by Sabrina York
She opened her mouth and closed it again. “I…what?”
“You’re not staying.” His voice was cold, clipped. “You need to leave.”
“It’s dark! It’s snowing and cold!” She shuddered.
His frown became a downright glower. He looked out the window, as though he didn’t believe her when she said it got dark at night. “Fuck.” He raked his fingers through his hair. “Wait here,” he snapped. “Don’t move.” He clutched his pink-hearted towel to his loins and stormed into the shadowed hallway toward the bedrooms, presumably to dress.
The dog, however, remained. Guarding her. He sat, his attention riveted on her, issuing soft growls at the back of his throat as though she might forget he was there and ready to tear her limb from limb should she so much as flinch.
Glancing at the cold fireplace, she sighed. If they hadn’t been here, she would’ve had her feet up by now, toasting them against a roaring flame and watching the steam rise off her soaking socks. Biby would be lapping tuna. She would be sipping tea.
Instead, she was trapped here by the door, shivering at the cold waves seeping through the cracks. It wasn’t her imagination. The temperature had dropped ten degrees as she’d made the trek from her car. She felt nearly frozen through.
But she couldn’t prance over there and start a fire. Not with that slavering creature in the way. And she certainly wouldn’t leave Biby unguarded.
As though she knew Lyssa was thinking of doing so, the cat let go a strangled yowl. The dog sat up straighter and licked his chops. His eyes brightened, narrowed, fixated on the cage, a little metal and plastic. It was the only thing keeping Biby from the maw of the hulking beast.
She shouldn’t have come. Why hadn’t someone warned her?
Seriously. Val should have said something. “Oh sure. You can stay at my cabin…but my brother, you know, the one whose photo you drool over like a hungry baby? Yeah. He’s there too.”
But Val hadn’t warned her. Hadn’t said a word.
So she’d come. Here. To this remote speck of real estate where she hoped she could find some peace and quiet, where she’d hoped she could finally say good-bye….
In retrospect, she should have suspected. She should have been able to read Val’s smile.
That was the trouble with knowing things.
It always surprised you when you didn’t. When you got it wrong.
Jax chuckled in her ear and she pushed his presence away. The last thing she needed now was comments from the peanut gallery. It was bad enough that she often had the cast of Ben Hur in her head. She really didn’t need them mocking her idiocy as well.
Wade stalked back into the room buttoning a flannel shirt over his chest. A hint of regret dribbled through her, but she ignored it. She wasn’t here to get it on with Val’s hunky-hero, calendar-model brother. And, judging from the way he glared at her, it wouldn’t matter much if she was.
He set his fists to his hips and looked her up and down. “You can stay the night, but tomorrow at first light, you’re gone.”
“My car is in a ditch,” she reminded him.
His frown darkened. “We’ll dig it out. My jeep has a winch.”
“Could you…?”
His eyes narrowed. “Could I what?”
God, he was cranky. “Could you start a fire? My toes are like ice.”
He glanced at her feet.
“It was a long walk.”
“Shit.” He raked his hair again—he seemed to like doing that—and stomped to the fireplace. It took him only a moment, as the logs were already laid. She gazed at the flickering flames longingly.
“Could you…call off your dog?”
“Shit.” His favorite word, apparently. “Bo. Come here.”
The dog padded to his side, but Lyssa waited until he grasped its collar, before she picked up Biby’s cage and edged around the room toward the fire. When the warmth hit her, she sighed. Bliss.
She stripped off one coat and then the next. And her jacket and her sweater and her hoodie. She’d put on all her winter gear, everything she could find in her trunk, not knowing how far she would have to walk. She was glad she had, but now it needed to come off. She dropped each piece into a pile at her feet, and then toed off her boots as well, wincing as a sharp sting sliced through her foot. She didn’t think there was any frostbite, but her lower extremities were numb. She stripped off her socks and peered at the alarmingly white skin.
“Rub them,” Jax suggested.
Lyssa blew out a breath as she sat on the ottoman and did so. Normally she tried to ignore Jax because disembodied voices jabbering incessantly in her ear annoyed her. But this sounded like good advice.
