A raised eyebrow, pure masculine arrogance.
Lips curving even as things low in her body pulsed with the darkest of sexual cravings, she stepped back to pull off her jeans and panties. This time, when she pushed at the muscled silk of his chest, he went down into a sitting position, his hands sliding over her rib cage to settle on her hips. Instead of tugging her forward as she’d expected, he leaned down to press a kiss to the dip of her navel. Hunter mine.
Heart aching under the rush of emotion, she weaved her fingers through his hair. “I love you, Archangel.” Her body trembled at the intimacy of his breath against her skin, the rough caress of his jaw. When he lifted his head, she didn’t wait, couldn’t wait. Shifting to straddle him, she fitted him to the ultrasensitive entrance to her body, sliding down that hard heat oh-so-slowly, his hands possessive brands on her hips.
A shudder rippled through her as she succeeded in sheathing him. Holding him within her, caressing him with intimate muscles until he whispered promises of retribution, she put her own hands on his shoulders, squeezed. “Brace me, Archangel.”
Would you ride tonight, hbeebti? Strong hands moving down over her thighs to grip her just below the knees as he sucked on her lower lip before inciting a languorous tangling of their mouths.
Oh, yes. Then, as the storm continued to rage outside, she took her archangel, slow and deep, and again, until the crashing wildness of pleasure swept them both under.
22
The next day, having received a message early that morning, Elena found herself flying down to land in front of a gated home in the Palisades area. Set back from the street and shaded with perfectly manicured greenery, it shrieked of money. Even the architecture—old, elegant, timeless—told her she was looking at something that had cost in the millions.
I could afford this.
It was a startling thought. She kept forgetting that she was rich now, that the Cadre—through Raphael—had paid her the fee they’d agreed on when she had “accepted” the Uram mission. Snorting at the memory of exactly how she’d been dragged into the whole bloody mess, she folded back her wings and stared at the glossy black door of the home only a few feet away.
Narrow. Too narrow for angelic wings.
It was stupid to feel rejected. Her sister Beth had lived here with her husband, Harrison, since the day they had married—both had been human at the time. Then Harrison had applied to be Made a vampire, been accepted . . . and broken the century-long contract of service he’d signed on for as a condition of being Made. Elena was the hunter who’d brought him back to face his punishment. Harrison didn’t understand that he couldn’t hide for eternity, that the longer it took for his angel to track him down, the worse the price he’d have had to pay.
As a result of Harrison’s antipathy, Elena had never been invited inside Beth’s home. She didn’t begrudge her sister for standing by her husband, had done her best to make sure Beth knew that. However, by the same token, she refused to disappear from Beth’s life. No matter what, her sister knew she could pick up the phone and Elena would come.
The door flew open at that instant, revealing a gorgeous strawberry blonde dressed in what appeared to be a cashmere sweater in cream paired with a polka-dotted knee-length skirt, the shape full and feminine. “Ellie!” Her sister ran. “Ellie!”
As she caught Beth’s smaller, softer body, Elena felt time unravel, scrolling backward until they were children again. Beth had always been the baby, and she’d toddled around after Elena as Elena had in her turn toddled around after Ari and Belle. Now, of the four children Marguerite had borne, only two remained—and Elena had become the big sister. “Hey, Bethie.”
Beth’s arms remained locked around Elena, her face damp against Elena’s neck. “You didn’t come see me first. You’re supposed to come see me first!”
Another bittersweet reminder of childhood, Beth’s insistence that she come first in Elena’s life. “I thought you just got back today? Weren’t you in the Caymans?”
A sniffle. “You have wings. You could’ve flown to me.” Pulling away at last, Beth reached out and touched the upper curve of Elena’s wing.
It was a sensitive spot, a place she allowed Raphael alone to caress. “Lower, Beth,” she said with conscious gentleness.
Beth shifted her hold at once—forever the younger sister, used to taking orders. “They’re so pretty, Ellie.” Sweet words, shining eyes of a translucent turquoise that had come from Marguerite, a single moment uncolored by the choices they’d both made. “I’m glad you have wings. You always wanted to fly.”
A flash of memory, Elena in her homemade cape, “flying” after a giggling Beth. It was impossible not to smile. “How are you?”
A shrug, her hand falling away. “Okay.”
Worried by the muted response from a sister who’d always been vibrant, if not a little high-strung, Elena brushed Beth’s hair away from her face. “You know you can talk to me. Have I ever let you down?”
“You turned my husband in to his angel.” Open petulance.
“Beth.” Harry had chosen his fate when he asked to be Made—and unlike Vivek, he’d been healthy as a human, could well have lived the full span of a mortal life. If the servitude he’d signed on for now grated, he had no one to blame but himself.
Beth’s sullen expression broke, her face seeming to collapse in on itself as she began to cry in great, gulping sobs. Shattered by her sister’s pain, Elena took Beth into her arms and rocked her. “Talk to me, Bethie. Tell me what’s wrong.” So I can fix it.