“Hot sauce.” Mara took it, ripped off a corner, and returned it to him.
Garrick squirted some of the red liquid onto a peanut butter-covered cracker.
“Uggh, don’t do that.” Mara grasped at the cracker. “That’ll taste disgusting.”
He was too quick and held it up and out of her reach with a chuckle. “I want to try everything.”
“Yuck.” She said the word with much exposed tongue. “But have it your own way. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Biting off half of the hot sauce and peanut butter cracker, Garrick was careful to project an expression of enjoyment as he chewed and then swallowed. “Mmmmm. Extremely tasty.”
“Really?”
“You should try it.”
He held out the remaining half and Mara took it into her mouth. Almost immediately her nose crinkled and lips curled. She spit the cracker into her hand.
“Ugh. That’s awful.”
He couldn’t help but smile.
“I think you should eat it if you like it so much,” she said, holding the cracker piece toward his mouth.
“Oh no.”
“Oh yes. In fact, I think it needs extra hot sauce.” Mara squirted more red liquid onto the cracker and stuck it into his face as he laughed, shifting his head this way and that to avoid the cracker. He fell backward. He ended up with much of the hot sauce on his chin and Mara sprawled over him.
Her mouth covered his. Then she nipped at him with short kisses interspersed with delicate licks of her tongue. Arms clasping her to him, he explored her mouth with kisses and licks of his own.
“Mmmm,” he said. “Delectable.”
“The hot sauce?”
“No. You.”
“Are you going to tell me what you found in the journal that had you going all chopsocky on the slab’s ass?”
Garrick could tell by her tone Mara was trying to be funny and keep the mood light. “Chopsocky. I like this word.”
She gave his arm a small pinch. “Hey. Tell me.”
He would try to tell her the truth…but not all of it. “The text is plain. My freedom will last but four and twenty hours from the hour you awakened me.” He tried to stare squarely into her eyes to communicate truthfulness and sincerity. Now was the time to lie. “This time when I return to the statue form, my imprisonment shall be irreversible. There is no way to make this flesh-and-blood body permanent. There is no way, love.”
“That can’t be right.” Mara scrambled to her feet. Plucking her dress from the floor, she pulled it over her head. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”
Reluctantly he rose and retrieved his trousers. Damn. Why could she not just accept his statements? As he drew the garment over first one leg then the other, Mara was marching to the museum director’s desk and sat down.
“Now that I know the text is in Welsh I can find a site on the internet to translate it.” She had fiddled with some device. Her fingers flew over the surface as if playing a piano keyboard. She gazed intently into a something that resembled a window displaying ever-changing landscapes of words and images. “The internet has everything.”
Garrick did not know what this internet was but he caught her meaning.
“All right,” he said. Once at her side, he placed a hand over both of hers, stopping their movement on the strange piano. “The text says that I have but four and twenty hours from the moment I was awakened and walked free of the stone to make the transformation permanent.”
“So it’s possible.”
“Yes.”
“Let’s do it right now. We have less than eight hours.”
“There is but one way,” he said, examining his feet.
“How?” she asked.
He dragged his eyes up to meet hers. “For me to live, the lifeblood of a Rushworth must be spent against the slab.”
Her blue eyes searched his in confusion.
“My love,” he said. “For me to live, you would have to die.”
Chapter Four
They poured over the Transfero Vita. Mara sat at the desk, searching frantically through the pages and periodically translating sections using the director’s computer. There must be some other answer but there wasn’t. The only way was her blood. All her blood.
“What about this section of the text here.” She pointed to a portion in Welsh.
“That is the spell the witch chanted as I was dying.”
Mara refused to process the idea of Garrick dying, bleeding his life away on a rock…all to give her family its money and position. Abominable. “What does it say?”
“Gwaed aberthu. Dy enaid am ei. That means, ‘Blood sacrifice. Your life for his.’”
Repeating the phrase to herself, Mara swore to remember the phrase when the time came…but could she really do what was necessary?
“What if I did bleed out against the stone? Would I die or would I be trapped inside a statue?” Mara asked.
Death would be better. After her time trapped in the car following the accident, she honestly didn’t know if she could stand being alive but encased in stone. But how could she sentence Garrick to that fate? He’d already spent centuries trapped. It was a wonder he hadn’t gone insane.
Garrick turned the chair, and taking her by the shoulders, he stood her on her feet. “You’re bleeding out on the stone is not an option we will consider.”
Mara glanced away from him. Nothing was off the table as far as she was concerned.
“I still don’t understand,” she said. “I awakened part of you five years ago and then earlier today. Why didn’t that trigger this…deadline?”
“I was never able to walk free of the stone before today.”
Long seconds passed until the realization hit Mara. “If this is true, then I’ve killed you. By trying to bring you back I’ve killed you.” Taking his face in her hands, she searched his eyes. “How can I live with that? How can I commit murder like that?”
If they could find no other way she would sacrifice herself. She had to. She cared too much about Garrick and she couldn’t let someone else she loved suffer while she did nothing.
“Mara, do you not know that you have given me the most precious of gifts?” He said the words as he shook her for emphasis. “You have not killed me. You gave me a chance to live again if only for this short time. A chance to love you.”
