Free Blank Slate by Tiffany Snow Page B

Langston climbed back over the seats, and he seemed
to deliberately avoid looking at her as he pulled his sleeping bag up around
him.
    “You
should get inside your bag,” he said gruffly, glancing at her before quickly
looking away. He began rearranging her bag, since it had gotten tangled in her
mad scramble to get out.
    Clarissa
obeyed, though the inside of her bag was icy cold. She’d had on her warmest
clothes, so the long-sleeved shirt and cotton pants she’d put on weren’t much
help against the chill. And her feet were freezing.
    As
she hunkered down in the bag, she turned on her side to face Langston. He was
flat on his back again, eyes on the ceiling.
    Should
she say something?  Thank him for helping her?  Tell him she hadn’t minded his
touch, had rather liked it in fact.
    Instinctively,
she knew he wouldn’t welcome that, so she said nothing, and neither did he.
    God,
she was cold. Had she been this cold before? It seemed being temporarily warm
from the heater only made it feel worse when it was shut off. A shiver wracked
her. Clarissa huddled deeper in the bag.
    Having
already slept, she now found she couldn’t turn off her brain enough to find
slumber again. Worry ate at her. What was she going to do when Langston turned
her over to the Feds? Would they put someone in prison who was suffering from
amnesia? Or, like Langston, would they not believe her? Was there any way to
escape before he turned her over? Any way to convince Langston to let her go? And
if by some miracle he did release her, where would she go? The only thing she
knew about herself was the name he’d told her, Clarissa O’Connell. She had no
idea even where she lived.
    Her
stomach twisted at her thoughts until she felt nauseated. Despair beckoned. She
had nothing and no one. Her only family was in prison and she was wanted by the
cops. The future seemed bleak indeed.
    The
shivering began again in earnest. Clarissa clenched her teeth to keep them from
rattling. If they got out of this, she swore that somehow she’d find a way to
live someplace where it was always warm. A place with a beach, next to a warm
ocean, where she could lie in the hot sand and feel the sun’s rays against her
skin…
    “Come
here.”
    Langston’s
voice interrupted Clarissa’s fantasy, and her eyes popped open in time to see
him reaching for her. He’d unzipped his bag and was now unzipping hers. With a
quick tug, he pulled her close, leaned down, and zipped the two bags together.
    “What
are you doing?” she asked.
    “I’m
keeping you from freezing to death,” he replied curtly. “You’re shaking the
whole car with your shivering.”
    “I’m
fine,” Clarissa protested, the brisk tone of his voice telling her he didn’t
want to do this, no matter what had gone on before.
    Langston
ignored her, settling back down and pulling her into him, moving an arm under
her shoulders to cushion her head while the other wrapped around her waist.
    Oooh,
this was nice.
    Langston
was toasty warm, and Clarissa couldn’t help but relax her body against his,
absorbing the welcome heat. She wasn’t quite sure what to do with her arms,
though, as their current position squished against his chest wasn’t all that comfortable.
Squirming, she tentatively freed an arm, resting it on top of his. The bicep
under her palm tensed, his fingers digging into her waist. But he didn’t
protest, so Clarissa left it there and he gradually relaxed.
    This
close, she could smell the spicy scent of his skin, feel the hard press of his
muscles surrounding her. The sick feeling in the pit of her stomach began to
fade, and with a start, Clarissa realized it was because of Langston. Despite
his antipathy for her, he had kept her safe, killing the wolf who would’ve
ripped her throat out. He’d helped her with the claustrophobia, and now he was
doing what he could to keep her warm.
    Despite
what the logical part of her brain was screaming at her, Clarissa knew in her
gut that she could