Angelsong: Dark Angel #3 (Urban Fantasy)

by Peach, Hanna

  He leaned forward so quickly that Alyx started. He grabbed her arms so that she couldn’t back away. Their faces were so close that she was breathing into his mouth. His green eyes glistened, and she found she couldn’t tear her gaze away from them.

  “Yes, I have been with a number of women. I’m not denying that. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you use my past against me to fuel your insecurities and to keep me at arm’s length. If you and I are to ever work you need to get the hell over it ‘cause I won’t pander to it after today. I never lied to any of them about how I did or didn’t feel, and I’m not lying to you when I tell you I’m fucking in love with you.”

  Her mind floundered as it tried to grasp onto what he just said. “Then… then why did you look so terrified after I told you?”

  Jordan took a deep breath and let it out as a sigh. His hands loosened from her and he used them to run his hands through his hair, his elbows resting on his knees.

  “At first I didn’t believe that I heard you right. I didn’t think that… that you might one day love me back...” He looked over to her. “Then I realized that I’ve never been in love before and I’ve never had to try and keep a woman happy apart from in bed and that I have no experience in relationships or forever, and it terrifies me that I’m going to screw up with you. I’m afraid I already have screwed up with you. That’s why I looked so terrified.”

  “I don’t have experience with that stuff either. All that ‘keeping you happy’ or relationships or forever stuff.” Alyx chewed her lip. “But what if … what if I’m not enough for you, Jordan? I mean, none of them have ever been enough for you, have they?”

  Jordan held her face between his palms. “None of them have ever been you.”

  Her lips crushed against his. Alyx felt her body ignite and any walls left around her heart burned away like a paper house in a roaring flame. The warmth, the love that he offered her in his kiss and in his touch expanded to fill up the rest of this void in her soul. And she felt… whole.

  His hands pulled her out of the blanket and onto his lap as if she weighed nothing, their lips never breaking apart. His fingers traced down her cheek and her neck. Using just his thumbs he drew two parallel lines down the swell of her breasts.

  There was noise in the back of her throat like a sob, like a pressure release that had built up, untouched, not allowed to exist or be acknowledged since she had met him. Jordan. Her Jordan. Why had she not allowed herself to feel this before? It was like… flying again after she had lost her flight.

  Her hands slid across the expanse of his bare chest, enjoying the feeling of her fingers pushing through the patch of hair there. Her fingers felt along his smooth rippled stomach, searching for... searching for… Scars. She flinched. Something flashed across the tip of her memory like a ghost, then it was gone. Jordan must have sensed her pausing because he pulled back from her.

  “Too much. Too fast. I’m sorry,” it came tumbling out of his mouth in an unsteady rush.

  Alyx shook her head. “No. I’m okay. I just…” She trailed off. She just what? She wasn’t sure what just happened. She was just being silly. Or was she? She traced Jordan’s stomach again. “It was so weird… like déjà vu but… not. I felt like I was looking for something…”

  Jordan’s face hardened and he picked her up and set her down on the blanket next to him.

  Alyx didn’t like this. “Jordan, what’s wrong?”

  * * *

  Jordan stared at Alyx. Her eyes had been so full with love and desire and everything that he ever wanted to see in them. But would it last when he told her about Israel? Would she ever look at him the same way? His heart throbbed in pain at the thought.

  He should tell her now before things went any further. He opened his mouth, but a stab of loss caused him to pause. Once she knew… things wouldn’t be like this between them, would they?

  He squeezed his eyes shut. Was he a bad person for wanting to wait to tell her? Would it be okay if he could have this one night with her? Would it be enough?

  “What is it?” her voice cut through his prayers. When he opened his eyes she was kneeling just in front of him, between his knees. He was rendered speechless. The fire behind her made her skin glow like warm embers, like an angel’s halo. His Angelfire.

  Please, God, don’t let her hate me for wanting this.

