Falling Hard

by J. K. Coi

  They both knew that if Amelia succeeded in taking Lucifer’s soul from him, she would never see the light of day again—if she lived at all. That was something he couldn’t let happen.

  Gabriel could understand her motivation. He’d been in her shoes more than once. He’d felt that kind of guilt, and he’d known so much failure he thought he was going to drown in it. There was a time he would have gladly given anything—even his own life—to make things right.

  But that would have been too easy. Life was never easy. There was nothing you could do to fix the mistakes of the past, only live with them and move forward.

  And now, if Amelia thought he was going to stand back and let her throw everything away…

  Gritting his teeth, he closed his hands into tight fists. Damn her. This was his life too. She couldn’t just remove him from the equation because he was a duty she needed to see fulfilled. He’d fight her if he had to. He’d—

  Stop.

  He needed to breathe. He needed to clear his head, find a way of slamming the brakes on his anger and frustration. Every time he slipped, every time he gave in to those feelings, everything started to spin out of control. The thing inside of him got a little stronger, dug its claws into his soul a little deeper.

  Lucifer.

  That angel was laughing. Gabriel could hear it, a demented echo deep in the shadowy corners of his mind. It wanted his darkness, was busy feeding off it, knowing that through his rage it would soon be able to overpower him. He had to stay in control of his temper. Not an easy thing to do. Not given his history and the current circumstances testing his limits.

  Opening his eyes, he found Amelia regarding him closely. Some of his tension eased and he almost laughed. At least he could always count on her to be watching him.

  “Damn it. What am I going to do with you?” He curled his hand in her hair. It was heaven to touch her. It didn’t matter what she was—angel, siren, friend, enemy. She was all of that. She was so much more.

  She was his trigger, the catalyst for his fury, and she was also his strength, the only reason he cared about anything. She was his reason to keep fighting for a world he was never again going to have a place in.

  The smooth silkiness of her hair between his fingers grounded him. But not enough. Not nearly enough. From his head to his toes, Gabriel’s entire body was still buzzing with the strain.

  “Help me, Amelia.” Bending, he buried his face in her neck, breathing in her scent and memorizing it as he’d memorized the color of her eyes and the feel of her skin, the way she fit in the crook of his arm. “Help me stay in control.”

  Her hands went around his waist. “I will do what I can.”

  Gabriel gloried in the warmth of her body as she pressed against him. Her soft lips parted over the spot where his heart thumped madly behind the wall of his chest. When she looked up at him, her gaze was haunted. He knew what she was thinking. Forcing himself to loosen his grip, he couldn’t resist dropping a last light kiss on the softness of her lips, although he resisted the urge to slip his tongue into her mouth and taste more deeply.

  She sighed. “Gabriel. Please, we have to—” Her beseeching murmur sent a spear of steel into his heart. She was desperate, he knew. Desperate to do what she’d convinced herself was right, no matter that he didn’t deserve to be saved, that it was going to destroy her. That it made a mockery of what they’d found together.

  There must be some other way.

  “No.” Pulling away, Gabriel swallowed and shook his head. He couldn’t do this with her now. Neither of them would find any answers tonight. He was dead on his feet and Amelia was blinded, she could see no choices but the most impossible ones.

  “I told you before. I’m not discussing this with you.” He knew his tone was harsh, that it revealed his impotent frustration. His body ached, his head pounded. Biting his tongue before he said something stupid, he groaned and rubbed his eyes with his fingers. “Listen, I need to get some sleep. Come to bed with me. Let me hold you while I rest.”

  She grumbled and spun away from him. When she turned back, it was with a look of pained exasperation.

  “Don’t worry, angel face.” He smiled, feeling the unfairness of it all twist a little deeper. “We can still trigger the apocalypse after a good night’s rest.”

  “You always make jokes so easily, but this is too important. This is—”

  “This is what? Fate? Destiny?” He snorted. “Bullshit. All of it is bullshit. When are you going to see that? This stupid plan of yours…” He shook his head. “It’s an excuse and you know it.”

