Heart of Stone

“Great.” Margrit caught his hand, tugging him up the stairs. Alban followed, as if the only thing keeping him in action was her momentum. “We’ll go to the Empire State Building. It’s tallest now.”

He made a low sound in his throat, loosening his hand and slowing to a stop. Margrit turned back, impatient, to catch a distant look in the blond man’s eyes, as if he no longer saw her or the stairs where they stood. “In Paris, it was Notre-Dame. We loved the cathedral and its gargoyles. Once in a while we’d settle there for a day, to be among our human-made brethren. Every night, Margrit.” He refocused on her, his expression drawn. “I waited every night for a year. She didn’t come. She ca

Margrit groaned and took Alban’s hand in both of hers, putting her whole weight into pulling him, without effect. “We’ll never know if we don’t try. Come on, Alban.”

“Margrit, it was centuries ago, and she never came.”

Exasperation overtook her. “Do you have a better idea? You could go back downstairs and let the police arrest you, for example. I’m sure they’d be very understanding at seven-thirty when the sun comes up and you turn into a block of rock, which you’ve already got for brains. Come on, Alban!”

Irritation flooded his face, the first real expression since she’d suggested Hajnal was alive. He looked up the circling stairway, then flexed his shoulders. “Do you insist on climbing all of these on foot?”

“I wouldn’t mind a faster route if you’d like to give me a hand. Are you with me now?”

Another grumble sounded low in his throat, but Alban offered a hand, a slow, graceful movement. Margrit plucked the sapphire out of his other hand and put it back in her pocket, shrugging when he looked askance at her. “So it won’t get dropped.”

“I wouldn’t drop it.” He closed his fingers around hers, pulling her into his embrace, and she heard words that went unspoken: no more than I would drop you. “Hold on,” he said above her ear. “There isn’t room here for my wings, and leaping requires both hands.”

“I’m a ru

After a tension-charged moment, he replied with humor, “Remember this was your idea.”

He slid his hands under her bottom and lifted her as if she weighed nothing, wrapping her thighs around his waist. Margrit barely contained a shriek of laughter, ducking her face against his shoulder to smother a shout that would bring the police to the stairwell in seconds. She locked her ankles behind him, then leaned back, gri

Margrit’s breath disappeared; awareness of his strength and closeness superseding all else. Clarity descended, making her hands tingle with knowledge of the thing that lay between them, as yet unbreached. It would remain that way unless Margrit acted, Alban’s nature precluding such a thing.

Should and ought to were washed aside in favor of the hunger she’d been trying to ignore. For an instant they were simply two people sharing desire, Alban’s mouth as soft as any man’s, Margrit’s fingers tight at his nape. They were both wordless, breathless, when they broke apart, Margrit’s eyes wide until a broad grin overtook her.

“This was my idea?”

He arched pale eyebrows, smiling. “I wouldn’t want you to fall.” He cupped a hand at the back of her head, drawing her nearer. “You’ll still need to hold on, Margrit. Hold close.”

She put her cheek against his neck, nodding. “I am. Don’t let go.”

“Never.” Muscle bunched under her thighs as he crouched, then uncoiled in a burst of power, leaping upward with dizzying strength. She squeaked, a constricted sound as much of laughter-filled panic as fresh desire, the play of Alban’s body against hers feeling far more personal than even the kiss they’d shared. Her bottom brushed his thighs again as he landed against the edge of a stair, the abrupt stop lasting only a few seconds before he leaped again. Eyes closed, Margrit felt the strength of his arms as he darted toward the roof. It seemed as though the power in his hands must dent the railings he clung to for brief moments, but there was no sound of rent metal, only her own near-silent laughter, muffled against his shoulder.

The landing at the top of the stairs was different, more solid. Margrit dared lift her head for a moment, wide-eyed. “Are we still alive?”

Alban tucked his hand against her bottom to lodge her more firmly around his waist as he pushed the roof access door open and stepped through. “Quite.” The door banged behind them and Alban broke into a loping run. “Hold on.”

“I am!” The words turned into a helpless shriek as he planted a hand on the waist-high roof wall and vaulted it with ease, flinging them into the air. Wind rushed, screaming past her ears and snapping hair into her face, and then Alban, wrapped in her embrace, transformed.

The soft implosion shot through her at every contact point, an erotic charge that weakened her muscles more thoroughly than any lover’s touch ever had. For an instant she was falling, unable to cling to the gargoyle any longer.

As if he expected it, Alban took her weight and pulled her close again. Margrit whimpered, rescue too close at hand for fear to prompt the tiny sound. Instead it was born of desire powerful enough to make her languid and needy, cradled in Alban’s arms. She nuzzled his neck, making another senseless little noise as she tasted desire sharp enough to be tears in the back of her own throat. The faintest thought intruded, that soaring above the streets of New York in search of a killer was a wildly inappropriate time to give in to need.

Irrational, she thought, and it brought her back enough to prod muscle into responding. She hugged Alban closer, and he turned his mouth against her hair, murmuring, “Don’t worry. I will never let you fall.”

“I know.” Margrit pressed her lips against his throat, her eyes closed. “I know.”

“She’s not here, Margrit.” Alban came up to her side, hands in his pockets, shoulders tense, the intimacy of their flight lost as they renewed their search for Hajnal.

Margrit leaned against the concrete barrier, fingers laced in the latticework wire that prevented jumpers. “Doesn’t it look peaceful down there?” Headlights and taillights streaked, eighty-six stories below, the sounds of the city faint when they could be heard at all. “I used to love coming up here when I was a kid. I’d scare the hell out of my Mom. Dad would put me up on the wall-” she bumped her elbow against the barrier “-and I’d hang on to the wire with both hands and look out. Once I tried climbing up to the bars.” She nodded upward at the curving steel spikes above her head. “Mom nearly had a heart attack. There’s a picture of me doing that, like a baby Spider-Man.”

“Margrit.” Impatience filled his voice. “She’s not here. Why stay?”

Margrit tilted her head to the side, looking up at him. “Because we paid twelve dollars each to ride up the elevator, and I want to look around?”

Alban’s expression soured. Margrit smiled, lowering her voice. “We couldn’t just land here, Alban. The observation deck’s open till midnight.”

“There are very few people around,” he muttered back. “It would’ve been safe.”

“Maybe.” She leaned against the wires again. “But I like the elevator. I used to think that being this high would show me how to fly. Anything that can get this high should be able to fly, shouldn’t it?” She spread her arms, spi

“You can fly now,” Alban murmured. Margrit bumped her hip against his, smiling as she looked up at him.

“I can,” she agreed in a whisper. “It’s like magic.” She curled her arms around his neck, leaning her head back to look up at the floors above the observation deck, then let go with a start. “This isn’t the top floor, Alban.”