Stone Passions Trilogy (Stone Passion 1, 2, & 3)

by A C Warneke

  Nodding his head, he swallowed, never taking his hands from her. After a moment, he softly asked, “Will you ever be able to forgive me?”

  She nodded her head once, her heart going out to the manipulative bastard who only wanted to be accepted. “But I’m not sleeping with you again.”

  “Fair enough,” he said but his eyes twinkled with secret laughter as if he doubted her words.

  “Marick,” she growled. "I'm not."

  He put his hands up and stepped away from her, taking his heat and overwhelming-ness away. “I’ll head back to Chicago and if you change your mind you know where to find me.”

  Nodding her head, she kept her eyes on him as she walked out of his shop, out of his life. Her thoughts were punching her in the face, urging her to take him up on his offer, chastising her for even considering it, kicking her for betraying Armand even though he was the one who chose to be a stone statue instead of spending eternity with her.

  Chapter 12

  The Wages of Arrogance

  Ferris sat up on the roof of the Castle, her knee bent and pressed against her chest as she painted her toe nails. Her anger simmered in her belly and she was still just so confused. She had thought spending time on the roof during the day would help but she didn’t count on Toulia wanting to join her.

  Toulia was absolutely stunning, with vibrant red hair that hung to her slender waist in thick, lustrous curls and eyes that were pale gold with vertical slits like a cat. Her nails, well, talons really, were long, lethal and black as an empty soul and she had a pair of wicked looking wings. When Ferris was younger, Toulia used to do a monthly treatment to keep her wings looking gossamer thin and glittering in the light but Ferris preferred the blazing red leathery wings so much more. They suited Toulia’s personality far better than faerie wings.

  They were friends of sorts and when Ferris was twenty, she had gone to Toulia for advice on how to seduce Armand. The succubus had laughed at that, as if Ferris had said something terribly funny. But when she saw that Ferris was serious, her laughter abruptly died. She stared at Ferris with those eerie, pale gold, cat’s eyes. “If I do this for you what will you give me in return?”

  Knowing that it was stupid to bargain with a supernatural being, especially a demon, she took a shuddering breath and met Toulia’s gaze full on, “What do you want?”

  A smile had curved the woman’s generous lips as mischief sparkled in her eyes, “I wish to sample a human who can see me as I truly am. May I sample you?”

  Ferris’s eyes had rounded in shock, “I’m not giving you my virginity.”

  “Oh, you’re so precious, but no, I don’t want to fuck you,” she said, drawing out the words as she ran a finger along Ferris’s jaw. When Ferris didn’t flinch away, a pleased smile lit Toulia’s face. “I just want a taste and you hardly have to do anything.”

  Wearily, Ferris studied her, torn between her desire for advice and a need for self-preservation. But Ferris had grown up in Toulia’s world, she believed she could handle it. “What do I need to do?”

  Toulia’s grin became truly wicked, “Think of your beloved Armand.”

  And so Ferris had. Within moments, her first orgasm tore through her body, leaving her breathless and panting in the middle of the floor. Trying to catch her breath, she looked up at Toulia and saw that the woman wore a similarly battered expression. “My gods, that was marvelous but I don’t think I ever want to experience that again, at least not very often. Your desire for him is too much I think. I will stick with lonely men who see what they wish to see.

  "Now, if you wish to seduce him," she said, flowing instantly into the part Ferris was most interested in. "Just be yourself."

  As far as advice went, it pretty much sucked. Until Ferris seduced him by being herself.

  Normally, Ferris adored the sassy succubus but today she just wanted to stew beneath the sun and bury her wounds and regrets. Only partially listening to Toulia’s words, she concentrated on her nails, ignoring the glares from the three gargoyles who glared at her with stone faces. Michael, Leo and Raphe could suck it if they didn’t want Toulia on the roof. The succubus was mostly harmless to them so they shouldn’t worry about it.

  “I have a niece who is half-human,” Toulia said from a distance, shaking Ferris out of her own contemplations that didn’t seem to be going anywhere anyway. “Beautiful girl but strangely monogamous. Of course, if Scott were my mate I might consider giving monogamy a try, for a little while at least. But then I doubt an angel would be all that interested in fucking a pure demon.”

