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  CLOUDBURST ICE MAGIC

  Avalanches may bring down more than snow…

  Working for the Search and Rescue team at the Cloudburst Resort in Colorado, Lily Sinclair figures she’ll do all the rescuing from now on. When hikers are caught in a spring blizzard, Lily and her partner head into the storm. Cut off from communication and facing deadly conditions, Lily fears she’ll never see her Ice Demon lover before death claims them.

  Zach Snow encouraged Lily move to Cloudburst to grow and learn, but missed her every day of their months apart. His plans of moving to Colorado get pushed up when he receives her text explaining her situation, and saying goodbye. He must negotiate with the local Ice Demon clan to work in their territory to rescue Lily and the hikers before the Spring Fling blizzard kills them. But he’s running out of time.

  Between the amorous hiker hitting on Zach, Lily’s self-doubts, and an avalanche bearing down on them, Zach and Lily must rediscover the love they first kindled in a Christmas ice cave, and create their own Cloudburst ice magic.

  CLOUDBURST ICE MAGIC

  A Cloudburst, Colorado Novella

  Copyright © 2014 Siobhan Muir

  ISBN 9781311544926

  Published by Three Lakes Books at Smashwords

  Cover Photo: Maksim Shmeljov | Shutterstock.com

  Kichigin | Shutterstock.com

  Cover Design: H.L. Carmichael

  eBooks are not transferable. They cannot be sold, shared, or given away as it is an infringement on the copyright of this work.

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author except for brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  First Electronic Print, August 2014

  DEDICATION

  Dedicated to all the men and woman who serve in Search and Rescue. Thank you for your service and efforts in all the worst weather. And thanks to their loved ones who wait for them to come home safely.

  Acknowledgements

  Writing a book is never really a one person job. In fact, it takes a great deal of hard work, editing, and research on the part of the author to get things correct. Great thanks go to Silver James who made sure my heroine wasn’t too whiney, and caught my typos. Thanks to Nichole Severn for catching my run-on sentences and even more typos. And thanks to Lanya Ross for reading through this tale and finding the logical sticky spots. And as always, thanks to Cara Michaels for designing the most glorious cover art.

  Chapter One

  Lily Sinclair dug as fast as her arms would allow, shoveling great drifts of snow behind her. The hikers she and her partner Randy had come to rescue stayed out of the way. Everyone wore exhaustion and fear wrapped around them like moth-eaten blankets.

  “Have you radioed in?” Her breath plumed in the snowy air before her.

  “Yeah, but I lose signal about half-way through.” Randy shoved the radio into his pack and bent to help her dig the snow fort. “They know we’re not coming in tonight, but they can’t send out the helicopter in this storm.”

  “Did you give them our position?”

  He shook his head with a grimace. “That’s when the signal cut out each time.” He glanced over his shoulder at the huddled hikers. “How long do you think this storm will last?”

  Ever since her boyfriend Zach had rescued her from a similar storm over a year ago, Lily had developed an uncanny storm sense. Too bad it worked too late today. She scanned the flake-filled landscape and took a deep breath through her nose. Scents of Ice Demons, dank ice and fresh snow, having some sort of spring fling filled her awareness. She bit her lip. More than likely they were only just getting revved up.

  “This one’s going to be bad. Three days at least.” She dug harder. “And we’re going to have a ton of snow dumped on us.”

  Randy swore under his breath. “Then we better get this tent up and the stove running. Do we have enough fuel for three days?”

  “Let’s hope so.” She prayed they did. If not, they’re going to find five frozen bodies in the tent. Not the way she envisioned her first season as Search and Rescue. I wish Zach was here.

  Lily pushed the complaints aside and focused on making a snow fort large enough for all of them. It would be a tight squeeze, but being close meant more warmth. Too bad we don’t have Zach’s beautiful ice cave. The lovely bubble he’d built and furnished on Mt. Charleston had been comfortable and welcoming. Focus, Sinclair!

  Between her and Randy, they managed to make a large enough space under the snow to get the hikers out of the weather. Randy brought their charges in while Lily expanded the cave and set up the stove. Gotta get this place warmer than a shop full of Chinese New Year fireworks. They’d celebrated the Year of the Horse this year. What we could really use right now is the Year of the Dragon. Fire would be a good thing.

  Randy set up the six-person tent against the wall closest to the open door and raised his eyebrows at Lily. “Damn, did you make it big enough, Sinclair?”

  “Hey, we needed room to stretch out and store the gear. No one likes sitting in someone’s lap to eat.” She pulled her gloves off and lit the stove. A blossom of heat warmed her nose and cheeks as the little machine roared to life.

  He shook his head, but some of the tension eased from his expression. “Stove running?”

  “Yeah, just got it started.” Lily grabbed one of their pots and scraped some of the wall into it before setting it on the burner. “Hot water in five minutes.”

  “We’re gonna die.” The panicked whimper echoed across the space and Randy crawled back to the hikers.

  “Shh. Tammy, it’s gonna be okay.” The guy with his girlfriend and her friend had only meant to go for a short day hike. The weather warnings had gone unheeded until it was too late.

