Total pages in book: 123
Estimated words: 119597 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 598(@200wpm)___ 478(@250wpm)___ 399(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 119597 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 598(@200wpm)___ 478(@250wpm)___ 399(@300wpm)
Frankie and her ruthless protectors conquered unspeakable evil. But their fight to escape the hills of shivers and shadows is far from over.
Stranded in Alaska, survival becomes paramount against starvation, hypothermia, and the dangerous predators lurking outside their isolated cabin.
Sharing precious body heat with her viciously possessive men presents another challenge. She must navigate not only the brutal arctic tundra but also the intricacies of polyamorous love to ensure they make it out alive.
Tensions rise as the ice thickens, and their only hope rests on a plane they can’t fly.
Unless they unlock the secrets hidden beneath its wings in a cage of ice and echoes.
Tropes: Adult Romance, Age Gap, Alpha Hero, Angsty, Band of Brothers, Billionaire, Boy Obsessed, Close Proximity, Enemies-to-lovers, First Love, Fish out of Water, Forbidden Love, Forced Proximity, Found Family, Heroine in Danger, Menage, MFM, One Bed, Poly (3+ people), Protector, Romantic Suspense, Scars, Stalker, Starting Over, Stranded Together, Survival, Taboo, Touch Her And Die, Tragic Past, Troubled Marriage, Unrequited Love, Virgin Hero, Why Choose, Will They or Won’t They
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
“Better the illusions that exalt us than ten thousand truths.”
Alexander Pushkin
In the quiet of my heart, where death whispers, I tread softly, carrying the weight of Wolfson’s absence.
A week has passed without him. A deep, black void. Cold. Painful. Never-ending.
Like the polar night.
Like our empty bellies.
Somewhere north of the Arctic Circle, I stand at the frosted window of our cabin, watching snowflakes dance.
Our cabin.
My prison for over four months. Longer for Leonid and Kodiak. They’ve been trapped here since childhood.
With Denver and Wolf gone, it’s our cabin now. A cage of ice with frozen pipes, dwindling pantries, and echoes of the dead.
A permanent chill lives on my skin, my goosebumps the size of cherries. But it’s a welcome distraction from the ache within.
The heavy weight in my arms, Wolf’s saxophone case, holds memories etched in brass and melody. A relic of a tortured soul taken too soon. His haunting music used to fill these walls as vibrant and inimitable as the northern lights.
Now there’s just silence. A silence so swollen it chokes.
I feel guilty wearing his coat when he died in the bloodstained ruins of mine. I feel guilty loving his brothers when I couldn’t love him the way he wanted. I feel guilty taking a breath when I couldn’t stop him from taking his life.
I need you with me. We can finally be together.
He didn’t want to die alone.
Part of me, a dark, dangerous shadow, knows it would be easier to join him. To let the cold embrace me, to close my eyes and imagine it’s Wolf’s arms around me one last time.
I shake off the thought, my survival instinct still too strong. Even stronger is my love for his brothers. I would never do that to them, would never hurt them more than they’re already hurting.
The tread of boots drifts from the basement stairs, heralding Leo’s approach.
In the caress of candlelight, he emerges, a silhouette of sorrow, cradling a box laden with ghosts of the past. Within lie the remnants of innocence—clothes he and Kody wore as children—and the identities of women lost to this place. Among them, his mother.
My eyes, always on the brink of tears, look away.
Sensing my turmoil, he sets down the box, eases the case from my grip, and lowers it to the floor with reverent gentleness. His hands, red from the cold yet steady and firm, find my shoulders, anchoring me.
Our foreheads meet, resting together in a communion of pain.
“Breathe.” His voice is my lighthouse in the fog. “Again.”
Our lungs empty in unison, our breaths a coil of vapor.
“Want to talk about it?” His fingers dig in, massaging tense joints.
Wolf lives in my head in fragments, in flashes. Eyes that once held galaxies of mischief, now stilled. Hugs that once thawed the harshest winter, now phantoms. His punch lines and pet names, now lost to the wind.
Wolf.
My Wolf.
He left this world because it hurt him irreparably. From the moment he was born, it brutalized him, molested him, starved him of love, and ripped him apart.
No use talking about it. It won’t bring him back.
“We need to move forward.” I bury my hands in the fur of Leo’s coat. “I don’t want to cry anymore.”
Understanding shines in his mismatched eyes. “I miss you. Your smile. Your body. Your warmth.”
I sleep between him and Kody every night, swaddled in masculine heat. But that’s not what he means. He misses our intimacy. Our profound connection through sex. We haven’t been together like that in two weeks.
Days consumed by the relentless pursuit of sustenance and solutions leave no room for baser needs.
Nights, while tangled together in a pretzel of limbs, offer no comfort for longing hearts, only the stark reminder that every calorie must be conserved. Anything beyond tender whispers of love is a luxury we cannot afford.
“I miss you, too.” I hold my lips to his, soaking in his affection. “So much.”
Frustration sharpens his breath.
“This is temporary.” He steps away to collect the box.
“Forever awaits.” Whatever that means, however long it takes, I’m here for it.
I grip the handle of the saxophone case.
He snuffs out the candles. Then, hand in hand, we step outside, braving the maw of a howling blizzard.
Snow crunches under our boots. Icy air bites at our cheeks. The short trek to the workshop isn’t quick, thanks to the brutal, unrelenting wind. When we finally step inside and slam the repaired door on the storm, it feels like I traded one tomb for another.
Not enough candlelight to chase away the shadows. No heat source to cut through the cold. We’re out of coal and firewood, and the power system remains inoperable.
I’m afraid. Afraid of the isolation that gnaws as fiercely as the hunger. Afraid of the hope we put into a plane we don’t know how to fly. Afraid of a future devoid of Wolf.