,” I promise him. “I want us to have a real chance.”