Her eyes fell before the intensity in his.
“Will you?” he asked.
“Will I what?”
“Will you let me love you?”
“Yes,” she said. In the years ahead, she would need the memory of this time together.
Together they sank to the floor. The wool of the Persian carpet under her was soft and the male muscle above her hard.
* * * * *
He could endure endless centuries in a stony tomb for this. The memory of her lying beneath him.
Leaning back, he pulled her dress up and over her head. Her form was lovely.
“Part your legs,” he said.
He saw the blush of blood rush to her cheeks.
“Do it.”
She obeyed him.
His eyes gazed at the core of her. “You’re glistening for me.”
“Touch me,” she begged. Her hands roamed over the strong muscles of his biceps and forearms. Her fingertips traced the tendons.
His right hand gently cupped her breast, fingering the nipple to a peak. Then the hand ran down over her middle, playing in her naval before delving lower. His fingers tickled through the crisp hair of her mons before delving into her.
His erection was burning hot and hard. Yet he would not take her. He must make this time last so he could remember every second. He separated the folds of her wider and slid his fingers deep to stroke the nub at the top of her sex.
Calling out his name, Mara pulled at his arms, trying to bring him closer, closer, closer. Then she slid her own fingers up his arms over his shoulders and through the mahogany mane. She leaned forward and buried
her lips against his throat. He shivered in response, causing her to smile.
“You like that, do you?” she asked. “You’re going to like this even better. She ran a hand down from his hair, over his face, his chest, his middle and inexorably downward to his hard length. He was hard and straining toward her touch. He pulled back from her questing fingers.
“Not yet. I do not want to come just yet. We have a ways to go,” he said.
He grasped both her arms above her head and straddled her hips. One hand returned to the teasing magic between her thighs. Too soon, her breath caught and held as she convulsed. Her inner muscles pulsing, pulling at his fingers as she cried out in her pleasure.
Only when the last of her shudders ceased and she was weak and limp did he stop and kiss her lips.
“We’re not done yet,” he said. He moved between her legs, fitting himself against her. With passion-roughened hands, he pulled her knees around his hips. He pressed himself to her entrance and then pushed inside. Back and then forward again he moved, pumping hard and deep.
Faster and harder he thrust. His breath chugged against her cheek.
His eyes locked on hers.
“Come with me.” He gasped out each word. Leaning back and holding her legs wide, he drove himself into her with long strokes until he felt her clenching around him.
“Aghhh,” he moaned, tightening with his own release claiming him. He collapsed on top of her and she lay with her arms clasping him to her as he continued to shudder inside her. His breathing heavy, he lay still with his head resting against her breast. He slipped into sleep. His first in more than two hundred years.
In the aftermath of pleasure, Mara fought against sleep. Her mind was consumed with remembering every feeling, every sense. Running her foot up the back of his calf, the hair on his legs tickled her. As she held him cradled in her arms and between her legs, she could almost forget their time together was so short. Her fingers slid through his hair and she felt the change. What had been silky now felt course and gritty. As if the strands were coated with concrete.
* * * * *
Over the next few hours the two of them talked, ate and petted. They even played a game of slide using the slick floor of the museum and its area rugs. The idea of living a lifetime together in a few hours was ridiculous, but Mara was going to try her darnedest.
Very deliberately, she ignored the blotches of alabaster coloring that had broken out on Garrick’s skin and were multiplying. She pretended not to see the way his joints were stiffening until his movements began to resemble Frankenstein’s monster. Garrick cooperated in her self-deception. It seemed that he also wanted to deny the inevitable, but the time came when further denial was impossible.
As they danced to slow music playing from the computer, Garrick stopped. “Mara. I do not think I can move my right leg. I fear this is the end.”
* * * * *
His blood was turning to marble sludge. Slowly seeping through and expanding in his body, Garrick knew he was turning to stone. His legs were heavy, stiffened. His arms hung from his shoulders as if he held boulders in his hands. He glanced down at his chest and saw the strange stony patches covered almost all of him. It was his skin that was in patches now.
He dragged his eyes up to his love. Mara’s eyes leaked tears. Her cheeks were wet and her expression stricken.
Garrick managed to lift his ten-ton arms to grasp her by the shoulders. The tips of his fingers were numb. Oh, how he missed the softness of her skin.
“You must promise me, Mara.” The words were stilted through his stiffening lips. His breathing labored as if the air were filtered through gravel. “Promise you will not try to sacrifice yourself for me when I can no longer stop you.”
Mara shook her head, but another voice—a man’s—spoke. “Oh, I can assure you she won’t.” He stepped out of the shadows into the room.
“Uncle Hobart,” Mara said, positioning herself in front of Garrick. “How did you get in here?”
Her uncle held up a ring of keys, dangling them to make a tinkling sound. “The director of the museum is a close friend of mine.”
“She called you after all.”
“Of course,” he said with a grin. “We’re going to dinner later.”
He raised his other hand. It held a gun. “Step away from him, Mara.”
“Do as he commands,” Garrick said.
