by Ann Aguirre
There should be some fear or alarm, but she’d passed beyond that point. Distantly she wondered if Slay would care, if he’d blame Dom. As she closed her eyes, the wind carried a voice to her. Pru didn’t call back; the great leopard king could do his own tracking. She wouldn’t give up, no matter what it cost her.
A sleek and gorgeous snow leopard raced toward her, and then he was Dom, clutching her with frantic hands. She stared up at him with wide eyes. They might be frozen open because she couldn’t even blink, and her voice felt like a ghost in her throat. The worsening storm stole his words, sweeping them away, but she could guess what he was saying. Then he swooped in a furious pounce and ran with her to the house. She could feel his shoulder bones beneath her cheek, but despite how thin he’d gotten, he still held her easily.
“You’re driving me crazy,” he snapped as they slammed into the retreat.
Pru didn’t protest when he stripped off her clothes; Dom had as much interest in her naked body as he had in modern art. Averting his eyes, he wrapped her in a blanket. That wasn’t enough, but she did start shivering again. She couldn’t remember Dom taking care of her before. Nobody had since her mother died. Her dad was taciturn and gruff, preferring to spend his nights prowling as a lynx. Before she came to the retreat, it had been a month since she’d seen him.
“Hang in there. I’ll be right back.”
Drowsily she watched him tear his closet apart, and then he returned with socks, a knit cap, and mittens. For some reason, the idea of wearing only those three items struck her as hilarious, so she couldn’t stop giggling as he tried to dress her. But Dom hadn’t practiced on dolls, so his normally deft hands fumbled, especially when he knelt at her feet.
She could scarcely feel his fingers and there was something magical about this numbness. A hateful inner voice pointed out, It’ll be worse than dying if you lose extremities. Then you won’t just be defective… you’ll also be the fool who maimed herself. That killed the laughter, and she swallowed the lump in her throat without weeping.
“It didn’t work,” she told him.
“Why the hell did you think freezing yourself would accomplish anything?”
“It’s about the only thing I haven’t tried.”
With a muttered curse, he cupped her cheek in his big palm. “You’re still too fucking cold, and taking you down the mountain would only make things worse in this weather.”
His touch burned her skin, so she flinched away. In weary astonishment she watched as he shucked his sweater and the white T-shirt beneath, revealing his bare chest. Even with clothes on, she’d noticed how gaunt he’d become, but his ridged abs had yielded to a concave belly, a hollow beneath his ribs, and the jut of his bones made her want to cook him something right away. Except that her legs wouldn’t hold her when she tried to stand.
“Don’t worry about me,” she mumbled.
“Like that’s possible. I think Slay sent you as my punishment. Come here.”
But she couldn’t even grasp what he wanted, let alone comply with his request. So he lifted her into his lap, her freezing back against his bony, fever-hot chest, and then he wrapped them both up in multiple layers of blankets. When he shifted so they were near the radiator, the blast of warmth hurt. The agony of her thawing flesh finally gave Pru an excuse to cry, and she could pretend her grief stemmed from something other than the fact that she’d failed.
Again.
Great sobs wracked her, and the entire time, Dom held her like she was fragile and precious, like nobody ever had. His arms tightened on her until it hurt almost as much as the sensation returning. When she shifted to complain, the tear tracks on his grim face silenced her. He needed to grieve more than she did. Whatever he’d been doing the past few years, it wasn’t mourning. At no point had he accepted his loss or let any of the pain out. It seemed more like he’d been nursing it, letting a broken heart fester into a soul-deep wound.
Clumsily, she shifted and wrapped her arms around him. Pru expected him to shove her away; maybe because she was still so cold, he didn’t. A shudder ran through him, and then he tucked his painfully warm, damp face into the curve of her neck. She cradled his head in her mitten-covered hands, closing her eyes so she wouldn’t fixate on how strange this was.