  Ferris’s head whipped up at that, her eyes wide in her face as she looked at Toulia who so casually talked about an angel being mated to a half-demon. “Pardon?”

  Toulia smiled at her with a knowing look in her cat’s eyes. Shaking her head, she relaxed back down on her lounge chair, putting her sunglasses back over her eyes. “Things are so different now that the veil has been ripped away. It’s no wonder your poor Armand is having such difficulties.”

  “He’s frozen in his gargoyle form,” Ferris muttered, glancing over her shoulder at the gorgeous griffin gargoyle and heaving a sigh. The other gargoyles shimmered with life beneath the warmth of the sun but Armand was lifeless. Suddenly, she wanted to cry, even though she had cried far too many tears over the years. Bitterly, she scoffed, “He isn’t having any difficulties.”

  Toulia tossed her head back and laughed, the red locks like flames beneath the sun. “He still suffers.”

  The darker side of Ferris was glad he was suffering because she had been suffering for five years. Hell, she had been suffering for years before that. The rest of Ferris wanted to wrap her arms around the stubborn gargoyle and hold him until he woke from his accursed state.

  A cramp rippled through her belly and she pressed her hand against her side, trying to ignore the ache. Looking over her shoulder at Toulia, she softly asked, “How do you do it? How do you separate love and sex?”

  An elegant brow arched over the top of her glasses, “Sweetie, I’m a demon. We fuck, we devour souls and we get on with our lives. It’s not a big deal.”

  Ferris couldn’t help but smile because Toulia was so matter-of-fact and at ease with who and what she was. She opened her mouth to say something but another rippling pain took her breath away and she had to concentrate on remembering how to breathe. From a distance, she felt Fray nudge her shoulder, feeling the concern as it emanated off the dragon in waves.

  “Jesus Christ, you have a dragon!” Toulia gasped, scrambling to her feet and staring down at Ferris in awe and surprise. “I just thought it was a statue, like the gargoyles only, you know, a statue.”

  Ferris tried to smile but the pain was becoming stronger, pulsing along her nerve endings and setting her skin on fire. Turning her head, she met Fray’s worried jeweled eyes, “Find Ajreis.”

  With a nod, the dragon flew off. Ferris pushed herself to her feet, trying to ignore the three gargoyles who had suddenly came to attention. Ajreis wasn’t too far away, he was never too far away, but he didn’t like the succubus and had returned to his room when Toulia showed up.

  “Ferris,” Raphe’s rocky voice grated over Ferris’s skin as the panther gargoyle reached out and touched her with the tip of his claw. It was as if were touching her with liquid nitrogen, his paw searing through her burning skin all the way to the bone.

  Pressing her hand across her stomach, she gave Raphe a reassuring smile, “I just ate something that isn’t agreeing with me. You might want to stay away from the pudding. I think it’s gone bad.”

  Staggering over to the door, it was with relief when Toulia’s long, slender hands gripped her upper arm and eased her down the stairs. “Easy, Ferris, I’ve got you.”

  “Thank you,” Ferris muttered, feeling the sweat beading on her brow. She just wanted to crawl into bed and sleep for a thousand years, or until the waves of cramps passed. The succubus helped her to her bedroom and into a nightgown before laying her on the bed.

&nbs
p; Kneeling on the floor next to Ferris, Toulia stroked her fingers through Ferris’s damp hair, “Don’t get sick on me, Ferris. For a human I am quite fond of you. Besides, Armand would never forgive me if you died in my presence and I have very fond memories of that gargoyle.”

  Ferris smile was closer to a grimace but her eyes were already closed.

  Omari shuffled around the small shop in a heightened sense of anticipation. The signs had been flaring up all week, ever since the night he had seduced the lovely Ferris. She had been everything he had hoped for and more, a delicious human that responded with exquisite passion. A twinge of guilt still gnawed at his innards for taking advantage of her when she was lost in grief and alcohol but, damn it, he had waited for five years for her to get over Armand. He had lived as the perfect man for five years to be with her, living up to every ideal she had ever imagined and then some.

