Hunted in Holly

Chapter 14

I jumped down from the trees, doing everything in my power to hold him. Even when I overestimated his power I had underestimated it, and his body’s retaliation was taking every ounce of my strength and concentration to contain. I didn’t have much longer before I would have to give in, and I definitely wouldn’t have the strength to sever flesh and bone while using this amount of power.

I needed to secure him another way. Fortunately, I had a great option in the very bag he packed for me.

I knelt by Nicholas, and I checked his reflexes with a few well placed taps.

He was legitimately out cold—not faking it to trick me. For someone who was ordinarily such a terrifying man, he looked so peaceful and harmless without his scarlet eyes burning into me. His steady breathing and neutral expression humanized a monster.

I inched in closer, and I removed the rope from my pack. I felt the weight of it in my hands, so thick and strong.

This had to work. No one could break this easily, and I wanted to believe he wouldn’t have given me a worthless tool. The net had held him—I saw his bound boots still on the ice sheet while we were under—and this rope was even stronger.

I tugged on each end as one last strength test, then I got to work, moving with agility that would outpace my waning freeze spell.

I had to win this decisively, or he would be chasing me forever. Even if a Saint was good to his word, there was no guarantee that he wouldn’t simply change the game to continue his pursuit. I didn’t trust anyone or anything within this forsaken Northern Pole.

I grabbed his wrists and I tied them over his head, before knotting the rope heavily around the wide tree trunk of a particularly tall and girthy Ponderosa Pine. I took extra care to assure he couldn’t wriggle free with any amount of sleight of hand by double, triple, and quadruple securing each loop of the restraints. His life force pushed back on my psyche, and the ice around his heart was starting to give.

I didn’t worry about cutting off circulation or tying the ropes too tight. My power was already starting to slip, and I didn’t have the luxury of gentleness. If the roles were reversed, he wouldn’t have been gentle with me. Something told me he would be disappointed if I showed him anything less.

I gritted my teeth as I held that ice in his chest for just a few more seconds, having to fight an internal fire that was doing everything it could to force me out. On the verge of exhaustion, I took one step back, dropped my power, and watched as he blinked himself awake .

The all-powerful Saint Nicholas looked startled and confused, as if he’d just awoken from a nap he’d not intended to take. I waited for him to orient himself to his surroundings, to observe and test the thick ropes on his wrists, then to meet my gaze. A grin danced on my lips as the roles were now fully reversed.

His Adam’s apple bobbed with unusual nervousness, and I took impossible satisfaction in that.

“Well, this is interesting.” He said through a shaky smirk, though his physical tells betrayed his expression. He attempted to rotate his wrists within the ropes, but my knots were perfect. “I didn’t take you for a fan of bondage, Sweet Noel.”

“You didn’t take me for an equal either, and that’s why I won, and you lost.” I crouched in front of him, my gaze level with his. With how tall he was, this was the only time I could do that.

I swallowed down my own nerves, then I shoved my palm against his neck, and I forced his head back against the bark.

He told me I could kill him if I took his head. I didn’t know if that was true, but it was worth a shot, and it all made logical sense. I didn’t have to know where the lie ended and the truth began anymore. I just had to take the leap and believe.

Completely depleted of my power, I picked up the knife he’d put in my survival pack. I felt the weight of the blade in my hand, I tossed it, caught it, and twirled it. Then I turned my attention to my captive.

Nicholas lifted his chin with the arrogant swagger I was becoming all too accustomed to, though I couldn’t say if it was to look down on me or to grant me better access. “ What are you waiting for?” He tugged on his wrists to emphasize his own predicament. “You have me exactly where you want me, don’t you? Go on now. Let me see how sharp your fangs really are.”

I drew a breath through my nose, not giving him the dignity of a response. He had an impeccable ability to make me second guess reality. Every twitch of his muscles had me on edge, like the tables could turn again with the slightest flick of his wrist.

So I clenched that knife until my knuckles turned white.

“Mmmmm, look at the vicious shine in your eyes.” He purred. “I knew we were the same, you and I.”

“I’m nothing like you.” I growled back. “You’re a murderer. You killed innocent people. Everyone I’ve ever known and loved lies in blood and ash by your hand.” I focused on my breathing to hold my composure. “You’re a sick man playing sick games, and the world is only worse with you in it.”

