Stone Passions Trilogy (52 page)

The line went dead silent and she was afraid he might have hung up on her. “Hello?”

“I’m sure your daughter wants a puppy for herself.” His voice was slightly less haughty than before. There may have even been a trace of amusement.

“Nah,” she shook her head, encouraged by the almost-friendly tone of his voice. “She wants a gargoyle now, of all things. Can you imagine?”

“Quite.” The partially thawed quality was erased completely in favor of a completely frozen tone. There was a shuffling sound and some murmuring in the background but Jenna couldn’t make out what he was saying. Her heart was racing in her chest at having survived a verbal skirmish with the man she had never met and now she was pretty sure she never wanted to meet him. Having said only a few words over the phone he was intimidating as hell; it was all in the tone of his voice. How else was he able to freeze a person with barely a word being spoken?

“Jenna.” Rhys’s warm voice melted through the frozen layer of ice left behind from her brief conversation with Armand. She could picture the slow, easy smile that curled his luscious lips and for a moment she forgot why she called. “What can I do for you this evening?”

“Rhys.” Licking her lips, feeling her body respond even though it wasn’t the time or place, she got straight to the point, “What the hell happened today?”

He let out a long, miserable sigh, “Their perfect world cracked.”

“Can it be fixed?” She couldn’t hide the desperate hope that made her voice squeak. He didn’t say anything for a long time and from the dread filling her she realized that she wasn’t going to like his answer.

“Vaughn is leaving in a few days,” he explained, leaving Jenna stunned and speechless. “He asked Melanie to go with him but it would mean giving up you and Ferris.”

“Why?” Jenna frowned, not able to comprehend how. “Melanie is my sister, Rhys. No matter how far she goes, she’s always able to return home.”

“Not this time,” he said softly, resolutely. “They would… leave and not come back.”

Jenna inhaled sharply as a knife was thrust into her chest and her heart continued trying to beat around the wound, writhing in agony. “Like a suicide pact?”

“What?” Rhys’s voice rose an octave in surprise before he bellowed with laughter, “No, sweetheart, no. He’s simply going away. It’s as simple and as complicated as that.”

“Oh.” She really didn’t know what to say and her emotions were running the gambit from despair to bewilderment. “So it’s not a matter of getting them together to work their differences out?”

“It’s really not,” he assured her. He took a breath as if to say something but remained silent until her belly began to tighten with dread. Wanting to hear what he meant to say, she held her breath and didn’t try to fill the void with meaningless chatter. Finally, he released his breathe and sighed, “There are so many things you don’t know about my brothers, Jenna, about me.”

“That’s what I’m trying to do,” she interrupted. “Get to know you better.”

He laughed but it was without humor, “You have no idea how that tempts me but it is impossible, at least for now.”

“When will it be possible?” she asked, her words soft as her heart sat like a lump in her chest.

“I don’t know,” he said wistfully, sounding like he regretted the words even as he spoke them. “All I know is that now’s not our time.”

“Will we have a time?” she asked, her throat tight with tears she refused to cry. She barely knew the man and she wouldn’t cry over something that almost happened. It was better this way, ending it before it could really begin.

“I don’t know,” he answered honestly and a surge of anger threatened to engulf her. He had gotten her hopes up, promising her that they would make it work, and now he was telling her that he just didn’t know. “I want you so badly, Jenna, but everything is so fucked up right now.”

Clearing her throat, she uttered the words that tore the scab from her heart, letting the blood flow freely. “Then we shouldn’t tempt fate and see each other anymore. I think we should break up.”

She knew that they weren’t dating but the hours they had spent together had been among the brightest in a very long time. Unfortunately, she needed more than the promise of someday to take the leap. She had already leapt once and almost hadn’t made it out of the blackness when it had turned to dust. As much as she liked Rhys, as easily as she could imagine a future with him, she needed more.

“Jenna….”

“I meant it when I said it felt like you were the piece of me that was missing,” she rushed on before he could convince her to change her mind and wait for maybe. “My daughter already adores you and I could easily adore you, too, but if there’s no hope….”

“There’s always hope,” he breathed.

She smiled sadly, “But in this case hope isn’t enough. I need more.”

“Jenna.”

“Good bye, Rhys,” she whispered, hanging up the phone. If she couldn’t fix the problem then the least she could do was be there for Lenni.

With a sigh, she made her way back over to the main house, to Melanie’s room. Ferris had somehow managed to make a place for herself on Melanie’s bed, leaving hardly any space at all. Careful not to wake either of them, Jenna climbed onto the bed, wrapping her arms around Melanie from behind, feeling Ferris beneath her fingertips.

“Here.” Rhys handed Vaughn another beer, his heart aching for his brother. “Maybe she’ll come back?”

Taking the bottle, Vaughn looked at him with a grimace and sighed. “No, I asked too much of her and there just wasn’t enough time.”

Straddling the ledge, Rhys faced Vaughn, “Why didn’t you simply tell her what all it entailed before you made the offer?”

Vaughn’s lips quirked up in a rueful smile, “I didn’t think. I just knew that I would give my life to protect her and beyond that?” he shrugged his shoulders and shook his head. “I just wanted to keep her safe.”

Armand joined them, sitting on the ground, resting his back against the half wall and stretching his legs out in front of him. “Humans are fickle creatures, Vaughn. When you wake all of this will fade into a distant memory and in a few years you’ll even forget the color of her eyes.”

