Mona Lisa Awakening m-1 Read online

  "What do mean, 'protected'? I protect myself."

  "No guards?"

  I shook my head.

  A genuinely pained expression swept across his face and I found my heart yielding to his deep concern. Although what he claimed was impossible, a part of me responded to his words. They resorted with rightness somewhere deep within me. And there was no denying his unusual power, so like mine. I started to believe him.

  "Do you have anybody else like…" he waved his hand, searching for words, "… like you?"

  "No," I whispered. "You're the first I've ever met."

  "Sweet Mother Light." His head sank down. His perfect shoulders slumped. He laughed without humor. "What am I going to do with you?" The last was whispered as if to himself. He sounded weak, defeated, and that bothered me. A lot.

  "Will you recover with time?"

  He shook his head. "Not without the antidote."

  "What is the antidote?"

  "I was hoping you could possibly tell me," he said with that bitter, wry smile. "But, of course, that would be too much to hope for. Some claim there is no antidote, but others whisper that only Queens have it. And so I am fleeing to the nearest Lady of Light, the nearest Queen, to beg mercy and seek aid."

  "You have more than one Queen?"

  "Each territory is ruled by a Queen," Gryphon answered. "And the land is divided into many territories."

  He said that I was a Queen, but not a true one, or I would be able to help him.

  "I'm sorry," I said, deep regret in my words. "I would give you the antidote if I had it."

  "Would you really?" he asked with a little smile. "A rogue male, injured by his own Queen's hand? How curious. And yet I believe you really would."

  "Why did your Queen poison you? Why did you leave?"

  He sighed. "Mona Sera is among one of our worst Queens. Those of us she takes in, no other Queen would have. Twenty years with her and I was sick to my very soul. But though she is a bad Queen, she is wise in matters of business and has accumulated vast wealth and power in her dealings with humans. She forces us to sleep with humans in return for concessions she desires in business. Humans are drawn to us by our uncommon beauty, even to the least of us. But we derive no pleasure in return. We are two different species. Our skin does not fill with light when we are with one of them."

  "Fill with light?" What was this light thing, I wondered.

  "Our hearts are left with emptiness," he continued. "Mona Sera created a caste of comfort women and men for these outside duties."

  "Were you one of them?" I asked quietly.

  "Yes," he said, shame lacing his voice. "I was one of her comfort men. This last time she sent out my half sister, Sonia, our beloved midwife, as punishment for her recent rebelliousness against this practice. These matings, though joyless and loveless, do bear fruit at times."

  "Like me."

  "Yes," he nodded, "and it is Sonia's duty to deal with such consequences. She delivers them and abandons them to the humans to keep the purity of our line. She has done so dutifully until her daughter's recent miscarriage from one of these unfortunate unions with humans. Since then, Sonia could no longer look upon the practice of abandonment with detachment and petitioned the Queen to resign from such a task. As punishment, Mona Sera sent Sonia out to sleep with a human male notorious for his twisted enjoyment of sex. Sonia returned with bloody lashes, cuts, and bruises upon her. I hunted the bastard down and killed him. I couldn't stand for anyone to treat my sister so. The dead man was the son of a Louisiana billionaire senator, Mona Sera's man in the human capitol of Washington, D.C. Instead of punishing me, Mona Sera had Sonia raped before my eyes by one of our most ferocious warriors, Amber. That broke me," he said. "The tyranny, the cruelty, the malice. I denounced Mona Sera in front of our people and severed all my allegiance to her. It was something that had never been done before. Mona Sera became enraged. She had her guards bind me to the whipping post. But instead of killing me quickly, she wanted me to suffer a lingering, painful death, so she plunged her silver-poisoned dagger into my belly. Just before dawn, one of the comfort women cut me loose and I fled."

  "What is your real name?"

  "My true name is Gryphon. What is your name?"

  "Mona Lisa," I heard myself say, and the name felt strange. Without conscious thought, I had given him my full name, the name etched on the back of the cross that I had worn as an infant when they found me—my most cherished possession, the only tangible tie to my mother.

