Nemesis: Paranormal Angel Romance (Realm of Flame and Shadow Book 2)

by Christina Phillips

  This time he kissed her as if she was the reason for his existence.

  Open mouthed she drew him inside, delighting in the sensation of him invading and exploring. He was frenzied, plundering, as though he wanted to brand her for the world—the universe—to see.

  She slid her tongue against his and although she pushed against his dominance, she embraced it. His hand clamped the back of her head, holding her still, holding her close, and his teeth tore her lips and her blood bound them both.

  His body was a furnace and his heat scorched through her. It seemed he created a cocoon around her as the wind no longer chilled her back. Feverishly she lifted her hips, desperate to feel him inside her once again. The head of his cock nudged her sensitized clit and her choked moan echoed in her mind and vibrated through her blood.

  He swore inside her mouth. Something hot and foreign and unimaginably arousing. She didn’t need to understand the words to understand their meaning and she laughed without breaking lip-contact.

  “You’ll have to oversee the docking procedure this time.” She gripped his hair harder, tightened her thigh muscles and dug her nails into the side of his throat. “If I move, I might lose my balance.”

  The rush of the wind—or maybe it was the sound of his heavenly wings—thundered in her mind, a thrilling counterpoint to the erratic thud of her heart. A rumble of laughter shook his body, sending ripples of raw need spiraling over her skin. Their bodies meshed, her breasts crushed against his chest, and then he roughly hoisted her upwards.

  “Docking procedure initiated.” His words grazed her lips, as tantalizing and erotic as the feel of his cock teasing her. Laughter threaded through his words, an exhilarating aphrodisiac. “Request permission to enter.”

  A groan of frustration tore from her throat. “Granted.”

  And then, in case he had any more twisted ideas about prolonging her torture, she released her death grip around his neck and sank onto his rigid shaft.

  So good. So right. For a lingering moment she savored the sensation of being impaled, filled, possessed. Her hands gripped his shoulders, but it was pure reflex. She knew she was safe. Knew he would never let her fall.

  But she clung onto his shoulders, and every powerful flex and contraction of his muscles sent delicious thrills tingling along her flesh. The incredible, magical colors of his feathers filled her vision, a heavenly visage haloed with sunlight. How could he be a harbinger of death? He was her Archangel of life, of light. The Archangel who had shown her the meaning of love.

  His breath rasped against her mouth and his hands palmed her butt, crushing her against his hard body. With every sweep of his wings the friction increased as he shoved her down his erection, and then dragged her up again.

  “Gods, Rowan.” The words were jagged. His eyes were a breathtaking glitter of black and gold and she nipped his lip, savoring his taste, a wordless encouragement. He gave a strangled groan in the back of his throat. “You push me to my limits. Every time.”

  “Yes.” She uncurled her fingers from his shoulders. “Every time, Azrael.”

  She slowly raised her arms from the security of his strong body and flattened her palms against the living panorama of his wingspan. Her life was in his hands. And his wings were in hers.

  Awe collided with lust and love and desire, became one and became everything. His grip around her tightened and a hint of madness glinted in his eyes. And then, without warning, he teleported, the sensation disorienting her as it had when they’d returned from Nico’s.

  She clung onto his biceps as her mind scrambled to adjust. Azrael was still flying, but it was no longer midday. The sky was a delicate shade of pink and as he turned, she saw the breathtaking sight as dawn broke on the far horizon of a peach-tinted ocean.

  “Beautiful.” The word was uneven, all she could manage. His thrusts became frenzied, slamming into her, and only his hands locking her in place stopped her from splintering across the heavens.

  “You.” He ground the word between his teeth, and she had to struggle to hear him, struggle to focus. “Are my dawn, Rowan.”

  His tortured confession shattered through her, as potent as if he’d laid bare his soul and said the words she knew he could never admit. I love you. Because, in a way she’d never imagined, he just had.

  She forgot about the beauty of the sunrise, forgot about their fragile future and her sordid past. Time ceased to exist. This magical moment that balanced night and day, darkness and light, encompassed her world. And his agonized roar of release as he filled her quivering body filled the aching chasm in her soul.

