Her Fallen Protector

by Nichole Severn

  “Your army?” He pushed himself closer. Uncertainty bubbled deep within, but not even the wall of heat she emanated would keep him from her. Pain registered, his senses overwhelmed by the inferno threatening to char him alive. Streetlight from the mouth of the alley glinted off the gold band on her hand and his stomach twisted hard. The Deceiver hadn’t taken the bait. How long would it take him to find the Seal? Not long, according to the tremors under his feet.

  “Yes.” She closed her eyes and tipped her head back. Her chest rose on a slow inhale. In a single heartbeat, the hallucination disappeared, not abruptly, but sinking into her pores as if she’d absorbed it whole.

  “No!” Pain be damned. He closed the distance between them and clamped down on her arms.

  With a single swing, she dislodged his grip and shoved him against the nearest building. The impact knocked the breath from his lungs and his knees gave out. Specks of dust rained down onto his shoulders. The playfulness in her dark gaze spread to her mouth. He’d been too late. “Vdarra—”

  “Why do you keep calling me that, Archangel? Don’t you recognize me?” She tilted her head, studied him as a praying mantis studies her mate before she devours him. Strands of her auburn hair turned black before his eyes, but not from the heat coming off her in waves. “I recognize you, but you’ve changed. You’re no longer sworn to the Father. You’ve fallen. His most trusted has seen the light. Or should I say the dark?”

  The sound of her voice, the intelligence in her now-black gaze, and the lethal sway of her hips revealed exactly what the Deceiver had done to his own daughter. Hope and devastation exploded simultaneously within. He couldn’t stand. “Duemos.”

  Despite the reverence coating her name, his voice shook. He’d longed to see her again, hear her voice, touch her skin, but his vow to prevent her ascension pulled a moan from his throat. “Is it really you?”

  She stepped forward. The unseen wall of heat pressed against him in a hot, demanding thrust. Her perfect features warped, narrowed her eyes. “What’s happened to you, warrior? The last time we met, you vowed to strip me of my inheritance and keep my head as a trophy, but you come here unarmed and with no power. What’s stopping me from killing you now?”

  Anguished, he swallowed hard, tried to bury the pain. All these years he’d wondered—prayed—what it’d be like to have her back. What for? Just as Vdarra had lost her memory, Duemos didn’t know him. “You don’t remember.”

  “How to kill you? Sure I do.”

  He leveraged his weight into his heels and stood. The brick wall scraped his back as he straightened. The plea in his voice didn’t exhibit a fraction of the storm inside. He’d wasted the last ten years for nothing. “You saved my life. The Deceiver put a price on your head because you let me live.”

  The playfulness disappeared from her expression. “And here I thought you couldn’t lie. It’s a sin, isn’t it? My, how the mighty have fallen.”

  “I came to you on the beach in Greece to find out why, and you begged for my help. We fell in love—”

  “No!” Her hands shot out against his chest. The contact forced him back into the wall a second time, but her defensive heat simmered to a low burn. She gripped the collar of his T-shirt with both hands, pinning his ribcage with her elbows. “Who are you? Did my father send you to test me? Well, you can go straight back to Hell. I don’t answer to you.”

  He’d never have her back. Not the way he remembered. Failure settled like a rock at the base of his throat. It wouldn’t budge, no matter how many times he swallowed. He should’ve saved her. Should have left her alone in Rio to live free of the Afterlife. Now, the deep brown eyes he’d fallen in love with had been overtaken by darkness and he ached to have the warmth back. Have Vdarra back.

  “Vdarra, I know you’re in there.” He ran the pad of his thumb along her jaw and her breath hitched. “Take control. If you don’t, your father will come back for you. He’ll use you to destroy the world just like he tried before. You didn’t want that. You still don’t.”

  “Stop calling me that.” Her head twitched as if she’d heard something he hadn’t. Jaw tight, she jerked her head away from his touch. Her grip on his collar faltered, but a split second later fastened tight. “Get out of my head. You don’t know me.”

