The Greystone Bundle (Books 1-4)

by Taylor Longford

  "Giving away your rune isn't something you should rush into," Valor suggested in a firm tone.

  Reason pinned him with a black look and said, "How long did you wait before you decided to mark MacKenzie? All of one week?"

  "That was different," Valor insisted.

  "Really?" Reason fired back at his cousin. "How so?"

  Valor didn't answer but I could guess what he meant. He and MacKenzie had liked each other from the start whereas Reason and I…hadn't.

  "I've thought this out," Reason claimed stoically. "I was going to ask Elaina to wear my rune, anyhow."

  Um, yeah. I assumed that was a big fat lie but I didn't call him on it. Instead, I asked, "So, what does this involve, exactly?"

  He looked relieved that I was being so reasonable about the matter. "I'll tattoo my rune onto your upper arm, near your shoulder."

  "Tattoo? You'll tattoo? With what?"

  He made a fist and exposed his barbs.

  I shrank back in my seat. Actually, I shriveled to be precise. "Wait a minute. Didn't you tell me those things are deadly? That the poison could turn me permanently to stone?"

  Reason waved his hand dismissively. "You'll have to build up a resistance to my venom. You start out by drinking one drop of poison in a glass of water and double the amount every day for about two weeks."

  That sounded a lot easier than I expected. Why did I get the feeling he was giving me the short explanation? "Then I'm immune?"

  He rolled his shoulders in a defensive shrug. "Then I can tattoo my rune into your shoulder without harming you. Once you're wearing my rune, I won't be able to give it to the harpy."

  "Once I'm wearing your rune, what's to stop the harpy from finding me and killing me to get me out of the picture?" I asked sensibly.

  "A gargoyle can only give his rune away once," he explained. "So, it doesn't help the harpy to kill you."

  "So, that's it?" I asked, thinking this didn't sound too hard. "I build up a resistance and you mark me to protect yourself and the rest of humanity against a super harpy?"

  "Pretty much," he answered looking all offhand and slouchy…and way hot.

  MacKenzie cleared her throat and gave Reason a blunt stare.

  I flicked my gaze between the two of them and asked, "Why do I get the feeling you're not telling me everything?"

  "Because he's not telling you everything," she growled and sharpened her stare.

  Reason pushed out a reluctant sigh then started to explain the pesky little details. "When a gargoyle gives away his rune, it's forever." His voice trailed away at the end and I wasn't sure I'd heard him right.

  "Excuse me? Did you say…forever?"

  He waved his hand like it was no big deal. "You don't have to stay with me forever if you don't want to."

  "So, it's just a one-sided forever?" I snarked.

  He lifted his gaze to the ceiling like he was praying for patience.

  "It's forever for him," Dare explained quietly. "He'll never leave you. He'll always protect you. For the rest of his life."

  "Oh," I said flippantly. "That kind of forever."

  Reason lowered his gaze and glared at me.

  "So, let me get this straight," I said, and leaned back in my chair. I locked my hands behind my neck and stretched my legs under the table. "Last week, I was your mess. This week, you're ready to give me your rune and spend the rest of your life with me?"

  "That's right," he said stonily.

  "Don't you think that's a bit of a jump?"

  He lifted his chin to a proud angle and looked down his nose at me. "It’s a perfectly logical jump."

  "And you're willing to be stuck with me forever so you can find your brother?"

  A muscle pulsed at the back of his jaw. This guy was determined. "It would be worth it."

  "You don't know me very well," I snickered.

  He stood suddenly, his chair crashing backward onto the hardwood floor as he braced his fists on the tabletop and leaned over me. "Look, if you don't want to wear my rune, just say so. I'll find someone else."

  Someone else? Ugh. Clearly, the guy was willing to play dirty. I got this private mental vision of Sequoia poncing around Boulder with Reason's rune carved into her shoulder. Not a pretty picture.

  "Okay," I said. "I'm in." Which wasn't completely true. But I didn't think there was much harm in drinking his diluted venom for the next two weeks while he had time to come to his senses and realize that we were a bad match. I even planned to help him reach this decision by being a pain in the ass. Well, more of a pain than usual. But my private scheming was interrupted when Hooligan glided to his feet and let out a low growl.