  With shaky hands she cupped his jaw and stroked her thumbs over his five o’clock shadow. Already night gave way to day, the pale yellow sky heralding that reality crouched just beyond the horizon. But right now, her reality didn’t matter.

  Nothing mattered but the archangel in her arms, who looked at her as if she was his salvation.

  Chapter 34

  Azrael

  Gabe yanked open the door of his farmhouse and squinted at him. “It’s one in the morning. This had better be good.”

  No, it wasn’t good, but Azrael knew damn well it would be of interest. That’s why he’d left Rowan sleeping and turned up on his friend’s doorstep. From his shirt pocket he pulled out the phial he’d taken from Rowan just days ago.

  “What do you make of this?” He held the phial up and its contents shimmered with tangible menace. Gabe stopped scowling and stared at the phial, disbelief clouding his eyes.

  “Is that—?” He didn’t need to finish. Because it was obvious he could feel the eerie pull of the Guardians’ Voids from where the swirling black contents originated.

  He shoved the phial back in his pocket and stepped into the hall. “The question is, what is a three-thousand-year-old vampire doing with it?”

  No need to tell Gabe about Rowan’s part in all this. She’d been an innocent pawn.

  He hadn’t meant to think of her. Not here, not now. But gods, it was hard not to, when she was constantly in his mind. As necessary to his survival as the air he breathed.

  “Sakarbaal? You’ve found him again?” Gabe pushed the door shut.

  “I’ve picked up his trail.”

  “How did you get hold of that phial?”

  “I acquired it from one of his operatives,” he said in a cool voice.

  Last summer, when he’d detected unprecedented disturbances on the astral planes, he’d traced them to Gabe. To the woman—to Aurora— that Gabe had rescued from the Guardians’ clutches. And Gabe had looked at him in the same way that Azrael was glaring at him right now.

  Say what you like to me. But leave my woman out of it.

  Azrael wasn’t human, was far from primitive and had no desire for a mate. Yet when it came to Rowan his instincts were nothing less than primal.

  Gabe appeared to realize he had no intention of elaborating on who this mysterious operative was. “Why are you here?”

  “Sakarbaal intended to target me with this stuff. How the hell would he get his hands on something that doesn’t exist outside of the Guardians’ Voids unless he’s in league with them?” No need to state the obvious—that Sakarbaal also appeared to know that archangels were vulnerable to the Guardians’ atmosphere. Why else would the vampire have intended it as a weapon?”

  “You should speak to Mephisto.”

  He hadn’t expected that response. Why would Mephisto, the biggest party whore in existence, be interested in something like this?

  “There must be a way of neutralizing the affects the Voids have on us. Aurora can analyze this sample in one of the research facilities you’re funding.” She could also analyze Rowan’s amber acid. He’d trust her findings above anything the vampires chose to tell him.

  “Mephisto,” Gabe said, ignoring his comment, “negotiates with the Guardians. Don’t ask me what that’s all about because I don’t have a clue. But if they’re fucking around then Mephisto needs to know about it.”

  �
�Negotiates?” That caught his attention. “How the fuck does he negotiate with those little shits?”

  “Beats me.” There was a grim note in Gabe’s voice. “But he managed to stop them persecuting Aurora because of her trans-dimensional heritage. And averted Armageddon,” he added, as though that was a minor afterthought.

  He wasn’t in the mood to discuss Mephisto. “Are you going to take this stuff or what?”

  “Sure.” But Gabe made no move towards him. “You look like shit, Az. What have you been up to?”

  “Hunting day and night has that affect.” Fuck it. He hadn’t even showered before taking Rowan in his arms. She had looked and smelled like a water goddess and he, in the not-so-immortal words of Gabe, looked like shit.

  “The operative?” Gabe said in a suspiciously neutral tone.

  “That’s right.” He sounded belligerent and didn’t care. Let Gabe make what he liked of it.

