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“How else would your kiss have opened my stone?” I ask her. “If you weren’t my mate?”

The amused look on her face slowly disappears. “Wait. You’re serious? That’s why you woke up? Because I kissed you?”

I nod.

“There are two ways a gargoyle can awaken,” I tell her. “Of their own volition, or from their true mate’s kiss.”

She just stares at me for a long moment, and then drops her head into her hands.

“What is happening?” she whispers to herself. “What kind of spell was in those muffins?”

“It is not a spell,” I tell her, standing tall. “It is fate.”

She looks up and her eyes go straight to my cock. They widen considerably. I start to harden with her shocked gaze on me, so I wrap my wings around myself, hiding it for the moment.

“Excuse my nakedness,” I say, feeling my own cheeks begin to heat up. “It’s easier to petrify with no clothes getting in the way.”

“I… see,” she says, dropping her eyes back down.

I can tell that her mind is racing. I have thrown a lot at her. She looks overwhelmed.

“Do you have any questions for me?” I ask gently.

“Only about a million,” she spits back.

I sit down across from her, still covering my lower half with my wings. “Let’s start with the first one.”

She looks at me, probably wondering which one to ask.

“What’s it like in there? When you’re turned to stone?”

“It’s like sleeping,” I say. “A long sleep that takes much effort to waken from.”

“So, you do that every night?”

“No,” I say. “I sleep just like your species does, with my eyes closed, hanging upside down.”

“How much do you know about humans?” she asks, looking at me funny.

“I know you are a fearful species, quick to anger and prone to overreaction.”

She laughs. I adore that sound. “Sounds about right.”

“Gargoyles can choose to petrify if their life is in danger or if they’d like to sleep through a significant amount of time. Perhaps decades or centuries.”

“Centuries?” she says with a gasp. “You were going to sleep for centuries?”

“No, but probably a few decades,” I say with a shrug.

“Why? Wouldn’t you miss your friends and loved ones?”

“Gargoyles are solitary creatures,” I say. “Well, at least they are until they find their mate.”

She swallows hard as those adorable green eyes widen.

“So, why did you want to sleep through a few decades?”

“My life was in danger. A powerful human wanted me dead.”