In the Dead of Cold (14 page)

“I feel like I don’t know a damned thing, but even though being away from you might clear my head, the idea of being away from you makes my stomach hurt. Can I trust you? Really trust you?”

“Yes.” He hoped to hell it wasn’t a lie.

“We shared a dream, didn’t we, a dream on a mountain?”

“Yes.”

“You made love to me.”

Her deep, throaty voice poured over him like a warm, soft summer rain.

“Yes.” She made it sound so simple when it was a world away from being anything simple. He’d tasted her blood the first time he’d ‘made love’ to her. As far as he was concerned, their two worlds had collided and gave new meaning to the big bang theory. Because they were mates, he could be with no other woman, nor she with any other man. She just didn’t yet know it.

He let her carry the conversation at her own pace.

“I remember that part well, especially in your hot tub.”

“Me too.” He worked to breathe through his tight chest. The memory of sliding into her silky heat and making love to the true mate destiny had chosen for him was etched into his soul and would remain there as long as his heart beat. He hated like hell that she refused to look at him. Her tantalizing scent filled him. Her warmth touched him and sent his heart into overdrive. He closed his eyes for a brief moment and enjoyed her essence so close to him. He didn’t dare close the quarter-inch gap that separated them. He knew if he did, she’d feel his hard-on. She sounded confused enough. He needed to let her put into place a few of her scattered puzzle pieces before she discovered the electricity that completed them like a closed circuit.

Hell, she probably already felt it but didn’t recognize it for what it was. The constant need to touch him most likely added to her confusion.

He followed her line of vision out the window and saw an early-morning group of skiers on a distant slope. He fought the urge to keep from grasping her arms and turning her to face him. He had to let her move and accept things at her own pace, no matter how much he wanted—needed—to feel her beneath him again. Fucking like rabbits was not going to gain her trust, just make things worse.

“Was Bart here, or did I dream that part?”

The flowery scent of her hair drew him to her like a bee. He worked to concentrate on her words and not bury his nose in its softness. It didn’t help that her throaty whisper didn’t sound much different than when she’d begged him to help her when Bart was in her head.

“He was in your head. He was really a few miles away outside, waiting for you to come to him.”

She continued to stare out the window. The calling warmth of her closeness was difficult to ignore.

“You told me in our dream he probably drank some of my blood and could control me. I don’t think I want to know what he would have done to me.”

For the fear in her voice alone, he wanted to rip Bart to shreds. Knowing what Bart had planned to do to her in the café was enough. Milo had no doubt Bart would now torture her for days if he got his hands on her again or regained any control over her, just to hurt Milo.

He bit his lip and worked in one controlled breath after another, vowing Jane would never know how riled Bart made him.

The mounting need for her burned in him. It was surpassed only by the need to move carefully and supply her with answers while not scaring her out the damned door. But he didn’t have the fucking patience for it. Hell, just like Bart, Milo could also now read her mind, know her feelings and her fears since he’d tasted her blood. He could even control her with a touch of his own thoughts if he wanted.

No, he’d never stooped that low, and he wasn’t about to start now with the woman who held his heart in her palm. He licked his dry lips and still tasted Jane—intoxicating and sweeter than chocolate. Never before had he walked such a tightrope. “Jane—”

“And I guess that part where you bit me and drank my blood wasn’t a dream either, was it?”

Her hot, whispered words fogged up the window before her and touched him like lit cigarettes, burning him with the terror he heard beneath them. He looked down and saw that she’d gripped the windowsill with both hands.

“Jane—”

“Answer the fucking question! Was it a dream?”

Her explosive words echoed off the walls.

Oh, it was a fucking dream, all right. It was a dream come true for me, having you beneath me and being lost in your tight heat while I drank you in.

“No, it wasn’t.” He did his best to keep his words calm.

Her breathing became loud, as if she choked. “You drank my blood.”

“I had no choice.” A clenching headache chipped away in Milo. If he knew of any way to help her through this, help her accept this—him and what he was, and that he wouldn’t hurt her—he’d do it. But invading her mind would be as bad as what Bart had done to her. He couldn’t go there, no matter how much he wanted to ease her pain and fear.

