Locked in Stone Read online

  “I made the mistake of mentioning a kid in an awesome ghost costume to Mom and, er, well, apparently there was no kid in a costume. She figured what had happened pretty quick. My seeing the ghost confirmed the fact that Dad wasn’t really my dad. Razael had left her a post office box to contact him if she ever needed him, so she did. Next thing I knew, Lucas showed up and I learned about the Sentinels and Protectorate.”

  That had been a bit startling, meeting his first gargoyle in the form of Dennis. He hadn’t been sure which was scarier for a while: Lucas or Dennis. He knew now that Lucas was easily the more terrifying. Dennis, after all, relaxed and hung out as one of the guys, even if he had a tail. Lucas carried the weight of the almost impossible task of keeping North America’s Twisted One problem to a manageable level. Add to that the looming specter of the Rift cycle starting sometime in the very near future, with not enough young Sacred Mothers to close them all, and it was a wonder any Sentinel at all slept at night.

  “Were you ever scared of them?”

  “I ain’t afraid of no ghosts,” he quipped just to see if he could bring a smile to her face. It took a moment, but she tittered a little and finished mixing up her second drink. “In truth, yeah. For a little bit. Then I started talking to them and learned they really weren’t that bad. They get scared and need someone to talk to. They’re usually here because they got lost or ran away when the Gatherers came for them.”

  “Gatherers?”

  “That is an entirely too long story with all that’s been thrown at you so far today,” he said.

  Her eyes narrowed on him, a flicker of irritation clear in her stiffened posture. Then the moment passed and she nodded shortly. “You may, just may, be right. Lighter topics it is. I don’t want to think right now.”

  …

  By the time she finished the chocolate banana delight (tragically, only half of the pie), a thick roast-beef sandwich, and three Long Island Iced Teas, Rose felt, if not better, at least more stable than she had when they’d walked into the kitchen.

  She found herself surprisingly entertained. Cal hadn’t spent the entire time falling over himself apologizing for not being dead, and after hearing his explanation as to why he hadn’t been there, she accepted the possibility that maybe he hadn’t deliberately let Anyuka die. That didn’t mean she’d forgiven the Sentinels as a whole, but having heard the details of the massacre and the aftermath, she would cut him a little slack.

  At least he was a familiar face, here in this strange place. He hadn’t physically aged more than a year or two from how he’d looked when they first met.

  Rose shoved her plate back and let out a satisfied sigh. Cal glanced up from the phone he’d scooped up at the sound of an incoming text. “Full?”

  She shrugged. He’d clearly never seen her when she was hungry. There’d been more than one occasion when she’d been asked to leave an “all you can eat” buffet. “Never really full, but it’ll do.”

  It was also almost sunset. Her skin was beginning the familiar itch that kept her incredibly aware of the time. She hadn’t seen another gargoyle in twenty-four years, and part of her simply wasn’t going to be able accept she’d really found others of her kind until she actually saw them transform.

  He must have seen her not-so-subtle glance toward the window because he nodded. “Yeah, good. The text just now was from Lucas. He got some info from the pendant.”

  She warmed a little toward the harsh-faced head of the Sentinels. Clearly he was respecting her and Cal’s request to give her some time to adjust; he probably could have just come back downstairs, but had instead texted. However, she got the distinct impression that Cal wasn’t saying everything. For the moment though, partially because her time-sense told her the sun was nearly set, she would let it go.

  Just for the moment.

  “’Kay.” She took a deep breath and then made herself ask a question that she needed answered. “I know I arrived with no warning, demanding Sentinel protection and all, but…am I going to be allowed to stay here, or should I maybe look for somewhere else to dump my stuff?”

  If the estate as a whole was holy ground and demons couldn’t come after her here, it seemed like a really good idea to stay put. However, she wouldn’t simply assume they’d put her up. Never mind they lived in what amounted to the Taj Mahal of houses.

  He made a sort of warthog noise of disgust. “We could house a small platoon and not notice.”

  She snorted. Leave it to a man to mention military stuff. And yeah, the house was definitely the image of conspicuous consumption.