“And you are my marionette, who hasn’t even noticed she’s tangled in her own strings, while I hold the cross brace that controls you. Even as you fight and scream and cry, you’re still tied to your master, and I can’t wait to drag you to hell with me.” Nicholas chuckled, and I hated the way I could feel his amusement shaking against my palm on his neck. “Go on, Caroline. Show me your beautiful monster. I want so badly to meet her.”

With a sneer on my lips, grinding my teeth, I lifted that blade high above my head.

Then with all of the resolve in my soul, I removed my hand from his neck, and I swung for his jugular. In fractions of a second, I would become his monster .

I’d have justice, once and for all.

Nicholas caught my wrist in a punishing grip, not inches from making contact. A rough squeeze disarmed me, the knife landing point down in the cold, hard ground, and I was still trying to process it all when I found myself on my back in the snow at his side. The white of the overhead storm was blocked by the shadow of his body, as he pinned me beneath him on the ground.

In the corner of my eye, the rope completely disintegrated in a magic flame at the foot of the tree. I didn’t know how or when he’d done it, but he’d freed himself, disarmed me, and reversed the power dynamic in the blink of an eye.

“Checkmate, Queen of the South.” He pressed the heels of his hands into my wrists, and he secured my thighs beneath his knees. I had to tell myself to breathe as I looked right through him in stunned, terrified confusion.

I didn’t have any words. I swallowed hard to pass the lump in my throat, but it didn’t budge. “How did you get free?” The question was rhetorical. The answer didn’t matter.

“Did you really think that I could be bound by my own rope? You are delightfully na?ve.” He laced his gloved fingers in between mine, then he squeezed my knuckles with taunting affection. My heart pounded, and I needed to believe it was in fear. There was nothing good or safe about this man. “Stopping my heart with your ice magic was quite the trick though. You might just kill me yet, Sweet Noel.” The admiration in his eyes was disarming, but I wasn’t going to fall for it.

“Did you like that?” I narrowed my eyes, and attempted to concentrate what little energy I had left to hit him again, hoping I might get just enough of a reaction to free myself. While he was fully aware, and me being so depleted of energy, I barely held him for a single heartbeat. His eye twitch was barely perceptible as my ice tried and failed to grab him again. I tested each of my limbs, looking for a weak point where I might squirm free, but his weight and his strength didn’t give a single millimeter. I did my best to play it off like it had been a quiet threat and not my own exhaustion that failed me. “You almost look cute when you’re unconscious.” I said, holding onto that false air of control.

Nicholas only laughed at that. “I can say the same about you. You are a wildcat while you’re at your best, but when you’re beneath me, so trapped and so helpless...” He slowly dragged his teeth along his bottom lip while holding eye contact. “Fuck, Caroline. With that face you’re making right now, I’m not sure which one of us is more deeply ensnared.”

My breathing was shallow, and while I didn’t know what expression he was seeing on me, the hunger and desire I was seeing on him was purely predatory. And again, I told myself that knot in my stomach and the heat in my chest was fear.

It was fear. The fact that being shaken to my core was precisely what had my heart racing like this—my body reacting like this—was a horror all its own.

Nicholas leaned down, still holding me between intertwined gloves, and he kissed the fingertips on my right hand one at a time. “Will you fight me to the bitter end, Dove?” He leaned over to my left hand. His gentle kisses, contrasting so dramatically with his cruel words, made me shiver. “Will you claw out my eyes, and put your teeth on my throat.” He fluttered butterfly kisses down my wrist. “Or will you accept that you’re not the hunter. That you were never the one in control.” Nicholas increased the pressure on our interlocked hands, just to make sure I understood that point. “You’ll be a good girl because, deep down, you know you were always going to be mine.”

Nicholas released me and sat back on his heels. Still on top of me. Still pinning me down. There was no physical contact nor bindings that kept my arms splayed beside my head in the snow, yet the way he was looking at me gave me an innate understanding that I wasn’t allowed to move. That there would be consequences I couldn’t handle if I did.

And I listened, because I knew he meant it.

“That’s what I thought.” One side of his lips lifted in acknowledgement of our silent negotiation.

