Raziel

Raziel

The Fallen – Book 1

By Kristina Douglas

RAZIEL IN THE BEGINNING

I AM RAZIEL, ONE OF THE TWENTY fallen angels spoken of by Enoch in the old books. I live in the hidden world of Sheol, with the other Fallen, where no one knows of our existence, and we have lived that way since the fall, millennia ago. I should have known there would be trouble on the horizon. I could feel it in my blood, and there is nothing more powerful than blood. I had taught myself to ignore those feelings, just as I had taught myself to ignore everything that conspired to betray me. Had I listened, things might have been different.

I rose that day, in the beginning, stretching out my wings to the feeble light of early morning. A storm was coming; I felt it throbbing in my veins, in my bones. For now the healing ocean was calm, the tide coming in, and the mist was thick and warm, an enveloping embrace, but the violence of nature hung heavy in the air.

Nature? Or Uriel?

I had slept outside again. Fallen asleep in one of the wooden chairs, nursing a Jack Daniel’s, one of the many pleasures of this last century or so. Too many Jacks, if truth be told. I hadn’t wanted this morning to come, but then, I was not a fan of mornings. Just one more day in exile, with no hope of . . .what? Escape? Return? I could never return. I had seen too much, done too much.

I was bound here, as were the others. For years, so many years that they’d ceased to exist, lost in the mists of time, I had lived alone on this earth under a curse that would never be lifted.

Existence had been easier when I’d had a mate. But I’d lost too many over the years, and the pain, the love, were simply part of our curse. As long as I kept aloof, I could deprive Uriel of that one bit of torture. Celibacy was a small price to pay.

I’d discovered that the longer I went without sex, the easier it was to endure, and occasional physical matings had sufficed. Until a few days ago, when the need for a female had suddenly come roaring back, first in my rebellious dreams, then in my waking hours. Nothing I did could dispel the feeling—a hot, blistering need that couldn’t be filled.

At least the women around me were all bonded. My hunger wasn’t so strong that it crossed those lines—I could look at the wives, both plain and beautiful, and feel nothing. I needed someone who existed in dreams only.

As long as she stayed there, I could concentrate on other things.

I folded my wings back around me and reached for my shirt. I had a job today, much as I hated it. It was my turn, and it was the only reason the détente existed. As long as we followed Uriel’s orders, there was an uneasy peace.

I and the other Fallen took turns ferrying souls to their destiny. Death-takers, Uriel called us.

And that’s what we were. Death-takers, blood-eaters, fallen angels doomed to eternal life.

I moved toward the great house slowly as the sun rose over the mountains. I put my hand on the cast-iron doorknob, then paused, turning to look back at the ocean, the roiling salt sea that called to me as surely as the mysterious siren female who haunted my dreams.

It was time for someone to die.

I AM URIEL THE MOST high, the archangel who never fell, who never failed, who serves the Lord in his awful majesty, smiting sinners, turning wicked cities to rubble and curious women to pillars of salt. I am his most trusted servant, his emissary, his voice in the wilderness, his hand on the sword. If need be, I will consume this wicked, wicked world with fire and start anew. Fire to scourge everything, then flood to follow and replenish the land.

I am not God. I am merely his appointed one, to assure his judgment is carried out. And I am waiting.

The Highest One is infallible, or I would judge the Fallen to be a most grievous mistake and smite them from existence. They have been damned to eternal torment, and yet they do not suffer. It is the will of the Most Holy that they live out their endless existence, forced to survive by despicable means, and yet they know joy. Somehow, despite the black curses laid upon them, they know joy.

But sooner or later, they will go too far. They will join the First, the Bringer of Light, the Rebel, in the boundless depths of the earth, locked in silence and solitude throughout the end of time.

I am Uriel. Repent and beware.

CHAPTER ONE

I WAS RUNNING LATE, WHICH WAS NO surprise. I always seemed to be in a rush—there was a meeting with my editors halfway across Manhattan, I had a deposit to make before the end of the business day, my shoes were killing me, and I was so hungry I could have eaten the glass and metal desk I’d been allotted at my temp job at the Pitt Foundation.

I could handle most of those things—I was nothing if not adaptable. People were used to my tendency to show up late; the secretary over at MacSimmons Publishers was wise enough to schedule my appointments and then tell me they were half an hour earlier. It was a little game we played—unfortunately, since I now knew the rules, I’d arrive an hour late, ruining her careful arrangements.

Tant pis. They could work around me—I was reliable in all other matters. I’d never been late with a manuscript, and my work seldom needed more than minimal revision. They were lucky to have me, even if biblical murder mysteries weren’t a big moneymaker, particularly when written in a smart-ass tone.

Solomon’s Poisoner had done even better than the previous books. Of course, you had to put that in perspective. Agatha Christie I was not. But if they weren’t making money they wouldn’t be buying me, and I wasn’t going to worry about it.

I had just enough time to make it to the bank, and I could even manage a small detour to grab a hot dog from a street vendor, but there wasn’t a damned thing I could do about my stupid shoes.

Vanity, my uptight mother would have said—not that she ever left the confines of her born-again Idaho fortress to see me. Hildegarde Watson trusted nothing and no one, and she’d retreated to a compound filled with other fundamentalist loonies where even her own sinful daughter wasn’t welcome.

Thank God. I didn’t need my mother to tell me how shallow I was. I embraced it.

The four-inch heels made my legs look fantastic, which I considered worth any amount of pain. On top of that, they raised me to a more imposing height than my measly five foot three, an advantage with obstreperous middle-aged male editors who liked to treat me like a cute little girl.

However, the damned stilettos hurt like crazy, and I hadn’t been smart enough to leave a more comfortable pair at my temp job. I’d been hobbling around all day without even a Band-Aid to protect my poor wounded feet.

I’d feel sorry for myself if I hadn’t done it on purpose. I’d learned early on that the best way to accomplish anything was to grit your teeth and fight your way through it with the best grace you could muster, and wearing those damned shoes, which had cost me almost a hundred and eighty dollars, discounted, was the only way I’d ever get comfortable in them. Besides, it was Friday—I had every intention of spending the weekend with my feet up, working on my new book, Ruth’s Revenge. By Monday the blisters would have healed enough, and if I could just tough it out for two more days, I’d be used to them. Beauty was worth the pain, no matter what my mother said.

Maybe sometime I’d be able to support myself with my writing and not have to deal with temp jobs. Snarky mysteries set on debunking the Judeo-

Christian Old Testament weren’t high on the public’s interest meter, the occasional blockbuster Vatican thriller aside. For now, I had no choice but to supplement my meager income, making my weekends even more precious.

“Shouldn’t you be heading out, Allie?” Elena, my overworked supervisor, glanced over at me. “You won’t have time to get to the bank if you don’t leave now.”

Crap. Two months and already Elena had pegged me as someone chronically late. “I won’t be back,” I called out as I hobbled toward the elevator.

Elena waved absently good-bye, and moments later I was alone in the elevator, starting the sixty-three-floor descent.

I could risk taking off my shoes, just for a few moments of blessed relief, but with my luck someone would immediately join me and I’d have to shove them back on again. I leaned against the wall, trying to shift my weight from one foot to the other. Great legs, I reminded myself.

Out the sixty-third-floor windows, the sun had been shining brightly. The moment I moved through the lobby’s automatic door to the sidewalk, I heard a loud crash of thunder, and I looked up to see dark clouds churning overhead. The storm seemed to have come out of nowhere.

It was a cool October afternoon, with Halloween only a few days off. The sidewalks were busy as usual, and the bank was across the street. I could always walk and eat a hot dog at the same time, I thought, heading over to the luncheon cart. I’d done it often enough.

With my luck there had to be a line. I bounced nervously, shifting my weight, and the man in front of me turned around.

I’d lived in New York long enough to make it a habit not to look at people on the street. Here in mid-town, most of the women were taller, thinner, and better dressed than I was, and I didn’t like feeling inadequate. I never made eye contact with anyone, not even with Harvey the hot-dog man, who’d served me daily for the last two months.

So why was I looking up, way up, into a pair of eyes that were . . . God, what color were they? A strange shade between black and gray, shot with striations of light so that they almost looked silver. I was probably making a fool of myself, but I couldn’t help it. Never in my life had I seen eyes that color, though that shouldn’t surprise me since I avoided looking in the first place.

