Cabin Fever by Elle Casey Page B

talking and he hasn’t taken offense to my rude comments. I think I was starting to have one of those Jack Nicolson all-work-and-no-play moments or something. I’m usually better at casual conversation than this.
    I’m bent over, arranging awkwardly-shaped, split logs in my arms, when a giant pile of ice-cold snow lands on the back of my neck and somehow finds its way down into my jacket to my bare skin.
    I screech and drop the logs, jumping back and bending over left, right, backward, and forward, trying to dislodge the snowball from my body. It melts before I can get any of it off, dripping down my spine to rest in my underpants.
    Jeremy is laughing so hard, he’s bent over, holding his stomach, his axe forgotten at his side.
    “You!” I scream, pointing at him. I cannot believe he had the gall to dump a snowball on me. How rude! We don’t even have a fire going yet! How am I going to warm up?! I could get frostbite! On my butt of all places!
    He points at his chest. “Me? Why me?” He’s still laughing.
    “ You did this!” Without thinking, I grab a glob of snow from a pile next to my foot and wing it at him, instantly triumphant when it splats right in his face. A surge of pure happiness fills me from head to toe. “Yeah, baby! Take that! Right in yo’ face ! Woo hoo!” I pump my fist a few times for good measure.
    His laugh cuts off instantly, the moment the snow makes impact, and he stands there frozen in place. Then he spits out a mouthful of snow. He blinks and his eyelashes carry lumps of the cold white flakes with them, up and down, up and down. His ultra-zen facade is pretty damn intimidating. My hilarity quickly turns to dread.
    “I can’t believe you just did that,” he says calmly.
    “I was just getting you back.” I’m whining. Why do I feel so guilty? He started this!
    “Getting me back for what? Not letting you use the axe?”
    “No, Stupid, for throwing that snowball down into my jacket.”
    He tilts his head sideways like a confused canine and then reaches up to wipe the rest of the snow off his face and out of his hair. “What snowball?”
    I’m getting nervous. He’s too calm. I know there’s something boiling just beneath the surface of that unaffected facade of his. The question is, what’s he going to do? Ignore my anti-social behavior or come for revenge?
    “Don’t play stupid, Jeremy, you know very well you threw a snowball at me.”
    He points to the tree above me. As soon as I look up, a clump of snow from one of the branches slides off and hits me on the shoulder.
    “There’s your snowball thrower,” he says.
    I look back at him and cringe. “Oops.” Holy crap! I can’t believe I attacked an innocent man and did a victory dance too! An innocent man who’s spent the last hour chopping logs for me! “Sorry about that.”
    His axe falls to the ground next to his leg and he leans over to the nearest drift, pulling up two hands full of snow.
    “What are you doing?” I ask, backing away.
    “Forming the perfect snowball.” He pushes his hands together, creating a ball, packing it tighter and tighter, his elbows jutting out to the sides. His grin goes decidedly evil as he adds more snow to it.
    “You’d better not be planning to throw that at me.” I continue to back away slowly, worried if I flat-out run, he’ll tackle me and make me eat that thing. He’s that bear from nightmare again, and my forest survival guide says that if you see a bear, you shouldn’t run; you’re supposed to curl up in a ball and pretend to be dead. But I can’t be that easy, can I? Or maybe I can. With this bear, anyway.
    “And why wouldn’t I be planning to throw this at you?” he asks, an evil grin making him look ten times sexier than he already did. “Seems only fair, since you started this war.” He takes a step in my direction.
    “War? Jeremy, no . I’m not kidding. I’m already freezing cold.” I wrap my arms around myself and fake a really big shiver. Truth be