Surrender the Dark

by L. A. Banks

  She took his mouth slowly in a soft kiss, testing for acceptance, feeling him tremble as her hands found the sides of his handsome face. “I’ll show you,” she murmured, lifting her feet from the water and lying back on the bed.

  He followed her, gently blanketing her with his warmth and the soft, soft down of his wings. He leaned into a deeper kiss that she offered, seeming to remember the first one they’d shared only hours ago as he eagerly sought her tongue. Damp feet against the damp backs of his muscular legs, she traced the cords of sinew, opening herself, arching, showing him the rhythm of pleasure with only the towel as a barrier.

  A gasp escaped his mouth into hers as she loosened his towel to slowly bring her hands over the swell of his buttocks, then followed the deep valley of his spine up and under his trembling feathers to that sensitive place between his outstretched wings. Raining kisses down his neck, she slowly dragged her fingers back and forth along the delicate ridge until he dropped his head back and moaned.

  “I shouldn’t,” he said in a hoarse whisper.

  She pulled back. “You’re right . . . you’re right. I’m so sorry, it just felt—”

  “Natural.”

  She nodded and stared up at him for a moment.

  “Queen Aziza said I wasn’t human...I’m a hybrid. Technically.”

  He just stared at her.

  “I don’t know who to ask or if a lightning bolt will come down from the sky if I ask . . . but do I count as a regular human that can trap you here?” She traced his jaw with trembling fingers, then tried to push him back to sit up. “You know what, I’m really out of line here and you’re the one with everything to lose. I’m gonna—”

  He kissed her hard, then rolled off her to stand, rubbing the nape of his neck for a moment and clutching his towel, then securing it. “I don’t know.”

  She watched him as he hung his head and closed his eyes, then turned away from her.

  “Az, I’m really sorry,” she whispered, and stood to go get a pair of jeans to put on. “I don’t want to be your addiction, the reason for your downfall. You’re clean, and good of spirit, and I’ve tasted way too much of this world. I’m all screwed up, Az. Look at me. You don’t want to risk being trapped for someone like me! I have major issues. My life is raggedy, my—”

  He held up a hand to stop her self-debasing flow of words and then looked up slowly, opening his eyes. “You’re not my addiction, Celeste,” he said in a low, sensual rumble. “Down here you’ve been my salvation.”

  That she’d so thoroughly corrupted him in so short a time made her want to cry. She hurried by him headed toward her backpack to get her clothes. But as she passed, he caught her by the wrist and slowly brought her into an embrace.

  “You are not human,” he murmured against her neck.

  “You’re sure? And that means...”

  He nodded. “Hayyel does not lie . . . my brother in the ether answered me.”

  His nipples had become tight raisins of need, and she brushed them with her fingers and then bent to suckle them, putting tears in his eyes as he moved against her harder when she finally sought his mouth again for a kiss. Her goal was singular, to make his first time what hers should have been . . . a long, sensual anointing of his body, rather than an irreverently quick desecration.

  Sending all the love that she could summon from within, each kiss down his chest was a prayer for his pleasure, every touch an exquisite verse to show him how much she cared as she led him back to the bed to lie with her.

  When she slowly slid his towel from between their bodies, he began to breathe so quickly he was almost hyperventilating. But with patience and never losing eye contact with him, she gently rolled him over, careful of his wings, aware of his excruciating arousal, but unable to allow him not to fully experience every bit of joy such an intimate encounter deserved.

  Attending his shuddering stomach in a series of slow kisses, she made him cry out and grip her by her arms. Their eyes met as she looked up. She waited until his grip relaxed and she nodded. He fell back, eyes shut, chin tipped up to the ceiling as she drew him into her mouth and he called her name.

  Unable to stand it as she felt his climax approaching, she climbed up his body and took his mouth, straddling him in a slow, determined sheathing. He broke their kiss, iridescent tears now streaming down his face as he stared up at her. When their pelvises met, he released a deep moan that bottomed out on a hard gasp. Suddenly multicolored light spilled down his locks, over his wings, and down his arms, covering her and the bed, making her cry out and move feverishly against him.

