by Marie Harte
“Well?” Sapphira’s gentle tone had vanished. She glared at him as if he were Satan incarnate, and while he thought the comparison complimentary, he doubted she’d mean it as such. So much for sugar and spice, yet she promised to be a refreshing change from Sarah and Abigail. And anything that would get him out of the upper realm and away from that fucking Uriel was a blessing.
“You lead, I’ll follow.” And keep my eyes glued to that exceptional ass.
She shot him a suspicious look, bowed stiffly to Uriel and strode from the room.
Duncan followed her, his footsteps lighter the farther he moved from the conceited angel. And then the dick stopped him at the exit to his quarters.
“Oh, and Duncan?”
“Come on, Uriel. I have souls to sway, remember? You do want me to make you proud, don’t you?” His snotty tone, however, didn’t pull Uriel’s face into a frown the way it had this past week. An uneasy feeling gripped him as Uriel smiled wide.
“I just wanted to wish you good fortune. Have no fear, Duncan. You’ll make me proud. I have faith.”
Sapphira glanced over her shoulder, waiting for a damned demon to find her. She tapped her foot and glared down at her angelic garb. White, white, white. Everything in this place was either white or gold. So boring. She couldn’t wait to get out of here. The upper realm always felt so thick, as if the air were filled with tiny sacks of cloying joy and goodness that made it hard for her to breathe. Uriel, Sarah, Abigail, and the others constantly had a positive thing to say or do, and basked in the notion of doing their part for the benefit of mankind and the Ethereal. And then there was her mother…
Sapphira cringed, imagining how truly irked Charmeine was going to be when she realized her orders had been usurped by an angel of a lesser sphere. And heck, not just a lesser sphere, but a lesser choir as well. Uriel, though head of the third choir, fell below Charmeine, a Virtue, in the angelic food chain.
The upper realm, composed of three spheres and three choirs in each sphere, had little to do with any sense of hierarchy in the Ordinary or lower realm, or so she’d been informed. The second sphere, Charmeine frequently told Sapphira, had an importance many dismissed out of sheer ignorance. The third sphere, of which Sapphira was a part, dealt with the Ordinary, with humanity, focusing on the mundane. And the first sphere, those blessed Seraphim, Cherubim and Ophanim, well, they were so close to the Creator, it was no wonder they could do nothing but think of Him.
Now the second sphere, the three choirs of Dominions, Virtues and Powers, had the most difficult job of all—easing the missions of the third sphere to coincide with what His first sphere needed. Charmeine would wax on and on about her importance in the harmony of mankind, of enlightenment to both humans and angels alike. And to have her lessons tossed aside by a mere third sphere angel wanting to turn a demon? Monstrous.
Sapphira allowed a small smirk, wishing she could be there when Uriel broke the news. But then Duncan joined her, and she quickly schooled her features into an expressionless mask. Or at least she hoped it was expressionless.
“Where to, fearless leader?”
If that attitude wasn’t enough to make her fall in love, that body sure as hel—heck—was. The fact that Duncan had made Uriel lose control amused her to no end. Sapphira herself had caused Mr. High and Mighty to raise his voice a time or two. To her discomfort, those occasions had been effortless. But how was a young angel to know what not to do when everyone preached love and happiness all day every day? So she’d engaged in sex with humans. She questioned Descension, sin, and what led many to ruin. Sapphira couldn’t quell her fascination for the lower realm, much as she tried to suppress her curiosity.
But how could an angel hope to stop thinking about the forbidden when it came in a package that looked like Duncan? Another glance at him showed a ripped upper body and golden, powerful thighs that appeared more muscular each time he shifted in the thigh-length cloth. And…oh baby, when the cloth molded around his impressive shaft, her body warmed with anticipation. Dam—darn it, she wanted to wipe her mouth to make sure she wasn’t drooling.
She hurriedly shifted her thoughts, trying to remember what Duncan had asked her. But irritation returned when she spotted Uriel passing in the corridor to her right.
