Frostbitten
Page 61

"Hold still!" a voice shouted.
I turned my head to see a figure running along the river's edge. It was Noah, stripping off his jacket as he ran. I tried to wriggle farther onto the ice.
"Hold still!" he yelled. "If it breaks, you're going under and you aren't coming back up."
He stopped parallel to me, then shimmied out on the ice until he got as far as he deemed safe. He tested it, rocking back and forth, then crouched. Holding one cuff of his jacket, he tossed it toward me. The other sleeve sailed out like a life-rope… and fell six inches short of my hand.
I wiggled, trying to reach it, but he yanked the jacket back with an angry "Stay still."
Moving on his stomach, he inched farther out, then threw it again. This time, it brushed my fingers. I caught the edge of the cuff, something I could tell by sight alone, my fingers too numb to feel the fabric between them.
I managed to get enough of a grip to tug myself nearer, then wrap it around my wrist. Noah pulled. I kicked, wriggling onto the ice, hearing it crack behind me. Noah kept pulling, carefully, then he heaved. The ice cracked and fell away as I shot toward him.
Noah backed up, still pulling, still telling me not to move, his face taut with concentration, tendons bulging as he dragged me to the riverbank.
"Okay," he said as I came to rest, huddled at the edge. "We need to-"
"What'd you pull out of the river, boy?" a voice echoed from the forest. "Is that my girl?"
Tesler stepped from the woods, his brother at his heels. Noah straightened. He turned from me, and there was my chance to escape. Leap up, knock Noah down and run… and I was no more capable of doing that than if I'd been bound hand and foot.
I huddled there, shaking violently. I tried to concentrate, but it was like standing on the precipice to oblivion-it took everything I had just to stay conscious and breathe.
"She fell in," Noah called back. His voice had changed, concern falling away, the timbre deepening, like a teen boy with his buddies. "Stupid city bitch. She ran out onto the river and fell through. If you want her alive, you're going to need to get her back to the cabin, pronto. She needs to get out of those wet clothes."
Tesler bent over me, teeth and eyes glittering. "Well, then, that's what we'll have to do. I wasn't planning to keep her in them for long anyway."
 
 
PRIZE
 

I WISH I could say I fought every step of the way. But even as that primitive part of me went wild with fear and panic, the rational part leapt in. I could feel my body shutting down, hypothermia like a sedative creeping through my veins, whispering for me to go to sleep, just go to sleep. The only fighting I could do now was to struggle to stay alive. And staying alive at this moment meant letting Tesler sling me over his shoulder and carry me to their cabin.  
THEIR "CABIN" WAS a big vacation house. The thick layer of dust over the knickknacks told me it didn't get much use, so I presumed they were squatting here, knowing there was little danger of the owner showing up. The security system had been ripped from the wall. Pizza boxes were piled by the door. Stains covered the carpets. The place reeked like a frat house-of spilled beer and sweaty bodies.
"You need to get her undressed," Noah said, dogging Tesler's heels as he entered the living room.
"Oh, believe me, I'm getting to it."
"Now, Travis. I'm not kidding."
I tried to look at Noah, but he'd turned away. Tesler dumped me on the bearskin rug in front of a smoldering fireplace.
"Strip."
"I'll grab her some-" Noah began.
Tesler wheeled on him. "You'll get her nothing, boy." To me, he said, "Strip. Unless you'd prefer I did it for you."
I pulled off my shirt. It took a few tries-my fingers refused to clamp on the fabric. I finally pushed my hands under and shoved it up over my head.
The cabin was already warm, with the fireplace still going and a woodstove blasting across the room. Tesler threw another log on the fire, then added tinder-pages ripped from books stacked by the fireplace. He looked over sharply as Noah reappeared in the living room, a towel in hand.
"Didn't I tell you-?"
"It's one towel. She needs to dry off." He walked over to me, and lowered his voice. "Don't rub too hard. Just pat your skin. You need to warm up slowly. Don't get close to the fire."
"You're a regular Boy Scout, aren't you?" Tesler said.
Noah shot a glower Tesler's way. "Do you want her with her fingers and toes or without?"
I was fumbling with the button on my jeans as Noah approached. He slung the towel over his shoulder and grunted "Here." He undid the button for me, as circumspectly as he could. His knuckles brushed my belly, but I couldn't feel it. He pulled the zipper down, then hesitated.
"Got it," I said as I wedged my hands under my waistband.
I pushed my jeans down over my hips. He didn't move, staying so close I could hear his breath picking up speed.
"Oh, he's a Boy Scout all right," Eddie said. "Never seen a naked woman before, Noah?"
"Only on his computer screen," Tesler said.
They laughed as Noah muttered, "Fuck off," handed me the towel and started backing up, gaze still on me.
"Better get that bra, too, boy," Tesler said. "I don't want those freezing and falling off."
"I can manage." I slipped my hands under the straps. I got them down over my arms, but no farther, the chest band still tightly fastened, cups hanging, fingers too numb to work the front clasp.
"Come on, Noah," Eddie said. "Be a gentleman. Help the lady."
Noah slid forward and stopped in front of me, eyeing the clasp. He unhooked it, hands trembling, fingers grazing the bottom of my breasts as the Tesler laughed at him.
I doubt it was the first time the seventeen-year-old had unfastened a bra, but it was more than that making his breath speed up. His nostrils flared as he drank in my scent.
He took the bra off, wrapped it around his hands and stood there, looking down at me in my panties, his own pants tenting furiously.
"Thanks," I murmured, gaze averted as I took my bra from him.
He backed away slowly, still staring. I tried to wrap the towel around me, but it was only a hand towel-I'm sure Tesler would have taken it away if it covered more. I could feel all three of them staring now. I resisted the urge to cover myself or turn away. If Travis wanted me to cower in shame, I wasn't giving him that satisfaction.