by Unknown
He paused. “No?”
After a few exhales, she said, “No, don’t stop,” More panting. “It’s so much. But please don’t stop.”
Her pleasure through pain excited him. Each time they’d gotten together, he pushed the boundaries a little further. Discovering anything she liked while they made love gave him a thrill. Only he knew this about her, only he could please her this way. He wondered if there were others before him, knew there had been, and a sharp poke seemed to stab him inside his ribcage. No, he wouldn’t think about them. She was his. A wee thing under him, he feared he might break her, yet she wanted all that he gave.
“You want me to keep fucking you like this?” He grabbed her hair and pulled. “Do you like it when I do this?”
“Yes!” she cried out. “Yes.”
He kissed her shoulder and gently bit it. When he reached around to find her swollen clit, she cried out at first, but then relaxed under his strokes. He increased the pressure and her inner walls tensed. A sheen of perspiration covered her back and shoulder blades. He had to be ten thousand degrees himself. She pressed against his fingers, riding his hand and taking control of the pace, raising it to a feverish pitch.
She yelled out, calling “Oh, Mason. Oh, goddesses.” She collapsed forward, coating his fingers in her sticky-sweet fluids.
The tightness around him was too much. The pulsing around his muscle too intense. He gripped her hips and drove in deeper. And harder still. The beast wanted all of her. Pleasure raced through him at an uncontrollable speed, pumping through his veins straight to his cock. He exploded, dropping his head when he came, unleashing an animalistic growl as he shot hot jets of fluid deep into her.
His mouth fell open as he panted for air. His heart must have beat a thousand times a minute. She was covered in a light layer of sweat. He traced his fingers through the glistening wetness, leaving patterns on her skin. Where he had grabbed her had left white marks on her. Hell, he’d been too rough with her.
“Are you all right?”
She turned to him and smiled. “Fantastic. Only I doubt I’ll be able to move for a week.”
The color returned to her skin, but guilt still rushed through him as quick as the blood had rushed to his cock moments before. “Did I hurt you?”
She rolled onto her back, and dropped a hand to her belly. “In a good way.”
He closed his eyes. He never should have let the beast in him loose.
“What’s wrong?”
“I hurt you. That’s the last thing I want to do.”
“Come here,” she said, raising her arms to him.
He laid his head against the crook of her neck, careful of his weight pressed on her. Their hearts pounded at a higher rate than normal, still recovering from their session.
“You didn’t hurt me,” she said, rubbing the back of his neck. “It was somewhat painful, but in a good way. Know what I mean?”
“I do.” Relief lifted the twinges of regret that were settling on him. He rose onto his forearms and kissed her lips.
“In case you couldn’t tell, I liked it. I liked it a lot. And if you take it easy on me from here on out, I will be greatly disappointed.” She peered at him with a straight face and then broke into a grin.
Her smile lit up her face, danced through her eyes, and he couldn’t resist smiling in return. “I’ll take note of that.” Gods, he was falling for her, falling as deeply as into a chasm with no end. “Because I want to be the one to make you happy.”
“You do, Mason.” She stroked from his cheek to shoulder with such slow deliberation, it left him speechless. “More than you know.”
After several languid moments where he savored Kayla wrapped in his arms and their legs entangled, she brought him back to the reality they had to face.
“Have you talked to the others about the wolves?” She propped herself on her forearm and faced him.
His muscles tensed, their stolen moment in each other’s arms ending. She’d asked him a couple of times when they’d met, but he’d find a way to distract her with more carnal pursuits. “I haven’t,” he admitted. “I wasn’t sure where to begin.”
“You need to, Mason.” She peered at him with her wide blue eyes. “It’s important. Not only to them. To all of us.”
“Did you talk to your coven?”
“I spoke to my mother.”
“And?”
“She wasn’t happy at first. I had to leave the part about you out. But she said she’d talk to the elders. She hasn’t as of yet.”
“I’ll talk to my brothers,” he promised.
Kayla ran her fingers along a lacy fern and her brows tightened.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Each time I’m with you, I worry it may be the last time.”
An icy chill ran up his spine. “Why?”
“All this sneaking around. I don’t know how long we can keep doing it.”
Her words got him right in the gut. The time he’d actually been jostled by a caber, a tree trunk twenty feet long, during the Highland Games paled in comparison. “What do you mean?”
“I can’t keep coming up with diversions or sneaking out of gatherings. They’re bound to catch me sooner or later.”
His insides clenched, churning painfully. If she was ending it—no, he wouldn’t even contemplate it. “We’ll have to find another way to get together.”
She arched her brows. “How? Neither your clan nor my coven would accept it. It’s impossible.”
“No, Kayla. We can’t let them keep us apart. You know how I feel about you. I can’t let you go.”
Her head tilted. “I don’t, actually. How?”
A burning sensation built through him as he tried to sum up his feelings, which he didn’t even understand himself. It was a good question. He lusted after her like no woman he’d ever met, craved being around her with a compulsion that almost bordered on obsession. But was it love?