They stayed that way for what felt like forever. His breathing went deep and slow. She registered the moment when the tension slipped out of him, and he leaned on her to the point that she had to exert herself to keep him from falling. He’s not as strong as I thought. But he’d done a good job of warming her up gradually. Now that her head was clear, she understood that he’d done things that way to avoid plunging her into shock or causing arrhythmia. Yet now she was naked in his arms, conscious of where his bare skin touched hers.
And he’s sound asleep.
On some level, she should probably be insulted, but he needed rest so much that Pru didn’t even mind. Carefully she stripped out of the mittens and brushed her fingers through his prickly hair. A rumble of unmistakable pleasure escaped him, startling her to stillness. She’d heard him make that sound a thousand times, usually when Dalena nestled close.
Maybe it’s a good dream this time.
He nudged her hand like the great cat he was, and she didn’t have the heart to wake him on a wave of disappointment when he realized she was the wrong woman. In secret and in silence, Pru comforted him the only way she could. Gently she dug into the neck muscles where he hid his tension, and he rewarded her with a noise that was nearly a purr. Encouraged, she worked down to his shoulders, and he responded with an unexpected nuzzle to her throat.
I can’t let this escalate. He’ll be mortified.
Yet he resisted when she tried to escape. Though he wouldn’t admit it, Dom must be starved for physical contact. Sometimes it wasn’t about sex, just a need to hold someone close and know you weren’t alone. So she ran her nails over his back in a soothing tickle, quietly wincing when she realized she could count his ribs. She remembered how Dom had sprawled on his stomach and demanded that Dalena use her “claws” on him. Their happiness had been palpable, golden and glowing, and he squirmed with pleasure beneath her hands until Pru had to leave the room. It was too much like spying on foreplay.
Now, though, little shivers twitched through him each time she dragged her nails up his back. The downward stroke seemed to soothe him, so he arched against her with increasing friction, tense and relax, until she had no idea if she was consoling Dom or teasing him in his sleep. When her hand stopped, he grumbled an incoherent complaint. She’d never considered the back an erogenous zone; Slay definitely didn’t react this way. When she shifted, trying to withdraw a second time, she realized two things.
He was awake. And he was hard.
Dom battled equal measures of bewilderment and guilt. This was, he figured, the normal reaction to cuddling with a naked person. Nothing to be ashamed of. He’d fallen asleep, and his defenses went down, but he had no idea how to extricate himself without making it awkward or awful. She solved the problem by putting a hand over his eyes. To his vast relief, Pru didn’t say anything about… that.
“I’m taking a shower.”
The least she could do was thank him for saving her life, but she didn’t seem grateful. He averted his gaze as she pulled one of the blankets loose. His cock throbbed with an ache so long unfelt that he’d almost forgotten it. While his heart might be buried, his body wanted to fuck.
“Be careful,” he said. “Use lukewarm water in case your body temperature is still low.”
“I will. One near-death experience a day is my limit.”
How could she take this shit so lightly? It rankled, but before he could lay into her, she was gone. Realizing he couldn’t let her out of his sight, he followed her to the bathroom, where she shut the door in his face. He paced the whole time. She might try to drown herself in the bath or open up a vein with his razor. Before he knew it, he was banging on the door.
“Hurry up, I don’t trust you.”
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“Still alive.” She emerged in a cloud of steam to tease him.
To tease him. Like there was anything funny about their situation.
Pru stood there, still dripping wet, and wrapped in a towel. Much to his frustration, his cock held firm at half-mast, and so much dewy, freckled skin didn’t help. Dom didn’t know where to look and finally settled on her injured arm. Her bandage was soaked, and he clenched his jaw over how little she cared about her own welfare. Maybe Slay really did send her to die. Unless he guessed I couldn’t just watch it happen. But in all honesty, he wasn’t sure his second had the cunning to come up with such a Machiavellian plan.
“Put some clothes on, then come to the kitchen for hot tea and dry bandages.”
Her brilliant smile actually made him back up a step. “You’re getting bossy again. That’s a good sign.”
“Don’t,” he said, unsure what he was even protesting.
