Stone Romance (Stone Passion #2) (24 page)

Lowering her hand, she wrapped her fingers around his penis and slowly stroked, the thick flesh pulsing against her palm. “But I don’t want to think about that, Rhys; I just want to be here, with you.”

“Jenna….” He tried to protest before a low moan was wretched from the back of his throat. When she continued
to caress
him, his head fell back and his eyes closed as he strained towards release. His hips rolled slowly and he was thrusting his
erection
within her grip, groaning in pleasure. Jenna thought his cock was so beautiful, with its corded length and gleaming plum-shaped head. And it was the perfect way to distract him from things she’d rather not think about.

Pressing her thumb against the weeping slit, she smeared the fluid over the flange, her belly vibrating with excitement. She wanted to please him; take him into her mouth and learn the taste of him; anything to keep her in the moment and not dwell on what might have been.

Sliding down his body until her mouth was next to his erection she tongued the honeyed fluid, and hummed in approval. It was ambrosia, salty and slightly sweet, like chocolate-infused seminal fluid. She swiped her tongue once more along the length, enjoying the taste of his skin, loving the taste of his pre-come. “I’ve never tasted anything like this;
since you have semen
does it mean you’re capable of having children?”

“Uh, no,” he mindlessly groaned, his hand moving and resting on top of her head. She took the tip of his cock into her mouth and moaned as its girth stretched her lips and pressed against her tongue. His cock filled her mouth completely and she had to inhale through her nose, filling her senses with Rhys’s intoxicating scent. His breathing was ragged and his hips began to undulate faster. “Gargoyle sperm is incompatible with… Oh, man, that feels incredible.”

“
Mmm
,” she murmured, devouring his penis, the delicious pre-come, enjoying the sounds that were coming from him, the groans and heavy breathing. She curled the fingers of her free hand around his thigh to hold steady as she tightened her grip on his penis and took more and more into her mouth. Lost in a sea of carnal delight, she tried to take him down her throat, to swallow him whole.

“No!” he cried out, his hips shuddering beneath her but not in orgasm.
“God, not now!”

Startled, she pulled away, her eyes widening in horror because she had done something wrong, because she enjoyed it too much. She was about to scramble off the bed when his fingers wrapped around her wrist and he held her in place, the color leeching from his face. Her worry that she screwed up was replaced with terror that he was sick. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

“It’s dawn,” he rasped, his voice sounding as if it his vocal cords were being tumbled with rocks.

At first she didn’t understand, her brain befuddled with lust and terror but then she remembered he was a gargoyle from sun up to sun down. And as she watched in frustration and awe, he changed from man to stone beast. His thick, auburn hair receded into a scalp that was quickly changing shape; his lovely, gold-kissed skin became marble gray, his muscles tripled in size, swelling rapidly; his nostrils flared, his ears grew, his mouth split open. With a groan, he stood up, taking her with him
as he shot up two feet
, as two stone wings sprouted from his heavily muscled back. They stretched outwards, filling the room as he extended them to their full, ten foot width.

Her eyes widened in alarm as her gaze dipped to his erection and she watched in fascinated horror as his penis grew and grew and grew, until it was the size of a baseball bat. Inquisitively, she reached out and gently ran her fingers along the long, rigid length. Looking up, she had to tilt her head back much further than before; as a man, he was very tall; as a gargoyle, he towered over her, easily eight feet tall. She caught his guarded expression as he looked at her, his face that of a stone monkey. Reverently, she ran her fingers over the carved lines of his face, the stone skin smooth and burning beneath her touch.

He looked like marble but his skin was hot and living to the touch, almost like contained lava and if she closed her eyes it almost felt as if she were running her hands over flesh and bone instead of carved marble. As she drew her fingers over the sharp ridges of his cheeks and brow, the flaring nostrils and protruding ears; as she stood up on her toes and ran her hands along the broad spread of his muscled shoulders, over his sculpted chest and ripped abs, her stomach clenched in desire.

Hoarsely, she whispered
in awe
, “You’re beautiful.”

He
laughed,
the sound gravelly and rough. He reached out and cupped her cheek with his broad stone hand, nearly covering her face. “Forgive me.”

“Why?” she seriously didn’t know why he would be asking for forgiveness.

“I lost track of time,” he admitted, a rueful expression on his stone face.

“You’re not the only one,” she offered, watching his expression as she ran her hand along his gargoyle erection. His stone lids closed and he let out a hiss of pleasure and she smiled: his stone body was as sensitive as his human one.

“Usually it takes longer for a human to see us,” he said, his words coming out haltingly as he spoke. When she paused in her ministrations, he added, “They cannot see our movements and the magic convinces them that we hadn’t moved.”

“Lenni was aware of it,” she said wonderingly, remembering her sister’s odd comment when they were sunbathing; ‘
It’s like they move but whenever I see them they’re where they’re supposed to be
.’ Working out the dilemma, she resumed stroking him, loving the way his stone erection over-filled her hand, the way it was almost too hot to touch.

“
Yessss
,” he breathed.

Her lips curved into a smile as she quickly figured out
how she adapted so quickly, “It’s
because I watched you change.”

“Uh huh.”
His eyes were squeezed shut, his face twisted into almost painful pleasure, and she wanted to know what his stone flesh tasted like, if it was as lusciously perfect as his human flesh.

Before she could think about what she was doing or talk herself out of it, she crawled up onto the bed and up onto her hands and knees. Breathing heavily, she ran her hands along the smooth length, knowing that if she were just a smidge more sober she wouldn’t even consider doing something so…
taboo, so
forbidden. But she had to know.