  Pleasure like she’d never known filled her. When he touched her breasts, gently gliding his hands over her aching nipples, her voice rent the room. His hands then found her ass, pulling her against him hard enough that he did a sit-up on every thrust. Ambrosia flavored her mouth; pleasure turned every breath into a high-pitched gasp. He held her now, sitting up, her legs wrapped around his hips, his wings wrapped around them both, their heads dropped back, auras joined . . . and then she felt him trip over the edge of the universe with a hard series of contractions that put blue sweat on his brow.

  Everything he felt, she felt. His pleasure became an echo of giving and receiving. Her cries would set him off again; hers were so powerful that he just broke down and wept. For a long time they sat joined, holding each other, tears streaming, gently rocking their way back to calm.

  “I want to give you the same joy you just gave me,” he said, still breathing hard as he nuzzled the side of her neck. He took her mouth again in a deep kiss. “I must share this gift of joy back to you, Celeste.”

  “You already have, trust me,” she said, winded.

  He stroked her hair and traced her eyebrows with the pad of his thumb. “No, I want to kiss you like you kissed me . . . in the place that begins with pain from so much need, but then spills like ripe fruit.”

  She closed her eyes and rested her forehead against his, feeling desire build just from his mere suggestion. “I don’t know if my heart can take it,” she whispered through deep breaths.

  “Your Light has fused with mine,” he murmured, caressing her face. “Everything I feel, you will feel; everything you feel, I will feel. I want to experience this with you again until fatigue claims us.”

  She brought her hands between their bodies and looked at the colored lights dancing at her fingertips, then slowly flattened her palms against his chest. The moment she brushed his nipples, intense pleasure tightened hers. He nodded and held her gaze as her arms slowly wrapped around him to find that place between his wings. The moment she stroked it, they both arched with a shuddering moan.

  “Oh . . . my . . . God,” she whispered.

  Azrael nodded and closed his eyes. “Definitely.”

  Chapter 16

  Dawn kissed the windows and entered the bedroom with rose-orange glory. A profound peace filled Celeste as she lay beneath an angel’s wings and watched the horizon change before her eyes. Now she understood why the brothers had chosen this high building with windows all around. She couldn’t imagine the many dawns they’d seen during the millennia they’d been marooned here, or what golden memories still called out to them from beyond the sun.

  “Please, God,” she whispered, staring at the parting clouds and focusing on a wide shaft of light, “I know I’m in no position to ask anything, but if you do hear me, please don’t blame him because I was weak . . . don’t blame any of them. Let them all go home. Down here is no place for an angel. We’ll make it. Humans always do. Even if you have to leave me, take them . . . because I wouldn’t wish their banishment on my worst enemy.”

  She closed her eyes as a strong arm pulled her closer and a gentle kiss brushed her shoulder. Then a warm cheek and a solid jaw fit into the space between her shoulder and cheek. Azrael released a long, shuddering sigh and his voice shook with emotion.

  “You prayed for me at dawn?”

  She covered his hand and nodded, swallowing hard as tears spill
ed down the bridge of her nose.

  “And you would sacrifice yourself for me and all my brothers,” he whispered. Between deep breaths his voice was thick and gravelly. “I . . . .” He stopped speaking as though he couldn’t go on, and soon she could feel his tears wet her neck. “What have I done?”

  “I’m sorry,” she murmured, and squeezed her eyes shut.

  “No . . . it is I who begs your forgiveness, Celeste.” He turned her over to look at her, anguish staining his expression. “I am not speaking of fear of the consequences I might face—I am speaking of your willingness to sacrifice yourself for me. That cannot happen. You are the one we are to sacrifice ourselves for. And somehow I have managed to influence your—”

  “Shusssh,” she murmured, placing a finger gently to his lips. “Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” She kissed him softly and cradled his face with her hand. “I love you, Azrael . . . so allow me to hope. I may not do many things well, but we humans are the best in the universe at hope.”

  He stared down at her, eyes serious and filled with too many emotions to name. “Then come share the water with me, ray of hope.”

