by Tessa Cole
I had to trade myself for Gideon. I had no doubt the archnephilim would go against his word and try to kill Gideon, but if I could get him free long enough to blast the brand, we could finish this.
The other guys, however, couldn’t come. The archnephilim had said to come alone and if they showed up, he’d kill them this time. I doubted Kol could fully recover all of his magical strength within the hour, especially if he wasn’t going to go out and replenish it, and while Marcus looked fine, I could still see a hint of tightness in his jaw that said he wasn’t completely healed. Even Jacob, while no longer physically hurt, looked exhausted. It was a miracle they were all alive, and I suspected that was exactly what the archnephilim had wanted.
I clenched my jaw to keep from saying something stupid. If Jacob even suspected I was going to face the archnephilim, he’d command me not to go, and with his claim on me strengthened, I wouldn’t be able to resist him.
Going alone was the only answer. It was the only way to protect them. Too many people had already died, and I wasn’t going to add the guys to the list.
That, and no matter what I wanted or how foolish it was, I couldn’t ignore the twisting need to save Gideon.
Chapter 19
“All right,” Marcus said, his voice low, dangerous, his gaze locked on me as if daring me to argue with him. “We call in backup and capture the archnephilim.”
Sadness crept into Jacob’s eyes. He offered me a bitter smile and a hint of mist curled around me. “You’ve got to accept the truth, Marcus.”
“My wolf is making that difficult,” Marcus growled.
“Then you should sit this out,” Kol said. “When we go out with the other team, stay here with Essie.”
Amiah turned to me, making the leather creak. “How strong is your bond with Gideon?”
“I don’t know. I know he’s alive.” But now that I thought about it, the electricity had shifted from a steady hum — kind of like the buzz, but at a gentler, lower vibration, and almost imperceptible against my grating buzz — to something more jagged, painful. He was in pain. Every fiber of my being knew it. The archnephilim might have said he’d let Gideon live, but he hadn’t said in what condition.
Panic seized my heart as the image of the archnephilim ripping off Zella’s wing flashed through me, making my throat burn with bile. I had to fight past my weakness and get to the archnephilim’s warehouse before the damage done to Gideon was irrevocable.
Except my dying still meant Gideon would die. And yet I couldn’t convince the need coming from the brand that my only plan was doomed, that it was impossible to save him.
“Can you sense anything else? His pain, his essence?” Amiah asked.
“I can’t feel his pain like it’s my own, but I know he’s in pain.” God, so much pain.
“We might be able to sustain him through Essie.” Amiah eased from the chair and knelt beside me. The glow in her eyes was feeble, allowing me to see her exhaustion. “Right now you’re weak, so the mating brand won’t let him use your essence. You might even be draining him.”
Marcus sat forward. “Amiah, don’t hurt yourself. Gideon is strong. He can last at least an hour, long enough for you to partially recover your magic before you heal her.”
Heal me? She was going to heal me? If she did, I’d be able to satisfy the compulsion from the brand and go ahead with my plan. And while Gideon could technically survive the archnephilim’s torture for an hour, if I didn’t show up, that would be all the time he’d get—
I forced a hint of a sob — I didn’t want to overdo it — and dropped my gaze to my hands. I didn’t want any of the guys to read my expression, for fear they’d be able to see the lie. “I don’t know if he can survive an hour.”
“Essie, he’s strong,” Kol said, brushing his hand across my shoulder, but not maintaining contact as if he wanted, but didn’t want, to touch me.
“But he was hurt when the archnephilim took him.” For all I knew, the archnephilim wasn’t doing anything to him and he was just bleeding out from all the holes in his body. His pain could be the emotional agony from seeing Zella murdered. And finding out he was mated with me.
“She’s low on blood and life essence. It’s not like I’m fixing broken bones again,” Amiah said, and she grabbed my hand.