  “It’s the only way.” She stalked across the room and stared into the fire.

  Following her, Gabriel took her arm and forced her around to face him. “No, it’s not. We can find another way. The two of us together. This…this is a cop-out. This is you avoiding the truth. It’s the only way you can think of to relieve yourself of the burden of your own emotions.”

  She gasped. “No.”

  “I can see it in your eyes. You think that if you do this, if you martyr yourself in my name, you won’t have to feel guilty anymore. You won’t have to feel doubt, or agonize over the mistakes you may have made. But you forget who you’re talking to. I’ve been where you’re at right now, baby. I’ve felt that way, pretty much every day. And you know what? All that uncertainty and pain…that’s just fucking life. We don’t give up on it, and we don’t go gently. We fight.”

  She looked up at him, her desperation plain. “That’s why I have to do this. This is the way I can keep fighting.”

  She hadn’t heard a word he’d said. “You will do what you have to do.” He let go of her arm and shook his head. “And so will I.”

  Chapter Twenty

  The bed was large, not that it mattered at all. In sleep Gabriel had gathered Amelia so close there was enough space left over for them to have shared the mattress with three more people.

  He held her tightly, so tightly it was a wonder she could still breathe. And even though she was aware of just how short their time was, she’d given in one last time. Her cheek rested on his chest, her hand splayed over the ridges of his abdomen, and she let him sleep while listening to his heartbeat.

  Rhythmic. Strong.

  His arms wrapped around her, measured breaths fanning her hair. Locked in the protective circle of Gabriel’s heat, Amelia let herself have one final moment for herself. One moment to believe Gabriel was right, that there was some other way to keep Lucifer’s prophecy from coming true. One moment to indulge in the lie that they could both be saved and might have a chance to come out of all this intact.

  But everything was not going to be all right. They had passed all right long ago and were a split second away from total chaos. Gabriel knew it as well as she did, and he was still going to refuse to cooperate.

  She’d tried talking to him, but he’d declared himself finished with talking and dodged her attempts the rest of the evening. Every time she’d opened her mouth to speak, he met her with long kisses that left her breathless. Every time she tried to get his attention, he countered by stealing her focus with maddening touches that led them both to distraction.

  All the while, Amelia had felt the fury that simmered inside him. It lit his deep brown eyes with a stubborn refusal to acknowledge the truth.

  He’d said she operated under a blanket of delusions, but she wasn’t the only one rejecting reality. Amelia had hoped he would at least listen to what she had to say.

  Lucifer could not rise. Gabriel could not die.

  Hers was the only logical solution, even if her true motives were based on anything but logic. It didn’t change the truth of the matter. Didn’t change the fact she’d made promises to Gabriel, promises to Michael, promises to her race. Leaving her with no other alternative.

  She edged out from beneath Gabriel’s arm and gazed down at his scruffy face. He looked far from peaceful. His battle against Lucifer raged even in sleep. It showed in the creases in his brow, the pullin
g of his mouth into a thin line.

  Amelia could save him from this. As long as she was willing to forfeit her soul and spend the rest of eternity in darkness and isolation. Gabriel would hate her for it and she would have truly lost everything. There would be no coming back this time.

  Could she do it? She’d given up her emotions once before, but after everything she’d experienced, could she do the same thing again? Could she cut out the love in her heart, forget the tenderness Gabriel had shown her, abandon the joy he’d given her? All in the name of duty?

  No. That had been a mistake she wouldn’t repeat again. Amelia pressed her lips to Gabriel’s forehead softly so he wouldn’t feel her touch and awaken. No, she wouldn’t do it for Michael or to prevent war. She wouldn’t do it for duty.

  But she would do it for Gabriel.

  With a hoarse groan, Gabriel turned over, hoping to break free of the disturbing dream that had him caught in its unrelenting grip. In his lightly sleeping state he was aware none of it had been real, but he still couldn’t escape the dark madness, couldn’t chase away Lucifer’s chilling laughter.