Mara didn’t move. It was as if she had not heard him. “You knew he was trapped in the statue, didn’t you?”
“Oh yes,” Rushworth said. “Don’t look so shocked. History is full of foot soldiers sacrificed for the sake of bringing prosperity to prominent families. This young man’s sacrifice was no different.”
At Mara’s horrified expression, Rushworth giggled. “You are such a bleeding heart, Mara. Just like your father. He wanted to let the soldier go also. I couldn’t let that happen.”
“What do you mean?”
“‘What do you mean?’” he taunted in a sing-song voice. “Don’t you even care that our family’s stock portfolio decreased in value over three million dollars just this morning? Can you imagine what would happen if he were free permanently?” Shaking his head, the muzzle of the gun wavered back and forth with each movement. “You don’t care. Like your father before you. No consideration for obligation to your family.”
“What are you saying about my father?”
“I’m saying, you fool, the accident I arranged was supposed to kill all of you but you didn’t die.”
Garrick struggled to speak but his lips no longer moved.
“Bastard,” Mara said.
“You didn’t die then, but you’ll die now.” The gun Rushworth had been waving stilled as he pointed it directly at his niece.
Fighting against the weight of his own solidifying body, Garrick lurched, throwing himself against Mara. She fell. The muzzle of Rushworth’s gun flashed and the bullet zipped past Garrick, lodging in the remains of the slab.
Managing another step and then another, Garrick lumbered toward Rushworth. A superior smirk formed on the man’s lips as he pointed the gun at Garrick and squeezed the trigger. Another flash from the muzzle and a splinter of rock broke away from Garrick’s midsection. He never even felt the impact of the bullet. At least there was one advantage to becoming a slab of rock.
Two more times the other man fired as Garrick advanced. The smugness slipped from Rushworth’s face when still there was no effect.
Garrick felt like Atlas lifting the world as he raised his arms to lock Rushworth in a stone embrace and squeezed.
Crush him. Crush him. Crush him. The chant repeated silently in Garrick’s mind.
The effort was worth the priceless expression of disbelief on his enemy’s face when Rushworth realized that he should have run from Garrick rather than depending on his gun.
As marble replaced the cornea of his eyes, Garrick had but one more thought. At least Mara was safe.
* * * * *
“Garrick,” Mara screamed springing up from the floor. He was fixing in place as she watched him crush her uncle in a hug.
“Let go,” her uncle screeched. He thrashed against the rock-hard arms of stone imprisoning him.
Frantically, Mara searched out the clock on the wall. She knew at best she had a few minutes before the twenty-four-hour deadline expired. At worst, time was already up.
She needed a weapon. Where—? She remembered the stone dagger in her pocket. The dagger she’d placed there to hide from the museum director.
Jamming her hand into her dress pocket, she wrapped her fingers around the handle. She heard her breath, raspy with desperation. She tugged the dagger and it caught on the fabric.
“Please…”
Another tug and the seam of the pocket gave way, freeing the dagger. She held it in her palm, staring down at it for what seemed like an eternity. Could she do it? She must do it. Thoughts of her parents last moments flashed in her head. Dread for Garrick’s fate gripped her. She ran to her unc
le and brought the dagger up in an arc.
“Gwaed aberthu. Dy enaid am ei.” She recited the incantation. “Blood sacrifice. Your life for his.”
Mara plunged the dagger downward with all her weight, driving it deep into her uncle’s neck. Blood spurted. He screamed, high and keening. She continued to chant as the blood flowed, coating sections of Garrick’s statue form.
Her uncle’s eyes stared into hers, the hatred along with the life finally fading away. Eyes vacant, he slumped and hung in Garrick’s statue grip.
Omigod. It was too late. Her uncle was dead but so was Garrick.
Knees buckling, she stumbled and fell against Garrick. She leaned against his back.
“No. Please, Garrick. Come back,” she whispered.
Complete silence hung in the room.
The body under her cheek shifted. Mara heard a long breath dragging, labored. Under her cheek, she felt a heartbeat. Was it her imagination?
Lifting her head, she saw that his skin had pinkened. The splotches of alabaster were still there but receding. The same splotches covered her uncle in an increasing area.
Mara blinked at the moisture burning her eyes.
Eventually the transference was complete. Her uncle stood as an edifice of marble. Garrick, flesh and blood, slid weakly to his knees on the ground.
Mara knelt beside him, her arms going around his shoulders as she nuzzled at his neck. His head came up and turned. His eyes stared into hers. Chocolate going from hard to melting. He smiled.
“Mara,” he said. “Is this a dream?”
“I think it’s real.”
As she helped him to his feet, Garrick glanced at the statue of Hobart Rushworth. “I can almost feel sorry for the bastard…Almost.”
“Let’s get my stuff and get out of here.”
Garrick took tentative steps toward the front door of the museum. A look of wonder crossed his face. “Nothing is stopping me. I can leave this place with you.”
She leaned into Garrick. Rising on tiptoes, she pressed a long kiss on his mouth. She pulled back and giggled. The laughter turned a bit hysterical and bounced in an echo around the gallery.
Sacrifice In Stone Page 4
