“You are mine, Elena. If you choose to sleep in another bed, I will simply pick you up and bring you home.”
“What would you like to call me?"
That made her pause. "Husband" was too human, "partner" factually wrong for a being as powerful as an archangel, "mate"...perhaps. But none of it was quite right. "Mine," she said at last.
He blinked and when he raised his lashes again, the blue was liquid fire. Yes, that will do. "But for public consumption, you are my consort."
"Consort," she murmured, tasting the word, feeling it's shape. "Yes, that fits.”
“For the first time in forever, he was stunned to silence. Not by her words, but by the tenderness in her hands, the worry in her eyes. He was an archangel. He’d been wounded far, far worse and shrugged it off. But then, there had been no woman with sun kissed by the sunset and eyes of storm gray to tear into him for daring to get himself hurt.”
“He has a fascination with mortals.
Raphael had said that to her before she'd woken with wings of midnight and dawn.
"Why are you starting at me, Ellie?" Illium said without taking his eyes from the blade dancing around his fingers.
The words were instinctive, something she might as easily have said to rib Ransom. "You're so pretty, it's difficult to resist."
A flashing grin, a hint of that aristocratic English accent in his response. "It's hard to be me, it's true.
”
“Even as she spoke, silver blue flashed on her other side and then Illium was standing beside her, his wing touching Elena's in an intimacy that made Raphael raise an eyebrow. Illium's lips curved in a wicked smile that did little to hide the intensity of his emotions. I would not watch you die again, Sire. His veins stood out against his skin as he gripped the wrist of one hand with the other.
Raphael met those eyes of gold that had stood beside him for centuries. If I had done so, I would have gone knowing you would keep my heart safe.
Illium's gaze went to Elena. Always.”
“Ransom really looked at the other man for the first time, shook his head, stared again.“Holy hell, your eyes are like a fucking viper’s.”
Venom raised an eyebrow.“You have hair prettier than one of Astaad’s concubines.”
Ransom gave the vampire the finger.
Venom grinned.”
“A lot of women have trouble with their mothers-in-law.”
Raphael’s look was priceless. “My mother is an insane archangel.”
“Illium, his expression subdued as it had been for too many days, turned to her. “Mind if I have a go?”
“Kick his ass.”
Stripping off his shirt and boots, Illium held out his hand for one of Venom’s blades. Lips curving, Venom passed it over. “Sure you can handle me, pretty, pretty Bluebell?”
“Did I ever tell you about my snakeskin boots?” A savage grin, and she knew Venom was about to bear the brunt of whatever haunted the blue-winged angel.
Venom swirled his blade in hand. “I do think I need some new feathers for my pillow.”
“Elena.
Hush, let me talk to the crazy lady.”
“Raphael, tell him you won’t do anything to him if I get ‘damaged.’ ”
“That would be a lie, Elena. I would tear out his throat.”
“Illium, with his wings of silver-kissed blue and a face designed to seduce both males and females, not to mention his ability to do the most impossible acrobatics in the air, would provide a worthy diversion. The fact that he’d decided to ditch half his clothing was just icing on the cake.”
“Our memories make us... even the darkest of them all.”
“Do you know where Jason is?” she asked Dmitri when they exited the morgue. Dmitri pressed the car remote to unlock the flame red Ferrari parked in the employees-only lot. “Tired of your Bluebell already?” A tendril of champagne circled around her senses, cut with something far harder. Never had she felt that harsh edge in Dmitri’s scent. She pitied the woman he took to his bed today.
“Yeah, that’s it. I’m building a harem.”
“it seems Montgomery could not help himself when it came to this vase. I'm afraid he has a weakness for beautiful things and has been known to relocate an item if he feels it is not being accorded the proper appreciation. Once he 'relocated' an ancient sculpture from the home of another archangel.”
“Death holds no allure for me, Elena.” The power of him cut against his skin, a cold white fire. “Not when I have yet to sate my hunger for you.”
“I swear to God," she muttered, fighting a laugh, "if you've dusted me with blue, I'll tie your balls in a knot and hang you up by them on the nearest sharp object I see.”
“It was a white-collar crime.”
Illium gave her an odd look. “In the human world, such crimes are lightly punished, though they harm hundreds, leading some to choose death out of despair, while the man who beats a single person is considered the worse criminal.”
“Elena scowled -the day she let Dmitri give her orders was the day ice-skating became a regular activity in hell.”
“/Are you sane, Mother?/
Laughter in his mind, painful in its familiarity. /Is any immortal every truly sane?/”
“Tell me," she whispered.
And he, the archangel used to keeping a thousand secrets, told her.”
“To everyone who has ever dreamed of flying and to all of you who have flown with me.”
“But plants grow again," She murmured, focusing on the verdant beauty around her. "They put down new roots, create room for themselves in foreign soil.”
“understood who she was, understood that a small surrender didn’t equal a larger one.”
“Elena scowled—the day she let Dmitri give her orders was the day ice-skating became a regular activity in hell.”
“Trouble's not only my middle name, it's my first and last, too.”
“What is it like to be mortal?” Startled, she took a second to think, to consider. “Life is much more immediate. When you have a time limit, every moment gains an importance that an immortal will never know.”
“More, Elena.” It was a command, given in the tone she only ever heard in bed, sexual and demanding and, sometimes, without mercy. “Always with the orders,” she whispered,”
“Sure you can handle me, pretty, pretty Bluebell?"
"Did I ever tell you about my snakeskin boots?"
"I do think I need some new feathers for my pillow.”
“Sleep now a little while
Till within our dreams we wake
Unfolding our Forever
If only for Never’s sake
And take me to your ever after
Let’s hide behind our eyes
Together pour through that door
Where autumn never dies
And I’ll sift my sands to your side
Before we slip away
Before we’re little more than silt
Beneath the rocking waves
And side by side we’ll fight the tide
That sweeps in to take us down
And hand in hand we’ll both withstand
Even as we drown.”
“You could waste your whole life worrying, you know that?”
“That’s why love stories don’t have endings! They don’t have endings because love doesn’t end.”
“Richard, Bill has the socialist disease in its worst form; he thinks the world owes him a living. He told me sincerely - smugly! - that of course everyone was entitled to the best possible medical and hospital service - free of course, unlimited of course, and of course the government should pay for it.”
“The history of life is a story of massive removal followed by differentiation within a few surviving stocks, not the conventional tale of steadily increasing excellence, complexity, and diversity.”
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