Page 25 of Bound to the Griffin
“I’m not your errand boy,” I snapped at him. “Sort this yourself.” The gall. No wonder Gwen had run away from this prick. He could sleep in his car or shack up with his buddy, but he was leaving me out of it. Of course this bastard had the perfect ace up his sleeve.
“Very well, then I will secure lodgings with Gwen. She does, after all, run the only B&B in town.” He swept past me to her door, and every instinct in me screamed in fury. If not for the weretiger grabbing my arm, I would have pounced, claws out. Then Luther was on my other side, holding me back with a grimace on his face.
“Think this through. We can’t let him freeze to death, no matter how pleasing the thought,” the vampire said, cultured voice tight with his own anger. “The B&B is the best spot, Gwen sleeps at your cabin anyway. Unless you want to put him up in your place and stay with Gwen?” No—that got an instant, hard denial. There was no way I’d let Gwen sleep in that house when the dreams had been unresolved. That definitely didn’t feel safe.
“Fine,” I growled at them and yanked my arms free. The weretiger dropped his head and huddled deeper into his ridiculous, oversized parka. Luther just smirked, then slapped my shoulder. He slithered off, smoothly gliding back into hisstore like this whole interaction had left him untouched. Might as well, not a hair was out of place.
I caught up to Evan by Gwen’s door, brushing past him and stepping inside with a warning glare. He was wise enough to keep his mouth shut, but something gleamed in his eyes that I didn’t like. Didn’t trust. “Gwen? Are you upstairs, honey?” I called out. She popped her head out of the kitchen, a cup of tea steaming in her hands that smelled green, fresh, with a hint of lemon. Her hair had a fine dusting of plaster clinging to the strands, which probably matched the snow still melting in my own. The storm hadn’t begun yet, but a fine powder had been falling on our streets for days now, covering everything with a pristine layer again and again.
She smiled, then caught sight of her ex, and her expression fell. I drew her into my arms, watching the guy closely to make sure he got the message. He didn’t say anything—didn’t even glare or sneer—which was a marked improvement, one I definitely didn’t trust. He was up to something, but what? What did he have to gain, anyway, by coming here?
“I’m sorry to do this to you,” I murmured against her hair. The sweet smell of lavender and cinnamon, with a hint of plaster, wafted up to me. She felt so right in my arms, and she leaned into me, full of trust. I felt no tension in her shoulders, so seeing this idiot might not be nearly as hard on her as I feared. “The storm coming means he can’t leave. I’m afraid you’ll have to put him up in a room, unless you prefer letting him freeze to death in his car?” I added the last hopefully, only half joking.
She grimaced, then shrugged. “Seems poetic that you pay to be my first customer, doesn’t it, Evan? I know the house is not upto your fine standards, but if you want to live through this storm, you’re going to pay me royally to put up with your shit.” She bit the words out at her ex with smug satisfaction, and he took the verbal blows with a grimace. He did not like this, but he dug into his pocket once again and waved several hundred-dollar bills in her face.
“This is extortion, you know that, right? But whatever. Where do I go?” Gwen took the money slowly from his fingers, then pointed up the stairs. The guy eyed the carefully waxed wooden stairs and banister as if they were snake oil, but nothing creaked as he went up them, thanks to the little elbow grease Gwen had already put into them.
I stayed with her until she’d shown Evan to one of the rooms in the best condition. She’d restored all the drywall here, and cleaned, sanded, and stained the hardwood floor. The bed was still a rickety old metal single with a sagging mattress, the nightstand crooked, and there were no curtains. Evan eyed the drywall with a curled lip, his eyes flicking from one spot of filler hiding screws to another. Yes, these digs were seriously below his standards, but he only needed to look out the single-pane glass window to know this storm was real.
“You can come eat dinner in the kitchen later this evening. There’s no internet yet, you’ll have to deal with being cut off from the outside world for a while,” Gwen drawled, already walking away to find him clean linen for the bed. I stayed by the door, arms crossed over my chest, feet planted. Evan only looked at me once, but he knew immediately that I wasn’t going to make this easy on him. Not at all.
My phone rang just as Gwen came back to dump the sheets into Evan’s confused arms. As he began demanding that she make the bed, Gwen laughed and walked away, and I answered the phone. The call was short and quick, though not satisfying. Another inhabitant of Hillcrest Hollow was dealing with an unwanted guest, thanks to this storm. Ísarr’s guest at least sounded benign, a hiker caught by surprise, while this guy was anything but. Not that I couldn’t handle him; Gwen was handling him, with clear satisfaction and a hint of pride.
Good. She deserved to look him in the eye and put him in his place. To face him and know that he no longer held the power to hurt her. That, and to know that she’d found her place in the world, right here in this town of outcasts. Right here, with me.
We left Evan to his own devices, struggling to figure out how to do the simple task of making his own bed. Hand in hand, we went down the stairs, and once we reached the kitchen, I could no longer resist. I drew her into my arms and kissed her, whispering to her that I was proud, that she’d done so well, how beautiful she was—all the things I knew she should be told every day of her life. Things I was certain that idiot had never discovered, never said to her, and now he never would. I hoped fervently that one day he would discover what a huge mistake he’d made, and then he’d know he was too late, she was already mine.