I flinched, expecting the same agony from Amiah’s healing as before, but instead a tingling warmth swept up my arm, mingling with Gideon’s electric hum before spreading into my chest. I closed my eyes and let myself float on the sensation, wrapped in its warmth. There were no fears or worries, no heartache for Gideon’s loss or my own. There was just peace and heat… and my God damned buzz. I could have stayed there forever, but that wouldn’t save Gideon… not that I could actually save him… but I had to try.
Then the tingle vanished and Amiah sagged back onto her heels like she had when she’d healed Marcus, her eyes unfocused. My dizziness, exhaustion, and churning stomach were gone. Even the nasty, partially healed wound Jacob had gnawed into my arm was only a pale patch of pink over the top of the perfect golden swirls of Gideon’s delicate mating brand. The buzz, however, remained.
Marcus left the couch and helped Amiah back into the armchair. “You shouldn’t have done that,” he said to her.
She brushed her fingers along his jaw, trailing them through his stubble, the tender move speaking of a familiarity between them that went deeper than just physician and patient.
“I bought Gideon time,” she said. “Now go call in backup. He’s mated with a human. There’s a good chance he’ll survive her death and a certainty he’ll survive if she just goes insane.”
The muscles in Marcus’s jaw twitched and he shifted away from Amiah, closer to me.
“Is that true?” I asked her. Maybe Gideon could get out of this alive. Maybe only I had to be the archnephilim’s last victim. Which sucked, but was the best of a lot of horrible choices.
“I’ve successfully treated the angel half of a broken angel-human bond.”
“It wasn’t in any of the books I read in the archives downstairs.”
“Those books are older than the war,” Amiah said. “A lot of things happened during the war, along with at least one human marked with an angelic mating brand.”
Which meant there was hope. I had hope. I was half human. That had to be human enough to save him. Now I just needed to figure out how to get Gideon to blast light into my brand — since light magic was surprisingly rare among angels and I doubted there’d be another angel stationed here who could summon light. Would he even risk my life to do it? I was willing to do anything to save him. Was that because my human half wasn’t strong enough to withstand the compulsion from the brand or was that just what the brand did? If Gideon felt what I felt, there was a chance he wouldn’t be willing to kill me to stop the archnephilim. Better to not even go there. Kol had said there was a divine light ring in the armory. I needed to get my hands on that.
Yes, get the ring. That was a good plan. If I went soon, I might be able to catch Summer still doing inventory, so I wouldn’t have to figure out how to get past the fingerprint scanner on the door. I’d either have to lie to her or steal it when she wasn’t looking, but that was my best option. Then I’d go to the archnephilim. Sure, I could try to kill him from afar, but there was a risk he’d kill Gideon before the blast burned him up since I didn’t know how long it would take. I needed to get him to let Gideon go, just long enough to kill him.
My stomach churned with hope and fear, all while my mind cheered that I could free Gideon. I could free my mate.
But I had to get away from everyone first. I could say I wanted to go to my room — and replacing my nicotine patch would be awesome — but I suspected someone would go and keep an eye on me.
“Okay.” Amiah took in a deep breath and straightened. “Jacob, go into triage and grab a blood bag from the fridge, Kol, you need to eat.”
“Can you get it done in thirty minutes?” Jacob asked, heading into the triage area
and opening a small fridge under a stainless steel counter.
Kol shrugged. “I’m fine enough. I’d rather not leave you guys shorthanded.”
Amiah huffed. “You’re hardly fine. Every bit of magic you have is going to be diverted to healing your injuries and you know it. You’re going to be weaker, slower, and less nimble. That makes you a liability and not an asset.”
“She’s right.” Jacob pulled out a blood bag.
“Fine.” Kol stood and marched out the sliding glass door.
“Marcus, can you be on Essie duty?” Jacob asked. “I should call the head office and request backup.”
Shit. I wasn’t going to be able to slip away, let alone snatch the divine light ring if I had Marcus shadowing me.
And I still needed a reason to go to the basement.
“I… I’m going to continue looking through Michael’s research. Maybe there’s a way to control the archnephilim and limit casualties the next time we— you go up against him.”
“My phone call might take a bit,” Jacob said, “but I’ll join you when I’m done.”
