She moved back from her guardian. The glow in his eyes had dimmed, but his Brimstone was still burning bright. She needed to distance herself from him before she asked.
“He’s agreed to attend a celebration at the palace on his twenty-first birthday. His whole family will be here. All the D’Arcys,” Ezekiel said. She could see a glint of blue in his irises now. The flames had died down. The reprieve wouldn’t last.
“I won’t be his queen, Ezekiel. I’ll never be his queen,” Lily said. She could no longer wait for the right moment to defy him. That moment would never come.
She’d been wrong that his Brimstone would flare. Cold abruptly filled the entire room instead. The air became so chilled that she shivered against it. Ezekiel had damped down his fire so completely that he’d sucked all the residual heat from the room, and her own body heat had been drained.
“You intend to defy me in this?” he said softly. He placed his hands behind his hips and clasped his fingers together. It was his usual pose when he was displeased. Casual, but tense. This time his tension was even more obvious in the stiffness of his shoulders and arms. She wasn’t fooled by his tone or the chill. He was furious. It was in his nature to control it. She should be thankful. If he’d been a lesser daemon she might have been scorched away whether he meant to hurt her or not.
“So I was right. That’s your grand scheme. To use my affinity to secure your chosen heir,” Lily said. “I’ve never defied you. I owe you everything,” If she’d been stronger, her flute and her warrior angel would be nothing but dust left in her clenched fists. She drifted farther away from Ezekiel. But this time he followed. Only a few gracefully casual steps, but she wasn’t mistaken to feel stalked.
He wasn’t a man. He was an Ancient One. And he’d never cared for her beyond his intention that she should wed his heir. She knew that now.
“I’ve loved you for as long as I can remember. My mother loved you, too. We received protection, but our love wasn’t enough in return. You ask for more. I understand. I promised you Lucifer’s wings. That is the bargain between us,” Lily said. “But that is all. Our bargain ends there.” He couldn’t force her to do more without another deal, but he was a master of manipulation. It would take every ounce of her wit and will to outmaneuver his wishes. She was playing chess with a nearly immortal being. She might check him, but a checkmate would be nearly impossible.
She held the kachina. She held the flute. She met Ezekiel’s cold gaze. Midnight blue without any stars. In her hand, the kachina grew icy. It didn’t matter. She was already chilled to the bone. She didn’t flinch when Ezekiel reached to smooth a tendril of hair that had dried and escaped her braid. He was always unknowable. But she did know his heart belonged to the D’Arcys. She knew it was a hard and scarred heart that couldn’t expand to include her. How could she settle for less than love from anyone else?
Sometimes the impossible happened. If you refused to give in.
“You’re afraid the wings won’t be enough. You want my affinity to seal the deal. But I’m not just a lure. I’m not a prize,” Lily said. “If I force him to accept the throne, he’ll hate me.”
“He’ll never hate you, Lily. You’re wrong. No one with Brimstone blood could hate you. Your affinity will see to that,” Ezekiel said.
Suddenly, Lily felt the flames of Brimstone in her own heart. Or an emotion that mimicked them perfectly. She hadn’t wanted to anger Ezekiel. And he knew it. He wasn’t afraid of her anger at all.
He should have been.
“I’ll leave before I risk tying him to me with affinity rather than affection,” she warned.
“This is your home,” Ezekiel said. His hand fell away from her face.
“Yes, I know. It was built for me. Daemon deals and plans and schemes before I was even born. I’m done with them all. I came to tell you that I owe you for the protection you promised my father, but I no longer need it. I don’t want to be safe anymore,” Lily said. She turned away from the hard look that settled onto his craggy features. “I love you, but I’ve lived in the shadows of your affections for the D’Arcys for too long. Meeting Michael has clarified for me how cold my life in hell has been,” Lily said. She wanted more. If she couldn’t have more, she’d at least have freedom.
“You’ll be here for the celebration,” Ezekiel said.