She winced at the first stroke, and then winced again as the heat soaked in, awakening the nerves. Tingles shot up her leg.
“Your pants are wet.”
Something soft dropped to the seat beside her and Lyssa blinked. She’d been so focused on tuning Jax out, she almost hadn’t heard Wade’s grumble.
“What?”
“Your pants are wet.” He nodded at the item he’d tossed. She held it up. Sweatpants. A million sizes too big, but they had a drawstring. “You should change.”
Lyssa nodded, and then stared at him. “Well?”
He arched a perfect brow. “Well what?”
“Turn around.”
She might have imagined that hint of a flush on his cheeks, but he did turn and she quickly peeled off her sopping jeans and slipped into the warm, dry sweatpants. Yup. A million sizes too big. But they were warm. And they were dry. And it was heavenly.
“Thank you.”
He grunted and headed for the kitchenette. “Are you hungry?”
“Famished.” She was. The lightheadedness warned that her blood sugar was dropping. She settled into the armchair by the fire and pulled Biby out of her cage, cradling her in her lap and sinking her fingers into her snowy white fur. The cat nestled in and though she kept her attention firmly on the dog—and vice versa—began to purr.
After slamming around in the kitchen in a manner that effectively telegraphed his annoyance, he brought her a plate upon which he had slapped a sandwich. He thrust it at her. “I’m Wade,” he offered, although it was a grudging offer.
Lyssa accepted the plate, took a bite and nearly groaned in ecstasy. She was hungrier than she had thought. She smiled her thanks and mumbled through a mouthful of roast beef and lettuce, “I know.”
He stiffened. Every muscle in his body went taut. His eyes narrowed. “You…know?”
She swallowed. “Yeah. Mr. December. Are there any chips?”
He didn’t answer. At least not about the chips, although she really would have liked some. “You know about the calendar?”
Lyssa didn’t snort, but it was an effort. Everyone knew about the calendar. All her friends had one.
Wade stepped away, studying her the way an entomologist studied a bug wriggling on a pin. But Lyssa didn’t wriggle. She took another bite—the sandwich was manna from heaven. She pulled off a piece of beef and fed it to her cat. Biby nearly took a chunk of her fingers with it.
Wade’s gaze flicked down. He paled. “You let it out?”
The way he said it, one would think she’d unleashed the seven plagues.
“Biby doesn’t like being caged.”
He gestured to the other side of the room. “I have a dog.”
Lyssa tipped her head to the side. “Biby won’t hurt him.” And then, she added, under her breath, “Too much.” If he behaved himself.
Biby was a fighter. She’d been feral before Jax had taken her in, a true wildcat tamed only by her ravenous passion for bacon. Lyssa had been mortified at the appearance of this small furry be-clawed creature in her home. She’d never had a fondness for cats. But Biby had won her over. Eventually. She’d even been able to overlook the shredded couches and hair-nibbling and dead birds miraculously appearing on the dining room table. She’d actually come to love the belligerent feline.
> So, when Jax died, Lyssa kept her.
Couldn’t bear to think of letting her go, much less dropping her at a shelter.
Jax wouldn’t have wanted that.
This she knew beyond all doubt.
Because he’d told her.
Wade’s gut churned with warring annoyance and…shit. Was that attraction?
No. It couldn’t be.
He’d watched her strip away her armor, coat after coat and then gaped as the most enticing, petite figure emerged.
The spear of lust had surprised him. He’d felt nothing—nothing—down there since that IED had taken out his squad. And had nearly taken his lower half.
But his lack of desire wasn’t only physical. At least, that’s what the V.A. psychologists had told him. Many soldiers suffered from it, they said…a symptom of PTSD, they said.
Wade knew the truth.
It wasn’t fucking PTSD dampening his natural need for a woman.
It was guilt.
A guilt he could never escape.
Besides all that—as though that weren’t enough—no woman would want him when she saw him. Really saw him. No woman would want to touch his mangled body.
