Jess peered in through the small window in the kitchen door and found a pair of wide eyes staring back at her through the glass.
“What is she, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“A pink dragon.”
Jess blinked. “What?”
Mel snorted and rolled her eyes. “Sage runs a mismatched island of misfit toys around here. You know that.”
“Don’t she, though?” Suki, Sage’s assistant manager, breezed past with a tray of freshly baked scones, her bright pink hair done up in a frolicking set of pigtails with little anime donuts wrapped around the bands. The front of her apron matched, with cute food art pins all over.
“Hey, Suki. Good to see you.”
“Same here, girl.” Suki gave her a bright smile, her almond shaped eyes twinkling. “You tell Sage to get her butt back down here and stop playing interior decorator all day at the house. We have a café to run.”
“Oh man. You don’t know how badly I want her here. Last night I came home and she’d moved all the furniture in the family room. I almost fell over an end table and landed face first in the fichus.”
“Ouch.” Mel winced.
“You’re telling me. I need to find her myself. Whoever’s making coffee at the house needs to be skinned alive.”
Suki snorted. “Mmm. Good luck with that.”
“Thanks. I’d better get back to my stalker. Talk to you girls later.” Jess picked up the carafe and sauntered back to the table. A pink dragon? Wow. She never knew such things even existed. And what the hell was a Night Wing gargoyle? Mel never did explain that cryptic little comment. Well, she was just going to have to find out.
Chapter Four
Thorne surveyed the dark landscape of the Westmore property and flexed his wings. The silence of the roof after the din of activity from below was a welcome respite. He relished his new job among Carrick’s elite guard, but being alone was what he did best. He readjusted his stance and craned his neck to see around the back of the manor house. The surrounding woods were dark but what he couldn’t see, his senses picked up without difficulty.
Wind whistled through the trees and the sounds of small animals foraging for food in the brush met his ears. Laughter and the playful nipping of wolf kind. No sign of the creature he’d scented at the coffee shop. Part of him hoped it would be foolish enough to track her back to the estate. That didn’t mean it wouldn’t try again. But this time he would be waiting.
A Night Wing gargoyle, he was used to the stares and contempt from those around him. In his human form, he looked very like any other male but, in his natural shape, he was the stuff of nightmares. Thorne had, in fact, been accused on more than one occasion of being the devil. He didn’t mind. Not if it got him where he needed to be.
He stretched his wings and let them flutter in the mild December weather. Texas was not like home and for that he was grateful. But sometimes, he caught himself longing for the craggy aeries of his lands and brutally thrust the thought away.
His home was gone. His brothers had seen to that. He absently ran a talon down the scar on his right side. Their treachery would go unpunished. For now. When he was ready, he would return and give them their just rewards for their fratricide. His father’s dying gasps still echoed in his memory and he hung his head low, trying to block out the sound.
“Find your place away from here, Thorne. Find a woman to love you. Build a home. Forget this place. Run, boy. Run. Before they finish what they started.” With blood on his lips, his sire had passed on into the next life, leaving a lost and trembling youth to climb his way from the ashes. The hybrids had already murdered his sister and there was nothing left of home. Of him. Instead he would rebuild and take back the night that had been stolen from him. His brothers would pay. One day.
He had made it his mission.
Every paid assassin he’d remembered from that night was dead, a swirl of ink running up his arms to mark the passage of time and the vengeance that was his. The pain reminded him he was alive. This job was another piece of the puzzle. If he could find one hybrid or the source of the nightmare, it would be enough.
A shrill sound split the night and he cocked his head, his preternatural hearing tuned to the slightest variable. Three nights to establish patterns and since then everything had gone like clockwork.
“It won’t always be that easy,” Carrick had warned. “Dante stumbled over a renegade dragon not too long ago and I don’t want any surprises. Not during the Yule Gathering.”
He had much to think about after his first interaction with his…what? Client? He didn’t even know what to call the female. Her name was Jess but his beast had another name.
Observing her from afar as she went about her day had been most illuminating. She spent hours poring over cookbooks in her room, reciting the names of recipes but thus far he had yet to encounter her in the kitchen. He’d also followed her into town, observing her and the woman she worked with rescuing stray kittens from beneath cars and a litter of puppies from a bramble.
No spoiled female would do such things.
This woman had potential. She was part of her community, not merely lording herself over it in a display of power. She reminded him of his sister Esmerelda, and he had to catch his breath for the wave of sadness that took him unawares.
Carrick was a brother looking out for his sister’s best interest. A mere boy when his murderous brothers took over their lands, Thorne had no way of protecting his.
“I will protect this woman. With all the breath in my body.” He whispered to the night winds, but the twisting in his gut told the truth.
He’d sensed it the first night and it set him spinning. His beast recognized her for what she was, but the human side was having trouble catching up.
She was his mate.
He knew it sitting across from her at the table, thankful there was a barrier to the erection that seemed to have taken permanent residence in his jeans.
Mate.
Fuck.
The thought had had him choking on his burger.