  She traced his eyebrows in a way that made him close his eyes. “Only if you promise to open your wings under the spray.”

  She was just pulling on a pair of black leather boots when the blare of an electric guitar sent shock waves down her spine. Azrael looked up from repacking their belongings into the bike saddlebags Jamaerah had left them and stared at the door. The signature sound of Carlos Santana bounced off the brick and metal, reverbing off the concrete floor.

  “I think that’s our wake-up call,” she said, standing and heading toward the door with a frown.

  “I believe so,” Azrael muttered, frowning.

  They walked down the hall in tandem as the music got louder, then they stopped twenty-five yards from the kitchen. Jamaerah was barefoot, wearing only a pair of ragged stonewashed jeans, playing an invisible guitar to “Put Your Lights On,” rocking out while coffee brewed, singing his heart out in perfect pitch, wings spread, eyes closed, and an expression of sheer ecstasy gracing his beautiful face.

  She placed a hand on Azrael’s arm when he started to advance. The sight of the young angel absorbed in his passion was one that required reverence, and soon she could feel Azrael relax beside her as he began to comprehend what he was witnessing.

  Listening to the words of the ballad, she understood why the angels whispered into the ears of artists so that they could touch the world with their Light. A voice so filled with emotion belted out stanzas in a plea that made her cover her mouth in awe. Jamaerah looked like a vision from the Sistine Chapel with his silken spill of dark brown hair covering his bronze shoulders, his fingers deftly moving up and down an instrument she couldn’t see as tight cords stood up in his neck while he sang his heart out.

  “Hey, la la, we all shine like stars...then we fade away.”

  At the conclusion of a long guitar exit, Jamaerah allowed the invisible guitar to fall from his hands with a flourish, then clapped. The warehouse was instantly silent. He wiped his face and hung his head with his eyes closed, then opened his arms and slowly turned his face up to the ceiling.

  “It’s okay,” a gruff voice said behind Celeste and Azrael, making them turn.

  “You can go get some java. Not like you’re interrupting a church service or anything,” Bath Kol muttered in a surly tone, clearly hungover and annoyed as he brushed past them heading toward the kitchen. “The kid only gets morose like this every once in a while. Shoulda went and gotten himself laid last night, but I guess he was doing shifts on account of the demons.”

  Jamaerah looked up. “Sorry, BK,” he said quietly. “Didn’t realize I had the volume up so loud.”

  “You never realize you have the volume up so loud—and most times I don’t care,” Bath Kol muttered, pouring a mug of black coffee into a used cup. He took a deep slurp and winced. “But, damn, this morning I mind.”

  Jamaerah turned to the sink, giving Celeste and Azrael his back, and quickly folded away his wings. “Coffee? Breakfast?”

  “They probably want that green-tea shit that Queen keeps forcing on me,” Bath Kol said, sitting down hard at the table. “Says it’s got antioxidants in it, like I give a rat’s ass.”

  “We have tins and tins of it,” Jamaerah said in a gentle tone, still not looking at Celeste and Azrael. “Please sit down and I’ll fix it. I’m sorry I woke you.”

  “It’s all right,” she said quietly, her heart breaking for the young angel who was, oddly, lifetimes older than she. “I can fix the tea, you’ve been up all night . . . and your voice is beautiful.”

  “Yes, so, please, no apologies, brother. We were awake anyway,” Azrael added.

  “Yeah, we know,” Bath Kol said after another slurp. “That’s probably what set the poor kid off in the first place.”

  Celeste studied the grain in the wood of the table. Azrael sent his gaze out of the window. Jamaerah grabbed his shirt off a stool and began rummaging around on the shelves for the elusive green tea.

  “I’ll put water on for it, and I believe we have honey.”

  “Thank you,” Azrael said, walking across the room to take a survey of the motorcycles.

  Maaaan . . . this was so not how she wanted the morning to go. Summoning the courage to look up at Bath Kol, she met his bloodshot gaze and changed the subject.

  “Do you think I might be able to call my aunt from here, like I did last night?”