  Too bad the weather is worse than they predicted.

  “Mr. Thomas is right, Ms. Whitaker. Lily is getting the stove set up so we’ll have hot water and heat.” Randy’s voice filled with deep calm and reassurance. Randy Montesque was the lead for a reason and he impressed her with his ability to use his voice to settle everyone. “To keep warm, why don’t you all help me get the gear unpacked? We need to set out the air mats and sleeping bags.”

  “We’re gonna sleep here?” The other woman scanned the little cave space with worried blue eyes. “But it’s getting colder and it’ll be night soon. What about other rescuers?”

  “They can’t get to us in the middle of the storm at night anyway, Ms. Benedict.” Randy handed the redheaded woman a sleeping bag. “We’ll try to radio them in later tonight if the storm blows out. Worst case it will be tomorrow morning.”

  I hope. Lily didn’t say the words aloud, but given the scents in the air and fierceness of the storm, she suspected the Ice Demons would be at it awhile. While she’d seen Zach go wild a few times in his true form, she’d never experienced a full-blown party. For all they looked like humans with white skin and ice crystals for hair, Ice Demons became elemental when the weather shifted, flashing long canines and thick talons. Sounds like they’ve
hit elemental tonight.

  She unpacked the cooking gear and heat packs, calculating how to ration everything to stretch for three days. Ever since she’d met Zach, she’d known how long storms would last. Good thing about dating an Ice Demon. She stopped those thoughts before they developed into melancholy.

  You made your choice, Sinclair. He didn’t ask you to leave.

  No, Zach had wanted her to stay on Mt. Charleston with him, but she’d wanted to be a Search & Rescue professional just like him, and there’d been no openings in Nevada. But Cloudburst Resort in Cloudburst, Colorado, had an immediate opening and she couldn’t pass up the opportunity. Zach had reluctantly agreed and said he’d come visit when the season let up in Nevada.

  It should be done by now, right?

  Most likely, but she hadn’t heard from him since that morning and he’d said nothing in his email. Knock this shit off, Sinclair. You don’t have time to waste on anything but surviving. True enough. She could worry and whine about Zach when she reached home.

  “Water’s ready for tea. I’m starting soup next.” Lily handed out the metal camping mugs filled with steaming chamomile tea.

  “Thanks.” Tammy rubbed her red nose with a mitten-covered hand and cradled the hot mug in both palms. “We really didn’t mean to be out this long.”

  “I know, but at least we have shelter, heat, and soon we’ll have food.” Lily tried to be as encouraging as Randy. “Here’s a heat pack. Tuck that in your jacket pocket. It’ll keep you warm for a couple hours.”

  “What about when it fades?”

  “We’ll worry about that when it’s time. But right now, take the heat pack and I’ll have soup ready soon.” Lily gave her most reassuring smile. “Warm food and the tea will help. And we’ll be able to radio out in the morning.”

  “Why can’t we radio out now?”

  “Weather is cutting us off. We’ll try to move to a better location to make contact in the morning.”

  “Are we going to be okay?” Tammy’s eyes filled with bleak dread.

  “Yes. We’ll be fine. There’s no use worrying. Right now we’re safe and warm. Focus on the good things.”

  Tammy bit her lip, but nodded before she returned to sit beside her boyfriend while Randy handed out the gear for them to arrange. Lily kept focused on the soup, trying to calculate the likelihood of their supplies keeping them going for the length of the storm. She prayed to whoever listened that she hadn’t lied to Tammy.

  “You think we’ll be able to radio out in the morning?” Randy’s voice snaked past her ear as he handed her one of the soup packets when the water rolled into a boil.

  She sniffed, taking in the scents from the storm, and grimaced. “All we can do is hope. Radioing out might not be our biggest problem.”

  “Oh? What is, then?”

  She met his gaze with stark solemnity. “With the way this storm is going, we’ll be lucky to see sky in three days. It’s not us getting the word out, Randy. It’s them getting a chopper in.”

  Chapter Two

  Zach frowned at his phone as he marched along the gravel path toward his cabin. Lily hadn’t responded to his email or his latest text. She’s probably on the job and will get back to me soon. He just had to be patient. The problem was he had something amazing to tell her, something he hoped would solidify the relationship they’d started at Christmas over a year earlier.

  He shoved the phone into the zippered pocket of his parka and glanced up at the clear blue dome overhead. The temperature had risen almost high enough to forego the coat, but enough humans wandered around the resort to require him to keep up appearances. He brushed a few blond strands of hair out of his eyes and wished he could be in some higher mountains. And that’s why I’m ready to leave.

  A smile pulled at his lips as he unlocked his cabin and surveyed the interior. Boxes and brightly-colored plastic totes filled the cozy space in haphazard stacks around the furniture. Moving sucked, especially when he’d been in Nevada for almost all his life. But he needed to move on, find new crags to roam, new mountain flanks to glissade. Like in Colorado and the Rockies.

  That was where Lily lived now, in a little town called Cloudburst. She’d wanted space to find out who she’d become since he’d rescued her at Christmas the previous year. Letting her go when she got the job at the Cloudburst Resort had been the hardest thing he’d ever done in his hundred and seventeen years. She was his mate and the one he’d want forever.

