WingSpan (Taken on the Wing Book 1) (11 page)

“Shadow—”

“Mark,” she interrupts. “I think for now Jenn and Mark. They talk and they feel and all Talon and Shadow are going to do is make it alright in bed when maybe it’s not the right thing to do now.”

“I want you close,” he says as he helps her sit up. “My bed, no making it alright. I promise.”

“That bus ride was three days with the stops,” Jenn rubs her leg. “It’s bad tonight. I’m not so sure I’ll get back to sleep.”

“What do you need? I don’t keep anything around for pain but I’ll run out.”

“My bag.”

“I’ll get it.”

First in his room he pulls back the blankets for her then grabs the bag and while she digs around he gets her some water.

“I don’t like taking them,” she admits. “Oxycontin makes me feel really strange for a while.”

“Were they what you had a problem with?” he kicks himself for asking but he still has the urge to take the bottle away and dump them down the toilet. “Shit, I didn’t mean for it to come out like that.”

“Once, I think,” she won’t look at him. “I overdosed. I don’t remember what I took but there was a bunch of stuff missing when I woke up two days later. Careful with them ever since; try to stick with the over-the-counter meds now.”

You’re being too hard on her. And on yourself.

Of course he is. Survival rate is only half for gryphons who lose their sibling when they’re so young. She made it this far. He should be grateful and he is; proud of her too.

“Where are your parents,
Arlette
?” he asks.

“Parents?” she laughs but she’s shaking and Mark knows he should have kept his mouth shut. “Terry and I grew up in foster care. All we had was each other.”

Mark has to grab her before she falls over. Something is terribly screwed up for her if they were abandoned. Terribly, terribly screwed up.

“Enough,” he insists, scooping her up in his arms and carrying her down the hall. She seems to weigh nothing and feels smaller and smaller with each step. Dear Lord, he’s not asking her another thing unless she brings it up.

Jenn won’t lie down. Instead she curls into a ball against the headboard, barely allowing him to get a pillow behind her. He wraps himself around her, keeping everything away.

Chapter Ten

By the time their dishes are put away the dryer is done. Mark folds her clothes, leaving them on the counter and is hanging her underwear over the shower rod when he’s interrupted by a loud thump on his roof.

Why can’t gryphons knock on the damn door like everyone else?

As he checks on Jenn the footsteps make their way in the other direction to the street out front. She’s lying down at least though it was a struggle. All he can see is her brown hair sticking out from under the blankets.

A quick look past the living room curtains tells him his night isn’t about to get better.

Torrent, royal heir to Talon’s adopted home eyrie in Jasper, stands in the street. With his wings extended he tries to exude every bit of intimidation his station lends him. Unfortunately the warrior in Torrent has never truly been tested; something about not embarrassing him or some other brilliant bullshit though Talon would love to forget that simple rule if only for a minute.

Three hundred years of being a prick has left Torrent with little in the way of personality. His long black hair is loose and he wears nothing more than jeans.

Talon pulls his boots on, already pissed. If he has to take wing he’ll have to tear off one of his favourite shirts to do it. Halfway down his stairs he’s distracted that Shadow is so far away even though the distance grants him some perspective on her feelings.

As Talon steps onto the street Torrent spreads his wings further and beats them down, blowing up a cloud of fresh snow. It’s fucking cold enough for Talon already with his coat off and now even more snow clings to his skin.

“Torrent,” Talon drops to one knee.

“Cut the shit, Talon. You don’t mean it.”

Talon shrugs, getting on his feet and jamming his cold hands in his pockets. Disrespect it is.

“I guess if I hadn’t nailed your sister we could be friends,” Torrent goads.

Talon’s reply is an insincere nod. He doesn’t understand what Feather saw in Torrent and why she made him swear to stay out of it.

“Well, perhaps I can change that.”

Not likely. The only things which keep Talon from running him off are his royal status and Feather’s wish he let their ‘thing’ go. He’d like nothing more than to tie Torrent’s wings in a bow and drop him from a building.

“I’m listening, Torrent,” Talon grudgingly remembers his manners. “I should offer you the hospitality of my home.”

“Indeed,” Torrent smirks. “I’ll keep it out here. You look cold.”

A winged gryphon can survive any climate given sufficient protein and at the moment Talon isn’t winged. He’s relieved, however that Torrent isn’t getting near his mate.

“My sire’s guard is aging, Talon,” he starts. “His right wing is retiring as are several others. Sire Sher extends his invitation to you to return to Jasper for consideration as a replacement.”

Talon doesn’t do a very good job hiding his surprise and suspicion. Sher has led the Jasper Eyrie for several hundred years and his guard is known for their size. Torrent has four inches on Talon and wouldn’t make the height requirement himself. Also an invitation to serve would come from the Sire himself, not his son. And why now? Sher’s guard isn’t as old as Torrent makes it sound.

“LIAR!”