“And I need to change clothes.” Marcus stood and tugged on his bloody T-shirt. “I’ll meet you down there.”
“Great.” Fantastic! If I hurried, I could grab the ring and get out of there before Marcus returned.
Marcus held out his hand to help me stand, the action fast, easy, as if it was instinct, and I took it with the same thoughtless ease. But his attention jumped from our joined hands up my arm to Gideon’s brand, and my chest squeezed. None of this was fair to Marcus. He’d said his wolf made it hard for him to stay away from me, but that he’d stayed away so I wouldn’t get caught up in the supernatural world. Now I was, couldn’t be his, and was probably going to die. All in a matter of days.
And above all that, I ached for Jacob to give me a command, and was terrified that Gideon would die.
“I’ll meet you down there,” I said, slipping my hand from his and pulling on my shirt.
This situation was impossible. No matter what I did I couldn’t win, so I had to focus on what I could do. Get the ring, go to the warehouse, and kill the archnephilim.
I strode out the sliding doors as fast as I could without looking like I was running, and hurried to the elevator and hit the down button. It dinged immediately, the door slid open, and I got inside and took it to the basement.
The large reading table was still covered in books, some half open, others with scraps of paper sticking out of them marking a spot Jacob wanted to return to. Had it really only been a few hours? Hell, it probably had barely been an hour. Most fights didn’t last long and the archnephilim had been ferocious in his attack.
The armory door was open and the light was on. Summer stood at a small standup desk just inside the door, staring at a computer screen.
“Any luck finding anything that can kill a wraith or an archangel?” I asked.
She jerked her thumb to a long narrow table in the center of the room. On it were two rings — not placed together — and an HK416 assault rifle beside three boxes of ammunition. “You tell me. We’ve got two divine light rings but only one that’s charged, and Gideon is the only angel in town able to summon divine light to put in the ring. And we have the rifle with ammunition enchanted to take down a greater demon, but I have no idea if that would work on a wraith since wraiths are insubstantial.”
I had no idea either. My education on demons from the advanced combat training involved those I’d most likely run into while walking the beat, and most of those could be taken down by a Taser on its highest setting — added special for supers — or a few of the department-issued enchanted bullets. But the highest Taser setting and the enchanted ammunition wouldn’t take down anything like a master vampire or an alpha were-anything. We’d also been told it wouldn’t affect the more powerful greater demons. I didn’t know where a wraith stood on the scale of a lesser demon with almost no magic and a greater demon with lots of magic.
I did know the ring would work. Just not in the way everyone thought it would.
“Not surprising,” Summer said, waving at the computer screen, “we have nothing in our inventory that can kill an archangel. The only weapon made to stop Michael and Rafael is with Gabriel in the Realm of Celestial Light, and no one has been able to contact him since he killed his brothers.”
“Well,” I said, trying to keep my tone even, “I’ll take the ring up to Jacob so he’s prepared for anything, and you keep looking.”
Summer stared at me, her eyes a little too wide. “You honestly think the archnephilim will attack again so soon?”
“We’re hurt and disorganized. That’s a serious advantage for him. I wouldn’t put it past him.” Save for the fact that I knew he was waiting for me to come to him. Which meant perhaps the fight had taken almost as much out of him as it had out of the guys. They’d gotten in some good strikes and by the end, his power over me had weakened enough that I could resist him. Maybe he was licking his wounds just like we were. Hopefully that meant I was guaranteed to kill him by blasting divine light into his brand.
“It’s the one closest to us,” Summer said, and she turned back to the computer screen.
“Thanks.” I picked up the ring. It was heavy and masculine, too big for any of my fingers, but would probably fit my thumb. Power radiated from it, crackling over my hand, so much like the electricity coming from Gideon’s brand. The compulsion to save him twisted inside me, my soul chanting, save him, save him, save him, and I turned to leave.
“The guys will get Gideon back to you,” she said, her voice soft, making me pause. “You should have told him about the brand.”
