“God that’s amazing,” he muttered. “Why does that feel so nice?” Almost without thought, Bobby started rubbing his cheek against Maelgwn’s chest. The leathery abrasiveness felt really…good, actually. Relaxing.
“Because one mate can naturally soothe another,” Maelgwn told him. “It’s in our nature to desire to please our mate. Keep them safe. Happy. Healthy.” Mealgwn cupped Bobby’s jaw, his claws brushing lightly over the corners of his lips. “Well satisfied.”
Bobby sighed, letting his eyelids slide to half-mast. “I think I love your touch,” he whispered absently.
Maelgwn looked exceedingly pleased by that utterance.
“What else do you need to tell me?” he asked. Now that he was relaxed and comfortable, maybe he could hear the rest of this information and not freak out.
Tilting his head, Maelgwn stared down at Bobby. “I’m not sure you’re ready,” he admitted.
“You’d better tell me,” Bobby murmured. He shrugged and gave his lover—oh, god, my lover is a gargoyle—a wan smile. “Otherwise I’ll just stew about it. I’ve got a pretty active imagination. Don’t want me to think up something too horrible, do you?”
“No, little one. I don’t,” he murmured.
Maelgwn rested his forehead against Bobby’s. “There is only one more big thing, my sweet,” he murmured.
Bobby could tell by the serious expression on Maelgwn’s face that this was something huge. As if being a creature other than human wasn’t huge enough! “What?” Bobby asked warily.
Chapter Six
Maelgwn sucked in a breath, praying what he said next didn’t send his mate running for the hills. Bobby seemed to be taking everything really, really well, so far. Praying that didn’t change, Maelgwn whispered, “Gargoyles can make males pregnant. If we have sex without proper precautions, you could bear a child.”
First, Bobby’s eyes widened, then narrowed. “You’re shitting me,” he said, clearly disbelieving. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. I thought I’d been handling things pretty well, why would you say something as ridiculous as—”
“It’s true,” Gus interrupted. So focused on his mate, Maelgwn didn’t know when Gus and Tible had returned, but never had he been happier to see the huge shifter. They sure could use a dose of calm right now.
Bobby frowned. “What? What are you talking about?” Gus and Tible strode into the living room and settled on an easy chair, Tible on Gus’s lap. “You remember I was in the hospital a couple weeks ago?” Gus asked.
Bobby nodded.
“I didn’t really have my appendix out,” he explained. “I was giving birth to mine and Tible’s son.”
Maelgwn watched a look pass between the mated pair, one of love and peace and comfort. A spike of jealousy hit Maelgwn and he had to look away. He so desperately wanted that with his mate. He’d been searching for his oneand-only for almost five hundred years. He had to make Bobby understand.
Returning his gaze to Bobby, Maelgwn cupped his human’s jaw and drew his mate’s focus back to him. “Have you ever thought about having kids?” he asked gently.
“Well, sure,” Bobby replied, his brows creasing. “Who hasn’t?” He shrugged. “But I’m gay, so it wasn’t like I really thought it was an option for me.”
Maelgwn nodded. “And now the opportunity has been opened to you, but you would carry the child,” he explained. “Or an egg,” he amended quickly.
“An egg?” Bobby muttered.
“Would seeing help you believe?” Tible asked quietly.
Maelgwn knew how closely Gus and Tible guarded the secret of their gargoyle son, so he found it incredibly sweet that they’d offer to share like this.
“Um, okay,” Bobby responded, drawing the word out, still obviously dubious.
Tible went to a cabinet in the corner. At first glance, the piece of furniture would pass as an old fashioned phonograph cabinet, but the inside was insulated and climate controlled. Opening the lid, Tible pulled out an oblong object with swarthy green, bumpy skin. He grabbed a blanket and wrapped it around the bottom half.
He brought it over and sat on the couch on Bobby’s other side. “Gus bore my son,” Tible murmured, holding the egg close. “He’ll hatch in about two and a half months, so we still have some time to choose a name,” he said, smiling fondly as he stroked his fingertips over the egg’s shell.
“Inside is a gargoyle?” Bobby asked, carefully tracing the skin of the egg. “Oh, it’s warm!” he cried, clearly surprised.
Tible nodded. “Yeah.” He glanced toward Gus, giving the shifter a smile, then refocused on Bobby. “We keep him in an incubator with a steady temperature of seventy-three. It’s not so important to keep the temperature steady as it is to keep bacteria out,” he explained.
