First she’d thoughtSeverinwas a cold, arrogant, needle-wielding asshole who was probably going to throw her right back out into theDeadZoneas soon as he finished poking and prodding her.Thenhe’d cupped her cheek so gently and brushed the tears away with his thumb, his pale blue eyes soft behind the lenses of his glasses, and something inside her had just…melted.
Which was ridiculous because she didn’t even like him.
Or at least, she haddecidedshe didn’t like him.Decidedit firmly, in fact, right around the time he’d orderedRavikto strip her naked and then stared at her under those glaring overhead lights like she was some kind of weird science project.Butthen he’d looked at her like she was a person again—not a specimen or an off-worlder or a defective female who couldn’t lay eggs and certainly not a washed-up human woman whose hormones had gone haywire.
He’d seen her as a person with emotions who needed comfort…and somehow that was worse than when he was being a cold, calculating asshole.
Cassie knew what to do with coldness.Shehad plenty of experience with men who were selfish and dismissive and cruel in that smooth, casual way that made you feel like maybe you were the crazy one for objecting.Mitchellhad been like that andSskarthhad turned out to be like that too, though in a much scalier and more alien way.
Cassie knew how to armor herself against coldness…but gentleness was dangerous.
Gentleness snuck in under her armor and found all the bruised, lonely places she was trying so hard not to look at.Itmade her want to lean into theBloodKindred’stouch.Itmade her want to believe things she had no business believing—like maybe she wasn’t alone…maybe she wasn’t completely screwed…maybe she hadn’t just gone from one bad marriage to another and then straight into a zombie apocalypse where she was probably going to die or turn into a flesh-eating monster.
And then there wasRavik.Shecouldn’t forget about the bigBeastKindred, who seemed to be the polar opposite of his friend.
She could still feel his arms around her—huge and hard and impossibly strong.Couldstill feel the heat of his big body pressing against her naked skin… the rough black leather of his vest against her bare breasts…the steady furnace warmth of him surrounding her as though he could simply burn the cold away by holding her tightly enough.
It had been embarrassing when he hugged her—mortifying, actually.Shehad been naked as the day she was born and pressed up against a seven-foot-tallBeastKindredwho thought she was his mate and kept sniffing her like she was the best thing he’d ever smelled.
But it had also been…nice.
Cassie frowned as she opened another cupboard in the small but surprisingly well-equipped kitchen area and stared blindly at the contents inside.
Nice?Wasshe insane?HadtheHungerVirusalready gotten into her brain and started nibbling on the parts that controlled common sense?
Maybe.Becauseonly a crazy woman would admit—even to herself—that there had been something almost unbearably comforting about being held byRavik.Hewas so big…so warm…so solid and alive.Everythingabout him was hot breath and hard muscle and protective strength, which was such a sharp contrast toSskarththat thinking about it madeCassie’sthroat tighten unexpectedly.
Sskarth had always beencold.Coldhands.Coldscales.Coldmouth.
And don’t forget—cold heart, the evil bastard,she thought resentfully.
Sleeping beside him had been like curling up next to a decorative reptile statue someone had left in an air-conditioned room.Hisskin—or scales, rather—had never warmed under her touch.Hisarms had never felt like shelter.Evenwhen he had held her in the beginning, back when he’d still been fascinated by her pale, scaleless skin and the “silk” that grew from her head, his embrace had never felt soft or comforting.
Being with the lizard-man had felt like being examined…possessed.Andwhen his status-hungry friends came around—displayed like an expensive piece of art he’d bought to make others jealous.
And kissing him had been theworst.
Cassie made a face as she remembered, while she pulled a squat green canister from the cupboard, mostly because she needed something to do with her hands.
TheVisskousdidn’t really kiss—not the way humans did.Sskarthhad no lips to speak of—just a narrow, lipless mouth and that forked tongue that was always flickering out to taste the air.
At first, she’d thought it was exotic—sensual, even.Hehad told her he was tasting her scent because she was so desirable and unusual to him, and lonely, stupidCassiehad believed it was romantic.
Now she knew better.
Now she knew it was just another way of assessing her.Samplingher.Decidingwhether she was pleasing or inconvenient or too hot or too hormonally unstable or not useful enough to keep.
She wondered how long it had been since a warm-blooded man had really held her likeRavikhad.Itmust have been years—not since before her marriage withMitchfell apart.
The thought sat in the middle of her chest like a stone and she felt her eyes stinging again.
“Stop it,” she muttered to herself, putting the green canister on the counter with more force than necessary.“Youarenotgoing to stand here mooning over two alien warriors while you’re infected with zombie cooties and trapped in an underground bunker.Geta grip,Cassie.”
Still, she couldn’t help glancing toward the doorway of the kitchen area as thoughRavikmight suddenly appear there, filling the entire frame with his broad shoulders and wild golden eyes.Becauseapparently the huge, half-infectedBeastKindredhad decided she was his mate.
That was another thought she didn’t have time to deal with right now.Itwas hovering somewhere in the back of her mind, though, right beside the knowledge that she might have to sleep inRavik’sarms tonight.
Cassie was not thinking about that right now.Nope—not at all.
