Chapter Six

Ifeed a log into the fire, watching as it crackles and pops in the flames. Maybe two people can be alone together. The words keep echoing through my mind with a mocking, mean-girl twang, making my entire body cringe with embarrassment. I shake my head. I've been watching too many rom-coms, not even the most pubescent, lovesick freshman in my creative writing class could come up with something as cheesy as that.

Be honest, you like-like him, don't you?

I cringe. Crap. My students really are rubbing off on me. I need to get it together before I slip a note under Az's door to ask if he likes me too, check yes or no. Despite his winning personality, I'm still attracted to Az. He's definitely not my type. Yeah, he's hot, but I tend to gravitate towards men who don't storm out when I'm trying to get to know them. Az is a little too emotionally stunted for my taste.

Yes. I like-like him.

I'd like-like to see him naked, and I'd like-like to feel his body pressed against mine.

As soon as he stepped through the cabin door, all cleaned up, I wanted to rip off his clothes and lick every square inch of his red skin. I wanted to push him to the ground and ride his face all night using his horns for balance. Warmth flutters to my lower abdomen, and I squeeze my knees together. Out of all the things left in my car, I miss my vibrator the most right now.

I sigh, clearing the image out of my mind.

The point is, I may be sexually attracted to him, but I really wasn't trying to come on to him, not consciously, at least. I was just trying to help. Opening up took a huge weight off my shoulders, so I wanted to give him that chance as well.

But now the relief is gone and all I feel is shitty–shitty and alone.

I feed another log into the fire. And another, just because Az warned me not to. My pile is starting to dwindle, but I don't care. Az is just a know-it-all. The room is warm enough; I'll be fine, even if the temperature drops tonight.

I don't understand how someone who used to heal people for a living can be so cruel and withdrawn. Maybe that's why he doesn't work as a doctor anymore. He was too callous. I watch the flames devour the logs until they're completely charred. I wonder if I were to crack open Az's chest, would his heart be as dark as that burnt wood?

That's mean, Holly.The words immediately pop into my head. I don't know what brought Az to the mountain in the first place, and it's not my right to judge. Everyone deals with issues differently, and I shouldn't try to rush anyone who isn't ready to talk.

Honestly, I need to take a page from Az's book. If I had closed off my heart a long time ago, then I wouldn't be so miserable right now. I wouldn't have stayed married to Jeremy so long. Melinda's rejection wouldn't have been so devastating.When was I finally going to learn to stop letting others in so easily? They only end up hurting and disappointing me.

I rub my eyes, suddenly feeling very tired. I feed the last log into the fire and stand, taking our mugs to the kitchen. I wash our cups in the sink and hang them up to dry before heading to bed. The room is as toasty as a preheated oven at this point, so I peel off my sweatshirt and undershirt, and climb under the patchwork quilt with only my leggings and sports bra on. I close my eyes and am quickly lulled asleep by the rhythmic crackles of the fire.

When I open my eyes hours later, the room is pitch black. The fire is just a small pile of embers now; I need to stoke it back to life, but I can't move. Right now, the room is so cold, I can see my own breath. That explains the dreams about being locked in a walk-in freezer. My teeth chatter, and I pull the scratchy quilt tighter against my body. The wind roars outside, shaking the thin walls of the cabin.

You have to get up. You have to restart that fire.

Taking a deep breath, I jump out of bed with the quilt wrapped around my shoulders like a cape, and rush to the hearth.

"Shit. Shit. SHIT!" I curse under my breath. There are no more logs because I used them all. Gahh. Maybe Az does know it all, but he doesn't have to be such a jerk about it. I might have listened to him about the wood if he'd used a more polite tone. This is his fault.

I hop from one foot to the other, trying to give them a reprieve from the ice-cold floor as I decide what to do next. I can't go out and chop my own wood; it's too dangerous to go out at night, plus it's even colder out there than in here. I could crawl back into bed and try to sleep, but I'm already losing feeling in my toes.

I could knock on Az's door and ask if he has a spare blanket . . .

No. Hell noooo. Please. Anything but that—

I peer over my shoulder at my pathetic Charlie Brown Christmas tree leaning against the wall. I could use it as firewood. I just . . . I don't have it in my heart to burn it. I know it's just a tree; the forest is full of them, but I can't do it. It's so thin, dry, and brittle, it'd burn up in twenty minutes anyway. It would be like Santa Claus making a Rudolph sandwich because he forgot to stock his fridge. I would rather freeze than kill my last shred of Christmas spirit, which is already hanging by a thread as is. Don't worry little tree, you're safe tonight.

