The Greystone Bundle (Books 1-4)

by Taylor Longford

  You can guess what I did next. I went looking for Reason's notebook.

  It was turquoise. I pulled it out, sat down and opened it on the table, slowly leafing my way through the pages. His notebook started off the same as the other two but stopped abruptly after a few lessons. I guess that made sense since he'd spent almost two months in Texas. His work also differed from the others by the doodling in the margins. It didn't take long before my interest shifted from the simple words and sentences to his sketches. It looked like he had talent.

  I turned the pages and gazed at the drawings, immersing myself in his work, feeling like I was getting to know him through his art. In the middle of the notebook, I found a page that had been dog-eared to mark its place. Soberly, I stared down at the drawing. It was a sketch of MacKenzie and it was beautiful. Absolutely, utterly stunning.

  Okay, so that explained the hold she had on him. I knew enough about art and artists to tell that this particular artist was in love with his subject.

  Chapter Five

  A harsh voice snapped me out of my solemn thoughts. "What are you doing?"

  Startled, I snapped my gaze up to Reason's face.

  "What are you doing?" he repeated, stalking into the room and sweeping the notebook from the table, back onto the shelf.

  I don't know what he was so pissed about. Take away a girl's phone and leave her alone in an empty room without a book or a television or a laptop and she's bound to explore. "You can draw," I said, resting my elbow on the top of the chair and turning to face him.

  "That doesn't answer my question," he snapped.

  "Ask friendlier questions," I grumbled.

  "What?" he barked.

  "Never mind," I told him. "I can see you're not in a friendly mood."

  "Come on," he said, taking my elbow as if to pry me out of the chair.

  His touch sent a jolt of awareness through my system. Electrified by the unexpected sensation, I jumped from the seat and jerked my gaze to his face. For several heartbeats, we stood there staring at each other. From what I could tell, the contact was just as unsettling for him as it was for me.

  His throat worked as he swallowed hard. "What's the matter?" he rasped.

  I yanked my arm from his grip and rubbed my palm over my elbow. "What's going on?" I asked, starting to worry about the strange effect he had on me and whether it was natural…or something else. "What are you guys?"

  "We'll explain all of that," he said impatiently. "Or at least, as much as we can."

  As much as we can? "Is this where you tell me it wouldn't bother you to kill me?" I asked, preferring being flippant to being scared.

  He looked shocked.

  "I know how these things work," I said, and lifted my chin. "I read, you know."

  "What do you read?" he growled. "Graphic novels? Mutant Vulture Romance?"

  "I happen to like graphic novels," I declared.

  "And stories about sociopaths who threaten young girls, I take it."

  "I'm not that young," I insisted right away. "I'm not as young as I look."

  He crossed his arms over his chest and looked down his nose at me. "You look about fourteen."

  I get that a lot but I wasn't about to admit it. "I'm nineteen."

  "Anyhow," he growled. "There's no way I'd harm you. I'd leave that to Havoc."

  Havoc? Really? Maybe it was just his purple jeans and matching high tops, but he looked the least likely of the six guys to harm me. But looks can be deceiving. Maybe he was one of those guys who smiles charmingly as he slits your throat. I've seen movies like that. I hoped he wasn't the equivalent of an other-worldly enforcer.

  "I'm kidding," he growled and rolled his eyes at my gullibility. He reached for my arm again then decided that wasn't a good idea. Instead, he turned on his heel and started out of the dining room. "Come on," he threw over his shoulder.

  I narrowed my eyes on his broad back, following him and Hooligan down to the family room again. By now, Valor had returned. He sat on the sofa, his ankle braced on his knee, his arm around MacKenzie's shoulders.

  Victor smiled up at me from the wicker chair as I came down the steps. "First, we want to thank you for warning us about the guys on the rocks, m'dear."

  "Who were they?" I asked as Reason motioned me back into the empty chair.

  "They said they were birdwatchers," Reason reported, hitching his hip on the desk in the corner of the room.

  I snorted. "In January? That's some pretty dedicated bird watching."

