“Nathanial?”
He turned to Billie, drawing warm comfort from her voice. He smiled at her—his smile, not Gilbert’s. “I’m okay.”
He wasn’t. And he wouldn’t be until Gilbert was dealt with.
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Yeah, I’m not buying it.”
He smiled again. She gave him strength. How was that possible? The only strength an angel could draw on was that of his fellow angels and his Creator.
She felt your wings. That’s not possible, either.
It wasn’t, and yet she had.
“So what happens now?” She picked up her fork and scooped up some eggs. “Adelaide is safe, but Gilbert is still out there? Will he keep…burning people, feeding from them, until he finds me?”
He didn’t answer. She would not like the only one he could give her.
She frowned at him, then at her eggs. “Why don’t we use me as bait, then?”
“No.”
Her frown deepened at his flat rebuke. “You’d rather innocent people die? What kind of angel are you?”
“The kind that knows what’s in store for you if Gilbert achieves his goal.”
A hot glint flared in her eyes. “If that’s meant to scare me, you don’t know me the way you keep saying you do.”
“Time out,” James said. “Time out.”
Nathanial glared at him. “Now’s not the time for your flippancy, djinn.”
“Probably not, angel.” James inched his chair back and clunked his heel onto the table’s edge, crossing his other ankle over it. “But it’s time for some hard truth, genie style.” He pointed his index finger at Billie. “For both of you.”
“James,” Nathanial growled. He wasn’t in the mood for this. He needed Billie to understand the danger she was in. Use her as bait? Was she insane?
Threading his fingers behind his head, James didn’t flinch from his hard stare. “When Nim detected the dark power of Gilbert’s first attack, she tried to find the source. It’s ancient. Older than any she’s experienced. Maybe even older than you, Feathers. By the third attack, she was scared.”
Nathanial sucked in a quiet breath. In the years he’d known Nimue Brynn, the wiccan had never once been scared.
James turned his unwavering gaze to Billie. “So the idea of using you as bait? When we’re dealing with a dark magic of this power? Yeah, I’m with Feathers.”
“Thank you.”
James raised his eyebrows at Nathanial. “I’m not finished. You have to stop being so stubborn about this whole lone-avenger deal you’ve got going on and ask for help. You’ve got friends with some serious nonhuman clout, mate. Tap that. Use it. Let us help you.”
Nathanial shook his head. “It’s too—”
“If you say ‘dangerous,’” James said, “you’ll find yourself suddenly stuck in a broken elevator covered in trapping wards in Siberia.” He grinned. “You know I can do it. With just a click of my fingers.”
He could. Nathanial had once seen him translocate Kade to a coffin buried in the middle of a garlic field in Brussels during an argument over the microwave in the Guarded Souls’ office kitchen. How or why James had an elevator designed to imprison angels in Siberia was a conversation for another time.
“You want me to ask you for help,” Nathanial stated. Billie’s hot stare drilled into his profile.
James nodded. “I do. We do. It’s not that hard. Just say, ‘Jimmy, old boy, can you locate this bastard Gilbert for me?’”
Could they? Could he? With the way Gilbert’s lust infected him, debilitated him with the barest of connections, he couldn’t use his own power, and Erah was… Well, Erah was being Erah.
Erah told you to forget Billie exists so you can return to Heaven. Would he really be in any rush to help?
Perhaps not, but Erah was still an angel. And no matter his opinion of mankind, an angel’s purpose was to defend the good and innocent and fight malevolence and evil.
“C’mon, Nath,” James said, watching him. “Three little words: Please. Help. Me.”
A ragged sigh tore from Nathanial. He flicked Billie a quick glance. Agitation radiated from her, but there was no contempt in her eyes.
He sighed again. “James,” he said. “Please help—”
James dropped his feet to the floor.
“—me.”
A grin split James’s face. He leapt up from his seat, grabbed both sides of Nathanial’s head and smacked a loud kiss on his lips. “Done.”
