Archangel's Kiss (17 page)

But he wasn’t listening. “Would you not like to stroke a stiletto across his throat, Elena?” His own hand closed around her neck, sensual, gentle, lethal. “Would you not like to watch him beg for his life?”

“P
art of me,” Elena whispered, admitting to the angry need within, “wants to do exactly that, wants to torture the bastard until he whimpers, until he crawls.”

“But you will pity him when the time comes.”

“My heart is human.” And that heart was his. Ignoring the hand he still had around her throat, she pulled his head down to hers. As their lips met, she felt the slow burn of his power grow until it pulsed against every inch of her flesh. It was a reminder that no matter if she now had wings, she was very much mortal in comparison to this archangel.

His energy surrounded her, soaked into her very pores, his lips taking hers with a terrible, beautiful cruelty. There was no attempt to harm, no pain. No, Raphael kissed her like the immortal he was—with the heartless skill of a man who’d kissed so many women across the ages, their faces had to be a blur by now. It was a direct, unmistakable display of the ruthless heart that beat within his chest.

You can’t scare me
, she thought to him.

A split second when his lips stopped, then she felt them curve, his hand rising from her throat to cup her cheek. The white-hot burn of his power faded, was replaced by the erotic touch of his skin.
Only you would ever dare say that to me.

Needing to breathe, she broke the kiss, her entire body a humming flame. Man, but the archangel knew how to kiss. “We have to go.”

A small nod, his hair sliding across his forehead before the wind pushed it back. “Where do you want to start?”

“How about the school—he might’ve been watching Sam or the other kids to decide which one to take.”

Raphael’s face went quiet, but though his eyes turned a deep indigo lit from within, he didn’t flame with power again. “I’ll fly you to the school grounds.”

However, though Elena searched until the early hours of morning, when the snow began to come down in white sheets, she didn’t find even the faintest trace of the vampire who’d laid brutal hands on a child in a place meant to be the safest of havens. More angry than anything else, she walked into their bedroom and began to strip off snow-wet clothes, her bruises stiff with cold.

“Let me.” Raphael placed his hands on her shoulders. “Your wings are dragging on the floor.”

“I’m tired,” she admitted, allowing him to peel off her sleeves, undo the straps of her top, and pull it from her body. “I’m used to being stronger than the people around me. Here, I’m pathetically weak.”

A kiss on the bare skin of her shoulder, warm hands on her stomach. “Strength comes in many forms, hunter. Yours is deeper than you know.”

Leaning back into him, she let her body relax, trusting him to keep her upright. “This is nice. Having someone to hold me when I’m tired.” It was an intimacy, a gift she’d never expected.

A long pause. Another kiss on her shoulder, those hands quietly possessive. “Yes.”

It had been a leap in the dark to admit that much, that she was coming to rely on him—she, a woman who hadn’t relied on a man since the day her father threw her out on the street—but she’d never expected that he’d honor her trust with his own. Closing her hands over his, she dropped her head to one side, exposing her neck.

He took the hint, kissing a line up the curve of it. “Shower?”

“Bath.” She didn’t think she could stand unaided.

“You’ll fall asleep.” His lips pressed to the quickening beat of her pulse, the possessive strength of his body reaching through her exhaustion to awaken the most primal of needs.
But I’ll hold you up.

It was another kiss, that offer. “Promise?”

“Promise.”

Upper body naked, she stayed in place as he remained behind her.

“So many bruises.” His hands were gentle over them, his voice holding a thrum of anger.

“Get used to it,” she said with a laugh. “I seem to have a knack for getting myself in trouble.”

A slow smile against her cheek, his hands on the button of her pants. “As you did the first time we met.”

When she was bared to the very skin, her pants kicked away, she reached back to wrap her arms around his neck, arching her body in a sinuous stretch.

“Elena.” A husky warning even as his hands stroked up her rib cage to close over her breasts.

Breath shaky with want, she pushed into him, her nipples aching for a rougher touch. “More.” A brazen demand.

“As you command, hunter.”

Her thoughts splintered as he pinched her nipples, sending a sudden, sharp ache straight through to the heat between her thighs. She moved, restless, wanting something only he could give her. “Raphael.” His lips met hers as she angled her head to reach him, his hands soothing the ache he’d aroused with slow, easy movements. He was intensity contained, passion leashed. Breaking the kiss, she met the blazing cobalt of his eyes. “I think I’ve got my second wind.”

The slightest of smiles, one hand leaving her breast to slide down her body and over the sensitive plane of her stomach to circle her belly button. She wiggled. “Tickles.” Her bottom rubbed over the jutting hardness of his arousal, turning the heat between her legs liquid.

When he moved his hand farther down, she didn’t resist, letting him part her with stark intimacy. He toyed with her, flicking his thumb over the ultrasensitive bundle of nerve endings at the top, but not giving her the hard pressure that she needed. Shuddering, she moved her body against him, tempting, arousing . . . teasing.

He grazed his teeth along her neck. “Doing that will get you punished.”

“Oooh, I’m scared.”

He pinched her clit. Pleasure short-circuited her system, her body tightening into a bow, ready, so ready . . . but the pressure eased a moment too soon. “Raphael.” A sensual complaint, her skin shimmering with a fine layer of sweat.

“I warned you.” It was an intimate reminder as he thrust two fingers inside her, pumping hard and deep. She rode him, rode those wicked fingers, her breath coming in harsh little pants, her body moving with a will of its own. On her breast, his other hand was a possessive brand, molding and shaping. His mouth touched her neck, her shoulder, his lips marking her without hesitation, without any attempt to hide that that was exactly what he was doing.

Blatantly possessive, hotly male.

Her bottom rubbed against him with every undulation of her body, driving her to a fever pitch. “I need more.”

