by Tracy Wolff
I shrug just before giving her an answer guaranteed to send her running for the hills. The fact that it also makes me sound like a total douche is for me to regret and for her to never know why. “As long as you leave this school, it doesn’t matter to me if it hits you or not. I warned your uncle you wouldn’t be safe here, but he obviously doesn’t like you much.”
Anger flashes across her face, replacing the uncertainty. “Who exactly are you supposed to be, anyway? Katmere’s very own unwelcome wagon?”
“Unwelcome wagon?” I repeat. “Believe me, this is the nicest greeting you’re going to get here.”
“This is it, huh?” She raises her brows, spreads her arms out wide. “The big welcome to Alaska?”
The snark surprises me as much as it intrigues me—which is not acceptable…on any level. The knowledge has me snarling, “More like, welcome to hell. Now get the fuck out,” as much as a warning to myself as an attempt to scare her senseless.
Too bad it doesn’t work—on either front. Because she doesn’t shut down at my warning, and she sure as hell doesn’t run away. Instead, she just looks down her very cute nose at me and demands, “Is it that stick up your ass that makes you such a jerk? Or is this just your regular, charming personality?”
Shock washes over me—no one talks to me like that. Ever. Let alone some human girl I could kill with little more than a thought. With it comes a quick lick of frustration. Because I’m trying to save her life here, and she’s too unaware to even notice.
I need to change that—and fast. Narrowing my eyes at her, I snap, “I’ve got to say, if that’s the best you’ve got, I give you about an hour.”
It’s her turn for her brows to go up. “Before what?”
“Before something eats you.” Obviously.
“Seriously? That’s what you decided to go with?” She rolls her eyes. “Bite me, dude.”
If she only knew how much I want to do just that… The angrier she gets, the better she smells. Not to mention how good she looks with flushed cheeks and the pulse point at the hollow of her throat beating double-time.
“Nah, I don’t think so,” I tell her even as my mouth waters and my fangs threaten to elongate with every rapid pound of her heart.
I want to taste her. Want to feel the softness of her body leaning into mine as I drink my fill. As I drink and drink and— I cut off the thought. Force myself to look her up and down disparagingly before answering, “I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t even make an appetizer.”
I step closer, determined to intimidate her—determined to get her out of here before all hell breaks loose and she gets hurt “Maybe a quick snack, though.” I snap my teeth fast and hard. Then do my best to ignore the way she shivers at the sound.
It’s so much fucking harder than it should be. Especially when she refuses to back down like anyone—everyone—else would. Instead she asks, “What is wrong with you?”
And shit. I nearly laugh at that, because “Got a century or three?” That just might be long enough to scratch the surface of my answer, if I was honest.
“You know what? You really don’t have to be such a—”
Behind us, everyone is circling, straining to hear. None of them is stupid enough to actually wander by too close, but I can feel them there just around the corner. Listening. Waiting. Strategizing.
Which means enough is more than enough. Time to get serious about scaring her away. “Don’t tell me what I have to be,” I growl. “Not when you don’t have a clue what you’ve wandered into here.”
“Oh no!” She does a mock-afraid face, then asks, “Is this the part of the story where you tell me about the big, bad monsters out here in the big, bad Alaskan wilderness?”
And damn, but she impresses me. Sure, it’s frustrating as hell that she’s not taking any of this seriously, but it’s hard to blame her when all she knows is what she’s getting from me. In fact, I’m impressed she’s doing such a good job of holding her own—not many people can against me.
Which is why I respond, “No, this is the part of the story where I show you the big, bad monsters right here in this castle.” I step forward, closing the small distance she managed to put between us.
She needs to know that if she’s going to walk around this place challenging people like that, there will be consequences. Better that she learn it from me than from one of the shifters who likes to claw first and ask questions later.
She must read the intent in my face, because she takes one trembling step back. Then another. And another.
But I follow suit, moving one step forward for every step she takes backward, until she’s pressed right up against the edge of the chess table. Nowhere else to go.
I need to scare her, need to make her run from this place as far and as fast as she can. But the closer I get to her, the more I lean toward her, the more I want to do anything but scare her away.
She feels so good pressed against me, smells so good, that it’s hard to focus on the endgame. And when she moves, her body bumping into mine again and again, it’s even harder to remember what the endgame is.
“What are—?” Her breath catches in her throat. “What are you doing?”
I don’t answer right away—because I don’t have an answer beyond, The wrong thing. I’m doing the wrong thing. But knowing that doesn’t seem to matter when she’s right here in front of me, her brown eyes alive with a million different emotions that make me feel things I haven’t let myself feel in way too long.
But none of those is the answer I need to give her right now. None of them is even a thought I should have. So instead of saying what I want to say, I pick up one of the dragon pieces. Then hold it for her to see and answer, “You’re the one who wanted to see the monsters.”
She barely glances at the piece. Instead she sneers, “I’m not afraid of a three-inch dragon.”