  “Yes, I do. I know your thoughts. I know every inch of your body. I know you better than you know yourself. And I can prove it.” He crushed her against him in anticipation of resurrecting the connection that’d broken his heart and pulled her lips to his.

  Every muscle in her body locked—fought him—but he couldn’t will his hands to let her go. The seams at his collar ripped and he dug his fingertips into her hips to hold her in place. It had to work. He had to have her back.

  The fire burning beneath her skin cooled as silky lips relaxed under his, their warmth heating him from the inside out. A small groan escaped her throat and she shuddered beneath his hands. Tension drained from her shoulders, transformed her from the hardened warrior he’d lost into the woman he’d found. He swept his tongue inside her mouth, tasted citrus and warmth. Tasted Vdarra.

  She broke the kiss and stepped back, mouth open, frozen mid-step. Her dark gaze lightened to the brown he’d prayed he’d see again, but the damage to her hair had already been done.

  “Jacob? How did you…how did I…?” She studied the alleyway and her hand flew to the dried blood staining her creamy skin. “No, no, no, no. It was real. He injected me with that stuff and—”

  “It’s okay. Nothing happened. The test didn’t work.” He brought her against his chest—where she belonged—and traced his fingertips through her straight, now blackened locks. She interlocked her hands around his waist and he exhaled in a rush. The dark eyes that didn’t remember him stared him down from the back of his mind. Given the chance, Duemos would take control again and bury the woman she’d become over the last ten years. His throat constricted. He pressed his nose into the crown of her head, committing her scent to memory. No way in hell. “You just passed out.”

  “So you were kissing me as I was unconscious?” The smile in her voice relieved the pressure building in his chest.

  “You know me, always the one to make things weird between us.” His shoulders shook with a laugh. “Come on. Let’s get you home.”

  The Deceiver’s second attempt to turn his daughter had failed. Now only the Father knew when the bastard would try again.

  …

  A dark presence loomed in the back of her mind, almost like a dream, but she couldn’t get to it with the migraine threatening to split her head down the middle. The light streaming through her bedroom window burned her retinas. She pressed a pillow over her face, taking in the slight scent of her lemon-scented shower gel on the fabric.

  She bolted upright.

  Her bedroom looked just as she’d left it; white walls, little decoration, and dirty clothes piled in the corner. The past day flashed in her mind in a quick, agonizing jolt. She’d been kidnapped, seen monsters. She pulled down the front of her tank top to the spot where her father had thrust a giant needle into her chest. Flawless white skin. No scarring, no scab, or any indication she’d been stabbed in the heart. No bite mark across her shoulder from Isabel either. Just a dream. She rubbed her eyes with her palms and exhaled hard. Lightning streaks and blurred spots of white crossed her vision from the pressure. A small, hysterical chuckle built in her throat. “It didn’t happen. None of it happened.”

  Her body tingled.

  “I wish that was true.”

  She tensed, then forced her hands away from her face.

  Jacob stood in the doorway, arms crossed. She shuddered as he assessed her from her head to the pile of sheets at her waist.

  “No.” She swung her feet over the side of the bed and stood. “You don’t exist. None of that happened. Rio, being kidnapped, your brownstone, the bank. It was all a dream. How else would I be here, in my apartment?”

  With attention fixed on her, he uncrossed his arms
and stepped toward her. When she didn’t move, he dared another step. The warmth radiating off him urged her to meet him in the middle, but she forced herself to remain in place. Despite being in a dream, she needed him to come to her, to prove himself. She didn’t know why. Something to do with a sword and fire.

  “I brought you home. You needed to rest after what he did to you, and I thought familiar territory would be the best place for you to recover. Mentally and physically.”

  “What who did?” Clouded memories bubbled inside her like boiling water, but the truth ringing in his tone severed her ignorance almost instantly. She shook her head. “It really happened. He… he injected me with that silver liquid. That’s the last thing I remember. And you— How do you know where I live?”