And with that, he disappeared.
The air particles convulsed, reality folded in on itself in a frenzied paroxysm only Nathanial could detect, ruffling his feathers, and then everything grew still once more.
“So what happens next?”
Anger threaded through Billie’s question.
Stealing himself against her irritation, he shifted in his chair and looked at her. “I cannot use you as bait, Billie. You must understand.”
Thunder flicked over her face for a heartbeat before she slumped in the chair. “You know, when I went to bed last night, I didn’t expect to be having an argument with an angel and getting a lecture from a genie when I woke up. If I did, I would have, I don’t know…braided my hair or something…”
A wry smile curled her lips and, pushing aside the remains of her breakfast, she folded her arms on the table and rested her cheek on them.
Her eyes found his, direct and unwavering.
“I promise you, Gilbert will pay for what he has done.”
She regarded him. “I know.” Her arms muffled her voice, but the anguish in it tore at him. “But I still feel useless. I feel like we should call the cops or something, and then I remember what he did to Detective Rhames, and my stomach rolls and my heart tries to bash its way out of my body and I feel even more useless and guilty and—”
He stood from his chair and rounded the table to where she sat. She watched him, expression unreadable, and only changed her position when he stopped at her side and held out his palm to her.
“What?” she asked, frowning at his hand.
“I need you to truly understand something.”
Was he really going to do this?
Her frown deepened as she took his hand.
Warmth flooded through him. Warmth, hope, life… He closed his fingers around hers and held her gaze. “I need you to understand what’s driving Gilbert right now.”
“I know what’s driving him. He wants to get into my pants, the sick prick.”
He shook his head. “If only it was that…” He didn’t want to say “simple.” It wasn’t the correct word.
Don’t do this. She may never forgive you.
He swallowed. He didn’t need her forgiveness. He needed her to understand.
“Ready?” he asked, searching her eyes. Could anyone ever be ready for what he was about to do?
She tilted her chin. “Sure. Hit me with it. Say it.”
“Not say.” He shook his head and lowered into a crouch beside. “Show.”
With a slow breath, he reached into the ethereal plane, sought out Gilbert, and brushed against the thinnest, weakest of the man’s wisps.
—myDestinyfuckheruntilwedielovehermineownherfuckhermineto—
He severed his connection to the thread, immediately purging its impact on him even as he stared at Billie.
“Oh God!” Horror leeched into her face. Her eyes grew wide. Less than .25 seconds of Gilbert’s obsession was enough—maybe even too much—to experience.
He let go of her hand, broke his connection with her mind, and cupped her face in his palms. “Do you understand now?” he whispered.
She stared at him, mouth open, and crumpled from the chair. Knees clunking on the floor, she buried her face into his chest.
Wrapping his arms around her, Nathanial closed his eyes. “I’m sorry.”
She clung harder to him. Her trembles quaked into his own body. His shirt grew hot, wet from her tears.
He scrunched his eyes closed and pull
ed her closer, resting his lips on the top of her head. He could ease her grief and fear. With a simple thought, a tendril of influence, he could remove her pain.
And in doing so, you would take away her trust in you. The one thing she aches for more than anything in her life is truth. In a life based on make-believe, she respects truth—trust—above all else.
He couldn’t do that to her. As much as the thought of her in anguish tore him apart, he couldn’t take away that which she valued so much: truth. Her truth. Her reality.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered against her hair again.
A choked sound—part sob, part sigh—came from his chest. “Me too.”
He pulled away, enough to lift her chin. Her eyes shone, but she met his gaze. “No. You don’t have anything to be sorry for. You did not ask Gilbert for his obsession. You did not ask him to do this abhorrent, unnatural thing.”
“I did force you to show me what you’ve been trying to protect me from.”
Giving her a small smile, he brushed his thumb over her bottom lip. “You are very forceful.”
