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“Yes, sweetheart?”
“I need you to answer some questions for me about Cameron.”
His stomach tightened, and he started to feel queasy. She had a right to know, and if they were going to start their relationship again, he needed, to be honest.
“Ask me anything.”
“Why did you set that contest up? It was cruel.”
He took a deep breath, “I know. I was stupid and careless. When they made me pledge master, I wanted to leave my mark. Something that would be talked about for years.”
“You know how hurt I was. Did you know they chose me?”
“I did. I’d seen you with Vance a couple of weeks before. I didn’t recognize you because it had been so long since I had seen you. Brooke never talked about you, and she had no pictures of you in her room. A few days before the party I found out your name and told them no. They needed to call off the contest. It was too mean, and I didn’t want any part of it.”
“Why did they keep it then?”
“I lost out. All the senior brothers voted to keep it even though they knew it would hurt you. I never went back to the house after that. I couldn’t bear to see the damage it was going to inflict.”
“Did you try to tell Brooke? Maybe she would have contacted me.”
“I did call her, but she had already left after she finished finals. She never answered my texts or calls until a few days after the party.”
Ava thought back to Brooke’s senior year and remembered that she had gone to Hawaii right after finals for two weeks. Since she still had another semester to make up classes, she wouldn’t graduate until December.
“I was so devastated that I left for New York the next day. Michael went to the school to pick up my things. I just couldn’t go back.”
He pulled her against him in a tight hug.
“I know what I did was wrong, and I hurt you. I will live with that the rest of my life and spend it making it up to you.”
“You don’t have to make it up to me, just love me.”
She snuggled up against him satisfied with his explanation. She faded into sleep with his arms around her.
Saturday morning she awoke to an empty bed. Xander’s side wasn’t even warm which meant he must have slipped out awhile ago. She got up and went to the bathroom, but all that remained were droplets against the glass shower doors. He must have gotten up, showered and gone somewhere.
She prepared herself for the day, wondering why he didn’t leave a note. As she blew dry her hair, she shut the dryer off after hearing banging. She rushed out of the bathroom and to the foyer. Xander was full of snow and stomping out his boots before he removed them. He had two bags of groceries from Stan’s.
“It’s snowing?”
“Yes and hard. I called Stan’s to order groceries, but they said they wouldn’t deliver in this. There is already about five inches on the ground. We have no food here, so I went to get the essentials.”
She tucked the towel around her tighter and helped him with the bags so he could remove his coat and boots. As she lugged them to the kitchen, she peered in the bags and saw that he had purchased eggs, milk, cheese, bread, bagels, butter, cold cuts, mayo and mustard and a few other items. He also had a bakery bag that he told her not to open.
She went back to the bathroom to finish drying her hair and then pulled on a pair of sweats and one of Xander’s t-shirts without a bra. She had no intention of holding up his deal of no sex until he thought it was right. Let him look at her breasts clad only in his thin t-shirt all day. Maybe he would give into her begging.
She went to the full-length windows in the bedroom and pulled back the drapes. The flakes fluttered against the glass, and she stood mesmerized as she watched them fall far below to the street. She loved snow but hated winter, not that it made any sense. She went to the terrace doors and watched the snow fall on the patio furniture. There was enough snow to scoop some up and shape a snowball. She opened the doors and reached out grabbing as much snow that would fit in her small hand.
Ava brought the ball of snow to the kitchen where Xander was unloading the bags into the refrigerator. She dropped the ball in the sink, and he looked at it melting on the stainless steel.
“Where did you get that?”
“From the terrace. I love snow. I wish we could go out in this later.”
“Why can’t we?”
“I don’t have boots or a hat here. I had no idea we were going to get a snowstorm.”
