Beauty In Her Madness (Winterland Tale Book 3)

by Stacey Marie Brown

  “Mama said I was very sensitive. That’s why I smoke…to calm my nerves.” He pinched the tiny joint between his claws, sighing dramatically. “She said I have such a pure soul I feel too much.”

  Dor snorted. “Sensitive? Pure? I have other names for you, like puss—”

  “Dor. Stop.” Frost pushed off from the table. “You know what happened last time you triggered him.”

  “Not my fault he consumed the entire kitchen.”

  “It’s not my fault! I am an emotional eater.” The bear sniffed as if he had been offended. “You know that.”

  “You ate forty pounds of chocolate,” Dor exclaimed. “And drank all the mead.”

  “I did it for you, so you wouldn’t be tempted, and I didn’t get one thank you.”

  “Thank you?” Dor squeaked, anger trembling his little form. “You ate all my special cheese too. We couldn’t get you down from the roof for a week.”

  “I still believe gingerbread men were trying to eat me.”

  “Ugh!” Dor smacked his face, his head shaking.

  “Guys.” Frost shifted their attention back to him. “I don’t have much time left.” Much time left? What did that mean? “Chipmunks haven’t ventured here since—” He rubbed his scruff. Fuck, the man was gorgeous, like stab-you-in-the-chest-and-rip-out-all-your-oxygen kind of hot. “I need to make sure nothing else is in the forest before Christmas. Do nightly runs and go out wider; it’s getting worse every year and starting earlier.”

  “On it, captain!” Dor saluted him.

  “PB?” Frost folded his arms. PB, right. I remembered Frost telling Dor to go get PB when the chipmunks attacked us. Then hearing a roar later.

  “But it gets so dark out there…and the trees are rude to me,” PB said softly, stubbing out his smoke.

  “Oh, Christmas punch. I need a drink.” Dor laced his fingers, pleading with Frost. “Pretty please with sugarplums on top? I can’t take sobriety anymore. Not with this plush-brained toy around.”

  “No,” Frost grunted.

  “Geez, pass out once…or maybe twice…”

  “Try fifteen times.”

  “Fifteen? No, it couldn’t have been that much.”

  Frost tilted his head, his stoned expression landing on Dor.

  “Fine, fifteen times you’re found swimming naked in someone’s teakettle, and they get quite snippy.”

  “I was drinking it at the time.”

  “So you got a hairball. Welcome to my world,” Dor scoffed. “Plus, don’t you get those when—”

  A rumble hummed through the room, cutting off Dor. My hair stood on end, deep fear spiking inside me, my skin flushing with goosebumps.

  “Fine. Fine, come on, PB. Let’s go start the sweeps of the forest.”

  “But…” PB’s long lashes fluttered nervously.

  “I will bring a flashlight.” Dor rolled his eyes, his voice cooing. “And tell off those bully trees when they are mean to you.”

  “They told me I was fat.” PB grunted and struggled to roll over, slowly rising to his feet. The animal was massive and almost as round as it was tall. It wasn’t like a normal polar bear you saw in Canada, more cartoony, and much bigger.

  Dor motioned to PB. “Yeah, because clearly you’re—”

  “Dor,” Frost warned.

  “Because clearly you’re…not fat. Crazy trees.”

  “Right?” PB sniffed. “It’s mostly fur.”

  “Sure…” Dor choked.

  “Oh, can we bring cookies with us?” PB stretched, his huge belly jiggling.

  Dor shook his head, turning for the door, heading for me.

  Shit… Any kind of plan was chucked; my instinct was to get away and hide. Whipping around, I sprinted back down the hallway, their voices nipping at the back of my heels. I darted around the corner into a dark room off the main hallway, tucking into the shadows.

  Footsteps and mutterings echoed off the stone, their voices sounding farther and farther away as they headed up the stairs.

  My shoulders dropped on my exhale, relief making me relax back into the wall. Light from the hallway spilled into the room I was in, giving me enough light to see that it held dozens of pictures and paintings. They were stacked in layers on three walls, as if all the ones upstairs had been taken down and stored here instead.

