Out In Blue

by Sarah Gilman

Trying to tame her pounding heart, she entered a small clearing. Towering hemlock trees, their dense branches high off the ground, created a dark area, free of undergrowth. But a branch lay broken on the ground. Nearby, an expanse of white feathers sprawled across the dirt in the darkness.

  “Wren?” Could it really be him? She approached the unmoving form, bracing herself for the blast of cold from her psychic talent. Pausing, she waited.

  Nothing. No bone deep chill, no fatigue. This wasn’t a spirit before her, but a fallen archangel. More than a hundred years had passed since the last archangel had fallen to earth. The wings covered his or her face, but the black markings near the feather tips where just like Wren’s.

  Ginger extended a tentative hand. “Wren? Is it you?”

  The archangel stirred and the wings extended to the side. Dark hair. A pale face. Green eyes with a hint of blue at the edges met her stare in the light of the lantern. He pushed himself into a sitting position, shaking uncontrollably.

  “Gin-love…”

  Ginger threw herself at her mate, all but knocking him over, squeezing him until he wheezed. Naked and covered in goose bumps, he continued to shiver and shudder. He curled his wings forward, enveloping her as he held her tightly in his arms.

  “Gin.” He stroked her hair. “I love you. I love you so much.”

  “And I love you,” she said, kissing him as his shaking lessened. He held her until she felt they would meld together.

  “What happened?” Every muscle tense, he breathed in shallow pants, his breath forming mist in the cold.

  She ran her fingers through his feathers, coaxing him to relax. “I was going to ask you that same question.”

  “I…” He pressed his eyebrows together and shook his head. “The poacher. How did you escape?”

  Ginger sucked in a breath. “You don’t remember any of it?”

  He raised his eyebrows. After a pause, he shook his head.

  “I killed the poacher. Then Thornton attacked me.” She described the scene in the forest, how he’d saved her from deadly energy drain with a kiss. Wren rubbed his temples as he listened.

  “I don’t remember any of that,” he said, his voice thin. “What happened to Trinity?”

  Ginger leaned into his wing. “Trinity went back to Eden after I killed the poacher. I don’t have much good to say about her, but she did act against her will. We had a long talk before she left. She found us on that mountaintop with her psychic talent.”

  Wren frowned. “Yes, she can sense the presence of other archangels. No wonder the poachers used her.”

  Ginger leaned forward and kissed him. “You came back.”

  He glanced upward. “I don’t remember anything…but I know there’s nothing that could ever keep me from you. I fell to earth for you.”

  Speaking into his skin, she whispered, “Twins.”

  “What?” He cocked his head.

  She took his hand and pressed his palm to her navel. “Twins.”

  He blinked. Twice.

  “Oh, Gin-love,” he whispered. He grasped her head in his hands and claimed her mouth, kissing her so deeply, she comprehended only his warmth, his soft lips, and the love he poured into every stroke.

  She glanced up, hearing the approach of others through the forest underbrush. Raphael’s voice rang out, calling their names.

  Wren got to his feet, pulling her with him. The shaking had stopped. Ginger ran her fingers over the edge of his wing, relieved beyond measure to see every feather in place, as if nothing had happened. She kissed him again, long and deep, and wrapped her arm around his waist.

  “Let’s go home.”

  “Yes.” He tucked his wing across her back and an arm across her shoulders. With his free hand, he brushed her belly and her chin. “Home.”

  Epilogue

  Jett leaned against a moss-covered marble mausoleum. The cemetery basked in the afternoon sun, the summer heat a secondary annoyance to the blinding light. His eyes stung. He adjusted his sunglasses and longed to return to the cover of the Vermont forest, but curiosity held him in place.

  Forty feet away, a demon female stood near the cemetery’s stone wall, pouring water over a flowering rose bush. She’d been out in the sun since morning, tending to the various gardens around the burial ground. No sunglasses. How did she stand the daylight in her eyes?

  The female turned and headed toward the stream with her empty buckets. The brown grass beneath her feet crunched as she walked, and strands of her long, dark hair fell into her face. She hummed a melody, the only sound besides the lazy water in the brook.

  Jett stepped back into the recess of the mausoleum door as she passed. If she noticed him, she gave no indication. Luckily for her, he meant her no harm. This oblivious of her surroundings, she had no business being out here alone.

  Returning from the stream, she set the buckets down near a bed of yellow flowers. A large shadow passed over the monument-strewn ground. She glanced up and smiled. An archangel landed in the clearing near the front gates, the gale from his wings kicking up dust from the parched ground. Wren, Raphael’s son. He held his mate in his arms and eased her to her feet, the swell of her belly betraying the many months she’d been pregnant. She clutched an armload of daisies.

  Another shadow circled, and Raphael joined his family, his landing rougher than his son’s. The archangel shook the stumble off, his chin up at a proud angle. His flight feathers had only recently finished growing, and he was still regaining his wing strength.

  “Lex!” Wren’s mate—Ginger, Raphael had called her—approached and embraced the demon female.

  Lex. Though he’d frequently seen this demon and Ginger together over the past several months, this was the first time he’d been close enough to overhear the female’s name. He committed it to memory.