  He had waited nearly five hundred years before that. All of that waiting was exhausting so when the opportunity came he seized upon it. And in the process of fulfilling his selfish desires he ruined something that he hadn’t realized he cherished: Ferris’s friendship. After she came to his shop in tears, after she realized he and Marick were one and the same, she looked at him differently. She no longer trusted him and asked him – asked Marick – for some space, begging for some time to figure things out. But he knew the truth: she was unable to engage in an affair with a man who lied so easily and for so long just to fuck her. Any love she might have harbored for him died a quick and violent death.

  Letting out a melancholy sigh, he realized it was time to return home, to put away his foolish disguises and simply return to Mount Olympus. The pisser of the thing was he truly liked her. Hell, he probably even loved her. He could be himself with her and simply enjoy life. Had he waited just a little while longer he was sure he could have won a piece of her heart. Not all of it, of course, or even half of it, but a piece of it. Most of her damn heart belonged to Armand, the lucky bastard. The fool had been too stubborn to see what a jewel Ferris was until it was too late.

  Like father, like son.

  The bell hanging over his door jingled and he looked up from his musings with a wide smile on his lips, prepared to greet the poor soul who stumbled into his shop. His mouth dropped as Ferris’s little imp struggled to break through the barrier that was erected to keep his kind out. The creature was determined, ignoring his blistering skin in his efforts to enter.

  Intrigued by such fortitude and resilience, Omari waved his hand, allowing Ferris’s friend entrance. The imp staggered into the store, blinking its muddy eyes in surprise at finding itself on the inside. The surprise didn’t last long before it turned its head and speared Omari with a glare of pure venom. In a low growl, the imp bit out, “Come. Now.”

  After working so hard to gain entrance, the little bastard simply turned around and walked out, clearly expecting Omari to follow. His feet were moving before he even realized he was going to follow, curious in spite of himself. Or maybe because the imp was Ferris’s friend and he was pathetic enough to admit he was a little bit desperate to hear from her, even if information came from a loathsome imp. Though there was something refreshingly different about Ferris’s imp even if the little creature kept to himself when Ferris was around other people.

  Exiting his shop into the chilly afternoon, he stopped when he saw the car parked halfway on the sidewalk with far more dings and dents and scratches then it had on it just a week before. There were a few tree branches stuck in the fender and he was pretty sure a ‘No U-turn’ sign was sticking out beneath the front end. Breathing heavily, the imp was leaning against the car, next to the open back door. A slender leg was visible and bone deep fear churned in Omari’s gut.

  “Help her,” the imp panted.

  Stumbling forward, seeing more of the lifeless form the closer he got to the car, Omari breathed out a single word, “Ferris.”

  Without conscious thought, he shifted into the form of Marick, knowing he was going to need the physical strength of his cowboy persona. His breath caught in his throat as he saw the pale aura surrounding Ferris, the spark that burned so bright almost gone. The hem of her shirt was lifted just enough that he could make out the line of the little pocket dragon on her stomach, her skin red and blistered around the bonding tattoo.

  “No,” he breathed, scooping her limp body up in his arms and bringing her into his shop. The dragon was too young to bond with anyone and his powers would either overwhelm a person and destroy her or backfire and destroy him.

  “He thought he could help,” the imp explained, following Marick into the shop without waiting for an invitation. “When she got sick, he only wanted to make her better. It kept her alive but I am afraid they will both die now.”

  “No they won’t,” Marick vowed, carrying her to his room and laying her on his bed. Pressing his fingers against her throat he felt her thready pulse and cursed. She was too pale and her heart wasn’t beating strong enough to pump her blood through her veins. Sparing a glance for the imp, he asked, “What’s wrong?”

  The imp’s nostrils flared and that venomous glare returned, “It’s your fault. You know a human body is not capable of carrying the offspring of a god.”

  For a moment, all of the sound in the world was silenced, leaving Marick in a sort of void, the imp’s words repeating themselves over and over in his head. A heartbeat later, sound came rushing back into his head and he cursed at the ramifications of his selfishness. “Fuck.”

