Archangel’s Ascension (The Guild Hunter Series)

Aodhan had steeled himself for disappointment for this very reason, but the confirmation hit like a blow nonetheless.

“I recall the general timbre of the messages,” the other man added before Aodhan could respond. “She called Marco her beloved, and said she intended to be with him for eternity. Generic inanities. Not an original thought in the bunch.”

“Did she ever threaten Tanika?”

Navarro paused for a long moment, his wings held with warrior motionlessness—an act so innate that even an injury couldn’t halt it. “I recall only two mentions of Marco’s young woman. The first was contemptuous. She said she understood he needed a blood donor and that things might go too far during a feed, but to never get emotionally attached to his food.”

A tic in his jaw, Navarro began to walk again. “Marco was angry. He never wanted Tani—that’s what he called her—to feel like she was only a blood donor, and would often drink bottled blood so their every date wasn’t about him feeding on her. From what he said of her, I don’t believe she minded but it was important to him.

“Now, the second note…it held more vitriol—and I did put one of my senior staff onto tracing that one because it struck me as crossing a line, but she had no success even though she’s my best tracker. There was simply no trail to follow—the letter was hand-delivered by being dropped onto the drive during a high-traffic time in the sky. And I have none of the recording eyes of mortals.”

Whatever Navarro might believe, it appeared to Aodhan that he’d done all he could to get to the bottom of what had, to that point, appeared a disturbing but not dangerous infatuation. “What did it say?”

“It was written in a jagged script, the fountain pen pushed so hard that it had broken through the thick parchment in places. She referred to Tani as a ‘blood whore’ who should know her place, and intimated that if she didn’t, it wouldn’t end well for her. That was where the writer betrayed herself another way, too—she said, to the best of my memory: ‘I am the caliber of woman you should call lover.’ Until then, we had suspected but hadn’t categorically known the gender of this person.”

Navarro’s boot landed on a fallen branch, the crunch loud in the greenery-draped landscape. “That is the last contact of which I’m aware, and it came some month and a half before the drums of war began to sound. I believed the writer had flounced off.”

Pain scored his features. “When Marco’s and Tani’s remains were found at the shop, I believed he’d met her there after she missed the evacuation, that it was a temporary shelter while he worked out how to get her away from the fighting.”

Turning, he faced Aodhan. “It still doesn’t make sense to me, the obsessed one murdering Marco, too. I would’ve expected her to take the chance to abduct him—no one would’ve known of it, Marco listed as missing in war.”

A horrific scenario. A victim so cagily trapped that people didn’t even know they were alive. Rescue would never come. Once, that would’ve made Aodhan’s gut churn, his nightmares claw awake.

Today, it just intensified his rage.

“Something went wrong,” Illium said when they met up that night on the Tower roof, the area swathed in shadows while New York fell away around them in a glittering carpet.

None of them had had any luck with the gloves, so they focused on what Navarro had told Aodhan. “I think he’s right,” Illium added. “Abduction was likely the point, Tanika’s the only planned death.”

“The perfect crime.” Aodhan flared his wings, only to snap them closed with a hard movement. “Except as I knew you would look, Raphael would look, Naasir and Galen, Dmitri and Jason would look, we both know Giulia would’ve looked. She would’ve dug and dug and dug.”

Illium found a primal joy in Aodhan’s rage. He knew that psychic wounds such as those Aodhan had experienced never truly disappeared, but he also understood that scars could form over them, that the wound could age until it was a faint echo rather than a throbbing pulse.

It was Keir who’d told him that many months after Aodhan’s rescue, when he’d still been in the Medica healing from his physical injuries. “His heart is cut and bleeding. But as his physical injuries will eventually scab over, then heal, so will the wounds to his spirit. Their timeline, however, is far slower—and where immortal skin is rare to scar, even we cannot escape scars to the spirit.”

Keir had run his hands through Illium’s hair as he sat slumped on a large stone, the cold winter wind at his back. “I would not say so for all angels, but Aodhan? Your friend has an inner sun that powers him, a spirit unlike any I have ever seen. Even more, he has his heart’s mirror to reflect that light back to him, further intensifying its strength.”

More gentle strokes, a warmth coming from him that had nothing to do with heat. “He will come back to us, Illium. This I believe with everything I am.”

You were right, Keir, he thought this beautiful New York night, his heart so full, it ached.

Out loud, he said, “Yes. Giulia would’ve searched and searched until she found an explanation for her son’s disappearance.”