  He reached blindly across the mattress, letting out a sigh when his arm curved around Amelia’s shoulders. He pulled her soft, naked body into his side, comforted when she obligingly bent a slim leg over his hip and rained sultry kisses across his jaw.

  The bad dream finally faded and Lucifer’s demands became less persistent. He could breathe again, and when he did, his angel’s intoxicating scent filled his lungs instead of the rank smell of death and blood.

  Amelia.

  Amelia was his anchor. Only she was able to turn his demons into insubstantial tendrils of smoke that scattered when she walked through them. She shifted and moved out of his embrace, and he feared she was leaving, but instead she pushed him all the way onto his back and levered herself over him. Her breasts pressed into his chest and she straddled his hips.

  Gabriel wanted to open his eyes, to watch the expressions crossing her exquisite face, but he couldn’t. He could only feel. Feel her quick breaths on his cheek before she kissed him, the warm slide of her tongue slipping into his mouth. He met her tentative stab with his own predatory, sucking kiss, but then he couldn’t lift his head from the pillow to maintain the deep connection when she started to sit back.

  He wanted to grab her and keep her close, but he couldn’t. He wanted to roll her beneath him and surge into her wet warmth, but he couldn’t.

  She pushed into a sitting position. Gabriel moaned her name, but he still couldn’t move any of his limbs. And then he didn’t care because Amelia was circling that sweet ass over his thick erection.

  She rubbed her slick folds up and down the pulsing length of him. “Gabriel.” She murmured his name in that sexy soprano that made him shiver with need.

  Gabriel was a junkie. Just because he didn’t get high anymore didn’t mean that was ever going to change. He only shifted focus. The intensity of his desire for just the sound of Amelia’s voice was the same as those cravings, and he’d be addicted for the rest of his days.

  “You want me, don’t you?” She was torturing him with her voice. Teasing him with her touch. “I want you too. I want you so badly.”

  Maybe he was still sleeping, still dreaming. If so, he never wanted to wake up. He could stay in this dream with Amelia forever.

  “Yes.” His voice rumbled from his throat. He tried to thrust his hips upward, to push inside her, but his limbs had turned to lead. Besides the rapid-fire beating of his heart and the insistent throbbing of his cock, his body felt weighted to the mattress, immobile.

  Behind his closed eyelids, a vision of her formed. Pure white wings spread wide, her smooth skin radiating soft, glowing color. Glorious, beautiful. Her deep blue eyes so full of love. “Let me go,” he said. “I need to be inside you.”

  “I know. I want that too.” She shifted her hips, but before he could protest her leaving him, she positioned the head of his cock at her slippery entrance.

  “Oh God.” The urge to thrust, to push, to move was overwhelming. He could feel the cords in his neck bulging from the effort he expended. But it made no difference, he couldn’t twitch more than a little finger.

  “Damn it,” he growled. “Do it. Take me inside you.”

  “As you wish, Gabriel.” Slowly, oh so slowly, she lowered herself, planting her hands on his chest for balance as she sheathed him in her, inch by excruciating inch. He heard the hitch in her breath, the low moan that told him she was getting as much pleasure from this as he was.

  When he was seated fully inside her, she stilled once again and he swore. “You’re torturing me.” Leaning forward, she circled her hips, dragging a ragged moan from between his lips.

  “No torture. Only pleasure,” she whispered, her mouth so close he could taste the heady sweetness of her kiss already. “I need you so much. But I also have to have your consent.”

  Straining against the invisible bonds keeping him from her, his desperation burned. A fever of unrelenting need flooded him. If she didn’t let him go now, he was going to explode anyway and he didn’t want to come like that, not without touching her, without making her scream his name.

  “Christ, Amelia.” His impatience was clear in the broken, muttered oath. “Take it. Whatever you want, you know that.”

  She moved then, sliding up and down on him in a relentless rhythm until he came hard and fast, his head spinning with the force of his release.

