The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance

danger.”
    Mate. Such a primitive word, and so possessive. All things considered, we barely knew each other. Why wasn’t I uneasy at hearing it? Why did warmth spread over me, even as I was shivering in the cold night air?
    I swallowed. “How can you be sure?”
    He was at my side in the next heartbeat, enfolding me in his arms, his body heat almost searing my skin.
    “I knew it as soon as I smelled your scent,” he said, low and rough. “I told you, that’s how it is with wolves. That day with Gabriel - I wasn’t tracking him. He and the others had masked their scents so I wouldn’t be able to trace them. But I found them anyway because I’d been tracking you.”
    This was overwhelming. I shuddered even as I leaned in closer to him. “Daniel, everything has happened so fast . . .”
    He caressed my face. “Don’t judge by that. Breathe me in. Tell me what you feel.”
    I inhaled near his neck, absorbing the mix of wood smoke, cinnamon and musk that made up his scent. Contentment battled with lust inside me. I wanted to throw Daniel to the forest floor, rub my body all over his, claim his flesh as my own, and then hold him and never let go.
    “I feel more than I have a right to,” was what I said, my voice shaky.
    He bent so that his lips were almost brushing mine. “I give you the right. I want you to claim me as yours.”
    And I wanted to be claimed. That was the truth of it. Whether it was me or the wolf inside who’d made this decision, I didn’t know. But I felt it through every fibre of me.
    I’d asked Daniel days ago if it was him I was talking to or the wolf. It’s both, he’d said. Always. I hadn’t understood then, but I did now. The wolf didn’t feel like it was a separate entity from me any more; it was me, but without all my fears, doubts or hesitations. The wolf was me stripped of all my pretence, and it knew, unequivocally, that Daniel was mine.
    And so did I.
    “Take me home,” I whispered. It was an invitation and a promise. I wasn’t giving up my family or my friends, but I’d first learn to live in harmony with the wolf in me, and I’d do it here, with the help of my mate.
    Daniel picked me up and carried me to his cabin. I was smiling the whole way.

When Gargoyles Fly
Lori Devoti
One
    She touched him. Her fingers were warm, soft, undeniably human. Mord Gabion blinked, and his eyelids made slow painful movements. They creaked like stone scratching stone, like a gargoyle coming to life while its body was still frozen in its sleep - which it was.
    He shouldn’t be awake, shouldn’t be aware of those supple fingers, or the scent of ginger and spice drifting towards him. Shouldn’t be aware of anything, ever again — but he was.
    Her fingers ran down the planes of his chest, traced the line of bone that formed the top of his wings, which were folded in sleep, but itching with the need to open, to take his body soaring through the night sky.
    “Such detail,” she murmured.
    His eyes shifted in their sockets. He wanted to see her, needed to see her, but his body wasn’t quite ready. It was still locked in its rocky state.
    She edged closer, her feet scraping over the hard ledge on which he was perched. He could feel it too now, through the thin-soled shoes he’d worn when he’d agreed to the sorcerer’s bargain, agreed to go to sleep for eternity so his enemies, the chimeras, would be put into the slumber too.
    He and the others like him had given up their freedom, their lives, to save the world from the chimeras who would have enslaved humanity - but he was awake. He swallowed, or made the motion at the back of his throat; the action was uncomfortable, unnatural locked in this stony condition.
    He tried again, managed to move his head to the side, but only an inch. The woman pressed against him, studying him, and didn’t notice. But the movement was real. He was coming awake.
    Were his enemies too?
    Kami Machon clung to the gargoyle, kept herself from looking down by concentrating on the impossible detail of his wings, muscles, everything. How she wished she knew who had sculpted him, how the sculptor had put such strength and darkness into the white marble he’d used to carve the creature.
    She’d been sculpting with clay for years, but had recently forked out the dollars for a block of alabaster. Her fingers itched to pick up that chisel, make the first chink in the stone. But she was afraid, wanted it to be perfect, beautiful, like this gargoyle.
    She ran her