The Night Everything Fell Apart (The Nephilim Book 1)(110)

“What about Rand and Hunter?”

“Gone. They took off when Mab fell.”

Every muscle in Cybele’s body unknotted. “She’s really dead, then. You defeated her.”

“Yes. Merlin’s staff—it woke up. I called and it came flying at me. I caught it and then...” He shrugged. “Apparently, I blasted Mab into a pile of ash. The thrall collars disintegrated. I don’t remember any of it. Luc filled me in when I came to.”

“Evander?” Cybele asked.

He avoided her gaze. “Your father didn’t survive Mab’s hellfire. That’s my fault. I used him—”

Cybele caught his hand and pressed her palm against his. “Don’t regret it, Arthur. You did what you had to do.” Evander might have fathered her, but he’d not spent a subsequent minute of his life caring about her. He’d stood by Mab, enforcing every one of her vicious rules, even though he hadn’t been bound by a thrall collar. It was only fitting that he’d died at her side.

She laced their fingers together. “So. My leg—I guess it’s broken?”

“Just fractured. You’ve got a couple cracked ribs, too.”

“I figured,” she said wryly.

“You came so close to dying. Did you...” He turned their joined hands over and ran his free hand up her arm to her shoulder. “Did you see Oblivion?”

“Yes. I did. It was—” She shivered, remembering.

“I know,” he said quietly.

“I feel—different now, somehow. It’s hard to describe. I’m in transition, aren’t I?”

He nodded.

“Two months, maybe three, before my Ordeal comes.” A knot of apprehension tied itself into her stomach. “Oh, Arthur,” she said. “I don’t know if I’m ready for it.”

His fingers tightened on her shoulder. “No one is ever ready for it. But you won’t be alone. I’ll be there, every minute. Trust me to guide you through it. To keep you safe.”

“I do trust you. With my life. And my heart.”

His touch glided along her jaw. His finger lifted her chin. When she tilted her head up, his mouth came down on hers. Hard and urgent, and yet tender, too. The combination opened an ache in her heart.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and deepened the kiss. The discomfort of her injuries dropped from her awareness, pushed aside in favor of a more pleasurable agony. Their tongues tangled; she gently bit his lower lip. When they finally broke apart, both of them were gasping.

Cybele closed her eyes against a searing wave of lust. Their eyes met and joy bubbled up inside her. They were alive, free, and together. She slid her arms up around his neck.

“I might be battered, and I might have more cracked bones than I care to count, but dang it, Arthur.” She pressed her lips close to his ear. “Just say the word and I’ll go down on you so hard you won’t know what hit you.”

He chuckled, and then laughed outright. Cybele pulled back and drank in the sight. The world might be an uncertain place, but as long as Arthur was in it with her, she was content to take the bad with the good.

His gray eyes danced. “I love how you’re always full of such brilliant ideas.”

She smiled back at him. “I know.”

“And I love you,” he said. “Only you, Cybele. Always.”

“I know that, too,” she said, and kissed him again.





Coming in 2017





DEMONS AND ANGELS


The Nephilim: Book Two



The war for humanity’s future begins...



Arthur guides Cybele through a harrowing Ordeal as his Druids battle to protect the human race from a massive invasion of hellfiend demons. Alchemist Vaclav Dusek harvests scattered fragments of Nephil magic from his captive thralls. A fledgling network of human vigilante demon annihilators falls prey to Dusek’s lies and joins the Alchemist in his quest to wipe the Druid Nephilim off the face of the Earth.



Turn the page for an exclusive short story The Nephilim: Summoning



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SUMMONING


A short story in the World of The Nephilim



Cameron Redmond woke with a start, heart pounding, his body soaked with sweat. He kicked off the clammy sheet and lay staring up at the ceiling. Beside him, Piers slept like the dead. Like he always did after sex.

Cam turned his head and studied his lover. Piers was decades older, but the difference in years seemed slight. His features were unlined except for a few attractive crinkles at the corners of his eyes. According to Piers, this wasn’t unusual. Nephilim didn't generally show their age. His hair was an anomaly, though, mingling dark and white. His ruby earring—a single, half-carat stud set in yew wood—was a garish contrast to the salt-and-pepper curls.

The older man’s expression was serene, his breath barely audible. Cam envied him. His own orgasm hadn’t given way to relaxation. On the contrary, sex only seemed to exacerbate his habitual restlessness. To Cam, slumber was something to be feared, much as he’d feared walking through Liverpool’s rougher quarters in what he’d taken to thinking of as the time before. The time when he’d believed he was human. Before he’d discovered, amid terror, pain, and immense, frightening power, what he truly was.