She snorted, rolling her eyes. “Damn right I am,” she mumbled, before burrowing back into his chest. “If it’s okay with you, I’m just going to stay here for a while.”
“It’s more than okay.” He returned his lips to the top of her head. Wished her pain would go away, even as he felt it gnawing at her.
The second she fell asleep—barely ten minutes later—he scooped her up and carried her to her room. Opened the door with his mind and stepped forward.
“Your room.”
He stopped at her low, almost inaudible murmur.
She shifting in his arms, eyes still closed, and slid her arm up around his neck. “I want your smell around me.”
Sleep turned the words to a drowsy slur, and yet, they stoked in him a fire beyond his comprehension.
Heart pounding, he moved away from the door of the room and carried her to his.
Angels didn’t require sleep, but he enjoyed the comfort the king-size bed afforded when he rested.
Crossing the room, he kept his pace slow. Moderated. She was asleep in his arms again, her breathing regular, her pulse the same.
With more care than he’d ever exerted before, he placed her on his bed.
Immediately, she rolled onto her side, snuggling into his pillow.
He smiled. Was this what human love felt like? This overwhelming, all-encompassing confusion of emotions? Powering his every thought, his every breath?
No wonder they craved it. But how did they govern it? Navigate it?
How did they survive it?
Erah warned she would be your undoing.
He turned to leave—and stopped when warm fingers slipped around his.
“Stay with me,” Billie whispered, looking up at him. “Please.”
A thick pressure wrapped around his chest.
Her eyes held his for a heartbeat before closing again. The faintest of pressure on his fingers, the briefest of tugs, told him exactly what she wanted him to do.
Rounding to the other side, he joined her on the bed, stretching out straight on his back beside her.
And bit back a groan as she rolled close and burrowed into his side.
Erah was right. She would forever be his undoing, but with just three words—stay with me—he willingly accepted his fate.
Until she told him to go away, he was hers.
Chapter 7
Okay, so she seemed to be lying on something warm and firm.
A sculpted chest pressed against her cheek, her left breast. Or rather, her cheek and left breast pressed against a divinely sculpted chest and torso.
Oh boy, was that an arm curled around her back? And were her thigh draped over legs? Yep, hard, corded, muscular legs.
Throat tight, pulse kicking up more than a notch, Billie opened her eyes.
So it seems I can check sleeping with an angel off my bucket list.
Not that she’d had it on her bucket list, but if she had…
He’d stayed with her.
Warmth bloomed in the pit of her belly, and she smiled. She remembered asking Nathanial not to leave, although the fog of sleep clouded the memory now. She’d been scared the brief glimpse into Gilbert’s mind would give her nightmares, but she knew if Nathanial was with her, she’d be safe.
She remembered catching his fingers with hers, asking him not to go.
She had no memory of him actually climbing into the bed with her.
But he had, he must have, because he was here now, and her dreams had been peaceful and serene.
Dreams of walking along a beautiful beach, an infinitely blue and cloudless sky sweeping overhead, the waves lapping at her bare ankles.
Dreams of Nathanial holding her hand as they soared together above the waves, the wind gentle in her hair, the brush of feathers soft on her face.
She liked those dreams.
Not wanting to disturb him—was he asleep?—she shifted her weight just enough to study his face, bringing her hand up to rest over his heart.
The steady thump beneath her palm fascinated her, as did the serenity radiating from him. It was as if a storm had passed and, in its thunderous wake, life took a deep, stilling breath.
Okay, so that was the wankiest thing you’ve ever thought.
Maybe. She was an actress, not a poet or a writer. And yet, the desire to define him, describe him, niggled at her.
To understand him, even as she reveled in just being with him.
She ran her gaze over his dark eyebrows, his straight nose. It was almost too big for his face, and yet it was perfect. As was the exquisite shape of his lips and the squareness of his jaw.
The urge to brush her fingertips over his stubble battled with the desire to keep feeling his heart beating beneath her palm.
