Again, he was trying to disengage, but he was the only person she’d ever met who had experienced snow, and she had to know.
“It’s different all the time,” he said, giving in a little, as if he sensed her needing to know. “If it’s very cold the snow is light and powdery, like frozen dust. If it’s warmer it’s heavy and wet and sticks together. You can build things with it when it’s like that.”
“Like a snowman?”
“Yeah, I suppose. I built a snow cave out of it.”
“Which kind is better for sledding?”
“The cold, dry kind. What do you know about that?”
“Nothing. I’ve seen it on television. I’ve always had a secret desire to try it, a secret desire to see different things than here, more beautiful.”
“I don’t know if there’s anything more beautiful than this,” he said. “It’s a different kind of beauty. More rugged. The landscape there is powerful rather than gentle. It reminds a person of how small they are and how big nature is.” He suddenly seemed to think he was talking too much. “I’m sure your husband will take you there if you want to go,” he said abruptly.
It was her turn to glare at him. She didn’t want to be reminded, at this moment, that her life was soon going to involve a husband.
“I’m fairly certain Prince Mahail,” she said, “is about as interested in tobogganing in snow as he is in training a water buffalo to tap dance.”
“He doesn’t like traveling? Trying new things?” He did open his eyes then, lower his chin. He was regarding her now with way too much interest.
She felt a sensation in her stomach like panic. “I don’t know what he likes,” she said, her voice strangled. She felt suddenly like crying, looked down at her plate and blinked back the tears.
Her life had come within seconds of being linked forever to a man who was a stranger to her. And despite the fact the heavens had taken pity on her and granted her a reprieve, there was no guarantee that linking would not still happen.
“Hey,” Ronan said, “hey, don’t cry.”
After all the events of yesterday, including being shot at, this was the first time she’d heard even the smallest hint of panic in that calm voice!
“I’m not crying,” she said. But she was. She scrubbed furiously at the tear that worked its way down her cheek. She didn’t want Ronan to be looking at her like that because he felt sorry for her!
She reminded herself she was supposed to be finding out about Ronan, not the other way around!
“What made you want to be a soldier?” she asked, trying desperately for an even tone of voice, to change the subject, to not waste one precious second contemplating all the adventures she was not going to have once she was married to Mahail.
Something flickered in his eyes. Sympathy? Compassion? Whatever it was, he opened up to her just the tiniest little bit.
“I had a lousy home life as a kid. I wanted routine. Stability. Rules. I found what I was looking for.” He regarded her intently, hesitated and then said softly, “And you will, too. Trust me.”
He would be such an easy man to trust, to believe that he had answers.
“Isn’t it a hard life you’ve chosen?” she asked him, even though what she really wanted to say was how? How will I ever find what I’m looking for? I don’t even know where to look!
He shrugged, tilted his chin back toward the sun. “Our unit’s unofficial motto is Go Hard or Go Home. Some would see it as hard. I see it as challenging.”
Was there any subtle way to ask what she most wanted to ask, besides How will I ever find what I’m looking for? It was inappropriate to ask him, and too soon. But still, she was not going to find herself alone on a deserted island with an extremely handsome man ever again.
She had to know. She had to know if he was available. Even though she herself, of course, was not. Not even close.
“Do you have a girlfriend?” She hoped she wasn’t blushing.
He opened his eyes, shot her a look, closed them again. “No.”
“Why not?”
His openness came to an abrupt end. That firm line appeared again around his mouth. “What is this? Twenty questions at the high school cafeteria?”
“What’s a high school caff-a-ter-ee-a?”
“Never mind. I don’t have a girlfriend because my lifestyle doesn’t lend itself to having a girlfriend.”
“Why?”
He sighed, but she was not going to be discouraged. Her option was to spend the week talking to him or talking to herself. At the moment she felt her survival depended on focusing on his life, rather than her own.
Maybe her desperation was apparent because he caved slightly. “I travel a lot. I can be called away from home for months at a time. I dismantle the odd bomb. I jump from airplanes.”
“Meeting the grizzly bear wasn’t the most exciting thing that ever happened to you!” she accused.
“Well, it was the most exciting thing that I’m allowed to talk about. Most of what I do is highly classified.”
“And dangerous.”
He shrugged. “Dangerous enough that it doesn’t seem fair to have a girlfriend or a family.”
“I’m not sure,” she said, thoughtfully, “what is unfair about being yourself?”
He looked at her curiously and she explained what she meant. “The best thing is to be passionate about life. That’s what makes people really seem alive, whole, isn’t it? If they aren’t afraid to live the way they want to live and to live fully? That’s what a girlfriend should want for you. For a life that makes you whole. And happy. Even if it is dangerous.”
She was a little embarrassed that she, who had never had a boyfriend, felt so certain about what qualifications his girlfriend should have. And she was sadly aware that passion, the ability to be alive and whole, were the very qualities she herself had lost somewhere a long the way.
As if to underscore how much she had lost or never discovered, he asked her, suddenly deciding to have a conversation after all, “So, what’s the most exciting thing you’ve ever done?”
Been shot at. Cut my hair. Ridden a motorcycle.
All the most exciting events of her life had happened yesterday! It seemed way too pathetic to admit that, though it increased her sense of urgency, this was her week to live.
“I’m afraid that’s classified,” she said, and was rewarded when he smiled, ever so slightly, but spoiled the effect entirely by chucking her under her chin as if she was a precocious child, gathered their plates and stood up.
Shoshauna realized, that panicky sensation suddenly back,