But even more astonishing, those eyes were watching me thoughtfully. Beautiful eyes in a beautiful face, I realized belatedly. I didn’t like men who were too attractive, and that term was mild when it came to the man looking down at me, despite my four-inch heels.

He was almost angelically handsome, with his high cheekbones, his aquiline nose, his streaked brown and golden hair. It was precisely the tawny shade I’d tried to get my colorist to replicate, and she’d always fallen woefully short.

“Who does your hair?” I blurted out, trying to startle him out of his abstraction.

“I am as God made me,” he said, and his voice was as beautiful as his face. Low-pitched and musical, the kind of voice to seduce a saint. “With a few modifications,” he added, with a twist of dark humor I couldn’t understand.

His gorgeous hair was too long—I hated long hair on men. On him it looked perfect, as did the dark leather jacket, the black jeans, the dark shirt.

Not proper city wear, I thought, trying to summon up disapproval and failing because he looked so damned good. “Since you don’t seem in any kind of hurry and I am, do you suppose you could let me go ahead of you?”

There was another crash of thunder, echoing through the cement and steel canyons around us, and I flinched. Thunderstorms in the city made me nervous—they seemed so there. It always seemed like the lightning snaking down between the high buildings would find me an easier target. The man didn’t even blink. He glanced across the street, as if calculating something.

“It’s almost three o’clock,” he said. “If you want your deposit to go in today, you’ll need to skip that hot dog.”

I froze. “What deposit?” I demanded, completely paranoid. God, what was I doing holding a conversation with a strange man? I should never have paid any attention to him. I could have lived without the hot dog.

“You’re holding a bank deposit bag,” he said mildly.

Oh. Yeah. I laughed nervously. I should have been ashamed of my paranoia, but for some reason it hadn’t even begun to dissipate. I allowed myself another furtive glance up at the stranger.

To hell with the hot dog—my best bet was to get away from this too-attractive stranger, drop off the deposit, and hope to God I could find a taxi to get me across town to my meeting. I was already ten minutes late.

He was still watching me. “You’re right,” I said. Another crash of thunder, and the clouds opened up.

And I was wearing a red silk suit that I couldn’t really afford, even on clearance from Saks. Vanity again. Without a backward glance, I stepped out into the street, which was momentarily free of traffic.

It happened in slow motion, it happened in the blink of an eye. One of my high heels snapped, my ankle twisted, and the sudden rain was turning the garbage on the street into a river of filth. I slipped, going down on one knee, and I could feel my stockings shred, my skirt rip, my carefully arranged hair plastered limp and wet around my ears.

I looked up, and there it was, a crosstown bus ready to smack into me. Another crack of thunder, the bright white sizzle of lightning, and everything went calm and still. Just for a moment.

And then it was a blur of noise and action. I could hear people screaming, and to my astonishment money was floating through the air like autumn leaves, swirling downward in the heavy rain. The bus had come to a stop, slanted across the street, and horns were honking, people were cursing, and in the distance I could hear the scream of sirens. Pretty damned fast response for New York, I thought absently.

The man was standing beside me, the beautiful one from the hot-dog stand. He was just finishing a chili dog, entirely at ease, and I remembered I was famished. If I was going to get held up by a bus accident, I might as well get a chili dog. But for some reason, I didn’t want to turn around.

“What happened?” I asked him. He was tall enough to see over the crowds of people clustered around the front of the bus. “Did someone get hurt?”

“Yes,” he said in that rich, luscious voice. “Someone was killed.”

I started toward the crowd, curious, but he caught my arm. “You don’t want to go there,” he said. “There’s no need to go through that.”

Go through what? I thought, annoyed, staring at the crowd. I glanced back up at the stranger, and I had the odd feeling that he’d gotten taller. I suddenly realized my feet didn’t hurt anymore, and I looked down. It was an odd, disorienting sensation. I was barefoot, and if I didn’t know it was impossible, I would have said there was thick green grass beneath my feet.

I glanced back up at the rain-drenched accident scene in front of me, and time seemed to have moved in an odd, erratic shift. The ambulance had arrived, as well as the police, and people were being herded out of the way. I thought I caught a glimpse of the victim—just the brief sight of my leg, wearing my shoe, the heel broken off.

“No,” said the man beside me, and he put a hand on my arm before I could move away.

The bright light was blinding, dazzling, and I was in a tunnel, light whizzing past me, the only sound the whoosh of space moving at a dizzying speed.

Space Mountain, I thought, but this was no Disney ride.

It stopped as abruptly as it had begun, and I felt sick. I was disoriented and out of breath; I looked around me, trying to get my bearings.

The man still held my arm loosely, and I yanked it free, stumbling away from him. We were in the woods, in some sort of clearing at the base of a cliff, and it was already growing dark. The sick feeling in my stomach began to spread to the rest of my body.

I took a deep breath. Everything felt odd, as if this were a movie set. Things looked right, but everything seemed artificial, no smells, no sensation of touch. It was all illusion. It was wrong.

I wiggled my feet, then realized I was still barefoot. My hair hung down past my shoulders, which made no sense since I had short hair. I tugged at a strand, and saw that instead of its carefully streaked and striated color, it was brown again, the plain, ordinary brown I’d spent a fortune trying to disguise, the same plain, ordinary brown as my eyes. My clothes were different as well, and the change wasn’t for the better. Baggy, shapeless, colorless, they were as unprepossessing as a shroud.

I fought my way through the mists of confusion—my mind felt as if it were filled with cotton candy. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong.

“Don’t struggle,” the man beside me said in a remote voice. “It only makes it worse. If you’ve lived a good life, you have nothing to be afraid of.”

I looked at him in horror. Lightning split open the sky, followed by thunder that shook the earth. The solid rock face in front of us began to groan, a deep, rending sound that echoed to the heavens. It started to crack apart, and I remembered something from Christian theology about stones moving and Christ rising from the dead. The only problem was that I was Jewish, as my fundamentalist Christian mother had been for most of her life, and I was nonobservant at that. I didn’t think rising from the dead was what was going on here.

“The bus,” I said flatly. “I got hit by the bus. I’m dead, aren’t I?”

“Yes.”

I controlled my instinctive flinch. Clearly he didn’t believe in cushioning blows. “And who does that make you? Mr. Jordan?”

He looked blank, and I stared at him. “You’re an angel,” I clarified. “One who’s made a mistake. You know, like in the movie? I shouldn’t be dead.”

“There is no mistake,” he said, and took my arm again.

I sure as hell wasn’t going quietly. “Are you an angel?” I demanded. He didn’t feel like one. He felt like a man, a distinctly real man, and why the hell was I suddenly feeling alert, alive, aroused, when according to him I was dead?

His eyes were oblique, half-closed. “Among other things.”

Kicking him in the shin and running like hell seemed an excellent plan, but I was barefoot and my body wasn’t feeling cooperative. As angry and desperate as I was, I still seemed to want him to touch me, even when I knew he had nothing good in mind. Angels didn’t have sex, did they? They didn’t even have sexual organs, according to the movie Dogma. I found myself glancing at his crotch, then quickly pulled my gaze away. What the hell was I doing checking out an angel’s package when I was about to die?

Oh, yeah, I’d forgotten—I was already dead. And all my will seemed to have vanished. He drew me toward the crack in the wall, and I knew with sudden clarity it would close behind me like something out of a cheesy movie, leaving no trace that I’d ever lived. Once I went through, it would all be over.

“This is as far as I go,” he said, his rich, warm voice like music. And with a gentle tug on my arm, he propelled me forward, pushing me into the chasm.

CHAPTER TWO

THE WOMAN WAS FIGHTING ME. I could feel resistance in her arm, something I couldn’t remember feeling before in any of the countless people I’d brought on this journey. She was strong, this one. But Uriel, the ruler of all the heavens, was infallible, or so he had managed to convince just about everyone, so this couldn’t be a mistake, no matter what it felt like.

She was just like so many others I had brought here. People stripped of their artifice, shocked and needy, while I herded them on to their next life like a shepherd of old, not wasting much thought on the entire process. These humans were simply moving through the stages of existence, and it was in their nature to fight it. Just as it was my job to ease their passage and see them on their way.

