He began to move inside her, relishing each stroke of his cock against the warm silkiness. She easily found his rhythm and matched it. The sensual roll of her hips heightened his sensations, stimulating every inch of his head with each thrust. Together, they moved in harmony, her breaths coming in time with his.
The smell of her arousal filled his nostrils like the richest perfume. Her breathy cries sang like the sweetest music to his ears, and the taste of her skin rivaled anything he’d ever tasted. He’d been with other women over the centuries, but he forgot about them the moment she touched him. His little demon hunter was in a league of her own. Everything about her called to him. She was made for him and him alone, and now that he knew the joy of making love to her, he’d never let her go.
An ache formed at the base of his shaft, and he tensed. Too soon. I’m not ready to come.
“Oh God, Will, please, don’t stop. I’m so close, so very close.” Her whimpers only gave a hint of what her face showed. Her eyes pleaded with him. Her lips appeared swollen from the way she kept biting them. White circles surrounded where her fingertips dug into her palms. Her biceps strained against the sari. Yes, she was just as close as he was, teetering on the brink, and a surge of satisfaction rushed through him for bringing her this far.
He flicked her nipples with his fingers. “Is that what you wish, my pet?”
She sucked in a breath with a hiss. “Will Vassago, you are the most frustrating man I’ve ever met.”
“But you enjoy it.” He doubled his efforts, thrusting harder, deeper, faster than before to bring them both back to the edge. Her legs tightened around him again, holding on to his waist for what seemed like dear life as he took her closer and closer. He no longer needed or wanted her restraint. She’d learned to free herself of her confines.
He fumbled the knots in the sari, now desperate to feel her hands on his body when he came. His balls pulled tighter against his ass, alerting him he was reaching the point of no return. His wings snapped out to the sides and mimicked the tension mounting inside him. The head of his cock almost burned in pleasure-pain from every stroke. He sucked in his breath, hoping he could hold back long enough to make her come first.
The sari slipped away from one of her wrists, and her arms wrapped around him with the same fierceness as her legs. A shattered cry broke free from her lips. Her body went rigid. The hot walls of her pussy clenched around him just as her nails dug into his skin. She never looked more beautiful to him than she did now.
He released his breath with a growl, and something exploded inside him. A wave of come shot out of him like a bolt of lightning. Every muscle in his body locked up for that second. His vision blurred, and Anjali consumed his senses. Her touch, her scent, her repeated whispers of his name. The pulsations of her sex prolonged his orgasm, milking every drop from him and sapping his strength. He fell forward on his elbows and savored these blissful moments while they lasted.
Yes, Heaven on Earth—no other way to describe it.
Her thighs began to tremble, and her legs fell away from his waist. Her fingertips released his shoulders and softly stroked his wings. Her eyes glazed over, and his breath froze.
“Did I hurt you, my pet?”
She shook her head and smiled. “Just the intensity of it surprised me. I never imagined someone could make me feel this way…” Her voice trailed off, and she traced the lines of his jaw. The sleepy wonder on her face sent a second, more subtle rush of warmth through his body. Could he be so fortunate to have her feel something for him?
He adjusted his wings so he could roll onto his back, taking her with him. She cuddled next to his side. Neither one of them said anything as he brushed her silky black hair. He marveled at how well it blended with the iridescent darkness of his feathers, at how well she seemed to compliment him. Maybe he was a fool for falling in love with a human, but Anjali completed him and filled the void inside that had eaten away at him since he’d been cast out.
Her soft breath danced across his chest as the shadows darkened outside. Night had fallen, but he hesitated to leave the comfort of her arms.
A few more moments passed before she said, “I think you’ve destroyed my bed.”
He couldn’t resist laughing. “What if I promised to straighten it up later?”
She lifted her head and grinned. “We’ll need clean sheets.”
“Are you going to make me change the sheets every time we make love?” He cupped her cheek in his hand, teasing her like he would a child. “If so, you’ll be spending a lot of time in the laundry room.”
A flush rose into her face, but she leaned closer to him. “Are you saying you’re going to tie me to the bed again?”
“Only if you ask me to.” The idea tempted him, and his cock twitched to life.
Her eyes widened, and she lowered her head back into the crook of his shoulder. “We’ll have to use some sort of protection next time.”
“You don’t have to worry about that with me, my pet.” He wrapped his wings around her like a feathered cocoon. “My kind aren’t able to breed with yours anymore.”
“Anymore?”
He flinched as the memories of the past came crashing around him. He wanted to enjoy holding her in his arms, not be reminded of how he’d ended up stuck on this plane of existence.
“What happened?”
Her question, although spoken barely above a whisper, seemed to shout at him. Sweat prickled the base of his neck. Was he ready to share this dark side of his past with her? “There was a time when the Fallen sired children with humans.”
She lifted her face to him and waited for him to continue. When he saw no signs of horror or repulsion on it, he drew a deep breath. “Lucifer thought that he could create an army of these half-angels and get his revenge over Heaven. You see, these children had all our abilities as well as the chance for redemption from their human mothers.”
“Did you father one of these children?” she asked with a slight tremble in her voice.