  "We didn't believe them, either," he rumbled. "But they moved off when we told them they were on private property."

  "What were they like?" MacKenzie asked.

  "One good, one not so much," Reason answered cryptically.

  "What's that supposed to mean?" I asked, puzzled by MacKenzie's question as well as Reason's answer.

  Victor leaned forward in his chair and replied, "We can tell if people are good or bad, just by getting close to them."

  "We?" I asked, giving him a wide-eyed look.

  Valor motioned to the others in the room. "We, meaning the rest of us."

  "So, what are you guys, exactly?"

  Valor held my gaze seriously. "Except for MacKenzie, we're gargoyles."

  Gargoyles! I didn't see that one coming. Angels, yeah. Shifters, maybe. Even winged vampires. But it had been a long time since that day when I'd first seen the statue and had compared his wings to those of a gargoyle. "Gargoyles?" I exclaimed. "But aren't gargoyles supposed to be ugly?"

  "Different gargoyles," Havoc drawled. He waved a hand dismissively and my gaze snagged on his gold rings inset with what looked like lapis and carnelian. They had to be ancient and I guessed they'd be worth a fortune to a museum. "You're thinking of the stone carvings that drain water from roofs."

  "I am?"

  MacKenzie spoke up and filled me in. "The word gargoyle comes from the French word for throat, and the grotesque stone carvings that you know as gargoyles were named that because they appear to pour water from their throats."

  "Now every ugly piece of rock is known as a gargoyle," Havoc sighed dramatically. "But back in our time, we were called gargoyles because of the runes we wear tattooed on our necks."

  "Back in your time?" I echoed, wondering what the hell he was talking about.

  Victor explained while Havoc bounded up the stairs to make some popcorn. Yeah, he bounded. I thought I'd never use that word in my lifetime but when Havoc gets going, he bounds.

  So, according to Victor, gargoyles were pretty common back in the thirteenth century. They lived in England and Europe, alongside medieval folk, hiding their existence from all but a few human friends. They had wings, which I already knew. They could turn to stone—and back again—as long as they had access to direct sunlight. They need the sun's energy to make the change.

  Reason and the rest of his pack had lived in York and were trapped between two walls at the back of an old house. No sunlight reached them between the walls so they couldn't return to their living forms. Eight hundred years later, MacKenzie's stepfather dug them from their prison and shipped them here to America. He planned to sell them and make a lot of money.

  Hamilton bought one of them and that's how Reason ended up standing beside the swimming pool in Dallas. The millionaire had actually ordered Valor so the pack assumed he'd return Reason when he realized he'd gotten the wrong statue. And Reason stood there for weeks, waiting for Hamilton to come home and return him. But when I fell into the water, all of that went out the window, because Reason returned to his living form to help me.

  All well and good as far as explanations go, but did you notice something missing in all that? Me too. The part where Reason came to life before we fell in the water. When I kissed him. Evidently, he hadn't shared that little piece of information with his friends and family.

  At that point, I probably should have asked how the gargoyles got stuck between the walls in York but all I could think about was the wings I'd seen on Reason when he was i
n his stone form. Were they operational? Could he fly? Why couldn't I see them now? Were the wings somehow absorbed into his body? Did the others have wings too?

  When I asked these questions, Reason pulled his shirt over his head. His upper body was covered with a black, ridged vest that was a little longer in the back than it was in front. As I watched, the vest lifted away from his shoulders and opened up into wings. It was way impressive. The wings were huge. And it was amazing that they could pack down into such a small vest. Kind of like those puffy sleeping bags that you can stuff into an empty pickle jar. And the spines that shaped the wings must have been really flexible. Strong but flexible. I watched closely as he wrapped them around his chest again. The tops of his wings crossed the front of his chest. His wingtips curled around his sides and met in the middle of his back.

  "That's amazing," I breathed. "Can you fly?"

  "Nay," Reason snorted. "The wings are just for keeping the rain off."

  I ignored his sarcasm. "I'd love to see you fly."

