How to Seduce a Gargoyle in 10 Days (2 page)

“I couldn’t possibly.” What would she do with behemoth when she got him home? If it was awkward here, what would it be like when it was only them? Ginger had fired her servants and kicked Gavin out.

“Of course you could. In fact, I insist. Happy Divorce.” Aradia waved her hand and Ginger’s drink was full again.

“I’m going to get hammered and won’t be able to fly home,” Ginger giggled.

“Slade will fly you home. It’s part of the deal. Isn’t it?” Aradia prompted.

The heel of his hand dug right into one of the knots in her back, one that she’d named George because she’d thought it would stay with her forever. Then he said, “It would be my sincerest pleasure.”

The deep octave of his voice seemed to touch her in places it had no business touching and that, combined with the dissolution of George, was practically orgasmic.

Aradia didn’t speak but got up and took Valerian’s hand. She led him to the magick ocean and they disappeared beneath the waves.

She was alone with Slade.

George was back, and he spawned babies.

Slade leaned back from his work. “Shall I stop?”

“Oh Goddess, no!”

“Then why did you tense when they left? Your actions today are much different than your actions at the tea. Have I displeased you?”

She bit her lip. “I was angry at my soon to be ex-husband at the tea.”

She was glad he couldn’t see her face because she blushed. She’d fellated a cock straw with him, Valerian, and the world looking right at her. Ginger couldn’t believe she’d behaved that way.

“Ah. I see. Are you afraid of me?”

No. Yes. No. Both
. She decided on no, Ginger was more afraid of herself. But she couldn’t seem to get the words out.

“Many witches prefer Valerian because he looks more like a warlock with his lighter coloring,” Slade said softly. “It’s okay if you do as well.”

She shook her head vehemently.

“Then look at me.”

She turned over on the chaise to look at him, but that was when she realized that the tiny bikini had betrayed her in the worst of ways.

In the process of turning, the useless bit of floss had migrated from covering her breasts, to twisted
around
her breasts, holding them high and bare—as if presented for his approval.

She looked like a bondage newbie who’d gotten confused playing with a ball of twine.

Ginger tried to use her magick, but she only succeeded in causing the suit to wrap itself more tightly around her goods.

She shrieked, “Aradia!” With a force so loud it shook the tranquil haven and caused the waves to crash more violently against the shore.

“No need for that.” He reached out his hands, one claw extended and snipped the fabric right in the middle, causing it to snap and her breasts to break free.

She flipped herself over on her stomach so fast that her bikini bottoms followed suit and she was sure she’d just flossed her ovaries with the damn thing.

“Oh my Goddess,” she whispered, humiliation burning her face. “This is so embarrassing.” She snuck a look at him.

“Why? Where I’m from, this—” he pointed to his loincloth “We don’t wear these. Our bodies were given to us by the creator. There is no shame in flesh.”

“Can you just…”

He snipped the string at her hip.

“Aradia seems to want you naked.”

“I think you’re supposed to be my divorce present.”

“You’ve just now figured that out?”

On the down side, she was naked in front of the sexiest male she’d ever met. She was completely humiliated.

But on the plus side, he didn’t seem to mind. In fact, if the bulge beneath that loincloth were any indication, she might just be on her way to having the best sex of her life.

Slade had brought her home after finding her a robe, and he’d stayed. He was hers for ten days.

She’d kind of expected him to carry her to the bedroom and have his wicked way with her. Or at least, that’s what she’d hoped.

But no.

He brought her home, tucked her into bed, and promptly perched himself on her balcony. He actually intended to guard her.

Ginger didn’t understand. He’d had a hard on—or maybe he hadn’t. Horror dawned slow and ugly. He was a gargoyle after all. They were hard everywhere, all the time, or so she’d been given to understand.

All of the heat and arousal she’d felt chilled to nothing.

Maybe he was waiting for her to order him to do her. That would never happen. Ginger wanted to be wanted for herself. Not because she told him to.

Although, she had gotten the best sleep of her life. Not as good as the best sex of her life, but maybe it was a near second.