  Maybe if he explained it to her… He ran his fingers through her soft hair. “From our very first conversation I knew you were different. Even when you were lying there on the cathedral altar, body frozen, you didn’t act like a helpless female. You were angry, passionate, proud, fearless. You refused to be swayed by my looks or my charm.”

  Alyx snorted. “You had me as your prisoner. I can’t imagine anyone in that position being swayed by your looks or charm.”

  Jordan smile wearily. “You’d be surprised.”

  Alyx raised an eyebrow.

  Now was not the time to go into that. He continued, “I felt… such a curiosity about you that has only grown over time. The curiosity was more than how you would react to my touch or how your body tasted. I wanted to know what you dreamed about, I wanted to know what you feared, I wanted to know what made you laugh.”

  Her face melted and she reached for him. He grabbed her hands before she could touch him.

  “Alyx, you make me feel more alive than I have ever been. You came into my life and slowly there was light again, there was color… and you made me feel… oh God, do you make me feel. Feel everything. You, just being you, have coaxed the feeling back into my heart. For this, I will always love you. Just promise me that whatever happens tomorrow, you’ll remember that I love you.”

  Alyx frowned. “Why, what’s going to happen tomorrow?”

  “Anything could happen.”

  “But you’re talking about something specific, aren’t you. What is it?”

  “If we could only have one day, just you and me, would you still take it?”

  Alyx pulled her hands away. “Jordan, you’re scaring me.”

  “I don’t mean to scare you. Please, just answer. It’s important to me.”

  He watched the confusion and worry crease her brows. Then he saw her eyes lose momentary focus, as it had just before she stopped kissing him, and he knew that this was a part of her that was struggling to remember Israel.

  You’re an idiot. It’ll never just be you and her. He pushed this crushing thought away.

  A kind of acceptance eased her features. Then a shy smile pulled at her lips. “If tonight is all we had, then we best not waste it.”

  He was humbled that she trusted him not to ask any more questions.

  “Come.” He picked her up and placed her gently on the bed. She pushed back at his chest, her eyes widening at him. He shook his head and retrieved the blanket so he could cover her with it. “I mean for us to get some rest. Not for us to… not that I don’t want to but we… shouldn’t … it’s too soon, too much…”

  He couldn’t. He couldn’t sleep with her while he was keeping a secret this big from her. Although, sweet Heavens he wanted to. Just watching her lying there in bed half-naked looking up at him, he didn’t think he had ever wanted anything more in his damn life.

  She laughed and the awkwardness was shattered. “I never thought I would see the day when you would be uncomfortable talking about sex.”

  He pouted, pretending to sulk. “See what happens when you give a woman your heart? She gets all insolent and thinks she can talk back to you.”

  Alyx rolled her eyes. “Please, I talk back you anyway.”

  He slipped under the covers next to her. Suddenly, he was desperately unsure of what to do and where to put his hands and his body. What the hell do you do with a woman in bed if you’re not getting her naked? Somehow she made him feel awkward and new. He almost laughed at himself. He positioned himself next to her, laid out straight like a soldier, his arms barely touching alongside hers. She seemed disappointed.

  “Can I ask you
a question?” she said.

  “Sure.”

  “What are your rules?”

  “Rules?”

  “You said once that I made you break all your rules.”

  He laughed. “Oh, yes, those rules. They’re irrelevant now.”

  “So it won’t matter if you tell me.”

  He grinned. Then he shook his head. “It doesn’t matter enough for me to tell you.”

  Alyx nudged his side, making him flinch.

  “Cut it out.”

  She did it again, pulling herself partly over him to tickle both sides of him at once. “Not until you tell me.”

  “Fine, you win. Just settle down.” He pulled her hands away. But it wasn’t because he was ticklish. He was too worried about how his body was reacting with her all over him.

  But instead of moving back to her side of the bed she settled in the crook of his shoulder and along his side. It felt so amazing just to have her there that he couldn’t bear to move her away.

