by A. K. Morgen
“I know.” He pushed away from the door, striding toward me. Energy danced along his sun-kissed skin like the crackle of electricity. He stopped at the foot of my bed and looked down at me, his shoulders hunched. “I’m sorry. I….” He shook his head, blowing out a long breath. “I don’t know. The thought of you being hurt again terrifies me.”
“It does me too,” I admitted, tilting my head back to look up at him. Beams of sunlight trickling through my bedroom window danced around his head like a halo, highlighting the golden strands of his hair. He was so beautiful, inside and out. How could he think he was cursed? “But we can’t wish the situation away. We have to deal with it, Dace. You have to deal with it.”
He blew out a breath.
“Come here,” I said, holding my hand out to him.
He took it carefully, lacing his fingers through mine. When we were palm-to-palm, electricity humming where we touched, some of the tension in his shoulders faded away.
“How do you do that?”
“Do what?” I asked, tugging on his arm so he’d sit with me. No matter how frustrated he made me, I still wanted him as close to me as possible. I craved the closeness and the way my entire body vibrated when his body was next to mine. Sometimes, I thought every inch of me remembered him.
He took the hint, settling down beside me.
“Make everything sound so easy,” he said. He tilted his head from side to side, his eyes locked on my face as if he could find the answer written there. He wouldn’t though, because I had no more answers than he did.
“Because I know you can do it.”
“You have so much faith in me,” he whispered. “I don’t want to fail you.”
“Then stop fighting so hard.” I squeezed his hand in mine, silently pleading with him to listen to me. “Don’t torment yourself like this. None of this is your fault. You have to believe that. You have to let go.”
He frowned, tension thrumming through him and into me. “I can’t do that.”
“You have to,” I said.
Why couldn’t he understand that? He couldn’t chain himself to my side, not when everyone else needed him, too.
You can’t ask me to put anyone else first when you’re all I think about.
“That’s not fair.”
His expression firmed, hardening the frown lines around his mouth until he appeared as intractable and stubborn as ever. “Doesn’t matter, love. That’s how I feel. They aren’t you, and I’m not going to put you at risk to save someone else. I didn’t ask for that responsibility.”
“And you think I did?” I pulled my hand from his, scowling at him. Why did he have to be so frustrating? “I didn’t ask for any of this, Dace. I don’t want this for either of us, but we can’t make the freaking apocalypse go away just because we don’t want to deal with it.”
He sighed. “Can we please not fight right now?”
“Will you stop being so crazy?”
“No.”
“I really want to yell at you.” I narrowed my eyes, glaring at him.
He reached out and cupped my cheek in his hand, smiling at me. “I know you do. But, for now, would you settle for letting me hold you? Please?”
I groaned, on the verge of giving in. He knew I couldn’t say no to him when he said please to me like his world would implode if I didn’t give in. I once asked him how he made me feel like my agreement was the most important thing in the world to him. He told me then that it was.
He really did not play fair.
“I’ll try to relax and stop being so difficult,” he whispered, staring into my eyes. “Can’t that be enough for today?”
My glare slipped and I nodded, allowing him to lift me into his lap. Sometimes, he made it so damn hard to be angry with him.
“How are the wolves?” I asked him as he shifted us around until he could lean back against my headboard with me between his legs.
“All safe,” he said, his breath tickling little wisps of hair all along the side of my face. He nuzzled into my hair, trailing his nose down my neck and then pressing his lips to the skin where my pulse danced.
I twisted his t-shirt around my fingers and hummed in contentment, heat spreading through me in gentle waves. I loved when he touched me, and he didn’t do it nearly enough anymore. Every day, he looked at me with so much desire in his gaze, I felt breathless, but he never acted on those feelings. Hell, he barely even kissed me anymore.
I think I hated that almost as much as I hated how fearful he felt.
“How’s your head feeling today?” he asked, his lips against my ear.
“Better.” I shivered at the heady sensation his warm breath sent shooting through me and curled myself more tightly around him.
“That’s good.” He slid his hands up and down my arms, leaving little trails of fire in their wake. “You’re cranky when your head hurts.”
So he’d noticed that too, huh?
“There’s too much going on in there,” he said, settling his fingers over my shoulders. He began to knead the muscles, manipulating them like he’d done it a thousand times before. “You never stop thinking.”
I snorted and then sighed, my body melting into him as he worked magic on the tense muscles in my shoulders and upper back. I couldn’t remember the last time I had an actual massage, but I liked this kind better.
My eyes fell closed.
“Always listening and worrying, never relaxing,” he whispered, running his fingers up the tendons in my neck before plunging them into my hair. He tilted my head to the side with a gentle tug, and then the magic really began.
I moaned low in my throat as he set to work with his lips, kissing and nibbling on every inch of my neck until I couldn’t breathe through the haze of desire strumming through me. I felt like a guitar string, every inch of me vibrating inside and out.
He kneaded my scalp while his lips explored my skin, and I moaned again, tension dissolving rapidly. My body sang. Electricity danced all along my back and arms, and then lower. A thousand butterflies leapt into flight inside me, twirling in intricate, dizzying circles. My stomach bottomed out and then flipped wildly.