  Something of her thought must have shown on her face as he stood and held his hand out because he said, “I know. It’s disgustingly big, but Lucas bought it so we’d have a stable base of operations.”

  Without thinking, she took the proffered hand to stand. When their hands connected, a little jolt of electricity passed between them and she blinked. Heat swept through her and she yanked away, rubbing her palm on her pant leg, trying to wipe the feel of him away before she let herself go back for another touch to see if the electricity would happen again.

  As he guided her from the kitchen, she looked at him. “Isn’t it kind of stupid? I mean, the Twisted Ones slaughtered my entire family and we were hidden out in the middle-of-nowhere Hungary.”

  Saying it surprisingly didn’t leave the same gaping wound as it might have only a few hours earlier. Just finding she wasn’t alone, that there were other survivors, including Vasiliu, made a huge difference.

  “How hard could it be for them to get to a single house in suburbia?” she asked.

  He nodded, a distant expression crossing his face, and thrust his hands in his pockets. It drew her attention to the way the material of his black jeans stretched taut over his thighs, and another little tremor of heat ran through her.

  Jesus, since when do I ever get the hots for a guy not named Gerard Butler? But there was no denying that, if she let herself forget for a moment he was Robin, her mother’s former bodyguard, Cal was hawt. Cliché it might be, but she could damned well wash clothes on his chest and belly—his t-shirt did absolutely nothing to conceal any of the coiled strength she sensed in him.

  And if she were washing clothes on his body, then he’d be at least half-naked and wet and…

  Stop!

  “We thrive on anonymity.” Thankfully Cal’s words broke the trance holding her attention riveted on his butt, since he was in the lead. “Any of the enemy who sees us doesn’t make it back to report in. Lucas has the community well-guarded and, let’s face it—Lucifer and his ilk want to destroy us, but while we’re outnumbered by them, they are badly outnumbered by humans. If attention is drawn to the fact that there are non-humans wandering around fighting each other, the chances are high that both Sentinels and Twisted Ones would be hunted and killed. So, for the most part, we don’t attack strongholds that are in settled areas.”

  “And they don’t either?”

  “Survival, Rose. It’s all about survival.” He sighed and stretched his arms above his head. “You know that feeling, yeah?”

  Did she ever. She settled for a quick nod.

  “So…” Cal cleared his throat as they reached the end of the hallway that lead toward the back yard. When he touched her arm, she nearly jumped out of her skin, but stopped at a quick jerk, not moving away. She was rather proud of herself for that. “Are we going to be okay, Rose? I understand if you never forgive me. Hell, I’ll never forgive myself for what happened in Hungary. But can you work with me, with the Sentinels?”

  Chapter Four

  Tip from Sentinel Angela Gorshin: Avoid telepaths. It’s awfully tempting to get your bank account number and PIN. We’re descended from angels after all, not saints.

  Rose heard a distinctly new hoarseness to Cal’s voice. She cracked her knuckles nervously as she considered his question. Finally, she said, “I don’t know about the Sentinels. I’ve got twenty-four years of resentment toward them and their failures.” She ran
her tongue over her teeth as she thought and decided to grab at the only lifeline she had. “But I’ll trust you. My attack on you was out of shock earlier, not actual hatred. I can deal with the Sentinels as a whole if I have someone I know with me.”

  “You’ll have no reason to regret it,” he murmured.

  With nothing else to be said between them, she turned her back on him and twirled the stick to open the blinds that led into the yard. She wasn’t sure she wanted to actually be outside and surrounded by them when the gargoyles woke up.

  Cal checked his phone as another text bleeped. It was less than five minutes until sunset. He grunted softly. “You want to be alone? I’m being summoned. Mr. Ray showed up.”

  She made a little noise of protest. Mr. Ray? That name still rang a bell. Cal had mentioned him earlier too. She couldn’t place it. Too, she hadn’t heard anyone come into the house. But it was so close to sunset. She didn’t want to get caught up in hearing whatever Lucas might have learned from Gwen’s pendant. Not now, not when it was almost time. “He didn’t want to see me too?”