But this woman was different. I knew it, whether I wanted to admit it or not. She should have been anonymous, like all the others. Instead I stared down at her, trying to see what eluded me. She was nothing special. With her face stripped free of makeup and her hair down around her shoulders, she looked like a thousand others. The baggy clothes she now wore hid her body, but it didn’t matter. I didn’t care about women, in particular human women. I’d sworn off them for eternity, or for as long as Uriel kept me alive. This one should have been as interesting to me as a goldfish.

Instead I reacted to her as if she somehow mattered. Perhaps Azazel was right, and swearing off women and sex had been a bad idea. Celibacy was an unhealthy state for all creatures great and small, he’d argued. It was even worse for the Fallen. Our kind need sex as much as we need blood, and I was intent on keeping away from both. And instead of things getting easier, this woman was resisting.

I paid no attention to my hunger—it had nothing to do with her, and I could ignore it as I’d been ignoring it for so long. But she was somehow able to fight back when no one else could, and that was something I couldn’t ignore.

There was no question—Allegra Watson was supposed to be here. I had stood and waited as she stepped in front of the bus, moving in to scoop her up at the moment of death and not a second before.

I never lingered. There was no need for her to suffer—her fate had been ordained and there were no last-minute reprieves. I had watched the bus smash into her, waiting just long enough to feel her life force flicker out. And then it was over.

Some argued when I brought them away. In general, lawyers were the biggest pain in my ass, also stockbrokers. They cursed me—but then, they weren’t heading where Allie Watson was heading. Lawyers and stockbrokers and politicians uniformly went to hell, and I never minded escorting them. I took them to the darkside, pushing them over the cliff without a moment’s regret.

It always shocked them, those who were banished. First they couldn’t believe they could actually die, and when hell loomed up they were astonished, indignant.

“I don’t believe in hell,” many of them had said, and I always tried to resist the impulse to tell them that hell believed in them. Sometimes I even succeeded.

“You’re a goddamned angel,” one had said, never realizing quite how accurate he was. “Why are you sending me to hell?”

I never bothered to give them the straight answer. That they deserved it, that their lives had been filled with despicable, unforgivable things. I didn’t care enough.

Goddamned angel, indeed. What else would a fallen angel be, a creature cursed by God and his administrator, the archangel Uriel? As man had developed and free will had come into play, the Supreme Being had all but disappeared, abandoning those in heaven and hell and everywhere in between, leaving Uriel to carry out his orders, enforce his powerful will. Uriel, the last of the great archangels to resist temptation, pride, and lust, the only one not to tumble to earth.

The curse on my kind had been clear: eternal life accompanied by eternal damnation. “Ãnd ye shall have no peace nor forgíveness of sín: and ínasmuch as they delíght themselves ín theír chíldren, / The murder of theír beloved ones shall they see, and over the destructíon of theír chíldren shall they lament, and shall make supplícatíon unto eterníty, but mercy and peace shall ye not attaín.”

We were the outcasts, the eaters of blood. We were the Fallen, living our eternity by the rules laid out.

But there were the others, the flesh-eaters, who had come after us. The soldier angels who were sent to punish us instead fell as well. They were unable to feel, and driven mad by it. The Nephilim, who tore living flesh and devoured it, were a horror unlike anything ever seen before on the earth, and the sounds of their screams in the darkness rained terror on those left behind, those of us in the half-life.

We had taken one half of the curse: to live forever while we watched our women die, and to become eaters of blood. While the Nephilim knew hunger of the darkest kind, a hunger for flesh that could only be fed with death and terror.

This had been our lot. Two of the oldest earthly taboos—eating human flesh and drinking human blood. Neither could survive without it, though we Fallen had learned to regulate our fierce needs, as well as the other needs that drove us—that had driven us from grace in the beginning, before time had been counted.

In the end the Fallen had made peace with Uriel. In return for the task of collecting souls, we were allowed at least a measure of autonomy. Uriel had been determined to wipe the Fallen from the face of this earth, but the Supreme Being had, for once, intervened, staying our execution. And while there were no reversals of the curses already in place, there would be no new ones levied against us. For what little joy that brought us.

As long as we continued our job, the status quo would remain. The Nephilim would still hunt us by night, rending, tearing, devouring.

The Fallen would live by day as well, fed by sex and blood, with those needs kept under fierce control.

And Allie Watson was just one more soul to be delivered to Uriel before I could return to our hidden place. Do the job and get back before too much time elapsed. The duties of a fallen angel were not onerous, and I had never failed. Never been tempted. There had even been a time when I rushed to get back to the woman I loved.

But there had been too many women. There would be no more. I had one reason and one reason alone to hurry back.

I couldn’t stand humans.

This particular creature was no different, though I couldn’t understand how she had the strength to resist my resolve, even the small amount of resistance I felt beneath my grip. Her skin was soft, which was a distraction. I didn’t want to think about her skin, or the unmistakable fear in her rich brown eyes. I could have reassured her, but I’d never been tempted to intervene before, and I wasn’t about to make an exception for this woman. I wanted to, which bothered me. I wanted to do more than that. My hands shook with need.

I looked down into her panicked face and I wanted to comfort, and I wanted to feed, and I wanted to fuck. All of the needs I kept locked away. She didn’t need anything from me. If she did, she’d have to make do without.

But the stronger her panic, the stronger my hunger, and I gave in to the safest of my urges. “Don’t be afraid,” I said, using the voice given to me to soothe frightened creatures. “It will be fine.” And I pulled her forward, spinning her out into the darkness and releasing her as I stepped back.

It was only at the last minute I saw the flames. I heard her scream, and I grabbed for her without thinking, dragging her back. I felt the deadly fire sear my flesh, and I knew then what had been waiting for me, out there in the darkness. Fire was death to my kind, and the flame had leapt to my flesh like a hungry lover. I pulled the woman out of the dark and hungry maw that should have been what humans referred to as heaven, and I sealed my own trip to a hell that would have no end.

We tumbled backward, onto the ground with her soft body sprawled on top of mine, and I was instantly hard, my rebellious flesh overruling everything I’d been trying to tell it for decades, overshadowing the pain as a pure, unspeakable lust flamed through me, only to be banished a moment later.

An inhuman howl of rage echoed up from the flames. A moment later the rocks slid closed with a hideous grinding noise, and there was nothing but silence.

I couldn’t move. The agony in my arm was unspeakable, wiping out my momentary reaction to the woman’s soft body sprawled across mine, and I could almost be glad. The flames were out, but I knew what fire did to my kind. A slow, agonizing death.

It was one of the few things that could kill us, that and the traditional ways of disposing of blood-eaters. Beheading could kill us as surely as it would kill a human.

So would the minor burn on my arm.

If I’d only stopped to think, I would have let her go. Who knew how she’d spent her short life, what crimes she’d committed, what misery she’d inflicted on others? It wasn’t my place to judge, merely to transport. Why hadn’t I remembered that and let her fall?

But even as I felt the pain leaching away any semblance of common sense, I couldn’t help but remember I’d brought any number of innocent souls to this very place, seemingly good people, cast them forth, assured them that they were going to the place of peace they’d earned. Instead it had been hell, the same hell to which I’d taken the lawyers and stockbrokers. This was no temporary glitch. I knew Uriel too well. Hell and its fiery pit were Uriel’s constructions, and I knew, instinctively, that we’d been offered no alternative when we’d delivered our charges. I had been dooming the innocent ones to eternal damnation, unknowing.

The sin of pride, Uriel would have said placidly, with great sorrow. The cosmic hypocrite would shake his head over me and my many failings. To question the word of the Supreme Being and the emissary he’d chosen to enforce it was an act of paramount sacrilege.

In other words, do what you’re told and don’t ask questions. Our failure to do that was why we had fallen in the first place. And I had done more than question—I had just contravened the word. I was in deep shit.

Night was falling around us. The woman rolled off me, scrambling away as if I were Uriel himself. I tried to find my voice, to say something to reassure her, but the pain was too fierce. The best I could do was grit my teeth to keep from screaming in agony.