I lay limply on Dace’s lap, unable to move as he turned every muscle in my body to pliable rubber. My breathing deepened and slowed, Dace’s massage wiping away all of the frustration, worry, and fear that never seemed to go away anymore until, finally, the only things running through my mind were Geri’s pleased rumbles and Dace’s soft whispers.
“I want you to shut all of that out. Today, I want you to be with me,” he whispered. “Just me and you. Can you do that for me?”
I nodded, more than willing to give in to his request.
didn’t have nightmares that night, and, when I woke the following morning, several inches of snow covered the ground with more falling from the sky by the minute. The world around us ground to a halt. Classes were cancelled. Businesses closed.
I sat at the kitchen table, alternating between watching snow sift down outside the window and observing my dad and Dace coat the walls with paint.
Dace was calmer than he’d been in weeks, as if our day together and my lack of nightmares left us both refreshed and hopeful.
“What color is that?” I asked when Dad climbed a ladder to work on an area of the wall out of his reach.
“Stirring Orange. Do you like it?”
“It’s… different,” I said, narrowing my eyes as I examined the walls. The outside of the house was red. And now the kitchen was orange. I liked the soft color, finding it more restful than festive, but, paired with the red outside, it kind of made me feel like I lived in a cornucopia.
Dad grinned at me, his expression teasing. “I thought about Obstinate Orange.”
“Obstinate Orange?” I snorted. “Who names these colors anyway?”
“Color consultants,” Dace said.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Nope.” He shook his head, the hint of a smile playing at his lips. “Companies hire people to name t
he paint.”
“That’s just sad.” I laughed.
“What’s really sad is how he knows that,” Dad teased. “We should pull his man card.”
Dace shrugged, unperturbed by my dad’s teasing. “I read an article somewhere.”
Dad laughed and resumed painting.
I turned back toward the window to watch the snow. Little flakes swirled in clouds of white outside the window, seeming to slant from the sky at an angle. The trees lining the property appeared yards away with the snow on the ground. I’d never really understood how snow made everything seem so much bigger, but it did. The icy blanket made everything move slower too, as if time worked differently when frozen rain fell from the sky.
Dace’s cell rang as I contemplated the mystery of cold weather.
He set his paint roller down and grabbed the phone from his back pocket, shooting me a quick smile before he ducked into the living room to answer.
I watched Dad run his paint roller across the wall in one firm, fluid movement.
“Thanks for asking Dace to help,” I whispered to him.
He glanced over his shoulder and smiled. “Having something to do for a while will be good for him.”
I nodded my agreement. Dace wasn’t the kind of person who sat around doing nothing all day. Even if he would never admit it, I knew he felt caged here with nothing to do but worry and stress and watch me hobble around. He needed to go back to work.
“Will the college fire him when his vacation time runs out?” I asked, voicing a concern niggling at the back of my mind more frequently the longer Dace stayed home with me.
Dad’s roller hovered an inch from the wall. “I don’t know. No one wants to lose him, but if he abandons his job, they won’t have much of a choice but to let him go.”
“What about you?” I asked. “You can’t stay home forever, either.”
“I’ll go back once you’re on your feet again.” He dipped his brush into the tray on the top of the ladder, using the sides to slough off excess paint. “Deal?”
“Deal,” I said, relieved. He’d be safer at the college than he would here.
Dad resumed his painting, and I shifted my gaze toward the window to watch the snow again.
A few minutes later, Dace came back into the kitchen.
“Who was it?” I asked, turning to look at him.
“Ronan,” he answered, sliding the phone into his pocket. He tilted his head to the side, giving me a crooked grin. “Everything’s fine.”
“I want to go outside.” I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.
“It’s twenty degrees outside.”
“So?” I refused to let him talk me out of going that easily. I needed to feel the snow crunching beneath me as the frigid air burned my eyes and froze my cheeks. I felt as caged as Dace did. Besides, I hadn’t seen snow all winter.
“If you freeze, it’s your own fault,” he said, half-teasing, half-serious.
“I won’t freeze.”
He snagged my blanket off the bar and strode toward me, his lips pursed.
“We’ll see,” he muttered, shaking his head when I bent to I slip my shoes onto my feet.
If I freeze, you can always warm me later, I told him.
Geri rumbled his agreement to my plan.
Dace smirked as he wrapped me in the blanket, then swung me up into his arms. My heart stuttered at how carefully he cradled me to his chest.
“I can walk, you know.”
“I know,” he said, smiling down at me. “But I like carrying you. You feel good in my arms.” He hefted me as if to demonstrate.
My dad smiled indulgently and shook his head, but didn’t comment.
I still struggled to deal with how quickly Dad had accepted Dace’s role in my life. Weren’t fathers supposed to flip when their only daughters fell in love? Mine was far too calm about the entire situation. Not just about Dace, but about everything. Me. Sköll and Hati. Ragnarök. I knew Dad worried, but he never faltered. And he didn’t look at me any differently than he had before I sat him down in the hospital and told him the whole truth.
I loved him so much for that.
“I don’t see what’s so great about snow,” Dace said, striding toward the back door.
