by Nalini Singh
Elena shivered. “You should’ve showed her that room where Uram kept the remains of his victims.” Her stomach lurched at the memory even now. “It was a slaughterhouse. The smell alone would send most people screaming.”
“You forget, Elena,” Raphael said, his gaze almost black, “Lijuan plays with the dead.”
“Hold the pendant still, Ellie.”
“I’m trying.”
“Shh, Mama will hear.”
Breathing in the fresh bite of Raphael’s scent, she swallowed the poignant whisper of memory and focused on the present. “Why was your father worse?”
Raphael’s hair lifted in the night breeze, darker than the blackness that surrounded it. “He didn’t kill indiscriminately. For the longest time, they were all convinced he was simply driven by a hunger for power, for territory.”
“Others joined him,” she guessed.
A slow nod. “He was an emperor, but he wanted to be a god. When the murders began, they were stealthy, even political.”
Elena reached up to push his hair off his face, needing to touch him, he’d become so suddenly remote. “What made people change their minds?”
He leaned into the touch, but his expression remained acetic, distant. “When he began incinerating entire villages in territories not his own.”
The reading she’d done under Jessamy’s guidance came to her aid. “A declaration of war.”
“My father didn’t see it that way. He expected the others in the Cadre to fall under his command—he’d come to believe he was a god by then.”
“How old were you when he died?”
“Mere decades into my existence.”
A child, she thought, he’d been nothing but a child. “That means . . .” She stopped, couldn’t continue.
“That he was well on the way to madness before I was born.”
She slid her arms around his waist, laying her ear over his heart. “That’s why the worry over your birth.”
His own arms were steel bands around her. Sometimes, I wonder what he passed on to me. What my mother passed on.
23
In that moment, Elena understood that the Archangel of New York had shared something with her he’d shared with no one else. How she knew, she couldn’t say. But she knew. As she knew there were no words to answer Raphael’s question. Only time could do that, but . . . “The course of your life has taken a direction I bet not even Lijuan could’ve foreseen. Nothing is predestined.”
Raphael didn’t speak for several long minutes, and they stood there while the night winds played dark music across their bodies, stroked over their wings. Her archangel hadn’t bothered with a replacement shirt, and his skin felt wonderful under her hands, her cheek. She was, she realized, oddly content in spite of the unsettling events of the day.
“The night is quiet,” Raphael said at last, “the winds fairly calm. Visibility is clear in every direction.”
“A good night to fly,” she whispered.
“Yes.”
She held on as he lifted off, shifting her hold to around his neck. The wind of takeoff whipped her hair off her face, then snapped it back to tangle around them both. “I need to cut this,” she muttered, pulling strands out of her mouth with one hand, the other locked around Raphael.
Why did you not, even as a hunter? I would’ve thought it a vulnerability.
The wound was too close to the surface today, but she answered anyway. My hair’s like my mother’s. I was the only one of her four children to retain the color as I grew. Ari and Belle had both gone a golden blonde like Jeffrey, while Beth was a throwback to their paternal grandmother, her hair a gorgeous strawberry blonde.
So, we are both our mother’s shadows.
Knowing that what she cherished might be to him a curse, she brushed her lips over his jaw in silent comfort. “Go faster.”
Raphael swooped up and down without warning, making her laugh in sheer joy as she locked her legs around his. She didn’t realize she’d expanded her own wings until they began to catch air. “Raphael!”
“Pull them in,” he said. “Otherwise our landing will be rough.”
Thinking it through step by step, she contracted her wings—her muscles gave a mild twinge at going against the wind, but nothing to worry about. “They want to open again.”
“Instinct.” Angling them lower, he flared out his own wings to their greatest width and brought them to a gentle, precise landing on a small mountain plateau overlooking a shallow valley filled with snow.
“This place looks different from the land close to the Refuge.” Its edges softened by time, the valley appeared as if it would cradle rather than crush.
“The snow here tends to be soft,” Raphael said. “That’s why it’s a good place for flight training.”
Her heart skipped a beat. “Now?” She’d thought he planned only to take her flying in his arms.
“Now.”
Excitement a tattoo against her ribs, she stepped to the lip of the plateau, and glanced down.
And down.
Vertigo had never been a problem, but—“It suddenly looks a lot farther away now that I know I’ll be falling toward it.”
“You, afraid?” The touch of his wings against her own, a shimmer of gold that she caught with the corner of her eye.
Her lips twitched. “Are you dusting me, Archangel?”
“Angel dust looks beautiful coming off wings in the dark.” A kiss pressed to her jaw as he shifted to stand behind her, the aphrodisiac dust a taste of unadulterated sex. “As you fly, it’ll sink into your skin, readying your body for me.”
“You’re all talk,” she murmured, feeling him settle his hands firmly about her waist. “So, what do I do now?”
“The only way to learn to fly, is to fly.” He pushed her off the edge of the cliff.
Fear obliterated everything but the need to survive. Her wings spread, catching air, slowing her descent as her muscles screamed at the sudden strain. Raphael’s shirt twisted around her, baring her stomach to the elements. She didn’t care, more concerned about getting her wings to work. But it was too late, the ground rushing up at terminal velocity.