She was halfway across the clearing, huddled on the ground, watching me in dawning disbelief and horror. Too late I realized my lips were drawn back in a silent scream, and she could see my elongated fangs.

“What in God’s name are you?” Her voice was little more than a choked gasp of horror.

I ignored her question—I had more important things to deal with. I had to gather my self-control or I was doomed. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be able to save myself at this point, and I couldn’t save her either, not that I particularly cared. She had gotten me into this mess in the first place.

She was going to have to help get me out of it, whether she wanted to or not. I shuddered, forcing the agony back down my throat. In a few minutes I wouldn’t be able to do even that much; a few minutes longer and I would be unconscious. By morning I would probably be dead.

Did I care? I wasn’t sure it mattered one way or the other. But I didn’t want to leave her behind, where the Nephilim could get her. I’d rather finish her myself before they tore her body into pieces while she screamed for help that would never come.

I sucked in a deep bite of air, steeling myself. “Need . . . to make a . . . fire,” I managed, feeling the dizziness pressing against my brain, feeling the darkness closing in. I could hear the monsters out in the night forest, the low, guttural growling of the Nephilim. They would rip her apart in front of me, and I would be paralyzed, unable to do anything but listen to her screams as they ate her alive.

Things were beginning to fade, and the nothingness called to me, a siren song so tempting that I wanted to let go, to drift into that lovely place, the warm, sweet place where the pain stopped. I managed to look over at her—she was curled in on herself, unmoving. Probably whimpering, I thought dizzily.

Useless human, who probably belonged in hell anyway.

And then she lifted her head, staring at me, and I could read her thoughts easily. She was going to make a run for it, and I couldn’t blame her. She wouldn’t last five minutes out there in the darkness, but with luck I’d be unconscious by the time they began ripping her flesh from her bones. I didn’t want to hear the sounds of her screams as she died.

One more try, and then I’d let go. I tried to rise, to pull the last ounce of strength from my poisoned body, struggling to warn her. “Do not . . .” I said. “You need a fire . . . to scare them away.”

She rose, first to her knees, then to her bare feet, and I sank back. There was nothing else I could do. She was frightened, and she would run—

“And how am I supposed to start a fire?” she said, her voice caustic. “I don’t have any matches and I’m not exactly the camping type.”

I could just manage to choke out the words. “Leaves,” I gasped. “Twigs. Branches.”

To my glazed surprise, she began gathering the fuel from nearby, and within a few minutes she had a neat little pile, with branches and logs on the side.

The last of the twilight was slowly fading, and I could hear them beyond the clearing, the odd, shuffling noise they made, the terrible reek of decaying flesh and old blood.

She was looking at me, expectant, impatient. “Fire?” she prompted.

“My . . . arm,” I barely choked out. The last ounce of energy faded, and blessed darkness rushed in. And my last thought was now it was up to her. I had done everything I could.

And the night closed down around us.

CHAPTER THREE

HE’D PASSED OUT. I STARED down at him, torn. I should leave him, I thought. I didn’t owe him anything, and if I had any sense at all I’d get the hell out of there and leave him to fend for himself.

But I could hear those noises out in the darkness, and they made my blood run cold. They sounded like some kind of wild animal, and in truth I’d never been Outdoors Girl. My idea of roughing it was going without makeup. If those creatures out there liked to eat meat, then they had dinner stretched out on the ground, waiting for them. It even smelled as if he were already slightly charbroiled. I didn’t owe him anything. So what if he’d pulled me back from the jaws of hell . . . or whatever it was? He was the one who’d pushed me there in the first place. Besides, he’d only gotten slightly singed, and he was acting like it was third-degree burns over most of his body. He was a drama queen, and after my mother and my last boyfriend, I’d had enough of those to last me a lifetime.

Hell, who was I kidding? Whether he deserved it or not, I wasn’t going to leave him as food for wolves or whatever they were. I couldn’t do that to a fellow human being—if that was what he was. Though I still didn’t have the faintest idea how I was going to start the damned fire.

I edged closer, looking down at him. He was unconscious, and in the stillness the unearthly beauty of his face was almost as disturbing as the unmistakable evidence of fangs his grimace of pain had exposed. Was he a vampire? An angel? A fiend from hell or a creature of God?

“Shit,” I muttered, kneeling beside him to get a closer look at the burn on his arm. The skin was smooth, glowing slightly, but there were no blisters, no burned flesh. He was nothing more than a big baby. I reached out to shake him, then yanked my arm back with another “Shit,” as I realized that beneath the smooth skin fire burned.

That was impossible. It looked as if coals were glowing deep under the skin, and the eerie glow was putting out impressive amounts of heat.

There was a shuffling noise in the underbrush, and I froze. My comatose abductor/savior wasn’t the highest priority. The danger in the darkness beyond was worse. Whatever was out there was evil, ancient, and soulless, something foul and indescribable. I could feel it in the pit of my stomach, a nameless dread like something out of a Stephen King novel.

This was just wrong. I wrote cozy mysteries, not horror novels. What was I doing in the equivalent of a Japanese horror movie? Not that there’d been any blood as yet. But I could smell it on the night air, and it sickened me.

I glanced back at the small pile of twigs and grasses that I’d assembled. My fingertips were scorched, and on impulse I scooped up some dried leaves and touched them against his arm.

They burst into flames, and I dropped them, startled; they fell onto the makeshift pyre, igniting it.

The fire was bright, flames shooting upward into the sky. But darkness had closed in around us, and the monsters were still waiting.

I put more leaves on top of the fire, adding twigs and branches, listening to the reassuring crackle as they caught. It was only common sense, using fire to scare away the carnivorous predators in the darkness. Even cavemen had done it. Of course, cavemen hadn’t started fires from the scorched skin of a fanged creature, but I was handling things the best I could. Hell, maybe saber-toothed tigers had had fire beneath their pelts as well. Anything was possible.

I rose, turning back to my own personal saber-toothed tiger. We were too close to the fire, close enough that my companion would go up in flames if we stayed there. If I could pull him back against the rock face, we might be safe, and it would be easier to defend only one side of the clearing. I reached under his arms and tugged at his shoulders.

“Come on, Dracula,” I muttered. “You’re too big for me to move on my own. I gotta have some help here.”

He didn’t stir. I looked down at him, frustrated. He wasn’t huge, more long-limbed and elegant than bulky; and while I didn’t waste my limited time and money chasing after the perfect body in one of the many fitness clubs in Manhattan, I was strong enough. I should have been able to drag him a short distance away from the fire. Nothing was making any sense, and all the possible explanations put him in a fairly nasty light. Even so, I couldn’t just let him die.

I couldn’t get a good enough grip on his body, so I caught hold of his jacket and yanked. He was unexpectedly heavy, though it shouldn’t have surprised me—the man had towered over my meager five foot three, and I’d felt the crushing strength in his hand as he’d propelled me toward the . . .

I couldn’t remember. Five minutes later, and I couldn’t remember a damned thing. I didn’t know how he’d managed to get burned, or what he’d been trying to do. It was a blank. Everything was a blank. The last thing I remembered was stepping off the curb outside the office building on my way to meet with my editors.

They were going to be pissed as hell that I’d stood them up again.

How much time had passed since then? Days, weeks, months? The short, sassy hairstyle I’d spent a fortune on was now an unruly mane hanging down to my shoulders, and I could see that it was its original mousy brown instead of the tawny, streaked blond I’d gone for. That certainly couldn’t have happened in a matter of hours. How long had I been gone?

His heavy body finally began to budge, and I dragged him as far as I could until he let out a piercing cry of pain. I let him be, squatting beside him, staring at his burned flesh. It was the weirdest thing—it seemed like he had flames beneath his skin, as if his bones were made of burning coals.

His entire body was radiating heat, but apart from his arm he wasn’t painful to touch. The night had grown sharply colder, and the shapeless thing I was wearing wasn’t made for late autumn nights. My patient shivered as I put more wood on the fire. Thank God I’d grabbed an armload. The nighttime marauders seemed to have gone, but there was no guarantee they wouldn’t return if I were fool enough to let the fire go out. Wolves didn’t actually attack people, did they? But who said they were wolves?

It was going to be a long night.

