Chapter 2: Altitude & Temptation at 40,000 Feet
The week after the party passed in a blur of rigid normalcy. Alex trained alone, punishing his body on the trails until his lungs burned, trying to outrun the memory of her skin under his fingertip, the look in her eyes by the black water. They spoke in clipped, polite sentences over meals. Magnus and Ragnar watched them both with a new, wary silence.
Their father found him in the boathouse, oiling an old tackle box that didn’t need it.
“We need to talk, Alex.”
His father’s voice, usually so steady, held a note of forced calm. He leaned against the workbench, his hands deep in the pockets of his waxed jacket. “Vanja has been invited to train with a specialist cohort in Colorado Springs. Altitude training, new sports science techniques. It’s a four-month program. A phenomenal opportunity.”
Alex nodded, wiping his hands on a rag. “She should go. She’s the best.”
“She doesn’t want to ask you,” his father said, cutting straight through. “But I will. She needs a base in the States. Somewhere familiar to decompress, away from the Olympic facility intensity. Her mother and I… we’d sleep better knowing she had family there. Knowing you were there.”
Alex felt the boathouse walls close in. The water outside seemed suddenly very still. “She wants to stay with me?”
“She needs to,” his father corrected gently. “And you have that big, empty house in Denver. You’re her brother.”
The word hung in the salty air, heavy with everything it was supposed to mean and everything it currently did not.
Alex saw the unspoken concern in his father’s lined face. He wasn’t a fool. He’d likely seen the charged silence, the way his two most driven children now orbited each other like opposing magnets. Perhaps he thought proximity, under the guise of brotherly care, would normalize whatever this was. Perhaps he was testing them.
“Of course,” Alex heard himself say, his voice hollow. “She can stay as long as she needs.”
His father clapped him on the shoulder, a gesture of relief that felt like a sentence being passed. “Good. Thank you. She leaves in a week. You’ll travel together.”
A week later, they were in the air.
The Learjet’s cabin was a study in muted luxury, all cream leather and polished walnut. Alex stared blankly at a magazine article about off-season training regimens, the words swimming on the page. Vanja sat across the aisle, curled in her seat with a notebook, sketching vague shapes that looked like mountain ranges or ECG readings.
They hadn’t spoken of the night by the fjord. The unacknowledged truth sat between them like a third passenger, strapped in tight.
“I’m going to sleep,” she announced abruptly, closing her notebook. “The time change is going to be brutal.”
“Yeah,” was all he could manage.
She shifted, pulling a cashmere throw over herself. Then, with a slow, deliberate grace, she swung her legs up and across the aisle, draping them over his lap.
He went absolutely still.
She wasn’t wearing shoes, just thin, grey socks. The weight of her legs was solid, real. He could feel the dense, powerful muscle of her calves, the curve of her thighs even through the blanket. She let her head fall against the side of her seat, eyes closed, a picture of casual ease.
Every nerve in Alex’s body was on high alert. He stared straight ahead, his jaw clenched so tight a tendon jumped in his cheek. This was an escalation. A blatant, physical claim on his space, echoing her verbal challenge on the path. I’m the best goddamn player on the field.
He didn’t move her legs. To do so would be to acknowledge the act, to make it a confrontation. He tried to breathe normally, to focus on the low, steady hum of the engines. It was impossible.
She adjusted slightly, a pretend shift in sleep. Her toes pressed more firmly into his thigh. The arch of one foot flexed, the subtle movement a brand through his jeans.
Minutes stretched. The cabin was silent except for the distant rustle of the flight attendant in the galley. Alex’s hand, resting on his own leg, twitched. His fingers curled into a fist. He was trapped, pinned not just by her limbs but by the entire impossible situation. By his own promise, by his father’s trust, by the terrifying, forbidden current that had been flowing since he’d watched her Instagram reel in this very jet a lifetime ago.
He let his head fall back against the seat, closing his own eyes. He could smell her. Not perfume. Just the clean scent of her skin, the faint hint of her shampoo. It was everywhere.
He must have drifted into a tense, shallow sleep, because the next thing he knew, the pressure was gone.