  "It is my honor and pleasure to meet you." Gryphon bowed with a flourish, the gesture natural and graceful, until he winced.

  "Stop that. You'll aggravate your wound."

  "As you wish, Mona Lisa." He said my name like a caress and the lilting utterance of my birth name from his beautiful lips touched a part of me, an empty part of me that I had not known existed until now.

  "I must seal this wound with something not permeable to air," Gryphon said, "or they shall continue to track me easily through my blood-spore scent."

  "A doctor should see…"

  "I cannot wait for a doctor. I must leave quickly. Help me, please."

  How I wished I could heal him. Never before had I felt the lack of my untapped ability more keenly. "I'll get the liquid bandage," I said.

  A swipe of liquid, a gust of paraffin spray, and the wound was sealed. After it dried, I applied Steri-Strips. Over it, I applied a clear plastic adhesive dressing. The sharp smell of his blood dissipated. Disappeared.

  "My thanks, Lady," Gryphon said. For the first time, I felt him hesitate. "I know not if you would be better served with me, or alone here, unprotected. I am injured, weak, and hunted, and can only offer you poor protection. In truth, my chances of survival are quite dismal."

  "Will the Queen you are fleeing to help you?"

  "I do not know." Again that graceful shrug. "She is not so terrible as Mona Sera. I do not believe any of her men have ever fled her." He looked at me, tired, weak, clearly torn over what to do about me, and it gratified some tiny part of me that he could worry so about my safety when his own condition was so clearly desperate.

  After a long, contemplative moment, he finally stood. He was a tall man, six feet. Four inches taller than me. "It will be in your best interest if I leave you now. The men hunting me perhaps may not come into this place of healing. It is their habit to avoid public domains such as this. But if they should come upon you, now or some day in the future, do not fight them, no matter what they do. They are full-blooded warriors, stronger and faster than you. Fear not, you will be drawn to them in the same manner as you are drawn to me," he said gently. "Afterward, claim the High Council's right of protection and demand that they take you to Ericsburg, Minnesota, where the Council's Court resides. The men shall have no other choice then but to take you there if they desire to live."

  "Why could I not go to Mona Sera?" I asked.

  "That you wish to avoid above all else," Gryphon said adamantly. "If Mona Sera detects the intimate scent of her men upon you, she will slay you all. She will kill you because she will see you as attempting to take her territory, her men. She will destroy the men who dare touch you because she will view it as betrayal against herself, a rejection. And as you can see," he grimaced and gestured at himself, "the lady does not take rejection well. If, in the unlikely event the men manage to constrain themselves, do what you can to seduce one or two—all would be best—and make them yours. Do not, at any cost, allow them to take you to Mona Sera. Competition or challenge by another Queen she will not tolerate."

  Gryphon bowed in farewell and swept open the privacy curtain.

  He was going! In that short moment, I felt the room empty out, felt my heart sink with the rock of disappointment. My senses, my power, beyond my control, reached out for him. "Wait," I blurted out.

  He stopped, obedience to a Queen deeply ingrained.

  "It is imperative now for both our safety that I leave quickly," Gryphon said softly, regretfully.

&nbs
p; It required no further thought. I was committed. A part of me that I could not deny knew what it wanted. I reached into my pocket and pressed my keys into his hand. "Go to my apartment. Wait for me there, I live two blocks away at 156 West Eleventh Street, apartment 7-B. I will be there in an hour when my shift ends."

  He looked at me, uncomprehendingly, dazed by the all-too-brief, pleasurable touch of my hand against his.

  "Do you know what you are offering me?" he asked.

  "No. I do not know and I do not care. I only know I wish to help you."

  "I cannot draw you into my plight. It is not safe…"

  "It is my wish," I interrupted, my voice firm. "And it is my command."

  He struggled against the need to obey. "It is not wise…"

  "Please." I begged him with my eyes, with everything in me.

  "Ah, little one." Gryphon sighed, his shoulders slumping in defeat, succumbing to my plea. He clutched the keys tightly in his fist. "You fight most unfairly with your eyes." He bowed in acquiescence, a wry smile tweaking those beautiful lips. "As my Queen commands."

