Archangels Creed Box Set 1-3

by Azure Boone

  Impatient to taste him, Devyn turned to bring her mouth to his. Not needing further encouragement, he angled his lips over hers, teasing her with tender nips.

  Playing her hands across his chest, exploring the delectable skin, she turned the tables on Troy by flicking her thumb over his tight nipple. He gasped and jumped, worrying her that he would leap entirely away from her.

  Surprised at the extent of his reaction, Devyn drew back a little, remembering in amazement, his inexperience. To think this hunk of a guy was new at this made her all the more eager to have him for herself.

  The scent of burning bacon penetrated between them, dispelling the heady arousal she swooned with. Troy noticed it at the same time she did. "Oh, God!" Bolting toward the stove, he slid a lid over the skillet to cut off the tide of billowing smoke rising from it.

  The horrified look on his face suddenly struck Devyn as hilarious, and she leaned against the counter, laughing her ass off.

  He glanced over at her and rolled his eyes. "What do you find so funny about burnt bacon? Now I get to start all over." He set the pan in the sink and started a new batch of bacon, Devyn watching him with a smile, chewing on her lower lip. Damn she wanted him.

  All business once more, he flipped another pancake and tended the new bacon before turning to face her, his hip against the counter. She hoped he'd come back and continue where he left off. "So…if it wasn't so bad, why… why did you and Karly turn to the life you did?" He lowered his head and shook it a little. "No, don't answer that. It's none of my business. I'm just curious about why people do the things they do." He opened the cabinet and took out plates.

  "No, it's okay." Devyn didn't normally care what the fuck people thought, but with Troy, she did. Although it was hard to focus when her lips still tingled from his sweet kiss. As did other parts of her body. "When Karly was sixteen she snuck out and went to a party. I never asked for all the details, but it was apparently a frat party. She snuck back in, and got caught. She'd been gang-raped, brutally. Instead of taking her to the ER and letting her file charges, the parents punished her for sneaking out. It really fucked up her head. She got into hard drugs and bad guys."

  Troy scowled, shaking his head. "They didn't even have her checked for STD's?"

  "No. They punished her for needing an extra pack of pads that month, from bleeding so much after, and took away her TV and game privileges instead. After she was on her own, she got cleaned up for a little bit. Found a decent guy and a good job. I stayed with them for a few weeks after I aged out, before I started college."

  Troy tried to hide his look of amazement by coughing. He compensated by handing her a cup of coffee. "Wanna set the table?"

  Devyn smiled slightly, enjoying the whole cooking together thing. "I'd love to." She could get used to doing things like that with him or someone like him. No. Only with Troy.

  He directed her to everything, while he finished up the food and moved hot platters to the table, while Devyn made every attempt to brush up against him. Teasing him was… fun. Yes, that was the word. Fun. Something she'd never before associated directly with sex.

  Devyn took a deep breath, the scrumptious smells catapulting her back to childhood, in the shoebox kitchen of their shabby little apartment. One evening a week, her mother would make breakfast for dinner, since there was never time for a sit-down breakfast as a family.

  Troy interrupted the memory before the tears came, thank God. "Do you think we should try to wake Karly?"

  She considered a moment. Solid food would be good for Karly. But time to talk with someone who didn't want to fuck her or pinch her nipples was such a rare luxury Devyn didn't want to give it up just yet. "She probably won't wake for hours yet. She usually doesn't when she's so deep in the nod."

  Troy pulled out her chair. "We can save her a plate for when she wakes up, then." He held the chair for her and waited until she sat, then took his own seat across from her. After he prayed, he started passing her platters heaped with food.

  Devyn filled her plate with light pancakes, fluffy scrambled eggs, crisp unburnt bacon, and fresh peaches, thinly sliced. When she had enough to feed her for a month, she started eating, ready to finish their talk. "It surprised you to hear I'd gone to college, didn't it?"

  Troy shook his head with one of those sexy half smiles, filling his fork. "Of course not. You're obviously intelligent."