She hadn’t been able to sleep since she’d kicked Gavin out. He’d play the injured party to the rest of the world, but he’d find a way to pay her back for embarrassing him.

Even though he’d humiliated her with his very public affair with Aloe.

The bell rang while she was still abed and even though she wasn’t inclined to answer it, Slade’s movement from her balcony railing intrigued her.

He stood straight and tall on the thin railing, his powerful legs keeping him balanced. When his wings spread to their full glory, she might’ve actually sighed out loud.

 They were so beautiful—like a black/blue mother of pearl. Her fingers itched to touch them.

Slade launched himself off the balcony and flew toward the front of the estate and her visitor.

She cast a quick grooming charm and made her way down to the door.

When she opened it, all of her good feelings vanished.

It was Gavin.

Slade stood off to the side and waited for her direction.

“You can’t keep me out of my own house, Ging.” He flashed her that politico smile with all of his too-white teeth.

“It’s not your house, Gavin
.
If you’ll refer to clause seven, line forty-two, sub part B of our marriage contract. It was my inheritance.”

“Yes, but you’re my wife. What’s mine is yours and what’s yours
is mine
.” Gavin eyed the gargoyle.

“What’s mine is yours? And you say this works both ways?” Her temper flared, hot and volcanic. After being married for one hundred years, she would’ve thought he’d recognize the signs by now.

“Exactly.”

“So your wand? That’s mine? If so, what were you doing shoving it into Aloe Hugginfroth?”

“Are you ever going to let that go? I’m a warlock. We’re not meant to be monogamous. Be a good blue-blooded witch and ignore it. We’ll go on about our business and our lives can get back to normal.”

The part that pissed her off the most about this was that he actually believed the garbage he spewed.

“Shall I eject him from the property?” Slade asked her.

“No one was talking to you,” Gavin growled and tried to make a show of shoving him, but was ineffectual. Magick crackled around him.

“If you try to curse him, how is that going to look for your pet project the Gargoyle Ball?”

“Yes, how would it look? Does your new attack dog know that the ball lost funding because of you?”

Slade was unaffected.

“The ball lost nothing. Aradia’s son filled in where you couldn’t.”

Gavin blasted Slade, but his magick beaded and rolled off his skin like raindrops.

“As above, so below, I divorce you, Gavin Butterbean. So let it be done.” She’d been waiting to say the words that would irreparably dissolve their marriage contract. It was irreversible. They could never be bonded again—and Ginger could never marry another warlock. It was a magickal binding part of the pre-nup.

“You’re going to spend the rest of your life alone. You’re going to be a bitter, wicked old witch.”

“I’ve been alone for the last twenty years. It’s really not so bad. I’m alone, but I’m rich. And you, Gavin, you’re broke. You’ll have to rely on Aloe’s generosity, because no one else will support you.” She managed to keep the expression on her face unfazed and calm, even though his words cut her deeply. The wound in her heart ached as it cracked open a little wider.

“It’s time for you to leave,” Slade closed his clawed hand around Gavin’s upper arm.

“Get your hands off me.”

“When you’ve exited the property. And if you come back without Ginger’s invitation, I’ll rip the meat from your bones,” he said conversationally and thrust Gavin through the front gates as if he weighed nothing more than a ragdoll.

She wouldn’t cry.

At least not where anyone could see her.

Reporters from
Magickal Mayhem
erupted from the bushes and they were snapping pictures of Gavin, of her, of Slade. She forced a smile, even though she was sure her face would crack open wider than her heart, and she waved.

Slade launched himself up the staircase, gliding with his wings splayed behind him. He turned to face the crowd and pushed Ginger behind him and into the house.

Then he closed the doors, effectively stealing their prize.

She scrubbed her hand over her face.

Ginger knew it was coming, that she was going to divorce him. But he was right, she was going to end up even more bitter than she was now, and she’d always be alone.

“Aradia should’ve sent me to you sooner. You shouldn’t have to deal with that,” Slade said quietly.

Ginger shook her head slowly. “He’s right. I’ve been bitter and hateful. I almost ruined Aradia’s son’s wedding. I probably deserve everything I’ve gotten. I’ve just been so angry for so long.”

“Anger has its place.”