  And now she’s in the Rockies and I’m packing my stuff in the Spring Mountains.

  “Hey, man, you’re really gonna move, huh?”

  Zach turned and found his best buddy Sleet leaning against the doorjamb, wearing little more than a pair of snowpants and boots. He still hadn’t quite mastered the human disguise. His eyes glittered steel-blue and his canines protruded between his lips, while his white hair hung in dripping dreds. But at least he didn’t appear fish-white like a Minnesotan tourist on holiday in Vegas.

  “Yeah, I’m really gonna move.” Zach grimaced at the frown on Sleet’s face. “Aw come on, Sleet. It’s not gonna be that bad. You and the family come to the Rockies every fall. The party usually starts around Halloween. Longer season there.”

  “Yeah, but you’ve always been here.” Sleet scowled. “Even if you were hanging out with humans all the time. At least you were just down the mountain. Now you’ll be several ranges away.”

  “At least I’m not moving to the Sierra Nevadas. Then you’d have to find a way across Death Valley.”

  Sleet shuddered. “Yeah, it’s better you’re headed back onto the Plateau.” He shook his head. “Why not the San Francisco Peaks? That’s a lot closer.”

  “Too small and too dry.” Zach moved some of the totes closer to the door. “Besides, after the Navajo named it one of the Four Sacred Mountains, the Ice Demons there have gotten a little holier-than-thou about their work.” Zach rolled his eyes. “Not really my thing. I don’t have the god-complex.”

  “Why are you moving there again?”

  Zach turned and scanned his belongings in the totes. He hadn’t told anyone in his family of his mating with Lily Sinclair, a human and his very own ice princess. Letting him work with humans was one thing. Mating one? Yeah, Mom and Dad would shit icicles.

  He shrugged. “It’s just time. I want to see some of the higher ranges and greet Santa Claus when he rides over Pike’s Peak.”

  Sleet snorted. “Santa Claus doesn’t exist.”

  “How do you know he doesn’t exist?” Zach ribbed his friend as he picked up a couple totes.

  “Have you seen him?” Sleet raised a prickly eyebrow.

  “Just because you haven’t seen Santa doesn’t mean he doesn’t exist.” Zach hauled the totes out the door to his truck. Driving took longer than his normal mode of transportation, but he meant to take his whole life with him. “Humans haven’t seen Ice Demons, but it doesn’t mean we don’t exist.”

  Sleet shook his head. “Come on, man. Why are you really leaving?” His eyes bulged and he sank his fangs into his bottom lip. “Holy Freya, you met someone.”

  “What?” How in the Ninth Hell had Sleet made that jump?

  “You did.” Sleet threw a claw at Zach. “You totally met someone. What’s her name? What clan is she from? Does she live in the Rockies permanently or is that just her favorite stomping grounds?”

  Zach tried for cool as he loaded more boxes into the truck. “How do you know it’s a woman?”

  “Seriously? You’re gonna go with that line? ’Cause I’m not buying the super casual dude routine.” Sleet crossed his arms over his chest and tossed his dripping hair over his shoulder. “You’ve never done anything so drastic and you’ve never been with anyone other than Greta. Who is still interested in you, by the way.”

  Zach laughed. “No, she isn’t. You’re just hoping I’ll change my mind. But I won’t. Let it be.”

  “Right. There is no way I’m letting this go, and you can bet an avalanche your parents won’
t, either, when they find out.”

  “Find out what?” Zach hoped his voice sounded sufficiently bland even as his stomach tightened. Telling his traditional Ice Demon parents that he’d mated with a human would be a helluva conversation. It was bad enough when he’d told them he planned to move to the Rockies.

  “That you’ve met someone.” Sleet inhaled and narrowed his eyes. “You smell different. Like spicy.” He wiped some of his sopping hair off his face. “Ice Demons never smell spicy.”

  Zach laughed to cover his unease. “You’re melting. Get out of here before you turn into a puddle on my floor. I’ll swing by the upper peaks before I go. Where are you migrating to this year?”

  Sleet’s irrepressible grin split his face and exposed his canines. “Patagonia. The weather’s gonna be wicked this year and they’re having a glacier building contest. Winner gets an ice cave in Banff.”

  Zach whistled, impressed. “Nice. Are you going to enter?”

  “Yeah. Me’n Hailee are gonna work together to win.”

  Zach raised an eyebrow as he shooed his dripping friend out the door. “You gonna share the ice cave with your brother?”

  “Yeah. We thought we’d make it a swinging bachelor pad for wooing chicks.” Sleet flashed his grin again. “But you don’t need to do that anymore, do you?”

  “Get outta here. You’re leaving watermarks.”

  Sleet laughed, saluted, and was gone in a hissing sprinkle of snowflakes. The desert air sucked up the moisture before it hit the ground and took Zach’s smile with it. He shoved the last of the totes into the back of his truck and closed the tailgate, grateful Sleet didn’t push too hard. He wasn’t ready to tell anyone of his impulsive choice to mate with Lily.