He opened his eyes. Vanja was sitting upright, the blanket folded neatly beside her. She was looking out the window at the endless blue below, her profile serene. As if nothing had happened.
She sensed his gaze and turned. Her golden-green eyes were clear, awake, and utterly calm.
“You know,” she said, her voice conversational, almost friendly. “For four months, it’s just going to be us in that big house of yours.” She let that hang for a beat, a ghost of a smile touching her lips. “Better get used to it.”
“Better get used to it.”
The words, so casually delivered, seemed to vibrate in the insulated air of the cabin. Alex just stared, his mind a blank static. He watched a strand of her dark blond hair catch the light as she turned back to the window, the subject clearly closed.
The descent into Denver was a study in turbulence, both atmospheric and personal. The plane bucked through thick clouds, and Vanja simply tightened her seatbelt, her expression one of bored anticipation. Alex gripped his armrests, his knuckles white, ground between the physical jolts and the psychological ones.
They disembarked into the sterile, cool air of the private terminal, collected their bags in silence. A black SUV was waiting, exactly as he’d arranged. He tossed the keys in his hand once, the metal cold against his palm.
“Shotgun,” Vanja said, sliding into the passenger seat before he could speak.
He loaded their luggage, his movements efficient and harder than necessary. The drive to his house in Cherry Hills was a twenty-minute lesson in restraint. She played with the radio, settling on some synth-pop anthem he didn’t recognize, tapping her fingers on her knee.
“So, is the great Alex Kongsgard Jakobsen seeing anyone?” she asked, not looking at him.
“No.”
“Why not? Scared they’ll want your autograph?”
“Busy,” he clipped out, focusing on the road. “And it’s none of your business.”
“Everything’s my business now,” she sang lightly, along with the radio. “We’re roommates.”
His house appeared at the end of a long, tree-lined drive: a modern structure of glass and steel, all sharp angles and cold transparency. It was a trophy, empty and echoing. He killed the engine. The sudden silence was a physical presence.
“Home sweet home,” Vanja murmured, eyeing the imposing facade. “Cheery.”
He led her inside, the heels of her trainers clicking on the polished concrete floors. The vast open-plan living area was clinically clean, all neutral tones and expensive, uncomfortable-looking furniture. A wall of glass looked out onto a manicured backyard and an infinity pool that glowed a vacant blue.
“Your room’s down the hall,” he said, pointing. “Second door. Ensuite.”
She didn’t move towards the hallway. Instead, she drifted to the center of the room, dropping her carry-on bag with a thud. She turned a slow circle, taking in the sterility. “It’s like a very expensive museum. Do you actually live here?”
“I’m here during the season.”
“Right. The fortress of solitude.” She walked to the glass wall, peering out. “Pool’s nice. I’ll use it.”
“Knock yourself out.”
She finally turned to face him, leaning back against the cool glass. Her expression had softened, or maybe just shifted. The teasing glint was still there, but it was quieter, more assessing. “You’re really pissed I’m here, aren’t you?”
Alex set his own bag down carefully. “I’m not pissed.”
“You haven’t said more than three words in a row since we left Norway.” She pushed off from the glass and took a few steps towards him. The distance in the large room still felt vast, but it was shrinking. “Was it the leg thing on the plane? That bothered you.”
He let out a short, humorless laugh. “You’re unbelievable.”
“I was tired. You’re comfortable.” She shrugged, but her eyes never left his. She took another step. Then another.
He didn’t retreat. He couldn’t. His back was already to the kitchen island. The hum of the Sub-Zero fridge was the only sound.
She stopped a foot away, well inside his space. He could see the faint dusting of freckles across the bridge of her nose, the precise darker ring of gold around the pupils of her green eyes. The scent from the plane was here again, intensified by the closed space—clean skin, sunshine, something uniquely her.
SHE LEANS CLOSER.
Her voice dropped to a whisper, a confidential murmur that vibrated in the hollow of his chest. “Or was it the thing by the fjord, Alex? Did that bother you?”
Her breath was warm against his jaw. Every muscle in his body locked. He could see the pulse in her throat, quick and alive. The memory of his finger tracing her spine, the shocking heat of her skin under the cool night air, slammed into him with full force.