“Okay. Do you have something I can put on? I only brought one change of clothes.”
Dom didn’t want to share his things because the intimacy seemed overwhelming, but he couldn’t leave her in a towel or blanket indefinitely. Begrudgingly, he found a ratty shirt and briefs, then offered them to her, and when she emerged from her room a few minutes later, he could only stare, transfixed by the thought, Pru is wearing my underwear. She looked small and disarmingly feminine. None of this felt real, as prior to her arrival, his existence had dwindled into a predictable nightmare of loneliness and liquor.
She followed him to the kitchen, where he filled the kettle and turned it on. While they waited for the water to boil, he checked her cuts, then cleaned and wrapped them. Afterward, in silence that was both awkward and not, they drank tea together.
She’s winning, he thought. Like he’d forced warmth back into her chilled body, she was reviving him, one provocation at a time.
“My heart can’t take any more excitement,” he said, once they finished. “I want a shower too, but I’m afraid you’ll do something stupid.”
“You already took one.”
His mouth flattened. “And then I nearly froze looking for you.”
With dawning chagrin, she seemed to realize that he might need warming too. “Sorry.”
“The problem is, the last time I left you unsupervised—”
“I’ll stay outside the bathroom while you shower. I’ll talk to you, so you know I’m still there. Is that good enough?”
“I suppose it has to be,” he growled.
Dom set their cups in the sink and took Pru by her unwounded wrist. If she’d fought him on the way to the bathroom, he might’ve lost control because while they sat, innocently sipping tea, that insistent need wouldn’t go away. He didn’t want to shower for warmth, but he desperately required privacy. Just five minutes. Damn. The way he felt, so tight and sprung, it might be less.
“What should I talk about?” she asked, as he shut the door between them.
“I don’t care. Tell me a story. Tell me a secret. Whatever you want.”
Since he was already half-undressed, he only had to shuck his pants and briefs. To lend credence to his claims, Dom turned on the water and stepped under the spray. His cock leapt before he even touched it, anticipating his intentions. It’s been so fucking long. Shuddering, he took himself in hand as Pru started talking.
“It’s strange how life never works out like you expect.”
Surreal.
Her chattering outside the bathroom should’ve slowed him down, but now that he’d started, he couldn’t have stopped if she’d opened the door. He used rough strokes, just wanting to quell the beast, and she kept talking, telling some story about how she’d gotten lost on the way to visit the Burnt Amber clan. He remembered that, actually. His father had been pride leader back then. Golgoth raiders had been sighted just beyond the borders, and they’d feared she had been taken. In particular, Slay had been frantic, though once rescuers located Pru, he’d acted like he didn’t give a shit.
For some reason, Pru’s monologue made him tug harder. Her words blurred into aural ribbons, warm and sweet; he couldn’t focus on what she was saying, but he knew she was safe, and he relaxed a fraction. The feeling built in his lower back, spiraling outward, and the hot water stung his sensitized skin in a good way. His hand moved faster. Almost there. Need to—he huffed out an urgent sound, and she heard him—she must have—because she paused.
And said, “Dom?” in a tender, quizzical tone.
He came.
Immediately, shame overwhelmed him, and he crouched beneath the warm water to wash it away. Such a visceral reaction, it was inexplicable. Somehow he struggled upright and switched off the tap. In the aftermath, he braced on the wall, unable to steady his breath.
“Yeah?”
“You okay?”
“Fine,” he got out.
Actually, he was dizzy as fuck and oddly grateful. There were no bad pictures in his head, nothing but a kind of fuzzy stillness, and that was so much better than it had been that he throttled the impulse to hug her as soon as he put on his clothes and opened the door. Her smile made him look away.
“Feeling better?”
There are so many ways I could answer that.
“Let’s talk about sleeping arrangements.”
