Sweethearts on the high school ski team, Riley and Jean-Claude always expected to marry and stay together forever. But as they become world-class skiers, they drift apart, and Jean abandons Riley.<br><br>Years later, Jean appears unannounced to train at the resort where Riley works. He's  still charmingly irresistible and physically powerful, and is the US's hope for a second Olympic downhill gold. Once Riley herself expected to win gold, but a skiing accident dashed those hopes. Jean never sent any condolences, and he shattered her heart when he married -- and quickly divorced -- a skier she dislikes.<br><br>Anger and pain flare between them, and Riley ignores Jean's attempts at friendship to insulate herself from further hurt. Yet the old longings and the love they once shared resurface. What will it take for her to come to terms with the past? Or can she?

Snowfall

When they stood, ready to ski, he whispered, “Just friends? So how come you just put two laces through the same hole in your right boot when you looked at my mouth?”


Thoroughly rattled, not knowing what to do, she looked down and saw he was right.


“Oh, yeah. We’re definitely ‘just friends.’” Jean-Claude laughed and started down the most difficult chute while she knelt to fix her boot.


That had been the beginning of their long slide into love.


Then, at the state championships when they were seniors, Jean, his dark hair heart-wrenchingly mussed from having pulled off his ski cap, leaned down from the awards stand so a judge could slip the blue ribbon holding a gold medal for the downhill over his head. He winked at Riley in the audience while the host school’s band played their Mountain Senior High School’s song.


Chapter 6