Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
N ext time for sure.
My dudes. I am tired. Can you please stop trying to get Fox to do shit he has zero intention of doing?
And also, why the hell would this Santanos guy keep sending cannon fodder?
Doesn’t he have someone like Fox who might be able to give Fox a run for his money?
Not that I want Fox actually hurt or killed.
I’m just kind of surprised that bad guys really are stupid.
Fox has literally killed like a hundred of Santanos’ people, and the dude keeps sending groups of over-confident, under-competent goons to dull Fox’s blade.
Maybe the blade really is dull because Fox gets fed up with it and starts shooting pretty quickly.
These people are more of the pink mohawk gang, and their means of trying to detain my future husband was some kind of mesh.
It looks like it hurts, but Fox isn’t one to let a little smoking skin stop him from putting bullets into the heads and hearts of random attackers.
I wonder if I should let Annette know now that Santanos is dead as soon as Fox is ready to hunt him down, or if I should wait on that, because it seems like these two groups of pink-haired idiots were probably sent out as a single group and decided to split their chances.
I mean, it could be that Fox doesn’t consider this a second attack and he’ll wait for Santanos to send one more set of goons before carrying out his threat. It could also be that Fox is irritated as shit because we’re half a block from home, hot showers, warm beds, and possibly all night snuggles.
He doesn’t know that I am considering the possibility of a slumber party in his bed, but I’ll figure out a way to tell him if I decide to sleep with him, even if I just make a show of crawling into his bed.
I’d wait until he was pajama’d, of course.
No sense in tempting myself too much before the third date.
Gotta make sure we hit all the right steps before we get married.
I can almost hear the church bells already.
I didn’t know I wanted to get married in a church, but I can definitely hear the bells.
Wait a fricken second. I really can hear the church bells.
I glance at my phone, and it’s not the top of the hour, so there shouldn’t be church bells, but then as I’m looking for the source, I see a couple more gargoyles just hanging out on the low stone wall in front of the brownstones in this neighborhood.
It takes me a second to realize that the sound is coming from them, and then it takes me less time than that to realize that they are conversing.
How awesome is that?
I wander over to them, listening to their chatter with a huge smile on my face while my soon-to-be beloved man finishes fighting the pink-mohawk gang down the sidewalk from us.
The gargoyles don’t stop their conversation on my account, and since I have no idea what they’re saying, I appreciate just listening.
Church bells have a pretty sound, but the language of the gargoyles is beautiful.
Of course, just because it’s beautiful to listen to doesn’t mean they’re not talking about dicks or something.
I mean, I’d probably talk about dicks if I could talk.
“Romily.”
A shudder of arousal knocks through me at the sound of my name on Fox’s lips. I turn toward him, standing in the middle of another massacre, and find myself desperate for our third date. Damn, why do I have to have standards?
It’s definitely cuddle time. I pat both gargoyles on the back and make my way over to Fox, grabbing his hand and running full speed toward his home.
I don’t want another interruption before we get behind the wards, and somehow we manage to make it inside his beautiful home before anyone else tries to attack.
Bloody boots stay in the entryway, and I push Fox to the master bedroom so he can shower, then I take stock of my suit in the mirror in the hall bathroom.
It’s a bloody mess from transfer from Fox.
I’ll have to replace it, but spending that kind of money on a new suit will teach me to keep my hands off Fox after he’s been working; I’m nothing if not tight-fisted and frugal with my own money. Some might call me beggarly .
Look it up, it’s a synonym for being a Scrooge. Yes, I like puns. Get with the program; I’m like the ultimate dad joke waiting to happen.
Ok, off with the suit, into the shower.
I scrub up quickly even though I want to luxuriate because: hot shower.
Drying off, I wrap my towel around my hips and head back to my room, leaving my bloody clothes for later.
I dig in the duffel bag of my stuff from the apartment and slip into a pair of threadbare flannel pajamas and an oversized T-shirt.
Whoever got my stuff was thorough; they even grabbed my frozen leftovers and the plants, which are sitting on the tables in my room—no, I don't feel bad about stealing Elijah’s plants; he just left them to die.
I’ll eventually replace my charity clothes with things I’ll buy for myself, but not until I’ve worn them through.
No sense in wasting money on lounge wear when my uniform is a suit that I have to wear from the time I wake up until I’m ready for bed.
Being on call requires a certain amount of preparedness, which includes staying dressed all day long.
Once I’m decent, I scamper over to Fox’s room and enter without knocking, delighted when I barge in on Fox in his birthday suit sewing up the holes in his torso.
I give him a lascivious grin, deliberately letting my eyes travel over all that deliciousness.
I would have probably even made it to his feet if my gaze hadn’t gotten caught on his cock.
Not for that reason, you perv. Well, not only for that reason.
I mean, it’s a gorgeous cock, long and thick and just about right as far as I can tell, but that’s not what stops me from taking in the all-of-him.
No, my attention snags on the fact that my man is castrated.
No balls. No hint of a sack. Nothing at all. What. The actual. Fuck?
I’m not saying that people don’t do cruel things for no purpose—I’m mute because a douchenugget decided he didn’t want to listen to a sick baby scream—but who castrates someone else?
! Unless he had testicular cancer, and then it makes sense he wouldn’t have balls, but they don’t amputate sacks too, do they?
Aren’t there fake testicles? You know, the same kind of thing as when women get implants after having mastectomies.
On the plus side, even though he doesn’t have balls, his dick works just fine, which I knew before because I could feel his erection, but now I get the pleasure of watching his cock go from flaccid to erect, and oh my, what a sight it is.
My dick responds in kind, as it should when I’m complimented so thoroughly, and it takes all my significant effort not to reach for him.
Instead, I force my eyes to finish looking at the rest of him and force my feet to walk in a circle around him so I can enjoy the view from every angle, and then I take my happy ass to his bed and crawl under his blankets, watching him as he watches me.
For several long seconds we stare into each other’s eyes, then Fox blows out a breath, looks away, and finishes sewing himself up.
The wounds from the subway car attack have all but disappeared, leaving scars, but nothing so hideous that it takes away from his sexiness.
Actually, looking him over and knowing what I know now about his lifestyle, I’m surprised he doesn’t have more scars.
The tattoos hide some of them, I’m sure, but seriously, he’s been shot three times in three days and has gotten a lot of cuts from knives and swords; he has a lot of scars, but not nearly as many as I would expect.
Damn, my life is just full of mysteries waiting for me to unravel them.
Fox and I are going to have some fun conversations soon.
I can't wait to find out what happened to his balls and why his skin smokes when touched by chicken wire, and also why there’s no evidence of burns now.
I didn’t see any damage, but I did see the smoke and I’ve never known smoke to exist without at least a little burn.
Of course, we’re talking about magic, so the rules of general physics probably don’t apply.
After stapling closed a cut running from the top of his thigh to his hip, Fox pulls some sweatpants on (sans underwear), turns off the lights, and crawls into bed, facing me.
I motion for him to turn over and when he does, I make him my little spoon, wrapping one arm around his chest and sliding the other beneath his pillow.
He’s taller than me, but that just means I get the pleasure of sinking into his warm scent with my nose pressed to the back of his neck.
Sighing happily, I squeeze him briefly and let sleep take me into dreams of love and laughter and Fox.