  "Someone's coming up the driveway," Dare announced quietly as his gaze moved to the window.

  MacKenzie looked at him. "Mim? Whitney?"

  Defiance shook his head. "It's a new vehicle. No one we know."

  Pushing back their chairs, the pack headed for the mudroom door. MacKenzie and I followed them into the garage. As the garage door rolled open, letting in a blast of sunlight, a black SUV pulled to a stop in the driveway. Two suits got out of the vehicle. And when I say suits, I mean suits. Dark jackets and slacks, white shirts and red power ties. One was old enough to be my father; the other one looked like he was fresh out of suit college. They looked like men-in-black, minus the sense of humor.

  Inside the dark garage, I could see my breath and wished I'd pulled on my coat. Havoc's arm rubbed up against mine as he moved beside me. "One good, one not so good," he murmured.

  I shot a quick sideways glance at him. "The guys from the rocks?"

  "Maybe," he answered, and kept his keen gaze on our visitors. "We'll see."

  The older guy pasted on a smile. It looked strangely out of place, like he didn't do it very often, like he was afraid a smile might crack his face. "Hello," he said. "We're looking for Ellen Campbell-Mayer."

  "I'm sorry, my mother isn't home," MacKenzie told them, stepping up from behind the others and stopping at Valor's side.

  The younger guy pulled a thin leather wallet from the pocket inside his jacket and flashed a badge at her. "I'm Federal Agent Simpson and this is Agent Donovan. We'd like to ask you some questions, if you don't mind."

  I have to give MacKenzie credit. Even though she was facing down a couple of federal agents, she kept chill. "What kind of questions?"

  Simpson's smile was a little more convincing than his partner's. "We're interested in some shipments made to this address."

  "Is this about my stepfather?" MacKenzie asked quickly.

  "Not directly," he answered. "We're more concerned about the shipments than Greg Mayer. We're trying to track down some statues he sent into the country. We understand that a recent shipment was lost in a crash outside of Limon but we learned there were some earlier deliveries to this address. We'd like to take a look at the packing crates you received, if possible."

  "That's not possible," MacKenzie told them right away. "They were stolen."

  "The crates were stolen?" Donovan questioned her, his expression and tone arrogant.

  "No," she replied. "But the things inside were."

  "That's…unfortunate," Donovan grumbled, his eyes narrowing into suspicious slits. "I assume you filed a police report?"

  "What is this about?" Valor cut in with a growl.

  Donovan jerked his gaze to Valor's face. "I'm sorry," he said condescendingly. "Who are you?"

  Valor locked his eyes on the obnoxious official. "Valor Greystone."

  Agent Donovan returned his blunt stare. "I'm sorry but our questions are for the young lady."

  MacKenzie started to look frightened and Valor looked like he was going to kill somebody if they didn't stop scaring his girlfriend. At the same time, Victor looked like he was ready to step in and take control of the situation. And if these suits decided to pull out some guns, I could see where they might end up as a set of life-sized garden gnomes. With that in mind, I pushed my way to the front of the pack. "Maybe you guys should come
back later, when MacKenzie's mother is home."

  Simpson gave me a practiced smile. "This isn't an interrogation. We just have a few questions for—"

  I cut him off. "Look, MacKenzie's only sixteen and I don't think it's appropriate for a couple of federal agents to be questioning a minor without her parent in attendance. Come back when her mom's home."

  The older guy hulked over me. "We don't have to—"

  I cranked my head back and glared up into his face. "I'm sure you don't. I'm just asking you to show some professional courtesy and come back in a few hours. Is that a problem?"

  While I was staring him down, I realized Hooligan had joined me, standing at my side. He wasn't exactly growling. It was more like a deep, make-my-day rumble. Simpson eased backward a step but Donovan wasn't as quick to give in. "We'll be back," he growled then turned on his heel and huffed his way back to his SUV.

  Once their vehicle had cleared the driveway, MacKenzie and Valor took off in the Jeep with Dare in the backseat, on their way to Mim's place. Victor closed the garage door and slanted a look down at me. "You don't back down, do you, m'dear?"