  Gathering Ferris’s limp body back up into his arms, he waved his arm and stepped through the portal to the realm of the gods where his child would thrive. Well, if he didn’t kill Ferris first. Marick had every intention of making sure that didn’t happen.

  Ferris stirred in his arms, blinking her unfocused eyes a few times before letting her lids drift shut once more. “Where am I?”

  Suddenly, the imp was by her side, taking her hand in his, a smile of relief curving his lips. The foolish creature had no idea what lay in store for the girl. “Ferris?”

  A low moan was her only reply but it seemed to satisfy the imp. With a grunt, Marick waved his hand once more and summoned a bed, where he lay Ferris down. Brushing her damp hair away from her clammy forehead, he leaned in close and whispered, “Sweetheart, if you really wanted to see me again you knew where I lived. You didn’t have to get sick to get my attention.”

  A half smile almost curved her lips but she still didn’t open her eyes. “Ah, Marick. You know my world revolves around you.”

  He smiled even as tears filled his eyes. What the hell? He never got emotional over a human. “Finally! Someone who properly worships me.”

  “Ha ha,” she muttered. She looked up at him, her eyes sunken and hopeless, and whispered, “I’m dying aren’t I?”

  “Yes,” he answered on a soft exhalation of breath.

  Her eyes closed and a shudder worked its way through her body. When she looked at him again, there was a slight spark of laughter in her dull eyes and she offered a trembling smile, “Your bedside manner really sucks, Doctor Marick. I wish Ajreis had taken me to a real doctor and not some minor god pretending to be a doctor.”

  Ignoring the suspicious moisture in his eyes, he smiled, “It wouldn’t have helped. Humans are not at all equipped to deal with supernatural pregnancies.”

  “Yeah, well, neither are you,” she taunted, her eyes drifting shut, the effort to hold them open obviously too much for her to handle.

  Kissing her brow, he inhaled her scent, smelling the child’s power that was devouring her from the inside out. Clearing his throat, unwilling to betray any hint of weakness, he said, “It’s not the child’s fault you know….”

  “I know,” she whimpered, interrupting him before he could finish.

  “Actually, it is the child’s fault,” he corrected himself. “Because he’s a little god and you’re a human. Even if we were to… end the pregnancy….”

  “Don’t you dare,” she seethed with
more passion than he thought possible, considering her very weakened state. Her eyes slit open and she glared at him with burning turquoise eyes.

  Clearing his throat, he continued, “As I was about to say, it wouldn’t make any difference. It’s similar to what happened when your aunt or your mother drank the potion all of those years ago.”

  Ferris’s brow wrinkled in thought, obviously having difficulty remembering the events that happened during her childhood, and not because she didn’t remember but because she was suffering so greatly. Not wanting to cause any more stress, he explained, “When Melanie took the blood of Medusa and Omari into her system it killed a part of her so that the curse could be broken and then she became more than human. The potion made your aunt and your mother strong enough to hold sway over the sun and moon and keep their gargoyle mate human during the day.

  “It’s like that only on a grander scale because the baby is inside of you,” he finished, closely watching her face. "If you live you will become even more powerful. A minor goddess."

  She nodded her head as if she understood but Marick wasn’t entirely certain she was even coherent enough to hear him. Bending over her, pressing his nose against the curve of her neck and breathing in her scent, he whispered, “I need to give you my blood so your body can handle carrying a little god around.”

  “But won’t your blood just kill me faster?” she asked, her voice weak and wispy.

  “It’s a strong possibility,” he teased though he spoke the truth. He kissed the weak pulse at the base of her throat and pushed his upper body off her so he could look down at her. Ignoring the seizing of his heart at the lack of color in her face, he added, “But it’s also the only thing that can save you. I promise to keep the cut shallow this time.”

  She swallowed and licked her parched lips, squeezing one glassy eye open. “Will Fray be okay?”

  “What? Fray?” he asked, trying to sound light-hearted to cover the sheer terror that was clawing at him. “That little dragon is a tough little bastard. He’ll be fine.”