Slaying Monsters for the Feeble - Annette Marie Page 0,38

channel, voices echoed beneath the ever-present noise.

Zylas scooted deeper into the pipe’s confines, pushing me ahead of him. Icy water washed over me, stealing the last of my body heat. I shivered violently as more sensation returned to my body.

With half his attention on the opening into the main channel, Zylas reached for his shoulder. His dexterous fingers snapped across the leather straps of his chest plate and they came apart. He shoved the armor off so it hung behind his left arm, then lifted the fabric underlayer over his head.

Beneath the numbing cold and fear, confusion buzzed through my head.

He unbuckled his armguard and set it just above the line of flowing water, then stripped the fabric from his arms.

“What …” I slurred in a whisper, “are … you …”

Turning to me, he grasped the bottom of my sweater and pulled it up.

I squeaked in disbelief, feebly twisting away. He dragged the soaked material over my head and tossed it aside. I forced my shaking arms up to cover my bra.

Zylas! I cried furiously in my head. Stop—

His hands closed around my waist. Vertigo swept over me as he pulled me up—and the next thing I knew, I was sprawled on top of him as he leaned back into the curved pipe, his knees bent and feet pressed against the opposite side.

He held me down, forcing our bodies together. My bare front pressed against his naked torso—and heat blazed from his skin into mine. Gasping, I instinctively pressed into his warmth. His hot arms banded across my icy back.

Holy crap, he was warm.

My chilled skin burned from his body heat. He was hotter than any human—or, at least, any human without a dangerous fever. I burrowed my frozen face into the side of his neck, only then realizing that my glasses were missing, lost in the turbulent water.

Somewhere outside our hiding spot, voices sounded louder than before.

“… smell blood …”

“… missing … do you see …”

“… who killed …”

“… keep searching!”

The words bounced off the walls, half lost in the water’s din. Vampires. More than one, and they were close. Would they find us hiding in this pipe? If they did, we had no escape. We were trapped.

Fear prickled over my skin and adrenaline sharpened my fuzzy brain. As my head cleared, my attention diverted from the voices to something far more immediate: Zylas’s warm hands running up and down my bare arms.

I was on top of Zylas.

No, not just on top. I was straddling him, my thighs pressed against his hips, my knees squeezing his sides. Our naked torsos were pressed tight together, skin against skin. My arms were tucked in close, hands gripping his bare shoulders as he rubbed more warmth into me.

With a mortified gasp, I shoved backward. Icy air hit my bare front, and as his gaze snapped from the pipe’s opening to me, I clamped my arms over my chest.

His mouth thinned in annoyance, then he grabbed my shoulders and pulled me back down.

“Zylas!” I hissed frantically, struggling to free myself. “Let me go!”

“You lost too much heat,” he growled. “Share mine, stubborn drādah.”

I gave one more desperate shove against his immovable arms, then slumped in defeat. The hottest blush in the history of blushes burned my cheeks as I rested my face against his shoulder.

Zylas stared at the pipe’s opening, his jaw tight—though whether with worry over the vampires’ proximity or annoyance with the stupid human, I didn’t know. As voices bounced through the cavernous channel, he tilted his head to catch the words with his sensitive hearing.

Something banged in the distance and Zylas gave the slightest start. I tensed in response, my blush reigniting and uncomfortable butterflies swirling through my gut. He stretched his neck, an ear tilted toward the sounds—and his hand slid up the length of my spine.

I shuddered from head to toe.

His eyes returned to me, fixing on my face. I peered up at him, frozen and unmoving, and he stared back, his expression a mystery in the near darkness.

Seizing my arms, he pushed me back against his thighs, his knees bent to keep his body—and mine—out of the water. As I blinked dumbly, he pulled his gear back into place and buckled the leather straps over his shoulder.

He found my shirt and wrung it out, then offered it to me. I snatched it from his hands, shook out the sleeves, and pulled it over my head. Gasping as the cold, damp fabric settled against my newly warmed skin,