  “My rules were: never get involved with someone in your community, never get involved with someone who could love you, and…”

  “And?”

  “…never fall in love.”

  “Oh.”

  She melted further against his body. Her bare leg sliding over his made him uncomfortably aware of how much sleep was not on his mind. Two little pieces of fabric and she’d be so ridiculously naked… No, he wouldn’t ask that of her. He couldn’t – not until she knew everything. He would be honorable, at least in this way.

  “Sleep,” he forced himself to say.

  “No. I don’t want to sleep.” Her finger tracing infinity signs on his chest made him want to sigh for all sorts of reasons. He squeezed his eyes shut. Being honorable was severely overrated.

  “I don’t want to waste our time sleeping, assuming this is our last night left on Earth,” she teased. Then her face grew serious. “I’m afraid I’ll miss something…”

  He understood. He was afraid, too. Afraid that everything would change tomorrow. That he would lose her once she saw Israel. The thought dug into his heart like a set of talons, sharp and hungry. No. Today. They still had today. He couldn’t taint today with tomorrow.

  “You know,” he said, “we don’t have to miss each other, even if we sleep.”

  He lifted up one of his hands and let a few blue sparks off his fingertips. A smile spread across her face as she realized what he was implying.

  “Where do you want to go, beauty,” he whispered into her ear. “I can take you anywhere.”

  “I don’t care. As long as you’re there.”

  Jordan smiled down at the angel in his arms and shifted so that she would be more comfortable. “You ready?”

  She nodded.

  He let the DreamWalker sleep roll over both of them. Together they fell, wrapped around each other, into the DreamPlain.

  Chapter 33

  By daybreak the black clouds were beginning to scatter and a soft, moist morning light filtered the air in the cottage. Jordan had been awake for a while. The scent of her hair had drifted into his dreams so that he woke before the sun. He pulled her tighter along him. Now that I’ve held you, how do I ever let you go?

  Alyx stirred in his arms.

  “Morning,” he whispered into her hair, taking in a deep breath of the sweet freshness.

  Her eyelashes fluttered like two dark butterflies. “No. Is it really morning already?” she said as she placed little kisses in the nook of his neck. “I think the moon and the stars are tricking you with their light.”

  He laughed. “I wish that were true.”

  She opened one eye fully and grimaced at the pale light streaming in through the window. “No. I know my nightlight from daylight, and that is definitely not daylight.”

  “We have responsibilities, Alyx.”

  She sighed and it seemed that she shrunk even more when she exhaled all that air out. “I know.”

  They pulled themselves out of the bed and soon were on their way.

  * * *

  Back at Saint Joseph, Alyx handed over the vial of Darkened blood and the ghost orchid to Tobias to add to the demon potion. They would be the last two ingredients as Tobias had prepared the base ingredients while she and Jordan had been away. She noticed Mason sidling up to Jordan as Tobias hurried away to finish off the cure.

  “Have you told her?” Mason said, loud enough for Alyx to hear.

  She turned to face the two men. “Told me what?”

  She watched the display of guilt lash across Jordan’s face.

  There was a little part inside her that knew, just knew, that this was something to do with all these odd things she had been experiencing and Jordan’s strange statement yesterday, “Just promise me, that whatever happens tomorrow, you’ll remember that I love you.”

  Jordan and Mason, both men almost equal in stature and size, were now glaring furiously at each other. The air crackled with tension as their fists balled at their sides.

  She pushed them apart with her hands, demanding their attention. “Told me what?”

  Jordan’s face fell as his eyes met Alyx’s. The aggression slipped from his stance. “I was going to tell you… I just wanted to keep you focused until we got the potion fixed.”

  “Liar,” growled Mason. Jordan turned back to glare at Mason.

  Hey,” she said, snapping Jordan’s attention back to her. “We have all the ingredients for the cure, so tell me now.”