  Reason's eyebrows arched upward. "You and everybody else in the neighborhood. Forget it."

  "What else can you do?"

  He just gave me a sardonic look and pulled his T-shirt back on.

  "I mean, do you have any other unusual traits or powers that humans don't have?"

  He looked around at the rest of his pack but nobody volunteered anything.

  I turned back to Victor. "So, what do your senses tell you about me?" I asked him.

  Havoc walked back down the stairs with a large bowl of popcorn in the crook of his arm. "That you're jolly awesome."

  I snorted. "That's not what my sister would say."

  "Then your sister would be wrong," Havoc pronounced and offered me the bowl, saying, "You looked hungry."

  Okay. So, I decided Havoc was a nice guy but I wasn't sure how he knew I was hungry. I helped myself to a handful of popcorn. "You guys can't…read minds, can you?"

  "Why would you think that?" Reason snorted.

  Victor laughed. "Nay. We can't read minds."

  I gave MacKenzie a pointed look.

  "They can't read minds," she confirmed with a grin.

  That was good news. Reason didn't need to know how hot I thought he was. I let out a slow breath and stuffed a handful of warm popcorn into my mouth.

  "Now we have some questions for you." Reason took over the conversation as if he'd had enough of the small talk. "First, did you tell anyone about us?"

  "What do you mean?" I laughed, getting up and following Havoc and the popcorn across the room to the bay window. "I didn't even know about you until five minutes ago."

  Reason pushed out a sharp sigh. "Did you tell anyone what happened at the pool in Texas?"

  I threw some more popcorn in my mouth and stared him down. "No! Oddly enough, I didn't want everyone to think I was crazy. I didn't want to end up in an insane asylum when I was scheduled for an education in Boulder. All I told my mother was that I ruined you. She didn't understand what I meant since she couldn't find any damage on you when we winched you out of the pool."

  "Well, that's something," he muttered.

  "What's your problem?" I asked, irritated with his tone and his attitude.

  "Don't be annoyed with Rees," Victor said mildly.

  "Even though he is being rather blunt," Havoc cut in.

  "But we need to hide our existence from the human world," Victor explained seriously.

  "So…what does all of this mean for me?" I asked, getting nervous again and wondering if they were going to let me go back to school or if they were going to keep me captive…or worse.

  "It means you have a new roommate," Reason barked. "Me."

  Chapter Six

  I stared at Reason, not sure I'd heard him right. I wasn't against spending more time with the good-looking gargoyle, far from it. But I wasn't ready to live with him…in a small studio apartment, sleeping in the same room, sharing a bathroom, with no privacy from a guy who didn't appear to like me very much. "But. But. My place is too small for a roommate."

  "Hey," he snapped. "I don't like it either. But either I go with you or you stay here with us."

  My mouth opened and closed a few times. I probably looked about as smart as goldfish. "But why you? If you guys think I need to be watched, why can't it be one of the others?"

  "Because this is my mess," he muttered. "I caused it. I need to be the one to take care of it."

  So, I was his "mess". Personally, I didn't consider that a compliment. And this live-in relationship was off to a bad start. So, I figured it wouldn't make much difference if I pointed out the obvious. "You wouldn't be in this mess if you hadn't come to life when I kissed you."

  With the exception of Dare, everyone else looked suitably surprised. Uh-huh. Just as I'd thought, he hadn't told the others about his role in the poolside debacle.

  "Like I said," he growled, his eyes narrowing into icy slits, clearly pissed that I'd outed him. "This is my mess."

  I didn't have a comeback for that and an awkward silence fell over the room while the fire crackled in the background.

  "Well, we'll certainly miss your cheerful personality," Havoc announced into the quiet. "Even though it will mean one less mouth to feed. Maybe you could take Defiance with you," he added, ducking when the slim blond shot a fist at his head. Havoc was laughing as he offered, "Shall I get your bags for you?"

  I gave him a look of thanks but Reason countered it with a dark glare so the net result was pretty much a wash. "I'll just collect my stuff," Reason growled, and pushed away from the desk.

