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Part One
1
The Colliers’ Winter Ball was considered one of the most exciting events of the winter season. It was always held a few weeks before Christmas, and the Colliers’ gifts to their guests were always the guests themselves. No one ever knew the guest list or the number attending. What one could count on, though, was a broad selection of not just the political and social elite but also those of the entertainment industry.
Landra Collier was known for her wide selection of interests and friends, and it was rumored there were very few immune to her charm. Or to her invitations.
Margot Hampstead, wife to the newly elected Senator Davis Allen Hampstead, was one of the few, her daughter, Alyssa, thought. Margot’s unexpected acceptance at the last minute had surprised not just her husband but her daughter as well. Alyssa hadn’t begged her mother to accept the invitation. She’d been certain it wasn’t accepted when she’d seen it in her mother’s wastebasket. The regret she’d felt had been impossible to hide. And Margot hadn’t been happy with her. Weeks later, when she’d told Alyssa to begin preparations to attend the event, Alyssa had been so excited she’d actually hugged her mother before racing upstairs to her room to do just that.
Slipping through a set of French doors leading from the huge oval ballroom to the gardens, Alyssa felt the night’s excitement building. Rumored to hold exquisite works of holiday art tucked within grottos and sheltered arbors, the gardens were one of the main reasons she’d wanted so desperately to attend.
Alyssa had waited all year to attend this one event. She was eighteen, no longer excluded from the Colliers’ parties, and she had already picked out the ball gown she was determined to wear, just in case her mother decided to attend.
The long cashmere gown was such a pale, pale blue that in certain lights it could be mistaken for white. Alyssa hoped few would catch a glimpse of her within the heavy snow that had begun falling over the softly lit mystery of the enchanting wonderland Landra was said to have created this year.
The heated brick walk instantly melted the fluff while all around it several inches of the snow glistened on the ground and clung to the bare branches and evergreens that spread out from the path.
Stepping cautiously along the damp walk, Alyssa made her way as quickly as possible into the shadowed garden, determined to find as many of the sheltered treasures as possible. She’d waited years to see the gardens. And they were just as beautiful, just as mysterious and enchanting, as she’d heard they were.
An ice castle nearly eight feet tall was the first treasure to be found. The soft white lights tucked in the sculptured firs to each side of it reflected off the ice and the shadowed forms of a Christmas tree and presents lightly colored at one window.
An ice door was partially open, and before it stood four ice carolers in front of the ice couple standing at the door, their faces lifted in joy.
It was so beautiful. The workmanship that had gone into it was so precise and detailed, the artistry in no doubt. It was said Landra’s nephews and her son did many of the carvings each year, though the nephews’ names were never revealed. And Landra had a lot of nephews, Alyssa had heard.
Continuing along the brick path, she found an ice angel next to a bed of straw, and on it lay a beautiful carved babe. Farther along the path blocks of ice carved to resembled gaily wrapped presents sat beneath a fir tree along with an ice-carved teddy bear. There were marble figures of children preparing to open presents, a large metal unicorn with a big red bow tied at the base of his horn.
A large wooden Santa painted in all his red and white finery knelt before a gas fire beneath a sheltered arbor where he lifted presents from his sack. A reindeer waited at his side.
Moving deeper into the grotto, Alyssa took a much narrower path that led away from the main walk. The path itself wasn’t as well lit, but a flicker of light along a dark curve filled with thick evergreens drew her attention. The hidden, the mysterious, the rumors and scandalous whispers of some of the more erotic artwork pulled Alyssa into the darker areas.
She found out why. Wide-eyed and curious despite her astonishment, Alyssa found a sculpture that held her spellbound, certain her imagination was playing tricks on her as she saw two male forms embracing a female, her long hair flowing around them.
It was an incredibly sensual piece of ice art, or a rather strange form due to a bit of melting. Alyssa couldn’t be completely certain. But it made her heart beat faster at the perceived vision before she drew away and continued deeper into the gardens.
All around her heavy flakes of snow fell gathering higher alongside the path. It held to branches and fir trees, piled atop glittering lights, and gave them a fractured, otherworldly look. The fantasyland atmosphere began to soften and ease a tension she hadn’t known she’d possessed until she felt it dissipate.
She wanted to become a part of the magic and erotic sensuality unfolding around her forever. She wanted to find a way to hold it just as it was, never allow it to melt. Never allow it to be taken from sight.
Lifting her face to the falling fluff, eyes closing, she inhaled the cold air, feeling it settle along her bare shoulders where the cashmere dress draped away from the curves.
She belonged here, she thought dreamily. Amid the rich treasure trove of lovingly carved ice and fantasy dreams. Here, where sensual art could be found tucked in the most unlikely of places, deep within the snow-filled night and the fantasies she dared not reveal were being brought to life inside her.
It was that damned carving of the two males with their female lover, she thought with a dreamy smile. How secure would that feel? How completely surrounded with sensuality and eroticism it would have to be. And she would never know, she told herself in amusement as she found another of the sensual poses. One of a reclining female, resting on her elbows, head tipped back, her back arched to lift her breasts closer to the male at one side of her, while the one kissing her cupped one breast as though offering it to his partner.
Wow. Alyssa was going to begin sweating soon. She was amazed the ice wasn’t melting from the sensuality of the carving itself.
Landra’s nephews had placed the explicit art pieces in an area certain not to be walked through as often. She might have thought there was nothing farther along the way if the snow hadn’t picked up a shimmer of light farther ahead.
As she moved quietly along the path a faint shiver caught her, the chill of the snow reaching past her fascination. Interspersed among the carvings here and there were the arbors with their gas fireplaces and enclosed padded seats. That was what she needed to find; otherwise she’d have to return to the ballroom or risk turning into a block of ice herself.