She trembled, tried to find her mind. “Why not? I’m rather fond of it.”

That got her another teasing brush across her clit. Sparks flared behind her eyelids, and she barely heard him through the buzz in her head.

Half insane with need, she rode him harder, faster. “Give me more.”

Are you sure?
An explicit sexual question.

She cried out as he spread his fingers inside her, making room for a third. The extreme fullness threw her to the edge. Then he pressed down on her clit with his thumb and she fell. The orgasm rocked through her, a hard, almost violent release that left her limp in his arms.

 

 

R
aphael drew in the scent of Elena’s satisfaction, holding back the dark passion within him by the narrowest of margins, passion that wrenched at the restraints, hungering to take her with a fury he wasn’t certain she’d survive even at full strength.

A year he’d waited for her. A year he’d heard only silence when he spoke to her. He didn’t have much patience left in him. “Soon,” he murmured, speaking to the voracious need within him.

When he began to withdraw his fingers from the tight slickness of her body, that need kicked him hard, making his cock throb. He wanted to throw her onto the bed, splay her legs wide, and thrust.
I’ll bite your breasts
, he told her, taking his time removing his fingers, enjoying the way she clenched on him as he spoke.
But mostly, I plan to fuck you until you can’t walk.

Her body spasmed, and he realized his hunter was ready once more. Taking advantage, he slid a single finger back into her body, the second no longer able to inch in now that she was so lushly swollen with pleasure.
After I sate myself, I’ll spread your legs, make you hold them open for me.

A slow, lingering thrust.

“Raphael.”
Her voice was husky.

Another thrust, another stab of pleasure-pain as her buttocks rubbed over his cock.

Moving up a hand, he pulled her back with his fingers on her jaw and took her mouth as he gave her a final, exquisitely intimate caress that pushed her over into orgasm once more. Her sexuality was earthy, wild, honest. It sang a siren song to him that hazed his brain, threatened to make him lose all control.

Holding her up when she finally tumbled down from the peak, he removed his finger and maneuvered her around until he could pick her up in his arms, her wings as limp as her limbs. But this time the limpness had come from passion well sated. Even if he hadn’t felt the damp evidence of it on his fingers, her sloe-eyed gaze as she looked at him from beneath her lashes was all the proof he needed.

She so rarely initiated mental contact that he savored it.
Neither do you. My cock is about to burst.

“I promise to make it better.”

Blowing out a breath between clenched teeth, he put her on her feet in the shower, then reached over and turned on the cold water. She shrieked as the water hit her, slapping her hands on his still-clothed chest. “Get me out of here!”

“You’re an angel,” he said, soaked to the skin. “You aren’t that sensitive to the cold.” But he turned up the heat.

She glared at him. “What was that for?”

He waited in silence.

“Good,” she said after a few seconds, “I’m glad you’re suffering.”

He was a being who’d lived over a thousand years, thought he’d long ago lost the ability to truly laugh. Tonight he felt humor tug at his lips, despite the fact that his body remained painfully hard with need, his blood a fever. “That wasn’t very nice of you, Elena.”

A suspicious look as she pushed her hair off her face.

“After all, I brought you to your pleasure twice.”

“We’re keeping track now?” Her eyes glittered.

“Of course.”

Her nose crinkled up, and then she couldn’t hold it in any longer, her laughter bubbling out of her in a wave of pure delight. It hit him right in the heart he hadn’t been certain he still had before he met Elena. Holding her under the water, he buried his face in the dampness of her hair and smiled.
When you’re back up to full strength, you’re going to be very busy catching up.

Her arms came around his neck, her body pressed to his in an open kind of affection that he knew was rare for his hunter. Trust, he thought, she was beginning to trust him. Fear was an emotion he hadn’t felt for centuries—not until the night Elena lay broken in his arms, in a Manhattan that had become a war zone—but now, it whispered through his veins.

Elena’s trust was not easily given.

But it could so easily be lost.

“Are you planning on taking off your clothes?” Her fingers were already on the buttons of his shirt.

Shifting back, he let her strip him, let her tease him, let her make him a fraction more human.

 

 

H
alf an hour later, Raphael watched Elena give in to sleep, her lashes pale against gold-touched skin that spoke of a land of orange sunsets and thriving markets, snake charmers and veiled women with kohl-rimmed eyes, her wings spread out in a sweep of midnight and dawn as she lay on her front. Those wings, the wings of a warrior-born, were a fitting accent to her strength. But it was the woman, he thought, kneeling down beside the bed for an instant, who was the true treasure.

Brushing her hair off her face, he ran the back of his hand down her cheek.
Mine.
The possessiveness had grown ever stronger since she’d agreed to be his lover. He knew it would only increase. Because in all his centuries of existence, he’d never before taken a lover he considered his on every level. He’d kill for her, destroy for her, savage anyone who dared attempt to take her from him.

And he would never let her go . . . even if she begged for her freedom.

Rising to his feet, he walked out of the room through the balcony doors, closing them gently behind himself. The snow had stopped falling, leaving the Refuge clothed in the shade of innocence.
Watch over her
, he said to the angel circling above.

Galen’s response was swift.
I’ll let nothing reach her.

Raphael knew Galen wasn’t convinced about Elena, but the angel had given his word—and none of the Seven would ever betray Raphael. Taking off in a steep dive, he touched his mind to Elena’s resting one—the act had become habit after the year she’d spent locked in a sleep he hadn’t been able to penetrate.

The silence had been endless. Relentless.

Today he felt her exhaustion, her mind at peace, free of the dreams that so often stalked her. Withdrawing, leaving her to her slumber, he cut through the icy air toward the Medica. It was as he was about to dive from his position high above Keir’s domain that he felt another mind touch his.