  The orgasm was as good as the ones that had come before, but regret quickly followed the rush. Amelia’s inner muscles clenched his cock tightly and she curled her hands into fists on his chest. She hadn’t finished. And she still hadn’t released him to touch her. He couldn’t open his eyes to look at her.

  He realized she’d been holding her breath when he heard her soft sigh. A sigh of relief? She should know by now there wasn’t any part of himself he wouldn’t give—

  She started to sing softly. The power of her voice penetrated his senses, quickly filling all the dark corners of his body and soul until every hair stood on end, every nerve ending vibrated in response.

  Shit.

  Dread locked his throat tight as he realized what was happening. “Ah, stop,” he groaned. “Don’t you fucking do this.”

  She didn’t answer. She didn’t stop. He felt the light touch of her fingers caressing his brow and hissed. He would have jerked his face out of her reach if he could, and wanted to shove her to the floor when she touched her lips to his and breathed her song right into him.

  I have to have your consent.

  Damn her. She’d played him. Tricked him. He was so fucking stupid. He’d thought she trusted him, respected his decision. He thought they were going to try to work things out together. But all this time, the coldhearted bitch had just been waiting for him to let down his guard. She’d clasped her leash around his neck as he slept and then set him up to walk right into her trap.

  Her song pulled at his heart. He felt the tug as a real, physical ache and realized he was already almost out of time. His chest burned. His temples pounded with pain. Somewhere inside him, Lucifer howled.

  “Damn you,” he spat, forcing the word through gritted teeth.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  He felt a drop of wetness hit his cheek. Then another. They slid down his face to the corner of his mouth and he tasted her tears, the salty bite of her regret. Part of him wanted to give in to his own tears of sorrow and pain, but his weakness had already gotten him into enough trouble.

  Stealing his heart against her, fighting the only way he knew how, Gabriel himself began to sing. Above him, Amelia gasped, her spellbinding voice faltering as she jerked back.

  Gabriel took advantage of her lapse and was able to open his eyes. Even in this, she was an incredible sight to behold. Perfect. Powerful. She’d tucked her wings behind her and her hair fell in a wave over her shoulders, light ends curling around the tight points of her nipples as she rose above him, strong leg
s straddling his thighs.

  He focused on moving his stiff, resisting muscles. At his sides, he twitched his fingers, was able to fist them into the bed sheet. Quickly, before she could recover and tighten her hold on him, he redoubled his efforts. He poured all the fury overflowing his soul into his voice until he could feel the strength returning to his body. With a sudden push, he broke free of Amelia’s angel spell and bucked her off with a shout.

  He tumbled her to the mattress and rolled on top of her slim form. She cried out, but recovered quickly, kicking and twisting in his arms until he ended up beneath her once again.

  They rolled, fighting silently but for the sounds of their heavy breathing and grunts of exertion. His advantage of surprise hadn’t lasted long, and Amelia was too strong. She steadily regained the upper hand. Sweat glistened on her skin. He could feel it dripping from his forehead as well. Gabriel’s grip on her arm slipped and then she had him exactly where she wanted him once again, but this time she pinned his wrists to the mattress.

  “Don’t struggle.” Her eyes pleaded with him, but he ignored her. The magic she’d worked on him was gone. He might not be strong enough to take her, but she would have to break him before she got what she wanted.

  “I’m not going to make this easy for you,” he ground out. “If you’re determined to do this, then you’ll have to fight me.”

  “No.” She shook her head. “It doesn’t have to be this way.”

  “And what way does it have to be then?” He glared, silently daring her to tear Lucifer’s soul out of him. “If this is my destiny, so be it. I can accept that. It’s mine to own. What I won’t accept is being responsible for anyone else’s death, especially yours. Don’t ask me to agree to that because I won’t do it.”

  “This is the right thing for everyone, and I’m prepared to do it. I can take your place if it will save lives, if it will save your life,” she insisted. “Please don’t fight it. I don’t want you to die.”