Bobby reached out tentatively. “So, if I mate with Maelgwn, I’ll have one of these?”
Maelgwn couldn’t keep from touching Bobby any longer. He grasped his lover’s other hand and answered, “It’s an option we would discuss, but I’d never force you to bare my children, Bobby. We have plenty of time to decide if we ever want kids.” He wanted to make it clear that this wasn’t a requirement.
Over the centuries, his people had learned that it was easy to remove the threat of unwanted pregnancy. Although, their people loved little ones, they knew how to make certain mates were ready. All Maelgwn had to do was include at least two tablespoons of cinnamon in his diet every day. That meant several pieces of cinnamon toast every time he woke from roost. He’d been doing that since discovering his mate over a week ago.
For a long moment, they sat in silence. Bobby stroked his hand over Tible and Gus’s egg, the expression on his face one of wonder and awe.
Finally, Bobby licked his lips and refocused on Maelgwn. “I feel really safe with you, and you say that’s because of this mate-pull thing,” he murmured.
Maelgwn nodded, wondering where Bobby was going with this.
“You’re awfully big, no offense,” he tacked on, almost cringing. “What if you hurt me? Or one of your, um, clanpeople hurt me?”
The very idea that one of his gargoyles would hurt Bobby was ludicrous, but he couldn’t tell his mate that. He hadn’t missed the shiners on his lover’s eyes or the bandage on his nose when he’d first started watching over him. If his mate’s scent hadn’t told Maelgwn exactly how important this was to Bobby, the way he clenched his hands and the tension in his neck would have done it.
Carefully cupping Bobby’s jaw, Maelgwn stared deep into his lover’s green eyes. “There will be times, as chieftain of my clutch that I’ll do things you won’t understand or perhaps won’t agree with. This I promise you, Bobby,” he said. “I will never raise my hand to you. Ever. And if anyone else were ever to do so,” his tone turned steely, “I would make them regret it.”
Bobby looked at him for a long moment, his eyes roving over his face, perhaps reading the promises in his eyes. Licking his lips, Bobby nodded once. “Okay, I’ll do it. How does the ceremony work?”
Maelgwn blinked, trying to make sense of what had just happened. His mate had agreed to be his? He started to grin. “Wait, what ceremony?”
His brows creasing, Bobby said, “Didn’t you say something about a bonding ceremony?”
“Oh.” Understanding dawned. Maelgwn smiled. “No, it’s not a ceremony.” From the corner of his eye, he spotted Tible and Gus exchange a feral look. No guessing what they were thinking about. “When a gargoyle bonds with his mate, it’s done during sex.”
His mate’s mouth formed the prettiest oh of surprise.
He let his hand slide to Bobby’s neck and rubbed the man’s pulse point, pleased by the way he shivered at the touch. Maelgwn leaned close to the mouth he wanted to kiss again until his breath fanned Bobby’s lips. Scraping the pulse point lightly with one claw, he murmured, “To bond with you, I will bite you, really bite you,” letting Bobby know it would be different than the small nips he’d given him before, “right here, Bobby,
giving you the most intense pleasure of your life.”
Bobby shivered again. Maelgwn caught the change in his scent, telling him how turned on Bobby was. His own dick began to fill. He’d loved docking his mate’s prick with his own, the connection and pleasure it created, but he couldn’t wait to feel the man’s ass around him.
“We should go back to your place, my sweet mate,” Maelgwn urged. “There are only a few hours until dawn, and I’ll need you to claim me as well.”
Straightening, Bobby cocked his head. “I have to claim you, too?” He swallowed hard. “And, and, b-bite you?”
Maelgwn paused. He should have realized ingesting blood would be problematic to a human. He struggled to think of how to smooth this over.
“O-okay,” Bobby mused. He tipped his head to the side and frowned at Maelgwn. “Your, um, your hide is…well…” He caressed Maelgwn’s bare shoulder, giving him goose bumps. “I’m not sure I can bite through your skin,” he said dubiously.
Relief flooded Maelgwn. That problem, he could work with. Mealgwn smiled. “Don’t worry, my sweet. It’s a simple matter for me to cut my neck a smidge to give you access,” he assured.
“You’d cut yourself for me?” Bobby squeaked.
