Winter's Kiss (4 page)

into it. It looked as though someone had sliced through his mouth to his ear.

She looked away from it, disturbed by the sight, and found her gaze meeting his. Hard, penetrating amber irises held hers. Their dark wide pupils made her tremble with the promises of violence and pain that they held.

Nika knew those eyes.

The wind blew, sweeping her hair from her face and making the plush grey fur collar of his coat dance. He smiled at her, revealing sharp teeth that made her gasp in recognition.

Before she could even think it, he twisted and growled, fur chasing over his skin as it stretched to fit new bones. She wanted to look away but found that she couldn’t. She could only stare in horror and sick fascination as he transformed into a wolf before her eyes.

Suddenly, six wolves were with him and she was in the forest. Nika turned in a heartbeat, running away from them before they could reach her again. Again? She hazily remembered that she had done this before. She had already run away from these wolves. In the distance, the shack appeared. She had run there. The guard had saved her. Her leg had been broken.

It exploded in
pain
as she remembered and a red haze covered the world. It quickly faded to black. Unable to run any longer, she started to fall.

Nika’s eyes snapped open and she stared at the sloped wooden ceiling. Her heart hammered against her chest, her breathing fast and panicked. She slowed it down, drawing careful even breaths. It was hard to figure out what was real and what had been just a dream. Her leg ached. The wolves had been real. Her head rolled to one side and she
stared at the man sleeping in the corner of the shack. So was the guard.

Who was the other man?

She rubbed her face and sat up, grimacing when her whole body protested. A thick black blanket covered her. No, not a blanket. The man’s cloak. She moved it aside and saw her own coat beneath it. He had covered her to keep her warm. She glanced at him again. The air in the room was icy at best. He would be freezing.

A frown married her fair eyebrows when she saw her left leg. He had bound it with what looked like part of her dress, some wood and some leather straps. It hurt, a dull throbbing pain, but nowhere near as badly as it had done last night. She looked at the windows. She couldn’t tell what time of day it was now. The light was golden, that of either morning or evening. What had happened to the night?

Panic lanced through her.

Her father.

He would be worried sick by now. She should have returned to the village hours ago. What if he came out looking for her and the wolves attacked him too? She tried to move and a wave of nausea crashed over her, sending her mind spinning and her skin burning. She pressed her hand to her head, feeling the heat of it and the damp layer of sweat. Was she infected? When she had been a child, the wolves had attacked the village and many had fallen sick from their wounds. The doctors had said it was blood poisoning and had sent the people away. She held herself, wrapping her arms across her chest. Did she have blood poisoning?

Nika jumped when the man in the corner stirred. Winter. She vaguely remembered him saying that was his name.
Winter looked at her with dark eyes that she couldn’t read. There was no emotion in them. In all the times that she had seen him and looked into them, they had always been unreadable, but she knew there were feelings inside him. She could feel them.

He stood, crossed the small room to her, and inspected her leg and her cuts. His eyes grew darker. He frowned.

“I feared it would be this way,” he said in a heavy voice laden with the emotions finally surfacing in his eyes— anguish and despair. She wished those hadn’t been the first feelings that he had shown her.

“What way?” The sudden appearance of his feelings made her panic. Blood poisoning. It had to be.

He moved towards her, his face expressionless even when his eyes shone with what looked like fear.

She closed her eyes when his palm pressed against her forehead, cool and refreshing. His touch sent waves of relaxing calm through her and she leaned back against the headboard of the bed, her whole body humming softly.

“Did any of the wolves bite you?”

Those words chased away the calm and brought fear crashing back. Her eyes shot wide and she stared at the opposite wall, her thoughts running a million miles an hour through what had happened last night.

“The big one, with the black fur and grey mane,” she said and looked up at Winter. “I remember it from when

I was small. The wolves came to the village one harsh winter. My father protected me.”

Winter was silent. His expression turned grim, sending fear into her heart.

“If it bit me, am I sickening—will I die? I’ve seen others die from a fever like this.” Her eyes searched his, heart holding onto the hope that he would tell her she would be fine. If he told her, she would believe him. He had said she wouldn’t die last night and she hadn’t. Perhaps if he told her that she would get better, she would.

He shook his head.

“No…” He sat beside her on the bed and removed his hand from her forehead. He placed his other one against her cheek. It was so cold that her eyes slipped half-shut again as she savoured the cooling effect that it had on her body. “You will not die. You will heal and you will grow stronger than you have ever been.”

Her eyes opened again.

“How?” She looked at her leg and concentrated. “I’m healing. I can feel it. The pain is almost gone, but the fever… what’s happening to me?”

A look that spoke of discomfort crossed his face and he stood, walking to the end of the bed and then turning to face her, as though he needed the distance. She willed him back to her. Whenever he was close, she felt safe and as though nothing could hurt her.

“You are becoming like them,” he said in a near whisper. He had to be joking. People didn’t become wolves. His gaze met hers. His eyes held nothing but honesty. Waves of panic rocked her, one after the other, each

stronger than the last. They tightened her chest until it became hard to breathe. “Within the next few days, your transformation will be complete.”

“I’m becoming a wolf?” Her voice was a high squeak of hysteria. “What crazy idea is that? You can’t become a wolf from being bitten by one!”

“They are not wolves,” he said, emotionless.

“They’re not?” She laughed but stopped when his face remained serious and it became even more difficult to breathe. She had to do something to dispel this growing fear inside her. He couldn’t be telling her the truth. “Next you’ll be telling me that you’re not human and we’re not in a shack in the woods.”