“The angel miscalculated in more ways than one.” Aodhan clenched his hands on the roof edge on which they sat. “Does Venom still have that punching bag in the basement?”

“Feeling murderous, are you?” Illium’s blood ran hot. “How about we strip off and spar?”

Aodhan shot him an assessing look. “No, you’re still too thin.”

“The insult!” Shifting, Illium poked him in the chest. “I can take you any day of the week, Sparkle-pants.”

“Sparkle-pants?” Narrowed eyes glinting, Aodhan rose to his feet and strode to the center of the roof. “Now I’m mad.” He put his hands to the bottom of his tunic to pull it off and throw it aside.

Illium’s heart thudded as he followed Aodhan up. “Oh, look how scared I am.” Grinning, he stripped off his own top, then they both got rid of their boots and socks and began to circle each other. “That the best you can do? Cassandra’s grandmother could move faster.”

“The roof is a very hard surface,” Aodhan murmured, the muscles of his shoulders glinting under the faint moonlight that diffused in through the puffy night clouds. “Sure you can handle it, my little blue flower?”

His gut clenched at the roughness in Aodhan’s tone, the way his eyes moved over Illium. “Oh, we’re trash-talking now, are we?”

“I do believe you started it.” Aodhan moved in a blur of speed that had Illium hitting the rooftop hard on his back before he rolled up and away with the bounce of a honed warrior—and retaliated with a kick.

Anyone watching them would’ve thought they were in a fight to the death. And there were people watching by now, their movements having caught the eye of passing angels. What those angels didn’t see in the darkness was the flashing grin on Illium’s face, or the equally amused and infuriated mental muttering from Aodhan.

If you dare use “Sparkle-pants” in public, I will release a painting of you dressed in a romper and ruffled shirt such as the ones some mothers inflict on their angelic toddlers.

I could pull it off.

That got him a growl. Which honestly, was ridiculously hot coming from his contained lover. This is the only time I wish I were an archangel.

A rapid-fire exchange of blows and kicks that turned them into a diamond-blue blur.

Aodhan’s chest was heaving when they faced each other again, as was Illium’s. Why?

So I had glamour and could turn us invisible. Then we could take this dance to the sky. His body throbbed, blood molten at the idea of tangling wings and limbs with Aodhan high up above the earthbound starlight of the city.

Aodhan managed to capture him in a hug-like grip as he said, I hear there are blind spots all over the place. Somehow, the satellites never quite get any images in those areas at relevant times. His breath was hot against Illium’s ear, his body slick with a faint layer of perspiration.

It took serious effort—mostly because he’d rather lick Adi up—for Illium to twist out and away. I had to do something when surveillance cameras and satellites that could capture images in high definition became a thing.

Angelkind had thought about banning the technology, with a strong push from the older sector of angels, but the Cadre had decided it was useful to them, too—as long as it was in their control. The leash of that control might be long, but it was still a leash. My team wouldn’t hear the end of it otherwise.

They’d worked it so certain remote areas went “dark” on an unpredictable basis—unpredictable to outsiders and anyone looking to exploit a security hole, that is. All senior Tower angels knew where to get the list of the planned blackouts.

The juniors had to get creative, or wait until they were in the safe zone of the Refuge. Such was life when you were a young angel with amorous intentions. The oceans are still safe. Not much pinpointed on vast swathes of open water.

Conversation stopped as they came into contact again, both of them flying into kicks at high speed, which were, unbeknownst to their growing audience, part of a routine they’d practiced as youths until they could pull it off at an insane velocity.

Silence surrounded them when they landed on their feet on opposite sides, each focused grim-eyed on the other. Only Illium was close enough to spot the amusement in Aodhan’s eyes.

Have you ever had to do cleanup after a couple in the throes didn’t check for technological watchers, and got caught?

Illium groaned inwardly. Let’s not go there. There’s a reason there are so many mortal artworks that show angels “falling in agony” from the sky. For some reason, mortal minds seemed to have trouble computing that angelkind might be up to more illicit things in the air, but at least it made life easier when dealing with the inevitable slipups.

Also, forget about a couple, he muttered. One day I’ll tell you about a quartet that decided to get creative. If I have gray hairs, it’s because of those four—even I learned things when the images first showed up on our monitoring system.noveldrama

Aodhan’s shoulders shook…but he blocked Illium’s next strike with a superb show of brute strength that made Illium’s cock throb in ways that had nothing to do with combat…at least not this kind of combat.

