Iniquity (The Premonition, #5)(77)

I shake my head. My throat burns with unshed tears. I kiss his neck then trail my lips along his jaw. Claiming his mouth, I recklessly stroke his tongue with mine. A groan of desire emits from him. Reed’s arms encircle me. He rubs his strong hands up my back touching the soft material of my sweater. His palms slip beneath the fabric to set fire to my skin. He guides my top over my head. I lift my arms from him only long enough to help, and then my hands are on his arms, pulling his shirt off over his head. I toss it away, uncaring where it falls. Running my palms over his shoulders, my urgent fingers warm from the contours of his skin. I move them up to his nape and splay my fingers in his hair. Reed’s nose grazes my neck. It has an incendiary effect, scorching my angelic flesh with wild sensation. My fingers tighten in his hair. I lean into his kisses, my senses raw. “I love you,” I whisper. “I always will.”

Reed rises from the floor with me in his arms. My legs wrap around his waist. He holds me, his hands cupping my bottom as his wings unleash from his back in a whoosh. Mimicking the extension of his feathers, mine unfurl and spread out, a red sunset against the dark night of his wings. I cling tighter to him, knowing that one day soon he’ll be taken from me. “I am yours, Evie—yours and no other’s until the end of time.” His powerful wings slice through the air. He flies forward until my back is forced against the wall. Far from being hurt by the impact, pleasure rushes through me at the contact against my wings.

His chest presses against mine. Raising one hand to my wing, his fingers curl in my feathers, a fragmenting ache of desire surges inside me. His cheek grazes mine. My body reacts, becoming dewy at my savage need to be possessed by him. He tears a red feather from me. Holding it between his fingers, he runs the silky tip over the flesh of my throat. A soft moan slips from me, making me suck in my bottom lip. Trailing the plume lower over my curves, my skin quivers from his relentless torture.

“Reed,” I breathe his name. The feather floats from his hand. His arm around my waist lifts me from the wall as he pops open the top button of my jeans. His hand slides over my bottom, pushing the denim and lace from me. I lean into him, finding his earlobe. I nip it between my teeth before sucking on it. His body tenses. His sharp intake of breath is followed by a desperate groan. He starts speaking to me in Angel, “It’s impossible sometimes not to touch you.”

“I need you to touch me, Reed. I need you to never let me go,” I whisper in Angel as I undo his belt. I suffer the loss of his skin against mine for a moment as he leans back so he can see my eyes.

“You spoke Angel.” His mouth curls into a heart-stopping smile.

My blood hums in my veins. I hunger with a potent ache for him. “I gave you a stolen heart, Reed,” I confess in Angel.

Reed loses his smile as his body stills. “Stolen?”

My eyes grow shiny again with unshed tears. “I’d given my heart to someone else before you. How could I know you’d be everything to me, Reed?”

“You’re my air, Evie. Without you, I drown in breathless sky.” He peels the rest of our clothing from us; his lips find mine once more. Dissolving into feverish intoxication, I vaguely realize that Byzantyne may have been right about something. Reed may truly be the one to shatter my heart and destroy me forever.




I don’t want to move. I don’t want to tell him what I saw. We’d found one of the guest rooms on the fourth floor. We managed to destroy most of it. Only one lamp is left unbroken, but the lampshade is askew. Reed leisurely strokes my hair, waiting for me to work up the courage to explain everything to him. I don’t know how. There are no right words. Words are feeble. My mind works franticly, trying to figure out a way to win and still keep Reed. If I kill Emil, I lose Reed. If I don’t kill Emil, Emil kills me—I’m dead and I lose Reed. It’s a catch-22. And then there is Xavier, and all of the dangerous feelings that now radiate through me for him.

I squeeze my eyes shut and rub my aching forehead. An unwanted tear slips down my cheek. Hastily, I scrub it away with the back of my hand. “It’s that bad?” Reed asks.

“Yeah, it’s that bad,” I murmur.

“Can you talk about it?”

“No.”

“Can you show me?” I move my cheek over his chest so I can see his eyes better. He raises his eyebrows. “Can you send me a clone of you? One that contains the memory of what happened in your past?”

I look away from him for a moment, thinking. Sitting up, I face him, pulling the sheet with me. “Okay. I’ll try.” Concentrating, I begin by remembering playing the piano as Simone with Emil behind me while Emil’s men were murdering the staff. I try to incorporate every detail up to the point where Suni, the Reaper, helped me to ascend from my life as Simone. The room spins. Light glows from me as I appear to be cut in half. A radiant image of me launches out of my body. Without far to travel, she enters Reed in a split second, disappearing inside of him. He glows for a moment as he absorbs the memory I sent to him. My emotions ravish him. He grimaces, unaccustomed to the intensity of my raw humanity. Or maybe it’s what he’s seeing that makes him flinch.

“You’re my champion,” he assesses. This strong, virile Power doesn’t know what to make of that.

“As you are my champion,” I reply.

“I thought…” his voice is hollow, “…I convinced myself after we met in Crestwood that we were meant to be—that you’re the love of my life. I couldn’t have been more right—” he laughs self-effacingly, “—and I couldn’t have been more wrong. You are the love of my life. I’m just not the love of yours.”