I sat back on my heels, studying him. Who was he, and what the hell had he done to me? There had to be a reasonable explanation for what had appeared to be fangs. There were crazies out there who filed their teeth to points so they could resemble vampires—I’d seen it on one of the rotting corpse television shows like CSI or Bones.

I could certainly see why some people would want to dress up like vampires. After all, bloodsuckers were hot and elegant; they dressed well and clearly had a lot of sex, if all the fiction was to be believed. They also didn’t exist.

But this particular man didn’t need to dress up or pretend to be anything he wasn’t. He was hot, in every sense of the word. I snickered at the notion. No one was around to appreciate my feeble wit, but I’d always managed to amuse myself.

“So what’s up with you?” I demanded of his unconscious figure. “What are we doing here? Did you abduct me?” Wishful thinking on my part. This was a man who clearly had no need to kidnap women. All he had to do was snap his fingers, and they’d be lining up around the block.

I had no illusions about my own charms. I was no troll, and I cleaned up pretty well, but next to this man I was clearly only ordinary. All the gym memberships in the world couldn’t seem to get rid of the unwanted ten pounds that hugged my hips. With the right clothes, hair, and makeup I was someone to reckon with, but even so I’d never be in this man’s league. Right now, dressed in sackcloth and ashes, I probably looked like a bag lady.

Not that I cared. My only company was passed out, presumably for the night. I leaned back, stretching my legs out in front of me, then realized I was leaning against the stone wall. I scrambled away from it, thoroughly creeped out. Hadn’t it split open, revealing some kind of horror . . . ? No, that was impossible.

And yet, where had the fire come from? It seemed to me I could remember flames, like the flames of hell, before he pulled me back again—no, the night must be sending my imagination into overdrive.

Smoke billowed up into the inky-blue sky, and I shivered again, wrapping my arms around my body in a useless attempt to warm myself. I could feel the thin, loose clothing beneath my fingers—it was little wonder I was freezing. And there was a delicious source of heat lying at my feet.

He was nothing special, apart from his rather spectacular good looks. And I lived in the Village—I saw any number of beautiful men on a daily basis and they never made me weak in the knees. Of course, in the Village most of the men would be patently unavailable, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t appreciate them. I seriously lusted after Russell Crowe, and he was just as unlikely to find his way into my bed.

This man wasn’t my type. I liked rugged men, a little on the beefy side, with broad shoulders, and average height so they didn’t make me feel small and inconsequential. I hated being loomed over, and if I could have found a boyfriend shorter than my five foot three, I would have grabbed him.

He had dark gold eyelashes fanned out against his high cheekbones. Even unconscious, he was still clearly in pain. If only I could remember how the hell I’d ended up here with him, I might figure a way out of it. But my mind was a blank, and all I could do was sit next to the unknown man at my feet and worry.

I put my hand on his hot forehead, brushing a lock of his hair away, and he muttered something beneath his breath.

“Hush,” I murmured. “Hush, now. We’ll find help in the morning if you’re not better.” I could hike out of this place and find the police as well as a hospital, and maybe come up with some solid answers.

But in the meantime I was freezing and he was warm and I wasn’t going anywhere. And while I couldn’t remember how he’d been hurt, any more than I could remember how the hell I’d ended up here, I had the unmistakable conviction that he’d been wounded trying to help me. So I owed him.

I lay down beside him, the ground cold and hard beneath me despite my natural padding. I’d always wondered why metal chairs hurt my butt when I clearly carried my own built-in cushion—if I had to have those extra pounds, I ought to have had some benefits.

I inched closer to the living furnace beside me, leaning against the comforting, solid feel of him. The dangerous heat sank into my bones, and I let out a blissful sigh.

He moaned, restless, and suddenly moved, rolling onto his side and putting his good arm around me. I was pressed up against him, and he was hot.

Too hot. Burning up.

But for some crazy reason, he felt so safe. He lay back, still holding me, and I went with him, letting my head rest against his shoulder. For the moment there was nothing I could do to rescue us. For the moment I could close my eyes, listening to the wild creatures out there in the darkness, and know that I was safe.

I could remember nothing; it was all lost and fuzzy. I was like that fish in Finding Nemo—two seconds later and the thought was gone. I only knew one thing. Lying in this man’s arms was good, and there was no place else I wanted to be. Not back in my apartment in the Village, not doing any of the thousand empty things that had seemed so important just a short time ago. This was where I belonged.

Beyond in the darkness, the hungry creatures howled their rage.

And I closed my eyes and slept.

CHAPTER FOUR

AZAZEL LOOKED OUT AT THE sky from his perch atop the high cliff. His only company was the occasional night bird—the rest of the Fallen knew well enough to leave him alone at times like these. He could be very dangerous when roused.

He closed his eyes, trying to concentrate on Raziel. He had gone out for a routine pickup—should have been back hours ago. But there was no sign of him.

He had been with Raziel since the beginning of time. They were brothers, though born from no woman’s womb. He had always known when Raziel was in any kind of trouble, but right now that connection was blocked.

There could be any number of reasons. Raziel could turn off the mental connection anytime he wanted to, and he often did. During his jobs. During sex.

Though Raziel had sworn he would never bond again, and his brief sexual encounters were rare.

He could be underground, or caught in an electrical storm. Strange atmospheric conditions sometimes interfered with the strong bond that lay between them.

Or he could be dead.

No, that was unthinkable. He would know if Raziel had died—they were too much a part of each other, from back in the mists of prehistory.

He closed his eyes, breathing in deeply, searching for the smell of him, the merest trace of him. He sent his questioning mind in each direction, and finally he felt it. The faintest spark of life—he was barely holding on. He wasn’t strong enough to signal for help, but Azazel sensed he wasn’t alone.

Whoever was with him might be able to help. All he or she had to do was ask.

Unless Raziel’s companion was the one who had brought him close to death in the first place.

Azazel’s eyes flew open. There were others in their hidden stronghold who had different gifts. Someone else might be able to narrow down where Raziel was. And if they were to have a chance of saving him, he would need help.

He looked out over the stormy ocean, the thick mists of daylight moving in, the mists that kept them hidden from everyone. Their home was tucked away on the northwest coast of North America, between the United States and Canada, shrouded in shadows and fog. Sheol was safety, secrecy, literally “the hidden place.” A place where they could dwell in peace until Uriel sent one of them out to collect one of the infrequent souls that actually required guidance.

Sheol had been in its current location for hundreds of years. A physical place that sheltered both the Fallen and their human wives, it could still be moved if Azazel deemed it necessary.

But there was no way to shield it from Uriel’s inimical gaze. He would find them, as the Nephilim would, and the uneasy détente would continue.

They had no choice. The Fallen lived precariously, doomed to eternal life, to watch their mates age and die while they stayed young. Cursed to become a feared and hated monstrosity.

By day they were free. And they’d learned to harness their blazing need, to control it and use it. No one outside the community would understand, and he didn’t expect them to. Ignorance was safer. They would keep their secrets, whatever the price.

He rose, his wings spreading out behind him, and soared down to the rocky outcropping in front of the great house. By the time he landed, the others had gathered, Raphael and Michael, Gabriel and Sammael.

“Where is he?” Azazel demanded roughly. “We cannot lose him.”

“We can’t lose any of us,” Gabriel said somberly. “He’s been betrayed.”

Michael snarled, his dangerous anger barely in check. “Who the fuck betrayed him? Why hasn’t Uriel looked out for him?”

Tamlel was the last to join them in front of the dawn-struck sea. They were the oldest of the Fallen still left on earth, the guardians, the protectors. Only Sammael was newer. “I don’t know where he is,” he said, his slow, deep voice leaden. “I don’t know if we’ll be in time. He is very weak. If I could just get a fix on him . . .”

Azazel hid his reaction behind a cold, unemotional exterior. If Tam couldn’t find him, there was no hope. Tamlel’s gifts were specific but strong. If one of the Fallen was lost, he could find him, until the very last spark of life was extinguished. If the energy was too weak even for Tam, then Raziel was doomed.

Unless someone found him and called for help, he would die, countless millennia after he’d first come into existence. The Fallen were not even given the comfort of death, but something far more terrifying.