Satisfied, he reached for my bag and started rifling through my things. “You hardly used any of this. What were you saving it all for?” He said as he tossed aside candy canes, another gingerbread bar, and a peanut butter cup. “I had so many fun gifts for you if you had taken the time to understand them.” He threw my knife into the nearby tree, then resumed digging like there was purpose to his intrusion. “Ah, there it is.”

With a wicked grin, he removed the mistletoe from my pack. He held it over my head symbolically, the smirk never leaving his face.

“Don’t move,” he whispered as he touched the small leaves to my cheek.

I did as I was told.

He feathered the plant down my neck, playfully rotating it against me. “Something you don’t know about mistletoe, Sweet Noel,” he fluttered it over the bust of my coat, “is that this was the most powerful tool in your bag all along.” He tapped the leaves over my breasts, then started down to my stomach, sliding the plant over each of my green buttons. “The rope might have helped you climb, but it couldn’t hold me. The net was strong enough to catch a small animal, but it wasn’t ever going to hold back a monster.” He took his time dusting the mistletoe over my hips, twirling it on my center. “But a Saint will always have to abide by the law and customs created by Mother Nature.” He slipped the plant between my legs, and brushed the sprig languidly back up to the central hem of my pants.

His movements were too distracting to process what he was saying. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking,” He leaned forward, “about the fact that your very own magic,” he tucked the mistletoe into my coat, “is impossible for me to resist. When the original Queen of the South Pole created this simple, silly, superstitious plant, she gave it a very specific power. The human custom is a simple kiss, but for a Saint, I have no power to resist anything it touches. If you’d pinned it to a wild animal, I would have no choice but to chase it down. But instead, you kept it close to you, never taking it out of your little bag.” What? “It was created to keep the Saints in line—to keep me in line. Even the most powerful beings on this earth have a weakness. Slip the leaves in my food, and you’ll paralyze me. But hold it over your head, and I’ll do anything to possess you.”

My eyes widened, and my lips fell agape.

The mistletoe?

Mistletoe.

The plant that has been used for matchmaking for thousands of years was a binding spell to control a Saint ?

How…

How could I not have realized.

Nicholas touched his lips to my cheek, exactly where he’d touched me with the sprig. My eyes only rounded further. “I’m a slave to nature, Sweet Noel.” He whispered against the tip of my nose, before touching down another barely there kiss. Immediately I recalled every inch of the trail he’d drawn over my body. “And you are now, and always have been, the incarnation of nature.”

He started kissing the side of my neck. He nudged aside the fur trimmed collar of my coat and nipped at my skin.

“Wait.” I panicked as he made it to the top button of my coat. “Wait wait wait—” He grabbed both sides of my jacket, and he yanked it open.

“Wait?” He slipped his fingers beneath my base layer top, and he pushed the material up to my collarbone. The sharp cold bombarded my bare skin, and my nipples were hard in my brassiere. My breathing stilled. I held a full breath in my lungs, when he touched those hot lips to the center of my chest. The heat of his mouth followed the contour of my small breasts until he reached the edge of the cup of my bra. I continued holding that inhale as he hooked his fingers around the edge and tugged down the lace barrier between us.

The cold that hit my nipple was instantly replaced by the fire of his tongue. He rolled the sensitive nub with articulate precision, then he drew circles around it with slow, provocative movements.

I exhaled in shock, and he followed my chest down as it flattened with my breathing. He engulfed my stiff peak with his moistened lips, then he kneaded my nipple with the tip of his tongue, and grazed the nerves with his teeth.

It was cruel and too soon that he left my left breast wet and cold as he started towards the other side, still following the path he’d drawn with the mistletoe. He jerked down my right cup, and he started playing me all over again.

I was throbbing between my legs, and all I wanted was for him to set me free or put me out of my misery. His weight held me down in the snow, and I was completely beholden to his mercy, not even able to move enough to create friction where I suddenly and desperately needed it.

“Gods, you taste like pumpkin spice and warm coffee, Sweet Noel.” Nicholas rasped out the words, like he was the one losing himself to me instead of the other way around. He spread his tongue over my breast, and he licked me like he was trying to devour me.