So when Lyssa dropped the last sweater into the pile and stood there in a tight T-shirt cradling the delicious mounds of her breasts in soft back cotton, he’d swallowed the drool in his mouth, choked back the rising frisson of arousal, and made her a sandwich.
And he was glad he hadn’t done anything stupid. Like yank her into his arms and rub his body against her softness the way he ached to—
No. He was glad he hadn’t done that. Because now he knew. She was one of them. One of the crazy, man hungry lunatics who stalked a man to the ends of the earth. Braved the mountain passes in the dead of winter. Hiked through miles of snow to get to him. With her cat. Somehow she’d found him. Hunted him. Tracked him here, for God’s sake.
Given that, she was probably the craziest of them all.
She muttered something to herself and then chuckled, as though someone had made a jest.
And then…she responded.
Horror curled through him as he realized she was having a conversation with herself.
Or her cat.
Or an imaginary friend.
None of which were promising options.
Oh definitely. She was gone tomorrow.
No matter how fucking gorgeous she was. No matter how delicious she smelled. No matter how much he wanted to fist his hands in her hair and seal her lips with his….
She laughed again and a frisson of trepidation danced down his spine. She was crazy as a loon.
No doubt about it. She was gone tomorrow.
Come hell or high water.
Chapter Three
It wasn’t high water.
It was high snow.
And maybe a bit of hell.
Wade stared out of the door of the cabin, a cold fist gripping his chest.
It has been a miserable night, lying on his bed, aching, Bo crowding him out but providing much needed warmth.
It had been a miserable night, lying on his bed, wanting her. The only thing that kept him from succumbing to a roiling panic was the knowledge that come morning, she would be gone. It was only one night. Twelve hours at the most. And he’d be alone again.
She—and her piquant smile, her silky black hair, her curvy body, and her upturned eyes that seemed to see too much, know too much—would be gone. He would be alone. Again.
It was what he wanted.
Desperately.
But, as he stared outside, with a cold fist gripping his chest, he realized. That would not be happening. The snow was too deep. And it was still coming down.
She wasn’t going anywhere. At least not today.
Yesterday’s flurries had, in the dark of night, become a blizzard, dumping nearly three feet of snow on the ground. It had been a pleasant winter wonderland yesterday. Today, it was impassable. To make matters worse, all the snow that had accumulated on the steep roof of the carport had slid off, completely burying the jeep. It would take him hours—maybe days—to dig it out.
The thought horrified him. His muscles still ached from yesterday’s run. He turned his head and stretched his neck. Cartilage cracked but the throbbing didn’t ease. The precursors to a blinding migraine hovered still. He rubbed his neck a bit, but to no effect. When it got like this, nothing helped.
He should probably pop a couple more pills and crawl back into bed to hibernate like a surly bear until it went away—
“Good morning.”
He grimaced. Did she have to sound so chipper? He glanced at her over his shoulder and tried not to flinch. She’d found some clothes closer to her size—they were probably Val’s, but his sister had never looked so damn sexy in yoga pants and a cami. Lyssa’s long hair flowed over her shoulders in a rippling river. Her eyes, beneath the fringe of her bangs, were wide and bright. She smiled and a raft of dimples erupted on her left cheek. And her breasts….
His fingers flexed.
“Did you sleep well?” She helped herself to his coffee, took a sip and then had the audacity to grimace. She padded to the fridge and added in a healthy dollop of his milk. “Well? Did you?”
He frowned. “No.” Why did she have to be here? Why did it have to snow last night? Why did she make him so damn…hungry?
“Really? I slept like a log.” She yawned hugely to illustrate that point. Or rub it in. Then she scrounged around in the fridge, pulling out his carton of eggs and the last of the bacon. His bacon. “Do you like French toast?”
His belly rumbled. “Yes.” He knew his tone was surly, perhaps petulant. He couldn’t help it. She made him restless. Twitchy. Still, he plopped into a chair and watched her putter in the kitchen, whipping up French toast, omelets, and bacon. He hardly glowered at her at all when she served him.