Her brows shot up; they were darker than her hair, nearly black, and their pride mates used to tease her about dyeing them. Russet hair, eyes like a winter sky, so many freckles that nobody had ever counted them. Her nose was short and tilted; like an ass, Slay had once said that if Pru ever shifted, it would probably be into a Persian house cat. Dalena didn’t stop hitting him for like five minutes.
Pru cried, he remembered then.
Though she’d forced a smile, Dom caught her later, curled up in tears. She never did it where anyone could see, not that he knew of anyway. Until today. He didn’t know why that mattered, or if it did. Suddenly he kind of wanted to punch Slay.
But that would mean returning to Ash Valley.
“I’m listening,” she said.
“We’re both bunking in your room for two reasons. It has the only surviving mattress, and you might wander off somewhere. For the record, I’m tying you to me with a length of string. I’ll sleep closest to the door, and if you try to get past me—”
“World of hurt, I know. I’m familiar with your rhetoric.”
“My what?”
“Bombast. Grandiloquence. Orotundity.”
“You’re just making up words now.” Dom smiled, despite the fact that she was clearly insulting him. Normally, the pride didn’t give him shit like this, part of being the exalted leader.
He didn’t hate it.
“False. I’d tell you to get a dictionary, but I’m sure you shredded all the books here and then burned them in a fit of rage.”
“I… don’t remember.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said gently. “Things are replaceable. You are not.”
He had no words.
It wasn’t late enough for bed, so Pru found a deck of cards and made him play some ridiculous game. She told him the rules, then changed them to suit her, but she had a terrible poker face. They gambled with matchsticks, and she pouted when he collected all of them.
It was only when they headed to her room that he realized he hadn’t taken a drink all day.
4.
Pru studied the length of twine that bound them, wrist to wrist, then shook her head with a faint sigh. How am I supposed to sleep like this? Though she had three feet of slack, she was on the wrong side of the mattress, but he’d insisted on putting himself between her and the door. Now he lay facing away from her, the curve of his back like a wall between them. As if that wasn’t enough, he’d also rolled up a blanket and used it to divide the space.
Judging by his breathing, he wasn’t asleep yet. He’d actually laughed a couple of times during their game of Follow the Queen, surprising the shit out of her. Maybe if she wore him down enough, he’d change his mind about the stu
pid terms he’d set. Pru understood that it was an impossible bar for her to vault over, but she still had five days before the Eldritch and the Golgoth representatives arrived. Raff and Beren wouldn’t be pleased over cooling their heels, so she hoped Slay’s stalling tactics had improved.
Since her brain wouldn’t stop ticking over, Pru found it impossible to sleep. The bolster also pissed her off, as if she couldn’t be trusted not to molest Dom in the night. In furtive motions, she slowly unspooled it and drew it on top of the rest of the covers. Eventually, the extra warmth made her sleepy, but she couldn’t figure out how to roll over without getting tangled in the string, and she usually slept on her left side.
“Why are you sighing?” Dom asked, sounding exasperated.
“I can’t get comfortable.”
“Then go back to the hold. Your own bed is waiting.”
“Like you’d let me leave. What if I do something dangerous on the way home?”
He glared at her over his shoulder. “You don’t ever want me to sleep again, do you?”
Pru couldn’t restrain a quiet laugh. “I’d apologize, but—”
“You’re not sorry.”
It felt strange to lie here talking to Dom as drowsiness tiptoed closer. He was asking something about Ash Valley when she passed out. Later, she woke to find him curled around her, his chin against the top of her head. Spooning. We’re spooning. Pru stared at the lean arm curved across her waist, the fingers splayed low on her abdomen.
I’d give a lot to be like this with Slay, just once.
But while he was open to having fun, he never stuck around afterward. Anything more is a bad idea, he’d always said. Because of how the mate bond formed, she guessed. Sufficient sex could jumpstart it, or a couple could choose each other, then the emotional connection developed over time. Slay couldn’t know that she’d always considered herself his, whether he chose to keep her or not. So it was beyond fucking ironic that Dom would be the first person to snuggle with her so intimately, his heart drumming a lullaby against her back.