Go one better…feel the warm skin of his chest with your hand.
A tight thrill shot through her, and she dropped her attention to the neckline of his shirt. Waking up beside Nathanial was incredible. Waking up beside him while they were both naked? How perfect would that be?
Biting back a groan, the junction of her thighs growing warm, she returned her attention to his face.
And found him watching her.
“Good…whatever time it is,” she murmured.
He smiled, smoothing his hand along her back. “Good—”
She swiftly climbed on top of him and kissed him silent.
A deep groan vibrated through his body, stirring something primal in her. She worshipped his mouth, his lips, his tongue, as she rolled her hips, grinding her sex to his. The rigid state of his length detonated fresh need in her, and Billie slipped her fingers beneath his shirt.
Skin on skin. Flesh on flesh.
A jolt of pure energy sank into her core, liquid electricity and concentrated life. Oh God…
He groaned again and smoothed his hands down her back to cup her arse cheeks, squeezing them.
Not enough. More.
Dragging her lips from his, she straightened, grabbed the hem of her tank top and pulled it over her head. “Make love to me,” she said, throwing her shirt aside.
His nostrils flared. His palms traveled over her waist, her ribs.
She smiled. “We got interrupted last time.”
“We did.”
“Any way you can make sure James doesn’t come back?”
He closed his eyes for a second, eyebrows dipping. The air shimmered around him, around them, and then he met her gaze again. “Done.”
“What did you do?”
“A barrier of sorts. If anyone comes into this room, they won’t be able to see or hear us.”
“So we can be as loud as we like?” She wriggled her hips a little, trying not to gasp at the solid ridge pressing against her.
“As loud as we—”
She kissed him again. Hungrier this time. Holding nothing back.
Took utter control of the situation.
He moaned into her
mouth, his hands exploring every inch of her body she’d bared to him.
Every. Inch.
And when that, too, wasn’t enough, she broke the kiss again and moved his mouth to her breasts, first one and then the other.
He took what she gave him, his lips and tongue doing things to her no sexual partner had ever done. With every swipe and suck on her nipples, it was as if the blood in her veins was being replaced with molten pleasure. With every nip of his teeth, every molecule in her body thrummed until she balanced on an exquisite precipice.
Ribbons of delicious tension unfurled through her, from every place on her body he touched, kissed, sucked, nipped. She moaned, breaths shallow, eyes closed, and surrendering to it.
“Nathanial,” she whispered, grinding harder against him as she fisted one hand in his hair and held his head exactly where she wanted it to be. “Nathanial…”
Removing his lips from the adoration of her body, he looked up at her.
“The way you say my name…” His fingers journeyed her rib cage before brushing over the puckered tip of her breast. “I wish I could explain how it makes me…”
“Makes you what?” Her skin tingled, every nerve ending attuned to him. “Feel?”
He shook his head and moved his hand up to the line of her jaw, brushing his knuckles along it. “Everything. The concept of speech, of names, is ancient, timeless, and we angels know the potent importance of a name more than any others. Angels have been vocalizing before the very first cell divided—but when you say my name, Billie, it is like everything I am, everything I have been and will be, becomes solid. Real.”
A soft breath escaped her. Her throat thickened.
He dropped his attention to his hand, watching his knuckles feather over her jaw once more. “Angels are luminous beings, ethereal creatures of intent and purpose. The need for form, for substance, is not paramount to us. The need to exist for our purpose, that’s what drives us. Compels us. And yet, when you say my name…” His Adam’s apple slid up and down his throat as he returned his gaze to hers.
“Nathanial,” she breathed.
Iridescent light glowed in his eyes for a heartbeat, and then—his movements slow and purposeful—he pressed her flat to her back.
His lips found hers. His tongue did the same.
Destiny's Knight: A Fallen Angel Protector Paranormal Romantic Suspense Book (Guarded Souls 1) Page 13
