Chapter 17
Quinn
Of all the places to ride out the intensifying symptoms of a failing heart, Rollick’s badlands house was probably one of the best. I had innumerable softly cushioned surfaces to stretch out on when my chest clenched up. There was a salt-water pool to take a refreshing dip in while I shook off the effects of the latest attack. And all the food and drinks I could possibly want were on hand, regularly replenished by Crag and fried or sliced up by Lance as need be.
Most other places I could have ended up would definitely have been worse. But I couldn’t say I was enjoying my stay all that much regardless.
None of the spasms in my chest had hit me as hard as the pain right after I’d compelled the leviathan, but they were coming frequently enough that my men had insisted I stay here while they did their recruiting—and from a practical standpoint, I couldn’t really argue. It wasn’t as if the average shadowkind being was going to respond better to overtures from a human sorcerer than from one of their own kind anyway.
So I was doing my best to recover more fully and to not go stir-crazy from boredom. When I felt steady enough, I went out into the yard and chatted with the newer beings who’d come to join us, getting a feel for their strength and skills. When I didn’t, I paged through my sketchpad, looking at the designs I’d set on paper with pencil and fighting the constricting of my throat.
I wasn’t going to see any of those plans to fruition. My chances of seeing my career through to any kind of real accomplishment had always been uncertain, and now it was pretty much impossible. I suspected I’d be lucky to have as much as another month or two before my borrowed heart crapped out on me completely, and that was if I didn’t put any more significant strain on it. I wasn’t on any waiting lists; my medical team didn’t even know I might need a replacement. Even if I had been, the chances of getting the right match at the right time were always iffy.
That was the way it was. I’d resigned myself to my probable limited lifespan before, and I could deal with it now—as long as I knew I’d stopped the threat to everyone else’s lives before I went.
Today, there hadn’t been a whole lot that I could accomplish toward that goal. I’d talked with several new shadowkind arrivals in the morning, and no other beings had turned up since then. Walking around had left me feeling faint enough that eating a proper lunch had been a bit of a struggle.
I’d dug my trusty multi-tool out of my bag in the hopes it might give me a sense of purpose, but as far as I could tell, Rollick kept his property in such good repair that there was nothing for me to fix even a little. And anyway, when I thought about it, making some tiny tweak to a fixture or piece of furniture seemed so pointless now compared to the vast problems looming over me.
Finally, I went out onto the inner patio around the pool in the hopes that soaking up some sun—after a careful layer of sunscreen, as if I really needed to worry about minor precautions like that at this point—would rejuvenate me, and ended up drifting off in a brief nap.
I woke up feeling annoyed with myself for dozing when there was so much to do, even if I couldn’t really do any of it at the moment, and headed inside to see if there’d been any news I’d missed. I was just coming through the patio door when a pressure like a massive hand digging its fingers into my ribs squeezed around my chest.
My breath hitched. I stumbled and caught my balance on the back of one of the living room chairs. A chill washed through me from head to toe.
“Quinn!” Crag appeared by my side out of the shadows, sliding his arm around my shoulders.
I opened my mouth to tell him I’d be okay, but all that came out was a choked gasp. Making a rough sound of dismay, the gargoyle swept me up in his arms and carried me into my bedroom.
Inside, he set me gently on the bedcovers and then seemed at a loss for what else to do. I gritted my teeth against the pain that was gripping me and jerked my hand toward him in a vague beckoning gesture.
Crag eased onto the bed next to me as gingerly as a man that large could manage. He tucked me against his massive form, brushing his fingers over my hair and humming in what I could tell he intended to be a soothing sound. “I’ve got you, Softness. You’ll get through this. I know how strong you are, even if you shouldn’t have to be strong enough to endure this pain.”
I managed a ragged chuckle and nestled myself closer against him. The warmth of his body radiating over me and the tenderness of his attentions melted the worst of my discomfort. I breathed in and out as steadily as I could, and gradually the tightness released me. My heart thudded on, if with a beat that was a little erratic.
“Thank you,” I said. “I’m all right now. No big deal.”
Crag grunted. “Of course it’s a big deal. I don’t like to see you hurting.” He pulled away from me just as tentatively as he’d gathered me against him, and I felt his nervousness about hurting me himself through the connection between us. “Is there anything else you need? Would you like help getting back to the living room—or wherever you want to go now?”
I rested my hand against his chest, where the planes of muscle were covered in human-like skin that now felt not quite as familiar as his rocky gargoyle form. Now that my body was no longer fighting itself, a different sort of heat was tickling through my veins.
Lance had needed a particular kind of assurance that my health problems hadn’t made me totally fragile. And Crag had always been the most worried about how his monstrousness might damage me.
And I had even less time than I’d had before to make the most of the life I’d gotten. The love I’d discovered in that life.
“I think I’d like to stay right here,” I said, looking up at him through my eyelashes. “As long as you’re here too.”
Desire flared in the gargoyle’s eyes even as I caught another tremor of uncertainty from him. “Are you sure that’s a good—” he started to ask in a tone that showed his reluctance at balking, and I answered him the fastest and most effective way I could: by slipping my hand around his head and pulling him into a kiss.
As our mouths melded together with the delicious friction of Crag’s rocky lower lip against mine, he let out a groan that reverberated through his chest. More desire licked at me like flames through our emotional connection. He sank down again to slide closer to me, but the hand he rested on my waist still felt too careful.