  As soon as the words had passed her lips, Azrael and Jamaerah spun to stare at her. Bath Kol lowered his coffee mug slowly and set it on the table with precision.

  “What did you say?”

  She looked at Bath Kol in confusion. “I said, can I use the phone, but if that’s like a felony or something, then—”

  “Celeste,” Azrael said, coming to the table to sit on a low chair in front of her. “When did you call your aunt?”

  “Twenty bucks says it was before we got ambushed,” Bath Kol said, standing and going to the sink. He tossed out his coffee and found the bottle of Jack Daniel’s, then returned to the table.

  “I called her from Queen Aziza’s office before we took the trains to the Bronx,” Celeste said, looking around nervously.

  Azrael closed his eyes, Bath Kol rubbed his palms down his face, and Jamaerah just shook his head while rubbing the nape of his neck.

  The sound of the elevator engaging and boots on the roof put Bath Kol on his feet. He grabbed a pump shotgun from beneath the kitchen table. Jamaerah yanked out a snub-nosed from beneath the kitchen sink. Azrael had found the nine-millimeter faster than Celeste could draw a breath. But a voice called out from the rising elevator and put everyone at ease.

  “Friend, mon! Don’t smoke a brother!” Isda came off the elevator with several of his men and Bath Kol’s patrols.

  The moment the elevator gates swung back, he walked right up to Azrael and pointed at his chest.

  “Dis mutherfucker is sloppy as shit! He almost got me boys snuffed for rebirth and got me ’oman kilt—Queen’s place laid to siege! Whot—all because he can’t handle his bizness, now we all got to suffer?”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Bath Kol said, coming between Azrael and Isda.

  Several angels separated the would-be combatants as they jostled close to an all-out brawl.

  “I made the call. He didn’t make the call,” Celeste said, looking around the group.

  “You are his responsibility down here!” Isda shouted as two burly brothers held him back. “He should know the fucking wires are the province of the darkness! You don’t have to know! He’s supposed to know!”

  “Speak foul in a sentence directed toward her again, and I will forget you are my brother!” Azrael yelled, lunging at Isda. Four angels pushed him back, grappling with him to keep him from going after the Sentinel.

  “You drugged him and then have the nerve to come up here blaming him for being off h
is game?” Celeste shrieked, scurrying around the brothers. “Let that sorry bastard go!” The second they did, she slapped Isda’s face. “You drugged him; fuck you! The only thing I care about is what happened to Queen Aziza.”

  Bath Kol walked a dangerous path toward Isda, making the others back up. “You drugged a newborn brother? Gave him some shit without his permission or knowledge and then allowed him to take a Remnant out in the street, unarmed?”

  Suddenly Bath Kol’s wings were out and he’d lunged with so much velocity that Isda slammed to the floor. His hands around Isda’s throat, Bath Kol yelled down in his face, spittle flying as another brother left Azrael and tried to pry Bath Kol’s fingers from Isda’s throat.

  “I’ll kill you myself! I swear I will! If Queen died because of this, I’ll put your head on a pike and sell it to the demons!”

  It took several minutes for the other brothers to prevail, and they finally got Bath Kol up and pressed against the refrigerator. Isda’s men helped him sit up, and he gasped, rubbing his throat.

  “She’s not dead, you crazy son of a bitch,” Isda wheezed. “We got there in time, no thanks to your boy.”

  “What happened?” Azrael bellowed, making Isda’s posse back up.

  “The wires are tapped for anybody she’s connected to—you know that,” one of Isda’s men said. “When she called home, they traced it to New York. They hit us first.”

  Isda nodded, still winded. “Couldn’t come for us, so they sent a demon into my dog . . . my ’oman opened the door to let Sheba in. It was a jumper. Blew my dog away with a sawed-off, then the fucking thing split and infected her and the other women.” Isda hung his head and drew a shuddering breath. “Couldn’t get it out of them. House got swarmed. Fallen Sentinels showed up...I had a machete and had to send my ’oman and her two sisters into the Light. Beheading was the only way.”