Page 7 of Etched in Stone
She stepped in through the door and could not have been more surprised by the decor. She’d been expecting old man stuck in the 80’s clutter, but instead, she saw sparse clean modern lines with updated tech everywhere.
“Ray?” This could not possibly be his apartment. She’d somehow stepped into a portal and been transported to some millionaire’s bachelor pad. The kitchen alone was to die for. It had beautiful granite countertops and a bar with several large sturdy chairs. A huge television nearly covered one wall. His bedroom must be up in the loft, because she could not spot a bed anywhere. She totally wanted to check out the fridge, but that would be snooping, and she really needed a shower.
There was something else odd about the layout of the apartment, but Jesse couldn’t put her finger on it. She shrugged and headed to the bathroom. There was no toilet banshee in here. Modern immaculate and spacious. It didn’t have a tub, but it did have a gigantic rain shower with all the bells and whistles.
Jesse closed the door behind her and made sure it actually locked. Again, old man walking in on her was not ideal. She shed her robe and pajamas and then played with the different knobs and dials.
Even the shower was modern tech infused. There were probably a hundred different settings.
“Why do you need a programmable shower?”
Then she selected one, stepped in and absolutely changed her mind. The water fell around her like warm rain, cascading from her hair and down the tips of her breasts. It cycled through a jet phase and all the tension that had been building up melted away. She totally forgot about the owner of the shower and let her mind drift into the tub with her gargoyle.
4
FR E L INR AY
This. This was not supposed to drive him crazy. This was simply the way things had to be.
Jesse in his shower, naked. He had never thought such blatant thoughts could surface with such an innocent situation.
Her shower was just broken, that’s all. He was being perfectly right in offering his. That didn’t stop certain parts of him turning hard, and it wasn’t because he was going into stone sleep.
He needed something to do, something not in his apartment. Maybe her shower wasn’t as bad as it had appeared. He entered her apartment and headed straight for the bathroom. He looked up at the ceiling and then down at the tiles that still lay in the tub. Nope. The whole thing needed to be gutted, had probably needed gutting ten years ago when he had redone his. He reached up and ran a hand along the tile, pulling a few more down into the tub. There wasn’t really even a way to patch it without redoing the entire ceiling, and he couldn’t imagine what raining tile would do to Jesse’s sensitive skin.
Damn. He was thinking about skin again. He’d love to sit and watch the rain shower rolling off her soft curves.
But she was not his. Even if she looked like Jessenia, there was no telling how she’d react to seeing his real form, to being in a relationship with an honest to goodness alien.
There were perks to mating with a Khargal as he’d explained to her great aunts when he’d been courting Jessenia, . The exchange of the vows, the bite, would change her on a cellular level. It would allow her to carry his children and extend her life, perhaps even double it. He’d heard stories of mates gaining strength or developing other abilities not common to their class or species.
He’d explained all this to Jessenia, and, according to the custom of the time, he’d agreed to wait until they were married before indulging in that facet of their marriage. The 1940’s were quaint like that. Now, women were much more open and liberated about sex before marriage.
Ray was not sure he could manage to make love to Jesse without biting and claiming her as his forever. Again, he was way ahead of himself.
He scooped up an armful of the tile and headed back out to the garden. At least he could make use of some of this situation. Although he’d adapted to human food for most of his dietary needs, the clay in the ceramics would provide a more rounded diet for his needs.
He paused to look at the pile of sketches on her table. Each one was more ridiculous than the next.
Surely she couldn’t be serious about a unicorn mirror. Then he saw it. She’d drawn a picture of him, in his true form, not Ray the super. And he was in a bathtub, naked and grinning. At least he assumed he was naked except for the fedora.
“What are you doing?” Jesse questioned from the doorway.
He nearly dropped his entire armful of tile.
“Tile.”
She looked from the bathroom door to the table where he was standing. It was not exactly on the way out to the garden, and she knew it.
“Okay, we need to set some ground rules here. A schedule maybe. For both you and me,” she said, hands clutching her basket of toiletries in front of her like a shield. That scent was going to linger in his bathroom. It would smell like her. He could not be more relieved that his perception filter would hide his arousal.
“Whatever. Just figured you wanted this tile cleaned up.”
“Thanks, but where were you when I knocked?”
He’d been standing right behind her in his stone sleep, but he couldn’t tell her that.
“Ms. Maguffin had a garbage disposal issue.”
