LITMIR.BIZ

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her in ways she had never expected and would probably never recover from. Garrison remembered pulling out a chair for Reyna. He also remembered her flinching from him. Her reaction had hurt, twisted him with guilt even though he knew he’d done nothing wrong. At least not technically.

      In hindsight, Garrison should have insisted that Barbieri provide for her, even though she had pressed for nothing on her own behalf and seemed to be waiting on the man she’d spent nearly half her life with to treat her fairly. Garrison’s inaction, and Reyna’s sadness, had haunted him ever since.

      But the Reyna who had confronted him outside the bathroom was not the same sad woman he’d met five years before. Not at all. This Reyna Barbieri was stunning for a completely different reason.

      She wore her confidence like a royal cloak. And her snapping black eyes had challenged him the moment she realized who he was. Her shoulder-length curls were tight and thick, inviting him to sink his hands into them and pull her closer. And her body. Christ Almighty...

      The long and tight sweater hugged a figure that came straight from his dreams, a slender but curvaceous body he could easily imagine taking into his arms and making love to all night. Because of her, he was powerfully aware of every masculine part of him, aware that he wanted to be intimately joined to every feminine part of her.

      Ignoring his work, Garrison stroked his lower lip and watched the seat where Reyna had sat down. A strong pulse of desire drummed deep in his belly, a guaranteed distraction for the rest of the train ride.

       Chapter 3

      By the time she got back to her seat, Reyna’s heart was beating way too fast, as if she’d just finished a marathon. Her cheeks felt flushed, and she was fighting the urge to look back over her shoulder at Garrison. What was wrong with her?

      “You all right, girl?” Louisa, the most perceptive of all her friends, asked as she sat down.

      The women had taken out a deck of cards, and Bridget was dealing.

      “Yeah. I’m good.” She forced a smile and cleared her throat. “What did I miss?”

      Louisa gave her a concerned glance but didn’t press it. “We’re playing blackjack. The winner gets a massage at the resort.”

      “I could definitely use one of those.” She lifted her tight shoulders with a sigh of anticipation. “Prepare to lose your shirts, ladies!” Reyna pushed her encounter with her ex’s lawyer to the back of her mind and focused on the card game.

      An hour later, the train arrived at their stop. Although she hated that she was paying attention, Reyna noticed Garrison getting off the train with her and her friends, immediately walking toward the taxi stand. She breathed a quiet sigh of relief and clambered from the train. Garrison wasn’t going to the resort with them. She didn’t have to worry about seeing him again.

      Outside the climate-controlled train, the day was crisp and cold. The sun had cleared away the snowy clouds, covering the white-and-green landscape in warm gold. Reyna breathed a lungful of crisp mountain air. It felt good to be at Halcyon again.

      “He’s cute!” Bridget looked over her shoulder at Reyna as she followed Louisa and Marceline into the black SUV that the resort had sent for them.

      Reyna gave her rolling duffel bag to the driver and claimed a seat by the window. “Who?”

      Louisa made a disbelieving sound. “The guy you’ve been staring at for the past five minutes.”

      Reyna blushed and turned her attention to the window as the Range Rover powered through the snow and up the hill toward the ski resort. Bridget and Louisa laughed while Marceline gave her a reassuring smile.

      “He is a cutie,” her friend said. “There’s nothing wrong with looking.”

      Reyna clenched her back teeth but didn’t say anything.

      It was a gorgeous morning in the Adirondack Mountains. With the windows up, the heater on and the driver playing a lively Beyoncé song, the women were comfortably isolated from the outside chill. Reyna sighed and relaxed into the heated seats, ignoring Bridget and Louisa’s chatter. The SUV growled up the path toward Halcyon Ski and Mountain Resort, a sprawling circle of cabins on a hilltop that overlooked majestic mountains and wintry fields of white.

      In Halcyon, the air was crisp and sharp, a welcome change from what Reyna experienced every day in the city. With the company of her girls, being there always made her feel refreshed, even if she was in one of her bad moods.

      The resort was one of the lesser-patronized places of the “it” crowd that Bridget and Louisa knew. It was beautiful, exclusive and scenic, with just about every amenity available. And it was a place people came to for the privacy as much as they did for the skiing.

      Halcyon was the one truly big splurge Reyna allowed herself every year. The resort had become the place for her to get away from all the things worrying her in the city. Her career at the tattoo parlor where she’d worked since her divorce, the MFA degree in Graphic Design she’d gotten during her marriage but never used, the decision of what graphic arts jobs to apply for, if she did take the plunge.

      Working at the tattoo parlor was fun, but every day she felt more and more like the only girl in a college fraternity. The boys who worked there—although over twenty-five—were all about picking up women, going to bars and getting more ink on their bodies. She’d outgrown the place a long time ago but was nervous about making the necessary change.

      “God! This place gets more and more beautiful every year.” Louisa sighed as they drove past a grove of naked trees. Their barks were a dark brown against the white landscape, branches covered in snow and stretched out above them like lace.

      Reyna agreed with a silent nod, staring out her own window.

      “Hopefully there’ll be hotter guys up here this year,” Bridget said as she freshened up her bright lipstick with the help of her compact. “Last year was a bust.” She pressed her lips together then snapped the compact shut.

      A woman who always did whatever she wanted, Bridget was more than willing to have a fling at the resort and never look back after the weekend. Reyna could never do that. Sleeping with a man at the place that had become her sanctuary from drama just seemed like a very, very bad idea.

      “I hear that Ahmed Clark might be up here this year.” Marceline shared the information with the slightest of smiles.

      At one time or another, the women had all drooled over the rising basketball star. Unlike his teammates, who they all thought were freakishly tall or had too many tattoos, Ahmed was just perfect. He was six and a half feet tall, wore a wide and frequent grin while on the basketball court and regularly gave money and time to charity. His body wasn’t half-bad, either.

      Bridget chuckled. “I guess I know who I’ll be hooking up with this weekend.” She pouted her freshly reddened lips and winked.

      “If rumors are reliable.” Louisa raised a skeptical eyebrow.

      “If he’s up at Halcyon, that man will be under me before the weekend is through,” Bridget said.

      Reyna laughed and shook her head at her friend. If only Bridget was that relentless about figuring out her life, she wouldn’t still be living at her parents’ place and steadily burning through her trust fund.

      “Honey, why do you have to make this weekend about sex?” Marceline looked as if she was only partially joking. “It’s supposed to be about us, remember? You and your girls.”

      “Yes, but you girls like to sleep, and I don’t. I have to fill the time somehow.” Bridget gave Marceline a saucy wink then started fiddling with her phone.

      They arrived at the resort a few minutes later. The lodge where they would check in, eat, drink and socialize was a big and beautiful old-fashioned log cabin straight out of a mountain woman’s dream. The two-story lodge contained a restaurant upstairs

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