  His expression softened. “Would you believe the phone book?”

  “Oh. But didn’t you say the safest place was your brownstone?”

  “I’ve added a few security measures here to warn me if your father or Isabel come within a half a block of this apartment. I thought you might be more comfortable with your own things.”

  “Ugh. My head is pounding.” She couldn’t afford to lose her head, not when the man claiming to be her father was still out there. She licked her too dry lips. “What happens now? How do we get away from this?”

  Real sorrow clouded his gaze and her heart lurched. “I don’t know.”

  “They killed those guards at the bank. Innocent people. What kinds of animals do something like that?” Nausea flooded her stomach as the image of Isabel standing over those guards—a man and a woman—forced her over the wastebasket beside her bed. She swallowed back a sob, but only deep gulps of air settled her stomach.

  His presence warmed her from behind, from the outside in, and she straightened to lean against him for support. How was it possible just a simple gesture from him could chase her demons away?

  Well, not all of them.

  She turned into his chest and closed her eyes. The rhythmic beat of his heart synced with hers. He wrapped his arms around her, his earthy scent delving deep into her lungs, filling her. “We have to fix this. We can’t let any more people die.”

  “And we will, but in order to do that, we have to find the Seal.”

  The apartment’s air conditioner kicked on, chilling her in the skimpy tank top and undershorts. An outfit he must’ve put her in. Jacob’s heat at her front tantalized her senses, but goose bumps rose along her spine and the back of her legs.

  He felt so good, and his touch in Rio flooded her mind. Her gut clenched in warning, but a piece of her stirred in response. The thought of that explosive night made her skin flush hot. What she wouldn’t give to forget the world outside for just a little while longer. With him pressed against her. Inside her again.

  And have him leave all over again?

  No. She shifted her weight back—distancing herself—and stared up at him. She fought the urge to run her hands along his jaw and experience him all over again. “They’re looking for this ring that supposedly controls an army. How do we find it?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Jacob?” She followed his line of sight, and glanced down. Her nipples had peaked in the cool air. Combined with the feel of his body against hers, she’d given him quite a show. She snapped her fingers. “Eyes up here. Plan. Remember? We need a plan.”

  He met her gaze, but the glow of desire lingered in the emerald orbs. Stretching toward her, he gripped her hips, his fingertips digging into her as he brought her against him. “If you don’t mind, I’ve spent enough time separated from you. I’d rather not keep so much distance between us.”

  His voice rumbled, vibrated down to her core. The combination of pleasure and pain rocketed her heart rate higher. The sense of right, of belonging, filled her chest. How could she share so much connection with a man she’d barely known three days?

  Soul mates.

  God, did she really believe that? That out of every time period and every man on the planet since Adam, he’d been destined for her? Maybe their atoms just happened to be near each other when the universe was created and no amount of time or distance could render inert that desperation to reconnect. She sure as hell felt invisibly linked to him, just like an atom used energy to form bonds with other atoms. “Okay.”

  “Good. The Seal of Solomon is the key to releasing the army of imprisoned demons sworn to the Heiress of the Underworld. With the army at his command, the Deceiver plans to take over the earth and eventually storm heaven, killing everyone in his path.”

  “So those things in the bank”—she wrapped one hand in his as she sat on the edge of the bed, her mind barely capable of processing what hid under Isabel and Damien’s skin—“there’s an entire army of them?”

  “Yes. What you witnessed in the bank was a fiend’s true form. The Deceiver has many servants, mostly low-level minions, not powerful enough to do more than manipulate a human, but the Army of Duemos is made up of Archdemons. The strongest of all demons aside from the Deceiver himself.”

  The warmth from his hand failed to quell the chill bolting down her back, although she gripped him a bit tighter anyway. Duemos. “The Army of Duemos?”

  “Yes.” His eyes darkened. “You know the name?”

  “If it’s my memories you’re looking for, you’re out of luck. My father—that man—he called me Duemos when he took me. They think I’m the leader of their army.” She rubbed her free hand against her eyelids again. The room had suddenly grown too hot. “I need some air.”