  “What’s so special about this operative?”

  Why the fuck were they talking about Rowan? He had no intention of discussing her with anyone. “Did I say there was anything special about her?”

  Gabe shrugged one shoulder. “Didn’t have to. The look on your face was more than enough.”

  The look on his face? He glowered at Gabe. “Shut the fuck up. You gone soft now you’ve devolved?”

  There was a time when Gabe would have responded to any kind of personal insult by ramming the perpetrator up against the nearest wall and smashing his fist into their face. This Gabe didn’t even blink. Just kept on staring, like he was seeing far more than he had any right to.

  He heard movement upstairs and light spilled down the stairs. Gabe’s face softened momentarily, and whoever had been moving around stopped and killed the light. His eyes narrowed. Gabe had lost his telepathic ability to communicate with fellow archangels when he’d lost his immortality. But apparently he still retained a telepathic link with Aurora.

  A crazy thought surfaced. Was it possible he could initiate such a link with Rowan?

  “Screws with your head, doesn’t it?”

  Azrael ditched his instinctive response to tell Gabe he had no idea what he was talking about. There was no point. Gabe had been there, done that and by the gods look at the price he’d paid.

  “Falling,” Gabe added as if he thought he needed further clarification.

  His chest tightened and it became hard to breathe evenly. He’d watched archangels fall in the past and seen their devastation when their beloved died.

  Just months ago he’d ripped into Gabe, all but accused him of being a masochist for falling in love with Aurora. She’s mortal. She’s destined to die.

  And every time she does, your heart will die too.

  There were no words to express the tangled mess of emotions that clogged his head and tore his heart like an insidious virus. And even if there were, he’d rip out his tongue before he said them to Gabe.

  “Is she a vampire?”

  “No, she isn’t.” He could barely push the denial out. Because she was a dhampir. And nine hundred years ago, he had slain her people with scarcely a second thought.

  Gabe frowned. “She’s human?” He sounded like he’d never come across an archangelic/human pairing before, when eleven thousand years ago virtually all the archangels who’d fallen had fallen for a human.

  Aurora herself was. And now, so was Gabe.

  He should get out of here. But some newly discovered masochistic tendency compelled him to remain. “She’s half human.” He glared at Gabe, wanting to provoke a fight so he could lose some of this black terror that engulfed his reason. And despite not wanting to talk about any of it, his deepest fear spilled into the space between them. “She’s destined to die.”

  “She’ll be reborn.” Gabe’s gaze shifted and he stared over Azrael’s left shoulder. “You’ll find her again.”

  Find her again? “The way you found Eleni?” His voice was harsh. “Sure, that’s a plan. It only took you eleven thousand years, didn’t it?”

  Gabe glanced back, compassion glittering in his eyes. He didn’t need Gabe’s fucking compassion. He was an archangel. Gabe was only a human and Rowan—

  When she died, how the hell could he wait eleven thousand years for her to be reborn?

  “It won’t be that long for you.” Gabe sounded so sure. But Rowan was half-vampire and vampires didn’t possess souls.

  Even with her human heritage she might not have a soul to return to him, even after eleven thousand years.

  “When you were immortal how could you stand it?” The words tore from his throat. “The knowing?”

  Gabe shifted and looked as if he wished he’d never brought the subject up. But the question was out there, and he damn well needed an answer. No matter how he protected her or kept her safe on his planet she was destined to die.

  How long did dhampirs live? From memory all those he’d killed in Romania had been young. Nico had told him dhampirs under Sakarbaal’s rule didn’t live to a great age. Was that because of how Sakarbaal used them? Or a genetic inevitability of their mixed blood?

  “You can’t think about it.” Gabe’s voice was rough. “You just have to take each day and live it to the full.”

  What psycho-babble crap was that?

  “Worked for you, did it?” Derision dripped from every word but what had he expected? Some magic formula that would wipe away the feeling of dread and helplessness that was eating him from the inside out?

  “No.” The admission was stark. “But it’s all you can do if you want to hang onto your sanity.”