All the D’Arcys would be in the palace for Michael’s birthday. After that, he’d be a king on the throne and forever out of her reach. Lily had never been so cold.
“I almost burned an entire army with nothing but a flute. Don’t underestimate my determination,” Lily said.
“For him. You almost burned the world for Michael. To save him,” Ezekiel said. His voice had never sounded so sophisticated and otherworldly. As if he knew her better than she knew herself.
“I’ll help retrieve the wings. I’ll be here for the celebration. But then I’ll leave,” Lily said. “Whether or not he accepts the throne will be entirely up to him. My affinity won’t be part of the bargain.”
Ezekiel didn’t protest when she spun away and hurried from the room. It was a mistake to agree to remain for Michael’s birthday. Every second in his company was another chance for her to succumb to the temptation to settle for less. Especially because she imagined that less with Michael would be more than she had ever had before. It would be hard to leave the only home she’d ever known. But even harder to leave the one man who had filled her heart with a quarter of what she suspected he had to give.
She’d never defied Ezekiel. She’d never stood her ground. It felt like flying through the starlit air in a Firebird at midnight. The hushed shadows of the palace fell away from her as she went back to her rooms. The gloom seemed to be afraid of the starlight she’d found in her soul.
* * *
“Grim, what have you done?” Lily asked the absent hellhound when the figure of Michael on her bed met her as she entered her room. She closed the door behind her and hesitantly moved toward the prone man she’d thought she left behind in the desert. He was awake. His hazel gaze tracked her as she crossed the room.
She noted the absence of ash on his features. The blood had been washed away. His body was bare save for low-riding jeans that looked fresher than the ones he’d worn before. There was an angry livid slash across his chest and numerous other scrapes and bruises blackened from the Brimstone cauterization that would leave more scars to join with the faded scars of his long-ago brush with death. But he looked surprisingly well.
“You can’t walk away from a daemon deal,” Michael said.
He probably spoke of the deal she’d made with him. But her cheeks flamed. She’d just walked away from a deal Ezekiel thought went hand in hand with the one she’d made with him. Michael could never know. Even once he realized she’d taken him to the wings because of Ezekiel’s wishes.
“You had water. And Grim. I was going to come back,” Lily said.
She had taken her hands from her pockets. Thank goodness the warrior angel hadn’t been on her nightstand. It was hidden in her pocket, but it was a bulge in the clinging sheath he could easily see.
Michael propped himself up on his elbows. His muscles rippled and he didn’t groan.
“Were you?” he asked. “We have an agreement, but now I wonder if it takes a back seat to other bargains you may have made.”
He left the bed more fluidly than she thought possible after his near brush with death. He wasn’t recovering. He was recovered.
“I was worried. I thought you might have been taken here against your will,” Michael continued. “But then Grim brought me to this apartment and I find a room that obviously belongs to you.” He stalked toward her on steady, strong legs, gesturing at the shelves of Kachina dolls her mother had made. She had almost burned the world with her flute...from a distance. She had been sheltered and protected for years. He had destroyed dae
mon after daemon in hand-to-hand combat. That potential for violence showed in the coil and release of every muscle as he moved. She backed away from his advance, but then she came up against the bedroom wall. She had nowhere else to retreat.
“Lily, what have you done?” Michael asked, repeating her earlier accusation. But his words and the intimidating movement of his body toward her didn’t match the glow in his eyes. They searched her with more hunger than accusation. A rush of blood roared in her ears as her heartbeat increased. Fear. Yes. But tinged with a thrill of anticipation.
“He’s my guardian. I’ve lived here since my father died,” Lily confessed.
“So it isn’t the affinity that influenced your age. It was growing up in the hell dimension. This palace has been your home,” Michael said. His lids had lowered so she couldn’t read his eyes. His hands rested lightly on her bare upper arms. They belied the tension she could see in his body. “Why doesn’t he force the throne on you then?” Michael asked, coming uncomfortably close to what Ezekiel wanted.