  “Hey, Lexine.” Wren stretched his wings, folded them and moved to stand at his mate’s side.

  “Raphael. Wren. G.” Lex beamed and kissed Ginger’s cheek. “You’re still standing, I see.”

  “I may faint yet.” Ginger raised the back of her hand to her forehead, faking melodrama, and settled her hands on her swollen belly.

  “You may have set a record for girth, my dear.” Lexine shook her head. “You should be home, resting.”

  “Yes, but today is the day my mother fell to earth, exactly three hundred years ago. I had to come.” She held up the daisies and exchanged a glance with her father-in-law. “Raphael says these were her favorite. They are my favorite, too. Ow!” Ginger’s eyes widened and her face paled. She bent forward slightly.

  “Kicking?” Lexine reached out, even as Wren grasped his mate’s shoulders.

  “No, worse.” Ginger took a deep breath and let it out slowly, but grinned. “Beating their wings.” She took Lexine’s hand and directed her fingers to a spot on her belly.

  Lexine beamed. “They’re strong, no doubt about that. You two are going to have your hands full.”

  “Naw.” Wren arched an eyebrow at his father. “Once their two enthusiastic grandfathers get a hold of them, we may never see the twins again.”

  “Until they start growing their first feathers.” Ginger laughed. “Then all help will vanish. Oh! We’ve settled on names, finally.”

  “It’s about time.”

  “Phoenix and Talon.” Wren ran his wing over his mate’s back.

  “A boy and a girl?”

  “We think so.”

  As the two women chatted, a slight movement in the trees behind Raphael and Wren drew Jett’s attention. His hand gripped the hilt of the dagger at his hip. He drew the blade and crouched, ready to rush the attacker—

  Lark appeared at the edge of the forest. Jett shoved the blade back into place. He’d accepted Raphael’s explanation of the events concerning Lark, as difficult as they were to believe. The archangel had left the information in a letter in the woods after Jett had refused a personal meeting, a handwritten letter Raphael had tucked in an envelope with a chocolate bar. The bastard
. The corners of Jett’s mouth turned up despite himself.

  Lark stared over his sunglasses in Jett’s direction, his hair and eyes startlingly red in the sunlight. Of course, the archangel’s primary Guardian wouldn’t miss Jett’s presence. Indeed, the real Lark made Thornton seem blind and deaf and clumsy. Every movement, or lack thereof, as the demon stood sentinel outside the archangel house each night, spoke of an unrivaled predator. Few of the other Guardians achieved that degree of stillness or lethal grace.

  Jett held Lark’s gaze and arched an eyebrow, not about to sulk away, even if it meant a confrontation. A consuming need to be there if Raphael ever needed protection from his own Guardians kept Jett glued to Sanctuary, but he wanted interaction with the other demons about as much as he wanted his fangs pulled again. The Guardians had left him well enough alone for the past nine months, but Jett hadn’t come this far into the colony before. Shit. How could he let himself get so caught up watching a female?

  The Guardian’s mouth curled in a peculiar smile, and he spoke with Raphael. The archangel turned, glanced up, and locked eyes with Jett. Still, Jett held his ground.

  Raphael wandered into the cemetery to Jett’s left. The archangel opened the gate to a small plot surrounded by a wrought-iron fence, and knelt in front of the three marble headstones. He pulled an envelope from his pocket, wrote something on it, and set it on the smallest stone, meeting Jett’s gaze again.

  What the hell?

  Raphael turned and strolled back to where Wren and the others had gathered in the far corner of the cemetery. Ginger stood in front of a small mausoleum built from the whitest marble, the bundle of daisies set in a stone vase by the door. The others gathered around.

  Jett retreated to the cover of the trees and waited. When Raphael and his family left, so too did Lexine. Shrugging off the shadows of the forest, Jett approached Raphael’s envelope.

  You know where to find us if you want to talk, Raphael had scrawled. Jett scoffed. How many times did he have to assert he wanted to be left—

  The envelope contained a photograph. A family posed by the edge of the lake, a male demon hugging a female, a little boy on the male’s back, arms around his neck. The photo fell from Jett’s numb fingers. The young demon…

  That child is me.

  Acknowledgments

  My sincerest gratitude to all who helped me breathe life into this novel. This book would not have come so far without the guidance and encouragement from Lisa Blackwater, Lindsay Buroker, Ashley Christiano, Jeanne Haskin, Liza O’Conner, and Jeanne Marcella.

  Many thanks to my editor, Marie Loggia-Kee, and my copy editor, Caroline Phipps, for their insights, and to Liz Pelletier and Heather Howland of Entangled Publishing, for believing in this book.

  Thanks and a bottomless margarita to Vanessa Burns. You’re a true friend.

  Loving thanks to my husband, Jason Gilman, for supporting my writing endeavors.

  Sarah Gilman writes paranormal romance. Her fascination with all things winged extends back to childhood, when images of the ancient Egyptian goddess Isis captured her imagination and never let go. She lives in Vermont with her supportive husband and two spoiled cats.

  Readers can find her on the web at www.sarahgilmanbooks.com

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