  "Back down?" I questioned him airily and gave Hooligan a scratch on the head, feeling like maybe I could get used to the big wolfhound. "What's that?"

  Havoc laughed and hooked an arm around my shoulders. "Like I said earlier, I think we should keep her."

  Reason brushed by him—hard—his shoulder connecting with the younger gargoyle's and knocking him away from me. "Shut up," he rasped.

  Regaining his balance, Havoc reeled me back against his side. His green eyes flared briefly as he turned and called after Reason's retreating back. "If you're going to mark her, she belongs in the pack."

  Belongs in the pack? Wow. Like an honorary gargoyle? I was psyched.

  "Nay," Reason threw back over his shoulder, rather sharply in my opinion. "Nay, I'm not ready for that."

  Defiance pinned Havoc with a hard stare. "Nor am I," he growled in a voice that seemed to say, "Don't even go there."

  So, I was a little discouraged by both of their attitudes but I didn't have time to mope over it; I had an essay due on Monday morning. "I need to get some homework done," I announced to Reason after following him into the house. My laptop and books were over at his place but he didn't offer to walk me to the rental so I gave him a pointed look.

  "The door's open," he muttered and dropped into a chair in the living room.

  "Aren't you supposed to stay with me?" I asked, being snide. "Make sure I don't contact anyone and give away your secrets?"

  With a growling sigh, he levered himself out of the chair and joined me at the front door where I pulled on my jacket and headed out on my own. Reason caught up to me a few seconds later.

  A heavy silence bulked between us like a concrete bunker, but I was determined to break it. Only, instead of asking Reason why he was being such a jerk, I thought it would be better if I focused on Defiance's behavior. Maybe if I could understand his cousin, it would help me to understand him. I mean, they both had the same issue; they didn't seem to like me very much.

  "So, what's Defiance's problem?" I asked.

  "What do you mean?" he countered like there was nothing going on.

  "He's not as friendly as Havoc or the rest of your family. In fact, he's not friendly at all."

  "He just doesn't want any more humans to know we're gargoyles."

  "That's understandable," I said diplomatically.

  "There's the safety issue," he continued. "He's never trusted humans."

  "How do you feel about humans?" I asked, holding my breath a little.

  "I like 'em fine," he answered, which wasn't exactly a rave review. "But it's more than that with Defiance. He wants to live a normal life and fit into the human world without anyone looking at him like he's a freak."

  "Being snarly to everyone doesn't exactly help him achieve that goal," I suggested as the snow crunched underfoot. I slipped a little and Reason automatically caught my elbow, guiding me for a few steps before letting go again.

  "He's just moody because he hasn't seen Whitney recently. She used to visit MacKenzie several times a week. Now we hardly see her."

  "Maybe Whitney doesn't like Defiance," I suggested dryly. It wasn't too hard to believe.

  Reason shook his head. "I don't think that's the problem. They have…chemistry. When Defiance and Whitney are together, sparks fly."

  "Sparks fly when we're together," I pointed out with a snicker.

  "Our sparks are different," he snorted.

  "Oh?" I questioned him. "How so?"

  Reason rolled his shoulders as he reached his back door and opened it for me. "Some sparks start a fire. Other sparks start a war."

  Sadly, it was a good analogy.

  After hanging my coat in the entry closet, I sat down in the living room and opened my American Lit text. Reason plunked down across from me and picked up his half of the sketchpad. Minutes later, he was absorbed with whatever he was drawing.

  I was just wrapping up my essay two hours later when most of the pack crowded back into the house. Only Dare was missing, probably still with Mim. As I glanced over at them, I thought MacKenzie looked a little pale. And Valor seemed especially attentive.

  "What's wrong?" I whispered to Havoc when he joined me on the couch. "Is MacKenzie okay?"

  "She's alright," he answered. "Just a little gobsmacked." He leaned toward me, our shoulders touching. For some reason, that seemed to attract Reason's attention. His gaze snapped upward and locked on Havoc like a missile tracking system. I ignored his sharp glare as Havoc explained. "As soon as MacKenzie's mother walked in the door, those two agents came back."