Talon flinches at Shadow’s volume. His hope of avoiding an altercation with Torrent is fading.

“You’re
not
taking him!” she bellows. She stomps toward them barefoot in nothing but his t-shirt.

“Human entertainment?” Torrent laughs. “That’s plain sad.”

“It’s okay Shadow, go in.”

“It’s not okay!” she cries.

Torrent’s laugh is cut short. His nostrils flare as he figures out she’s not human and she speeds up, not feeling the cold or the pain in her leg.

“You’re
not
taking him,” she sobs. “Son of a bitch! You took my brother and you’re not taking Talon!”

“
This
little thing is Shadow?” Torrent growls with more than just offence at the insult. “You’ll pay for her big mouth.”

Crap. Feather must have said something.

Shadow breaks into a run, fists swinging wildly at her side and before Talon can get his arms around her she takes a swing at Torrent, her right opened up and partially shifted into a claw. Her long nails rake across his chest as he steps back in surprise that she’d actually try it. Talon pulls her off as she gets her clawed feet up, just missing in her attempt to disembowel Torrent.

“Bastard!” she screeches. “Lying bastard!”

I’m screwed,
Talon thinks as he pulls her away. Nobody touches royalty or questions a royal’s integrity.

Ever.

Blood runs down Torrent’s chest and stains his pants black in the streetlight. Talon groans, pushing away the pressure to take wing and fight. He has Shadow to protect and for the moment that need is stronger than his reaction to aggression and blood.

Torrent’s hand is over his wound and he charges. As Talon stumbles with Shadow up the slippery sidewalk she casts a hand toward the house.

“You won’t enter here!”

A flash of heat sears him, fading as quickly as it hit and Talon looks down to see a line of scorched grass at his feet.

Jesus, she’s stoned
.

Shadow’s pupils are blown wide open and she sobs, completely hysterical. Like comforting his sister, Talon cups the back of her neck in his big hand and squeezes only much more firmly. When done gently it soothes a female but enough pressure will put her under.

“Hold on,” he whispers and tightens his grip even more. Shadow goes limp as Torrent comes to a sudden stop only a few feet away on the other side of the burnt line in the frozen grass.

Talon backs into his door and assesses Torrent’s threat to Shadow. The bigger gryphon is on his ass in the snow, nose bloodied from an injury Talon didn’t see him receive. Torrent gets on his feet and with a roar charges before he’s fully upright.

And bounces off an invisible wall where the smoking grass is. Blood ruptures from Torrent’s forehead where he must have struck it, adding to the mess from his nose and chest. Talon watches, fascinated, as he cradles Shadow closer.

Torrent staggers up, this time probing the invisible barrier with his toe then he disappears into the night.

“Who are you?” Talon asks as he gets Shadow on the sofa and covers her up. Another piece of wood on the fire should help warm her. He takes her bottle of pills from her bag and reads the label. One it says and he’s certain he saw two in her hand, maybe even three now that he thinks about it.

And sure as shit it was her magic that banned Torrent from his house.

Shadow is no common gryphon. She has to be pure royalty to pull that off but a royal abandoned to live the life of a human?

It doesn’t make any sense at all.

“Mark?”

Jenn tries to focus through the pills still raging through her system. If she’s awake it means her messed up metabolism is burning off the narcotics and it shouldn’t be long before she’s mostly alert and free of the hallucinations they cause. An undocumented side-effect, her doctor said, and added more pills to her regimen to compensate. She doesn’t take them since they do nothing for her.

Blinking doesn’t help with the blackness and she remembers being carried down the hall to his bedroom before the usual nightmare about Terry became really weird.

“Here, Jenn,” Mark moves and she realizes he’s completely wrapped up around her. The little hairs poking out past his top button tickle and she runs her lips over to try and make them lay flat. “You’re okay.”

Ouch, maybe the tickle isn’t too unbearable. Jenn’s throat hurts and the movement makes her neck ache.

“Where are you from?” Mark asks.

“Parksville,” she gets on her back and pulls the pillow out from under her head hoping to straighten the kink in her neck.

“And before that?”

“Terry and I grew up in Victoria. He supported me through university and we moved to Parksville when I got my BA. We lived there ever since. He always talked about moving further up Island but we never did.”

Mark slides down under the blankets so she stays covered up and Jenn realizes why she thought she was alone in the bed. He’s fully dressed so he felt like more blankets. She laughs as Mark pushes up her shirt and gets his mouth on her belly just above her panties. Jenn imagines he sleeps with his clothes on as some sort of protection thing so he’s ready for anything. Okay, that’s romantic. The canned fish was strange. She pulls her fingers through his soft hair as she feels more like herself.

“Bad dream,” she apologizes. “Did I wake you?”

“No,” he mumbles into her skin. “Fuck that smells good.”

“Are you wearing boots?”

Jenn pulls her legs up, trying to catch his head between her thighs but he laughs and blocks her.