Maelgwn chuckled. “I’d do anything for you,” he responded immediately.
“Oh!”
On that note, Maelgwn pulled his mate into his lap and wrapped his arms around Bobby. He captured his sweet human’s lips, nibbling lightly on the plump bottom lip first, before diving in to taste his mate. His cock swelled beneath his loincloth. He could feel the hood of his cock pulling away from his glans as need for this human coursed through his veins.
Easing the kiss to an end, Maelgwn murmured against Bobby’s lips, “We should really go to your apartment. Leave your porch door open and I’ll let myself in.”
To his shock, the blood drained from Bobby’s face and he actually began to shake in his arms. The acrid scent of fear poured off his sweet human.
“Hey, hey,” Maelgwn purred, trilling on instinct and rubbing his cheek against Bobby’s, desperately trying to soothe his mate. “We don’t have to do it tonight if you don’t want to,” he said, hating the words even as they passed his lips. Now that Bobby knew what he was and seemed ready to accept him, Maelgwn didn’t want to spend another minute without him. But he would, if that’s what Bobby needed.
Bobby shook his head, then buried his face against Maelgwn’s neck, clinging to him. “Don’t wanna go back there alone.”
The hoarsely whispered words were difficult to make out, even with Maelgwn’s heightened hearing. He glanced toward Gus and Tible. Gus’s brows were drawn in worry. Tible frowned, his eyes narrowed.
What the hell is going on?
“Tell me why you’re so scared, little one,” Maelgwn urged. “What can I do to help you calm down?” Rubbing his cheek along the top of his mate’s head, he continued to trill while marking him with his scent. If Bobby were another gargoyle, or even some other paranormal creature, being marked by a mate would ease him. Since Bobby was human, Maelgwn wasn’t certain if it’d affect him the same way, but since he seemed to enjoy his trilling so much, Maelgwn hoped.
Less than a moment later, Bobby’s trembling stopped. “I’m sorry,” Bobby whispered, still hiding his face against Maelgwn.
Smoothing his hands down Bobby’s spine, Maelgwn nuzzled his lover. “Tell me what upset you so much, Bobby. Whatever it is, I won’t do it again,” he promised, praying he’d be able to keep it.
“Not you,” Bobby managed. “Can’t go home now. Seth was there.”
“What?” Maelgwn growled, his wings flexing instinctively. “When?”
Bobby shook his head.
It suddenly dawned on Maelgwn that he’d never actually learned why Bobby had come here instead of going home. He’d assumed it was because he wanted to check up on Maelgwn, but what if that wasn’t the case?
“Was Seth at your apartment building when you tried to go home from our date, Bobby?” Maelgwn asked pointedly.
Bobby nodded. “God, I feel like such a wuss,” he muttered.
“Hey, you’re not a wuss,” Gus immediately denied. “Seth is an asshole.”
“It’s not Seth, either, really,” was Bobby’s surprising response.
Needing more information, Maelgwn cupped the nape of his mate’s neck in one hand and his jaw in the other. He urged his mate to meet his gaze. His heart nearly stopped at the look in his mate’s eyes—shame.
“Ah, my sweet,” he murmured, giving up on looking his mate in the eye in favor of reassurance, he tucked Bobby’s head under his chin and held him close. “Please tell me what has you so worked up. What’s the matter?”
“Seth has friends,” Bobby whispered. “They’re abusive. Seth never stopped them unless they marked me in a visible location. It was Grant who broke my nose, not Seth.”
Maelgwn fought down a wave of rage at learning what his mate had been through. Even though he desperately wanted to hunt Seth and his friends down, he knew that wasn’t what his mate needed. Instead, he sucked in a deep breath and said, “I have a friend. We’ll call him. He’ll give us a room.” He prayed the wolf alpha, Declan McIntire, wouldn’t make a liar out of him. “We’ll go there and finish our bonding.”
He tipped Bobby’s head back and sipped several butterfly kisses from the man’s lips before forcing a smile and murmuring, “We will please each other greatly and after we’re done, I will keep you safe,” he vowed. “Tomorrow, we’ll go, together, to your apartment and pack. Then we’ll go to my clutch’s home near Durango, Colorado where you’ll not have to worry about Seth’s friends anymore.”
Bobby tilted his head and looked up at him. “Really?” He suddenly frowned and shook his head. “Damn it, I sound like a fucking pussy,” he snarled.