He did not need this kind of complication. Not now. He was here for a purpose.
No. Fucking. Way.
He ignored the gut clenching sensation when she was near and if there was a question about his body’s reaction, it was confirmed when she’d gone up to the counter to retrieve coffee from the timid waitress and the loud-mouthed siren with the fiery eyes.
They had finished their meal in relatively companionable silence and she’d driven them both home, vanishing into the house before he could say a word. She wasn’t what he expected. Not by a long shot.
Thorne watched her now, perched on the roof outside her window, as she readied for bed. She pulled off the Christmassy plaid shirt and hung it over a chair. Rubbing her hands over her arms, she yanked the tee shirt over her head and he groaned at the lush breasts encased in satin. Making quick work of her boots and jeans, she walked to the bathroom clad only in silky red panties. Moments later she emerged, the tendrils around her face damp, her face devoid of makeup.
When she reached for the nightgown draped on the edge of the bed and slid the cotton gown over her lush figure, he thought he would lose his mind.
How he would have loved to rip the undergarment from her curvaceous form and bury his now raging erection in her liquid heat. She was his and no other.
Thorne repositioned himself, thankful for the sudden blast of chill air. She turned from the bed and her eyes shot toward the window, an uncertain expression crossing her face. Was she aware he watched her?
He felt dirty doing so, and he shifted his weight again, staring out into the night. Moments later he glanced back, relieved when the light went out, and he could focus on the landscape around him. She would sleep and so would he. Nothing would move him save a call from her lips and that he knew would never happen. He readied himself for another long night and stared into the distance, trying not to think of the woman on the other side of the glass and how much he wanted to ho
ld her.
***
Jess was dreaming. In her mind she knew it, but the twisted images that raced past her mind’s eye were so tangible she couldn’t tell what was real and what was only illusion.
“Stop…” she moaned, pushing at the covers that wound around her legs. Eyes watched her in the night. She could feel their oppressive weight and fought against it. And then he was there, again. The unwanted face of her attacker, up close and personal.
“Howl for me, wolf. I’ll teach you to beg for it…”
“No!” She lashed out, her body hitting the floor, the covers binding and choking her like grasping hands. Her stomach twisted and she wanted to be sick.
A litany of cookies slipped from her lips, but the memories were so real they were hard to escape. A sob tore from her throat and she sagged against the side of the bed, her fingers curled against the sheets in an effort to right herself.
The images that assaulted her brain were burned there forever, the fear of releasing the beast that was caged inside her. Carrick couldn’t know. None of them could. She was a monster. Justin had seen to that. She’d been relieved when Carrick had killed him. A hybrid beast by his own hand, he had forced his genetic modifications on her. Among other things.
“You will be my mate, girl.” His sour breath on her face had made her want to gag. Injection after injection of body altering drugs were designed to make her stronger and match for him in every way.
He never did get her to shift and for that she was eternally grateful. Let Carrick and Reid think she was scared of horror movies. That wasn’t the real reason. She’d lived it. And if she wasn’t careful, one day she would slip and allow herself to change and have to face the fact that her nightmare was far from over. It was hiding in plain sight and no one had a clue.
A sob shook her as she remembered the dream. In it she’d shifted into a ravening beast, killing everyone in her pack.
“No…” She curled in on herself and lay on the floor panting.
The loud clang of breaking glass rent the night and suddenly arms were around her, rocking her and holding her close.
“I have you.”
She opened her eyes and screamed, the visage of her protector a nightmare personified. His smooth features were gray like stone, the long dark hair framing his powerful and seemingly arrogant face. But the rest of him… Feathery black wings that appeared to be sculpted in stone reared up from his back, his naked form covered in rippling muscle. Talons dug into her flesh, but the longer he held her, the less they stung.
She gazed into his eyes and knew him.
The horrors in her mind faded and she latched onto the man in front of her. He had saved her once more and he didn’t even know it.
“Thorne?” Her voice was gritty from sleep and her sight thick with tears.
“I am here.” He lifted her effortlessly from the floor and placed her on the bed, moving back into the shadows of the room. With the absence of his touch, the nocturnal images threatened once again. As he moved, she could hear the crunch of broken glass. “What has caused your distress?”
“It was nothing…a dream.”
She saw his shadow cross the open window and disappear into the darkness. “Not nothing.”
“Where are you?” Her voice trembled and she hated herself for it. He had vanished into the pitch black of the room and, even as she strained, she could not see him.
“I will watch over you. The creature will not harm what is mine.” He said it with such determination that she quivered inside.
His?
What did that mean? What creature?
“Thorne?”
“Yes?”
“Will you come here so I can see your face?”
“I don’t want to frighten you again.” His voice was bitter.
“You won’t. Not ever again.”
He hesitated, and then returned to her side, standing at the foot of the bed as if he were afraid to get too close.
“I’m sorry I screamed. I…get panicked when I get those dreams. I’m sorry…” Her voice drifted off and she met his luminous gaze.
