Gargoyle: A Reawakening (Briarcliff Series, #2) by Lorraine Beaumont Page A

shivered
lightly.
    “ I am Simon, by the way—you
know, in case you were wondering,” he said, giving her a lopsided
grin.
    “ Moriah,” she offered her
name freely, wondering if he was drunk or if he was just one of
those crazy happy people. He kept smiling. He looked like he was
biting back a laugh. Maybe he was doing some kind of drug? Yeah,
maybe he was stoned. Stoners thought everything was funny. Still,
she smiled back at him, not able to help herself.
    “ Party not to your liking?”
he asked.
    “ No, it’s not that. The
party is great…”
    “ It’s great?” he asked,
lifting his brow like he didn’t believe her.
    She wrinkled her face. “Well it would be, if
my boyfriend wasn’t such a jerk,” she muttered.
    “ Come again?” he asked,
lifting his hand to his ear, clearly missing what she
said.
    “ It’s not important.” She
leaned forward and propped her chin on her hand.
    “ Okay. But hey, if you want
to talk…you got two good ears sitting right next to you….just
saying.”
    Moriah turned, ready to say thanks but no
thanks but once she looked at him…really looked at him she kind-of
forgot what she wanted to say. He was leaning back against the
stair. His exceedingly tight black t-shirt clung to his muscled
chest tucked-in the front of his black skinny jeans. He wore a
batman seat-belt belt. Her gaze drifted down to his feet, his
bright red Chuck Taylors, they were real showstoppers. Maybe he was
gay…she was good with gay. Maybe she should use him to make
Kingston jealous with no repercussions. Kingston would see her with
him and get his ass away from Heather. She smiled warmly at him,
her mind spinning variables.
    Simon leaned forward and
put his chin in his hand, staring out into the crowd. Moriah
couldn’t help but stare at his profile. He had angular features and
long dark lashes cast out across flawless skin, all that and nice
lips too. He looked like a model, or he could be with skin that
nice. Her skin only looked that good with makeup. His was perfect.
Maybe he was a
model. He had a really nice body, not too big, not too small and
cut. His arm muscles bulged under the sleeve of his shirt and he
had a crazy tattoo on the inside of his left arm, which was
seriously cool looking. Evie would freak if she saw it.
    Speaking of Evie, where
was she? She hadn’t seen her since she took off to get them drinks.
That was at least an hour ago now. Hopefully, she was having fun.
She still felt really bad for leaving her with Colton last night.
Especially, now that she knew what a “ wad” he was. Of course, Evie never
said as much but she could tell. Once she got Evie alone she would
make her spill. They would curl up on Evie’s bed and fill each
other in on all the stuff that happened—like they always did,
staying up half the night laughing together, stuffing their faces
with chips, salsa, and chocolate. Moriah loved it when they did
that. Evie was hilarious and always had some funny story to
tell.
    “ So dove you want to tell
why are you sitting all alone?” Simon asked, turning towards her,
his steely gray eyes glittering.
    Moriah gaped at him. “Did you just call me
dove?”
    Is that all right?” he asked, a ready smile
pulling the corners of his mouth upward.
    “ Um, yea,
sure, why not,” she said, in shock. Dove? Seriously? Kingston had never called
her anything close to that and she was sleeping with his ass. She
smiled openly at him, not able to help herself, suddenly hoping he
wasn’t gay after all.
    “ Why not indeed,” he said
simply and turned quickly, pushing a leggy brunette, in a tight
spandex print dress upright who was about to fall backward down the
stairs.
    “ Whoa,
thanks handsome,” the girl said, smiling down at him, and then gave
Moriah an inquisitive stare before bringing her eyes back to Simon.
“You get tired of her ,” she stressed the word, “You come see me. I’m April, by the
way, as in showers.”
    “ Showers…” he
repeated.
    “ Yeah,”