  I slumped back into my chair like a deflated balloon. I was pretty much in a state of shock. So much had happened in such a short time. Now I was going to share an apartment with a beautiful gargoyle who I thought was hot as hell. Sadly, the feeling wasn't mutual.

  While I was trying to regroup, MacKenzie cleared her throat and told the guys she wanted to talk with me privately for a minute. The effect she had on them was amazing. They all left without a word of disagreement. Even Defiance sauntered away without a backward glance.

  She waited until the front door had closed and the guys had walked past the bay window, then she turned to me and spoke in a very quiet voice. "Just a word of warning. There are a few more things you should know about gargoyles. They're very protective. It's their nature. They can't help but defend their "home and hearth"."

  "Home and hearth?"

  "Well, that's the way Valor puts it. I just want you to know that Reason will never do anything to harm you, no matter how gruff he seems. But gargoyles can be dangerous. Beneath their knuckles are poisonous barbs that shoot into position when they're threatened or even startled. You don't want to get in the way of those barbs. It would probably kill you."

  More good news. "Got it."

  "I know this is a lot to take in all at once, but do you have any questions?" she asked quietly.

  I shook my head then changed my mind. "What's with the symbols they wear on their necks?"

  "They're runes," she explained. "Words from an ancient alphabet. Each gargoyle wears his name on his throat."

  "His name?" I echoed, my eyebrows winging upward.

  She tilted her chin in answer. "Dare's rune is a wing on fire. Valor's is a rock turning back the ocean."

  So, I had been right about the ocean. "And Reason's?"

  She shook her head. "I've never asked and I can't quite make out what it's supposed to be. 'Course I can't make out Victor's or Defiance's either."

  That left Havoc. But his rune didn't need explaining. It was quite plainly a tornado or at least a whirlwind.

  About that time, I heard Reason on the stairs. He came back down into the room with a sports bag over his shoulder. It wasn't very big. For some stupidly sentimental reason, the idea that he had so few worldly possessions tugged at my heartstrings.

  "Did you pack your drawing pens?" MacKenzie asked him as she stood and walked toward him.

  "I wouldn't leave them behind," he an
swered on a warm smile. The way he looked at her made me feel sad because he didn't smile at me like that.

  She walked us to the front door, stepping into the dining room to retrieve his notebook from the bottom shelf on the bookcase. "Keep working on your reading and writing. I'll quiz you when we see you again."

  "I will," he said softly, and slid the notebook into a side pocket on the sports bag.

  She looked at me then back at him. "Call us."

  I pulled out my cell. "What's your number?" I asked then saved her phone number as well as a number she gave me for Valor.

  We caught up to the rest of the pack who were waiting outside and everyone walked us down the driveway to the car. Nobody seemed very happy. One by one, Reason grasped arms with his pack. "Fare thee well," he said in a low voice, as if leaving his family was the worst thing that could happen to him. Like I'd ruined his life.

  I hung back while they said their goodbyes, feeling like such an home wrecker but Havoc came over and gave me a rough hug. "Come back soon," he said while Dare sent an encouraging smile. Victor turned and grasped my arm, pulling me close. "Take care of him," he murmured against my ear.

  His pack stood on the side of the road as we got into the car and drove off. And as I navigated the winding roads away from MacKenzie's house, I tried to make conversation. But Reason wasn't very cooperative.

  "So, what 's your last name?" I asked.

  "Roughly translated, it used to mean builder of bridges," he answered in his incredible accent. "But now it's Greystone."

  "So, your family used to build bridges?"

  "Aye," he answered.

  So, that was the end of that line of conversation. "What does your rune mean?" I asked, trying again.

  "It means Reason," he answered on a disinterested sigh.

  "Yeah, but how does it mean that? MacKenzie told me Valor's rune is supposed to be a rock turning back the sea's waves. What does yours represent?"

  "Not all of the symbols can be translated so literally," he countered without looking at me. "And Reason is a particularly ancient rune; its exact meaning has been lost over time…but I think it's supposed to represent balance."