I ran my fingers over the sheen of black hair on his scalp, curling them to tease my fingernails over the bronze skin in an imitation of claws. An eager quiver passed through Crag, and he kissed me harder. The bulge behind the fabric of his shorts was already stiffening.
A rush of wildness caught me up. I wanted him. I wanted every part of him. He needed to know that.
I tore my mouth from his and met his eyes, my cheeks flushed from the passion we’d already kindled between us. “When you’ve been with other shadowkind, it wasn’t just with your gargoyle size. You brought the gargoyle fierceness too.”
A whole lot of other parts of Crag stiffened at those words. He frowned. “They could handle it. They?—”
“They didn’t have delicate human bodies, I know.” I cupped his cheek. “But I’m not that delicate either. I’ve taken Lance’s claws and Torrent’s tentacles. I don’t want to be just pampered, as nice as that can be. I want to be ravished too.”
Crag’s tongue flicked over his lips in a way that sent sparks right down the center of me to my cunt. “I don’t need to let out that side. You shouldn’t have to witness any more of my brutality than you’ve been forced to before.”
I stroked my thumb over his prominent cheekbone. “I love your tender side and your brutal side, Crag. I appreciate your hardness as much as you enjoy my softness. And what I’d really like right now is for you to rip the clothes right off me and take me like you can’t stand to wait another second without us fucking.”
A guttural sound emanated from Crag’s throat. His eyes flared with a hotter light as his body expanded into his full gargoyle form: skin turning rock hard, horns jutting above the sharper angles of his face, wings extending from his back.
With a growl, he flipped me onto my back and loomed over me. The claws that had sprouted from his fingers were much shorter than Lance’s but no less deadly. He raked them down the front of me with a swipe of his hand, shredding open my tee and shorts without doing more than grazing the skin.
That prickling, not quite painful touch woke up even more desires in me. I trembled with giddiness, a gasp tumbling from my lips. As Crag shoved the tatters of my clothes aside, I raised my arms to pull him closer, rising up to seek out his mouth. He needed to see just how into this I was now that he’d accepted my demand.
He let his lips crash into mine with a force that left my head spinning with a heady pleasure that was echoed through our connection. His forceful hands swept aside the last fragments of my panties and the cups of my bisected bra. He gripped one breast, massaging it firmly and pinching the nipple between his thumb and forefinger with a jolt of bliss. I whimpered eagerly against his mouth.
Crag raised his hand to scrape the tips of his claws over my breast the way he’d have seen Lance do a dozen times. I pressed my lips against his while holding the rest of me still so that he didn’t sever anything important with his thrillingly dangerous touch. Then he reached farther down, trailing his claws over my sternum and belly until he reached the mound between my legs.
When he cupped my pussy, I arched to meet him, my lips parting to let him devour me even more fully at the same time. With a heated rumble, Crag swept his long gargoyle tongue into my mouth and flicked his claws up over my slit to my clit. I moaned, shuddering against him with nothing but enthusiasm for all he was offering.
His mouth wrenched from mine as he teased his fingers over my sex at an aggressive pace. My head tipped back into the pillow, my breath breaking into pants. Crag let out another growl as he gazed down at me.
“I want to make you mine in every possible way. I want to plunge into you so hard it knocks every other thought from your mind. I want to feel you shaking with delight.”
An impatient noise formed between my ragged breaths. “Then what’s taking you so long?”
He snarled and heaved my hips up to meet him with one hand. I knew how large he was, but I was used to him now—and the savagery of his foreplay had left me drenched and ready. I hefted my ass a little higher to show just how on board I was, and the next thing I knew he was thrusting his entire thick shaft into my pussy.
The giddily searing friction had me gasping for more. I shook in his arms like he’d asked for, clutching him and pressing closer. With a flurry of noises that were half growl, half groan, Crag pounded into me. I bucked to meet every thrust with all the hunger scorching through my veins.
“So soft,” he muttered, “but so strong. I love you, Quinn. Always. Always.”
“Always,” I gasped in agreement, and lost my voice completely with the next plunge of his cock. I was seeing stars, pleasure blazing through me like a flashfire, burning away everything but this moment. Me and one of the monstrous men I loved so much.
His claws dug into my thigh with a flash of pain that I knew meant I’d need a quick swipe of Lance’s tongue later, but in the moment it brought nothing but a deeper shock of bliss. I cried out, a tremor wracking my body as the building ecstasy exploded in a final, epic firework. But even in the haze of my pleasure, I kept rocking my hips to meet Crag, wanting more, wanting him to come with me.
“Want to feel you come,” I muttered, and Crag slammed into me with a roar that shook the walls. His cum flooded me, perfectly hot and thick, his cock pulsing with the effort he’d expended.
He eased me down on the bed and held himself over me on his hands and knees, his chest heaving, his fiery gaze seeking out mine. I beamed up at him, a little delirious in the afterglow, and only then did he relax. A smile crossed his lips that was broader and brighter than anything I’d seen from the usually solemn gargoyle before.
“I satisfied you well,” he said with a hint of pride in both his voice and the emotions traveling between us.
I couldn’t restrain a giggle. “Very well. But then, you always do. My stony gargoyle.”
He leaned in to nuzzle the side of my face with a gentleness that was the total opposite of the beast he’d brought out on my request. “My soft-but-strong mortal. The leviathan is a fool if he thinks he can beat you.”
My smile faltered just slightly. I sure hoped my lover was right about that.