Stone Solitude Read Online Free PDF Page A

she had any hope of finishing the paper, she was going to have to spend all of her spare time at the library, which was why she was there on a Friday night instead of enjoying the last weeks of summer before the fall term began. Taking a summer class was her way of getting ahead so she might be able to graduate a few months early.
    Not that she had a glamorous social life of club hopping and swanky parties. Instead, she preferred hanging out with her pack and a select group of friends. Most of the humans she knew were just trying to live their lives, though a few were reckless when they went out at night. They hoped to snag the attention of a vampire or a werewolf but they never understood the cost of falling in with the other side until it was too late. Despite the transitions of her Uncles Cole and Dima to wolves, most of the humans weren’t so lucky, dying painfully within a few days of being bitten. Wolves had no wish to destroy humanity. Vampires, on the other hand, didn’t give a damn about humanity and would kill indiscriminately if they thought they could get away with it.
    Concentrating on where she was going, she descended the narrow staircase to the cellar where the really old books were kept. The dank, concrete stairwell was rarely used and she always felt as if she were entering a tomb when she had to go to the archives for research. It was her fault, of course, for choosing such obscure topics to write about, whether in English class or biology, including the paper she was currently working on about the origins of the gargoyle. She couldn’t imagine what she was going to choose once it came to her thesis paper for grad school. Luckily that was many years away. At twenty, she had plenty of time to figure out the rest of her life.
    A low light emerged from beneath the heavy door and Daisy wondered who else could possibly be down there since most people avoided the tomb room if they could help it. As she put her hand on the doorknob, a slight jolt of electricity surged into her arm and she jerked her hand away. Her heart thudded once really hard in her chest before it started to race. Who was in the room?
    Cautiously, she opened the door and peered inside, cursing when she realized the light was too low to actually see anything beyond vague shapes. The dim light was coming from the table but it was only enough light to illuminate the book the stranger was reading and not the stranger. He, she assumed he was a he, was massive, hunched over the table with a cloak concealing what the shadows missed. Sliding her hand over the wall to the light switch, wanting – needing – to see who it was that trespassed upon her privacy, she froze when his deep, dark voice graveled out, “Please. Do not turn on the light.”
     

     
    Roman didn’t turn his head and look at her directly because he didn’t want her to see him, not yet, maybe not ever. This was too important to ruin by being impatient to finally see her up close. For ten years he had watched over the girl from afar, biding his time until he could approach her and set his plan in motion. The biggest challenge had been keeping the boys who sniffed after her away from her. Generally, a visit late at night was enough to get the job done. There was nothing quite like a nocturnal visit from a nightmarish creature to curb a boy’s lust for a pretty girl.
    He would have taken her after her first bleeding but he wasn’t a barbarian. It hardly mattered because at the time, he had been more beast than man… fuck, he was still more beast than man but time was running out and he had to act. He had to seduce a bloody virgin as he was, a stone beast. When he had been flesh, he had reveled in female warmth, from the innocent touches of eager virgins to the more carnal pleasures of accomplished courtesans. Honestly, though, he had preferred experienced women over virgins since they had a level of confidence that was sorely lacking in the untouched girls.
    Of course, it was