Free Night's Cold Kiss by Tracey O'Hara Page B

close his fingertips were to the sensitive underside of her breast and swallowed hard. Every burning brush of his touch spread heat across her already feverish skin.
    “We need to put a poultice on the wound to draw out the infection.” He rose and returned to the bathroom.
    The sound of movement from the other room piqued her curiosity and she propped onto her elbows to look at the angry flesh around the parallel gashes just above her right hip bone. She had never allowed a wound to get this bad before. Christian was right, though, if it remained untreated, she’d be very sick indeed. The fever made her body feel on fire.
    “Can’t you behave yourself for five seconds?” he said from the bathroom doorway. “I told you to stay still.”
    “I just wanted to see,” she said for a second time. “It was healing really well.”
    “Dreniacs can carry some nasty shit,” he said.
    “Yeah, this one was especially…” She frowned, rising higher onto her elbows. “I never told you it was a dreniac wound.”
    “I assumed, given your profession.” He looked away quickly and she got the sense he was hiding something, then his unyielding eyes met hers. “Now, lie down and let me finish.”
    When she did as she was told, he raised a questioning eyebrow. “What, no arguments?”
    Tiredness washed over her. “No,” she said, closing her eyes.
    Antoinette opened them in time to see him pick up a scalpel from the tray on the bedside table and nick the tip of his finger. A few drops of dark blood fell onto the salve smeared on the dressing.
    “What are you doing?” she asked in horror.
    “This will heal you faster than any human medicine can.”
    “No.” She tried to climb off the bed. “Get it away from me.”
    He grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her back. “I don’t have time for this crap,” he growled, the menace in his voice raising goose bumps on her skin. She struggled but he held her helpless and then his voice softened. “This may burn a little.” And he placed the dressing to her wound with gentle fingers.
    A fiery intense pain lit up all the nerve endings in her side and she sucked back her breath, grimacing. “I thought this was supposed to make me feel better.”
    “Give it time,” he murmured, fixing the dressing in place with some tape.
    Fire exploded in her side, and her vision grayed from the pain, then slowly the searing dulled to a burning and finally to a slight tingling warmth.
    “I’m also giving you a shot of painkiller.” He picked up a needle and drew in clear liquid from an ampoule.
    She quashed an instinctive flash of distrust and held out her arm.
    He shook his head with a malicious smirk. “Roll over.”
    “You have got to be kidding.”
    “Nope.”
    “Surely the arm is just as good.” She held it out again—hopeful.
    He shook his head. Shit. She huffed and rolled gingerly onto her side, holding her breath. His pulled down the top of her panties and she swallowed nervously, his touch setting off a tingle in her lower back. She heard the flick of the syringe, smelled the sharp scent of an alcohol swab before its cold touch and then the sting of the needle.
    “I didn’t need it,” she lied—her headache still pounded heavily behind her eyes even if her side was no longer on fire.
    “You can get dressed now.” Christian’s voice held an odd, gravelly timbre.
    Antoinette turned to see ill-concealed hunger as his gaze slid down her scantily clad body, triggering her own heat. He wanted her—that much was clear. The woman in her felt a bolt of satisfaction; the Venator saw something she might be able to manipulate in future. Antoinette swung her legs off the bed and stood up way too fast, sending her head into a spin. She staggered forward and her feet entangled in the discarded dress on the floor. Pinwheeling her arms, she tried desperately to stay upright, but fell—right into his lap. Just as she started to get her bearings a thunderclap of red-hot desire hit with a