  Chapter Two

  Darkness welcomed me. Cold wind licked across my skin, soothing me. The stars winked and the waxing moon, three-quarters full, beamed benevolently down, its invigorating rays caressing my face. I walked quickly down the street, alert, watching, searching with that extra sense. There was no one. No one else out there like me. They had either come and gone, or they had not yet come.

  With Gryphon's blood scent gone, there was no way to detect if he had passed this way. My heart clenched as I wondered if he had. Passed this way, that is. Perhaps he had changed his mind and fled. The thought of him weak and alone out there quickened my steps. I entered the apartment, a modest brick building, and passed by the elevator—it would be too slow. I walked to the stairwell and took the steps six at a time in that effortless strength that had always seemed a part of me, bounding up the seven flights of stairs in less than a minute. I stood before my door, hesitating. Then I heard it, that wonderfully slow heartbeat.

  "It's me," I whispered and the door opened.

  I slipped inside. The locks clicked loudly into place in the fluid silence and Gryphon stepped back quickly, careful not to touch me. The room was dark, no lights, but I saw him clearly. He was more beautiful than any man had a right to be. The alabaster white of his skin and deep red of those full lips were a siren's call that I had no desire to resist, and his sad blue eyes had a quiet allure I could not deny. He smelled like the night—a faint scent or trees, wind, and earth. He smelled like home.

  Deliberately I breathed him in, taking the scent of him deep inside of me with a fierce, possessive joy. This was what I had been waiting over twenty long, parched years for. A messenger from my world, an initiator into my real life. This was what had been vitally missing in the few men that I had taken into my body. None that I had been intimate with was of my chemistry, my kind. I hadn't known what was wrong with them, with me, until that moment when I had sensed Gryphon with primitive recognition in that sterile emergency room. Mate. Now he was here, in my apartment, waiting for me in my home.

  Some strange malady possessed me. A bold, aggressive spirit that I had not known was within me came to the fore and controlled my next actions, and I succumbed to it because my body wanted him, and my heart desired him, too.

  Gryphon stepped back as I approached, a hand held up in strained beseechment. "No." He shook his head as I advanced, retreating until his back was pressed against the wall. "It would not be wise. Mona Sera…"

  "You left her."

  "But she still thinks of me as hers, to punish, to destroy."

  "Bur you are not hers." I stopped, my body a mere whisper away from his. "Don't you want to be mine?" My hot breath wafted over the pale sweep of his neck just above where that slow pulse pounded. "Don't you want me to be yours?"

  He shuddered and closed his eyes. "More than I wish to live."

  My eyes glittered in triumph.

  "But it would not serve you well."

  I pushed away from him and he breathed deeply in relief until I pulled loose the elastic band, spilling my black hair to fall in an inky wash down my back, around my shoulders, the front strands teasing over the gentle rise of my breasts.

  Gryphon froze in a stillness so deep he seemed like carved marble.

  "You told me to seduce the men and make them mine." I kicked off my shoes.

  He swallowed, his jaw clenched. "So that they would be bound to you and protect you."

  I bent over. Watching him watch me, I pulled up one pant leg, smoothed down a sock. Both of us watched it fall to the ground.

  "There is no need to seduce me." His voice was gratifyingly strained. "I would protect you to the best of my ability without claiming you."

  "I know." I pushed down the other sock. He stared, seemingly fascinated at the simple sight of my bare feet.

  "You already have the benefit without the risk." He breathed heavily as I untied my pants and let them fall in a pool around my feet.

  "If you take me, Mona Sera's rage will be great," he said hoarsely but there was a wild inconsistency between his spoken words and what his eyes bespoke. He wanted me.

  "Rage great or little, she'll still want to kill us both, you said."

  Slowly, oh so slowly, I lifted my top up. His eyes fastened on the smooth roundness of my belly and his breathing grew harsher.

  He tore his eyes away from the yearning indentation of my belly and forced himself to look up into my eyes. "Your chance of surviving her will be greater if we restrain ourselves."