“I asked you last night to tell me what it was like to be a vampire, and you wouldn’t answer me.”

Funny how she could remember that part with so much fog-lifting clarity. Milo let out a slow breath, his chest aching with the knowledge that he was the cause of the pain he heard in her words. He ached to lean forward and close the inch gap between them in hopes of bringing her some comfort, even if it was only with his body heat. He didn’t move. “I knew you weren’t ready for the truth.” Milo was surprised he didn’t hear a subtle
plop
as his lame words hit the carpet before they reached her. From the first moment he’d seen her in the lobby, had seen her bruises and torn clothes and terror-filled expression, he’d wanted nothing more than to protect her. Always. Even if it meant keeping the painful truth from her.

“Well, I am now. So am I now like you?”

Her voice sounded flat, empty, almost foreign. Milo would rather have her screaming at him. At least her anger was predictable and measurable and expected. She finally turned around to face him. Her beautiful blue eyes looked lost, haunted, as if she silently pleaded for him to help her.

Milo didn’t move, didn’t touch her. He knew if he did, he wouldn’t be able to hold back and keep his needy hands off her. He knew if he closed the gap between them and took her in his arms, he would be working to ease her pain and uncertainty through his devouring kiss. His nails bit into his palms. “No.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.” He was also sure about how much he needed her. Her calling warmth burned him, and he wasn’t even touching her.

“Well, I think you’re wrong.”

Was that a tear sliding down her flawless cheek?

He stared at it for a long moment, unable to decide if he wanted to brush it away with his tongue or his thumb. Milo discovered then how weak he was when it came to her. Unable to hold back, he reached out and brushed the heart-wrenching tear away with a small swipe of his thumb. Soft flesh, softer than down, softer than anything he’d ever felt, was beneath his fingertips.

He was no longer afraid to reach out to her. Touching her in any and all ways was now as natural to him as breathing. It took him a moment to remember the last thing she’d said. He felt lost in the sea of her eyes. He wanted to stay lost. “Why do you think I’m wrong?”

“Because I feel different—well, at least I think I do.”

His heart pounded painfully. He hadn’t shared his blood with her. He hadn’t completed any fucking transformation. But had there been something else he hadn’t seen? Had Bart done something to her? The idea sent a cold knife slicing through him.

“What do you mean, different?”

“I can’t describe it. I just know I’m not craving the taste of blood.”

His heart relaxed. A little. “That’s good.”

“Yet while I crave the normal stuff I usually want for breakfast, there was something else.”

The tension in the room was so thick Milo could have cut it with one of the knives left on the breakfast table. “What?” he finally choked out.

Damn, she was back to avoiding his gaze. She tried to turn away. This time he held her arms and kept her facing him. Her arms were hot beneath his palms, so small and fragile compared to his strength. Her vulnerability touched him like a feather across his chest and reminded him how easily Bart could have killed her. “What? Tell me.”

She let out a huff and looked at the floor. “I crave…”

“What?” He fought the urge to shake the damned answer out of her.

“Never mind, I can’t tell you.”

The hell she couldn’t. He had ways of making her talk. He could make her sing opera if he wanted.

“You can tell me.” Holding his breath, he forced his words to be gentle. “You can tell me anything, Jane.” He cupped the side of her face with the fingers of one hand and stared into her eyes.

He could force her to tell him. He’d rather she trusted him and told him anyway. “What do you crave?”

She let out a laugh of disbelief. “I crave your rock-hard dick in my mouth and in my pussy and even in my ass if that’s where you want to put it. I’m wet just thinking about it.”

Her words toppled out, tripping over each other in her haste to get them out. She suddenly clamped her mouth shut. Then she blinked at him. “I can’t believe I just said that. I can’t believe I said any of those things. And yet, it’s true. I’ve never wanted any man like I want you.”

