No.That’s worse. She’d use it against me, use it to manipulate her way free. And then my father would kill us both.
This is the only way. Marriage, possession, claiming her as mine, it’s the only way to keep her alive. Even if she hates me for it. Even if she’d rather die than accept it.
Too fucking bad. She doesn’t get to die. Not while I’m still breathing.
Minutes pass. Could be five, could be twenty. Time loses meaning when you’re holding someone on the edge of death, willing them to come back. The fire crackles beside us, heat radiating across my back. I keep Saint pressed tight against my chest, my body a furnace surrounding her.
Every shift of her body against mine is torture. Sweet, agonizing torture. Her skin is warming now, no longer the shock of cold but the slow return of blood flow, of life. And with the warmth comes sensation, not just for her, but for me. The soft give of her flesh under my hands. The way she fits against me like she was made for this, despite the circumstances. The little sounds she makes as her body fights hypothermia.
I’m hard. Fully, achingly hard. There’s no hiding it, no adjusting away from it. My cock presses against her hip, and there’s not a damn thing I can do about it except hate myself for it.
She’s dying, and I’m turned on. She’s hypothermic, and my body wants to claim her. She ran into a blizzard to escape me, and all I can think about is how right she feels in my arms.
I’m fucked up. Completely fucked up.
Slowly, so slowly, her skin starts to warm. Soon enough, the deadly blue tinge fades from her lips and color creeps back into her cheeks.
She starts to shake.
Violent, full-body tremors rack her entire frame. I hold her through it, relief flooding me even as the movement presses her against my erection. Her breasts slide against my chest with each shudder. Her thighs clench and unclench against me. It’s innocence and sin all tangled together, and I’m drowning in it.
“That’s it,” I murmur, my voice rougher than I intend. “Come back to me, sweet girl.”
Focus on her face. On her breathing. On anything except the fact that this is the most intimacy I’ve had with her, and she’s not even conscious enough to know it’s happening.
Her eyes flutter open, unfocused at first and glittering with confusion. Then awareness returns, and with it, her memory. She stiffens in my arms, and that sudden tension presses her even more firmly against me.
She has to feel it now. Has to feel exactly what holding her like this is doing to me.
“Wh-where—” Her voice is hoarse, barely there.
“The cabin. You’re safe.”
“Not s-safe.” She tries to pull away, but her body won’t cooperate. The shivering is too violent, her strength completely sapped. Then she goes very still, and I know the exact moment she realizes our situation. Nearly naked. Pressed together. My obvious arousal digging into her hip.
Her eyes widen. “You’re?—”
“I know.” I don’t apologize. Can’t lie about it. “My body’s responding. I can’t exactly control it.”
Color floods her cheeks, not from cold this time, but from embarrassment. Or maybe anger. Hard to tell with Saint. “Let m-me go.”
“Can’t do that.” I adjust my hold, trying to ease some of the pressure but only managing to slide her body against mine in ways that make my breath catch. “You’re hypothermic. You need body heat, or you could die. So stop fighting and let me warm you up.”
“D-don’t want—” She shivers again, violently and full-bodied, which presses her breasts harder into my chest. Her nipples, tight from the cold, drag across my skin, and I have to bite back a groan.
“I don’t care what you want right now. Right now, I’m keeping you alive whether you like it or not.” My voice comes out strained from the effort to maintain control.
She makes a sound that’s half sob, half laugh. “M-monster.”
“Yeah.” I tuck her head under my chin, one hand splayed across her back, trying to focus on what’s medically necessary rather than the feel of her soft skin under my palm. “The monster that saved your life.Again.”
We stay like that as her shivering gradually subsides. Minutes stretch into an hour, maybe more. The storm howls outside, but inside, there’s just the crackle of fire, our breathing, and the slow return of warmth. Underneath it all is the tension—sexual, undeniable, and wrong as hell, given the circumstances, but it’s there, nonetheless.
I can feel every breath she takes. Every subtle shift of her body. The way her skin goes from cold to cool to warm under my hands. The softness of her pressed against the hardness of me. It’s agony. Beautiful, terrible agony.
My cock hasn’t softened. If anything, as she warms up, as her body returns to life, the ache grows worse. I don’t move. Don’t act on it. Just hold her, torturing myself with the promise of what could be mine if circumstances were different. If she wanted this. If I hadn’t destroyed any chance of her coming to me willingly.
Eventually, she stops shaking, and her breathing evens out. She’s still weak, still exhausted, but no longer in immediate danger.
