Frost (Frost and Nectar, #1)

by C.N. Crawford

I was cursed, and I had been my whole life. If I ever fell in love with my bride, she would die. And it would be my own touch that would kill her—freezing her to the marrow like the bleak landscape around us.

“Well, that’s good, darling, because as I said, I’m looking for someone I can’t love, and so far, you are the perfect match.” That’s right, Torin. I’m not super lovable. His words stung a bit after Andrew’s rejection, and without entirely realizing, it, I found myself flipping my middle finger at him. He glanced down at it, looking baffled.

“No, Ava. We fuck each other hard up against the oak trees, rending the forest air with the sounds of our ecstasy. We fuck around bonfires, bathed in their flames.” He leaned in closer, his finger gently stroking the side of my face. With his lips by my ear, his earthy, masculine scent wrapped around me like a forbidden caress. “When was the last time you lost yourself in a pleasure so intense, you forgot your name? That you forgot your own mortality? Because that is what it means to be fae. I could make you ache with pleasure until you forget the name of every human who made you think there was something wrong with you.”

“And if you think I can’t see how much that excites you, if you think I couldn’t hear your heart racing, Ava, you are mistaken. Because if it were you and me, in the oak grove on Beltane, I would have you screaming my name. Calling me your king. I would have your body responding to my every command, shuddering with pleasure underneath me, until you forgot the human world existed at all.”

We are creatures of the Wild Hunt, and we could never be anything else. If you feel we go too far, it’s only because you are living a lie about your true nature.” The corner of his mouth curled. “Because underneath it all, you are as vicious as the rest of us.”

Despite my ears and genetic makeup, I was a human through and through—Chloe’s daughter.

Come away, O human child! To the waters and the wild With a faery, hand in hand, For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.

“It makes it more exciting,” he whispered. “Thinking of your complete disdain for me.”

The king—the most powerful fae in existence—looked completely and utterly alone.

Oh, gods. I must stop. Fucking focus. I was losing it. Because the fact was, I was cursed. But surely this was only lust running out of control. And a king’s impulse to conquer, to tame, to make my subjects worship me, body and soul. Wasn’t it?

“We are a match made in hell, but I have never wanted anyone more, Ava Jones,”