  But why? Why have all this art and keep it hidden below? Most of them were turned away, so I couldn’t see the canvases. Inching up to a stack, my fingers ran over a textured painting, pulling it back. I saw a picture of three kids playing in the snow.

  One boy’s hair was bright as sunshine, the other boy dark as night. The little girl’s cheeks were rosy, her face happy, a red-and-white scarf looped around her neck.

  “Dinah, you and me against Jack in a snowball fight.” Blaze slung his arm around me. I could feel him shivering violently under his puffy coat.

  “That’s not fair.” I pulled away from Blaze, looking between the twin boys who were like night and day.

  “Why not?” Blaze shrugged. “This is his terrain. It’s actually only fair if we both team up against him. He has the advantage here. We can’t let him win.”

  Jack’s eyes moved to me, his scrutiny digging into me, waiting for my answer. Jack never spoke much, not compared to Blaze, who rarely shut up. Jack watched. Observed.

  “Come on, Dinah.” Blaze yanked on my jacket, trying to pull me away from his brother.

  I hesitated, still bouncing between my two friends.

  “It’s okay.” Jack, even as a kid, had a raspy voice. “Pair up with him.”

  “But…”

  “You want to.” The intensity of his blue eyes made me wiggle. Jack sometimes scared me, while Blaze was always happy and fun. “Plus, he’s right; I have the advantage here.”

  I nodded, moving to stand next to Blaze, who was rolling balls of snow in his gloved hands. Jack and I didn’t wear any. Compared to snow in Earth’s realm, Winterland wasn’t cold at all to me. I loved it here, hated when I knew it was time to return home.

  “Dinah?” I turned to glance back at Jack. “I always win.”

  The memory flooded back to me, bending me over. I could still taste the air on my tongue, the smell of pine and snow, hear the crunches from our boots, the laughter as Blaze and I tried to hold our own against Frost.

  We lost.

  Smiling, I recalled Blaze being a sore loser, stomping off, saying he was tired of being cold. I followed him back to the beach, leaving Frost behind.

  It had happened. It was as real as any childhood memory I had of Alice and me. I used to come here all the time. My memories were still hazy of that time, only a handful of moments coming back to me, but I knew with everything in my body Winterland was real.

  Or real to me. I had blocked it from my mind for so long. When slices of it slipped through, I would blame it on my childhood game of make-believe, creating friends, a world so crazy there was no way I could believe it was real.

  My eyes caught on another painting in the stack, one dark and foreboding, tapping at an awareness in my chest. Reaching for it, prickles speared my nerves, warnings spreading through me like wildfire.

  Abruptly a hand clamped over my mouth, stifling the scream in my throat, another hand yanking me back into a firm physique. The sharp sensations of cold and hot both burned and soothed my skin as lips grazed my ear.

  “What the fuck are you doing here, little Liddell?” A voice full of fury snarled into my ear, his entire body engulfing mine, flicking fear and desire through me, hitching air in my lungs. “Did you come back for more?” His thumb dragged along the hem of my boy shorts. “Do you know what I do to trespassers sneaking around where they do not belong?” His breath slithered from my ear down the back of my neck, grazing a sensitive spot, while his fingers glided over the fabric of my underwear. My back arched, desire raking down between my thighs, my body reacting without my control.

  His grip tightened on me, his tone fierce.

  “I destroy them.”r />
  Chapter 13

  Terror, thick and murky, mixed with adrenaline in my bloodstream, heightening my senses.

  The clean smell of pine and snow wrapped around me. The cold burned my body in flames, the depth of his voice making my bones tremble and buzz like someone threw me from slumber into snow.

  I was alert, awake, angry, and slightly confused.

  “Tell me, little one,” he growled, the vibration shivering my flesh. His hand lifted from my mouth, sliding down to my neck. “How did you get down here?”

  “Th-the mirrors.” My voice came out raspy and broken.

  “So…you remember now, do you?” His hand around my neck tightened, stirring something deep in me, hardening my nipples. “What else do you remember, Dinah?” His thumb rubbed my pulse. A hum thundered from him as he dug in a little harder. “You like that, don’t you?”

  “No,” I spat. If Scott had ever grabbed me like this, I would have hit him. I wasn’t into those dominant/subservient sexual games. But wetness seeped from me at the same time my mind berated me. “Let. Me. Go.”

