Page 29 of Kept in the Dark (Hitmen of Ulysses #2)

Nicole

Truce.

When he lays a hand on my shoulder, I hiss and drop away from it.

Not just because I’m so cold that his regular body temperature feels like it scalded me, but also because it’s his hand.

I refuse to look at his face as he ushers me towards the building on the opposite side of the slate patio that must be a pool house.

“Nicole, I just told you. You are safe . I will not hurt you—”

I shake my head, keeping it tilted down, trying to focus on each step so I don’t accidentally step through another portal to icy hell. Why was the pool cover the exact fucking same shade as the stone? Who the fuck designed that?

“You threw me into the trunk of a car, Dimitri. The trunk of a car ! You kidnapped me!”

“I did not kidnap you—”

“So, I can go?” I ask, voice dripping with more sarcasm than my body and clothes drip with frigid water.

He doesn’t miss a beat. “Of course not.”

“Then this is a kidnapping!”

“You are in danger!”

“From who, you?” I hiss, a deep shiver slicing through the accusation. “What are you going to do to the only witness who knows you killed Kyle?”

“Fuck,” he whispers, scratching at his scalp.

“Yeah. Fuck. Are you going t-to gaslight me now? Tell me I didn’t hear w-what I know I heard?” I demand, my harsh tone undercut by how hard my teeth are chattering.

“And what is it you know you heard?” he retorts, stopping us and spinning me to face him. With a hand around each upper arm that sears my freezing flesh, he shakes me a little. “Tell me.”

I’m not so nearsighted that I can’t see the pain on his face.

The lines around his eyes and brows are deeply carved with worry and anguish.

And it’s not from that wound I know I accidentally clipped with my elbow or his obviously broken nose.

His frown is deeper than anger or confusion. He looks… betrayed.

That must be why I open my stupid mouth and say, “That you don’t leave witnesses and you’d t-take care of me.”

His eyes flick back and forth between mine for a second, then he spears me with one of those extra-intense looks meant to intimidate me. I’m not even sure he realizes when he’s doing it.

“I did not mean… fuck!”

He releases me, spins away, and walks a few steps. When he turns back around, I’m wracked with a shiver so hard I bite down on my already damaged tongue and whimper.

Seeing that snaps him out of whatever blind rage he seems to be in. “Come inside, Nicole. You are frozen. I will explain to you what I would have told you in the car if you had not called the police and fought me so hard.”

Do I dare? The last time I trusted him because I felt like I had no other options, I ended up on a boat with no escape, then shoved into the trunk of a car.

But I’m shivering so hard I might chip a tooth, and I’ve gone numb to the sensation of cold.

It’s never a good thing when you’re numb to the cold—hypothermia is no joke.

If my core temperature drops too low, I’ll stop shivering and lose consciousness.

I definitely won’t be able to escape if I’m unconscious.

“F-fine,” I relent.

He pushes open the door to the building and gestures for me to enter first. I do, looking up as he flicks on the lights, and am startled by what I see.

Well, the blurry, out-of-focus, vague impressions of what I see, anyway.

I may not be able to get most of the finer details, but I know they are fine.

This isn’t a pool house—it’s a whole-ass apartment.

Everything has the sleek, clean lines of expensive shit.

It even smells expensive—like a room freshener named after ridiculous things that don’t even have a smell, like “cashmere and a soft breeze.” There’s a king-sized bed with crisp white sheets dominating the entire right side of the room, a sitting area with big brown blobs that I assume are a plush, overstuffed leather couch and chair, and the shape of the stuff in the area towards the back makes me think it’s a kitchenette.

Two doors along the back wall are open, one leading into what’s obviously a luxurious bathroom, full of marble tile and a glass-paned walk-in shower, and the other leading to a separate room that seems big enough that it could be an office or a guest room.

A pool house with a guest room? Where the hell am I?

He steers us towards the bed. “Take off your wet clothes and get in,” he instructs .

“Get-t out,” I counter. If he thinks he gets to sit in here while I get naked and get into his bed, he’s crazy.

His arm snakes around my waist. I stiffen in his grip, wanting to pull away but too numb to trust my own body.

The places where he’s touching me sting like open wounds—the heat of his body turning into pain on mine.

“I will get in with you,” he says, and I’m not quite sure if it’s a promise or a warning. “It will warm you faster.”

“N-no! Go aw-way.”

He tightens his arm around my waist and lowers his face close to mine to growl, “If you think I am letting you out of my sight after you broke my nose, then you are more foolish than I thought. Get. In.”

