Candy for Christmas: Hockey Player vs Ice Skater (3 page)

There was a reason he
hated the torn up ice, and it wasn’t because it messed with his
game. He’d grown up playing on far rougher ice than their little
pond. The gouges didn’t affect his play an iota. It would be easier
if they
were
the problem.

Instead, every gash he
saw was evidence of her falling. Of that slim body smacking against
unforgiving ice. He knew the kind of bruises that left. Wore some
now. It was like she was trying to bleed out the hurt. The problem
was, it didn’t fucking work.

She punished herself
over and over and it didn’t make a goddamn bit of difference. One
one hand, he admired her determination. She was a tough as any
hockey player he’d ever met. The problem was him. He couldn’t stand
to see her hurting. So he tried to stop it. Gave her shit about
fucking up the ice and turned the pond into a new Jerusalem. There
was never going to be a winner but he hadn’t known what else to do.
The cost was high and he was afraid he’d lost any chance he may
have had with her.

But he couldn’t stop.
As long as she kept falling he’d keep trying to protect her. It was
what he did. He was a defender. He just couldn’t seem to find a way
that didn’t have them at loggerheads. Not that he’d give up. The
first time he’d ever watched her skate a new reality defined
itself, and it was entirely Candy Levine.

He watched her glide
across the ice in deepening shadows. Saw the tension in her body
change. Knew she was going to jump. She gathered speed and that toe
pick dug in as she threw herself into the air, spinning in the last
glimmers of light.

And when she came down
she fell. Straight through the ice.

The shock and stinging
pain hit Candice instantly. One moment she’s coming down from a
triple. In the next the ice breaks and she plunges into the bitter
water. The frigid temperature made her gasp and she inhaled water
as her head went under. Then more water, as she began to
hyperventilate from cold and shock. She kicked with her skates,
tying to surface, but her hands only met the glassy underside of
the ice crust.

Candice twisted her
head, desperately trying not to inhale any more water, searching
for the break in the ice she’d fallen through. She clawed against
the crust, lungs burning, limbs in agony as all warmth leeched from
her body. Until her movements slowed, and then stopped.

Nolan jumped the
railing and tore down to the pond. The trees hid it from view for a
few moments and when he reached the edge he realised that she
hadn’t surfaced. Although every instinct he had was clamouring at
him to hurry, he stopped at the small shed beside the pond and
grabbed a rope and a torch. He tied one end of the rope to the
cement-footed shelving and dragged the free end with him. Then he
stepped out onto the ice cautiously. Couldn’t afford to fall
through before he reached Candy.

As he approached the
hole, the ice cracked underfoot. He glanced down through the cloudy
film and could swear he saw a flash of chestnut. As he approached
the hole he shed his winter coat and shirt and tied the rope around
his waist. Then he removed his boots, flicked on the waterproof
torch, took a deep breath, and stepped over the edge into the icy
water.

The frigid temperature
hit him hard but he was expecting it. Was able to control his
response. He shone the powerful beam of the torch through the water
and prayed.

Then he saw it, a
flash of black against the lighter white ice crust. He swam towards
the shadow and the torchlight picked up chestnut strands flowing in
the current, swirling around her still body.

Nolan wrapped his free
arm around Candy then turned back towards the hole. As soon as he
saw the darker spot that marked the break in the ice, he dropped
the torch and swam strongly towards the surface. Emerged gasping
and freezing into the cold night.

“
Candy
,” he
called urgently, but she was unconscious. He couldn’t tell if she
was breathing. He pulled on the rope trailing over the ice into the
water. Used it for leverage as he hauled her torso up out of the
water onto the ice edge. Then he wrapped his arms around her thigh
and pushed up, sliding her along the ice and out of the pond. Then
he pulled himself up beside her. He wrapped an arm around her again
tugged on the rope, using it to slide them both away from the weak
ice.

As soon as they
reached safe ice he rolled her over and checked her breathing.

Nothing.