  I ignored his noble plea and pulled off my top and dropped it to the floor. No bra. Gryphon clenched his fists, his eyes falling irresistibly down to my small, high, firm breasts. The peaks stiffened and pebbled beneath his gaze and I felt a wave of triumphant satisfaction wash over me at the knowledge that the sight of my body could affect a man so powerfully, bringing a flush to his face and a tremor to his hands. It was glorious.

  "Our chances of survival with Mona Sera are small either way," I whispered. "Don't you want to live now, fully? I do. I want to touch you. Have you touch me in return. I want to know what it's like to take a man into my body and truly enjoy it." I closed my eyes. "My body weeps for you. I want you so much. I've never felt like this before, ever."

  "You wear silver," Gryphon said with surprise.

  It took me a moment to comprehend what he was saying, so caught up was I in what I was feeling. My hand flew up to the cross I wore always around my neck, covering it. "I'm sorry. Does it hurt you?"

  "Why would it hurt me? It lies against your skin, not mine."

  "Does the holy cross bother you in any way?" I undid the clasp, walked away from him and dropped it into the drawer of a credenza set against the wall. Then I turned back to him. With the distance of the room between us, I felt that peculiar possession leave me and felt myself reverting back to my old self, filled with trepidation and self-consciousness, remembering once again that pain, not pleasure, was all that I usually harvested when I tangled men upon my bedding sheets.

  "We can touch and look at the holy cross and enter churches without impunity. It is only the silver content that irritates us. Does not the feel of silver against your flesh disturb you in any manner?"

  I shook my head in denial and crossed my arms over my bosom, coldly naked, coldly aware that I inhabited a body men would never consider voluptuous. That awareness prompted me to venture the conclusion: "Perhaps you are not pleased with my body."

  "No," Gryphon said gravely. "Your body is most pleasing to me."

  But in the sudden chaos of my emotions, I could not discern the truth of his words. I did not believe him. The pull between us was there and strong, but that seemed to be instinctive, something he couldn't control. His willful choice, however, was clear. He hadn't moved. He did not want me.

  "I'm sorry." I laughed brittlely. "I don't seem to be too good of a seductress. Men are attracted to me at first but afterward
they say I'm cold. And I am. Frozen inside."

  "We are not attracted to humans," he explained again, quietly, patiently. "We do not feel with them what we would feel with another of our kind."

  The irony was that I wasn't sure whether he included me in with those humans. "I see. You're right, of course, about us. We shouldn't…" I inched toward the haven of my bedroom. "I shouldn't have tried to force myself on you. I'm sorry."

  Gryphon crossed the ten feet between us with one giant leap, moving so quickly, he wasn't even a blur. He was just suddenly standing there, an inch away from me. I gasped.

  "I've changed my mind," he said softly, perverse man that he was.

  Anger flared up, burning away my self-consciousness in a wonderful wash of cleansing heat. "I don't want your pity," I hissed, backing away from him, retreating into my bedroom, silently cursing the vagaries of all men, no matter what their kind.

  "Good. Neither do I desire yours," he said shortly, pursuing me until the back of my knees bumped against the mattress. My bedroom was so small there was no room for anything other than the bed and bureau and a few feet of walking space.

  "The last emotion I feel for you is pity," Gryphon said, his eyes soft and luminous. Unbuttoning his top two buttons, he tore his shirt over his head and let it drop to the ground. The sound of a zipper rasped loudly in the tense silence. Gracefully, he stepped out of his pants and stood before me, baring even more of himself to me than I had to him. I still had on my underwear. All that adorned him now was the white bandage on his left side. It did nothing to hide his glory.

  I sank down onto the bed, my knees suddenly weak, marveling at the revelation of how lovely the male form could be. Clothes had hid him, masking him in commonness. Unclothed, his full beauty was revealed. He was divine.

  I let my eyes wander freely over him, to and fro, over the excessive loveliness of his form. Allowed my visual senses to gorge without restraint on the sensual feast that he was after a lifelong famine. His chest rippled, more muscular than I could have imagined, more than that brief, tantalizing glimpse of his abdomen had hinted of when I had tended to his wound.