Eclipsing Dawn (Dusk takes Dawn) by Celia Sweet

Chapter One
     
    She woke up beside the statue of the man she loved. Pride brought a smile to her face. No man so beautiful, so utterly male had ever been sculpted out of granite. He lived and walked the world each night. Duncan Craig, her cursed lover. Her love. Not her lover. Not her lover yet, anyway.
    Sunlight freed her limbs from the marble that also imprisoned her each night. Dawn’s lungs ached as she breathed in morning air and dew. The first breath hurt the most. Damn the daybreak because her people were as damned as Duncan’s. Long ago her ancestors had abused magic so badly, most people still called them witches. Others said they were sorcerers. Either way Dawn’s ancestors had flown too close to the sun, seeking to rival the gods with their magic. The Powers That Be hadn’t liked the competition and swatted them down, cursing them to spend all their nights as marble sculptures. The Powers could really be a pain in the ass sometimes. Most times. Dawn’s people had lived by the moon, and it fueled their magic. Since they’d been denied moonlight they’d become weaker and dependant on spells.
    Duncan’s ancestors had suffered a similar fate. Except they’d been mages, ancient magicians, who made the mistake of bargaining with dark powers to gain their magic. Eventually those bargains gained them their curse.
    Dawn grumbled under her breath at the sun, a bitter substitute for the moon. She looked out over New Chicago. The rooftop perch she and Duncan shared stood twenty-two stories high with no easy way up or down, unless you had their permission to enter or to leave. In quiet moments she fantasized about riding Duncan’s thick erection as he balanced her over the ledge. She imagined him thrusting strong and deep into her as the danger of falling made her orgasm two or three times over, in delicious overlapping waves.
    She ran the back of her hand over Duncan’s chiseled thigh. Her man must be a magnificent sight in the flesh, but Dawn could only imagine. When he walked the night she slept the stone sleep and vice versa.
    Straddling his thigh, Dawn exhaled. One hand cupped the impressive bulge at the front of his statue, the other splayed across the small of his back. She wanted so badly to see him in the night, when the scarlet of his favorite long-sleeved t-shirt would complement the wealth of muscle beneath it. Especially when paired with the blue-grey of his eyes and his tousled onyx hair.
    "Ahh," she murmured dreamily, sliding down, then up again, then down and pressing his sculptured thigh into her core until hot moisture soaked her underwear. The smooth yet wind-roughened texture of his stony forearm teased her nipples to life—part pleasure, part pain, and all good. Dammit! Frustration caught in her throat. She craved skin-to-skin contact. She wanted to feel the length of him stiffen in her hand, or her mouth, and to know her body, not the curse, made his erection turn to stone.
    All right then, if she weren’t grinding against his statue she might be able to make the fantasy of seeing him in the flesh come true. She had a mission to complete. Tonight was All Hallows Eve. From what they’d learned, it might be their only shot at freezing time and finally being able to touch. She got moving.
    Duncan had left their shared smart phone at her feet along with a messenger bag she hadn’t seen before. The dark bag jangled when she prodded it with her toe.
    A mental sticky note went up in her mind to remind her to check the bag out later.
    Right now, she needed to listen to the message she knew Duncan had left on their phone. Hopefully, he’d outlined what he discovered during the night. And whether they were any closer to freezing time so they could be together.
    They’d promised to leave one another video messages, texts, and notes. Otherwise, they’d have no way of keeping up with each other. No way of communicating at all. She reached for the phone and hesitated. She tucked her hands into her