He continued downward from my breasts, leaving them cold, damp, and very exposed in the wake of his affection, then he took a moment to remove his gloves, one finger at a time. I watched the curiously threatening display, my heart picking up a few more beats per minute as he casually tossed those gloves aside. Then he grabbed my waist with his warm, coarse hands, and he held me down while he resumed his exploration.

Nicholas continued drawing along the center of my body, dancing kisses down the line of my abdomen, lightly scratching my skin with his rough stubble each time he tapped against me. The soft and rough was sensational, and I couldn’t seem to talk myself into hating it.

He slipped his tongue into my naval and twisted it inside me before he pulled back out, then he licked me from my tits to my waist band. Still holding me, not giving me any leeway to move, he slid his palms down to my hips. He circled my waist band, then he popped the button on my snow pants.

Still, I did nothing but watch, my breasts on display, my bra out of place, my breathing shallow and quick, and my heart thumping need through my core.

He repositioned between my thighs, freeing me from his weight, then he undid my fly and started tugging my pants from my hips.

I complied, and I couldn’t say why. I let him remove my boots, my pants, and my base layer bottoms. My coat was long enough that my nearly bare ass rested in soft, warm fur lining instead of sitting directly in the snow. I tried not to think about the lines he’d drawn with that mistletoe now. I knew and anticipated them without having to, whether I wanted to admit it or not.

He waited a moment, lingering his fingertips just beneath the waistband of my panties.

“Tell me, my perfect prey.” He started tugging them down, taking his time as he exposed me to his eyes. “What will it take to make you my Queen in earnest? To have you as my bride until the end of all time.”

I swallowed any words before I could say them. Any answer I might give right now, as that thin lace was separated from the wet heat of my pussy, would be shameful and not of sound mind.

“What do I need to do for you to willingly lock yourself inside this cage, Dove?” He asked, a playful bite to his tone.

“I’ll never be yours” was the best I could manage.

That only made him laugh .

“Never? Heh.” He continued dragging my undergarments along my thighs. “I suppose I haven’t shown you enough of the benefits then. Allow me to change your mind.”

I barely heard his words over the pounding of my own pulse in my ears. The below-zero temperatures were the only thing cooling down the blazing heat beneath the surface of my skin. I damn near melted when I felt those dirty lips pressing so gently atop my mound. He kissed a line from one hip bone to the other, still trailing the mistletoe, then he returned to my center and dipped his tongue between my folds.

I threw my head back, and a shameful gasp left my throat the moment he started kneading my clit with strong, perfectly pressured strokes of his tongue.

“N-Nicholas, please.” I heard myself beg when he spread me with his fingers, so he could get unencumbered access. “Please.” I wasn’t sure what I was asking for. Though he read me like we were of one mind, when he sucked on me, stroked me, then sucked again. Nicholas created an irresistible rhythm of hard and soft, push and pull, pressure and release.

I willed my hands to cover my mouth, trying to muffle every filthy whimper and moan, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of doing that to me. He followed the contours of my lips down to my entrance, then he dipped his tongue into my pussy without a moment’s hesitation. Any time I tried to buck my hips into his touch, increase the pressure, grind against his stubble, feel him as he devoured me, he held me down and shook his head. He had all of the control now, from my body to my pleasure to my soul, and he was going to make it abundantly clear that he knew exactly what to do with all of them .

He used his strong tongue to stroke along the front of my inner walls, then he pulled out and drew circles of pressure around the shallow nerves. He traced and tasted my cunt like he was insatiable, then he licked me back up to my clit, and he played me like a puppet, flicking and sucking and sending my body into a maddening euphoria.

The tension in my core was wound so tight it was unbearable. At some point, I’d stopped covering my mouth and started burying my fingers in his platinum hair, letting him hear every gasp and breath that I couldn’t help anymore. I felt him smile against me as he slipped back down to my pussy again. Back and forth, back and forth, and I was losing my fucking mind on his tongue.

He shoved my thighs wider, and he moved more aggressively now. I grabbed my own breasts, and started squeezing them, pinching them, rolling my nipples for an extra hit. I wanted every feeling all at once, from pain to perfection. In my head, I might have pretended I was trying to distract myself—to feel anything but the explosive pleasure he was forcing through my body—but in my heart and my core, I knew I just wanted more of all of it. More of him, more of this, just more .