He didn’t breathe. The world narrowed to the space between their bodies, charged and impossible.
Then, with a small, knowing smile that didn’t reach her eyes, she leaned back, breaking the spell. “Jet lag’s a bitch,” she said, her voice normal again, bright and false. “I’m going to find my cave and crash. Don’t wait up.”
She scooped up her bag and walked down the hall, the sound of her footsteps fading until a door clicked shut.
Alex remained frozen, his hands braced on the cold stone of the island behind him. He finally sucked in a ragged breath. The house swallowed it, returning only silence. He was alone in his perfect, empty museum, and for the first time, it felt like someone had just stolen everything right out from under him.
The silence in the wake of her door closing was absolute, and it pressed against Alex’s eardrums. He pushed off the kitchen island, his footsteps echoing too loudly in the vast space. He moved to the glass wall, staring at his own reflection superimposed over the darkening backyard. His face looked unfamiliar, strained.
He poured two fingers of whiskey, drank it neat, and felt the burn do nothing to warm the cold knot in his stomach.
Vanja’s room was a guest suite, all muted greys and beiges. It smelled faintly of lavender cleaner and emptiness. She dropped her bag on the pristine duvet and stood in the center of the room, listening.
The house gave nothing back. No creak of floorboards, no distant television. Just a deep, consuming quiet.
She walked to the window, looking out at the sculpted trees. A museum, she’d called it. A very beautiful, very lonely museum. She hugged her arms around herself, the bravado from the living room leaching away, replaced by a sharp, aching clarity.
HE IS TOO BEAUTIFUL AND HANDSOME.
The thought was involuntary, a physical ache behind her ribs. It was the way he filled a doorway, the unconscious grace of his athlete’s body even when still, the startling blue of his eyes that felt like a collision. She had spent a week in Norway watching him, that forbidden attraction coiling tighter each day, a live wire she couldn’t stop touching.
She had pushed him by the fjord. She had pushed him on the plane. She had pushed him against the kitchen island minutes ago, breathing in the clean, sharp scent of him, watching the conflict storm in his eyes.
AND IF HE BRINGS SOMEONE HOME IT WILL BREAK HER.
This was the cold fear that underpinned everything. The image was visceral: some laughing, effortless American girl with perfect teeth in his kitchen, wearing his shirt. Alex’s easy, charming smile directed at someone else. The thought made her feel sick, desperate in a way that shamed her.
She needed a shower, to scrub off the travel and the tension. The ensuite was all marble and chrome. She turned the water as hot as she could stand, letting the steam fog the mirrors. The jet lag was a lead weight behind her eyes, but her mind raced.
He had said he wasn’t seeing anyone. That was something. It was everything.
Wrapped in a towel, she padded back into the bedroom. The house was still silent. She dressed in soft shorts and an old t-shirt, her hair damp down her back. Hunger, a familiar and demanding companion, finally pulled her from the room.
The kitchen was illuminated by a single pendant light. Alex was at the massive stainless steel fridge, his back to her. He’d changed into sweatpants and a loose tee. The sight of him, so domestic and yet so profoundly unreachable, made her throat tight.
“Any food in this museum, or is it just for show?” she asked, her voice softer than she intended.
He didn’t turn. “There’s food.”
He pulled out eggs, spinach, a block of cheese. His movements were efficient, his focus entirely on the task. The message was clear: he was making food. Not for her. For himself.
HE DOES NOT BRING ANYONE BUT HE IGNORES VANJA.
The truth of it settled over her, colder than the Colorado night outside. His rejection wasn’t active or cruel. It was this. This total, practiced omission. He was a fortress, and she was irrelevant to the day’s logistics.
She watched his shoulders work as he chopped spinach, the defined muscles of his forearms shifting. A strange, hollow anger bubbled up. She’d rather a fight than this void.
“You could make enough for two,” she said, leaning against the doorway. “I’m a growing athlete.”
“You know where everything is.” He cracked eggs into a bowl, the sound sharp in the quiet.
“Right.” She pushed off the doorframe and walked to the fridge, deliberately brushing past him. He didn’t flinch, but the air around him seemed to tighten. She pulled out the same ingredients he had. “So this is how it’s gonna be. Four months of silent omelette-making competitions.”