  The compliment warmed her to the bones and made her want to explain everything to him. "Right before my senior year of nursing school, my boyfriend talked me into sharing an apartment to save money. He came home drunk one night after promising to stop. When I tried to leave, things got violent. I spent almost a month in the hospital, and had months of recovery after that." Just talking about it made her ache deep inside, where broken ribs had punctured her lung.

  "Was he punished?"

  Devyn looked up at the hard edge in Troy's tone. His mouth had tightened into a firm line.

  "No. He called 911, said he'd walked in on the attack. He accounted for all his cuts and bruises by saying he fought off the assailant. I was unconscious for days, and couldn't tell anyone otherwise. By the time I did, he had a rock solid timeline that put him showing up at the end of the assault. He fixed it all up to look like a home invasion, and himself the hero." Lifting a forkful of scrambled eggs, her hand trembled with the memories.

  Troy’s gaze locked on her hand, noting the tremor, but, to his credit, he didn't say anything about it. The angry tic in his strong jaw comforted Devyn more than anything he could have said. "And no one countered his story, or bothered to look closer?"

  "No. There had been break-ins in the area, and everyone assumed that's what it was. The few times I mentioned it was him, to cops and to friends, I was gently reminded how severely I'd been injured, and how I must have mistaken his fighting the perps and confused it all to think he'd attacked me."

  His fork clattered onto his plate. "Seriously? No one even considered the idea?"

  Shaking her head, Devyn fell silent for a moment, collecting her thoughts, deciding if she wanted to continue, and how much to say. "Normally, I could have just started school again the next semester, but because it happened right before midterm, I didn't maintain the GPA I had to have to keep my financial aid. I could have been awarded special consideration because of the circumstances. Unfortunately, the administrator of the nursing school was my ex's step mother. My scholarship expired. There was nowhere to turn." Devyn pushed hair behind her ear. "I called Karly and she took me in again, but things were bad for her too."

  She stopped again, rubbing at her hand as flashes of Ellis's heel grinding her hand into the tile floor came.

  "When I couldn't find other work, I took a job dancing with her." She gave a dry laugh. "Just kept going downhill from there." That was enough. He didn't need all the dirty, nasty little details and she sure didn't feel like educating him on the brutal facts of some people's lives. Besides, they'd finished eating. "Um, I'll clean up, then see if Karly's ready to wake up and eat something yet."

  Troy finished his coffee and nodded. "I'm off work today and tomorrow, so I need to earn my rent. My parents buy houses that need repairs, I move in and fix things up, then they rent the house out." He shrugged one shoulder. "Better than living at home."

  He had no understanding of how much Devyn would love to live at home. Nothing in his life gave him a frame of reference for her situation. Even as a grown man, if things got rough, he could go home. She'd never had that security.

  By the time Devyn finished setting aside a plate for Karly and cleaning up, Troy had returned. The grungy jeans and faded button-up shirt with the sleeves ripped out combined with the tool-belt riding his hips to emphasize his leanness.

  Oblivious to her awareness, Devyn watched intently as he started removing the cabinet doors and drawer fronts. Images of his lips on various parts of her body made her tummy flip.

  Troy looked up to catch her watching and grinned when s
he flustered like a teenager. "Kind of waiting for you to look away so I could have a turn staring at you."

  She chewed her lower lip as desire burned through her. So damn odd and new for her. And scary. She tossed her thumb behind her, unable to meet his gaze. "I should go check on Karly." Not waiting for an answer, she walked off.

  As soon as she entered the bedroom, Devyn knew something wasn't right. Silence lay over the room, instead of the sounds of Karly's deep, measured breathing. Shit! The bed sat empty, Karly's clothes no longer over the footboard, and the window still a couple of inches up. The bitch had snuck out!

  The sheets where Karly had lain were cool and dry, so she'd been gone a while. Probably to find another fix, or another man to fuck, or both.

  Shit. A hollow feeling struck the pit of Devyn's stomach. Hands shaking, she checked the pocket of her jeans. Empty!

  Fuck! She should have hidden the damned money! But too tired and not knowing how long she'd be there, she hadn't taken the chance. Idiot. She should have sealed the money inside a condom and carried it the way women had carried secrets since time began. She stood there feeling numb and stupid with tears threatening.