“I’m not a D’Arcy. And I never will be,” Lily said. She met his gaze. She was Samuel Santiago’s daughter. Only Ezekiel would find that lacking.
“Never?” Michael asked. His movement resumed until his body was pressed lightly to hers. Not an imposition. An invitation. One her and her affinity wanted to accept. “Never...” he repeated, and this time his breath teased across her lips when he spoke because he’d tilted his head down until their mouths were almost touching. “It seems never is a very long time for us both. I should be angrier, but I find myself too damn glad that you’re whole and here and not hurt in any way.”
Lily closed her eyes and held herself very still to keep from claiming the kiss he seemed to offer. Her affinity was less controlled. His heat caused it to rise up and engulf their bodies in an aura of power. She trembled against it. He must have felt her shaking because his hands tightened slightly. He stroked her skin with his thumbs. Meant to reassure or to inflame? Whatever his intentions, the later was the result.
Her nipples peaked against the silk of her gown. She opened her eyes and glanced down. Against the white of her dress, her flush was embarrassingly obvious. He followed her gaze. He lightened his touch when he saw that his grip dimpled her skin.
But he didn’t let her go.
Instead he stroked one hand up to the strap of her gown and then teased several digits lightly over her collarbone and down to the vee of silk between her breasts. He’d shifted his body back—barely an inch, but an inch was enough to see her reaction to his touch through the smooth material of her dress. She didn’t have a curvy figure, but her pleasure in his touch and his perusal made her breasts seem siren-worthy.
Suddenly, she didn’t want to hide her flush or her pebbled nipples. She wanted him to look. She wanted him to know. Her gaze rose up to meet his, instinctively seeking to gauge his reaction to her obvious signs of arousal. She caught her breath when she saw twin flames deep in his hazel eyes, darkening them and brightening them at the same time.
“Why didn’t you tell me that you were the daemon king’s ward?” Michael asked.
“The two of you aren’t on the best of terms. You promised to help me fulfill my mother’s request,” Lily replied, softly. “I thought it best to keep my past to myself.” She didn’t tell him about the precious kachina doll in her pocket. About how much a part of her past he was.
“Ezekiel raised you? I’m beginning to understand why Grim didn’t trust you,” Michael said. But his hand skimmed up to cup the nape of her neck. He didn’t step away. She was caught and seduced at the same time. The fires in his eyes flickered softly. He had widened the space between them to caress her, but he still leaned close when he spoke. She closed her eyes again against the dizzy swoop of desire that flowed from his fingers to her stomach and lower. She swallowed. Then she opened her eyes, afraid the swooning blink had been too long. She couldn’t afford to miss one second of his reaction to her deception.
“Ezekiel is a master of manipulation. He’s a daemon. That’s what daemons do. When you found me in the desert and revealed your identity, I thought it couldn’t be a coincidence,” Lily confessed. “I thought I’d run away from the palace to fulfill my mother’s wishes. But he let me go.”
“He knew I’d fail to find the wings alone. And he wanted to keep tabs on my progress,” Michael guessed. But did he guess there was more to Ezekiel’s plan? She felt like a medieval princess offered up as a bride with no thought to her own desires.
“Yes. He used me. The affinity makes me useful. Just as it made my father useful,” Lily said. Her eyes filled, but she didn’t let the moisture fall. She had never been anything but a means to an end to Ezekiel. She knew that now. She’d risked her life to help him by sealing the sipapu portals that had worried her mother. She’d done it because she loved her mother. But her love for her guardian had been a factor, too.
“And just as my mother was useful and her mother before her,” Michael said. He let go of her arm and lifted his hand to brush the loosening strands of hair back from her face. Again, she closed her eyes against her reaction to his touch and then opened them so she wouldn’t miss what might come next. He toyed with strands of hair as he observed her. The quickened rise and fall of her chest. The tip of her tongue moistening her lips. He was as watchful as she was. They both explored the truth and the possibilities held in the next moment and the next.