“It’s awesome.” I reached for the doorknob, eager to go outside. Apocalypse or no, snow was more magical than unicorns.
Frigid air hit me in the face as soon as I tugged on the door knob, cracking the door open. I couldn’t get it open any further without twisting awkwardly in Dace’s arms. He noticed my struggles and stuck his foot through the crack, pulling it wide open for me.
I craned my neck to see out.
Snow still fell in gentle flakes from the sky and drifted from frozen branches, creating uneven piles beneath the massive trees that marched right up to the edge of the property. The entire yard had transformed into a winter wonderland overnight. Everything looked so soft, an entirely different world than the one I’d grown used to.
Dace stepped outside, allowing me to pull the door closed behind us.
Complete silence enveloped us. Not even the sound of frozen branches cracking spoiled the tranquil quiet.
I loved it.
Dace carried me down the steps, then set me on my feet in the middle of the yard. He didn’t let me go, though. He kept one arm around my waist, making sure my legs weren’t going to give out beneath me as I steadied myself with a hand against his chest.
“It’s so beautiful,” I said, leaning into his side. My words steamed before me in the frigid air. “How can you not like snow?”
“Because it’s cold?”
“Grinch.”
“It’s spring already, Arionna. The Grinch stole Christmas.”
“Technicalities,” I said, tilting my head up to watch as flakes drifted toward the ground. Several brushed across my face, melting when they touched my warm skin. One caught in my lashes like a piece of glitter. I brushed it off, laughing.
“You really love this, don’t you?” Dace asked, my laughter echoing around us.
I reached out to catch a snowflake on the tip of my finger. “Yep. Snow is always fun.”
“Unless you’re a wolf.”
“Oh!” I whipped my head in his direction. “They’re okay, aren’t they?”
“They’re fine,” Dace promised, squeezing my waist to reassure me.
“You’re sure?” I bit my bottom lip, frowning. They were probably freezing by now. “Can’t we bring them to the house? They’d be safe inside.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“We’re not bringing ten fully grown wolves into the house just because it snowed. They wouldn’t fit, and your dad would freak out. Besides which, they wouldn’t come anyway. They’re wild for a reason, love.”
“Fuki isn’t fully grown,” I reminded him, but didn’t argue further. He was right. Fuki might have come inside, but I couldn’t see the others stepping foot through the door unless Sköll or Hati strolled inside again. Not even Buka would enter without that threat, and she was nearly as curious as her half-grown cub.
“Regardless,” Dace said, “they’re fine. Not cold.”
“Then why don’t they like snow?”
“It’s hard for wolves to hunt in snow.” Dace reached out to adjust the blanket around my shoulders. “They don’t like leaving tracks, and snow can be dangerous, too. It hides pitfalls that can drop a wolf as easily as they drop their prey.”
“Oh.” I frowned again. “None of them have been hurt, have they?”
He stroked a thumb along my cheek, setting off little fires in the pit of my stomach. “They haven’t been hurt. They’re watching Fuki right now. He seems to like snow as much as you do.”
I sighed, envious I didn’t have access to the entire pack mind thing like he did. The pack could share their thoughts with me and hear mine, but only when they were close to me. Not at all like Dace who could communicate with them over long distances.
“I want
to see Buka.” I hadn’t seen her in weeks, and I missed her desperately.
“Maybe later,” he said, his thoughts distracted.
My shoulders slumped. “The hunters are out looking for them again, aren’t they?”
He nodded.
“How many?”
“Twenty or so.”
Twenty or so. All with guns and a license to kill.
“This sucks.”
“I know.”
We stood in silence for a moment, watching as a branch across the yard drooped, sending another shower of snow onto the pile at the base of the tree.
“Has the pack hunted lately?” I asked, leaning against him.
“Not much,” he said. “Kalei is keeping them out of sight for now.” He tightened his arm around me. “They’ll be fine.”
I tried to believe him, but I’m not sure he really even believed himself. “I still think you should let me talk to the wildlife people.”
“What would you say?” He glanced down at me with wide, gentle eyes. “You can’t very well explain that Hati attacked you.” His voice dropped to a growl, and his expression hardened. His fury washed through my head in a series of sharp lashes. At least he actually said Hati’s name this time, though.
“I don’t know what I’d say.” I huffed, frustrated that everything was suddenly doom, gloom, and apocalypse again. “Anything to make them stop trying to kill the pack. I feel like this is my fault.”
Dace pulled me to him, enveloping me in his arms. His heart beat strong and steady beneath my ear. “This isn’t your fault, Arionna. The wolves don’t blame you, and you shouldn’t either. You did nothing wrong. Nothing.”
I pressed my face into his chest, wishing I could bury myself in his warmth and stay there until this entire nightmare ended. “You can’t command them away?” I asked, already knowing his answer.
“You know I can’t,” he said anyway, tilting my chin up so he could look at me. “Kalei’s already made it clear that they won’t leave until Sköll and Hati die. Besides, I need them here.”
“I wish you wouldn’t risk them. It’s not right.”
“They came here to fight, Arionna.”
“Then refuse to let them!”
“I can’t.”