Enough was enough. He knew her feelings. There was no sense, no solid reason, to torture either one of them any further. He pulled her to him and covered her sweet, hot mouth with his. She tasted of hot chocolate and syrup and woman, his woman, enticing. He couldn’t taste enough of her. His fingers on her face and her throat, he eased her backward until she was against the wall beside the window. He pressed against her, deepening his kiss. He danced his tongue around hers. His rock-hard dick, as she had called it, wanted its freedom to go to her.

Her tongue followed his lead. Her deep groan ignited an instant flame inside him. It was no small spark but rather a bonfire. He had every intention of doing her right here, right now. Nothing else felt so perfect. He pressed her back harder against the wall. All she had to do was wrap her legs around his waist. He’d never made love standing up, but he planned to now.

He could see the two of them in his mind.

He reached for her soft, perfect breasts and squeezed. They filled his hands as he rained kisses down her throat. He brushed his fingers over the pebbled nipples through her shirt. If his touch through clothes could cause such a reaction, what would his hot, wet mouth bring? He would find out in a few seconds. “Tell me again. Tell me you crave me. Invite me into your body,” he whispered between exploring kisses.

“Yes, I—”

He kissed, then ran his tongue over the spot on her throat where he’d bitten her, savoring the sweet taste of her he held in his memory.

She jumped and cried out and slid away from him in less than a heartbeat. Her huge, wild eyes were full of question as she stared at him and held her hand to her throat. Her loud panting breaths were the only sounds in the room for a moment.

“What the hell?”

He should have warned her. He should have been more tentative when laving that spot. He should have known it would be sensitive for some time. Lost in her mouth, in her taste, in her heat, he’d forgotten. He licked his tingling lips and tried not to stare at her swollen lips or her nipples.

“If you didn’t turn me, then what the hell
did
you do to me?”

Her breathy words, so like those spoken between kisses, were like peanut oil on the raging fire within him.

“I didn’t turn you. It takes more than my biting you. It takes a sharing of blood to start the process. It can be somewhat painful. You’d know. I only drank from you.”

As if that meant nothing.

Her damned confusion, her fear, and the evident loathing he’d heard in her earlier words ate at his core. He didn’t quite know how to ease her fears. Making slow, exploring love to her again not only felt right but also seemed to be the right solution. His tongue tingled with want, to again lick over the spot where he’d bit her as he slid two fingers into her tight pussy. He knew she’d come in an instant. His aching cock seemed to know it too. He had to shake his head to clear it before he could carry on the conversation.

“You
only
drank from me?”

“I had no choice.”

“That’s right, you said that before.”

“I had to take back the control Bart held over you.”

“You had a choice. You could have…”

A sudden burst of anger burned through him. Had she not noticed the imprint of his body in the bedroom wall? Did she think this whole episode had been easy on him? Did she think all he had to do was say,
Hey, Bart, leave her alone, you big bully
, and that would be the end of it? Milo did his best to keep his rage tucked away and out of his voice. It still managed to leak out and lace his words, though. “I could have what? Let you walk barefoot through the snow and go to him? Walk out of my life when it’s taken me two damned long years to have you in my arms? What? Tell me. Should I have let Bart have you? Have you forgotten what he planned to do to you, what you saw in your visions?”

She didn’t shrink under the harshness of his questions. “No. I haven’t forgotten that part, although I wish I could. I doubt I’ll ever forget it. You still had no right, though, to take from me. I could have slammed him like I did before.”

Milo’s laugh came out bitter. “You think so? Do you even remember walking out into the snowstorm? You weren’t trying to slam him then. Just me.”

She met his gaze.

He saw confusion in her eyes. “That’s right, that wasn’t part of any dream. He held you under so much control that you were halfway to the gate before I could get to you. You were barefoot and half-naked, and you didn’t feel the cold until I kissed you.”

She shook her head as if she didn’t believe his words. Then her expression changed. “James… I sent my energy at him, didn’t I?”

“He’s fine; you didn’t hurt him.”

She rubbed her forehead. Milo wondered if remembering was bringing on a headache. He should get her some aspirin.
Later.