Confetti Hearts (Confetti Hitched, #1)(53)

“Fuck dat hurt,” I groan.

I hear footsteps and the door is wrenched open. “Joe?” Lachlan says.

He fumbles with something for a moment, cursing the airbag. There’s a sudden pop and the air bag deflates. White dust clouds the air and lands on my face—a final indignity.

Lachlan looms over me, holding a pocketknife. Gone is his usual calm. He’s breathing heavily, and his eyes are frantic. “Are you alright, sweetheart?” he says, his hands moving gently over me, searching for injury.

Sweetheart? “I’m fide,” I whisper.

He switches on the car’s overhead light and exclaims. “Your head. You’ve banged it.”

“I’m okay,” I say, my breath whistling through my rapidly swelling nose. “It was the airbag. It hit me in the dose.”

“Poor boy,” he says rather unsympathetically. He leans in and unclips my seatbelt. His scent weaves around me and suddenly his soft curses are the most comforting thing I’ve ever heard. I barely manage to suppress the urge to throw myself into his arms.

“I’m sorry,” I say in a small voice.

He pats my face gently. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”

“Just the face and my pride. I’m dot hurt.”

He looks undecided, but finally nods. “Why are you sorry?” he asks gently.

“Well, if I’d listened to you, this wouldn’t have happened.”

“I don’t think I’d be very comfortable if you followed my words slavishly. It doesn’t give me any plausible deniability for the usual shit you get up to.”

My laugh stings my nose and makes me wince.

He gives me a crooked smile. “Come on. Out you get.”

He’s not calling me sweetheart now, and I miss it. He never used endearments when we were together, and they’re curiously sweet in his unpractised voice.

“Okay, coming out,” I mutter.

He falls back a step, as I squeeze out of the car. I put my foot down and immediately feel it slide out from under me. Lachlan catches me, and for a moment, it’s just us underneath the wild grey sky. His face is all I can see, his cologne all I can smell. Unable to stop myself, I lean in a little, and for a brief second his eyes flare with desire.

Then he sets me neatly back on my feet, dusting the snow from my coat. “There you go,” he says smoothly.

“What?”

His face is mysterious and dark in the gloomy light. “I think you’re on your feet now.”

“What does that mean?”

He just gives me his urbane smile that always makes me want to ruffle him up a bit and disturb the calm surface of his life.

Reminding myself that I’ve been aiming and missing wildly at dignity today, I straighten up. “Thank you.”

Antique lamps have come on near the hotel, illuminating snowflakes through the gloom. The loch is a dark mass in the distance, and snow has made extraordinary shapes out of the mundane.

“Bloody hell,” I say.

“It’s getting thicker,” Lachlan agrees. “Come on, Joe. Into the hotel. You’re only in that thin coat that is neither use nor ornament.”

“But it does look good,” I say through chattering teeth.

“Well, there is that. You’ll make a very trendy snowman.” He pulls my bag from the back of the car.

“What are you doing with that?”

He gives me a patient look. “I’m bringing it in. You’ll need it.”

“Yes, I need to ring a taxi.”

He takes my arm, and we begin to edge over the snow-covered ground. “Joe, I don’t think you’ve got the big picture yet.”

“And what’s that, Bob Ross?”

“You’re not getting out of here tonight. And probably not tomorrow either.”

I stop dead, ignoring his chuntering over how I’ll catch pneumonia out here. “What the hell do you mean?” I cough, cold air stinging my chest, and I grab my inhaler.

“Look around.” He waits patiently as I take a puff of my inhaler and then sets me walking again. “This is getting thicker. There is no way a taxi is coming up that lane tonight.”

“Oh fuck,” I breathe. “But my plane.”

“That will also be unable to get up the lane. Those wings are a wee bit wide.”

“You are not funny in the slightest. I have a flight to catch.”

“It won’t be going anywhere. It was just on the news that they’ve grounded all flights.”

“But what am I going to do?”

Getting snowed in really wasn’t part of my travel plans—a short list that included a pair of tiny briefs and drinking cocktails nonstop for a week.

“Well, as luck would have it, you’re actually standing outside a five-star hotel.”

I sigh. “You’re right. Thank god I’m here. I’ll go in and grab a room and then I can reassess the situation tomorrow.” I start walking and then turn when he doesn’t follow me. “Lachlan?”

“There aren’t any rooms left.”

“What?”

His expression is suspiciously innocent. “All the rooms are taken. Surely you know that.”

“Fuck. Dougal did say that earlier.” I run my hand through my hair, and the snow strikes cold kisses against my skin. “Oh well. I’ll just kip on the sofa in the bar.”