Swallowing my pride, I cross the room to Az's door. I hover there for a moment, gathering all my courage. I raise my fist. I take a deep breath and knock. I take a step away from the door and wait, my teeth chattering louder than the actual knock.

I wait.

Nothing. No response. Maybe he didn't hear me. I'll give him another thirty seconds before I try again.

I stumble back as the door whips open. I expect to find Az standing there, glowering down at me, but when I tilt my head back to look at him, he doesn't look pissed. Just tired. The tiny white edges of his dark eyes are bloodshot like he hasn't been tossing and turning the past few hours. My gaze wanders back down his body and my eyes widen when I realize he's wearing briefs and not much else . . . I suck in a sharp breath, forcing myself to meet his eyes.

"Holly." His voice is filled with surprise.

"I'm an idiot," I interject before he can say anything else. Az arches a brow at me. "I didn't listen, and I used up all the wood, and now I'm freezing. Do you by chance have an extra quilt I could borrow, or . . ." My voice trails off and Az rubs his forearm nervously, his eyes already telling me he doesn't. I guess he's more acclimated to the cold because he's sleeping in just his underwear. I'm sure he already gave me all the extra blankets he has.

"I don't," he says slowly, almost regretfully. My heart sinks. I guess my only option is to sleep in my winter clothes and boots.

"But if you need to warm up," he says, his eyes lowering to the floor. He's a demon, his skin is already a bright red, but I get the odd sense he's blushing.

"Yes?" I say, encouraging him. I'm open to anything. This trip has already been pretty shitty, and having to lose a limb to frostbite would be the cherry on top. Maybe he wants to bargain? That's a big part of demon culture. They're always bargaining. Too bad I have nothing left to give him. Unless he wants the fifty dollars left in my bank account, everything I own is buried under four feet of snow.

He reluctantly meets my gaze; his features set. "I promise this isn't a come on, okay? So please don't freak out. I'm thinking logistically. You could sleep in my bed. Just for tonight. My extra body heat will keep you warm."

"Oh." I take a step back, shaking my head, but I feel a deep tug in my core. "I-I . . ." I shouldn't. But I don't immediately run away. I stand there, thinking. Az watches me intently. At that moment, a strong gust of wind hits the cabin. I brace my hand against the doorframe as the walls groan, and the cold air cuts through me, making my entire body feel like one giant goosebump. I don't think I was this cold when I was buried by that avalanche.

It looks like the decision has already been made for me.

"Just tonight," I agree. It's for survival; no different from the hikers who get lost in the mountains and have to share a sleeping bag so they don't freeze to death.

Without another word, Az steps out of my way. I walk past him, heading towards his bed. It's about the same size as mine, which wasn't really big to begin with. But considering we're only sleeping together so I don't freeze to death, smaller is probably better.

I am about to ask which side of the bed he prefers, but I can't stand the cold any longer, and I crawl in. The blankets are still warm from his skin, and I snuggle in with a relieved sigh, not hating the smell of his bed. I sniff his pillow, biting back a groan. It smells like campfire and fresh evergreens and oh boy—it just smells like Az.

I peer at him over the quilt, praying he didn't notice me sniffing his pillow. Az hesitates for a moment, as if he's uncertain, before he lifts the edge of his blanket and climbs inside. The mattress groans under his enormous weight.

As he settles in, I try my best not to touch him. I'm clinging to the edge of the mattress because between the three hundred-pound-demon and me, there's not a spare inch of mattress between us. Thanks to gravity pulling me towards the dip he's made, I eventually give in and fall to his side. Az doesn't move or jerk away at my touch. I can't help it, I relax into him because he's so warm.

"Thank you," I whisper, staring at the broad ridges of his profile in the dark. He's lying on his back, his hands folded across his chest, holding his body perfectly still.

He nods softly; his eyes glued to the ceiling. "I hope I'm not making you uncomfortable. I always sleep in my briefs. I can go put on more clothes if you want—"

"No, you're fine," I say, cutting him off. I want to make this as comfortable as possible. It's not his fault I was reckless with the firewood, even after he warned me.

I feel his chest rise and fall, as if he's taking a breath for the first time since climbing into bed. He takes another measured breath. I smile to myself. He's technically the apex predator at this point, being a seven-foot demon with eye-gouging horns, and he seems more nervous of me. The thought makes my body relax even more.

"Holly?" I love the way he says my name; it's deep and warm and relaxing, just like the first sip of a cup of hot chocolate after a long day of playing in the snow.

"Hmm?"

"You can press your feet or hands against my skin if you're still cold. I don't mind. My friends always called me their personal furnace growing up because I ran warmer than them. Even as demons, I ran the hottest. They'd stick their hands under my shirt after we got done playing in the snow." He scoffs. "The little assholes."