Uriel had too many rules. Angels had to adhere to so many strictures. So many demands on them to help, heal and deliver that it made it hard to simply exist. For her part, Sapphira couldn’t stand all this sentimental claptrap about saving the world from itself.
Another glance at Duncan reminded her of who, specifically, they had to save—his question in the first place—and she sighed. “Nathan Shepherd. The Towers in King of Prussia.”
“King of Prussia? That’s near Philly, my town.” Duncan smiled and crossed his arms, his biceps bulging lovingly over a broad chest partially exposed by the thin white silk covering him. Her fingers itched to touch his firm flesh, and she wondered if his nipples would taste as sweet under her tongue as she imagined. “…do you think?”
She blushed, embarrassed to realize he was waiting for her to answer. She’d missed most of what he’d said, too busy ogling the man to listen. “Right.” She frowned, as if irritated with him. Looking mad would hopefully make her appear a stern, commanding angel. Hell, it worked for Uriel. “So let’s change into something appropriate for the Ordinary and get down to business.”
Duncan quirked a brow at her. “Don’t tell me you plan on doing what Uriel says.”
“Of course I do.” I hope you’re hearing me, Uriel. Or Sarah, or Abigail, or any of the other angels dogging my every step. “It’s an honor to protect the balance. I’m told you and your brother and sister work to sway the souls bent on Decision. Your knowledge will help us do as we’re meant.” That about summed up what she’d been lectured on for the last several years. “Oh, and I just wanted to add what a pleasure it is to work with such an established Decision maker.” Right, keep it positive. She wanted to choke on the words, but forced them out regardless. “I want only to restore harmony and balance…and love.”
Duncan frowned, and she wanted to kiss him for having a disagreeable bone in his body. “On that note, I’m ready to leave. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
Thank God. Sapphira nodded pleasantly and took his hand, flashing them to the area where clothing suitable to the middle realm sat on hangers and in heaps for those needing them.
Anticipation surged, the knowledge that soon she would once again be surrounded by greed, lust and conflict, by the very qualities that made humanity what it was—exciting, lively and a complete opposite of life in the upper realm—causing her heart to race. Her excitement had little to do with the sensual demon forced to follow her orders. Or so she kept telling herself. She glanced at him and licked her lips. Such a strong, powerful creature. Tall and broad, heavily muscled. Dark of spirit and contrary. And hers to do with whatever she wanted, under her thumb, her boot, her body…
“Sapphira?”
Duncan’s smooth tone tore her gaze from where it had wandered to his impressive erection, and she flushed when he smiled, a carnal grin that told her he knew very well what she’d been imagining.
“Let’s go save some souls, sweetheart. I’m more than happy to teach you everything I know.” He grabbed jeans, a ragged T-shirt, and a pair of scuffed boots—all black. Then he promptly dropped his white robe and stood before her, gloriously naked. “I promise not to leave anything out.”
Chapter Two
“Uriel’s calling. I’ll be right back.” Her eyes wide and fastened on that part of him rising to meet her gaze, Sapphira disappeared before Duncan could take his next breath.
Duncan scowled at the empty space where she’d stood. His plan would never work if the angel kept her distance. Despite the fact that he’d decided to use her for the information she possessed about the upper realm, his body demanded he take whatever else she had to offer. For all the physical pleasures he’d been subjected to these last nine days, he had
n’t once been as aroused in Sarah, Abigail and the others’ presence as he was just by standing near Sapphira.
For a minute he wondered if that had been Uriel’s plan all along, to seduce Duncan with feminine perfection. As he dressed, Duncan pondered the idea and discarded it. No, Sapphira didn’t seem as easy around Uriel as the others. And Uriel had given her a tired, almost exasperated study, much like the one Duncan’s father often gave James, his brother.
Thoughts of James took his mind from Sapphira, and Duncan wondered how he’d once again found the short end of the stick. James and Duncan had played a prank gone very wrong, and though amusing to see the angels getting their asses handed to them, Duncan knew he and James rightfully deserved some type of punishment, if for no other reason than they’d been sloppy enough to get caught. Yet while he’d been banished to the demon-forsaken upper realm, James, his twin, was no doubt living it up in the catacombs with the dragons, sentenced to punishment by the dragon prince, his best fucking friend. And how his father had loved rubbing that in.