Falling had made them close to human. The curses that accompanied that fall from grace might have finally caught up with Raziel. No hope of redemption, not even the dubious blessing of Uriel’s hell. Just an eternity of agonized nothingness.

Azazel shut his eyes, pain lancing through him. There had been so many losses, endless losses, so few of the original left. This might be one loss too many.

And then he lifted his head, and he could feel the light enter his body again. “I think I hear her,” he said softly.

CHAPTER FIVE

IT WAS ALMOST DAWN, AND THE MAN next to me was dying. His body felt as if it were on fire, and the coals had spread beneath his skin, emanating an unearthly red glow that lit the darkness after the fire had finally died out. He hadn’t made a sound in hours; even his moans had been silenced. Sometime in the night he’d released his hold on me, and the heat from his skin had become unbearable. I wondered why his clothes hadn’t burst into flames.

I’d done what I could to cool him down—I’d managed to strip the leather jacket from him and put it beneath his head as a makeshift pillow, then unfastened his denim shirt and pulled it free from his jeans, opening it to the cool night air, feeling oddly guilty about it. The skin on his chest and stomach was smooth, with just a faint tracing of golden hair. Human, I’d thought, and laughed at myself for thinking anything else. I’d reached out a hand to touch him, unconsciously drawn, and yanked my hand back, burned.

His mouth was a grim line of pain. At least I was spared the disquieting view of those disturbing teeth. I must have been hallucinating, and no wonder. I didn’t know where I was, when I was, or how I’d even got here, and the night had been filled with the terrifying sounds of predators. No wonder I was imagining things.

Even now my brain wasn’t working properly. One thing was clear—I wouldn’t have come here on my own. So it was only logical to assume this man had brought me here; and being a city girl, I wouldn’t have come willingly. While I liked a pretty face as much as the next female, I was preternaturally wary.

So why was I so determined to protect this man? This man who didn’t seem to be quite human, teeth or not? The glow of fire beneath his skin was far from normal. Yet I knew that I had to keep him alive, I had to stay with him.

The first light of dawn was beginning to spread over the tall trees that guarded the clearing. Whatever foul things had lurked in the bushes were long gone, and there was nothing keeping me here. I could walk out of this forest—it couldn’t go on forever. The man was dying; there was nothing else I could do for him except see if I could find help. I should save myself, and if he survived, fine. It wasn’t my business.

But it was. I moved closer to him, as close as I could get to the ferocious heat that burned deep inside his bones. “It serves you right,” I whispered, wishing I dared put my hand on him, to push the tangled hair away from his face without getting scorched.

Except that he’d been hurt pulling me back from whatever horror I’d somehow imagined behind what was most definitely solid rock. I couldn’t remember, but that much I knew. He’d been trying to save me, and for that I owed him something.

I edged closer to him, and the heat seared me. I felt tears form in my eyes, and blinked them away impatiently. Crying wouldn’t do any good. If I leaned over and let them fall on him, they would sizzle and evaporate like water on a skillet.

“Oh, hell,” I muttered disgustedly, wiping them away. “You shouldn’t have to die, no matter what you did to me.” I moved closer, and my face felt sunburned. “God help me, don’t fucking die on me,” I said desperately.

The sudden flash of light was blinding, thunder shaking the ground, and I was thrown back against the stone wall. Panic swept through me—what if it opened again; what if this time he couldn’t save me? I scrambled away from it, then turned to look for the dying man, and I knew I was hallucinating again.

His body was surrounded by a circle of tall figures, shrouded in mist, and there were wings everywhere. Maybe he’d died. They must be angels coming to take him . . . where?

One of them picked him up effortlessly, impervious to the heat of his flesh. I was frozen, unable to move. Sure, he was dead and on his way to heaven, but I had no strong desire to accompany him. I wanted to live.

But I could feel eyes on me, and I wondered if I could run for it. And I wondered if I really wanted to.

“Bring her.” The words weren’t spoken out loud; they seemed to vibrate inside my head. I was prepared to fight, prepared to run before I let them put their hands on me, before I let it happen all over again . . . but there was nothing but a blinding white light, followed by dark silence, as a blackness deep and dark as death pulled in about me.

“Shit,” I said weakly. And I was gone.

I WAS COLD. AND DAMP. I could hear a strange sound, a rushing noise almost like the ocean, but there was no ocean in the forest, was there? I really didn’t want to move, even though I was lying somewhere hard and wet, the dampness seeping through my clothes and into my bones. In my Swiss cheese of a memory, it felt as if every time I opened my eyes things had gotten worse. This time I was going to stay put with my eyes tightly shut—it was a lot safer that way.

I licked my lips and tasted salt. There were voices in the distance, a low, muffled chant in a language older than time.

Keep your eyes closed, goddamn it. This had all been one hellacious nightmare, and clearly it wasn’t time to wake up. Once I could feel my comfortable bed and my five-hundred-thread-count cotton sheets beneath me, then it would be safe to wake up. Right now consciousness was nothing but more trouble, and I had had enough.

But all my self-discipline had been reserved for my writing, and when it came to anything else, like denying my curiosity, I had the willpower of a rabbit. I decided to open my eyes just a slit to verify that, yes, I really was lying in wet sand at the edge of a rocky beach. And out in the waves the men stood waist-deep in the water, holding the body of my . . . my what? My kidnapper? My savior? It didn’t matter what the hell he was, he was mine.

He wasn’t dead. I knew this as I struggled to my feet, my whole body feeling as if it had been kicked around by monkeys. He wasn’t dead—yet they were letting him sink beneath the surface as they chanted some kind of garbled nonsense. They were letting him drown, burying him in the sea, and I was not going to let that happen, not after working so hard to keep him alive last night.

I’m not sure whether I said something, screamed “No!” as I raced toward them. Out into the icy water, shoving past them as they let his body go, diving for him before he could sink beneath the turbulent waves.

It was only when my hand touched him beneath the water, felt him turn and his hand catch mine, that I conveniently remembered that I had never learned to swim.

The words came out of nowhere, dancing in my head:

Full fathom five thy father lies:

Of his bones are coral made;

Those are pearls that were his eyes:

Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth suffer a sea-change Into something rich and strange.

The words were muzzy, dreamlike, but now I was the one sinking. What an idiot I’d been, diving after him. I was going to die after all, and it was no one’s fault but mine. I should have known I’d hear Shakespeare when I died.

I would suffer a sea change, entwined with the demon lover beneath the cold salt sea, and I welcomed it, dazed, when his mouth closed over mine beneath the briny surface, his breath flowing into me, my body plastered against his as I felt life return. A moment later I found myself propelled to the surface, still trapped in the dead man’s arms. The dead man who had pulled his mouth away, and was looking down at me from those strange, silvery black eyes.

Then we were standing waist-deep in the ocean, the waves breaking against us, and he was holding on to me as he looked to the men who had brought him here, a dazed, questioning expression on his face.

Which was basically how I was feeling. A sort of a sodden WTF, and the only thing familiar to hold on to was this man beside me.

Which was basically how I was feeling. A sort of a sodden WTF, and the only thing familiar to hold on to was this man beside me.

“She called for help,” one of the men said from the shore. “You told us to bring her.”

The man threw back his head and laughed, unexpected and unguarded, and relief washed through me. His teeth were white and even. I’d been imagining the fangs, of course. Vampires weren’t real. I couldn’t believe I even remembered that particular hallucination.

He scooped me up in his arms, and I rested my face against his wet chest as he carried me out of the surf, not quite sure why. The footing must have been uneven, yet he carried me without a misstep, almost gliding over the rough sand. I’d never been carried in my life—despite my short stature I was built upon generous lines, and no one had ever been romantic enough to scoop me up and carry me to bed.

Of course, that wasn’t what this man was doing. Come to think of it, what the hell was he doing? I looked up at a huge stone building set on the edge of the sea, and I squirmed, trying to get down. He ignored me. That, at least, felt familiar.

He didn’t put me down, and I found I knew him well enough not to expect that he would. He’d kissed me. Sort of. He’d put his cold, wet mouth on mine and breathed life into me, when he was the one who’d been on the verge of death.

“You wanna put me down?” I demanded in a reasonable voice. Not that I expected him to be reasonable, but it was worth a try. He said nothing, and I struggled, but his grip never tightened. It didn’t need to; it was loose but unbreakable. “Who the fuck are you?” I demanded irritably. “What are you?”