  The phone rang somewhere else in the house, and Troy's voice rumbled, then his footsteps sounded down the hall.

  He tapped at the doorframe and stuck his head in. "Um, do you know anyone called Devyn?" He winked. "There's some guy, Jake, on the phone for them."

  Devyn's heart jumped into her throat. Her immediate instinct screamed NO! but her gaze landed on the empty bed. Karly. Her heart plummeted to her feet. She reached for the phone.

  "Jake."

  "Hey there, chica." Jake's voice, roughened by years of smoking anything and everything, did nothing to disguise his deep southern accent. The combination with gangster slang gave a chilling result. "We got'sa talk, you an' me. Your girl, Karly, she say hey."

  Devyn's blood froze in her veins, and she shivered involuntarily. "What do you want, Jake?"

  "Aaw, Baby Girl, I wants you." He laughed, dry sticks rubbing together. "Gots me a homeboy wanting him a taste of that sweet thang." Dropped consonants and endings gave the words an almost musical lilt. Scuffling noises sounded in the background, then a muffled scream. "Dammit, Zip, I said hold her." A loud curse in a different voice, followed by the solid thhnnk of a fist hitting flesh. "Hear dat, Baby Girl? You gots twenty-four hours. Then I give poor li'l old Karly to my boys for a send-off par-tay, and I come and takes you away from that fuckin' preacher." The line went dead.

  Devyn met Troy's gaze just before her knees started to buckle. Some warning must have showed on her face, because he lunged and caught her before she could hit the floor.

  ****

  "Oh God." Troy caught Devyn before she hit the floor and eased her limp body down and grabbed the phone. "Hello? Hello? Who is this?"

  "They have Karly." The deep voice rumbled behind him.

  Troy spun with a startled yell then collapsed in relief. Kassern, leaned against a wall a few feet away, appearing utterly bored, thumbs hooked in his red jeans, coat opened with the creepy cross glowing on his torso.

  Troy tore his eyes from the impossible sight. "What do you mean? Who?"

  "Her ex-boyfriend."

  "Oh shit," Troy whispered, then looked at him. "What does he want?"

  Kassern angled his hard gaze at Troy. "He wants Devyn, or Karly will suffer."

  "Devyn? Why?"

  Kassern pushed off the wall and dropped on his haunches next to Troy and took Devyn's hand.

  Devyn came to with a "No, no, no," moan.

  Troy helped sit her up, looking at Kassern. "What does he want her for?" Fear and anger deepened his voice.

  "To sell her to a wicked man involved in international human trafficking."

  Devyn stifled a cry with a hand over her mouth.

  Troy looked from her to Kassern. "What will you do?"

  Kassern remained crouched and met Troy's gaze. At such close range, Troy could make out the pupils of the angel's eyes, and distinguish tiny flecks of various shades of red, from almost pink, to fire engine, to burgundy, in his irises. "In this body, I'm limited. We'll need to step up this battle plan, I'm afraid."

  Why did it sound like he was about to hear the rest of a very bad story? "How does this have anything to do with your mission?"

  "Karly's kidnapping might not have anything to do with it, but my guess is, they’re using Karly to get to Devyn in more ways than one, so it’s in my mission's best interest to get Karly back, hopefully safely." Kassern stood. "And when I said I needed to use your home, I’d meant your spiritual home."

  "My…my what? You mean my body?" Hard to keep the screech out of his voice.

  "Not exactly." Kassern's tone hinted at impatience as he walked across the bedroom to the window and stared at the blinds. Or stared through them.

  Troy helped Devyn stand. "You okay?"

  She nodded, but she clearly wasn't. There was no masking the terror in her eyes. For herself and Karly no doubt.

  Troy jumped when Kassern was suddenly next to him again. "Well what do you need, exactly?" Had he just popped across the room?

  Kassern leaned his back against the wall and crossed his arms, not meeting Troy's questioning stare. "I need your consummation, to be exact."

  "Consummation? Of what?" Had the man lost his mind?

