The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance (Trisha Telep) (Kitty Norville 0.50)

He ignored her, tightened his hold and dived forwards until air whooshed past her again to steal both her breath and the scream that had been flying from her throat.

Two

Mord angled his wings to slow their landing, let his feet skid across the roadway. The female in his arms lay limp, pale. She’d screamed as she was falling, and screamed again when he caught her.

He bent one knee and lowered her to the grass. They were in some kind of park. A statue of a man, dressed in a uniform unfamiliar to Mord, guarded the entrance. A large fountain that Mord remembered from when he had last been awake and flown over this city lay a few feet past that.

He stared at the statue for a moment. The date, 1944 - forty-six years after the gargoyles had agreed to the great sleep. He started to stand, to leave the female where she lay. He’d saved her. His job was done.

The wind shifted. The smell of ginger wove around him, halting his steps. He glanced back at the female. She was pale, too pale for a human. He knelt down and placed his hand next to her face. Her pallor almost matched his own, and he was still in his gargoyle form. He wasn’t able yet to shift to his human shape.

He flexed and unflexed his wings, enjoyed the feel of them moving behind him. A breeze from his movement caught the female’s hair and threw it across her face. The dark locks clung to her lips. He brushed them aside, or tried to. The tendrils wrapped around his hand, seemed to pull at him, refuse to let him go. He cursed. He couldn’t leave her here, like this. He knew nothing of this time, the dangers that might lie in wait for an unprotected female.

He scooped her up. She weighed nothing, but was warm against his chest. Her arms fell at her sides, but this close, holding her, he could hear the even in and out of her breaths. She was alive, just passed out.

He exhaled, annoyed at his unexplainable need to care for her, to see she was OK before leaving to investigate whatever awaited him in this new time. He strode to the fountain. The water splattered onto a carved bowl then spilled into a bigger section at least twelve feet across. Kneeling, he opened his arms and let her roll into the water with a splash. As she sank below the surface, he bent his knees and propelled himself into the sky. The water would awaken her while allowing him to leave undetected. He couldn’t risk staying by her side, revealing himself any more. Humans didn’t know the gargoyles’ secret. They couldn’t.

His wings spread and he flattened them, allowed himself to glide for a second, silently, so he could hear her sputter back to life. He’d watch from up high as she pulled herself upright, then made her way back to wherever she called home.

Except she didn’t. She sputtered and shook, rubbed her hands over her hair and face. Then she stood in the knee-high water, her thin shirt and obscenely short pants clinging to her breasts and buttocks. Water dripped from her hair. She shook her head again, then stared at the sky.

“Gargoyle,” she whispered. “Where are you?”

Her voice was low, stunned, but sure. She’d seen him, and could somehow see him as he soared over her head. She was watching him.

He hesitated for a moment, then turned. She only thought she’d seen him, would easily convince herself otherwise soon. He’d been through this before. Humans were good at protecting their own realities. They believed what they had been trained from birth to believe.

And stone didn’t come to life.

She’d forget him soon.

Water dripped from Kami’s hair. She slicked her hands over it, sent a river running down her back, but kept her gaze on the sky. She wasn’t crazy. The gargoyle was alive and had saved her.

Something moved above her, but high up — too high to make out in the darkness. She ran her hands over her arms, realized she was shaking. The wind whispered. She spun, ho

ped it was the gargoyle returning, but the grass beside her was empty.

She stepped from the fountain and wondered for a brief second how she’d landed there. Then another sound caught her attention, an engine turning over. She froze, prayed the driver wouldn’t see her. She had no explanation for where she was or the state she was in.

She glanced up at the building she’d fallen from and the window she’d left open. She was sure of the last, but it was closed now. Strange. A memory tickled at the back of her mind. Something about her fall.

She frowned and stared at the ledge. The gargoyle? Her gaze darted to the right. Nothing. No statue, no sign one had ever perched there. Her heart jumped.

He was real.

For some reason the thought warmed her. With a smile she patted the keys in her pocket. Still there. She could drive herself home, or go back inside, see up close that he was really gone.

Knowing exactly what she was going to do, she stepped off the grass and into the road. She was halfway across when a motor roared behind her. She spun. Lights beamed at her, blinding her, freezing her steps.

For the second time in half an hour, she was facing a sure death.

Mord, clinging to a cold metal and glass building nearby, watched as the female stared up at the skyscraper he’d called home. Wonder, then joy, lit her face. She stepped off the kerb then moved with purpose towards the building.

He frowned. She was supposed to leave, to forget him. She looked up again, her gaze locked onto the spot where he’d been perched, frozen ... for how long?

He was still staring at the ledge he’d vacated when he heard a strange, mechanical roar. Instinctively he jerked towards it, saw twin lights burning through the night, pointed at the little female. The machine rushed towards her and she stood frozen, staring at it.

Without thinking, he pushed away from the building, pointed his wings to the ground and the girl, and snatched her like a hawk capturing a rabbit from a field. The machine whizzed beneath them. He made out eyes, dark and intense, peering over the wheel.