Afraid to Die (Alvarez & Pescoli)

He was closing the distance and taking off his own clothes, kicking off his boots, but his cold fingers fumbled with the buttons of his shirt, and his jeans, they were difficult to pull off and toss aside, so he couldn’t catch her, had to race to catch up.

He thought of what he would do to her, how he would thrust into her, make her cold body turn molten and heat the snow that fell until it melted over her skin.

But in his hand was his knife. The one with the handle made from the antler of a four-point he’d killed three years earlier. He remembered felling the buck, with just an arrow ...

He was closer now ... his heart pounding, his fingers clenched over the hilt of the knife.

Only inches from her, a half step behind when she turned, her lips turning blue, her eyes bright, her cheeks crimson with the frosty winter air. A playful smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. So perfect. Like an angel’s.

Then she saw the knife.

Her soft grin fell away. Shock, then horror registered on her beautiful features and she stumbled, nearly falling, throwing up more white powder as panic set in and she ran faster, not playfully, but spurred on by terror.

His nostrils flared. He sprang forward, giving chase.

Within a few strides he caught her, his free hand tangling in her mass of long hair and then ...

A blur.

All he could remember was the slash of warm blood spraying scarlet over an icy white snowdrift ...

No! He snapped back to the here and now. He couldn’t let his mind stray from his work.

The ice was melting in his mouth. His erection was full and bulging, straining against the hot neoprene. Straightening, he felt a moment’s disgust for his weakness and forced his ever-willing cock to stand down.

What had gotten into him?

He gazed down at the naked woman and noticed the place where his mouth had melted the ice and left too much of his DNA. Not smart, not smart at all. Certainly not something a person with a near-genius IQ would do.

Quickly, as if in working swiftly he could erase the damage he’d done, he started chiseling out that spot where his mouth and saliva had touched and melted the ice.

The bitch in the back room let out another moan and his jaw tightened. She’d die soon enough and her perfect body would show no bruise or cut or anything that would hint at violence. Then, she, too, would be encased in ice, a perfect specimen, another work of art.

Glancing at his watch, he noted he still had enough time to finish for the day. His wife wasn’t expecting him for another hour. Plenty of time.

Carefully, he pumped more water from the stream and poured it over his work in progress. She wasn’t quite ready, he thought as he gazed into her wide-open eyes.

But it wouldn’t be long.

Thankfully, the moans from the other cave had stilled and he could concentrate again, sluicing water over her while under his breath he muttered, “Let it snow, let it snow ...”

“... let it—” Click!

Selena Alvarez slapped the snooze button on the clock radio, then, thinking twice, turned the alarm off and rolled out of bed. God, she hated that song. Then again she wasn’t too big on anything to do with the Christmas season.

She had her reasons.

Not that she wanted to think about them now.

Maybe ever.

Though it was dark as midnight, the digital readout glowed a bright red, telling her that it was four thirty in the morning, her usual time to get up and get going. For most of the year, she tackled each day as if it were a challenge, but as autumn faded and the days of November bled into the heart of December, she felt that same old ennui that accompanied the holiday season, a definite energy sap that darkened her mood. Her usual take-the-world-head-on attitude hibernated for the winter and she had to work doubly h

ard to find her usual enthusiasm for life.

“Idiot,” she muttered under her breath as she stretched her muscles.

She knew the cause of her change in attitude, of course, but she never discussed it, not even with her partner. Especially not her partner. Pescoli just wouldn’t understand.