Frost (Midnight Ice Book One) - Preview!

Chapter Two

What did he see when he looked at her?

The same fifteen-year-old girl? Just as lost? Just as lonely?

"Dory," he whispered, deep voice thrumming.

Part of her yearned to whisper his name.

Jax.

But the other part won.

The part still clinging to his betrayal, perpetually aching from it.

I should have left when I had the chance, she cursed inwardly. Why did I turn around? Why, oh why, did I actually look at him?

Pandora swallowed her rising emotions back down, flipping the switch inside her head, letting the vampire take over. With a cool, crisp voice free of the taint of human feeling, she asked, "What are you doing here?"

His soft green eyes flashed, revealing his surprise. But then he crossed his arms, responding with a challenge of his own. "What are you doing dropping what could be an entire life's savings into an anonymous donation box for a zoo?"

Pandora ignored the question. "Are you alone?"

A lazy smile crawled across his face, one she recognized immediately because it was the same grin he wore in the photograph she'd stuffed in the back of her closet. Carefree and confidently amused. "You really think I need backup to face you?"

She shrugged absently. "None of the other titans came alone."

"None of the others know you like I do," he murmured, voice silky as he reached across the space between them, a distance that seemed both vast and nonexistent at the same time, gently running his finger over the bare skin of her hand. And again, her pesky heart thumped once, alive for a moment, ignited by his touch. Without even a hint of hesitation, he latched his fingers around her forearm, palm burning hot through her sweatshirt. But his brows came together as he felt the frozen temperature of her skin, confirming what he'd seen with his own eyes—that she was a vampire.

"Let go," Pandora demanded, pushing past him hard enough to make him stumble.

But he just tightened his hold. "Not so fast."

"Jax," she warned.

His entire face brightened, eyes sparkling like the ocean on a sunny day. "So you do remember my name! I was starting to get a complex about spending four years chasing after a girl who'd completely forgotten me."

Pandora took the opening he'd provided. "Four years, huh?" She scoffed, mocking him. "I always wondered when they'd send you. It never crossed my mind you've actually been trying to find me this whole time."

"I haven't," he denied.

But Pandora knew the truth—the body didn't lie, and his was abuzz with feeling. His heart was pounding, a heavy beat of blood that smelled deliciously alluring. His throat was tight as he fought to maintain a relaxed façade, unaware that she could read past any front he put up, could hear his stilted breath and one very slow, purposeful swallow. Jax was overflowing with anticipation—he just didn't want to admit it.

Before Pandora could retort, he tugged on her arm, dragging her away from the donation box. "Let's go."

"No." She yanked against his hold, but it was no use. Titans were annoyingly powerful and annoyingly similar to vampires. They had all the good stuff like superstrength, superspeed, and superinvulnerability without any of the downsides—the blood sucking, the immortality, the unavoidable frost of death.

Just another thing for Pandora to hate about her former best friend.

"Jerk."

"Dory." Jax sighed, lifting their arms so his bicep came around her shoulder, pulling her against his side—a place she'd been many times, under different circumstances, of course. And yet he felt different, solid in a way he hadn't been before, broader and taller too. She was hyperaware of his flexing muscles, of the heat building in the small space between them, of the way her body seemed to mold perfectly to his—as though after all this time, they'd finally grown up enough to fit.