LITMIR.BIZ

      CHAPTER ONE

      AS SASHA WILSON reached the first sharp hairpin bend on her descent from the top of Takaka Hill into Golden Bay she eased off the accelerator, moving even slower than her previous snail’s pace.

      A shudder rolled through her chilled body, nothing to do with her friend’s entreaties for her to move back to the city where her biggest mistake ever lived but all about the treacherous road conditions. While there was frost on her heart, it was the black ice at every corner and coating most of the road that required her undivided attention right now. As it had done for the more than five hours she’d been driving home from Christchurch. Where her headlights swept the grass and tree-covered banks, blinding-white frozen water glittered back at her.

      ‘Winter sucks,’ she growled, and swiped the back of her glove-covered hand across the condensation on the windscreen. ‘If only it wasn’t so important to be back for work in the morning, I could’ve waited until the weather cleared.’ Then her voice softened and her hand briefly touched the bump over her stomach. ‘At least you’re tucked up nice and warm in there, Flipper. And safe from that selfish man who accidentally fathered you. The man who wanted me to terminate you.’

      Gasp. ‘Wash my mouth out.’ Flipper wouldn’t pick up on her thoughts, would she? Because no matter her own opinion of the man who would remain nameless, she wasn’t ever going to visit that on her daughter.

      Gripping the steering-wheel, she continued her diatribe. ‘It’s like someone threw a switch on my life. Winter’s always been about chasing the best snow and hurtling down ski slopes, and going to those amazing après-ski parties to rub shoulders with some of the best skiers in the world.’

      Not any more. Her skis were in a cupboard at the back of her parents’ shed. Her fancy outfits were folded away in cases filling the wardrobes in the tiny cottage she now lived in on the edge of the family orchard.

      ‘We don’t even like the cold, do we, Flipper?’

      The baby kicked none too gently.

      ‘You’re quite the swimmer, aren’t you?’ Sasha smiled as she sucked in a breath. ‘The inside of my tummy must be bruised purple from your feet.’ Pregnancy was amazing. Every day seemed different. She already loved her little girl. Completely and utterly. Fiercely. She’d protect her with her life.

      On the radio a song finished and the announcer piped up in his false cheery voice, ‘Coming up to eleven-thirty on the clock, folks. I hope each and every one of you is tucked up warm and safe by now.’

      ‘I wish. Big time.’ Sasha flicked a glove-covered finger in the direction of her radio. ‘You obviously haven’t listened to your station’s weather forecast, buster. It’s been blowing a blizzard up and down New Zealand for most of the day and some of us are struggling to get home in

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