I’m so sick of being fucking growled at. I don’t even care anymore.

“At l-least turn around!”

I wiggle to put enough distance between us, and it’s all the tie in my pants can take.

It snaps, and the heavy sweatpants hit the tile with a fleshy, wet plop, splashing my legs.

Since there’s no point in trying to salvage my dignity, I step out of both his pants and over-large socks, pushing against his chest for enough distance to manage the movement.

As he turns to give me a modicum of privacy, I discard his shirt with fingers that shake from more than just the cold.

Suddenly, all my justified outrage from a second ago evaporates, and I’m just a nearly naked woman next to a man she’s stupidly attracted to.

I’m exposed—on display—covered only by nude Spanx.

And I know he’s going to look. My arms move to cover my breasts, but I’m so frozen that I can barely even feel my own skin.

When he hears the shirt hit the floor, he glances over his shoulder.

I fucking knew he was going to look. Asshole!

I curl inwards, falling onto my ass on a plush, bouncy mattress as his eyes forge a path down my exposed chest and stomach and legs. “Stop looking,” I hiss.

No way am I letting go of my chest to pull back the covers .

My whole body contracts in one giant shake of a shiver. His face tenses, and he strides across the room.

“Get in the bed,” he repeats, opening a closet and grabbing a bundle of something. “We need to get you warm.”

Free of the paralyzing effect of his stare, I scramble under the covers, pulling the sheet and blanket up to my chin. It’s woefully thin, and I nearly say something, but then I see the bundle tucked in his arms. Bigger blankets.

It crosses my mind that I’m covered in disgusting pool water and grime from God knows what. I’d never get into my own bed like this, but I’m too cold and furious to care. Serves him right. A little laundry is the least he can do.

He lays the blankets over me, and I wince a little under their weight. I’m not any warmer yet, but it’s best to do this slowly so I don’t go into cardiac arrest. The relief will come soon.

When he drops his pants, I get a blurry flash of white ass that embarrasses me enough to make me close my eyes.

The bed dips under his weight as he climbs in next to me.

I shift away, keeping my arm firmly around my chest, but he drags me towards him.

The sheet bunches up between us as he presses the entire length of his body to mine.

He’s hard everywhere, his body a wall of smooth skin and muscle with the consistency of a rock.

I’m basically naked. In a bed. With Dimitri. And he’s totally naked.

This isn’t quite how I pictured this happening.

All the fight goes out of me when the heat of his skin hits mine. Hours of uncertainty, terror, rage, frustration, and physical exertion have taken their toll, and I’ve got a headache from eyestrain. I’m dizzy now and grateful for being horizontal.

My breath cracks and breaks in a shaky in-and-out, and I squeeze my eyes shut as hard as I can. There’s a faint whistling wheeze at the apex of each breath from my asthma that feels cartoonish and out of place .

His body heat stings and burns, making me whimper. This is more than an icy, unexpected dip; it’s an icy dip after hours in a metal box with no wind insulation.

He tucks me against his chest and lays a soft, soothing hand on the back of my head.

“Shh, I know. It hurts. You will warm soon, and it will not hurt. Put your fingers here, under my arm.” He flares his top elbow out so I can tuck my icy fingers in between that hard, hot rock wall of his arm and torso.

I don’t know how long it takes, but eventually the heat of him bleeds into me. It slowly chases the feeling back into my rigid muscles and frozen nerves. I clutch harder at his body heat as the cold leeches out of my extremities, replaced by pins and needles under every inch of my skin.

I wince. That’ll be my nerves waking back up.

This sucks.

“Truce, my med?”

“You want a truce,” I repeat flatly. It’s muffled by his chest, but I can’t seem to move my cheek from the relief this skin-on-skin contact is providing.

“Yes, I want a truce.”

I shake my head slightly. “You threatened me.”

“You broke my nose.”

“You chased me into a frozen pool.”

“You ripped open my wound.”

I rear back, just so he can see me scowl at him. How dare he have equal and opposite things to be upset about?! “You shoved me into the trunk of a car!”

“You kicked me in the face.”

“Trunk of a car,” I repeat. “For hours . It was freezing in there, and I was panicking, not knowing what was happening or where we were going. I thought you wanted to… I thought you were going to kill me, Dimitri. ”

He winces. “I acted rashly. You called the police, and I did not have time to explain everything to you. If the police had come…” he trails off.