No, he wouldn’t think that way. If she rejected him… He’d sulk away a good and bloody fool and rightly so. Maybe to her she he was just a diversion, sexual recreation. And now she was trying to end it.
“Well?” she prodded.
“Oh, come on. You already know. I come to meet you every night.”
She arched a brow. “So you like having sex with me, I gather.”
He ran his hand over his head. “It’s more than that.”
“Like?”
She wouldn’t let it rest, would she? She was going to make him say something. “I’m fond of you.”
She nodded and said, “Uh huh.” Then she rose to her feet. “How lovely.”
Anger radiated from her. The quick, snappish way she dressed confirmed it.
“Don’t be like that,” he added and stood up. “You know what I mean. I’m very fond of you.” He quickly donned his kilt.
“Well, that’s good,” she said in a flippant tone. “I’d hate for us to risk the ire of our clans if we weren’t fond of each other.”
“Damn it, Kayla, what do you want me to say? I care about you? You know that already.”
“How would I know that?” She narrowed her eyes. “I come to you night after night, sneaking away from the coven. It’s not as difficult for you. You have more freedom.”
“And yet, I still can’t get over to you. There are so many damn spells keeping me out.”
“You’ve tried?”
“When I was young.”
“And what happened?”
He inhaled. “I got blown onto my arse and felt like a bloody fool, that’s what happened.” When Kayla giggled, he said, “Oh you think that’s funny, do you?” He grabbed her and tickled her sides, and laid her back on the ground.
“No, Mason,” she pleaded through her laughter. “Don’t.
“Ticklish?” He straddled her and his hands moved down her body, over her thighs. “Let’s see where else you’re ticklish.”
“Stop,” she protested, while thrashing around to avoid his probing fingers. “You’re trying
to avoid the question.”
He stopped and pinned her wrists above her head. “And what question was that again?”
“Don’t play.” She pouted.
He took a deep breath and exhaled. “What do you want me to say?” He searched her blue eyes. “I’m crazy about you. I think about you all the time.” Releasing his wrists, he leaned on his heels. “I know this whole thing is supposed to be wrong and I wonder what the hell I’m doing. But it doesn’t feel wrong at all. Now that I’ve found you, I don’t want to give you up.”
She stared at him for a long moment. “I don’t want you to.”
“What can we do?”
She shook her head before raising her hands and dropping them. “I don’t know.”
“We can run off together,” he suggested.
Her eyes widened before she sat up. “And go where?” She searched the horizon, spreading her arms wide.
“Anywhere. Leave this isle. Go to the Highlands or the cities. Find someplace where we can blend in.”
She cast her eyes to the ground. “I know nothing of other lands other than a few hours with you in the Highlands. I’m a witch with a knack for herbal potions. Where will that get me in the modern world?”
“You’d be skilled in a number of ways. You could work in gardens or in a position helping people with herbal remedies if you wanted a human job. Or we would find a way to live off the land as we have here. Whatever it is, we’ll find a way to adapt.”
“But what about your brothers? You’ll miss them.”
“If they won’t accept you, then…”
Her smile lit up her face. “You’d leave your home, your family for me?”
“It doesn’t matter where we go as long as I’m with you.”
“Does this mean you really care about me? This isn’t just some fling?”
“Of course. It’s real to me. Very real.”
“Do you love me?” Her voice was just above a whisper.
His body burned again. Love. Words he’d never said to a female before. Was it possible that these overpowering compulsions to be near and protect her were more than lustful stirrings? Could he be falling in love?
* * * * *
“Kayla!”
The unmistakable voice of her mother indicated one thing. She was caught.
“What are you doing with a—a—a gargoyle?”
Kayla turned in the direction of her mother’s voice and found her advancing on her with her two sisters flanking her.
“What are you doing?” Kayla’s voice rose with her indignant protest. “Following me?”
“This is not right,” Aunt Muriel said. “You know you should not be associating with their kind.”
“I knew you were up to something,” her mother added. “All the questions about gargoyles. All the absences each evening.”
Mason stepped toward them. “The quarrel is not ours. Kayla and I do not harbor any ill will to other clans.”
The mixture of shocked, surprised, and disgusted expressions on the witches’ faces summarized their distaste for Mason. Kayla’s mother scanned from his face down his bare chest and over his kilt.
“Did you dare touch my daughter?” She raised her hand and hurled a ball of light his way, knocking him off his feet. “You loathsome creature!”
Mason fell to the ground, laid out on his back from the surge of energy.
“What have you done?” Kayla shouted, rushing to his aid. “You don’t know him at all.”
“It’s all right,” he said, sitting upright with unsteadiness.
“No, it’s not,” Kayla said. “Leave us alone,” she cried to the women.
Aunt Muriel and Aunt Emma exchanged knowing looks with her mother.
“Absolutely not!” her mother declared, moving forward to grab her upper arm and drag her from Mason. “This is forbidden. Betraying your coven!”
Her aunts joined in, grabbing Kayla and pulling her from Mason. “Let go of me!” Her cries were futile as they dragged her to their territory “Mason!” she turned over her shoulder.