  He stopped there and Victor took over. "They said they weren't interested in the statues, themselves, but the material they're made of. According to them, it has some interesting properties and they were hoping to get a larger sample so they could test it in their labs."

  MacKenzie dropped down onto the couch beside Reason. Valor joined her, lacing his fingers with hers as he said, "We didn't know what they meant by a larger sample, since we couldn't imagine how they had any sample at all."

  The conversation stopped there for a few seconds, like nobody wanted to say what happened next.

  Finally, Havoc cleared his throat. "Then Simpson pulled out a brown envelope and shook something into his palm."

  I watched his face and waited.

  "It was Mim's fingers," Havoc said.

  Chapter Twelve

  "M-Mim's fingers?" The idea was gruesome but also confusing. How could the federal agents have Mim's fingers? And what did the fingers have to do with the stone sample they were looking for? But I guess I must have gone a little pale because Reason was suddenly beside me on the couch.

  "Remember the shipping van that crashed outside Limon?" he asked.

  I nodded uncertainly.

  "We made a couple of trips out there to search for our kin. On the second trip, Dare and Mim ran into a little trouble, a harpy named Nitschka. He killed the harpy but Mim was accidentally poisoned."

  "P-Poisoned?" It took me a few seconds to figure out how that could have happened. "By Dare's barbs?"

  "That’s right," Reason answered, and took a deep breath. "Immediately, her fingers started turning to stone. Dare had to cut them off. He left them behind."

  I wanted to shout, "He cut off her fingers?" But I prided myself on being unsentimental so I worked hard to hide my reaction. I took a steadying breath and asked a more reasonable question. "How did the federal agents get their hands on them?"

  "It's a long story," Victor answered, taking a seat on the arm of the couch. "After the shipping van crashed outside Limon, the locals reported some unusual sightings to the local police. Their sightings probably would have been ignored except that Donovan's cousin lives out there. She contacted him to show him a statue that appeared in her barn overnight."

  I searched Victor's eyes. "The harpy that Dare killed?"

  "That's ri
ght. Using a hammer, Donovan broke off part of the statue and had it tested. It was common granite. Still no explanation for how it got in the barn but it could have been a prank. But upstairs in the loft, he found two additional pieces of stone. Mim's fingers. The tests on the fingers proved to be much more interesting. The molecular structure was something their lab techs had never seen before—lightweight, dense, tough and virtually indestructible."

  "So, now they're interested," I murmured, and looked at Reason. "And they want more. That's not good."

  "No kidding," Reason muttered, but not in a smart ass way. He said it softly, his gaze locking on my eyes and muddling my wits.

  I forced my attention back to Victor. "So, what did MacKenzie's mother tell them?"

  "She said the first five statues were stolen while she was out of town," Victor reported. "And the last one was shipped to Texas but came back crushed."

  "Crushed? Did they…buy your story?"

  "They wanted to see the packing crate," Valor answered. "Then they wanted to know where the crushed material was."

  "I told them I'd thrown it out weeks ago," MacKenzie said, looking worried.

  A small ridge settled between Valor's black eyebrows. "So, they swept the bottom of the crate and took the dust away with them."

  "So," I ventured carefully. "Maybe that's the end of it?"

  "Maybe," Victor murmured, reaching up with one hand and rubbing the back of his neck.

  "What?" I asked. I could tell there was more.

  Victor pushed out a sigh. "Donovan asked us about our knives. He said the harpy statue in the barn had a knife in its throat. It was Dare's knife, of course."

  "What did you tell them?"

  "Nothing," Victor admitted. "The knife Dare used on the harpy was a thin, modern blade he bought at a local hardware store. It didn't look anything like the ones we carry, so they had no reason to suspect us."

  Okay, that didn't sound too bad. My gaze drifted downward and I realized Reason was holding my hand, his thumb moving gently against my skin. Startled, I lifted my gaze to his eyes…and broke the quiet spell that had wrapped around us like a warm cocoon. Without thinking, we jerked apart, Reason getting to his feet and pacing from the room.