No snow was that soft—she was still going to hit hard enough to splinter bones.
Hands gripping her under her arms, lifting her up with effortless strength. Close your wings.
She obeyed, though the adrenaline pumping through her body made her want to do the exact opposite. The instant her feet touched the ground, she swiveled around to push him in the chest, her palms sizzling at the contact with his bare skin. “That’s your idea of teaching? I could’ve been splattered from here to Manhattan!”
“You were never in any danger.” His eyes gleamed with laughter and that just made her madder. “That’s how young angels learn to fly—they’re pushed out of the aeries before they have a chance to develop a fear of it.”
Her fury came to a screeching halt, though her heart continued to ricochet violently in her chest. “You push babies out into thin air?”
“How do you think birds learn to fly?”
“Huh.” She folded her arms, the shirt clammy against her sweat-soaked skin. “You know, I’m an adult—I already know fear.”
“That’s why I didn’t give you any warning. Instinct did what it was supposed to.”
Wiping her hands across her cheeks in an effort to cool them down, she took a deep breath, tied the tails of the shirt at her side and walked back. “Okay, push me again.”
“You can step off yourself.”
Elena had long ago learned to keep her fears to herself, seeing them only as weaknesses that could be used against her, but this time, there was nothing to do but admit it. “I’m too chickenshit.”
Raphael pressed a kiss to her nape, put his hands on her waist again. “This time, snap your wings out as soon as possible.”
Nodding, she was barely in position when he pushed. It took her at least three seconds to snap out her wings. Too slow. Raphael brought her u
p again. And again. And again.
“Once more,” she said, her muscles crying with exhaustion. “I need to get it.”
Raphael’s face was all austere lines, but he nodded. “Once more.”
Knowing her body would give out even if her will wouldn’t, Elena took a few steps back from the edge. “It won’t be as bad if I run.”
“Remember, you must unfold your wings the instant you become airborne, or the downward momentum will be too strong to stop.”
She nodded, pushing sweat-soaked strands of hair off her face. Then, filling her mind with the image of her body in flight, she began to race over the plateau. She went airborne seconds later, and it was only when she felt the hard pull of muscle in her shoulders that she realized her wings were out. There was even, for a single moment, a slight upward drive before she began to fall again. Except this time, she felt a sense of control.
Her landing was nowhere even remotely close to Raphael’s grace. She came down bruisingly hard on her knees, her momentum throwing her face forward, but she was grinning when she lifted that face from the powder. “I did it!”
The archangel crouching in front of her had eyes filled with a fierce kind of pride. “I had no doubts you would.” He watched her dust off her face. “You’ll hurt as if you’ve been beaten tomorrow, but you must continue to train.”
“I know. Same principle as applies to normal training.”
“However, if you feel true pain, let me know.” Fingers on her chin. “It’s better to wait for minor injuries to heal than turn them into major ones.”
“Especially since we’re on a deadline.” She met his gaze, so brilliant even in the snowy dark. “You think Lijuan will use my inexperience in handling my new body against me.”
A curt nod as he released her chin. “She’ll use every weapon she can.”
“Why?”
“A break from ennui.” His lips flattened into a thin line. “If asked, she’ll say it’s about power, about politics, but in the end, it’s about nothing but her own amusement. You’re a new toy, one that’s caught her interest.”
“And we must play.” Aching in every muscle, she got to her feet.
Raphael rose with her, seeming not to feel the cold at all, in spite of the fact that he was magnificently shirtless. “At another time, I may have declined the offer of the ball”—an unspoken reminder that he, too, was an archangel—“but we must attend this one.”
She nodded. “You need to see how far Lijuan’s devolved.” According to what she’d heard, the oldest of the archangels was no longer willing to leave her homeland, even to meet with the Cadre.
“If she unleashes her reborn on the world, there’ll be no going back.”
The idea of the dead walking, their souls trapped in those horrific shells made Elena shiver. As she did, fine traces of gold glittered in the air. “Will you fly for me, Raphael?” she asked, deciding to hold on to the wonder tonight. “I want to see the angel dust coming off your wings.”
Raphael flared out his wings, making her breath catch. The patterns that marked his wings as unique were indistinct in the dark, but she knew the bright sunburst on his left wing down to the last streak, the last line. It was a scar, made by a weapon she’d shot. He’d been so very cold that night. “Will you ever go Quiet again?” she found herself asking.
His answer was potent with memory, with the knowledge of how close he’d come to the precipice of evil. “The need would have to be very great.” And then he lifted off in a tempest of the finest snow and wind, his power making her dig her feet into the powder to keep herself upright. Ecstasy soaked into her tongue a moment later, and she realized he’d flickered the aphrodisiac dust on her as he rose.
The special blend.
Her entire body beginning to hum with need, she watched as he rose ever higher, becoming a silhouette in the night sky. When he started to descend, it was in a series of slow, almost lazy dives, as if he was riding the air currents. Streamers of gold tracked his every movement, a wondrous light show against the velvet black sky.