  Chapter 35

  Azrael

  Azrael stood on the veranda outside his villa, waiting for Rowan to finish in the bathroom, but for once he didn’t see the majestic range of mountains or the lush valleys below. Gabe’s words haunted him. They would haunt him always.

  For the first time since discovering Gabe had lost his immortality, and that his and Aurora’s life-forces were entwined, Azrael saw the advantage.

  Because when Aurora died, so too would Gabe.

  It was insane to think that an advantage. He had no desire to be mortal, no wish to lose his archangelic abilities. Involuntarily he spread his wings and savored the light breeze that caressed his feathers. Even the threat of losing his wings was enough to curdle his gut.

  Rowan walked over to him.

  “I could never tire of this view.” She wound her arm around his waist and rested her head against his shoulder. He tugged her close and wrapped his wing around her, enveloping her in the protective mantle of his… immortality.

  “Good.” Just as well, since once they’d seen Nico and discovered the secrets of Rowan’s amber acid, he had no intention that she’d leave this planet again. “Are you ready?” Nate was picking them up to take them to the vamp at any moment and what a pain in the ass that was. What did Nico think he was going to do if he knew the whereabouts of his home?

  “Yes.” She turned to him and held out her free hand. The phial lay across her palm. “The sooner we know what this stuff is, the better.”

  He picked the phial up and smothered the shudder that threatened to attack. Earlier he’d virtually had to force Gabe to call Aurora downstairs so she could siphon some of its contents, and the remainder he intended to give to Mephisto. Even without that plan he had no intention of handing it over to the vamp. He owed him enough as it was.

  “No need.” He shoved the phial into his pants pocket and steeled himself against the unnatural vibrations that radiated from the shimmering black. “I’ve got it covered.”

  She threaded her fingers through his and he resisted the urge to press her hand against his heart. It was bad enough Gabe had guessed his feelings for Rowan. He wasn’t up to having Nate catch him doing something so… revealing.

  “If Nico’s scientists discover how to recreate amber acid, I think he intends to manufacture it for wider distribution.” Hope glowed in her beautiful eyes. “I was taught the Strigoi despised dhampirs to the p
oint they’d kill us on sight. But that’s not true. Sakarbaal might be an evil bastard but maybe his discoveries can be used for some good after all?”

  He could only imagine how much she longed to help her fellow dhampirs who scrabbled in the gutter without the magical elixir that subdued their primitive nature. It went against the grain to think Sakarbaal’s existence had been good for anything but the fact remained.

  If not for the Enclave’s scientists, Rowan would probably be dead.

  Before he could respond, Nate arrived. His surly expression didn’t alter when he glanced at Rowan.

  “Ready,” he said. It wasn’t a question. And then he teleported them to Nico’s.

  Rowan

  Rowan glanced around Nico’s laboratory, located on the top floor of his home—the Strigoi HQ? It looked every bit as sophisticated as the ones of the Enclave.

  Nico led her, Azrael and Meg farther into the lab. The other archangel, Nate—the one who looked at her as if he’d like to drive a stake through her heart—had remained downstairs flirting with a Strigoi hunter.

  “Octavia is our chief scientist,” Nico said. “Her findings are… interesting, if not wholly unexpected.”

  Rowan looked at Octavia, who perched on the end of a stainless-steel bench and regarded them as though they were next up on her to-do list. Her deep auburn hair was pulled back from her beautiful, flawless face in a sleek French plait and her white lab coat was open, showing off a figure-hugging jersey dress. The woman wasn’t a vampire and yet there was something about her. Something Rowan couldn’t put her finger on, and inexplicably a spooky sense of familiarity trickled through her.

  “We’ve identified all the elements,” Octavia said, as her assessing glance rested on Rowan. “In a nutshell, this substance was created for two specific purposes besides being a synthetic blood substitute. Not only is it designed to make the user irrevocably addicted, but it also renders the body physically incapable of ingesting fresh blood.” Octavia paused for effect. “A strange drug to hook dhampirs on.”