She didn’t acknowledge the compliment, or the way it made her feel all melty inside. Still she just moved out of his hold, got to her feet, and walked away. She left the room without so much as a glance over her shoulder toward him, and it was possibly one of the hardest things she’d ever done in her life.

Ahnvil rubbed the heel of his palm down the length of his cock. He had a cockstand that could drive nails and the woman who caused it was walking in the wrong damn direction. Christ above, didn’t she understand how this was painful for him? And not just in the physical sense. No matter what her protestations otherwise, he knew she saw him as a thing … a thing to be frightened of. And she wouldn’t be entirely wrong to think so. It’d been a long time since he’d been human, and now he spent only half his life as one … if that much. He wondered sometimes if he had forgotten how to be human altogether.

He shouldn’t be dwelling on this. He shouldn’t be doing things to push her away. If he had any hope of getting out of this mess he was going to need her help and his goddamn cock was thinking for him and fucking things up.

Why? Why canna I leave off her and let her be?

His life depended on her. He was entirely in her hands. And he suspected she knew that and that it was a heavy burden for her to carry. God, he wished like hell he could leave her out of this, but he had few choices available to him. He couldn’t turn to stone. He couldn’t risk it. Being away from his touchstone for this long could mean he would turn to stone permanently if he did. But it was only in his grotesque form that he could have access to his wings, the wings he needed to travel with any speed back to New Mexico. So that meant traveling by conventional means and considering his stripped down state he was going to need funds and resources for that.

And then there was the small issue of leaving her behind or taking her with him. Well, actually, it wasn’t an issue at all. He truly had no choice in the matter. The problem was, he didn’t think she would come willingly.

Damn him. Damn him to hell for ruining another woman’s life. For risking another woman’s life. And this one was mortal, human, and far more fragile than the one who had been lost before. At least the other had known what she was getting into. Despite all his revelations to her, Kat had no idea of the danger involved in being this close to him.

CHAPTER TEN

Kat avoided the bedroom like the plague for the next few hours. She was tired, her usual bedtime having come and gone and the stress of the whole situation wearing her out even more. She tried her mother two more times and got the same lacking result. She wished, for the first time in all of the time she’d lived there on the mountain that she had a landline. Normally she wouldn’t have needed it, and it wouldn’t have mattered to her to be cut off from the rest of the world. After all, it was kind of the whole point of having moved there in the first place. And the cost of a landline on top of a cell bill was prohibitive. She’d had to make a choice and this was what she’d chosen.

Of course, when making the decision she hadn’t taken Gargoyles into consideration.

And other things.

She ran through a list of beasties and ghouls in her mind and then shoved it all away. She had enough to worry about with the Gargoyle in her bed. No need to go looking for any more trouble than that.

In spite of all her fretting, she did drift off to sleep for a little while, napping in the recliner in her living room. When she awoke, she found she had a blanket draped over her that she hadn’t had when she’d fallen asleep. She looked around in confusion for a moment, but then remembered there was a Gargoyle in the house. A very considerate Gargoyle, she noted, unable to help the little smile the idea brought to her lips.

Well, she could at least return the favor and make him more food. Hadn’t he said that he had a high metabolism? Although at this rate he would eat through all of her stockpiled supplies in a week! Thankfully the storm wasn’t supposed to last that long and the roads would be cleared a few days after.

It was only shortly after she started moving around the kitchen when Ahnvil walked out of the bedroom. When she glanced over at him she ended up doing a double take. He had apparently showered, cleaning away all the remaining blood and grime from his injury and from being in the woods. He was wearing one of the white terry towels from the bathroom and somehow looked twice as sexy as when he was completely naked … which was saying a lot because a completely naked Gargoyle was nothing to shrug your shoulders at.

“Are you hungry?” she asked, turning her back to him in hopes that it would keep her from running greedy eyes all over his glorious muscles, his wet hair which made him look attractively tousled and that enticing line of hair that began slightly above his navel and darkened the farther down below his navel it went.

Yes, that towel was slung across his hips very low indeed.

Luckily for her he took a seat at the breakfast bar, sliding onto a barstool and putting an entire granite countertop between them as she moved around the kitchen. That was good, she thought. The more things that were between them, the better off she’d be.

“Are you hungry?” she asked again.

“Always,” he said, and she was glad she couldn’t see the grin that no doubt followed. His smile was an absolute killer all on its own, but add those vibrant amber eyes to the mix and it was utterly devastating. “And yourself?”

“Actually, I think I am a little hungry,” she admitted. “I could make some more sandwiches or something hot …”

“Hot. With meat. Something that’ll stick to a man’s ribs.”

And better still, Ahnvil thought, to that already delectable fanny of hers. Which was, at present, facing him as she did her damnedest to avoid looking in his direction. But he wasn’t fazed by her obvious awkwardness. It was actually satisfying for some reason to know that she was so affected by him … no matter whether it was a good effect or a bad one.

Honestly, he had no right to be looking at her as a man looks at a woman. He had made her life complicated enough as it was. She certainly didn’t need him making advances toward her and, logically, he couldn’t afford to do anything that might put her off to him. But as prevailing as his need for her to help him to get back home was, he was finding his unexpected desire for her to be equally prevailing.

All the more reason to let her be. He was a rough, powerful man with equally powerful passions and she was human.