  Jordan’s eyes glanced sideways at Mason. “You mind giving us some privacy?” he said through gritted teeth.

  “Not a bloody chance.” Mason folded his arms. “I want to make sure you tell her the whole truth.”

  Alyx matched Mason’s stance, her arms folding tight across herself like a shield. She prepared herself.

  Jordan spoke, “I never meant… I thought it for the best…”

  “Best for her, or best for you?” sneered Mason.

  Alyx stared at Jordan’s face. The regret and guilt was clearly written there. He had kept secrets from her. What he was feeling − being caught keeping secrets from the one you love − it resonated in her chest. She too knew this feeling… so familiar but… not. Her heart felt tight, as if these forgotten things contained within it were ready to burst. What was going on?

  Jordan began to speak, “I can’t say I’m not happy that it happened. Because it gave me a chance with you. It gave us a real chance. Before, I never even had a hope. Your love for him already saturated your heart, so there was no room for even the possibility of anyone else.”

  “Who? Who did I love?”

  “You are − were, are − I don’t know… In love with Israel. But you’ve forgotten.”

  Alyx felt her body flush with anger. “Is this some kind of joke? Is this some kind of twisted way of pushing me away?”

  “No, Alyx.” The sadness in Jordan’s voice was enough to soften the anger. “I wouldn’t do that.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “He’s telling you the truth, Alyx,” Mason said.

  Alyx shook her head. “No. No. If I loved someone else I would never have fallen for…” You. Her head snapped up, catching Jordan’s pained gaze. “How? How did this happen?” she demanded.

  “The MemoryThief,” Mason said. “She took your memories of loving Israel.”

  Flashes came back to her. Falling to the floor of the tunnels. A voice. Just let go. Then a tug…

  “It happened just before I came for you in the cathedral,” she said to Jordan, her voice sounding dull to her ears.

  He nodded. “That night, you looked at me, you really looked at me for the first time. All I wanted was for you to really see me. If you really saw me and still decided to be with him I could at least live with that.”

  “That’s why you told us to keep this from her, isn’t it?” said Mason. “You just wanted a chance to get her into bed.”

  “No. That’s not… I didn’t…”

  Alyx stared at Jordan
. “You told them to keep this from me? For how long?”

  Jordan’s chin dropped. “Since Mayrekk passed away.”

  Only one day.

  “If we could only have one day, just you and me, would you still take it?”

  Alyx blinked, surprised at the tears that welled from somewhere in the depths of her soul. A well so deep but just forgotten.

  “I need to see him.”

  Chapter 34

  Alyx stood by the compartment where Israel lay inside. She had her hand on the handle, but she couldn’t bring herself to enter just yet. Her stomach ached. This just felt so wrong, like a betrayal to Jordan. How could she have had those feelings for Israel? How could it feel so right with Jordan if she was supposed to be in love with someone else?

  She could feel Jordan’s presence behind her, but she didn’t turn around. Her hand tightened on the handle. She’d go in there and see Israel and she’d feel nothing, and then she could go back out here and move on from this huge mistake.

  Alyx kept her eyes on the floor as she entered Israel’s compartment and closed the door behind her. She could see the body in the bed covered by the white sheet in her periphery. It took no more than two steps before she was by his side.

  She could see his hand and his arm, laying by his side over the sheet. She was shocked at the curiosity that rose in her to touch him. She remained still for several more moments. Procrastinating. Delaying. But the longer she stared at his hand, the more she wondered what it would be like to lace her fingers in his. This urge invading her body felt foreign, yet… something about it resonated in a place deep within her.

  She could hold off no more. She lifted her eyes to his face.

  She saw the lines of his cheekbones and his jaw and the scar across his lips. It hit her in the chest like an electric shock, bringing the ghost in her back to life.

  It felt like love at first sight.

  She had no memories of their love to draw upon, no memories of loving him, but she felt it deep in her soul, in the place that existed eternally. The place beyond memories. Beyond magic.