Page 38 of Hot Vampire Next Door: Season Five

“Don’t leave her side,” he says.

“I won’t,” Cal promises.

“The Summer Queen will be coming for her.”

“Then I guess you should hurry up then.”

Bran grumbles as Cal turns away, carrying me off down a darkened path into the woods.

“I mean it, wolf,” Bran calls. “Don’t leave her side.”

The light from the pack house fades the further into the woods we go. Cal says nothing, but I can hear the steady drum of his heart through his shirt.

When the trees thin out to a clearing, I spot a little outbuilding shaped like a large barrel with a door and a long, rectangular window beside it.

Cal wrestles the door open, trying to keep me firmly in his grip, and when we walk inside, I catch the faint scent of cedar. The air is already warm.

“It’s a sauna,” he tells me and gingerly sets me on a bench along the far wall. “I started it up ahead of time with my phone so it’s already nice and toasty. I use it for contrast therapy. It helps me regulate my wolf’s aggression.”

The chattering in my teeth lessens. “What’s contrast therapy?”

“Hot and cold.” He pulls off my boots, then my socks. They’re stiff and ice flakes off the toes. “There’s a deep spring nearby. I go into the cold water, then come into the hot sauna. Some days I have to go back and forth for hours. It seems to be worse since…” He trails off, his gaze going distant.

“Worse since what?”

“Sam,” he says, almost a growl. “But that’s another conversation for another time. Let’s get as many layers off as you can. I’ll turn around.”

“I can’t feel my hands.”

With a grumble, he grabs the hem of my shirt and pulls it off slowly, then helps me wiggle out of my leggings leaving me in just my bra and panties. Within seconds, his back is to me and he’s handing off a clean, dry towel to wrap around my body.

“Thank you.” I tuck the thick cotton around my chest and then lay back on the bench, soaking in the heat.

The overwhelming rush of power dissipates taking the chill and the frost with it.

“That was bad,” I tell him. “I didn’t know…”

He drops onto the bench across from me, the steam of the sauna making him look more dream-like.

“You’ll get it figured out.”

I snort and close my eyes. “I’m not so sure. Every time I think I’m on a path to become more of who I’m supposed to be, something bad happens.”

“Well did you think it would be easy?”

I glance at him with heavy eyes. “I guess I did, yeah.”

“That was your first mistake.”

“You sound just like Bran.”

Cal laughs. “I’d ask you kindly to keep that to yourself.”

I lay my arm over my forehead feeling infinitely better now that the hot air of the sauna is driving out the cold.

“You two are more alike than you’d like to admit.”

“Probably true.”