Page 61 of Taken for Granite
“Were you one of them?” she asked.
“I am a thousand years removed from the war. Even at that distance, I find I no longer have a taste for politics or intrigue,” he said.
“Aren’t you an intelligence officer?” Seemed like career suicide to not care for politics.
“I think I’ve earned retirement. A male of my years should focus on his family.”
His family. His tone implied a relationship other than siblings and parents. She dreaded to ask, but she had to know. “Wife and kids waiting for you?”
He tilted his head in a quizzical look. “No.”
“Good—I mean, okay. It would suck if you had kids missing you.” It would suck, but her jealous heart loved that she had him all to herself.
“I worry that I have changed and that my family will not recognize me,” he said.
“I don’t believe that. You always know the people you love.” She’d always recognize Chloe, no matter how much time had passed, just as she’d know her parents if they miraculously walked in through the front door. Metaphorically speaking, of course. She wasn’t interested in having a pair of zombie parents.
That wasn’t true. If her parents came back to life, she’d be ecstatic, zombies or not.
“Is that how you recognized my human form?” he asked, rousing her from her silly train of thought.
“Yeah,” she replied, then tensed when she realized that her answer implied that she loved him.
He dropped his head to murmur in her ear. “You love me.”
He made a happy crooning noise that sent a jittery jolt of anticipation through her. She squeezed her thighs together, sighing heavily.
“Good, because I find myself loving you with each passing moment,” he said, voice low.
This gargoyle.
She shifted, keenly aware that she sat on his lap and could feel his hard cock. He released her from his arms and wings, allowing her to straddle his lap and face him. She drew his head down to hers, focused on his lips that said such sweet words—
“I’ll sleep in the car tonight if you’re going to be gross,” Chloe announced. In a dramatic teenage huff, she dragged her blanket and sleeping bag to the SUV. “With my earbuds in, listening to music.”
“Don’t use all my data,” Juniper said.
“Don’t be making kissy faces and stuff.”
She snickered, knowing that laughing only encouraged Chloe’s sassmouth. How would she ever be a well-behaved young lady when Juniper kept laughing at her bad behavior? Then again, being well-behaved was overrated.
“So,” Tas said, drawing her attention back to him.
The campfire at his back cast a shadow over his face, obscuring his features except for his gorgeous amethyst eyes. With his horns rising from the wild tangle of his hair, and his wings partially extended, he could be mistaken for a demon—but she only saw the tenderness in his eyes.
Fuck it. No pain, no gain.
“Don’t go,” she said.
“Juniper—”
“Don’t go alone,” she amended.
For a long moment, he said nothing, just held her gaze with those eyes. She swallowed, nervous at his lack of a response.
His arms tightened around her and his wings descended, cocooning them together against the night. “I never intended to go alone,” he said, lips pressed to her ear.
“No?”
