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“Aside from accidentally killing people? None. Perhaps I should learn to knit.”

“You’re a gloomy drunk, you know that?”

“It was your turn anyway. Is it too late to change my mind about a cat?”

“Ah, so you accept my theory?”

“That I’m so pathetically lonely I pull the life out of my partners? Sure, let’s go with that one.” Her breath came faster. “I might need more than one cat.”

He put his glass down and stood. “I have an idea.”

Alessa backed away. “What are you doing?”

“I’m giving you a hug so you can save the world.”

She knocked a chair over in her haste to escape. “No. Bad idea.”

“You’re covered from toe to chin, and I’m a full head taller than you. You’d have to leap into the air and smash your face against mine to hurt me.”

Putting the couch between them, she mustered her most stern glare. “It’s too dangerous.”

“Do you want a damn hug or not?”

Desperately.

She swallowed. “Gloves.”

He yanked them from his back pocket, shaking his head with amused exasperation.

At his first step, she skittered backward. “Your face.”

Dante rolled his eyes but glanced around the room until he found a display of colorful scarves hanging from pegs by the door. Snatching a bright purple scarf, he tucked one end into the top of his shirt and wound it around his head. His gloved fingers plucked at the folds, trying to pick them apart so he could see. “Dammit, where’d you go?”

Alessa pinched her tongue between her teeth.

One dark eye became visible, and he opened his arms and waited.

Courage, desperation, or pure drunken stupidity drove her into his embrace.

The moment they touched, every muscle in her body pulled so tight she couldn’t have moved if she wanted to.

He was warm.

It was all she could think. She’d forgotten that people felt warm.

She tried to rest her hands on his back, but jerked away reflexively. His arms came around her, strong and unafraid, so she tried again, placing her palms on the flat planes of his back.

Bit by bit, muscle by muscle, she eased into him until her cheek rested against his chest.

The steady beat of his heart accelerated.

She tried to find the strength to move—she didn’t want him to fear for his safety—but he didn’t pull away, andnothinghad ever felt so good. Nothing. This hug was officially the best thing that had ever happened to her.

Pathetic.

She didn’t care. It felt like breathing after being underwater for years. Lulled by warmth and comfort, she let the world fall away, every sense soothed by the strong arms holding her up, the firm heat beneath her cheek—

She jerked her head up.