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Just in case I did find Sunny and…
I released a slow, heavy breath. It had been two weeks—a slow, dull, colorless two weeks of sitting around an apartment I'd barely used, itching to kick the door down and put my nose to the ground until I'd tracked Sunny and had her back in my arms.
I turned my back on the space and headed to the front door to lock up. Rafe was already in the driver's seat of the truck rental, and he leaned toward the open passenger window.
"Meet you at your new place. I'll pick up the food."
"Is there enough room for everything you're going to pick up?" I asked.
Rafe grinned and shrugged. "Figure I'll just toss out a couple of your boxes if I have to."
I grunted, not caring if he wanted to crack another joke for it, and headed for my own vehicle. Leaving the apartment was nothing. The only thing that mattered was already missing from my life.
Not forever. Just for now.
"I have to admit, I don't get how you end up mating a client," Rafe said, wiping his mouth with a barely usable napkin.
He'd arrived with a baker's dozen Chicago dogs, two orders of onion rings, two orders of coney fries and two regular fries, four chocolate malts—three were for him—and a side salad. For me, which was thoughtful.
I wasn't keeping track exactly, but I figured he'd eaten more than two-thirds of the food already and would likely finish off the rest when I was done. Gargoyles were impressive garbage disposals.
"There's not a process to mating. It just sinks in," I said with a shrug.
My new apartment was the first story of a slightly shabby graystone, but it had high ceilings and a large shower, so it would do. Rafe and I had dropped everything off in the living room by the drafty bay window and then settled ourselves on the stoop to eat.
"Like, just randomly?" Rafe asked, frowning.
"No. It's high-functioning instinct. When that compatibility arises and the emotions click… Well, we don't really know why it happens sometimes and not others," I said, giving up on my explanation. How could I explain to someone how Sunny suited me? She suited my cock and my claws and my tusks. She suited my need to nurture another. She was strong and brave, and she submitted as easily and beautifully as she took control when she wanted.
"I guess that's my question, then. Since when do emotions come into our work?" Rafe said. He was wearing a puzzled frown, staring across the street as a couple strolled by, their hands linked and shoulders brushing. "I can't imagine seeing a client as anything but…work."
I shrugged. "Neither could I." Until Sunny. It was as much a mathematical equation of what she asked for and how she responded, as it was the scent and feel of her or the instinctive itch in my chest to remain near her from the moment I'd walked into the dungeon.
Rafe hummed and then rolled his shoulders, his vast black and deep purple wings shuffling and rearranging themselves infinitesimally as he relaxed again. "Maybe it's the difference between what you do and what I do. I suppose you might get lost in role-playing."
I bristled at the suggestion but didn't bother correcting him. Rafe's work for MSA involved being available to…rougher clients. A gargoyle was about as indestructible as you could get, especially in their stone forms. And maybe he was right. The trust Sunny had granted me was personal. The act of satisfying her in a way she'd never known before was intimate.
"I miss her." I didn't mean to say it out loud, but once it was there on the air, I didn't really care.
"For the record, I think you made the right choice. Five days of fucking isn't the ground you build a relationship on." Rafe raised his hands to his side as I glared at him. "I'm not saying move on. I'm just saying, maybe take the girl out on a date and ask her about her hobbies before you tell her you're like, bound for life or whatever."
I grunted and turned away, resting my elbows on my knees and watching the neighborhood. There was a nice mix of species here. I'd been one of few non-humans in my old neighborhood. Ravenswood was full of species specialty shops—which were frequented by a wide mix of different folk—and nice parks. The nearest to me overlooked the Chicago River.
Sunny would like it here.
And perhaps it was only wishful thinking, but the ache that had settled down into my bones seemed to have eased since we'd arrived in the neighborhood. Maybe I was closer to Sunny. Maybe she was around the corner. We could bump into one another in the elfin produce market—they always saved the best of their crops for their own markets—and I would have her against the wall in the alley before she could say hello with that bright blush on her cheeks.
I blinked and then remembered that Sunny wouldn't have signed half a dozen consent forms up front.
Fine, then. She could say hello. And then as I set her basket under the radish bin and took her hand, she could tell me how much she missed my mouth on hers. Or my stav stroking her sweet, wet pussy. And then that hand that held hers would cover her mouth to muffle her cries of relief as I fucked her in the little hidden nook between the market and the florist. I'd clean her pussy with my mouth when we'd both come—her twice—so she wouldn't be embarrassed to return to the market long enough for me to buy our groceries, and then over to the florist for her to pick out the flowers she wanted on the table. The table I would bend her over after dinner, the flowers we would accidentally knock over—
"Khell!"
I sat up straight and winced at the stiff throb of my groin and the dull pound of my balls as I shifted.
"You looked like you were about to drill a hole in that tree, if you know what I mean," Rafe said, raising one of the Styrofoam cups to his lips, an obnoxious slurping sound replacing the memories of Sunny's bright cries of pleasure.
"If I'd known you were going to be this much of a pain in the ass, I would've done the work of moving by myself," I muttered, but without any real heat.