“Have you forgotten the color of Katrina’s eyes?” Rhys asked, nudging Armand with his knee.

Reluctantly, Armand smiled, “Blue-ish green.”

Rhys arched an eyebrow, “Her eyes were brown.”

Armand’s smile widened as he looked over his shoulder at his two brothers, “See? Forgotten.”

Vaughn chuckled but it was strained. Twisting so he was leaning against the half wall, he let out a long sigh, “I don’t regret it.”

Looking out over the city skyline, Rhys listened with half an ear. He enjoyed the muted sounds of the city from his perch on the building. There wasn’t a lot he could add to the conversation since he had never given up his nights for anyone and until he met Jenna he never even considered doing so. He had been content sampling the delights of many women, sometimes at the same time. With a huff, he took a drink of beer, “We should take the next few nights off and let the city go to hell.”

Armand smacked his thigh, the hit actually painful, “Don’t be an idiot, Rhys. Abdicating our responsibilities isn’t the answer.”

“You’re so full of crap, Armand.” Rubbing his thigh, Rhys continued scanning the city as he laughed, “You used to be able to take a joke, what happened to you?”

“You used to be funny,” he retorted, the razzing good natured despite the underlying cynicism that he now wore as a second skin.

Rhys chanced a look at his brothers and frowned when he saw the whiteness around Vaughn’s mouth, the way he pressed his lips together and squeezed his hand into a fist. Putting a hand on Vaughn’s shoulder, he jumped when Vaughn flinched. Vaughn looked up at him with desolation in his golden eyes, the light faded to almost nothing, “How am I going to go on without her?”

“She might return,” Rhys offered, hating Melanie in that moment for doing this to Vaughn.

“You’ll survive,” Armand said softly. “It’s the nature of gargoyles to survive.”

Vaughn bent his head and rasped, “What if I don’t want to?”

Rhys gaped at him for a moment before smacking him on the back of the head. When Vaughn grabbed the back of his skull, whipping his head around and glaring at Rhys, Rhys snorted, “That’s a hell of a way to cherish Melanie’s memory. You’re acting as if she is already gone.”

Vaughn closed his eyes as a shudder worked its way through his body, “If she doesn’t return in time than she might as well be. I’ll never see her again and,” he swallowed thickly. “And I can’t figure out what I am going to do without her.”

Despite his brother’s breaking heart Rhys could still envision a scenario where he would give up his nights for Jenna. To keep her safe he would give up everything even if it meant losing her. In the end, Vaughn was going to realize that he made the only choice he could: in order to keep Melanie safe he had to give up his nights.

If he was given the chance he would give up his nights for Jenna in a heartbeat.

Chapter 5

Jenna stood in the break room at the office, waiting for the coffee to finish brewing so she could wake up enough to get her work done. It was going to be at least a three cup day today. Between worrying about Melanie and trying not to think too much about Rhys, she was already exhausted and the week had barely begun.

Hiding her yawn behind her hand, she stared at nothing as she gave herself permission to think about Rhys for a few minutes. There may not be a future for them but that didn’t mean she couldn’t relive the few moments they had shared.

It definitely didn’t prevent her from dreaming about him.

A slight smile curved her lips at the heated memory of her erotic dreams, of Rhys teasing her with his lips, his fingers, of Rhys fucking her until she screamed. They had been some really good dreams. Relaxing, her eyes slid shut and she pictured Rhys’s chest gleaming in the night, his jacket and shirt gaping open despite the cold air. Even in the middle of winter he had radiated so much heat and she just wanted to bask in it….

“Good morning, Jenna.” A voice interrupted her thoughts and she blushed, opening her eyes and seeing her co-worker Blake standing in front of her with a coffee mug in his hand. He leaned against the counter and smiled at her, his hazel eyes twinkling far too merrily for that hour of the morning.

“Blake,” she returned. There had been a time not so very long ago that she had found him attractive but compared to Rhys he was just Blake. He was pleasant looking, with short, dark blond hair and a tall, svelte frame, but he lacked the pure masculinity that was Rhys, the laughing brown eyes.

He stared at her for a long time, assessing her with an odd expression on his face. His lip quirked up in a slight smile as he murmured, “There’s something different about you, Jenna.”

She glanced down at herself and made a face since she was wearing her usual outfit, a nice blouse and a pair of beige slacks. She had draped a colorful scarf around her neck but it was nothing out of the ordinary. Blake’s laughter had her lifting her head and looking at him. “I’m talking about you, Jenna, not your outfit.”

“I see,” she murmured, but she didn’t because her brain still needed coffee to be able to function after a night of so little sleep.

“Listen, I’ve wanted to ask you out for some time but you always seemed,” he chuckled, letting the word hang there for a moment before he continued, “Distracted. What do you say?”

“About what?” She really needed her coffee if she had any hope of following the conversation because men in the office didn’t walk up to her and ask her out. They talked about tax codes and rates of return, not dating.

He smiled, “Joining me at a bar for a drink and conversation.”

“We’re talking now.”

His smile widened, “I was thinking something a little more intimate.”

She wasn’t sure what the protocol was because she wasn’t actually seeing Rhys – she had put an end to that. But she wasn’t really interested in Blake. Color stained her cheeks as a smile played about her lips and she murmured, “I’m sort of seeing someone right now.”