Will you two stop pretending you’re fighting to the death? came a dark voice in their heads. I’ve fielded at least five panicked reports so far and I am not in the fucking mood.

Yes, Dark Overlord, Illium replied to Dmitri.

Aodhan, please kill him so I can enjoy a moment of peace.

Eyes squeezed shut, Aodhan was clearly fighting not to laugh. Consider it done. He opened those eyes of shattered glass. “Truce, my little blue flower?” he asked in a voice so quiet, it barely reached Illium.

“Truce, my pretty Sparkle-pants,” Illium replied in as low a volume before they separated and bowed to each other in the way of warriors formally ending a sparring session. It seemed necessary in light of those panicked reports.

When they rose back up, then clasped forearms, the silent crowd began to clap and whoop at what had been, Illium knew, a display of skill they rarely got to witness. That kind of speed in angelic ground-sparring could be achieved only between two high-level warriors who’d been training together so long that they could predict each other’s moves to a hairbreadth.

Broken wing bones had never been a possibility.

After giving the others a good-natured bow that clearly delighted them, Aodhan snapped out his wings…and took off into the night sky in a seamless vertical ascent that turned him into a streak of starlight.

More than ready to be alone with his Adi, Illium took off after him.

No one else was fast enough to follow them, even had they tried.

Illium was the faster where he and Aodhan were concerned, but Aodhan was stronger, which meant he could brute-force things in a way Illium couldn’t as quickly—such as just powering through the headwind that hit them as they were striking out over the ocean.

Illium played with the currents instead, and ended up to Aodhan’s back left not long afterward. A tanker piled high with shipping containers erupted with tiny waving figures as they flew past at low altitude, so Illium circled back at an even lower altitude to “buzz” them.

He was close enough to hear their delighted shouts.

Rising again, he caught up to Aodhan with ease now that the wind had dropped. His heart thudded as he flew almost wingtip to wingtip with the other man. He had no idea what Aodhan was thinking, but given their playful midfight conversation…

His mouth dried up. Where are we going?

Angling his wings left, Aodhan turned toward the endless horizon. We’re just flying. A wicked glance. I am way too big a sparkling target to dance that dance anywhere but in the protected skies above the Refuge.

Illium found himself saying, I swear I’ll black out every single recording system in the entire region. Strange, inexplicable failure, so sorry.

Laughter in his mind, the Aodhan of yesterday a bright echo in the Aodhan of today. For this man, Illium would do anything. Even just fly wild and free…until they dove into the ocean far from land and from any oceangoing vessels.

It was under the waves that Aodhan took his face and kissed him with a raw passion that had him groaning and wrapping himself around his half-naked lover…as his wings created a glow around them that he ignored with every fiber of his being.

The Cascade was over, ascension no longer a possibility.

Their upper bodies collided, hard muscle to hard muscle, firm lips to firm lips, hands in hair and wings working to keep them under. Because angels could go without air much longer than mortals.

And this kiss…it was a kiss that spoke of a dance hundreds of years in the making.

They parted only when their lungs hurt from the lack of air, and even then, they lingered, looking at each other in the glowing blue-green of the ocean, the merest handspan of water between them.

When they erupted out of the waves, it was as a pair.

There could be no dance here, not without protections in place to shield an act Illium would not have visible to the world…but when they tumbled into bed together after drying off, they did so skin to skin.

Mea lux? Are you sure?

I changed inside today, Illium. I understood my power for the first time and it is a dividing line between past and present.

Illium had no more questions, not when he saw the determination in his lover’s eyes. From that point on, there was only them and this joyous moment in time.

Hot breath against the curve of a neck.

A callused hand skimming down a flank.

Fine strands of hair against a ridged abdomen.

Knowing caresses at the arches of wings held with precision.

Kisses raw and untamed as perspiration broke out over their bodies, arousal a pumping beat in the blood.

“You taste of salt and want.” Words that only amped up the need thick and humid in the air.

Gasps, tugs on hair, and the taut strength of one flipping the other, the chest of one pressed to the bed as his lover took control. Thighs thick with muscle pushed apart in a tussle that had no loser. Bodies rubbing together with a roughness that was natural for two warriors.

Wrists grasped. Demands made.

Laughter deep and intimate wrapped in love endless, kisses that were never enough…and wings that arched open until they became a feathered sky.