“Figures,” Duncan muttered and tied his boots.
Duncan felt closer to James than anyone else in the Ethereal, with his younger sister and father running a close second. A fallen angel, Asael was nevertheless a decent caregiver. He made no allowances for shortcomings, but loved with a full heart, as dark as it was. Asael also possessed a rather skewed sense of humor, which explained why he hadn’t lauded his sons for implicating angels in a demon prank, but instead had thrown Duncan to the angels and James to the dragons.
Like Teban would really make James suffer. Duncan highly doubted James was doing anything but drinking and whoring, his two favorite pastimes. Then again, with Eve now stuck in the lower realm working on swaying the souls of the blood elves, the middle realm was seriously in danger of being unbalanced. With Duncan up here, James had to be working the souls in the Ordinary. Heaven take him if Asael found other demons to cover their territory. Just thinking about it pissed Duncan the hell off.
Needing to get back to business, Duncan debated whether or not to wait for his prudish angel to show herself again. Maybe he could pop down to the Ordinary for a few, just to see if he had any potential sways in the area before he was forced to go with Sapphira.
Fortunately, for her sake, Sapphira reappeared right as he’d made the decision to leave without her. Unable to stop himself, Duncan stared at her lithe, luscious body encased in tight jeans and a flattering black T-shirt. Her light brown hair looked almost gold against the darker color, and the flash of unease in her gaze told him she was fully aware of the direction of his thoughts.
The challenge to topple one of Uriel’s minions attracted him as much as the thought of driving inside of her. Smiling wickedly, Duncan turned on the charm. “Sapphira, love, I was just coming to get you.”
She huffed and rolled her eyes. “Yeah, and Asael’s ready to Ascend as we speak. Tell me another one.” She grabbed him by the arm and pushed them through space and time into the Ordinary. They landed in the backyard of a tall row house. “No, this isn’t Nathan Shepherd’s. This is Roxboro. I need a drink.”
Stunned that an angel would put off duty in favor of alcohol, Duncan followed her around the house and down to the corner, where a dark pub sat. Entering, Duncan felt as if he’d come home. A sticky floor, bad lighting and depressed occupants littered the place at—he called on his internal clock—six on a Friday night. The stale stench of cigarettes, alcohol and unwashed bodies filled his nose, and he inhaled the sin with pleasure as he watched Sapphira saunter to the bar.
The crowd of lowlife stiffs parted like the Red Sea as she reached the counter, and all activity around her ceased as a thug of a bartender handed her two beers in two seconds.
“On the house,” he barked before gifting her with a smile harsh enough to break a mirror.
“Thanks, Tim.” Sapphira grinned as she turned away, and Duncan heard a collective sigh fill the bar as everyone, male and female, watched her rejoin him.
He followed her to a table that quickly cleared, and as he sat, he stared at her in wonder. “I didn’t know angels liked to drink.”
She took a hefty swig from her long-neck bottle. “They don’t, but I figure I’m entitled because I’m sentenced to a literal hell on earth with you.”
Instead of the insult he should have suffered, Duncan was suffused with laughter. “Words to warm a man’s heart.” She avoided glancing at him but chuckled. “What’s wrong, love, afraid to look at me?”
“I’d rather have a root canal.” She exhaled loudly before reluctantly meeting his gaze, and the effect she had on Duncan was like a punch in the gut. His heart skipped a beat then raced to a maddening lust. By all that was unholy, she had the softest brown eyes, eyes that melted his willpower and had him drowning.
It took all of his composure to act unaffected, and he used the excuse of his beer to break eye contact as he took a long drink. What the fuck was that about?
“How old are you, Sapphira?” She had to be ancient, maybe even a plant from the second sphere. And, as an angel, she wouldn’t lie. Damn them for their upright principles, but the angels spoke truth as if it were as necessary as breathing. As Duncan tried to absorb what it was about her that called to him, he tried to picture her as a Virtue or Dominion, but didn’t think she had that all-holy aura that type normally did. In fact, come to think of it, had he not known better, he might have thought her human, or even a citizen of the lower realm.
