Archangel's Kiss (Guild Hunter #2)(32)

“What does that mean?”

“Pain for Michaela when she pulls it back out, when she reheals.” There was no mercy in him. “It’s why Noel’s attackers drove shards of glass into his flesh.”

She knew he’d linked the vicious beating and his own actions on purpose. Another reminder of who he was, what he was capable of. Did he expect her to run? If he did, he had a lot to learn about his hunter. “You did something else.”

You think you know me so well, Guild Hunter.

At that moment, he sounded like the archangel she’d first met, the one who’d made her close her hand over a knife blade, his eyes devoid of mercy. “I know you well enough to figure out you’d never let an insult pass unanswered.” She’d seen that in his relentless search for Noel’s attackers—his resolute determination likely the reason the angel behind it had gone to ground.

“In your travels around the Refuge, did you ever see a rock that reaches toward the sky on the other side of the gorge?”

“I think so. It’s very thin, sharp . . .” Her mind made the connection with sickening ease. “You dropped her on that rock, didn’t you?”

She would’ve ripped out your heart. I simply returned the favor.

Goose bumps crawled over her skin at the ice in his tone. Crushing the fabric of his shirt under her hand, she took a deep breath. “What would you do to me if I ever did something to make you that angry?”

“The only thing you could do to make me that angry would be to lie with another man.” A quiet statement against her ear. “And you would not do that to me, Elena.”

Her heart clenched. Not at the darkness in his words. At the vulnerability. Again, she was shaken by the power she had over this magnificent being, this archangel. “No,” she agreed. “I would never betray you.”

A kiss pressed to her cheek. “Your hair is damp. Let me dry it.”

She stood motionless as he stepped back and picked up another towel, drying her hair with the careful gentleness of a man who knew his own strength far too well. “You closed your mind to me.”

“I might not be human any longer, but I’m still the woman who stood against you on the Tower roof that first day.” Now that terrifying male she’d met was her lover, and she knew if she gave in to his demands, the relationship between them would be irrevocably, unalterably damaged. “I can’t accept your right to invade my mind as you please.”

“It is said Hannah and Elijah share a mental bond,” he told her, putting the towel down and tugging her hand to lead her into the bedroom. “They are always with each other.”

“But I’m betting their link goes both ways.” She stroked the arched line of his right wing—rising gracefully from his back. His shirt draped easily over his muscular frame, the back designed to accommodate wings. “Doesn’t it?”

“In time,” Raphael said, his voice changing, becoming deeper, “we will have that.”

She stroked the ridge again, dropped a kiss to the center of his back. “Why do you sound so certain when so many things about angelic power seem to depend on the angel?”

You speak to me with the ease of a two-hundred-year-old already. You’ll gain the power.

“That’s good to know.” She walked around to face him. “But until I do, I won’t allow one-way traffic.”

His eyes were arctic, so very, very blue she knew the color would follow her into her dreams. “If your mind had been open,” he said, “I would’ve known of Michaela’s arrival the moment you did.”

Okay, he had her there. But—“If you let me have my privacy, then I won’t mind calling out to you when I need you.”

His hand on her cheek, a protective, possessive touch. “You didn’t call today.”

“I was taken by surprise.” She shook her head, took a deep breath. “No, I’ll be honest. I haven’t yet learned to rely on you. I’m used to dealing with things alone.”

“That’s a lie, Elena.” He brushed her cheekbone with his thumb. “You’d call Sara for help in a heartbeat.”

“Sara’s been my friend since I was eighteen. She’s more my sister than my friend.” Reaching up, she put her hand over his. “I don’t know you like I know Sara.”

“Then ask, Guild Hunter.” An order from the Archangel of New York. “Ask what you would know.”





13




Raphael was angry. But, Elena thought, this clean, bright anger, she could deal with. When he became as he had earlier with Michaela, then she was fearful for his very soul. “Tell me about your childhood,” she said. “Tell me what it’s like to grow up a child in an angelic world.”

“I will, but first, you’ll get into bed, and I’ll bring you something to eat.”

Realizing that was one battle she didn’t particularly want to fight, she shucked off the towel as he went to the other room to get the food, and shimmied into one of Raphael’s shirts. The slots in the back flowed around her wings, but she could find nothing with which to secure them at the bottom. Deciding she couldn’t really be bothered searching for the illusive closures, she was sitting quietly in bed when he returned.