  Cal gave her a lopsided smile. “Go on. He only asked for me, and I’m sure you want to see your cousin. Lucas will complain for a month if Vasiliu rips off doors in his drive to find you if you’re not there when the sun goes down. Save me from him. Please?”

  She was pretty sure he was deliberately trying to get rid of her. Why that might be, she didn’t know. Uncertainty tugged at her for only a second longer and then she curled her fingers around the doorknob. She would get to see real gargoyles again in minutes. And Vasiliu could verify everything Cal had said about being off in Paris at Anyuka’s insistence that day.

  In the silence that descended, heightening her awareness of the steadily increasing pressure within from her gargoyle side, she heard him walk swiftly away.

  Thank you. Nerves kept the words trapped in her throat.

  Her hands trembled, sending a little flurry of movement into the blinds themselves. Real gargoyles. Her own kind. It didn’t seem possible. And yet, as she stared out at the ring of statues in the backyard, she started to believe it might be true.

  As her mental clocked ticked down from minutes to mere seconds, the sun taking its own sweet time to sink below the horizon, she considered the dead-set sincerity in Cal’s voice when he’d asked if she could trust the Sentinels. He believed in these people. Clearly the gargoyles trusted them if they camped out there during their vulnerable hours.

  But would she ever be able to get over the fact that she’d lost almost everyone in the world because the Sentinels just weren’t good enough?

  She shook her head, trying to rid herself of the maudlin reflection. Now was not the time. Not as the last rays of sunlight slid from the yard. Her gaze snapped back to Vasiliu. She stopped breathing as the transformation began.

  At first it was a little shimmer, a tiny spider’s web of cracks splintering across the massive stone shape. Light emerged from the center of his face and the stone tips of Vasiliu’s wings quivered. A tremor stole across his broad shoulders and ran down the length of his body. The cracks allowing light across his face widened, finally shattering with a crack, audible even through the barrier of the door.

  A loud bellow, followed quickly by others, echoed from the yard as each gargoyle threw back his or her head, wings exploding from their stone prisons to stretch wide as they broke free from the day’s immobility.

  Little spots swirled before Rose’s eyes, reminding her that breathing was a necessity. In that same moment, Vasiliu’s giant head turned toward the door. Their eyes met through the glass, though a haze of moisture abruptly blurred the edges and angles of his face. A shudder wracked her body, excitement, nerves, and outright terror all rolled into one, and she took a staggering step backward.

  He bounded up the porch steps. Just behind him, Lucas’s Dennis cut off the other gargoyles to keep them from following Vasiliu in his rapid approach to the house.

  The doors crashed open and she held back no longer, leaping forward. No doubt about it, this was Vassy, her playmate and friend. Big and brave, and entirely here. Real.

  They collided, his arms and wings wrapping tightly around her, even as she curled her arms around his thick neck. She buried her face against him and breathed in deeply.

  Dear God… Tears streamed down her face at the heady, musky gargoyle scent, the faint aroma of leather and newly hewn stone. So long, God, so long.

  She cried out, “Vassy! Oh, Vassy!”

  As he whispered, “Ah, husikám, babám,” a shuddering breath escaped her lungs and she relaxed into him.

  She wasn’t alone any more.

  …

  Cal slipped into the second floor office where Lucas and Mr. Ray waited. His stomach churned as he closed the door behind him. Lucas’s message had been clear: We need to talk about Rose’s “savior.”

  Tom floated through the door a second later, shooting Cal an annoyed look. “C’mon, man. You think I don’t want to be in on this?”

  Clearly there were bigger problems on the horizon than a nosy ghost, especially since Mr. Ray still didn’t know the truth about Tom. It had been two years since Cal took Tom on as his resident Casper and he still wasn’t ready to admit he had saved a Twisted One’s ghost from traveling on to Otherworld.

  “Be nice to me. I stayed out of the kitchen while you made nicey-nice with Sweet Cheeks.”

  He stiffened a tad at the reference to Rose. She definitely had a gorgeous backside, but damned if he wanted Tom checking it out. Didn’t the ghost have someone else to haunt?

  Hell. He didn’t.