  He tilted his head in Troy's direction but still didn't meet his incredulous stare. "Of your union. With Devyn."

  Troy choked on a shocked laugh and raked a hand through his hair, more than a wee bit confused. One look at Devyn said she was just as thrown. Please don't let him mean… "Soooo you're saying you need us to…"

  "Make love. I need you two to make love." Kassern finally looked at him. "I was trying to let nature take its course but if you want me to do anything about Karly's situation, I need you to open the second portal so that I can make the transformation."

  Troy blinked rapidly. "Trans-wait, portal? What?"

  "Your first kiss opened the first portal and allowed me to be visible on this realm. The consummation is the portal that will allow me to retain physical form here, and affect the physical world. It's the first step in my transformation into the being that we need." Kassern paused and raised his brows. "To fight? The demonic army I mentioned earlier that is planning to destroy the world within a year?" He twirled a finger in the air, as if to stir memories.

  Troy fought to use the logical functions of his brain. "So…you need us to…make love. So you can transform." Okay, logic was not the tool for this. It sounded even more insane filtered through sanity. In fact, it sounded like a crock of shit. He finally dared a glance at Devyn, expecting horror. But at the most, she seemed embarrassed. Was he the only one that saw this for the absurdity it was? Troy sighed and looked at the ceiling. "Can you give us a moment?"

  Kassern pushed off the wall. "Take as long as you like. Just not too long." The door shut softly behind him.

  ****

  Troy watched Devyn walk to the bed and sit. "Okay, wow." The words were frail and stunned.

  "Do you believe him?" Troy fought to keep the panic out of his voice.

  Devyn's wide gaze jerked to his. "As much as I'd like to say I don't, I can't. The man's words just…" her shoulders scrunched with incredulity, "feel too damn true, like my mind won't let me not believe them, like he's telling me hot is hot or-or cold is cold." She put her hands over her face.

  "So…you wish…it weren't true?" Troy couldn't help it, but suddenly all he cared about was how she felt about him in that respect. He surely knew how he felt about her, foreign as the concept was, he couldn't deny it. Neither could the arousal straining the zipper of his jeans. From the first mention of making love to her, his body began reliving that dream in vivid detail. But this was a whole lot more than just a damn dream, this was real.

  Confusion marred her forehead before understanding smoothed it away. She lowered her head. "Oh…um…I did
n't mean it like that." She picked at the shredded tear on the front of her jeans.

  Troy swallowed, needing a clearer answer but almost afraid to have it. "Do you…mind…if it is? True, I mean?"

  Devyn's gaze got as far as the carpet at Troy's feet. Her answer seemed stuck by the way her mouth opened without words.

  "It's okay if you don't. I completely understand. You hardly know me." He felt awful for even asking and hurried to tidy the room, just to have something to do while he fought the disappointment in his gut. Disappointment! Why should he be disappointed? She was being smart! How wicked of him to think that way. Of course she shouldn’t want that with him so quickly. “I’m relieved that you’re not sure,” he folded the blanket. “I mean that’s how it should be, you need time, you deserve stability, and-and romance.” He stuffed the blanket in the closet. “You deserve a man who is willing to sacrifice everything for you, willing to put your needs and desires first, willing to do whatever it takes to keep you safe and…” He sighed and turned, startled to find her right behind him.

  She grabbed his shirt and pulled him to her lips and gave him the sweetest kiss, shattering his gallant thoughts. “Are you this man, Troy?” She held his face and gave him several tender pecks.

  “Yes,” he blurted, before he could stop himself. But he was. Amazingly enough, he was that man. Ready, so very ready to be those things for her.

  She stroked his cheek. “Nobody has ever thought things like that about me, much less confessed them out loud.” The tip of her thumb stroked over his lower lip. "I trust you." She gave him another soft peck. “I need you.” She licked his lower lip, shooting heat through his body. “I want you.”

  Her words train wrecked in his mind. First with she trusted, followed by she needed, and last, she wanted.

  "I mean…" she drew back, not meeting the stare he fixed on her. "If you want, of course. I'd surely understand if you di—"