"Oh, okay, if you're sure." I hesitate at first, but then press my cold feet against his calf. I sigh with relief as the feeling slowly returns to my toes. He stretches out his forearm, and I let out a small groan as I press my fingers against his skin. So warm. He really is a furnace. "So, you grew up in Idaho?" I don't want to be too nosy, especially when he has every right to kick me out of his bed, but I can't help it.

"Yeah, in Winter Bliss."

"Really?"

"Only until I was about fifteen. I lived here before my parents sent me off to a demon boarding school. I haven't visited since I moved back a year ago."

"Do your parents still live here?" Maybe he's not as alone as I was thinking.

It's dark, but I see the vein pop in the corner of his head. "No," he says in a low, cold voice.

"Any friends that you knew before?"

Az exhales. "Not really," he starts, then adds, "I did see my childhood friend Rom—one of the little assholes I was talking about earlier—the other day." When he says asshole, there's a note of tenderness in his voice. "I haven't seen him since middle school. It was very . . . strange," he says, as if he's not sure how he's supposed to feel about seeing his friend. "What about you?"

"What about me?"

Az places his arm behind his head to get a better look at me, and I nestle in closer to his side.

Self-preservation,I tell myself. That's all this is. I'm all warmed up now, burning from the inside out.

"Where do your parents live?"

"Oh." I blink. "They're dead," I say, a little too bluntly. Az doesn't squish up his face and say in a too soft voice, "Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry," like most people do whenever the subject of my dead parents comes up. They're my dead parents and yet whenever I tell new acquaintances about them, I'm the one who ends up comforting the person who asked.

Az nods to himself, taking it in as if I was telling him what day it was. What a relief.

"I'm sorry to hear that," he says after a moment.

"It's fine. My mom walked out when I was a kid, so you can't really miss someone you never really knew. My dad died five years ago. He was an alcoholic and was in a lot of pain towards the end because of his liver failure. It was hard to watch him go through that, but his death was a blessing in a way."

Az nods knowingly. I wouldn't be surprised if he's taken care of patients in liver failure before. It's a painful, unrelenting disease, especially towards the end. It's hard watching anyone suffer through that, so out of anyone, he knows exactly what a relief their death can be. Which is something not a lot of people in my inner circles understand either.

"I'm sorry about walking out earlier," he says quietly. "You're right, it's not healthy to keep things bottled up, but it's also the way I was raised. You're a nice person, Holly. I had almost forgotten that nice, selfless people actually exist. It's a good reminder that there are still some good people out there."

I snort. He literally used to cure people for a living. If that's not selfless, I don't know what is.

I used to love it when people described me as good or nice, but the past few years I've really started to resent it. It took me too long to realize that good and nice meant too nice. Too nice to ask someone to stop walking all over you. Too nice to push for that raise even though you've been working at the same school for years, but whenever you bring it up to the principal, she bursts into tears and tells you their budget is already being cut in half, and they can barely afford to keep staff as is.

But when Az says I'm nice, he's not trying to call me spineless under his breath. It sounds like a genuine compliment on his lips.

"I'm sorry for pushing you to talk earlier. Sometimes I forget boundaries are a thing and not everyone likes pouring out their hearts to complete strangers." I hesitate. "I know we don't know each other, but you can trust me. And if not, you always have plenty of blackmail to use against me to ensure compliance."

He chuckles; the brusque sound coming from deep within his chest. He pats my hand. "I"m already planning on it," he says. I think that's the end of that, but then he shifts slightly to his side so he can see me better, as much as he can without gouging the mattress with his horn. "I asked some probing questions earlier without giving you any information in return." He blows out a long breath. "So, you want to know why I moved back to Winter Bliss? Fine. I'll tell you. Before I dropped out of residency, I checked myself into an inpatient psych hospital for treatment." There's a slight pause, as if he's waiting for some reaction from me. Maybe he expects me to scoot away? But when I don't, he continues, "And when I was discharged, I didn't really know where to go or what to do. All I knew was I didn't want to finish my residency. I didn't want to be a doctor. So I came back to the only place I've ever felt at home and now I'm here."

"Oh."

He smirks down at me. "You can ask me why I dropped out of residency. I promise not to storm out. Even if I want to, I can't. You're in my room."

I laugh softly and lean on my elbow. "Alright, why did you drop out?"