“No, I wasn’t a Fallen then.” He shut his eyes and prayed she wouldn’t ask any more questions.
“What changed?”
His gut clenched, and he almost wanted to bolt from the bed to keep from answering her question. Instead, he settled for sitting up and turning his back to her. His wings retracted, a visual cue of how he wished to close himself off from this topic.
Her hand rested on his shoulder, holding him steady. A ripple of acceptance spread through him and calmed his pounding heart. He’d been right in assuming she was different than other human women. She’d seen the darkness and didn’t fear it.
“I’m an Angel of Discovery. My skill lies in finding things that are lost or hidden. When God found out about Lucifer’s plot, He ordered me to find and destroy all the children of the Fallen.” A lump formed in his throat as he relived the agony of hearing that command and the internal struggle following it. “I refused.”
The aftermath of his decision revived itself in excruciating clarity. When humans talked about the wrath of God, they only had a mere idea of what it entailed. With a point of the deity’s finger and the sentence of banishment, Vassago fell to Earth. The impact alone left his body weak and broken, taking months to heal. Even after that, the pain of being cast out of Heaven plagued him like being covered with raw, blistered skin, but that was a mere abrasion compared to the shame of his blackened wings. It took centuries before he finally accepted his fate and learned to live on this plane.
Anjali’s cool fingers grazed his skin and pulled him back to the present. She turned his chin so he faced her. Her dark eyes watched him with concern. Then she leaned forward and brushed her lips against his. “I’m glad you had the courage to do the right thing.”
He caught her hand and held it against his heart. Maybe he’d never return to Heaven, but he’d been granted a lifetime with her. One human lifetime that he didn’t intend to squander. He pulled her closer to him and captured her mouth with his. The sweetness of her kiss
surprised him. He had wanted to ravage her, to fuck her into oblivion again, but instead, he found himself now wanting to capture her heart.
She straddled his lap as she continued to draw him out of his misery with her kisses. He ached to grab her hips and force her down until she took all of him inside her again, but he held back. He’d taken control once. Now, it was her turn to set the tempo of their lovemaking.
As if she could read his thoughts, she slid down, impaling his shaft with the grace of a dancer. A small smile lit up her face, followed by a soft sigh. “You better mean what you say, Will Vassago. If I see you with another woman, I’ll make the day you fell seem like a birthday party.”
The walls of her sex clenched around him, and his cock twitched. As if there could ever be another woman who could cause this rush of desire in him. He curled his finger around a lock of her hair. “Possessive already, my pet?”
Throaty laughter answered him as she began to rock back and forth. Tingles of pleasure shot up his spine from the slightest sway of her pelvis. His balls tightened. Damn, they’d barely started, and she already had him on the brink again. His hands clamped around her hips, slowing her movements and urging her to draw this out as long as possible. She responded by matching the tempo he set and slowly made love to him until he reached the dizzying height of another orgasm, followed by her own.
They both collapsed in each other’s arms as they finally came back down from that blissful summit. Exhaustion weighed down every muscle in his body. He wrapped his arms around her and drifted to sleep, feeling at peace for the first time in millennia.
Chapter Thirteen
Anjali’s eyelids fluttered open. She half expected everything to be a dream, that she’d imagined lying in Will Vassago’s arms, but his male scent filled her nostrils when she yawned.
“Still tired, my pet?” The warm timbre of his voice sent delicious ripples down her spine.
She lifted her head and smiled. The exhaustion of their lovemaking lingered in his half-hooded eyes. No, it hadn’t been a dream. How could she go from wanting to rip her skin off while under the influence of the Skinwalker’s venom earlier to lying warm and safe in his arms? “I’m waking up.”
A wicked grin flashed on his face as if he was suggesting they have another round before leaving the bed. She wouldn’t refuse him if he did. When she woke up this morning, she would have recoiled at the idea of being tied to the bed, never imagining it would result in the most earth-shattering orgasm she’d ever experienced.
She’d seen stars.
Twice.
But more than just the great sex made her want to stay curled up next to him. She’d finally begun to scratch the surface of the enigma that was Will. What little she’d heard about Fallen Angels painted them as no better than the demons she hunted. After all, they resided in an underworld that burned with brimstone. But if the story he told her was true, maybe the world wasn’t as black and white as she imagined it to be.
She scanned the disaster of her room. The sheets lay in a rumpled heap around them. Her bra hung from a lampshade. And the sari still trailed from one wrist. “We made a mess.”
“But what a mess,” he replied with a catlike stretch. “I’ll help you clean it up if you admit you enjoyed it as much as I did.”
“Always trying to bend me to your will.” She sat up and raked her fingers through her hair, trying to dislodge the rat’s nest that had taken root there.
He chuckled and kissed her forehead. “Just trying to prove to you that sometimes losing control of things is fun.”
No arguments from her. A twinge of guilt stabbed at her chest, though, when she spied the scratches on her arm. They were lying in bed, making pillow talk, while a demon still prowled the streets.
“Don’t say it. I can read your face as well as any book.” He sat up too, depriving her of his warmth. “We have work to do. But afterwards…” His dark eyes glittered with the promise of more bedroom antics when they returned.