Mason tried to stand, but his legs buckled beneath him.
“What have you done to him?” she screamed. “Let me go.” She fought to escape their grasps.
Her aunt said words she didn’t recognize. Her senses were clouded by a sense of calm until she didn’t remember why she was upset. She stopped struggling and let them lead to the coven.
CHAPTER SIX
Mason stumbled to his feet. That damn tree witch had knocked him on his arse, and he’d been unable to stand for several minutes. His legs were still rubbery.
What the hell? He’d had enough of their sense of superiority with their precious protective spells. They’d called him a creature. That was it; he was going there to find Kayla.
Watching her being dragged away pierced his heart with an agony greater than any physical one he’d ever known. What he’d been wrestling with came to him as clear as the sun on a cloudless midsummer day. He loved her. So what if she was a tree witch? The rivalry between their clans no longer mattered.
He loved her, and he’d do anything to be with her. Even facing the wretched spells from the damn witches who’d taken her away.
He flew out of the forest, scanning below for signs of the foursome returning through the moors. The emerald green fields were empty. He must have been knocked out of commission longer than he’d thought. Was Kayla already at her coven? Facing the wrath of the other witches?
Picturing her being punished for cavorting with him filled him with a dread heavy enough to weigh down his wings. Recovering from the distraction, he ascended higher. He soared to a spot with a vantage point of their land. His heartbeat quickened with the risk. It had been several years since he’d last tried to venture there. He’d been a young gargoyle then and far too curious. Fascinated with a world he was forbidden to see, he convinced his youngest brother, Calum, to explore what had been closed off to them.
They had waited until midnight before they took flight, hoping their gargoyle magic of masking themselves in the darkened skies would work on witches the way it did on humans. Excitement had made him buoyant, he’d quickened the flap of his wings and soared forward. And then he had seen the treetops just as he did now. When he had flown toward it, he had hit something invisible, but as hard as glass. Electrical shocks had followed, they had pulsed through him and sent him hurling toward the ground at a dangerous speed. The earth had approached quickly, much too fast. If he didn’t do something fast, he’d end up a bag of jelly on the forest floor, or seriously crippled. He flapped his wings and found a flight rhythm again with nary a second to spare.
And here he was again several years later attempting the same foolish maneuver that had almost killed him in his youth. He shook his head with a nervous laugh. Love made all species do crazy things. But he was older and smarter now, plus he had more experience. Instead of attempting to fly in from above, he descended to the edge of the moors and walked.
Stepping forward with confident strides that belied his wariness, he hoped the witches protective spells had weakened, as they had over the rest of the island. He followed the path that he had watched Kayla take night after night while he waited until she was safe.
The grass beneath his feet thinned as he approached their territory. The grass of the moors gave way to sparsely planted trees. His heart beat quicker. If he made it through, he would find her and ask her to leave with him.
Ferns and groundcover grew all around. He had to be in their territory by now. Did that mean he’d made it through? His chest pumped out as he strode forward. After a moment of triumph, a stab of fear pierced him. If he could get through, so could the younger wolves, the ones Ian had explained most at risk for losing control.
His steps quickened; the idea of Kayla being in danger pushing him forward. The further he penetrated, the more his heart pounded. He had to get to Kayla. Find a way to be with her and keep her safe.
Smack!
The sounds of bir
ds tearing through the branches to flee reached him as he soared through the air, and then hit the ground with a thump. Staring up through the trees to the blue sky meant one thing. He’d been blown onto his back. Jolts of pain ripped through him, as sharp as electrical currents traveling through his veins.
Damn witches! Their barrier was still intact.
Mason lay there staring at the clouds sailing by as the throbbing eased. When he mustered enough strength to rise to his feet, he turned toward the gargoyle’s land.
He’d have to find another way to get to her.
* * * * *
Kayla woke in her tree house after a night of no dreams. That was odd, usually her dreams were vivid. She thought back to the night before and bolted upright.
Mason.
Her mother and aunts had found them and had taken her away from him. They must have put a spell on her.
She dressed and found the three women in the clearing between their tree houses. Her mother stirred something in a bowl while her aunts flipped through a book of spells.
“Is that where you found the spell you used on him?” She’d never shouted at her aunts before, but the accusation in her tone was clear. “And me?”
Her aunts stared at her, and one closed the book.
“We had to,” her mother replied in a calm tone. “You were out of control.”
“Out of control?” Kayla repeated, shaking her head. “You have no right to do this. I’m of age to make my own decisions—”
“I have every right to do so since you clearly are making poor decisions! I am still your mother. You are not to see the gargoyle again!”
“What are you going to do, guard me here like a prisoner?” Kayla motioned to the three women standing before her.
“That’s exactly what I should do.” Her mother hmphed while adding flour to the mixture in an earthen bowl.
“Consorting with a gargoyle,” Aunt Muriel muttered with a shake of her head. “I wouldn’t believe it if I hadn’t see it with my own eyes.”
“You’re wrong about them,” Kayla said.
Her mother stopped stirring. “What were you thinking?”
“Did you talk to the elders about the wolves?”