“No,” Tible said, crossing to him. “You sound like someone who’s been abused.”
To Maelgwn’s surprise, Bobby leaped from his lap and exploded. “It’s my fault because I stayed with him. I accepted his stupid explanations and platitudes,” he railed, arms flailing.
“Hey, easy,” Maelgwn ordered again, pulling his mate tight against him. “You won’t have to worry about him anymore, and once we get to my clutch, I’m not the only one who’d lay down his life to keep you safe,” he said sincerely.
Bobby’s eyes opened so wide, they dominated his face. “You’d lay down your life for me? Why would you do that?” Before Maelgwn could answer, Bobby smacked his chest. “Don’t you talk about dying. No dying!”
Maelgwn grabbed Bobby’s hands, holding them to his chest. “Right. That goes for you, too,” he murmured. “No dying. We have a long life to live together.”
“Do you really live thousands of years?” Bobby whispered the question, his tone awed.
“Gargoyles do, yes,” Maelgwn confirmed. “And since you’re my mate, once we bond, your life will extend to match mine.” He frowned, worried he’d lose his mate once he revealed the next bit. Knowing he couldn’t hide such important information from Bobby, he added, “If something should happen to you, I’d die and the same with you should something happen to me. We’d go mad with longing or die of heartache or—”
“I get it,” Bobby interrupted. “We can’t live without each other.”
“Right,” Maelgwn said solemnly.
Bobby looked toward Tible and Gus. “Are you two bonded?”
Gus grinned. “Yep,” he said, obviously pleased. He pulled Tible, who still held the egg, onto his lap and kissed his neck. “Tible’s all mine.”
Tible grinned over his shoulder at Gus. “And you’re all mine.”
“I’m gonna call Declan, while you chat,” Maelgwn said. Although he didn’t want to, Maelgwn shifted out from under Bobby and headed toward the window. He pulled his cell from his shoulder strap and called the alpha wolf.
“Declan here.” Declan’s lilted voice came through the line.
“Hello, Declan. This is Maelgwn.”
&
nbsp; “Maelgwn, how’s the hunt goin’?”
“Pretty well,” he told him, “but I need a favor.”
“Of course,” Declan responded. “I owe ye for helpin’ me pack members. Anythin’ in me power.”
Although Maelgwn had never really considered aiding Tible and Gus worthy of holding a boon over Declan, he wasn’t going to contradict the alpha wolf. It wasn’t worth the fight and would insult the shifter. No paranormal enjoyed being indebted to another, and if Maelgwn could leave Declan’s mind at ease by asking for private space for him and his mate for the night, then he’d do it.
“My mate accepts me, but we need privacy for the night to complete our bonding,” he stated bluntly, seeing no reason to beat around the bush. “Can I fly us over?”
“Aye, that’d be grand,” Declan replied, his mirth easily discernible. “Come on over.”
“Thanks.” Maelgwn hung up and turned back to his mate. He smiled when Bobby immediately blushed and focused on the floor. Stalking close, he murmured, “What are you thinking about, my sweet?”
“Um…” Bobby deferred.
“Just telling him all about how wonderful a mate’s bite can feel,” Tible answered, grinning. He bounced up off the couch and moved back toward the egg cabinet before Bobby could pinch him. Laughing, Tible quipped, “Well, I was!”
Seeing how this could get out of hand very quickly, Maelgwn wrapped his arms around his mate and pulled him close. “We’ll be staying the rest of the evening at Declan McIntire’s,” Maelgwn said. “Do you want me to fly us over there?”
“Fly us?” Bobby whispered.
Maelgwn grinned and flexed his wings, drawing attention to his leathery appendages.
“What about my car?” his mate asked, eying him dubiously.
Shrugging, Maelgwn started leading his mate toward the back. “We’ll pick it up tomorrow,” he said. “Let’s get going.” He leaned close and whispered, “I’m eager to feel your sweet cock in my ass.”
Bobby’s jaw dropped. “Really?” he murmured.
Maelgwn shrugged. He’d never bottomed before, he was chieftain of his clutch after all, but he’d known that one day, if his mate turned out to be a male, he’d have to. Now was the time. Besides, he’d seen how much pleasure his bedmates received from his cock in their asses and wanted to experience that. He just happened to want to feel it with his mate, so he’d waited until he’d found him.
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