He didn’t answer, of course. The other men came up to us, and I had the oddest sense that they were surrounded by some kind of haze or aura. It must be a reaction to the salt water. No matter how hard I tried to focus, things stayed as hazy as my memory.

“We can get rid of her now, Raziel, before it’s too late,” one with a cold, deep voice said. “She has no more need of you, nor you of her.”

The language sounded oddly old-fashioned, and I tried to turn my head to see who was speaking; but Raziel, the man who was holding me, simply pushed my face against his chest. “What about the Grace? Surely that would work.”

There was a moment’s silence, one that didn’t seem to bode well for my future. With my foggy brain, he was the only thing familiar, and I panicked, reaching up and tugging at his open shirt. “Don’t let them take me.” I sounded pathetic, but there was nothing I could do about it. I’d swallowed some salt water before Raziel grabbed me, and my voice was raw.

He glanced down at me, and I knew that look. It was as if he knew everything about me, had read my diaries, peeked into my fantasies. It was unnerving. But then he nodded.

“I will keep her, Azazel,” he said. “At least for now.”

Better than nothing, I thought, not precisely flattered. I was tempted to argue, just for the sake of it and because he’d sounded so damned grudging, but I had no idea where I might go, and I didn’t trust those other men who’d tried to drown my companion.

At least for the moment, as long as he held me, nothing could harm me. I could deal with the rest of it when it happened.

For now, I was safe.

CHAPTER SIX

HAD I LOST MY MIND? “I WILL keep her.” Ridiculous. I had no use for a human.

It was early evening. I’d spent most of the day in the pool, letting the seawater wash my battered body, healing the pain that still spiked through me.

Azazel was looking at me. “What are we going to do with the woman? Now is not the time to bring someone new into Sheol, particularly someone with no set purpose. Uriel moves closer, and the Nephilim are at our very doorstep. We can’t waste time with inconsequentials.”

“Where is she?” I said, stalling for time, my voice cool as I stretched out on the black leather sofa. The searing agony was gone, but my body ached as if I had run a marathon and then been trampled by a herd of goats.

“Sarah has her. She and the other women will take care of her, calm her fears.”

“Will they tell her the truth?” I wasn’t sure that was a good idea. The woman was smart, fearless, and just the kind of woman to fight the status quo. The kind of woman who would drive me to insanity and beyond with her ways.

“She probably knows already. At least part of it. What she remembers, that is,” Azazel said in the icy voice that terrified most of our brethren and managed to roll off my back. We’d been through too much together for him to intimidate me.

“We can always make her forget,” I said. “She has been with me so long the Grace would have to be very strong. She’d be confused for weeks. But it would work. She’s already forgotten what happened when I first took her.”

“But where will she go, old friend? She died yesterday. Her body has already been cremated.”

“Shit,” I said, thoroughly annoyed. “I thought she was Jewish.”

“You know that some of them no longer follow the old ways.”

Typical of humankind. They were always so hypocritical when it came to their faith, choosing what they cared to follow, ignoring anything that was inconvenient. It was little wonder the Supreme Being had washed his hands of them, leaving a heartless bastard like Uriel in his place. “If they are going to be devout enough to bury her immediately, they should at least keep her body intact,” I said, trying not to growl. “We could have worked with that.”

“Where is she going to go?” Azazel persisted. “You have no use for a human female. Unless you’ve changed your mind?”

I knew that was coming. “I haven’t. I won’t bond again, and I have no current need for sex. And if I were stupid enough to change my mind, it wouldn’t be with someone like her.”

“What’s wrong with her?”

I closed my eyes for a moment. I could see her, smart, questioning, undeniably luscious. “She’s just wrong,” I said stubbornly.

Azazel was watching me too closely, and I shifted so he couldn’t see my face. “Then why did you save her?” he said in what for him was a reasonable voice. “Why did you tell us to bring her?”

“How should I know? A moment of insanity. It’s not as if I remember anything that was going on—I was almost dead. Are you sure I did? I could barely speak.”

“Yes. I heard you.”

Damn. Azazel never lied. Even if I couldn’t say the words out loud, Azazel would hear me and follow my wishes. If I’d told them to keep her, I must have had some reason, but damned if I could think of what it was. “Just one more thing to deal with, then. And I have no idea what the hell is going on, only that Uriel has been lying to us.”

“And that surprises you? His power is infinite. As long as free will exists, Uriel is in charge, to heal or hurt anyone as he sees fit. Just because he told us the good ones are moving on is no guarantee that we aren’t taking them straight to hell. Children, babies, young lovers, grandmothers . . . It was foolish of us not to realize he would do this. Uriel is a cruel and mighty judge.”

“Uriel is a pain in my ass.”

“You’d best watch out,” Azazel warned. “You never know when he might be listening.”

I rose, stretching my iridescent blue wings against the twilight sky, glittering against the purple and pink hues that saturated our misty world. “You’re a pain in the ass, Uriel,” I said again, raising my voice so there could be no confusion as to who was tossing out the insults. “You’re a spiteful, vindictive, lying pain in the ass, and if the Supreme Being knew what you were doing, how you were interpreting the laws, you would be in deep shit.” I loved cursing.

That was one thing I actually liked about humans—their language. The rich expressiveness of the words, sacred and profane, that everyone outside of Sheol seemed to use. The way the forbidden words danced on my tongue. Not to mention the fury I knew I was causing Uriel.

Azazel was unamused. “Why are you asking for trouble? We already have enough as it is. What are you going to do with her?”

He was right. Our lives were precarious enough, balanced between Uriel’s powerful hatred and the unspeakable dangers of the Nephilim, and now I had brought our entire family closer to devastation because of one stupid, quixotic gesture. I sank back down on the old leather sofa, momentarily distracted by the feel of it beneath me. Its coolness soothed my damaged body.

“Asking me over and over won’t get you an answer any sooner—it will just annoy me,” I grumbled. “I expect I’ll find someplace to send her. Somewhere far away, and Uriel will have more important reasons to come after us.”

“And you’re sure you have no interest in mating with her?” Azazel said carefully.

“I don’t even want to fuck her.” I watched Azazel wince. Not that he had any problem with the word—he just knew I was courting trouble. Uriel hated words as much as he hated so many other things of the human world, including sex and blood, and I did my level best to annoy him whenever I could. After all, our sentence was eternity, and the one remaining archangel couldn’t kill.

“She will have to stay here for now,” Azazel said finally. “Sarah will know what to do with her. She’s the wisest of us all.”

“Of course she is. She’s the Source.” I didn’t bother keeping the sarcasm out of my voice. There were times when Azazel treated us all like idiots.

“I will remind you that I am your leader. I can take everything away from you, every gift, every power,” Azazel said, his voice like ice.

I ignored his empty threat. We’d been raised up together, lived together, fallen together, been cursed together. There was no way he was going to cow me. “Leaving you short one soldier if the Nephilim decide to engage, or if Uriel sends the Host down on us as he always threatens. But feel free to try it.

You could banish me as well. . . .”

Azazel made a noise very much like a growl. “You know I would never do that.”

“I’m touched.”

“The Nephilim are too dangerous. They outnumber us, and they’re all mad.”

I laughed. No sentiment for Azazel. I was just another soldier. “Why the hell can’t they be like the others? Unable to harm us. Uriel’s heavenly forces cannot attack us. The Nephilim were once like them—”

“They were before they fell,” Azazel interrupted me. “When will you learn to stop fighting against the forces that cannot be beaten? There are times when you are your own worst enemy. You have no one to blame but yourself for this current mess. Get rid of the girl, and we’ll concentrate on what matters.”

I laughed bitterly. “I blame Uriel. He led me to believe I was taking her to heaven. How many people have I tossed into the mouth of hell for him, thinking they were returning to paradise? Paradise!” I was filled with disgust, both for Uriel and for my own unwitting complicity.

“So this is about the woman?” Azazel said.

I shrugged off the ridiculous idea. “Of course not. I don’t like being manipulated.”

“Then don’t think about it. There is nothing we can do except not let him trick us again. And you still haven’t answered my question. What are you going to do with her? We have no place to put her—Sheol is not made for visitors.”

