I wait for more, but nothing comes. The other boxes are lighter, but Gavin still takes one of them, leaving me with one box to trek back through the snow. It’s coming down in quick, fat flakes, covering Gavin’s shoulders and hair. The clouds overhead don’t look like they’re going to clear anytime soon, making his claim of another storm plausible.
I take advantage of Gavin’s huge boot prints and step in them, following directly behind him to return to the house. My boots cover my ankles but don’t go any higher, and while they’re waterproof, this snow is taller than my boots already.
The trouble is, I’m watching the ground, so I don’t realize when Gavin stops, and I run into him. The box bounces off his back, and I fall backward. Snow might look soft and pillowy, but it doesn’t feel like a bed of feathers when you fall on your butt. My tailbone stings while I lay there, looking up at the gray-white sky and blinking at the snowflakes in my eyes.
Gavin drops to his knees near my head. “Where does it hurt?”
“I’m not telling.”
“So, your butt?” My glare only seems to make his smile grow. “Good. You didn’t hit your head, then?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
He offers me a hand. How childish would it be to refuse at this point? Too much? I slip my fingers around his, and his whole hand practically swallows mine like the daddy shark eating the baby shark entirely.
Gavin pulls me softly into the seated position. “Catch your breath.”
I inhale as cold wetness seeps through my pants, making my skin numb along the back of my legs. In this light, his eyes are unreal. His pale blue irises resemble a husky’s, made brightfrom the natural light eking through the snow clouds. Snowflakes fall on his beard and melt.
“It’s caught.”
Gavin tugs, putting his hand on my back to help me stand. When I bend to lift, a twinge goes up my back and I spasm.
He notices, and concern flashes over his face. “You need to see someone.”
“I’m fine.”
“Your back’s not right.”
To prove him wrong, I reach for the box again, more slowly this time. My back tweaks again. “Goodgriefthat hurts.”
Gavin lifts the box and trudges toward the house, picking up the other two boxes on the way. He puts them down in the house and pulls out his phone.
“Don’t call anyone,” I yell from the yard. I’m still making my way toward the house, but I’m much farther behind, carefully stepping in his gargantuan boot holes so I don’t slip again. Do doctors even make house calls anymore? If they do anywhere, rural Scotland seems like the place it would be, and I don’t want Gavin making someone travel in this weather for a back tweak.
“You’re hurt,” he says.
“I just need ice.”
Gavin doesn’t look like he agrees, his brow furrowed into a frown. Here’s the broody Scot I’ve been waiting for.
“So the golden retrievercanscowl,” I say, stomping my boots lightly on the mat before toeing them off in the boot room.
His expression immediately drops, lips flattening as I pass him to move into the house. “If you’ll not see a doctor, at least let me speak to one.”
“There’s no reason to.”
Gavin closes the door, blocking the cold wind at once. “I would feel better.”
I have to turn my entire body to look at him, becausetwisting to glance over my shoulder is too painful. “It’s nothing. If I was injured, I wouldn’t be able to walk.”
Gavin puts out a hand. “While that is sound logic,” he says sarcastically, “I can’t help but feel like a phone call isn’t a terrible idea.”
Rolling my eyes, I turn my entire body back toward the living room and leave. I’d do a cartwheel or something to prove I’m fine, except I think that would cause lasting damage.
He doesn’t need to know that.
Gavin doesn’t waste any time. I hear him on the phone moments later. He pushes through the doorway into the living room.