Silly girl. “Yeah, well, you should be.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not.” Her voice is strained, and I start to think that maybe I’m getting through to her. Except right now, she doesn’t smell afraid. In fact, she smells— Fuck, no. I’m not going to go there, no matter how much I suddenly want to.
Instead, I pull back enough to put some space between us. And to watch her freak out a little as the silence between us grows longer and longer.
Eventually, I break the silence—and the tension building between us—because I know that she won’t. “So if you aren’t afraid of things that go bump in the night, what are you afraid of?” And then I work really hard to pretend that her answer doesn’t matter to me.
At least until she says, “There’s not much to be afraid of when you’ve already lost everything that matters.”
I freeze as her words slam into me like depth charges—sinking deep and then exploding so fast and hard that I’m afraid I’m going to shatter right here in front of her. Agony I thought I was long past rips through me, tearing me open. Making me bleed when I thought I had already hemorrhaged everything I had to lose.
I shove it back, shove it down. And can’t understand why it’s still right here in front of me—until I realize that this time, the pain I’m seeing is hers.
It’s terrible and terrifying to realize that she carries some of the same wounds, if not the same scars, that I do. Knowing that, recognizing it, makes it so much harder for me to back away. Makes it nearly impossible for me to do what I know I need to.
Instead, I reach out and gently take hold of one of her curls. I like them because there’s so much life there, so much energy, so much joy that touching one makes me forget all the reasons it’s impossible for me to let her stay.
I stretch out the curl, watching as it wraps itself around my fingers of its own volition. It’s silky and cool and just a little coarse, yet it warms me like nothing has in way too long. At least until she brings her hands up between us and pushes at my shoulders.
And still I don’t back away. I can’t. At least not until she whispers, “Please.”
It takes me a second—maybe two or three—before I finally find the will to move away. Before I finally find the strength to let that one, single curl, that one, single connection, go.
Frustrated with myself, with her, with this whole fucked-up situation, I shove a hand through my hair. Then wish I hadn’t when her eyes immediately go to my scar. I hate the fucking thing—hate what it is, hate where it came from, and hate even more what it represents.
I look away. Duck my head down so my hair quickly covers it up again.
But it’s too late. I can see it in her face and her eyes.
Can hear it in the breath that catches in her throat.
Can feel it in the way she moves toward me for the first time instead of away.
And when she reaches out, when she cups my scarred cheek in her cold, soft hand, it’s all I can do not to shove her away. Not to run as far and as fast as I can.
Only the irony holds me in place—the idea that I came down here to scare her away for her own safety and now am considering fleeing for mine.
But then our gazes connect, and I’m held in her thrall, completely captivated by the softness and the strength in her eyes as she strokes her thumb across my cheek over and over and over again.
I’ve never felt anything like it in my too-long life and nothing—nothing—could make me break the connection now.
At least until she whispers, “I’m sorry. This must have hurt horribly.”
The sound of her voice combined with the glide of her thumb across my skin sends electricity arcing through me. Has my every nerve ending screaming in a mixture of agony and ecstasy as one word washes through me over and over again.
Mate.
This girl, this fragile human girl whose very life is even now balanced on the edge of a yawning precipice, is my mate.
For a moment, I let myself sink into the knowledge, into her. I close my eyes, press my cheek against her palm, take one long, shuddering breath, and imagine what it would feel like to be loved like that. Completely, irrevocably, unconditionally. Imagine what it would be like to build a life with this smart and snarky and brave and battered girl.
Nothing has ever felt so good.
But people are all around us, watching us—watching me—and there’s no way I can let this continue. So I do the one thing I don’t want to do, the one thing every cell in my body is screaming against. I step back, putting real distance between us for the first time since I walked down those stairs, what now feels like a lifetime ago.
“I don’t understand you.” They aren’t the words I need to say, but they are the ones I have to.
“‘There are more things in heaven and hell, Horatio, / Than are dreamt of in your philosophy,’” she answers, deliberately using my earlier misquote with a smile that slices right through me.
I shake my head in a vain effort to clear it. Take another deep breath and slowly blow it out. “If you won’t leave—”
“I can’t leave,” she interjects. “I have nowhere else to go. My parents—”
“Are dead. I know.” Rage burns inside me—for her, for what she’s suffered, and for all the things I want to do for her but can’t. “Fine. If you’re not going to leave, then you need to listen to me very, very carefully.”
Her eyes widen in confusion. “What do you—?”
“Keep your head down. Don’t look too closely at anyone or anything.” I lean forward until my lips are almost pressed against her ear, fighting the instincts roaring to life inside me with every breath we both take as I finish, “And always, always watch your back.”
Before she can answer, Foster and Macy come down the hall toward us. She turns to look at them, and I do what I have to do to keep her safe—do the only thing I can do in these ridiculous circumstances. I quickly fade to the stairs—the speed of it helping me pretend that each step away from her doesn’t cut like jagged, broken glass.
I plan on going back to my room, but I don’t make it that far. Instead, I stop just around the corner and listen to her voice as she talks to Foster. Not the words, just her voice, because I can’t get enough of her. Not now. Not yet.
