Jade
He had claimed the single cot, leaving her with nothing but the hard, damp stone floor. It didn’t matter. Sleep was a luxury she couldn't afford.
She sat with her back against the wall, listening to the slow, steady rhythm of his breathing. He slept like the animal he was, with a stillness that was unnerving. For hours, she sat there, replaying the day’s events, the terror, the humiliation, the strange, cold bargain she had made.
Then the cold began to creep in.
It started in her fingers and toes, a deep, biting chill that leached the warmth from her body. Vampires were not like the warm blooded wolves. We were creatures of the night, yes, but we needed warmth to sustain us. Without it, our bodies would simply… stop.
A shiver racked her body, a violent, uncontrollable tremor.
“Stop that,” Issac’s voice came out of the darkness, a low growl.
“I cannot,” she replied through chattering teeth.
“Then be quiet about it.”
She wrapped her arms around herself, trying to conserve what little warmth she had left. But the stone floor was a leech, pulling the heat from her, replacing it with a deathly cold.
Another shiver, more intense this time, rattled her bones. The sound of her teeth clicking together was loud in the small cell.
He shifted on the cot, the straw mattress rustling. “What is wrong with you?”
“I am cold,” she said, her voice small. She hated the weakness in it.
“So? It’s a prison, not a palace. You’ll get used to it.”
“My kind does not ‘get used to it’. The cold… it is poison to us.”
He was silent for a moment. She could feel his stare on her, even in the pitch black.
“That sounds like your problem,” he finally said, and rolled over, turning his back to her.
The cold deepened. It was a living thing now, sinking its claws into her muscles, her organs. Her thoughts grew sluggish. The shivers became weaker, replaced by a profound numbness.
This is how it ends, she thought, not with a fight, but with a silent, frozen whimper.
Her teeth kept chattering, an automatic, relentless rhythm. Click. Click. Click. A death rattle.
“By the gods,” Issac snarled, sitting up. “Are you doing that on purpose?”
“No,” she managed to say, the word barely a puff of air.
“It’s driving me insane.”
“My apologies for the inconvenience of my impending death,” she whispered, a faint spark of her old sarcasm returning.
“Don’t be dramatic.”
“I am not. My body is… shutting down.”
He let out a long, frustrated sigh. A heavy sound that filled the cell. “You are the most irritating creature I have ever met.”
“The feeling is mutual, dog.”
Silence stretched again. The only sound was the clicking of her teeth.
Then, the scrape of his boots on the floor. His heat was suddenly beside her, a furnace in the icy air. She flinched as his hand clamped down on her shoulder.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her voice trembling.
“Solving a noise complaint,” he growled.
He hauled her to her feet. She was too weak to resist. Her legs felt like they were made of glass. He practically dragged her the few steps to the cot.
“Get in,” he commanded.
She stared at the thin mattress. At him. “What?”
“You heard me. Your teeth are going to chip if you keep that up, and the sound is making my wolf want to rip your jaw off.”
“I will not share a bed with you.”
“It’s a cot. And it wasn’t a request.” He pushed her. She fell onto the mattress, the rough straw scratching her cheek.
Before she could react, he was lying down behind her, his huge body taking up all the remaining space. He pulled the thin, threadbare blanket over both of them.
“Don’t move,” he ordered, his voice a low vibration right behind her ear.
She lay ramrod straight, every muscle in her body screaming. The proximity was suffocating. He smelled of pine and damp earth and something else, something uniquely his. Something wild.
But the heat. Gods, the heat.
It was like stepping into the sun after a century in a crypt. His body was a raging inferno. The warmth radiated from him, soaking into her back, seeping through her clothes, chasing the deadly chill from her bones.
She instinctively wanted to press closer, to absorb every last degree of his warmth. She wanted to burrow into it like a dying animal seeking shelter.
She resisted. She lay perfectly still, her back just inches from his chest.
“Is the noise going to stop now?” he asked, his voice rough.
Her shivering was already subsiding. Her teeth had stopped their frantic clicking.
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Good.”
He didn't move either. He was as rigid as she was. She could feel the tension in him, the tightly controlled power. He was a coiled spring, a caged animal forced to share its den with its natural enemy.
She hated him. He was a monster, a savage. A filthy dog who now called her his property. She should be repulsed by his touch, by his scent.
And she was. But under the disgust, a traitorous part of her reveled in the life saving heat. Her body, independent of her will, was slowly, gratefully thawing.
She could feel the steady, powerful beat of his heart against her back. It was a slow, heavy rhythm. Thump. Thump. Thump.
The heart of a killer. The heart of her protector. The heart of the man whose body was pressed against hers.
She thought she heard him inhale deeply, his nose near her hair.
“You smell… strange,” he murmured, his voice thick with sleep, or something else.
“And you smell like a wet dog that rolled in dirt.”
A low growl rumbled in his chest, so close she felt it vibrate through her entire body. For a moment, she thought she had pushed him too far.
“Go to sleep, vampire,” he commanded, his voice tight. “Before I change my mind and let you freeze.”
She said nothing more. She closed her eyes, acutely aware of the werewolf breathing against her neck. She was disgusted. She was terrified. She was… warm.
And for the first time since she’d been thrown into this hell, the cold could not touch her.