Chapter 21
Gwendolyn
By the time the sun went down, the storm had taken over everything. The windows rattled in their panes, icy gusts clawed against the walls, and the wind shrieked over the roof like a banshee who had had too much sugar. The whole town was swallowed in darkness, shutters closed, doors locked. Even the streetlamps seemed to cower.
Evan, of course, hadn’t said a word about the storm. No, he’d wasted all his energy at dinner, griping about every last bite—too bland, too greasy, too small-town, blah blah blah. He was mid-sentence about how even Chicago diners knew how to plate food properly when Jackson set his fork down with a sharp clink and told him, in a voice that could freeze water, that the next complaint would have him tossed headfirst into the snow.
For once in his life, Evan shut up. It was very satisfying to see his mouth grow tight, his shoulders going back like a boxer preparing for a strike. Yet, even with all that fighting energy, he did not say a thing. He eyed Jackson like he had swallowed a bag of lemons, but he seemed to know he would not win this fight. He’d be right. Evan was in shape and tall, he’d been a star quarterback in high school, and he liked to remind people that he could have gone pro. Jackson and he were of equal height, but Jackson carried a lethality that came from seeing real combat. He was a veteran, after all, and beneath his skin, a beast simmered—one my ex might not have known about, but sensed anyway.
The spoiled bastard retreated from the room as soon as he’d scraped the last bite of dinner from his plate. It must not have been too bad after all, as he’d finished every bit of it. When the dishes were cleared and the locks slid home on the doors, Jackson went up to the room where I’d put Evan to give him his number in case of emergency. I could hear him coldly telling my ex to stay put. “Storm’ll eat you alive if you set foot outside,” he said, and I didn’t doubt it for a second. It sounded absolutely crazy outside, and I didn’t relish the thought of crossing the three hundred or so yards to get to his cabin.
We braced ourselves against the gale, Jackson tucking me against his side as we stepped out into the chaos. The cold hit first—knife-edged and biting—but then his jacket came around my shoulders, heavy and warm, smelling faintly of pine and smoke. His arm drew me close, broad and solid, and I thought that was shelter enough.
Then, suddenly, it wasn’t an arm anymore; something soft and strong curved around me, cocooning me from the storm. I looked down and saw the sweep of feathers, gold and cream, blocking the wind, wrapping me in warmth. A wing. His wing. I should have been shocked, maybe I was, but mostly, I just felt… safe. Safer than I had in a long, long time.
We crossed Main Street together, snow drifting in deceptively lazy curls despite the fierce whipping of the wind, and headed down the narrow alley beside the General Store. The storm howled, but I barely felt it under his wing.
Still, I couldn’t help glancing back at my B&B. The house I’d so impulsively bought with the money I’d inherited from my aunt. The roof was blanketed in shadow and snow, but beneaththat, I knew every inch of it—every board, every nail, every slate tile Drew and Jackson had hammered into place today. They’d worked until their hands were raw, pushing daylight to the edge of foolishness. Jackson swore it was done: everything patched and sealed, just the chimney waiting for new brickwork come spring.
I whispered a silent prayer that it would be enough. That my home would stand tall through the night. If only the nightmares didn’t whisper at the edges of my mind whenever I stepped inside, then it would truly be mine. I let the wing pull me closer, and for the first time since I’d signed the papers and moved in, I didn’t feel like I was bracing for disaster. I felt…protected.
Jackson’s cabin was dark and cold when we stepped inside, the storm clawing at the shutters. He moved with easy purpose, stacking wood, striking a match, and coaxing the fire to life. The flames leapt, chasing away the chill, their glow turning his profile into something carved from bronze and shadow.
I slipped past him to the stove, shrugging off my jacket. By now, the rhythm here was familiar; I’d done this every evening for days now. The chipped tin canister of loose-leaf tea, the dented kettle, the tiny rituals of belonging. I measured out the leaves, my hands steady, though my mind was anything but.
Because in this house, in his bed, my dreams had changed. Gone were the shadows and fear that had clung to me in my own home. Here, it was always him. His griffin, wings outstretched, as we flew together through an endless sky. When the dream darkened into something hotter, it was him again: wild, untamed, pressing me into the forest floor with a hunger thatstole my breath. Every night, it blurred into something primal, something that felt like it was ours, not just my imagination.
Heat rose to my cheeks just remembering. I bent over the kettle, pretending to fuss with the water as if I could hide the blush from him. Except he was already there, pressing in behind me, his chest warm against my back, his voice low and rough by my ear. “Forget the tea,” he murmured. “I want you. Now.”
The words struck like lightning, every nerve in me sparking awake. His hands slid down my arms—claiming, reverent—as though he’d been starving and I was the feast. “I’ve been dying to stake my claim,” he whispered, nipping the curve of my neck with soft lips and blunt teeth. “Ever since that kiss on your porch. Watching your ex watch us. I wanted him to know you’re mine.”