He rubs the stubble on his chin. "I never wanted to go to med school. I don't know if you know much about demonkind, but there is a lot of pressure to be the best of the best—in business, finance, whatever. It's a natural instinct we're all born with, except me. My parents thought I was defective because I was the only one in the family who didn't care about success. I got good grades, but not because I wanted to get into an Ivy League school. I was a good student because I loved learning. I resented the internships and extracurricular activities my parents forced me to sign up for because it would look good on a college application. Because I excelled in math and science, and blood never grossed me out, my parents pushed me into the next career they thought would bring in the most prestige: medicine. Don't get me wrong, I loved the challenge it brought. I loved my patients, but I had a hard time with the stress. The long grueling hours of study with no sleep. Working over eighty hours per week for my hospital shifts. It was more than I could handle. And after a while, my mental health started to crumble."

"That's a pretty good reason to quit."

He chuckles softly. "Agreed, and I wish I had taken that approach. I think it would have saved me a lot of heartbreak." I frown at the sad twinge in his voice, my curiosity growing stronger. "With no outlet and no break from the constant grind, I started giving in to my reckless side."

I raise my eyebrows at all possibilities of what that could mean.

He huffs, shaking his head at my expression. "It's probably not what you're thinking—not sex or drugs. Why waste precious sleep for mediocre sex? And I knew too much about drugs to get involved with them. It was little, inconsequential things at first, like driving over the speed limit. Going mountain biking without a helmet. But then I started picking fights with orcs at the bar who I knew could kick my ass, and doing things that caused the kind of injuries I treated in the ER. I knew what I was doing was dangerous, but I couldn't make myself stop, especially when I was really stressed out. Which, as a resident, was all the time—stress was my baseline. But when it was really bad, I would get this panicky feeling, and a brush with danger was the only thing that made me feel calm."

"So what made you stop?"

He shrugs. "There was a motor vehicle accident that came into my ER one night. It was a young woman, driving by herself, not inebriated. She was driving too fast and lost control of the wheel. Luckily, she wasn't seriously hurt, just badly scratched up. When I went into the room to talk to her privately, she admitted that she didn't lose control of her wheel. She just let go. And as I thought about it, I could see myself doing the exact same thing. To just let go? It sounded . . . thrilling. This woman almost died. It made me realize how closely I was toeing the line between life and death. It starts out as a thrill, but who knows? What if I let go one day? So, the next day, right after my shift, I checked myself into a treatment center and it wasn't until I was working with the psychiatrists and therapists that I was able to come to terms with what I had been ignoring for years—I didn't want to be a doctor. I was only doing it to make my parents happy."

A moment of silence passes between us as I absorb his story. It hits a little close to home. I know all too well the feeling of doing everything to make others happy while sacrificing your own happiness in the process.

I splay my fingers across his abdomen, admiring his softness and his strength at the same time. "Thank you for telling me."

Az huffs out a breathy laugh. "I do feel better. I guess you were right," he says begrudgingly, dipping down his chin to give me a knowing smirk. "I know it doesn't seem like it," he says, waving his hand dismissively in the air, "considering my situation. Isolating myself in the mountains may not seem like the epitome of health, but I'm doing a lot better. I'm not stressed out. That's all that matters."

"You don't have to explain yourself to me," I insist. "I understand better than most. Nature is medicine for the soul. I think that's why I was desperate to spend Christmas here. I just needed some of that healing that only being alone in the mountains can offer. I'd live out in the woods too if I could afford it." And if all my friends were just a stone's throw away. Unlike Az, I'd get lonely after a while.

Az nods. I don't know if I scooted towards him, or if he pulled me closer to him, but next thing I know, my body is flush with his side. I hope this is okay since he doesn't seem like the touchy-feely type, but he doesn't seem to mind either.

The bed creaks loudly as he fully turns to face me. He props his head up with his right hand, so his horn doesn't pierce the mattress, and he drapes his other hand across my waist, pulling me closer—if that's even possible. I'm eye level with his nipples and his chest hair tickles my face, but I don't mind. I'm so small compared to him, and in any other situation, alarm bells would be going off. But right now, I feel safe.

"This okay?" he asks quietly.

My body is so coiled, I can barely speak. I nod quickly and make a tight "Mmm-hmm" sound deep in my throat.

"Good night, Holly," he says. He closes his eyes. So I'm just supposed to fall asleep facing him with his warm breath tickling the top of my head? Or maybe he thinks I'll turn away and then we'll be spooning. Gulp.

I roll to my other side so I'm facing the wall. "Night," I squeak over my shoulder.

He adjusts slightly, and that's when I feel it.

Something hard and big presses into my backside. I suck in a sharp breath. I close my eyes, trying to ignore it as a strong current of need pulses between my legs.

Yeah. I'm definitely not sleeping tonight. Not if I'm going to be thinking of that all night.

And just then, as if I don't like-like this demon enough already, he murmurs into the dark, "I know you wanted to be alone for Christmas, but I'm glad you're here."