“I accept your apology.” He came closer and lowered himself onto the mattress.
The bed creaked with the added weight and she leaned against him, happy he had returned. She listened to his breathing and sighed, her animal content that their mate was here.
Mate.
There was that word again.
She wanted to be mad but all she could feel right now was happy since he was here. She must have made a sound because his weight shifted.
“Are you well?”
“I am now. Why do I feel so comfortable around you?”
“You are mine.”
He said it with such a matter of factness that she smiled into the dark and gave a nervous little laugh.
Her animal stretched beneath her skin and she shivered at the heat swirling in her belly at his declaration.
She should slap him for assuming such a thing. Jess from a few days ago or even just this morning would have. She would have dumped him on his ass and yelled the house down. But not here. Not now. Now she only wanted Thorne around her and inside her. And so did her wolf.
Jess reached out and touched his face. “I’m glad you’re here.”
Thorne pulled her hard against him and she let herself be held, enveloped in his cool embrace. Her animal hummed in appreciation and she snuggled against his chest. Why did he have the power to calm her? It didn’t make sense.
“I’m sorry.”
He drew back and lifted her chin. “Do not be sorry. I am here to safeguard you.”
Heat infused her face. “No one can protect me from this.” A small hiccup of a sob bubbled up from her throat and she smiled through watery tears. God. That he would see her like this was mortifying but somehow it felt right.
“You haven’t let me try.” He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
“My window…” She stared dumbly at the glittering shards and shuddered. “I’m sorry. That’s my fault, too. I shouldn’t have cried out.” She curled into herself and buried her face against her knees.
God. Why was she such a fucking mess?
“No.”
She felt the bed shift beneath his weight as he sat down next to her.
“I heard you scream and reacted. For a moment, I was afraid the being from outside the café had come during my slumber. I would let nothing harm you on my watch. Nothing.”
The horror of what he said slammed into her and she raised her head.
“There was something out there tonight?”
He nodded. “I scented it but it retreated as I approached you.”
“Oh.”
So, she hadn’t been paranoid. Something had been out there watching her. The thought made her shiver and snuggle in closer to his cool comfort.
“I will have someone clean this tomorrow. Please have a care where you step.”
He moved to stand and she caught his hand without thinking. All she knew is she didn’t want to be alone and her animal wanted him close. As she shifted position, she noticed the erection he was trying unsuccessfully to hide. Naked from his shift, there was little he could do about it. She also spotted the tattoos that snaked up his arms and across his chest. They were hard to make out in the shadows of the room but she longed to run her hands over them.
“Forgive me.” He bowed his head and pulled free of her grasp. “My beast recognizes something in you. I want to explore it, but not when you are suffering from such a bad experience.”
Jess didn’t let him finish his thought. At his touch, the fear melted away. Her lips found his, the thin barrier of her gown the only thing between him and her pulsing heat. Her hand slid between his thighs and she brushed against his length. He froze as her fingers wrapped around him, a swift intake of breath his only response.
“I want you to stay.”
She had lost her mind. But maybe with him she didn’t have to be afraid. Of herself or anythi
ng else. She wanted him.
She really did. Whatever thoughts she had earlier about not falling for a male just because he crooked his finger fell flat. All she knew was the man in front of her made her feel safe for the first time in forever. It had started in the coffee shop when she felt the panic start to rise, and here again as she came out of her nightmare. If she’d been alone, she would have been reading that damn pile of cookbooks until dawn crept over the horizon or the bone weariness of the day dragged her down so deep even her demons couldn’t find her.
But Thorne…he made her feel like a woman.
“No.” Thorne pulled back, removing her hand from his cock. His eyes were luminous in the dark. “Not like this. You will be mine, Jess of the Westmore Pack, but not this way. Our beasts know what they want, but your human side is healing. We will speak more on this tomorrow when we both have had time to think it through. For now, sleep. I will watch over you.”
“But…” He made sense. He really did. The Jess from this morning would have laughed if anyone had told her she would be chasing after a hottie gargoyle she’d met only hours before. She’d always mocked the insta-mate thing she’d seen with every other member of the pack, including Reid. And Carrick. She’d never said as much to Sage, who she loved like a sister, but she wondered how a cat shifter and a wolf could ever connect on that level.
Now she wasn’t so sure of her position. The feeling of raw need was a force of nature and it licked fire over her whole body, urging her to join with him now and accept his mark.
Her nipples tightened into hard nubs and, each time she moved against him, her lady bits sang.
The moon moved from behind the clouds, filling the room with enough light for her to truly see him. He was beautiful. Sculpted abs and a body built for sin, she wanted to lick it and claim him as hers. Every delectable inch. The black feathery wings had folded against his back and she knew he had only partially shifted. Before she’d fallen asleep she’d looked up Night Wing gargoyles and found in their full form. They could blend into the blackest night, unseen, and were the strongest and most vicious warriors of the breed.
It should have made her afraid but instead it made her wet.
Westmore Wolves Series: Shapesifter Collection Bks 1-5 Page 31