She sat in the other chair and smiled at him across the table. “Dig in.” Without waiting for him, she proceeded to do so.
It made him hungry to watch her eat.
And not hungry for food.
Lust, for her, bubbled in his gut.
A cold nose nudged his hand, clenched in his lap. Reflexively, he opened his fist, patted Bo’s head, and scratched him behind the ears. He whined and nudged again. Wade broke off a chunk of—perfectly cooked—bacon and fed it to him. He wolfed it down and then set his muzzle on Wade’s thigh, peering up with big brown eyes. A dampness formed on his jeans.
Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing, seducing her. Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing, having a fling. It had been years since he’d had intimacy of any kind that didn’t involve his fist. It had been years since he’d even had the urge to try.
“Aren’t you going to eat?” Lyssa chirped, attracting his attention once more. She leaned in and grinned. “I promise, I didn’t poison it.” And that easily, he was reminded: She was crazy.
He strengthened his resolve.
Yeah. Okay. For the first time since Kandahar, he wanted a woman. Really wanted a woman. But indulging in any kind of intimacy with a stalker was just asking for trouble. His friend, Jenner, Mr. July the year before, had made the mistake of flirting with a calendar groupie. He’d had to file a restraining order in the end.
Wade picked up a fork and gingerly cut into his French toast, although he didn’t know what he was looking for. He was sure she hadn’t poisoned it. Still, he watched her as he slipped the morsel into his mouth and—Oh. Holy. God.
Absolute heaven. With his cooking skills, he’d been existing on what equated to K-Rations. Spam, spam, and more spam. This tasted like ambrosia.
“What did you do to this?”
She bristled at his tone, which, he had to admit, was a trifle harsh. Accusatory maybe.
“Do to it?”
He frowned. “It’s good.”
“Oh.” She blew out a breath and her bangs fluttered. “Cinnamon, cloves, and vanilla extract. And of course, lots of butter.” Her cat leaped onto the table—
it shook when the portly feline landed—and skulked around her plate. “Oh,” she cooed. “Do you want something to eat?” She pinched of a bit of her omelet and the cat gobbled it up. When she offered a bit of bacon, the creature snatched it and scurried away.
To his surprise, Bo didn’t give chase. He remained where he was, dampening Wade’s jeans, though his eyes did follow that snow-white streak into the spare bedroom.
“Mmm.” When Lyssa popped the rest of the strip into her mouth, he had to look away. “I love bacon. Shall I make some more?”
Wade balled up his napkin and tossed it onto the table. “There is no more. That was the last of it.”
She gazed at him in dismay. “You’re not serious.”
“I’m absolutely serious. I was hardly planning on…having company.”
She had the good grace to look mortified as she settled back in her chair. Silence reigned for a moment, and then she cleared her throat. “I brought some bacon.” He glanced at her. He liked to think it wasn’t a hopeful glance. “It’s in my car.”
Okay. Maybe it wasn’t so bad that she was here after all.
He frowned thoughtfully. “How far is your car?”
“A mile or so. That way.” She waved her hand to the north. Then tipped her head, as though listening, and waved to the east. “Right. Over that way.” She huffed a laugh. “I’ve always been bad with directions.”
“Have you?”
“Yes.” She nibbled her lower lip. “At any rate. There’s food in my car. If we need it.”
“A mile or so.”
“Mmm hmmm.”
“In three feet of snow?” His hip ached at the thought.
“Right.” She peeped at him. “Well, there’s bacon.”
“How much bacon?”
“Two slabs.”
He gaped at her. The omelet churned in his belly. Two slabs of bacon? How the hell long was she planning to stay? Would she tie him to the bed, hobble him, and lock him in the cellar like Annie Wilkes in Misery? He opened his mouth…and the words slipped out. “Are you crazy?”
She stilled. He tried to ignore the wounded expression in her eyes. It helped that she blinked it away quickly. “Well,” she said. “People do think I’m weird.” She snorted a laugh and waggled her fingers behind her head as though swatting a fly. “But I’m not crazy.”