“I’m young. Is that going to be a problem?” She drained her beer and another appeared on the table, courtesy of a hovering biker with arms like tree trunks and a goatee that made Duncan think of Baal. He looked like most of the others frequenting the bar, and now that Duncan noticed it, they’d entered one of the seedy biker bars commonly avoided by those with a conscience, or a brain.
“You need anything, Sapphira, lemme know.” The guy had a voice deeper than a dragon’s, yet his gaze was soft as it lingered over Sapphira.
“Thanks, Jack.” She smiled and waited patiently for him to leave. To Duncan’s amusement, the male gave him a onceover and a hard glare that quickly faded into panic. In seconds he backed away like hunted prey, turned, and raced toward the bar.
“Not nice, Duncan.”
“Not my fault. We’re what we’re made to be.” He shrugged and drank some more, staring around him. Yep. He liked it. Definitely a bad place. Home to the Rebel Guards, if the many denim jackets were anything to go by. And Duncan recognized one soul quickly hovering on the bridge leading to hell, a male he’d visited a few months ago. “How young is young?”
“A quarter century.”
He nearly choked on his beer. “You’re only twenty-five years old?”
“More or less.” She stared anywhere but at him, and even in the darkness of the place he could see her blush.
“Well, which is it? More or less?”
“I’m twenty-eight, if you must know,” she said through gritted teeth.
“Holy shit.” Duncan sniggered. “And they think you can manage me? Has Uriel entered his dotage so soon?” He met her irritated glare with another laugh, even as another part of him worried. If she was only twenty-eight, her hold on him wasn’t steeped in ethereal magic, but in something else. Something he couldn’t yet place. Needing to focus on what he could control, he shifted the conversation. “So tell me again why we’re here instead of at Nathan Shepherd’s place. Not that I’m complaining.”
Sapphira fiddled with the label on her bottle. “You’re not exactly on Uriel’s list of favorite people.”
“Hell no, I’m not. I can’t stand that arrogant prick.” She coughed, but he saw the grin she tried to hide. “Ah, I see. You think this will annoy him, so you’re taking your time.”
“Not exactly.” She glanced up at him and, in a whisper, confessed, “I like it here.”
“You do?” Duncan frowned, wondering if he’d missed something in what one could barely describe as a sludge of a bar.
&nbs
p; “It’s lively.” Sapphira let go of the ripped label in her fingers and leaned closer, excitement darkening her gaze to melted chocolate. “Can’t you feel it?”
“What, exactly?”
“The life here. The needs and wants, the hungers…”
Duncan couldn’t believe she sensed what he did. Most angels detested humanity, thinking themselves far above the mortals it was their duty to guide. The demons, however, relished the vices humans lived with day in and day out. For it was the foibles and failings that intrigued Duncan, the flaws that ultimately shaped mankind and proved what power they harnessed under extraordinary circumstances. Perfection, in his opinion, was overrated. And Sapphira’s unwholesome curiosity likely took her down a peg or two on the holy charts…conversely scoring her higher on Duncan’s list.
“I know exactly what you mean,” he said quietly, caught by the awful yearning on her face.
As if sensing she’d said more than she should have, Sapphira hastily spoke, “So, what’s the lower realm like?”
“You’ve never been there?” Of course she hasn’t. She’s a novice, a young woman, too young for you. He fought his baser needs, his conscience a result of the goodness of spirit his human mother had unkindly inflicted upon him during his upbringing, years before he’d found his father. But when Sapphira licked her lips and took the bottle in her mouth again, it was all he could do not to haul her outside and take her against the alley wall.
“No. I almost got to go, once. But my mother found out about it and my trip was cancelled at the last minute.” She pursed her lips in disappointment. “It’s hard to always do what’s right when you have no idea of where the wrong path will lead.”
“Ah, but then curiosity killed the cat.” Duncan couldn’t help himself. “And that’s just a waste of fine pussy, if you ask me.”