Because one truth that went unspoken was suffusing them in an almost visible glow. Lily licked her lips. They’d gone dry from Michael’s Brimstone heat. He was barely tamping it down; in the palace they were buffered from Rogue detection.
“I understand daemon games, Lily. Even if I usually refuse to acknowledge that half of my heritage,” Michael said.
He was looking at her lips again. His attention drawn by the movement of her tongue.
“Usually?” Lily asked.
“I’m standing in hell. I’m holding you. My blood is on fire. There’s no way I can ignore who I am when I’m with you in this way,” Michael confessed. This time he closed his eyes. For a long time he stood with his chin tilted up and his lips pursed in thought. Someone without affinity might have thought he was fighting the burn or working up the self-control to back away.
A cool flood of adrenaline rushed up Lily’s spine. Gooseflesh rose on her skin. She gasped and then wondered that the adrenaline didn’t cause steam when it met with Michael’s burn.
Because he was savoring, not resisting.
He was fully enjoying the call of her affinity and his Brimstone response, here, where they were sheltered and fully free to burn.
When his eyes opened, the hazel was consumed. Fire had claimed his pupils as it had claimed his body. Lily reached for his arms because her knees had gone weak. She was surprised when blisters didn’t rise on her fingers. The heat from Michael’s skin was glorious. Her affinity wouldn’t allow her to be afraid. She was as drawn to him as he was to her.
“I’m sorry if you’re caught in the webs Ezekiel weaves. I’ve spent my life caught as well. But when you and I are together this aura burns everything else away. I don’t care about heaven or hell,” Michael said. He pressed his body fully against hers, and the wall helped to hold her for the kiss that came seconds later. She was able to let go of his arms and bury her fingers in the waves of his mussed hair. She fisted handfuls and he groaned against her lips in response.
Michael would never need to mourn the loss of the sun. He was the sun. Fiery and blazing bright. She’d spent a lifetime in a purple haze of darkness, but the man who devoured her mouth burned those memories away. His sculpted lips were a pure sensory pleasure to trace with her tongue. His gasps of reaction were as delicious as his salty skin. And when their tongues met and twined, the rough, slick slide made her melt in intimate ways her imagination understood even though her experience was lacking.
/> He moved his hands from her face and neck down to her waist. He molded her against him, and the thin silk of her dress was hardly a barrier to the muscled expanse of his bare chest, hard abs and even harder arousal that pressed against her stomach. A wild aching hollow seemed to open in response to his erection. One that demanded to be filled.
Lily allowed her hands to fall from his hair to his shoulders. She wrapped her arms around him and he responded by dropping his hands to her hips and lifting her up. Her skirt was hiked by his movements and her legs were slightly freed. Enough to wrap around his lean waist and settle her heat against him. She rode his erection now. Its pulsating length, though contained in his jeans, was cupped by the hollow between her legs.
His head fell back and their mouths parted. They were both breathing heavily and oxygen was necessary, but Lily still moaned in protest.
“Damned if I can bring myself to care where you come from or who raised you,” Michael said.
Hell was filled with the damned. The palace walls and ceilings were carved with hundreds upon hundreds of faces and figures—men, women, human and Rogue—who were trapped because they weren’t welcome in heaven or into Oblivion. Only Lily’s rooms were free of the damned.
Or they had been until now.
Only giving in to this burn didn’t feel like damnation. That would come later when they were forced to part.
She and Michael might both regret succumbing to the fires that raged between them. Because they were going to succumb. There was no turning back now.
Michael held her and slowly walked toward the bed he’d been lying on before. She leaned down, but didn’t kiss him. She met his gaze instead. She searched the flames and saw a reflection of herself in their depths.
“Ezekiel doesn’t matter. This is for us. Whatever pleasure. Whatever pain. It’s ours to fan and face,” Lily whispered. Then she leaned to brush her lips against his. Once, twice, before he fell back on the bed, taking her with him.
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