  “Telling lies this close to Christmas?” He chuckled, pulling me more firmly into him, my muscles stiffening, feeling him press even farther into me.

  Oh, jingle bells...

  Hard and throbbing, he pushed against my ass. This man was packed, stuffed, hung like a bulging stocking. My teeth crunched together. Raw desperation to feel him, for him to slip my knickers down and thrust into me whiplashed through my body, drawing up spitting fury.

  “Get off me.” I thrashed against him, only to rub against him more in my effort to get away, trying to ignore the cry in my body.

  “Stop.” He grunted, his hand on my waist pinning me to him. “You keep doing that, and I’ll find other ways to break you.”

  I went still, my head curving enough to peer over my shoulder, his full lips so close to mine. “Against my will? Tells me what kind of man you are.”

  “Would it be against your will?” His hand at my waist slid over the cotton of my shorts.

  “Yes,” I snarled as I felt myself pulse with need, contradicting the anger bristling from me.

  “Really?” His fingers dipped slightly lower, and I sucked through my nose. “It certainly wasn’t earlier this evening. In fact, I think you were begging me for more.”

  “That wasn’t real, nor was I acting like myself.”

  “Quite the contrary, little Liddell,” he rumbled in my ear, my muscles shaking with the desire to melt into him. “It was especially real, and for once, you were completely yourself.”

  “You don’t know anything about me,” I hissed, knocking my shoulders into his chest in a feeble attempt to escape.

  “Don’t I?” He slipped under the band of my boy shorts, gliding his fingers just above my clit.

  Hot.

  Cold.

  Fire.

  Ice.

  A wave of hunger choked my throat. Raw. Desperate. The intense sensation volleyed a noise from my chest, my breath heaving.

  “You’ve gotten good at lying to yourself, burying who you are under rules and restrictions.” He swept closer to my folds, my heart thudding through my ribs. My hips clamoring to open for him kept me immobile, not daring to move. My breath stilled as he inched down, as if he were waiting for me to oppose. I should have been telling him to stop, but my teeth dug into my bottom lip, holding the cry to keep from leaving my tongue. “Fuck, you are so desperate for someone to actually push you. Shatter you into pieces. Break the walls and let you feel alive again. To be yourself. With a passion that consumes.” He glided into me, my lips parting. “Destroys.” My body drowned out my rationality.

  “Don’t you, little one? You are so walled up, sex deprived, and bored, you’ve become dead inside.” He continued gliding through me, causing a moan to escape. “Answer me.” He squeezed my throat, hurtling another wave of sensations through me. “Tell me, or I’ll stop.”

  “Yes.” The word popped out frantically, my brain hazy and not grasping logic, my body in full control, and it didn’t want Frost to stop. What was happening to me? I never lost myself like this. Never threw caution to the wind. Never ignored what was right and wrong. Because I knew this was wrong, but I couldn’t actually seem to end it.

  Sex always felt nice with Scott, especially in our early, horny teenage years of discovering and learning with each other. We had been each other’s first and only. I wasn’t even the girl who had fantasies about some teen pop band or TV star. It had always been him, and I never had a problem with it. But I couldn’t deny the need in me now, shoving away all logic and control.

  Frost’s thumb rolled over me.

  “Oh god…” I let myself fall back into him, my hips fanning open.

  “Too bad.” His tone shifted, cruel and cold. He withdrew his hands, licking them, making a humming noise in his throat. “So good, Dinah, but I don’t reward lying, deceitful little trespassers.” He let go, almost shoving me off him. “Go to Blaze for a quick fuck.”

  “What?” I stumbled forward, circling around to face him. Even with his expression locked in fury, the man took all my breath and stomped on it. My veins still throbbed with desire as confusion and embarrassment sprang up, flowering into anger.

  “You think I can ever forgive what you did?” He snarled, his blue eyes glinting with hate.

  “Forgive me?” I had no idea what he was talking about.