It hit her again, right in the heart—how could this amazing, powerful being be hers? And yet he was. Perhaps he wasn’t hers, would never be hers, in the way a mortal man might have been, but then, she’d never really fit well with those mortal men. They’d found her hunter strength off-putting, had called her unfeminine to her face. You’re amazing, she thought up to her archangel.
He heard her, because his next dive was steep, the climb up even steeper.
Show-off.
Another steep dive, so hard and fast that her breath caught. She reached out as if to catch him as he plummeted, her heart racing a hundred miles an hour. He pulled up with less than a meter to spare between him and the unyielding earth, the wind of his ascent hitting her as he lifted back up.
She knew before she tasted it that he’d showered her with more of the dust. Every exposed part of her body tingled . . . including the entire span of her wings, which she’d spread out in preparation for flight, though she was far too inexperienced to execute a vertical takeoff like Raphael. I hope all this dust isn’t just a tease, because that might put me in a killing frame of mind. She could already feel the erotic impact, the pulse between her thighs lush with need.
The scent of the sea swept over her as he answered. Your muscles will feel much better after a bath and a massage.
It was all her mind needed to mount a sensual assault filled with images of the last time they’d been in a bath together. His fingers driving into her, his gorgeous body bare for her perusal, his arousal heavy and demanding. She drew in a trembling breath as her breasts pushed against the damp fabric of his shirt, the tips aching at even that fleeting contact. Lifting her hand, she dropped it before she could touch herself. Everything felt too sensitive, too needy. I think it’s time to go home. She imbued her mental words with the raw sexual craving that had her skin so tight, so exquisitely tender.
Raphael’s response was to land behind her, his arms coming around her in a steely hold as he swiveled her to face him. Starving for the taste of him, she wrapped her arms around his neck, snapped her wings tight to her back and held on for the ride.
They rose through lingering traces of angel dust, each fine mote kicking her further into a kind of heat she wasn’t sure she could survive. Groaning, she pressed her mouth to the uncompromising angle of his jaw, licking at his skin, sucking and tasting as he flew them home. Against her belly, he was hard, deliciously tempting. She wanted to close her hand around that heavy heat, but had to satisfy herself with biting kisses along his jaw.
He didn’t stop her, but his body grew increasingly more taut, his muscles electric with strain by the time they landed on the balcony outside their bedroom. She felt him slide open the doors, shut them after they entered. And then the archangel lost control. She was being turned with a hard move that left no room for argument, the shirt ripped off her like so much mist.
A fragment of thought before his hands closed over her breasts from behind, his teeth sinking into the sensitive flesh of her neck. The scream of pleasure was torn out of her, a short, sharp burst. The hands curved so possessively around her breasts squeezed, sending another bolt of lightning straight through to the heat between her thighs, her body slick with welcome, with need.
Releasing the grip he had on her neck, Raphael sucked on the mark he’d made, his body a furnace that burned her from the inside out. When she twisted, trying to turn, he slipped one hand down to her abdomen, holding her in place with effortless strength, his other hand continuing to torment the sensitive flesh of her breasts, her nipples almost painfully aroused.
“Your mouth,” she whispered, her voice husky. “I need your mouth.”
Not yet.
She shivered at the implacability of that comment, the dark sexual tone of it. Raphael was not only out of control, he wasn’t going to allow her any either. She could have fought, but she’d hungered for him since the instant she woke from the coma. The archangel co
uld have her any and every way he wanted.
Raising her arms, she went to twist them behind her and around his neck, but he was already nudging her forward, onto the bed. She flowed with the movement, ending up on her knees on the sheets. Raphael pressed his hand to her lower back. Understanding the silent message, she went down onto her hands, too.
It was a starkly submissive position. However, she was feeling anything but submissive. Using one hand to shift her hair to the side, she glanced back over her shoulder, wanting to tease him in the way a woman could tease a man in bed. “Oh God.”
The archangel was glowing. A visceral terror in her gut, born of eons-old instinct.
I can feel your fear, Elena.
Blowing out a breath, she sucked in another, the action shaky. “It’ll add spice to the proceedings.”
A slow blink, his eyes lingering over the sweep of her back as he unfolded his wings with a careless grace that left her mouth watering. Then, eyes hooded, he stroked one hand down the curve of her bottom. Spread your thighs.
She resisted.
A glance of savage, wild blue.
Smiling just enough to let him know she was teasing, she widened her stance the merest fraction. He responded by running a single finger across the seam of her pants, stroking right over the hottest, most hungry part of her.
“Raphael!”
You wanted to play.
Still as dark, still as full of sexual intent . . . but holding an undertone of sensual amusement. Shuddering under the intimacy of the caress, she blew out a breath. “Yeah, I did.” She went to flip over onto her back, but he read the tension in her muscles faster than she could move, holding her in place with a single hand on her hip.
“No fair,” she murmured, dropping her head. “I’m not as strong.”
Who said anything about playing fair?
She laughed, feeling as if her skin was stretching to accommodate the sexual energy within. “Are you planning to take off my pants anytime soon? I’m burning up.”
Another lushly intimate caress. “I can feel your dampness through your clothing.” His voice dropped, became impossibly more sensual as his fingers pushed upward. “I’ll lick you here.”