  Ghost-talkers were rare, and Cal’s watch contained a protected drop of the ghost’s blood. He’d bound Tom’s soul to him after the man had died warning Cal’s patrol of Sentinels about a Twisted One ambush and then dove into the fray, trying to help the Sentinels survive.

  To Cal’s mind, that was worth saving someone from crossing over to Otherworld into demon-controlled territory. That part of cosmos pretty much fit the Christian description of Hell.

  He gave a quick shake of his head toward the ghost. Tom brightened, getting the message that he wasn’t being ordered out, and wafted to the window. As the office overlooked the backyard, the ghost might be scoping out the ongoing gargoyle reunion.

  Lucas and Mr. Ray were seated on a couch, poring over some documents in Lucas’s lap. The angel was slightly chubby, short, and wore tiny gold-rimmed spectacles, conveying an impression of a harried accountant.

  Looks, especially in the cases of angels and Sacred Mothers, were definitely deceiving.

  “So, what’s the problem?” Cal asked, jamming his hands into his pockets. “What’s the big deal about Gwen? I could tell in the kitchen there was something nasty about that letter Rose gave you.”

  Lucas frowned and handed the papers in his lap over to Mr. Ray before he leaned back into the cushions with a groan. “Does the name Gwyeira Heir ring a bell by any chance?”

  It did, but he couldn’t place it initially. “Should it?”

  Lucas nodded, his lips pressed into a grim line before he elaborated. “Witch, believed dead for twenty-four years.”

  Memory slammed into him and Cal bared his teeth. In the inquest that cleared him of any wrong-doing to cause the massacre, the Protectorate’s investigators had turned up one name over and over as the designer of the attack: Gwyeira.

  “Shit, are you kidding me?”

  For once his angelic observer didn’t smack him upside the head for swearing.

  “I don’t kid about that bitch,” Lucas growled and pushed up from the couch to stalk over to the computer. “Gets even better. Gwen’s letter? Pretty much full of the vilest hatred I’ve ever seen aimed at anyone in my life.” Given that Lucas was more than a century old, that was a lot of hate. “She despised Rose, but gave her instructions to come here if she were murdered. Why, you may ask.”

  Well, yes, if Lucas would shut the fuck up and let him.

  “She had a soul-sto
ne set up to capture her essence should the Twisted Ones catch her. She wants to be pulled out, left alone as a ghost on this plane.”

  Cal snorted and chuffed a choking laugh. “Right, because we’d just go along with that. With letting her out. She might be a ghost, but I’m not the only ghost-talker.”

  Mr. Ray let out a small sigh and removed his glasses to polish the lenses. “Unfortunately she has something to bargain with.”

  Cal’s eyebrows snapped together and he straightened up. The angel looked seriously—well, for him anyway—pissed. “What? She’s dead. What could she possibly offer us that would convince you, or me for that matter, to let her out?”

  “The name of the couple she handed Serenity over to.”

  He gawked, staring first at his friend and then back at Mr. Ray. “Whaaat? Serenity? As in Sacred Mother, long-dead, Serenity?”

  “So she says in the letter.” Lucas snarled and jiggled the mouse by the computer before plopping down hard in the chair. Cal’s hearing picked up several particularly impressive strings of curses. “And damn it all, in her death memory I picked up a fleeting thought she had about taking Serenity with her, along with Rose, which seems to indicate Gwyeira isn’t just blowing smoke up our asses with her offer.”

  What. The. Fuck?

  What was Rose going to say if they told her this? About Gwen, about even the faintest possibility that one of her sisters might still be alive? Would she believe them? Be happy? Be pissed?

  That wasn’t even taking into consideration whether or not Rose would believe them if they told her about Gwen’s history.

  He scrubbed his hand across his jaw, feeling the first prickles of stubble under his fingertips as he cast his thoughts back to the inquest. The witch had been fucking Lucifer himself, and apparently at least one Sentinel as well, in the months before the massacre. That was how she’d not only been given the lead on preparing the assault, but gotten the location of the compound in the first place.

  How the fuck were they going to tell Rose this? She barely trusted the Sentinels at all, even if she seemed to be fine with him at the moment, and now someone—him probably—was going to have to tell her that Gwen was, or had been, Lucifer’s bitch?