  “And you sneak back again. Coming here of all places.” Ignoring me, he continued. “Poking your nose where it shouldn’t. Some things haven’t changed, I guess. Still too curious for your own good. Or mine.” His form loomed as he stepped back for me. I countered his steps, backing away. “I used to be the one who followed the rules, the good boy.” He closed the space between us, his eyes lit with fury and hate. “You changed that. Now I’m the one who takes without care or fairness. The one who has no rules or laws to govern me.”

  “What are you talking about?” My body and mind were mystified by the sharp change in direction.

  “Don’t play with me.”

  “I-I’m not.”

  He snarled, his boots ramming into my bare toes. I slammed back into the paintings, my spine scraping against a wood frame. He loomed over me, trapping me, his large build completely engulfing mine. His blue eyes were blistering and bright.

  Dangerous.

  Wild.

  Cold.

  Violent.

  He was like a winter storm. Behind the beauty, he would destroy and bury you.

  “Why are you here, Dinah?” he gritted through his teeth, his frame vibrating with fury.

  “I-I don’t know,” I sputtered.

  His hand snapped up to my jaw, his finger clamping down on my chin.

  “You don’t know?” He inched closer to my face. “It’s been over twelve years, and now you come back.” His nose flared, his chest puffing as his eyes ran over me. Like running through webs, I could feel his gaze consume my figure. “You decided to come back and finish me off?”

  “What?” My brow furrowed, my skin humming everywhere his hand gripped me, his handprint scorching into me. “What do you mean?”

  As if he were in a trance, he stared at me for another beat. I thought I saw grief and longing flicker in his eyes, but it was gone so fast I was sure I imagined it. Rage took over his features, his broad shoulders rolling back, his lip rising.

  “Right. I was going to show you what I do to trespassers.” His large hand cupped my bicep, yanking me forward.

  “What are you doing?” He roughly pulled me out of the room, marching me down the hallway, the opposite way I came down. “Stop! Where are you taking me?”

  Not acknowledging me, he strode down another corridor, his viselike grip keeping me stumbling right behind him.

  “Let go of me!” I clawed at his hand, trying to yank free of his hold, but he only fastened down firmer, squeezing my arm. “Ow! Let me go!”

  “Aren’t you the one who broke into my home?” He sh
ot back at me. “Went snooping into private rooms, pilfering through my stuff?” He jerked to a stop in front of a heavy arched wood door lined with metal. The type you would picture in some old castle. “I have every right to contain a thief.”

  “Thief?” I responded. “I didn’t take anything.”

  “Wrong,” he huffed, stepping into me, sneering down at me. “You took everything.”

  “Wha—?” I didn’t get the word out before he flung open the door, shoving me in with force. I fell onto the hard stone floor with a thud. I barely registered what happened when I heard the thick wood door slam shut with a metallic clank.

  “No!” Scrambling to my feet, terror shot through my veins, rushing me back for the door, which had no doorknobs on the inside. My nails still clawed at the wood, shoving and hitting it. “What are you doing?”

  “What I should have done twelve years ago.” His deep timbre soaked through the wood, swiping at me. “Hope you enjoy your cell, little one.”

  “Wait! No! You can’t do this! Let me out!” I pounded on the door, hearing his boots clip the stone, fading away. “Frost!” I bellowed his name. “Come back. You can’t lock me up like this.”

  My only response was silence.

  “Frost!” I yelled out again, ramming my shoulder into the door. “You asshole! Come back here!”

  Silence.

  Holy shit! He actually locked me in and left.

  Shocked and scared, I peered around the room where he tossed me. Windowless, a single light overhead lit the box-shaped space. The one piece of furniture was a cot in the corner bolted to the ground, with a wool blanket and pillow. In the other corner, four thick chains pooled on the stone, two fastened to the wall and two from the floor, with heavy cuffs at the end of each one. Stepping closer, my fingers skimmed over one of the hanging manacles. Red stains covered it. My eyes darted to each shackle, seeing red stains on all of them and the floor.

  Blood.

  Was this where he locked up prisoners and tortured them? Was I going to be next? Was Frost a murderer?

  Whirling back, I ran for the exit, pounding on the door.

  “Please! Let me out!” I screamed, my fist wailing on the wood. “I can’t be here. Scott will wake up and notice I’m gone. Please let me out.”