He took a step towards her, hesitated, and then curled his hands into fists. When he spoke, his voice was one of pain and anger.

“I am not human, Nika, and neither are you… not anymore. Rest. You will be weak until you are healed.”

She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Was she still dreaming? Was she delirious?

“Rest? You tell me that I’m not human and neither are you, and then you tell me to rest?”

He just stared at her.

“There is nothing we can do. You cannot move until your leg is healed and even then it is dangerous to move you before your transformation is complete.”

That word made her sick. Transformation. He kept saying it as though it was really happening. She was becoming a wolf. How was that possible? People really

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didn’t turn into wolves when one bit them. She frowned at her leg. Winter had said that the wolves hadn’t really been wolves. Had the man in her dream become the wolf?

This was insane. She had to get out of here and away from this craziness. If she did, then maybe she would be fine.

“I can’t stay here. My father will be worried and the wolves might return. This shack won’t hold… and you’re clearly as demented as the man in the mansion you protect!”

He said nothing. He stood still a moment and then walked to the window and stared out of it. The broken glass let the frigid air in. How could he stand the cold? Her gaze fell to his armour. The back of it was as detailed as the front, shaped like black muscles and intricately decorated with silver lines. His thick black shirt and that armour couldn’t be keeping him warm. His hands had been freezing.

“What kind of lunatic do you protect that demands you wear such an outfit? It’s the twenty-first century and you’re wearing armour.”

He whirled to face her, expression dark and deadly, eyes black as midnight. “My lord is none of your business. You would do well to keep your questions away from him.”

Nika leaned back into the bed in an attempt to avoid the cutting edge of his tone and the violent darkness in his eyes. She hadn’t meant to provoke him, or perhaps she had. Her father would be worried about her and everything that Winter said seemed impossible.

When she opened her mouth to speak, his eyes narrowed, silencing her.

“You must stay here,” he said, his tone still rough. He looked at the window again and then back at her. This time when he spoke, his voice was softer and full of feeling. “If the wolves return, which is likely since their leader will now
see you as his, then I will protect you. He is no match for me, but with the others, I will be at a disadvantage. I am not demented, and I was not lying to you when I said that I am not human, and neither are you. I see no point in this conversation. You cannot change what happened… “

Nika winced when her leg hurt and curled up, drawing her one good leg to her chest and holding it. His words had started out so nice, but the cruel brutal edge they had gained made her heart ache. For a moment, she had thought that he
was kind
to
want
to protect her. Why had he spoiled it by reminding her about the wolf bite and her supposed new inhuman status?

Surprise
claimed her when Winter sat beside her on the bed. He sighed. Was he upset about something other than what she had said about his master and her insistence about going home? She sighed along with him, wishing she understood what was happening. He stared down at his lap. He really was handsome, and very pale. Perhaps his position kept him away from the sunlight, or maybe the black clothing and his dark hair was the reason his skin appeared milky.

It suddenly sunk in.

It was an utterly ridiculous thought that made an impossible amount of sense.

“I’m a werewolf, aren’t I?” she said, still looking at him, studying his face for a reaction to her words.

He nodded. Not a flicker of feeling crossed his face. Anyone else would have laughed at her suggestion. Then again, anyone else would have insisted that she was human and just had a case of blood poisoning, not that she was turning into something else.

“Are you one too?”

A shake of his head this time.

“Something else?” she said, wondering what he could be.

He nodded again.

“What?” Nika had to ask. Winter had said that he wasn’t human. If he proved that, perhaps she would be able to
start
believing that she was becoming a werewolf.

His gaze slid across to meet hers. Her eyes widened when the colour of his irises gradually changed from deep blue to a rich purple. He straightened, turned his head to face her, and slowly smiled. His lips parted to reveal sharp pointed teeth. When he grinned fully, she realised that they were his canines. Fangs.

Her heart thumped erratically against her chest. Fear pounded down on her. Her instincts told her to run but she kept still instead, standing her ground in the only way she could. This man had saved her. He had offered to protect her when the wolves returned, regardless of how outnumbered he would be. He wasn’t going to harm her.

She swallowed when his gaze raked over her, slow and assessing, somewhere between an animal eyeing its prey and an amorous man eyeing a potential bedmate.

His eyelids dropped, hiding his stunning purple irises, and he inhaled, slow and deep, as though savouring the smell of something.

“You still smell of blood… the temptation…”

Her, apparently. He liked the smell of her blood. Blood, fangs, pale skin, never aging. She should have spotted it before. A vampire. That meant that she was definitely becoming a werewolf. Or was she still trapped in that dream?

His eyes opened and he stared straight into hers. His gaze
slid down to her neck
and
then moved across, narrowing with contempt. Was it her gold cross that made him look that way? In the movies, vampires hated crosses. Perhaps it was true.

She removed her hand from her arm and looked down at her palm. Crimson stained it. She held her hand out for him to see and trembled when he took hold of it, his skin cool against hers and his touch gentle. With wide eyes, she watched him, unable to move as he leaned towards her. He closed his eyes, dipped his head, and licked the blood from her palm.

Her heart rocketed when he drew her hand closer to him, forcing her to lean forwards, and then opened the slit in the arm of her dress with his other hand. His tongue swept across the cut and then his mouth closed around it. He gave a shallow suck, as though removing poison from a snakebite, but she didn’t feel the sting of the wound as it reopened. The pleasure from such a sensual caress drove it to the back of her mind along with the dull ache in her leg. He licked the wound again, sending desire spiralling through her.