Her face was alabaster
and her lips were blue. She’d been in the water about ninety second
to two minutes by his reckoning. He checked her airways then laced
his hands over her breastbone and started chest compressions. Two a
second, pressing down hard a few inches. After thirty, he tilted
her head back to open her airway, pinched her nose closed, then
locked his lips on hers and breathed air into her. He checked to
make sure her chest rose. He did it again, then went back to
compressions.

“C’mon, Baby,” he
muttered. “Breathe.”

He didn’t notice how
cold he was, kneeling on ice, wearing only jeans, having just
emerged from subzero water. His only focus was Candy.

“Open those pretty
blue eyes and glare at me.
Please.
”

Breaths. Compressions.
Breaths again.

“
Fucking hell
.
Don’t you give up,” he yelled at her, desperately.

Every second she
remained lifeless on the icy pond drove a spike of fear into his
heart. She was a fighter, goddamit. So why wasn’t she fucking
fighting?

“I knew figure skaters
were pussies. There I was, thinking maybe, just maybe, I was wrong.
That if they were like you they must be tough motherfuckers. But
you’re all just a bunch of wimps in tights who like to prance
around the ice and call it a sport.” He paused, then continued
raggedly, “You want to land a triple? How the fuck do you think
you’re gonna do that when you can’t even
breathe?
”

Then, as though that
was exactly what she needed, Candy coughed and spluttered water.
Nolan slid behind her, tucked an arm around her waist and cradled
her to his chest as she continued to cough.

He stroked a trembling
hand against her wet hair and soothed her with low murmurs. She
didn’t wake, just slid back into unconsciousness, but this time she
was breathing. He didn’t waste any more time. Hypothermia was a
very real danger. For both of them.

He took two seconds to
slide his feet back inside his boots but didn’t bother lacing them.
Then he picked Candy up in his arms.

Nolan shouldered open
the door to his home and carried Candy across the threshold. Set
her down beside the roaring fire, on a ten-foot sheepskin rug.

Then he stripped
her.

His teeth had started
chattering and his hands and feet were numb, so he couldn’t undo
the laces on her skates. He grabbed his hunting knife and sliced
through them then pulled the boots off her feet. He peeled the
black leggings down her long legs, along with the short skating
skirt, then worked the clinging black jersey of her shirt over her
head.

As cold as he was, he
almost groaned when he saw her midnight blue panties and bra. So
sheer he could see through them. They were wet and had to come
off.

He could have averted
his eyes, but he just wasn’t that strong. He slid the panties down
her hips, swallowing hard when he saw only bare skin. He slid a
hand under her back and tried to flick open the clasp to her bra.
His hands were too cold. Instead, he tugged the straps down and
working her arms out of them. Then he pulled the cups up over her
breasts and slid the bra over her head.

He swallowed hard at
this site of her pale pink nipples tightly constricted in the cold.
He was still having trouble tearing his gaze away when he flipped
the sheepskin rug over to encase her.

Then he stripped,
hands clumsy against the button on his fly. It took him four tries
to get it open. His fingers were too numb to feel for her heartbeat
but he could see the sluggish pulse against the base of her throat,
and her shallow respiration. She wasn’t shivering and she still
hadn’t regained consciousness.

He been born in
Colorado and knew the signs of hypothermia. Knew he should try to
wake her, get her to drink something warm, but he was uncoordinated
and had lost dexterity in his hands. He needed to get warm as well.
He turned up the internal heat. Tossed more logs on the fire so
that it would blaze high and long. Then he did the only thing he
could.

Candice was so
comfortable she didn’t want to wake up. Heat surrounded her,
licking down the long line of her spine while warmth radiated along
her front. She trailed her fingertips across that gentle warmth,
luxuriating in the delicious sensations travelling through the pads
of her fingers and embedding themselves in her bones. A small sound
of pleasure escaped from the back of her throat.

“Are you awake?”

The voice was familiar
and she snuggled deeper.

“Candy, are you
awake?”

At the sound of the
name she hated, consciousness slowly began to filter through. She
became aware of hot skin and hard muscle serving as a mattress
beneath her. Realised that the leg she was slowly sliding up and
down was nestled between two male limbs. That her hard nipples were
pushing into a muscular torso.