Jeez, did everyone know I hadn’t told Gideon that I was his fated mate? Of course, a mating brand was rare, and Gideon had been certain Zella had been his mate. With a workplace this small, I shouldn’t be surprised if everyone knew about Gideon’s brand. And yeah, the odds were good everyone also knew about my kiss with Marcus.
“Just keep looking,” I said, and hurried back to the elevator. If my plan didn’t work, the guys would need every advantage they had to stop the archnephilim.
I pressed the call button and shoved the ring in my pocket while I waited. I could have taken the stairs but they would have put me in the cafeteria with everyone cleaning up the mess from the fight.
Except each second waiting for the elevator felt like an eternity.
I had the means to save Gideon, to protect the guys, and to end this nightmare. I couldn’t make myself see the situation as a good thing, but I could keep telling myself this was the best of many horrible options. If I died with the archnephilim and Gideon survived, he’d never have to find out what I really was. I wouldn’t be imprisoned or sentenced to death or studied like a lab rat. I also wouldn’t completely break Marcus’s heart. He wouldn’t have to live seeing me being Gideon’s mate and not his. We wouldn’t have to figure out how to deal with or ignore the sizzling attraction between us, because I knew Marcus was like Kol. A friend didn’t get in the way of another friend’s relationship, apparently even if that relationship was forced on both parties.
The elevator door slid open, revealing Marcus leaning against the back wall. He’d changed into a clean T-shirt that pulled tight over his deliciously muscled chest and jeans that hugged his hips and thighs.
He raised his piercing green gaze to mine and my pulse stuttered. Even with Gideon’s brand fully formed, the attraction still burned between us. My heart raced and my breath came a little too fast just at the sight of him, while a hint of heat caressed my skin, telling me he felt the connection, too.
The door began to slide shut and we both jerked forward. Marcus caught it with his arm and it reopened, but now we stood so close his breath tickled my cheeks. If I took a deep breath, my breasts might brush his chest. God, how I wanted my breasts to brush his chest.
A hunger burned in his eyes and more warmth curled over and under my skin. I had to touch him, give in to the power between us, or I�
��d combust. But I couldn’t be his. I wasn’t going to survive past the next hour and that wasn’t fair to him.
He must have seen something in my eyes, because the heat of his desire chilled with a hint of fear.
“Essie.” He growled my name, tugging on something primal within me, and I leaned closer. Now barely a breath stood between us and I could feel the heat of his body, sense the power of his wolf, ferocious and passionate, curled tight within him.
I pressed my hand against his chest before I fully realized what I was doing, then jerked back when common sense kicked in a second later, but Marcus grabbed my wrist. The door started to shut, and he pulled me inside, turned, and backed me against the back of the elevator. He captured me with his body, his hands pressed to the wall on either side of me, and kissed me.
The kiss was soft, quick, tentative, as if Marcus was uncertain of his reception, but it sent a shudder sliding through me, making me moan with desire. Even just a brush of lips sent me trembling, aching for him.
I ran my fingers through his stubble, up into his hair, and pulled his lips back to me. He didn’t need any more of an invitation. Heat swept around me and he claimed my mouth with his. The ferocity of the kiss left me breathless. His tongue invaded me, fueled the fire of my desire for him, and sent me spiraling.
His hands pushed under my shirt, a sizzling shock of flesh against flesh. One hand slid around my back, securing me — which was good, my mind was spinning and I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to keep standing — and the other dipped into my sports bra and kneaded my breast. There wasn’t anything delicate or slow or drawn out about it. This was ferocious, pent-up desire, released without control, and it made my blood sing, made me crave all of him. And it had nothing to do with being unsatisfied after Jacob’s bite. It was all Marcus, all the desire between us that I thought was impossible, that I shouldn’t be feeling, that I wanted to lose myself in.
He shoved my shirt and bra up, the heat of his desire building around me, and dropped his mouth to my breast, sucking my nipple into a tight bud and drawing a gasp. His hand that had been on my breast swept under the waistband of both my cargo pants and underwear. He found my slick heat, and plunged two fingers inside of me, sending a shock of pleasure zinging through me.