“Until you drown in it.”

“You can’t drown while you’re flying.”

“I don’t know how to fly.” She didn’t even know him, and she was confessing everything to him like he was a priest.

“Come.” He held out his hand and led her through the house and up to the ancient archer post on the roof.

She followed him blindly, thinking that flying was going to be some kind of orgasm, but he meant actually flying. Which in itself wasn’t bad. It was actually pretty amazing.

But all she could think about was sex.

Especially when he drew her against him. “Hold to me.”

Holding to him was definitely not a problem. She leaned her cheek against his hard-muscled chest and wrapped her arms around his waist. He was so… big. He made her feel tiny, and when his embrace tightened, she felt positively dainty.

He spread his wings and leapt into the air.

The higher they flew, the colder the atmosphere, but she only felt it in bursts. It was a strange contrast to the heat building inside of her.

Slade landed in a strange valley nestled between the peaks of two snow-capped mountains. It boasted a hot spring and an endless blanket of little purple flowers.

“Where are we?”

“Gargoyle lands.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“Come.”

Oh, how she’d like to.

He drew her toward the hot spring and this time, she manifested her own swimming suit. It was a tasteful one-piece and there was no danger of flossing her bits, or exposing anything she didn’t want exposed.

Except, she kind of wouldn’t mind him looking at her again, if he’d liked what he saw the first time.

She stepped down into the water, and the heat seeped through to her bones. She sighed as the tension slipped from her body.

“I don’t have a pineapple with rum in it, but I can offer you this.” He handed her one of the blue blooms, and she saw it was filled with a kind of nectar.

As she drank it, he stepped into the steaming spring with her, the water beading on his skin and glinting like diamonds in the sunlight.

It was like honey and whiskey—a sweet burn as she swallowed. That languid heat filled her veins and chased away a cold that she didn’t know she’d been harboring.

It was as if the nectar pushed out all the bad feelings, scalded them and turned them to ash.

“It’s so—” she laughed, “—magickal.”

His stone carved mouth curled into a smile. “Yes, it is. It’s sacred to my people. It’s a healing of sorts, from the inside out. Your sadness was making you sick.”

“Why would you bring me here and give this to me? I haven’t earned it. I don’t deserve it.”

He looked away from her. “Sometimes, we all get things we do not deserve. Good and bad.”

She set the flower down softly and crept closer to him in the steaming water. “Thank you.”

“Be well, Ginger.” He leaned back against the rocky edge, unfazed by the rough terrain.

She wished she were bold enough to reach out and touch him. She knew that he wouldn’t tell her no. After all, he was essentially hers until the ten days were up. Only she wanted him to touch her because it was what
he
wanted, not because he felt it was his duty.

Ginger was tired of being a duty.

She sighed, and while this thought displeased her, it didn’t come with the same crippling doubt and sharp things poking into that hole in her chest. The nectar had done its work.

“I want you to be well, too.”

His dark eyes fixed on her with a singular, animalistic intensity. “Do you?”

Suddenly, she felt like a rabbit, and he was a hungry wolf. She didn’t mind the sensation in the least. Her mouth watered and she bit her lip. “I do.”

She wished she could say more than that, that she could tell him boldly all the things she wanted to do to him that could, perhaps, help him be well. In all the books she’d read and movies she’d seen, this was the time to tell him.

Or even show him.

Close the distance between them, push her hand underneath that loincloth, and bring him to culmination.

But Ginger wasn’t that kind of witch.

He brushed his knuckles so softly against her cheek that she wasn’t actually sure if he touched her or if she imagined it.

“Your skin is so very soft—very fragile.”

“I am not so breakable,” she managed. Ginger bit her lip just a little harder, wondering if he considered the same things she did.

“Perhaps not, but Gargoyle bodies are like stone and swords.”

Ginger arched a brow. “Swords, eh?” Then she blushed.

He didn’t laugh. “Sharp and hard. All over. Meant for tearing, impaling, and destroying.”

Impaling didn’t conjure the image he was probably going for. All she could imagine was being “impaled” on this cock. Straddling his powerful thighs, digging her nails into his broad, strong shoulders.