Soon enough. I’m going to have to give this up.
Soon enough, I’m going to have to stay as far away from her as I possibly can. Because if I thought it was bad for her to be used as bait, that’s nothing compared to the danger of being a human mated to a vampire. And not just any vampire but one who holds the fate of the world in his hands.
It Only Takes
One Hot Vampire
to Win a Snowball Fight
—Jaxon—
I watch Grace head out the door with Flint and Macy and tell myself to walk away. That there’s nothing to worry about. That she’s going to be fine. And know, even as I say it to myself, that I’m going to follow them anyway.
Follow her anyway.
They’re out in the snow now, moving slowly enough that any predator with half a mind could catch them—while walking backward on a leisurely afternoon stroll. I wait for Flint to get fed up, to try to hurry Grace along, but he doesn’t do it. Instead, he walks close to her, laughing at whatever she’s saying, making her laugh in return.
It’s enough to make my blood boil, considering that’s my mate he’s trying to charm. And my mate he might very well be trying to kill. That thought does something way worse than make my blood boil. It makes every part of me freeze, every nerve in my body arrested with horror—and a rage so cold, it burns like ice.
Despite my determination to go unnoticed, I draw closer to them. Alarm bells are going off inside me, driving me to break all the rules I’ve held myself to for the last year. Making me do things that I normally wouldn’t even consider.
Then again, the last year has been all about doing things I wouldn’t have imagined. Things I wouldn’t wish on anyone, even a monster like myself. And now, here I am, trailing my ex-friend through the snow as I try to figure out exactly what Flint is up to.
There was a time not so long ago that I would have trusted him unconditionally, a time when he would have done the same for me. But that was a long time ago—in events if not in actual years. And now…now I don’t even trust him with a simple snowball fight.
I sure as shit don’t trust him with my mate.
The three of them finally make it out to the clearing where everyone is waiting. I stay in the trees, watching as Flint moves to the center of the group. He cracks a few jokes, loosens everyone up, then lays down the most ridiculous rules in existence—I should know. We made them up together years ago. Back when I got to at least pretend that I was like everyone else.
Grace watches him the whole time. It’s enough to set my teeth on edge…and more than enough to make me feel like some kind of stalker. I’m only here because every instinct I have is screaming at me that something is wrong, that my mate is in danger, but it’s still hard to justify peering at her from behind a tree like some kind of creep. Especially when she seems totally absorbed in another guy.
For a minute, just a minute, I think about heading back to the school. But then Flint finishes his rules and beckons like some kind of prince for Grace and Macy to join him. They do—of course they do—and Grace reaches up and pulls on his stupid dragon hat. Flint laughs and bends his head to give her better access, and I see fucking red.
Bloodred to be exact.
It takes every ounce of control I have to stay where I am, fists clenched and teeth on edge, as I try to figure out exactly what game Flint is playing. If he’s playing a game at all.
He bends down to talk to Grace, to whisper something in her ear that I’m too far away to hear—even with my heightened senses. And when his fucking lips nearly brush the small strip of exposed skin at the top of her cheek, my fangs explode in my mouth.
&nb
sp; I’m suddenly a whole lot closer to them without having made any conscious decision about moving, thoughts of murder and mayhem blazing a trail through my brain.
I tamp them back, shove them down deep. And pretend to myself that I’m not tracking Flint’s every move like a predator about to strike his prey.
“Chill,” Mekhi tells me from his spot behind a tree several yards away. For the first time, I’m glad he and the others wouldn’t let me come out here alone. Ostensibly, it was for my own protection—that’s how they roll—but now I can’t help but wonder if it’s for everyone else’s as well.
Fuck. I close my eyes, run a hand over my face. When it comes to Grace, I need to get my shit together…and fast. Because the universe might have decreed that she’s my mate, but that doesn’t mean anything if she doesn’t agree. And Flint comes with a lot less baggage than I do—is it any wonder she’s laughing so easily with him?
I need to move back, to give them a little more room and maybe get this damn bloodlust under control.
But then the game is on, and Grace, Macy, and Flint are running into the trees on the other side of the clearing. I let them go, determined to watch from here. But since I apparently have no self-control when it comes to this girl, my resolution lasts about five seconds before I start making my way toward them stealthily—no reason to have to explain to anyone else what I’m doing out here when I’m not even sure myself.
I skirt around a group of witches who aren’t even bothering to make snowballs. Instead they’re firing streams of snow at one another in what looks to be a wholly ineffectual but amazingly fun exercise in futility. At least until a witch named Violet manages to pick up enough snow to leave her opponents buried in the stuff.
They screech as they try to burrow their way out, and I’m left grinning as I slide by unnoticed. Looks like the snow spelling wasn’t so ineffectual after all.
Grace is several trees in front of me now, making that arsenal of snowballs I suggested. She’s laughing, and I realize it’s the first time I’ve heard her do that since she got here. It’s a good sound, a happy sound, and I grin even though Dragon Boy is responsible for it. It’s nice to hear her happy.