  He stopped her before she could pull away. If he wasn’t careful, those atomic bonds they’d inexplicably forged would explode on a nuclear level. “You can’t leave the apartment. I’ve placed protection runes along the doors and windows to keep them out, but if you go outside or even open a window, Isabel and your father will find you. And I won’t lose you again.”

  Fire. Wings. A sword. Those eyes. The same intensity of sorrow clouded them now as it had then. She’d burned from the inside with that memory at the front of her mind. That broad chest once supported a hundred pounds of armor. Those hands had wielded a mace and a broadsword. He’d been a warrior. Strong, commanding. Hers.

  Until he’d run a sword through her chest.

  “We’re not married, are we?”

  The lines around his mouth softened. His shoulders rose slowly. He reached for her, but hesitated. Was he unsure she could handle it? “Not in this life. We never needed a piece of paper telling us we were mates. We lived it.”

  “Mates?”

  “Mortals refer to our connection as true love. In the Afterlife, we’re known as mates, bonded forever physically and spiritually.”

  Like atoms. Once those bonds had been made, it was nearly impossible to destroy them. But something had ripped him from her life. “I understand why you couldn’t come forward until a few days ago. You didn’t want to risk Isabel and Damien finding me. But if we were so in love with each other, how did I end up in the Atlantic alone? What happened between you and me?”

  The creases around his eyes deepened; his hands fisted at his sides. He stared at the carpet. Frozen. Silent.

  Her heart skipped a beat, but she couldn’t turn back now. She had to know if history was doomed to repeat itself. “Please, just tell me. Were we really so bad together?”

  “You were my entire world, the reason I’m here.” His rough exhale brushed against her collarbones and neck. Light sprang back into his eyes, but not the kind she’d expected. Defeat. Nothing else described the darkness flooding his expression. “But we knew if anyone discovered our relationship, your father would have you killed.”

  “Why?”

  “Because pairings between angels and demons are illegal in the Afterlife. The Deceiver wouldn’t tolerate his own daughter fraternizing with the enemy. She was supposed to kill Archangels and bring down the Father’s order. Not defect. Not fall in love with one of them.”

  A sick knot twisted in her gut.

  “That day
you ended up in the ocean, the Deceiver found out about our relationship. I still don’t know how.” His full attention centered on her, threatened to upend her entire world all over again. “You made the choice to die—to save my life—and promised we’d be together again. And the Heiress to the Underworld always kept her promises.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Truth resonated down into her bones, but Vdarra couldn’t force her head to acknowledge it. “I’m not like them. I’ve never hurt anyone in my life. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I can’t be—”

  She swallowed hard. Her head spun. So hard to breathe. The vision—no, memory—she’d relived over and over since the injection inflamed her defenses. She stepped out of his reach. Kept going. Distance. His earthy scent, his penetrating gaze, sizzling touch—they all fogged her brain. “The sword. The burning forest. I didn’t choose to die. You stabbed me.”

  “Vdarra.” He followed her retreat.

  “Don’t. I can’t…” The hard edge of her dresser bit into her back. The spread of pain kept her head straight, but she couldn’t get control. “I’m not a demon. I’m not.”

  Who was she trying to convince? Him or herself?

  He frowned. “I tried to change your mind, but you made me promise before I knew what you wanted from me. I’d have given you anything. I never expected you to sacrifice yourself to save me.”

  As if another person resided inside her, the pressure in the back of her head exploded.

  “He knows, Israel. I can’t stay long. I barely escaped this time.”

  “Impossible. We’ve been too careful.” He stroked a strand of her black hair behind one ear. The wind rustled through the forest, ruffling her clothing. “These are times of war, my love. Your paranoia is merely enhanced because your training demands it.”

  “This is different.” She searched the surrounding trees, the weight of thousands of eyes suffocating her. Israel’s hand on her jaw forced her to meet his gaze.