of the girls had just ignored her and the guys hadn’t been much better. But they were not just being cruel. Meredith had a way of speaking to people that was extremely off-putting. She’d handled her peers as if she were a queen dealing with mere commoners. Her behavior had become a running joke between his friends, who had dubbed her “Princess,” short for Ice Princess. It wasn’t that she was a typical snob, thinking that she was better than everyone else because of her family money. Not at all. Meredith, with her mismatched outfits and tights with holes, cared little about money. Meredith was an intellectual snob.
She’d always been the smartest person in the room, and she’d known it. Still, there was something about her he’d found appealing. He realized later that in an odd way he related to Meredith. Meredith had suffered the loss of a parent and had had a troubled relationship with the man who had taken her father’s place. Josh’s own family history was similar. His mother had died when he was young and his father had married a girl just out of high school when Josh was eleven. He had not gotten along with his young stepmother. His father later divorced her and married another—a woman who was even worse than the first. The situation had gotten so bad that Josh had moved in with his mother’s sister.
Although he’d enjoyed living with his aunt, she’d never really been his parent. In a town where family and money determined one’s success, Josh had had neither. He may not have looked the outcast that Meredith was, but inside, he’d felt like her.
One night he’d attended a party and stumbled upon Meredith sequestered in the library. She’d been sitting at a desk, reading intently. She’d removed her thick-lensed glasses, and her long, curly hair—usually pulled tightly back—had been loose around her shoulders. In that moment he’d thought her the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
She had looked up at him and smiled, a rare thing for Meredith. Encouraged, he’d struck up a conversation. It was as if she was a different person. They’d spoken for hours, rambling about everything from Thoreau to the state of the ski slopes. He’d felt a connection between them, an understanding.
But he’d been called away by friends and, although Meredith had promised to wait for him, she had gone by the time he returned. Afterward, he’d thought of little else: the feeling of excitement, the anticipation he’d felt at seeing her again. The next day he’d arrived at the lodge early, fully aware that Meredith was to be his student in a trek down Lost Mountain. But his anticipation was for naught. When Meredith arrived, her figure hidden beneath layers of clothing, her beautiful eyes once again covered by her thick, tinted lenses she’d acted as if nothing had changed. Whatever spell had possessed her the previous evening had been broken. She’d obviously had no interest in him.
He’d attempted to put her out of his mind and, for the most part, was successful. Sure, he’d feel a mild sting of curiosity—a what-if?—whenever her name was mentioned, but that was all. Life went on.
During the next five years, he interacted with Meredith briefly, with nothing really happening. Then things changed one Thanksgiving weekend when Meredith returned from her expensive Eastern college looking as though she’d enrolled in beauty school. His friends, most of whom had never even noticed her before, had suddenly taken an interest in her. But Meredith had had her sights set on him.
She’d hired him for a private lesson. She’d chosen Bear Mountain, one of the most difficult courses in Aspen. Accessible only by helicopter, it was a private and expensive run. It was so difficult that the owners kept a stocked halfway house for those who were either too tired to make it down the mountain or got caught in one of the blizzard-like snowstorms that engulfed it several times a week.
He had given Meredith private lessons before, but none that had required packing an overnight bag. And although Josh had found himself in sticky situations before with amorous female students, he’d never suspected Meredith’s intentions.
Not even when she’d hurt her ankle and insisted on going to the cabin. Although he’d known her injury was not severe, he’d been more than happy to acquiesce. He’d helped her back to the cabin, relishing the feel of her as she’d leaned against him. When she’d told him to wait before calling for assistance, he still hadn’t suspected anything untoward. Because by then, he’d been so smitten with her that he’d been barely able to think.
Sitting across from her in that cabin, he’d been tongue-tied. He’d realized that he’d had nothing to say to a woman like Meredith, so educated and intelligent. And for the first time in his life, he’d cared.
Fortunately, Meredith hadn’t seemed to mind. She’d appeared relaxed and at ease, seemingly metamorphosing into a completely different, warm and flirtatious person. He’d lost track of time and, before he’d realized, it had been too late to call for help. They’d had no choice but to spend the night in the cabin on the mountain. As he’d watched Meredith limp around the room, he’d realized that she had switched legs, that she’d been faking her sprain. For whatever reason, she had wanted to be alone with him as much as he had wanted to be with her.
And when Meredith had moved to sit beside him, he hadn’t hesitated. He’d done what he had wanted to do since that night in the library. He’d kissed her.
She’d been a surprising lover. Passionate and daring, wildly responsive. So much so that, until he’d entered her, it had never occurred to him that she’d be a virgin. He had pulled out immediately, afraid of hurting her. But she had insisted and he had continued, albeit at a more gentle pace.
Knowing that he’d been the first to touch her had only increased his desire. He’d wanted to consume her, to keep her beside him always. He’d wanted her to be his and his alone forever.
But when the dawn broke, the feelings that had engulfed him had been replaced by more familiar ones. A dull, throbbing discomfort, a reminder of a need to be alone. A desire to stay single and unattached.
Fortunately, Meredith’s ankle had miraculously healed. After an awkward morning with stilted, uneven spurts of conversation, they’d skied down the mountain in silence. When they’d parted at the lodge, he’d made the promise he made to every woman who shared his bed. I’ll call you.
It had taken him several days, but he had called and been somewhat annoyed when she hadn’t called him back. In fact, he’d begun to feel desperate when she hadn’t returned any of his calls over the next several days. Suddenly, he no longer cared if he spoke with her again and it hurt him that she hadn’t felt the same.
The truth had been bitter and unavoidable. “She thinks she’s too good for me,” he had told his aunt a week later.
His aunt had not beaten around the bush. “She is.”
As hard as it was to hear those words, he’d known his aunt had been right. How could he even have hoped to woo someone like Meredith? He’d been an uneducated playboy, a man whose only interests were skiing and women.
“At least, right now,” his aunt had added. “But who knows what the future holds. Perhaps you will prove her wrong.”
His encounter with Meredith became a turning point in his life. For the first time he’d started to think about the boy he was and the man he wanted to be. When his aunt had died and left him the money, she’d given him the means. He’d always had the will.
He had often thought about seeing Meredith again and wondered what it might be like. He had to admit, laying eyes on her tonight, after all these years, had taken his breath away. When he’d last seen her, she’d still been a girl about to come into her own. She was now a woman, poised and confident, radiantly beautiful. But from what he had heard, looks were deceiving. Meredith had a reputation as one of the most ruthless chief executives in the business.
So ruthless that she was willing to trade her sister’s happiness for artificial snow. Although he had a hard time believing that Carly would let herself be manipulated like that, he still found the entire deal suspicious. He did not trust the Durans and had no intention of getting into a secret bidding war with Meredith. He had been involved in those before and had found himself the victim of the winner’s curse more than once. The price would become so inflated,