“If you want an omelette, make an omelette.”
She slammed her carton of eggs on the counter next to his. “I am.”
They worked in parallel, a tense, silent ballet in the expansive kitchen. The only sounds were the sizzle of butter in two separate pans, the scrape of spatulas. She felt his distance like a physical wall. It was infuriating. It was agony.
She plated her food and took it to the absurdly long dining table, sitting at one end. After a moment, he brought his plate and sat at the opposite end, twelve feet of polished oak between them. He picked up his phone, scrolling with one thumb as he ate.
Vanja stared at him, her food untouched. The pool’s blue glow through the window lit the side of his face. He was a statue. A beautiful, closed-off statue.
“You know,” she said, her voice cutting through the silence. “For a guy who hits people for a living, you’re really committed to the silent treatment.”
He didn’t look up. “I’m eating.”
“Wow. Deep.” She stabbed a piece of egg. “Look at me, Alex.”
He took another bite, chewing slowly. His eyes stayed on his phone screen.
The hollowness in her chest cracked open, spilling something hot and reckless. She stood up, her chair scraping loudly. She walked the length of the table, the cool floor under her bare feet. She stopped beside his chair, looking down at the top of his blond head.
He finally set his phone down, but he didn’t look up. He just stared at his plate, his jaw rigid.
“Why did you even say yes to this?” The question came out raw, stripped of all its teasing layers.
Now he moved. He tilted his head back, his blue eyes meeting hers. They were devoid of the conflict she’d seen earlier. Just flat, guarded ice. “Because Dad asked me to.”
The simplicity of it, the brutal honesty, was the worst thing he could have said. It confirmed everything. Duty. Obligation. Nothing more.
She held his gaze for three long heartbeats, the air between them charged with everything unsaid—the fjord, the plane, the terrifying pull. He offered nothing. Not a flicker.
Vanja turned and walked away, leaving her food cold on the table. She didn’t look back. She couldn’t.
In her room, she closed the door and leaned against it, the emptiness of the house now inside her. He would ignore her. He would cook his solitary meals and train and exist in his beautiful, silent museum, and she would be a ghost haunting the halls.
Fine.
A fierce, familiar determination ignited in her gut, burning away the hollow feeling. If he wanted to ignore her, he’d have to work for it. She walked to the window, the ghost of her own reflection staring back. A plan, sharp and clear, began to form in the darkness.
The plan was simple: she would become impossible to ignore.
She heard them before she saw them. The following evening, the hollow museum of Alex’s house filled with a different kind of noise—the bass thump of hip-hop, the explosive grate of male laughter, the clatter of bottles on stone. His teammates had invaded. Vanja stood in the hallway, listening to the rough, easy camaraderie that was Alex’s world without her. She smoothed her hands over the thin fabric of her dress, a simple black slip that fell just above her knee. It wasn’t an invitation. It was a declaration.
She walked into the living room. Five large men were scattered around, wearing team gear and casual arrogance. The conversation dipped for a second. Alex was at the kitchen island, his back to her, pouring a beer. He turned, bottle in hand, and his eyes found her. His expression didn’t change, but his grip on the bottle tightened.
“Hey,” one of the guys said, a defenseman with a red beard. “You’re Vanja. The runner. Alex said you were staying here.”
“He did?” Vanja said, her voice light. She let her gaze slide past Alex as if he were furniture. “Well, he’s right. I’m infesting the place.”
She moved to the cooler, pulled out a sparkling water, and leaned against the counter. She could feel the collective attention of the room, a warm, palpable thing. She could feel Alex’s silence like a frozen core in the center of it. She asked the red-bearded guy about his shoulder injury, listened with a focused, smiling intensity that made him sit up straighter. She challenged the rookie to an arm-wrestling match, her laugh ringing out when he hesitated. She was a spark, and the room was dry tinder.
Alex watched it all from his post. He said nothing. He drank his beer. He answered questions about training camp in monosyllables. His eyes were blue flint.
