A COLD WINTER NIGHT

Prologue

My husband rushes past me as I stand in the doorway to our walk-in closet. My arms are crossed while I stare him down, waiting for him to acknowledge how upset I am. I watch him pull a thick sweater over his head. It's the dark olive-green wool sweater I bought him two winter's ago. It's his favorite sweater and one of the warmest one's he currently owns. He pulls the material over his face and his eyes instantly find mine after they peek out from being hidden behind the material. A charming smile begins to widen across that handsome face, and I can feel myself surrendering to the magnetic pull he has on me. He lowers his sweater, covering the white shirt he was just lying in bed with me in. I watch him as he moves slowly towards me. I try to fight back the urge to smile by biting my bottom lip, but he has me. He has me by that one, dashingly handsome smile and he knows it.

"Adam," I shyly say, when he grips my hips and lifts me, holding me back against the closet wall. His fingers run through my hair, lightly pulling at the back of my head.

"You can stay mad at me all you want, but you know you can't stay mad at me forever. You love me too much," he mentions, and it's true. I love this man more than anything.

"I just don't understand why you and Danny can't wait until tomorrow to go. It's snowing like Hell outside and the roads are dark. Just wait until tomorrow when it's at least light outside," I try to persuade him.

"You know we can't wait. The company needs us. Your father needs us. He's at the office right now, going through everything that was ransacked. The whole place is a mess and if whoever broke into our offices got a hold of all our private files, then— We just need to go through everything and make sure it's all there, if not then it's fucking war on those bastards," he vows.

"You don't know for sure if it was them. It could have just been some burglars looking for anything to make a quick buck off of," I say. Adam gazes deeply into my eyes, smiling in awe.

"Your optimism is one of the many reasons why I love you so much," he tells me.

"In that case, then I'm choosing to be optimistic about you not leaving and getting back in that bed with me so we can continue doing what we were just doing," I say. Adam stares me down and then sighs heavily.

"You think you're clever, don't you?" he asks just as he begins tickling my sides, making me giggle and squirm against him.

"Oh, I'm the cleverest because I know just how to distract you!" I tell him while laughing. I then go on to grip the back of his neck and pull him close so that I may kiss him. His tickling stops and he cups my face, pressing his lips against mine. After a long, passionate minute, we pull apart, just enough to breathe.

"Please be safe," I whisper softly against his lips. He pulls back a little to stare into my eyes.

"Always," he vows. He leans in again to give me one long, deep kiss and I cherish every blissful second of it.

"I love you, Adam," I tell him after our heated kiss. He gazes into my eyes, just staring deeply as if he is somehow falling in love with me all over again.

"I love you Clara," he speaks after a moment. A warm smile then begins to rise at the corner of his lips before he speaks again. "When I get back, I'm waking your ass up and we're making that damn baby," he tells me, and I chuckle.

"You better wake me. I'm ovulating and wetter than Niagara Falls right now," I state. Adam's eyes close just as he bites his bottom lip and drops his head back.

"Mmmh. Don't tell me that," he moans. His head then drops forward just as those blue eyes of his look up at me under a heated gaze. "Now I'm tempted to stay and fuck you right here, right now."