B Cubed #3 Borg by Jenna McCormick Page A

shook, not from hypothermia, but
from emotion. He caressed Sage’s soft cheek, admiring the smooth texture of her
skin. She could have drowned or frozen to death or been ripped apart before he
knew just what she meant to him.
                Everything.
    ****
     
                Sage
snuggled deeper into the solid warmth of her bed.  It shifted beneath her and
large calloused hands smoothed over her bare back. The sensation startled her
awake.
                She
sat up and then gasped when she realized she was completely naked. So was
Berrick, who lay flat on his back under her. Green eyes were fixed on her face.
                “How
do you feel?” his rumbling voice jolted her into action. She sprang away from
him as far as the confines of the small space allowed.
                Cave,
they were in a cave. And from the looks of it, not just any cave, but one of
the Born inhabited ones. The firepit had been painstakingly carved out of the
rocky cavern floor, and tattered blankets were strewn over rocks, creating a
somewhat softer seat. The cave had long since been abandoned for more secluded
tunnels and burrows. This one was exposed on one side to the elements, thought
the snow had stacked up by the mouth of the cave, creating a barrier against
the howling wind. How did they get here?
                “You
fell through the ice. I pulled you out and brought you in here to warm up.”
                Her
jaw dropped and she swung back to stare at him. His ability to read her mind
had to be more than intuition—he’d done it too often. “How did you know what I
was thinking?” Was it really Berrick or was it part of that….thing he’d morphed
into?
                “Don’t
fear me,” his deep voice commanded. He reached for her, and she skittered away,
all too aware of her nakedness.
                “Don’t
tell me what to do,” she snapped. God, she was so fricking sick of every male
she met treating her like she was some sort of halfwit that needed to be
ordered around all the time. “And where the hell are my clothes?”
                He
pointed to a large rock beside the fire pit where her thermal suit had been
laid out to dry. His clothes—what remained of them anyway— were spread out
beside them.
                “Sage,”
he stayed where he was, his posture intentionally non-threatening. As if that
could somehow erase her memory of him, large and in charge, never mind bloody
and befanged . “I vowed I would protect you.”
                “Yeah?
Can you protect me from yourself?”
                His
eyebrows drew down. “I’d never hurt you.”
                She
looked him over, doing her best to ignore the fact that he was very naked. And according
to his anatomy, very aware that she was also naked. “You’re not Bred, are you?
I mean, the Bred can’t transform at will.”
                “Neither
could I, before a few hours ago.”
                She
frowned. Why was it the more questions she asked him, the less she seemed to
understand him?
                He
rose abruptly and her back slammed into the wall. Berrick scowled at the
movement. “If you believe nothing else, accept that I mean you no harm.”
                She
shook her head. “Sorry, but I’ve been told that before and it didn’t hold
water.”
                His
expression turned murderous. “Who was he? The Born who hurt you?”
                She
blinked at the change of subject. “Holy shit, you really can read minds! What
the hell are you?”
                “I
don’t know,” He looked away. It might have been a trick of the light, but she
thought she saw color rise in his cheeks, almost as if he were ashamed?
                “He’s
dead.” Sage spoke before she realized she was going to tell him anything. “The
man