Page 35 of The Bratva's Innocent Pregnant Bride
It was, with the craggy mountaintops looming above us, surrounded by a blinding white expanse. “Don’t deflect,” I said, turning back to him with a fake scowl, then returning his appreciative stare. “But yes, the view’s not too bad.”
His laughter soon turned to a stream of obscenities, some of them in Russian, when he realized the door of the shed opened outwards and was wedged shut by a heavy drift of snow.
“What did you just say?” I asked. “I know they were bad words, but give me a Russian lesson while we dig.”
We both hunkered down and began sweeping and tossing snow. “Not on your life. I shouldn’t have even uttered such words in front of a woman. Go ahead and call me sexist again and I’ll pick you up and tie you to one of those metal bed frames.”
I blushed and he grinned, raising his eyebrows. “So it seems like you’d like that.”
I tossed a handful of snow at him with a satisfying splat. When he began gathering up a huge pile in his shovel sized hands, I quickly retreated, holding up my hands in defeat.
“Okay, I get it, you’re bigger and stronger. Let’s get that darn door open before I lose a toe.”
“I’ll rub them again,” he promised, making me blush harder. “Perhaps while you’re tied up.”
I had to get off this line of discussion in a hurry, because to my dismay, I kind of liked the idea of being at his mercy. Wasn’t I already? So far I hadn’t suffered very much and that was thanks to him. I looked around again, then up at the sky. It was no longer coming down with blizzard force, but the clouds that kept gathering as far as I could see were dark and threatening.
“I don’t think they’ll send anyone out when it’s like this,” I said.
Dan heaved the door open with a final grunt of exertion and turned to me in triumph. “That’s fine. Look here.”
The shed was piled high with dry logs and I breathed a sigh of relief. At least we wouldn’t be popsicles when we were eventually found. After we carried armloads of it into the cabin,Dan remembered his phone, hurrying back outside to see if he could get a signal.
I stood in the doorway, my hands clasped in front of me, hoping as well as not hoping that he could get a call out to let someone know we were still alive and needed help. Could I actually want to stay there with him another night? My body sure did, even if my mind was racing with worry.
It was impossible to know exactly where we were since we wandered in those woods for a while, but I could at least explain to a rescue team which trail we’d been on before we got sidelined by the blizzard.
His ruddy face went pale and his usual cocky grin slid off of it. He shook his head and held up his phone for me to see when he was back inside.
There was still no signal and the thing was down to three percent battery, seconds from shutting itself off. Dan turned it off himself, citing that maybe that would keep it from completely dying.
“We’ll try again as soon as these clouds disperse,” he said, sounding so confident there was no room for me to worry.
As soon as the stove was piled high with fresh logs and a fire was blazing, he pulled out the deck of cards and motioned for me to join him at the counter. “Want to try to win back some of what you owe me?” he asked. “And then we can have lunch. I feel like protein bars, how about you?”
“A protein bar is exactly what I was craving,” I said, going along with his game of pretending everything was all right.
Another storm was brewing, the wind was back to rattling the window panes once again. The snow was already up past our knees and might completely block us in the cabin if it came downas hard as it did the day before. No one had a clue where to start looking for us.
I should have been horrified, trapped in a rickety cabin with limited food and no way to call for help. And yet, as I sat down across from Dan and he began to deal a hand of cards, I just wasn’t.
Chapter 23 - Daniil
It was our third day in the cabin, and the snow had risen so high we could barely get six feet from the door after hours of grueling digging. The little woodshed was completely buried, the tip of its roof disappearing the day before. The final time I turned on my phone to try to get that elusive signal, it died. Paisley had stared out the window as if she could see anything at all through the swirling snow, a look of despair on her face.
Our firewood pile had seemed enormous when we first ventured out to gather it, and now we were back to rationing. We’d taken to having our card games on the floor in front of the stove to keep warm, and both of our stomachs growled incessantly. The protein bars weren’t cutting it and we were sick to death of their dry, chalky taste.
“I’m going to pretend this is fried chicken,” she said, when I handed her one that morning.
“Good luck with that,” I said. “As soon as we get back to the lodge, I’m ordering a big, juicy steak.”
“Do you think we’ll get back?” she asked in a low voice.
I leaned across the blankets to hug her and she didn’t recoil, only listlessly rested her forehead against my shoulder. “Of course we will. It’s not snowing anymore, the sky is blue. If nothing else, we can get back to digging and make our own way back to civilization.”
She pulled away and scowled, then shrugged, reaching for the deck of cards that had been keeping us somewhat sane. That and other things, which she didn’t seem too much in the mood for at the moment. There were no more dark clouds outside but one still loomed over her head. The look in her eyes kept mefrom asking what was on her mind. She looked ready to bite at the first provocation.
“So, what are you up to owing me now?” I asked as she dealt. “Eighteen grand?”
