When a Gargoyle Pretends to be Santa Claus (Gargoyles Book 4) Read online

  “He can’t be up there, baby.”

  “Why not?” she asked with a stubborn pout.

  “Because…” she caught herself before she really did ruin Daphne’s Christmas. “Because it’s not Christmas Eve – you know he only goes up on roofs and chimneys on Christmas Eve.”

  Daphne thought about that as Joely tried to hurry her through the crowds to the diner.

  “I saw him,” she said decisively.

  “Okay, you saw him,” agreed Joely wearily. She really wasn’t in the mood to argue.

  *

  Grey was heaving in silent laughter.

  “This is no laughing matter,” snapped Brom. “That short human saw me.”

  “If you will present yourself in bright colors like a female.”

  Brom sent some oaths over the other gargoyle.

  Grey seemed unconcerned. “It was a child. Human children are full of nonsense; nobody will listen to it.”

  Brom shifted uneasily. Grey seemed so sure, but then the male was hardly the most concerned gargoyle when it came to keeping their existence a secret. He was all for revealing themselves and killing any humans who tried to get in their way.

  “I must ensure the child knows to keep it’s mouth shut.”

  Grey arched an eyebrow. “You plan on silencing it? One less human, I hardly say I mind.”

  Brom winced. Nothing quite that severe. He had killed humans before in battle, but he had too much honor to hurt a child. No, he was planning on scaring the child half to death to ensure they did not talk – it was the kind thing to do.

  “I will see that it does not breathe a word of me.”

  Grey shrugged his wings unconcerned. “Suit yourself.”

  Brom cursed himself – they should never have been this close to the humans. Stupid Grey. This was all his fault!

  *

  “Well? What do you think?”

  Annis stretched her arms over her head. Chris paused in the motion of putting the disc into the DVD player.

  “Very nice,” he mumbled, though it came out more as ‘vlurrysmice’. Blood was rapidly leaving his brain and words were difficult.

  Annis beamed at him and flicked her tail. She was decked out in a pair of Christmassy pajamas. The two of them were newly mated, and Annis was embracing every human tradition she could. In particular, she was determined to enjoy and undergo every single Christmas tradition and custom Chris could think of. Christmassy pajamas being one of them. Though when he was younger, and his family all dressed in Christmassy pajamas to gather around and watch a festive movie, he couldn’t remember any of them looking half as sexy as Annis.

  With her tail and wings, she was not naturally built for pajamas. Yet she had done a remarkable job in modifying the cotton, gingerbread man print pajamas. The pants hung low on her hips beneath an expanse of dark pink, flat stomach and a tiny indented belly button that begged to be kissed… again. He’d certainly kissed it before, but he was very much of the opinion that she could not be too kissed. The top - which had been a baggy vest, was now a mere scrap of a halter-top, stretching across her plump breasts.

  Annis exuded sexuality to an insane degree. At least to him, she did. She was modest about herself, but Santa save him, he could barely think straight around her. To think, male gargoyles didn’t find her attractive. She was dark pink, with elfin ears, enormous eyes, wings and a tail. Chris thought she was the most beautiful woman he had ever met. To him, she was perfect. Kris Kringle, he was turning into a soppy bastard in his old age!

  He shoved the DVD into the machine and bounded over to his little gargoyle, pulling her into his arms for a lengthy kiss.

  “Mmm, I think I very much like your Christmas traditions,” she purred. Her tail tickled its way around his ankle.

  “Glad to hear it. I have lots more, but they all involve you getting naked.”

  Annis giggled a sweet musical sound. “That seems to be your tradition of every night, my mate.”

  “Hey, I’m a traditionalist.”

  Chris dropped onto the couch and pulled Annis down onto his lap, she draped herself over him, folding her wings behind her and snuggling her head on his shoulder.

  “So what is this movie we are watching? Brenda tells me there are lots of Christmas movies to choose from.”

  “This is the best one ever made.”

  Annis pulled a bowl of popcorn onto her lap. “I cannot wait, what is it called?”

  “Die Hard.”