She was watching him dress when a shiver crawled down her spine, and her vision blurred. Her heart pounded, speeding up with each beat. Her mind’s eye flew across Manhattan to the southwest, honing in a building a few blocks away from the Actor’s Studio. Her fingers bunched up the covers as a hideous image flashed in front of her eyes.
Blood coated every wall of the room. The Skinwalker crouched in the corner, still in its normal form instead of disguising its grotesque features with the skin of a human victim. A blonde woman lowered her head in conversation with a man who had leathery black wings and a jagged scar running along his shoulder. When she lifted her face, the light flashed off her fangs.
Anjali gasped and pulled the sheet up to her neck, wishing she could hide from what she was seeing. A cold vice squeezed her chest. The vampire flicked her tongue out, lapping up the blood that lingered on her lips. She stared directly at Anjali as if she were in the room and grinned. Her laughter made the light dance off the glittering blue stone amulet around her neck.
“What’s wrong?” Will’s voice broke into her consciousness, and the vision began to fade. His strong hands gripped her shoulders. “What do you see?”
When she didn’t answer immediately, he shook her awake. The image disappeared, leaving just his worried face hovering before her.
The shiver that she’d repressed seized control of her, and she worried that she’d never feel warm again.
He pulled her against his chest and stroked her hair until the fear subsided. “You know where it is, don’t you?”
She nodded. “He’s not alone.”
As she described her vision, his arms tightened around her. “Now I have an idea who released it.”
“What’s going on, Will?” She pushed away from him and looked him in the eyes. “What aren’t you telling me?”
“None of your business.” He slipped his feet into his shoes and tucked a sword hilt into his belt. “Tell me where they are.”
“I’ll tell you when we get closer.” She jumped to her feet and wrapped the sheet around her while she gathered her clothes.
He picked her up and tossed her back into the bed. “No, you are staying here. I’ve almost lost you twice in the last twenty-four hours, and I’m not taking any chances this time.”
“You should have thought of that before you dragged me into this.” She crossed her arms and stuck out her chin. “Either you let me come with you, or I go out alone.”
His hands balled up into fists, and the red glow appeared in his eyes. “This is not a time to be stubborn. If I don’t catch that demon soon, all of New York will burn for it.”
Her mouth went slack. “All of New York?” Her pulse carried the jolt of a dozen cups of coffee as it throbbed through her veins. “There’s more to this than just a simple bounty hunt, isn’t there?”
“Anjali, tell me now.”
The low growl in his voice meant to intimidate her, but she shook her head. “No way. I’m the only one who knows where they are. Without me, you’re lost.”
“Can’t you see I’m trying to protect you?” He leaned on the bed, his face inches from hers. “You just described a vampire and a Fallen Angel ganging up together and controlling a Skinwalker. Do you have any idea what any one of them could do to you?”
“Your concern is greatly appreciated, but—”
“But nothing. I’m immortal. I can fight them and not be killed. You’re not.”
“I’m quite aware of the limitations of my body.”
He cupped her chin in his hand, and some of his rage dissipated. “Maybe I’m not making myself clear, my pet. I don’t want to lose you.”
His voice broke with the last sentence, and the cold vanished. She didn’t need to hear the words behind his statement to know he loved her. And as insane as it sounded, she realized she was falling in love with him too.
She covered his hand with her own. “Please, let’s face this together.”
“Why do you have to be so pig-headed?”
“
You always knew I was this way.”
He released her with a sigh and took a step back. “Fine, get dressed. I’ll let you show me where they are, but I want you to promise me you’ll stay out of the fight.”
“I’ll try.”
Chapter Fourteen
Vassago paced the living room while he waited for Anjali to dress. What the hell had he just agreed to? If he’d had any common sense, he should have tied her back to the headboard and left without her.
Unfortunately, she had a point. She knew exactly where the demon and his captors were. Without her help, he’d spend the whole night flying in circles around the island, completely clueless to their location until they made their next move. And judging by her description of the Fallen Angel in her vision, they’d have a nasty fight ahead of them. His hand tightened around his sword as he wavered on whether or not to ask for reinforcements before attacking them.
“I’m ready.” Anjali stood in the doorway dressed in jeans and a fitted, long-sleeved hoodie over a T-shirt. The tight lines of her face spoke of her effort to conceal her fear. Once again, he questioned his decision to let her come along.
“Where are we going?”
“Hell’s Kitchen.”
A hiss escaped his lips. Of course they’d be close to the portal. That’s the only way a Fallen could slip into this plane without attracting too much attention. He pulled off his shirt and unfurled his wings. “Let’s go.”
“We’re flying?”
For a brief second, a grin touched his lips. Her wonder reminded him how naïve she could be about things. She didn’t have millennia of pain to temper her disposition, and it kept his cynicism in check. “Do you know a faster way to get there?”
“But what if people see us?”
Now he laughed. “This isn’t the first time I’ve flown with you in my arms, my pet, just the first time you’ll be awake long enough to remember it.” He pulled her close to him and stretched his glamour over her.
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