One Last Shot

[18] Ski Sleeping

           Iris

The first day of our trip to Lix's ski lodge is spent gearing up to ski.

"No time to settle in! The slopes are calling!" Felix yells as he forces us to drop our bags in the living room. I have never skied before, neither has Violet. Lilly and Thomas are pros, and it seems all the guys are pretty good. After getting the skis on, finally, we head out to the slopes. Violet and I are standing at the top of the slope, while everyone else is flying down.

"This is going to be so fun," Violet says sarcastically.

"I'll help you Violet!" Grayson skis over. Violet and Grayson start bonding as he teaches her how to ski, and then I feel snow fly in my face.

"You couldn't have stopped any other way?" I groan.

"It's the way of the mountains," Liam shrugs. "Don't tell me you don't know how to ski."

"Okay, I won't."

"This is embarrassing."

"You're embarrassing."

"At least let me teach you the basics so you'll stop looking like a loser."

"Fine," I huff. As Liam teaches me to ski, he won't stop being snarky.

"Why can't you get that down? It's so easy." I'm struggling with how to turn. Stupid, I know, but skis are heavy as fuck. I remember when my younger brother, Jacob, tried teaching me how to snowboard and I wiped out and the board hit me in the face. Never again.

"Because, you're used to it, I'm not."

"I know, but even when Lix taught us it was the easiest thing."

"Not everybody learns and picks things up the same way, 'kay pretty boy?" I'm getting frustrated and my voice is rising because of it.

"Literally all you do is angle your body, I don't know why you can't get this down. Do you have no leg strength?"

"God you are such an asshole!" I shout, Grayson and Violet look over at us.

"I'm not, you're just not learning this!"

"You're insufferable!"

"You're frustrating!"

"Fuck this, I don't even know why I'm wasting time with you," I groan, unstrapping the skis from my feet.

"Where are you going? Violet calls back to me.

"Inside where there are no Liams." I head inside, take a deep breath, and explore. I see 6 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms. Not too bad. The house is nice, I can tell Lix comes from money. It's like a small chalet in here.

"Okay!" Lix shouts as the rest of the group reenters the house. "Hot tub time!" Everyone takes turns changing in the bathrooms, and I'm the last one. A lavender bikini, with cheeky bottoms, a low cut top, and a lavender sarong tied around my waist. I let my hair lay down, and it's slightly curled. Cold weather does that to my hair for some reason. As I leave the bathroom, I see Liam talking to Archer. Holy fuck. He's shirtless, in just a pair of swim shorts. His hair is messy, but not sweaty messy, he must've just pulled it out of the ski helmet. His abs. They're hot. The thought of dragging my hands up and down them- Stop. What am I doing? No. Not Liam. I do not want to fuck Liam.

I realize I'm staring and break my eyes up to his face, where I see he's also staring. Of course he is, I'm hot. Something about him staring at me while he's shirtless though, god damn am I feeling it!

I walk past him to grab a Truly, and his hand grazes my thigh. We look at each other, our eyes searching the other's for a way to describe how we're feeling.