  *

  Joely poured herself another glass of wine, scowling as the box ran out when the glass was only half full. She tried shaking and tapping the box, but nothing would help. To ensure she got the most out of it, she sucked the remaining wine droplets out of the nozzle. Well, as cheap as the wine she drank was – given it came in a box and was legally called wine flavored drink – this still might be the last time she would have it for a while. Without Chuck’s paycheck things were going to be very tight again.

  She felt a tingle of sadness about him. It wasn’t just his paycheck she would miss – far from it. He was nice and fun, and great with Daphne. Her friends sneered at him because he was hardly gorgeous, but she didn’t care – she’d always had a thing for big, brawny barrel-chested men. Nearly all of her exes had been like that. Maybe Chuck was on the wrong side of paunchy, but that didn’t put her off.

  True she hadn’t been in love with him, but she was starting to fall. But she wouldn’t be with him again now. She could put up with a lot from men – but cheating was strictly a no-no.

  Shame, too. Chuck was pretty good in bed, and there was something about Christmas that made her horny. Joely smiled. No, she knew exactly what it was. When she was nineteen, she got a job in a department store as an elf and she was a very naughty elf who played with Santa’s candy cane a lot. Until that point in her life, all the men she’d been with had been a bit boring and insipid. As perverted as it sounded, Santa really opened up her eyes to great sex. No wonder she had a thing for burly men, or that she’d volunteered Chuck to play Santa. Guess Lola had a Santa fetish, too. Damn her. Damn him.

  Joely sighed and tossed the empty box away. Booze was the first thing to go when they were on a budget. They could manage, but it was a stretch and her biggest worry was about disappointing her little girl at Christmas. The thought of Daphne running down stairs on Christmas Day to find the bottom of the tree bare would be too much. It would be a pretty crappy way for her to find out the truth about Santa.

  She’d think of something. Yes, she definitely would. She had to.

  Joely clasped her last glass of wine and tried to make it last as long as possible while watching her favorite Christmas movie – Elf. Hopefully, Buddy the Elf would give her a little Christmas cheer because not much else could at that moment.

  *

  Brenda grinned as her mate inhaled five more cookies. “Those were supposed to be for the party.”

  “Guess if I eat them all you won’t be able to go,” Ric said far too innocently.

  Brenda rolled her eyes. “You know I have to go.”

  “You do not have to do anything,” he grumbled.

  She sighed and dabbed some more icing onto her snowman cookies, quickly adding gumdrops for eyes. Only slapping Ric’s hand a couple of times as he tried to steal them.

  He didn’t like her doing anything without him, though he had to concede that she had to do some things without him during the day. At night, however, he saw that as their time. But, there was a town party in the library, and she needed to go. Ric was not happy.

  Ric strode around the kitchen, his wings fluttering behind him, his tail flicking in irritation. She tried to ignore him, but her eyes were automatically drawn to him. Her cheeks flushed as she watched his large muscles bunching and tensing. More than one snowman had a very wonky smile.

  Ric stopped abruptly and sniffed. He frowned for a second before turning to her and smirking.

  Baubles! Damn gargoyle senses. He could scent her burgeoning arousal. He d
elighted in the fact that he could smell her desire for him. It annoyed the jingle bells out of her.

  His smile turned a little thoughtful. She could almost see the cogs turning.

  Ric kneeled on the floor next to her; his head was level with hers, and he leaned over her shoulder. She could feel his breath tickling her cheek, and she stilled as he kissed her neck. She didn’t trust her hands to do anything with the snowmen at that moment.

  “Are you sure you have to go?”

  “Well, I…” Snowballs! He was trying to seduce her into not going.

  “That’s not working,” she said primly. “I still have to go. Chris has to go because he’s the Chief of Police and I have to because I’m his family. They’d wonder where I was. People are already curious about what I do up here every night.”

  Ric grumbled into her shoulder. “Perhaps I will attend the party, too.”

  “Oh good, rather than a party it can be a lynching,” she said sarcastically.

  “I will merely be on the roof.”

  “You still might be seen.”

  “I will be careful.”

