Another step closer. “Terrifying?”
Something melts inside me, a calm breaking through the dark storm of my emotions. “Fluffy.”
He halts. “What?”
I take a step closer, ignoring the pools of blood all around us. “Can I please touch your fur?” Even as the words leave my mouth, I know they’re ridiculous. But my mind isn’t in the best state. I’m teetering on the edge of hysteria, balanced between safety and the dangerous chasm of grief that lies gaping beneath me. I need comfort right now. Either that or my tincture.
He pads a few more steps closer, his tone taking on a tenuous quality. “I suppose.”
That’s all the permission I need before I reach out and bury my hands in his soft hide. A hum of bliss rolls through me as I stroke my hands over his silky fur. My rational mind tries to remind me that he’s likely coated in blood, but all I care about now is soothing my emotions, numbing my panic, my sorrow, my agony. “You are so soft,” I say, only half aware that I’m speaking. “It’s taking all my restraint not to squeeze you hard and bury my face in your neck right now.”
His thick, warm hide ripples beneath my hands. Then the bear is gone.
I blink at my hands, finding them no longer buried in brown fur but…pressed against the Huntsman’s chest. “What is wrong with you?” he asks.
I frown up at him, finding narrowed eyes beneath a quirked brow looking back at me.
It cuts through my momentary haze of comfort and reminds me where I am. What just happened. Whose chest I’m touching.
My cheeks turn warm. “I like the feeling of fur, all right?” I take a step back and snatch my hand away. Just then, I hear a click.
The Huntsman’s lips twist into a sideways grin. He lifts his hand to show that he’s locked himself back in the cuff—the cuff that had still been dangling open from my wrist.
My eyes go wide. “Why would you do that?”
“It’s a convenient solution to prevent your escape.”
I try to cross my arms, but it’s no use with our cuffs connecting us yet again. “I liked you better as a bear.”
“And I don’t like you much at all. Give me the key.”
I curl my fingers into fists, but that brings a startling realization.
I’m no longer holding the key. I shrink down as I say, “I don’t have it.”
“What?”
“Did you expect me to keep hold of it while I was being attacked by an ogre?”
His expression softens before he brings his hand to his face and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Where do you think you lost it?”
I’m about to say it could be anywhere, but my gaze lands on the ground near the waste bins where the ogre first tossed me. The Huntsman follows my line of sight. Before I can say a word, he drags me there. It takes all my willpower not to glance at the hulking dead body as we skirt around it.
“Look for the key,” he demands.
I obey, for finding the key serves me just as much as him. And if I can get to it first…
Moonlight glints off something peeking out from the nearest waste bin. I bend down, wincing at the pain that surges through my hip. Elation floods me as I snatch up the key.
The Huntsman pulls me to my feet before I get the chance to pocket it. He holds out a hand. “Give it to me,” he says through clenched teeth.
I stare back at him with defiance. Remembering how he’d hid the key in the absolute last place he thought I’d try to retrieve it, an idea sparks in my mind.
His tone darkens with warning. “Give it to me or I’ll take it through force.”
My hand slowly moves toward my chest…
“Don’t you dare,” he hisses.