Bending her head, she closed her eyes and slid her tongue along the carved slit, nearly coming on the spot as flavor exploded in her mouth. He didn’t taste like a rock; he tasted of moonlight and passion, of sex and Rhys. But he was so large, she couldn’t fit her mouth over the entire appendage, having to settle for licking and sucking the most sensitive part.

One arm snaked around his waist,
her
fingers curling into the stone flesh of his ass, holding on to him as she began to lose all of her senses. A broad hand cupped the back of her head, pushing the short strands of hair away from her face but she barely paid any attention to anything other than his penis. Rhys’s hips jerked erratically and she continued the assault by stroking her free hand along his massive stone erection.

“Jenna,” he rumbled as hot liquid erupted from his cock, filling her mouth and then… disappearing
as she
swallow
ed
the molten
gargoyle semen. Suddenly, h
er entire body tightened and splintered apart in a disastrously unexpected orgasm and she collapsed onto the bed, lost in sexual nirvana.

A millennium later a large stone hand gently stroked down her spine and a shiver rippled over her skin, bringing her back to Earth. Rolling onto her back, she looked up at the hulking gargoyle and heaved a voluptuous sigh, “Wow; that was… wow.”

“In all my years I have never experienced anything like that,” he graveled. “Your mouth is a dream.”

She huffed out a light laugh, “Because there just aren’t enough women willing to give a blow job to a gargoyle.”

“No,” he shook his head, his expression serious for a change, even in his gargoyle form. “I’ve had women touch me when I am a gargoyle; not often, mind you, and never because they knew what I was.” He took a shuddering breath, “I didn’t feel them, Jenna; I only feel you. I
don’t
remember any of the lovers I’ve had before you, Jenna; no other female exists for me but you.”

Tears of profound passion welled in her eyes as she held his gaze, his words filling her with joy and fear. Licking her lips, she softly asked, “Have there been so many women?”

“Yes,” he
admitted
, the word torn from his rocky throat
. He hastily added, “Gargoyles are lusty creatures.”

She smiled slightly at his fum
bling, asking,
“
How old are you?”

He shook his head in consternation, his expression guarded. “I’ve been around for a couple hundred years; maybe four hundred and fifty, five hundred? To be honest, I’m not sure; time is different for those of us who live for so long.”

Doing a quick calculation, using the conservative figure of five lovers a year (a very conservative number, considering how gorgeous and horny Rhys was) she gasped, “That’s thousands of women.”

“Spread out over many, many years,” he clarified, confirming her meager estimate. At her shocked gasp he grimaced, almost in embarrassment, “But you needn’t worry; gargoyles cannot catch any disease, human or otherwise.”

“Well, that’s relief,” she couldn’t keep the sarcasm from her voice. There were so many women; how many fell in love with the beautiful Rhys, who was so damned easy to love. She almost wished she hadn’t met him, knowing that after he exited from her life he would be taking the colors of the world with him. She’d survive and eventually the
colors might leak back in but they would always be muted. But at least she knew that colors still existed.

She stared up into his face, his stone eyes blank and unnerving. How could he see? And yet he said he could. And not having to stare into eyes that could see into the depth of her soul made it easier to delve into these sticky areas. If Rhys as a man had admitted to having thousands of women it would have devastated her; coming from the mouth of a gargoyle made it almost bearable. Of course, when he returned to his human shape, she wasn’t sure how she was going to react.

And it was ridiculous to be falling so hard and so fast; hadn’t she learned her lesson with Jeremy? His death had nearly destroyed her. And yet she couldn’t help falling for Rhys, whose laughter brought her back from the dungeons of merely existing. He made her want to embrace life once again and throw caution out the window and not worry about whatever darkness lay ahead. So much had changed in such a short time; maybe things would return to normal in a few weeks. But how likely was that when she was having this conversation with a living statue?

His stone brows pulled together as he cocked his head to the side, looking like a curious carved monkey. She could use him as a model for a painting of the trio of ‘See No Evil’ monkeys. But he was Rhys, always Rhys
,
and it was disturbing how she saw him as Rhys no matter what form he took. “What thoughts are going through that beautiful mind of yours, Jenna? You’re brooding and while I find a naked and brooding Jenna sexy as hell, it worries me that you can do so while standing in a small room with a gargoyle.”

That earned him a reluctant smile but her heart still fluttered madly in her chest. How could he understand her fear when he didn’t have to worry so much about time? “I’m twenty-four and already I feel old before my time,” she confessed, trying to figure out what was bothering her as she spoke. “Yet you… you will always be young and beautiful; you have relationships with other beings that never grow old, never age and I am only a human. I’ll grow old and die and you’ll always be perfect.”

He cupped her cheek in his warm, sculpted gray hand, his eyes taking in her worried expression. Framing her face in his hands, he stared at her intently. “It doesn’t have to be that way.”

Putting her hands over his, feeling the
sharp knots
of his knuckles, the
long, sleek stone
of his fingers, she asked, “What do you mean?”

“There is a ritual that will bind us together,” he told her, his expression intense even in its sculpted monkey form. “I give up my nights for you and at the end you accept my gift.”

“What gift?” she quirked a smile even as she desperately wanted what he was offering, to have a lifetime with him, to have eternity with him.

“You become a gargoyle.”

She stared at him for a full minute, taking in the carved marble nose, the wide mouth, the stone tongue, the sculpted body, before she
exploded in laughter
. The only other option was to cry. Shaking her head no, she curled her lips into a smile to keep from giving into tears. Then she took a step away from him and wrapped her arms around her body, abruptly feeling vulnerable in her nakedness as she stood before an eight foot tall gargoyle monkey asking her to give up her humanity. “I cannot; you know I cannot.”

“Not immediately, of course,” he continued, not heeding her words.
“But eventually.”