  Brenda groaned. “That’s what you said when I had to attend that study group – thank god that guy who saw you was drunk.”

  “I will be more careful.”

  “You shouldn’t take any unnecessary risks.”

  “Ensuring your safety is a very necessary risk.”

  Brenda looked at him, and she melted just a little more for him. He could be downright infuriating ninety-nine percent of the time, but there was that one percent where he pierced her right in the heart.

  “I love you,” she whispered. With icing smeared hands she clasped his face and kissed him.

  “Does this mean you are not going?” he murmured dreamily.

  “No, still going.”

  Ric let out a growl and Brenda resumed icing the snowmen.

  *

  Brom impatiently peered into the windows of the small house. He was no judge of human edifices, but this one was surely poorly maintained and too small for the two inhabitants. The windows and doors looked like a decent sized sneeze could blow them down.

  The larger human had led the small human into the town diner – which Brom understood to be some kind of eating place for humans. A few hours of tedious waiting later, they emerged. The larger female virtually had to carry the smaller one.

  He was somewhat concerned that these two humans – who on closer inspection were both females – were moving around so late at night with no male escort. He would think nothing if they were female gargoyles, but these were humans and needed protection. In his experience, female gargoyles were large, scary creatures with too many teeth and claws to want to get too close to them, while human females were soft and pink and squidgy.

  The larger of the human females, in particular, seemed exceedingly squidgy. Her form bounced in an almost hypnotic fashion as she strode through the snow-laden streets to her negligibly safe home. Her rear, in particular, drew his eye – not something he would have noticed on a female gargoyle. But on this human it was hard to miss.

  Her brilliant red hair billowed behind her like fire against the stark white snow. Part of him wondered where her male could be and why he would allow such an obviously desirable creature out at night, yet somehow he felt relieved that there was no male in his way. He wondered at that and considered that it must be because a male would make it more difficult for him to approach the short female. Yes, that had to be it.

  Nothing much happened for a while. He perched on a roof opposite and spied through their windows. He watched as the female put her child to bed, kissing her cheeks and forehead and smiling fondly at her young. He couldn’t help his small grin at that. Other than Ingrede, he had never met a female gargoyle so enamored by her youngling. He could almost feel the heat of her affection all the way on the other side of the street.

  He then shamelessly watched as the mother stripped out of her white shirt and blue trousers. The female was exceedingly curvy and sporting some very lacy, white underwear that barely covered her abundant breasts and didn’t even try to cover her rear. Indeed the back of her bottom undergarment disappeared between two very round, peachy cheeks. He wondered if they would fill his large hands; he had an unexpected urge to find out.

  It was perhaps fortunate that the female covered herself in a large, oversized t-shirt. She was needlessly distracting, and Brom had a mission.

  After the female slumped in front of the television – mindlessly stupid human contraption – he dropped into their minuscule garden with a soft thud. It was merely a patch of land covered in powdery snow – there was nothing there, nothing to hide behind, perhaps if he tried he could blend into the shadows, but he was not trying at that moment. Which was unfortunate as a few seconds later the door opened and out flew the short human, wearing a coat and boots over a voluminous nightgown and clutching a worn purple bear.

  “Santa!” she squealed.

  Dragon fire and brimstone! Brom froze.

  The small human stopped and frowned. “Santa?”

  “Ah…”

  She gasped. “Krampus?” she asked fearfully before her small face took on a stubborn lilt. “No, you can’t be here for me. I’ve been really good. The only bad thing I did was when I pushed Penny Muller in the mud, and she deserved it because she stole Cody’s lunch and ate it all herself. You must be Santa. You look weird, Santa.”

  “Ah, I, ah…” Now was his chance to scare the little girl into ensuring she didn’t reveal his existence to anyone else, yet faced with the loquacious child he became suddenly tongue tied.

  “Are you hungry, Santa?” she asked brightly.

  At that moment, Brom’s large stomach dutifully rumbled. He was accustomed to eating every couple of hours. His old clan had lived in cold conditions. They regularly ate to ensure they kept their strength and temperature up.

