Free Deep Kiss of Winter by Kresley Cole

about her. If anyone found out she’d been cast away by a Forbearer, she would never live it down. Her only hope was that no one ever discovered her disgraceful morning.
    To add insult to injury, she’d also remembered him interrogating her. While she’d been filled with poison, he’d been filled with questions.
    Her supposed white knight had taken advantage of her, and she couldn ’t recall how much she’d told him. Surely she hadn’t revealed any critical secrets or weaknesses. . . .
    Stop thinking about him. You have things to do. Like fleeing the city.
    Since none of the assassins from last night would be reporting back, King Sigmund would soon send another Icere contingent.
    He wouldn’t stop until he’d killed her.
    Just as he’d murdered the true queen of the Iceren, Svana the Great, Danii’s mother.
    Danii had to get home and pack, but she grew weary merely thinking about returning to Val Hall, weak and shamed, a vampire informer. Via Farmer Ted. How could she face her sisters now?
    Myst was still getting razzed for hooking up with Nikolai five years ago, even by other Lore factions. Having the aggressively omnisexual nymphs ridicule one’s choice of lover was about as low as one could get. Mysty the Vampire Layer was the butt of many a joke.
    Who was worse? Myst, who’d dabbled with a vampire, or Danii, who’d dabbled and had desperately wanted more?
    Murdoch dreamed.
    Sometimes he dreamed of the sun, sometimes of old battles. Now he dreamed of his father, of walking in on him wet -eyed, clutching a portrait of Murdoch’s mother on the fifth anniversary of her death.
    Murdoch had loved his mother, though she’d been zealously religious, and he’d grieved her loss, but his father had been left a broken shell of a man.
    At first, Murdoch had pitied him. Then he’d scorned the father who had scant time for his family, who’d all but orphaned his four young daughters with his neglect.
    By this time, Murdoch had been enjoying women for years, knew that they were always about when he needed one. His father could have enjoyed the same—as a wealthy aristocrat, he could easily have found a woman to replace his departed wife.
    “Get another one,” Murdoch had finally demanded, unable to comprehend what kind of hold the woman had over him. His father had refused to move on, obsessed with her.
    A woman’s death had broken a strong man. . . .

    The dream began to change. Murdoch found himself with Daniela in a strange room made of ice walls. But he felt no chill from it, no discomfort.
    He placed his palms on either side of her ethereal face —without giving her pain. When his thumbs brushed her delicate cheekbones, she smiled up at him, but her countenance was different. Everything about her had changed.
    Wisping ice crystals had formed in half-moon shapes at her temples. More crystals spiked her lashes and tangled in her wild, shimmery hair. Her skin was even paler, her lips tinged with blue. Delicate cobalt -colored designs laced around her wrists and descended over her hands. In his dream, he knew they ran across her lower back as well.
    Her eyes seemed to be filled with an ancient knowing, and they glowed as if banked with a blue fire.
    She looked otherworldly. Like a completely alien being. She is otherworldly. . . .
    “Do you want me?” she whispered on a frosty breath, leading him to a bed in the center of the room.
    He’d never wanted anyone more. “I have to have you.”
    “Then take me, Murdoch.”
    He was about to give her his standard warning, that this was only for a night. He wouldn’t be interested in more. But she pressed her chill lips to his, stunning him with the cold—and with the pleasure. Perfection. Delicious.
    He lost track of what he’d been about to say.
    As they kissed, he slipped her skimpy dress from her, then pressed her back on the bed. He tugged her panties down, left her heels on.
    Sweeping his hands up her thighs, he spread her legs. Now that he could, he made a