“Is this how you hoped I would punish you, Sweet Noel?” His words vibrated against me. “Or maybe this is you punishing me .” His grip on my thighs was brutal, but fuck: I liked that too. “Making me need you. Crave you. Unable to live without you.” He sucked on me again, and I swear he took my life force into his throat when he did it. “You are all I’ll ever be able to think about.”

I heard my voice like it was a thousand miles away, as I fell over the edge under the power of that skilled tongue. My eyes were still blurred by moisture and orgasmic high, when his strong hands grabbed me by each side of my waist, then dragged me towards him in the snow.

My holy spirit had barely returned to my body, when I realized he now had me sheltered beneath him. He took both of my hands and pinned them over my head under a single palm, while he used his other hand to line himself up with me.

He pressed the tip of his cock to my pussy, and he lingered there, holding me in his eyes, and silently asking me for permission. We stayed in suspended motion long enough for him to fully absorb my expression, and for me to drink in his. I didn’t know what he was seeing in my eyes—maybe it was terror, or maybe it was lust, but in him, I could see nothing but desire, delight, and viciousness.

And yet I didn’t look away. I used all of my courage to hold his gaze with mine, trying not to flinch as he pushed in his first inch, his second, his fifth, his eighth, his… tenth. I was squeezing my hands into a fist as he filled me beyond capacity.

Nicholas held me there, sheathed to his base, letting both of us fully take in how we fit together. The stillness was as maddening as the feeling of fullness, and I was biting my lip to hide another pathetic whimper.

Nicholas grinned, while his sightline dropped down my body slowly, reveling in the image of having me connected to him, beneath him, and pinned by him.

“You’re perfect.” His tone was strained and unraveled. “You take me like you were made to be mine, Caroline.” I focused on nothing but my nervous breaths, as he started to add movement. “I love the way you squeeze me.” His cock slid easily through me, my own arousal smoothing the way for each and every thrust. “Gods…” Every word shook with need. “You have to be mine.” I bo wed my back against the snow, craving his body heat, but only able to admit it through my physical instincts. He added a few extra pounds of pressure to my pinned wrists to assure I couldn’t move beyond that, then he supported my lower back beneath his free hand.

“Look at how badly your body wants mine.” Nicholas purred as he flashed me his perfect white canines in his perfectly wicked smile. My heart fucking stopped when he released his grip on my wrists so he could grab my hips. Bracing me forcefully, the Saint fucked me like he loved me and hated me and needed me and condemned me.

“This is what happens when you show up where you don’t belong.” He growled through his slipping control. “Only to end up,” he slammed in, “exactly,” he pulled out, “where you always should have been.” He hit his hips into mine so fast and punishing, I swear I saw stars.

“Harder,” I taunted him, like a possessed psychopath. Fuck, I want him to take me harder.

“As you wish, my queen.” His laugh was one of pure, twisted joy. “From here on, I will always do exactly as you wish.”

I cried out as he finished me again, in an overwhelming crescendo of white heat and brilliant ecstasy. I felt his thick cock tense the moment before he released inside me, and our combined fluids soaked my nethers.

Nicholas lingered there, remaining locked in my heat, until he’d fully softened. Then he pulled out, and ran his hand up the slick arousal coating his shaft. He pressed his wet and sticky palm to my stomach, and he spread our mixed come up to my chest. The trail glistened with semen, sweat, and a hint of blood, while he scented me with sex, cloves, cinnamon, chocolate, and ice .

Nicholas looked down on our filthy mess with devilish amusement. I must have been quite the vision, while I still couldn’t figure out what to say or what to do.

So he decided for me.

He picked up a small chocolate ball that had been discarded on the blanket, still wrapped in brightly colored foil. He meticulously removed the red and gold wrapper, placed the ball between his teeth, then he leaned down and connected our lips. He used his tongue to force my mouth open and slip the ball past my teeth.

The chocolate melted slowly on my tongue.

The tranquilizer contained in its center, however, kicked in very, very quickly.

“Merry Christmas, Sweet Noel.” Were the last words I heard before I truly became his.