Vanja’s laughter felt sharp in her own throat. Every smile she gave his teammate was a little knife twisted toward the man at the island. And he just stood there, immovable. The hollow feeling from the night before began to seep back in, wider and deeper. The spark she was trying to fan was guttering out against the sheer wall of his indifference.
She excused herself, the smile still plastered on her face. She walked down the hall, past the guest room, and into the first bathroom she found. She locked the door. The roar of the party became a muffled drone.
She looked at her own reflection in the vast, well-lit mirror. The girl in the black dress, with the expertly crafted smile, looked back. Her eyes were too bright, glassy. The performance had been perfect, and it had cost her everything. A shuddering breath escaped her. Then another. The first tear fell hot and fast, a silent betrayal tracing a path through her powder. She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes, but it was useless.
SHE CRIES.
It was a quiet, violent unraveling. She cried for the fjord and the cold distance in his eyes. She cried for the twelve-foot dining table and the silent omelettes. She cried for the brutal, simple truth of because Dad asked me to. Her shoulders shook, but she made no sound, swallowing the sobs until her ribs ached. The porcelain sink was cool against her forehead. She let it happen, this private collapse. When it was over, she felt scraped raw and eerily calm.
She ran the cold water, splashed her face. She reapplied a little mascara, her hands steady now. The girl in the mirror reassembled herself, piece by piece. The eyes were a little red, but it could pass for tiredness. The plan hadn’t changed. It had just gotten real.
She opened the door. The hallway was empty. The party noise swelled. She walked back toward it, the click of her heels on the floor a deliberate metronome. She entered the living room. Alex was in the same spot. Their eyes met. For a fraction of a second, she thought she saw something flicker—a question, a recognition of the dampness on her lashes. She killed it with a smile.
SHE FLIRTS WITH HIS TEAMMATES.
She walked straight past him to the rookie, who was now laughing with the red-bearded defenseman. “You dodged my arm-wrestling challenge, so you owe me a drink,” she said, plucking the beer from the rookie’s hand and taking a sip. She made a face, playful. “Ugh, you drink this swill? We need to educate you.”
She handed it back, her fingers brushing his. The rookie flushed. She turned her body, fully engaging the two of them, drawing them into a circle that explicitly excluded Alex. She asked about their pre-game rituals, leaning in to listen, her hair falling over her shoulder. She told a story about a race in Berlin, animating it with her hands, touching the defenseman’s arm to emphasize a point. Her laughter was lower now, more intimate. It was a masterclass.
She could feel Alex’s stare like a physical pressure between her shoulder blades. She didn’t look. She gave the rookie her full, dazzling attention. “So, you’re from Minnesota? All that ice. I bet you started skating before you could walk.” He was mesmerized, nodding, tripping over his words.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Alex push off from the island. He set his empty bottle down with a definitive clink. The room’s energy shifted, subtle but immediate. He didn’t say a word to anyone. He just walked out of the living room, down the hall, and a moment later they all heard the heavy slam of his bedroom door.
The sound was a gunshot in the sudden quiet.
The music played on, but the conversation died. The red-bearded defenseman cleared his throat. The rookie looked at the floor. Vanja kept her smile fixed, even as her heart hammered against her ribs. She had gotten her reaction. It was not the one she wanted.
“Well,” she said, her voice miraculously steady. “I think the host has retired.” She picked up her sparkling water. “Don’t let me scare you off. The night is young.”
But the spell was broken. The party unraveled quickly after that, with mumbled excuses and awkward thanks. She stood in the foyer, offering polite goodbyes, the perfect, unshakable guest. When the front door closed on the last of them, the silence rushed back in, deeper and more profound than before.
She was alone in the great room again. The empty bottles, the discarded plates, were evidence of a life that had briefly filled the space and then retreated. She walked to the glass wall, seeing only her own reflection in the blackness now. The pool light was off.
From the dark hallway at the other end of the house, she heard it: the rhythmic, punishing thud-thud-thud of a fist hitting a heavy bag. It was coming from his home gym. It was slow, powerful, and relentless. Each impact was a period at the end of a sentence she couldn’t read.
She didn’t move. She just stood there, listening to the sound of his anger echoing through the bones of the house, a language they both understood perfectly.