  “I’m Daphne, but everyone calls me Daffy. I like your tail, Santa.”

  “Oh, ah…” He flicked it while preening slightly. A strange quirk of his old clan was that their tails were much shorter than other gargoyles. Perhaps it was just a way they had changed over time, but given how the other gargoyles mocked him, it was a sensitive issue for him, and he was pleased to be appreciated.

  Daffy then proceeded to grasp his hand, her tiny appendage swallowed whole by his huge paw, and pull him into her house. He tried protesting, but the stubbornness on her face coupled with his rumbling stomach outweighed any objections he had.

  *

  Cai found his mate gliding through the snow. Her green, lovely body stark against the powdery white garden. Ingrede smiled at him, laughing as their youngling Wolfe escaped her arms and launched himself at his father. Cai easily caught his son, only frowning slightly at the various knitted blue items of clothing adorning him. Arthur’s sword, they even had bunnies on them.

  In their time, gargoyles would think nothing of braving the cold naked. He thought to say something to Ingrede but as she stroked her stomach he thought better of irritating her. Ingrede adored dressing their son up in various pastel outfits decorated with cute animals. Cai thought they were unworthy items for a future warrior, but he loved his mate, and he was more than happy to let her have her way about this.

  She was two months into her pregnancy, and her stomach already sported a healthy swell. Another few months and their new youngling would arrive. To think, humans were pregnant for nine months – how could the males stand the wait?!

  In deference to her pregnancy, Ingrede had opted to drape herself with a knitted blanket. He doubted she needed it, though it was probably better to be safe than sorry. Their old clan would accuse both of them of becoming weak and pathetic, but he couldn’t hate the new world they found themselves in. Well, he could, but he wouldn’t. Ingrede was happy, and she even loved him – something he had never dared hope for before. Life in spite of the tragedies they had been through was good.

  Cai grasped his mate and pulled her agai
nst him, nuzzling her neck. She chuckled and let out a moan.

  “I thought you were hunting.”

  Cai growled in annoyance. “Luc was needed by his mate to help with the Christmas tree and Ric is helping his mate bake Christmas cookies.” The last few words had a derisive twist.

  Ingrede arched an eyebrow. “Indeed?”

  “Damn humans and their damn Christmas. Seems like a lot of effort for nothing.”

  Kylie and Maggie had practically been bouncing up and down with excitement for the last week. Silly, excitable human females. He slid his arm under his mate’s blanket, around her waist to caress the warm skin of her back. They couldn’t hold a candle or any other lighting device to his poised, perfect mate.

  The humans had been decorating and planning and shopping like crazy, then wrapping their many purchases in bright, headache inducing paper. There had been much baking of sweet treats – none of which he could stand – and the watching of many twee, irritating movies. Humans were strange.

  Ingrede nestled her head in his shoulder, and he wrapped his wings around his family.

  “I like how happy this Christmas makes everyone. The good spirit is infectious.”

  Cai grunted as if that was the farthest thought from his mind.

  Ingrede tickled one of Wolfe’s feet, and he clutched at his favorite stuffed penguin with even more fervor as he squealed in laughter. Cai noticed that the penguin was also sporting a new scarf.

  “I hope you will cheer up on Christmas. I am sure you will when you see my present.”

  “Present? What present? Ingrede?!” He felt an unexpected amount of panic.

  “I chose a gift for you and a gift for Wolfe on the computer and Kylie ordered them for me.” She smiled beatifically, and for a moment, it eclipsed his panic, but only for a moment.

  “Ingrede, I… I have nothing to give you,” he admitted worriedly.

  Her smile widened, and she took hold of his hand and pressed it against her rounded stomach. Wolfe gurgled. “My mate and my younglings are all I need.”

  *

  Brom hunched into one of the tiny kitchen chairs while wolfing down his food. Whatever it was, it was delicious. He had worried for a moment when he saw how empty their refrigerator was – the refrigerator at the mansion was always chock full of edible goodies. But Daphne assured him that they were never going to eat the food in the small cardboard cartons, so she said he could have it if he wanted it, and indeed he did.