She raised her head,
tangled chestnut curls falling across her face. She slid her hand
through the mass, pushing it away. Her eyes met a hot hickory gaze
and she realised she was sprawled naked across Nolan
bloody
Ducayne. The movement of her leg arrested as she realised he was
just as naked as she.

Then she remembered
and her breath caught in her throat. “The pond.
The
ice
.”

“
Shh
. It’s
okay. You’re okay.”

The chestnut strands
fell back across her face but this time the hand that reached to
push them away was his. Somehow the tresses fell down around them
in a cocoon, enclosing their faces against the rest of the
world.

Her words were a
whisper. “I fell through the ice. I couldn’t get out. How…”

Nolan just shrugged.
She felt the move along every inch of surface area where they
connected. But she knew the answer. “You saved me.”

Another shrug.

“How?”

“Had some rope and…
stuff.”

It was the first time
she’d ever seen him bashful or at least something approaching
bashful. It was irresistible. Her hand reached out to gently cup
his jaw. “Thank you,” she breathed the words and lowered her lips
against his for just a moment. A butterfly kiss.

Nolan had been hard
for an hour. Ever since he’d woken up to find Candy’s naked body
cuddled up in the shelter of his. One hand had been buried in her
long curls, which had dried in the fire’s warmth. The other was
wrapped around her, big palm spread across her spine. So he left it
there. Stroked up and down that long slim column, tracing the faint
ridges of her bones through silky skin.

It was only fair. She
may be asleep but her hands had wandered over almost every square
inch of him. And her leg,
God but her leg
was driving him
insane — her pelvis was nestled into the side of his hip and the
long limb was sprawled across him, gliding up and down between his
own. Every torturous slide brushed against his cock and the feeling
was somewhere between agony and ecstasy.

He’d dealt with it.
Because now he finally had her in his arms he couldn’t bear to wake
her. He was sure that when those beautiful blue eyes opened he
would lose her. So he lay with his eyes closed and breathed in her
scent… peppermint.

And now she had just
brushed those pink lips across his and he could swear that’s what
he tasted. He forced himself to not swipe his tongue around his
lips in search of more. To not pull her back down and dominate her
sweet mouth.

But it was a near
thing.

“You’re welcome.”

Blue eyes gazed into
his. And for a moment, he thought she would kiss him again. She
didn’t. Just breathed deeply. He became even more aware of the
breasts flattened against his chest and swallowed hard.
Don’t
even fucking think it
, he warned his cock.

Candy’s breath
deserted her when she registered the look in Nolan’s eyes. The
hickory was burning. Focused intently on her. She couldn’t seem to
care that they were both naked. No, that’s not true. She cared
intensely. But not in any way that made her want to change the
status quo. She could quite happily lie in his arms forever. It was
a truth she’d resisted admitting for some time.

He was hard.

They were both
pretending they weren’t intensely aware of that fact.

“How do you feel?”
Nolan asked her.

Wet. Aching. But no,
that couldn’t be what he meant. Oh, yes, he was referring to her
almost dying. “I feel… fine.” Fucking insane with need. Eager. Then
she heard the music. She’d been aware of it playing low in the
background, but the smooth, slow lyrics said it all:
Don’t want
a lot for Christmas / There’s just one thing I need…
The last
line escaped her lips softly. “All I want for Christmas is
you…”

“Candy…”

“Don’t call me Candy.”
The whispered response was automatic.

“I just went into a
frozen pond after you. I’ll fucking call you Candy if I want.”
There was heat in his tone, but it wasn’t anger.

“You save my life and
that’s the reward you want?”

“I didn’t realise a
reward was on offer.”

“And if one were, what
would you choose?”

“
Candy
…” the
tone of her name was harder this time. “I’ve been hard as a goddamn
steel pipe for hours and not able to do a bloody thing about it.
Stop fucking teasing me.” Any other time he’d have delighted in it.
But right now he just wasn’t strong enough to take it.