Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
A cab awaits me in front of the church, so I climb into it and give the man a wave in the direction of Fox’s home.
“Home, Harbinger?” the man asks in an accent so genteel, I know that this guy is not a cabbie.
So, I get the fuck out of the car and start running. I do not have time for an abduction today.
I hear the door of the cab slam and footsteps following me, catching up, of course. It’s not like he can attack me, and hopefully my ward believes that abduction is a kind of attack. It would suck if the guy was able to get his hands on me and relocate my body without my explicit permission.
Church bells ring out in front of me just as a gargoyle appears on the sidewalk, wing extended as if pointing the way for me.
I’m not dumb enough to get confused, and I follow the direction of the pointing wing, pivoting to cross the street without so much as a glance to see if it’s safe. I trust my gargoyle friend.
Friends.
The next one turns me in the middle of the road, sending me into the middle of an intersection while horns blare behind me.
The next gargoyle sends me crosswise across the intersection to the soundtrack of a screech and a crunch of metal and glass.
I don’t turn around, I don’t slow down, I jog with purpose, following my gargoyle friends as they lead me through the city and keep me out of the hands of my would-be abductor, or whatever he is.
Breathless and tired, I finally make it to the brownstone, collapsing against the front door before I turn to see if my pursuer managed to follow me.
A line of gargoyles sits on the low wall demarking the edge of Fox’s property, and on the other side, a man with more freckles than a red-headed step child breathes heavily as he looks at me with laughter in his pale purple eyes.
“I’ll catch you next time, Harbinger,” he says before giving me a salute and jogging away.
Before he gets too far, he calls over his shoulder, “Tell Fox, Santanos won’t be attacking him again. ”
Great. Fox set a boundary, everyone agreed to his terms, and he forgot to include me in it.
I walk into the house, typing out a message to my future husband.
Me: Santanos has agreed to your terms. He swears he won’t attack you or send anyone to attack you.
I don’t immediately get a reply, so I pocket my phone and crouch to unlace my combat boots, jumping out of my skin and crab walking backwards when the front door hits me in the ass.
I only stop when I see Fox giving me his worry-eyes as he pushes the door closed behind him.
I guess running home took more time than I thought.
“Did Santanos do something?” he asks, bending to help me get my shoes off.
Aww. What a sweet man.
After the gargoyles absconded with you without so much as blowing me a kiss goodbye, the cabbie waiting for me at the curb turned out to be a bit too upper class to be a real cab driver, so I booked it out of the car and started jogging home.
Our lovely church bell singing friends guided me through the city causing who knows how many fender benders, but I got home without a scratch on me.
You might have noticed the line of gargoyles on our wall?
Anyway, the person chasing was nice-ish.
Just told me to let you know that Santanos won’t attack you again.
Oh, and he might have threatened to “Catch me later.”
Fox stills at the last part, rereading it twice before he very carefully pulls my boots off and sets them aside.
Fury rolls off him in hot waves that are not just a descriptive technique and press against my skin.
His anger is palpable and beats against my body for several minutes while he grips my ankles and stares a hole into the wall somewhere behind me.
I sit still, pinned in place by his emotional outburst and waiting for his anger to cool or for him to give me a clue what I should do.
I knew the man liked me, obviously; he bought me diamonds for fuck’s sake.
I didn’t realize the depth of his affection.
The almost suffocating fury on my behalf is more than anything he’s ever put out on his own behalf.
It makes me feel cherished and also wonder which part of his heritage he gets this empathic ability from.
“Next time, let him catch you. It will give me permission to kill Santanos,” he murmurs, squeezing my ankle and rising.
He offers me a hand and pulls me to my feet and into his arms, hugging me as he buries his nose in the crook of my neck. Yes, of course he changed clothes; I’m not ruining another suit and my ward wouldn’t let me near him if he was still covered in demon ick.
I run my hands up and down his back, stunned by both his words and his emotional display.
He wants me to let myself get abducted? Isn’t that counterintuitive to keeping me safe?
Not that my ward will let me get hurt unless Santanos knows how to negate it.
Somewhere out there, something exists that can make my protective magic null.
I shudder at the thought, reminding myself that if Annette doesn’t know what it is, Santanos likely doesn’t either.
“You’ll be safe, Romily, and I'll get to kill the annoying cockroach.”
I pull back from his hug, typing fast before showing him my phone.
Getting abducted doesn’t make me feel safe, but I’ll do it for you because you really want to kill a guy and because you’re so good at it. Competence is sexy, and I just can’t bring myself to withhold from myself the gift of watching you eviscerate a man. Or whatever he is.
“He’s a hybrid plus like Annette. The plus is whatever gifts the council has deigned to give them, and no one except the council knows everything about those gifts.”
Look at you, explaining things no one asked you to explain. I’m proud of you for using your words.
Deadpan as anything, “I have to make up for the words you refuse to use.”
I widen my eyes and drop my jaw, exaggerating shock and offense on behalf of my disability.
Fox snorts and pushes my mouth closed, then melts me by pressing his lips to mine.
The kiss starts soft and affectionate, just the press of lips, the quiet comfort of connecting with the person who gets you.
My Fox gets me. He understands my words, especially the unspoken ones, the ones that matter the most. His tongue darts out, and I open for him, giving him the access he wants, the taste we both crave.
Our tongues slide together, tangle up, and dance, eliciting a delightful groan from my man that vibrates against my lips and causes them to tingle.
I press my body flush to his, gratified when his hands grip my ass, kneading the soft flesh there as he pulls me as close as two people can get with their clothes on.
It’s almost enough to tempt me to amend my three date plan, especially because I’m meeting the parents tonight. Almost.
Before my horniness can actually change my mind, I pull back from the kiss, pecking him a couple times and stepping back so I can't rub my dick against his. I smile up at him, projecting the affection I have for him as I type a few blind words into my phone.
I really like you.
Autocorrect must be on the ball today: no mistakes!
He huffs and squeezes my butt again. “Me too.”
I giggle and pull him to the couch so I can cuddle him. We need a few hours of nothing to do.