“She can go in my rooms until we decide. I sleep outside half the time anyway.”

Azazel looked at me for a long moment. “Are you certain she isn’t your mate?”

“How many times do I have to tell you? I will not take a mate ever again.” I kept my voice neutral, but Azazel knew me too well.

“You can stop as soon as I believe you. In the meantime, how are you feeling?”

That question was too stupid to answer, so I just looked at him.

“It has been months since you’ve fed,” he continued. “I’ll tell Sarah.”

That was the last thing I wanted. “No! I’m in no mood for all that fuss. Do not say a word—

“I don’t need to,” Azazel said. “You know Sarah can feel your need even before you do.” He came closer. “You’re weak, and you know it. You’d be worthless if we were attacked. I’m willing to respect your ridiculous wishes as long as they don’t hurt the community. Having you this weak puts us all in jeopardy.”

I knew I wasn’t going to be able to talk him out of it. And he was right—after the last twenty-four hours, I was barely able to lift my head, much less fly.

“Not the full ceremony,” I grumbled.

“I will tell her to make it very short. Then you need to sleep. Though if the woman is in your rooms—”

“I can find a place,” I said sharply.

Azazel looked at me with the wise eyes of an old friend. “Are you certain Uriel wasn’t right? What do you know of her and the crimes she may have committed? Perhaps you risked everything and saved her for no reason. It would make things much simpler if I finished the job you started.”

“Keep your hands off her!” I said, suddenly furious. I took a deep breath. “She saved me. We keep her here until we decide what to do with her.”

Azazel stared at me for a long, annoying moment, then nodded. “As you have spoken,” he said formally. “Come with me to Sarah before you collapse.”

I didn’t want to move, any more than I wanted to admit that Azazel was right. I wanted to close my eyes and disappear. If I’d had the energy, I would have risen and soared away from everything. But right then I could barely summon up enough energy to walk. I needed to feed, and until I did I was useless.

Once I fed and recovered, I would know what to do with the unwanted woman, would find a place to leave her. Until then I had no choice but to obey Azazel, no matter how much it galled me.

WHEN I AWOKE THE ROOM was dark, and I lay perfectly still, clinging to the vain, eternal hope that this had all been a nightmare. I already knew I was shit out of luck, and I opened my eyes reluctantly, knowing this bizarro world was going to continue.

The women had been very kind. The man, Raziel, had carried me into this huge old house and then unceremoniously dumped me, disappearing before I realized what was going on. The women had gathered around me, making the kinds of soothing noises that always made me nervous, and they herded me up to some rooms where they fed me, bathed me, and cosseted me, deftly deflecting any of my questions, all under the capable direction of the woman named Sarah.

And an extraordinary woman she was. Over six feet tall, she was one of those ageless women who might be anywhere between forty and sixty, with the serene grace and lean, agile body that probably came from decades of yoga. The kind of woman who made me feel lumpy and inadequate. The practice of yoga always seemed to suggest a moral superiority rather than a physical conditioning, and I mentally promised myself that I’d drag out the yoga DVDs that were still shrink-wrapped, sitting on my bookshelves.

No, I wouldn’t. I wasn’t going home. That was one thing I knew, amidst all the vast holes in my memory. There was no returning to my comfortable life in the Village. Just as well—I couldn’t really afford that apartment, but it had been so gorgeous that I’d gladly beggared myself for the chance to live there.

Well, maybe if I was going to stay, I’d have Sarah teach me yoga. If it made me look as good as she did at her age, it was clearly worth the effort.

Sarah had silver hair in one long, thick braid, wise blue eyes, and a rich, comforting voice, and when she’d eventually dismissed the other women, some half dozen between the ages of twenty and forty, she’d sat by my bed until I slept. My questions would be answered soon enough, Sarah had said.

For now I should rest.

Which I was quite happy to do. The night before had been endless, lying huddled against Raziel’s blazing body, trying to get comfortable with sticks and rocks and hard earth digging into my soft flesh. Maybe if I slept long enough, this nightmare would be over.

No such luck. When I awoke I was alone, and hungry again. I sat up, waiting for my eyes to grow accustomed to the darkness. I was wearing soft clothes, a loose-fitting white dress of some sort, and I remembered the embarrassing battle I’d had with the Step-ford wives when they wanted to bathe me. A battle I’d lost.

I touched my hair, finding it freshly washed but still that disconcerting length. I hadn’t worn my hair that long since I’d attended that lousy high school outside of Hartford, after I’d been kicked out of my expensive boarding school. Not that that was my fault. It had been the one fundamentalist Christian boarding school in the entire liberal, anarchistic, blaspheming state of Connecticut. Clearly I was going to break out as soon as I could.

Always in trouble, my mother had said in disgust, praying over me loudly. I always got the feeling that she never prayed for me in private—that her loud exhortations were for my benefit and mine alone. I was a miserable daughter, she told me, always spitting in the face of society, always talking too much and pushing against the status quo. Was that what had got me here? And where the hell was here?

I swung my legs over the side of the bed, feeling dizzy for a moment. There were shoes on the floor, and I slipped my feet into them, then winced, kicking them off again as I rubbed my heel. I had a blister there, left from those miserable shoes—

That was flat-out impossible. A blister healed in a few days, but it took months to grow my hair this long. Months that I couldn’t remember. Maybe I hadn’t lost huge blocks of time after all. The idea was reassuring, but it held its own kind of freakiness. None of this was making any sense, and I needed it to, quite desperately.

Sarah would tell me the truth if I asked. Unlike the man, she wouldn’t just brush off my questions, ignore my doubts. The warmth and truth of Sarah was palpable, soothing. I needed to find her.

I didn’t bother searching for a light beside the high bed; I didn’t bother with the shoes. The door was ajar, a sliver of light beckoning, and I started toward it, feeling only slightly uneasy. I’d seen those movies, read those books. Hell, written those books, where the stupid heroine in her virginal white goes wandering where she shouldn’t, and the homicidal maniac appears out of nowhere, complete with a butcher knife or an ax or a fish spike.

I shivered. People got murdered in their beds, too. Staying put wasn’t going to get me anywhere.

The outer room was empty. Hours ago this had been filled with women. Now it was abandoned, thank God, leaving me to my own devices, to find my own answers.

I looked down at my flowing white dress. Yup, virgin sacrifice stuff, all right. At least I was a far cry from a virgin—if they wanted to cut out my heart as an offering to the gods, the gods were going to be mighty pissed. Though in truth, that part was virginal. I’d had sex, but my heart had never been touched.

All the women had been similarly dressed, in some variant of flowing white clothes. They all had long hair, loose and natural, and they’d been warm, welcoming. Stepford wives. Had I been abducted into some kind of cult? Next thing I knew we’d be singing hymns and drinking Kool-Aid.

I shivered again. The women hadn’t looked like mind-sucked idiots. My imagination was running away with me, and no wonder. Somewhere along the way I’d fallen down the rabbit hole, and nothing made sense anymore.

The hallway was as deserted as the rooms, a mixed blessing. On the one hand, I didn’t want to be shepherded back to the bedroom with a bunch of platitudes. On the other, I didn’t know where the hell I was going, or whether Freddy Krueger was about to appear.

I looked around me. The interior of the house was interesting—it look like an old California lodge from long ago, with bronze art-deco sconces on the wall that made me think of Hollywood in the 1930s. There were overstuffed leather chairs and mission-style tables at various intervals down the long hall, with an ancient Persian runner in the center of the highly buffed floor, and a sudden horrifying suspicion came to me.

Things were bizarre enough already—if I’d somehow managed to travel through time, back eighty years to the early part of the last century, I would be extremely annoyed. That was the problem with time travel—no one ever asked if you’d be interested. Just a flash of lightning and you were gone.

I remembered a flash of lightning, on a New York street. The vision was swift and fleeting, and then I was back in this weird old house, looking for serial killers.

No, time travel was out of the question. I simply refused to consider the possibility. It was as absurd as some of the half-remembered fantasies that played in the back of my mind. Wings? A body with fire beneath the skin? A vampire?

I became aware of a sound, quiet, muffled, a soft chanting not unlike the voices I’d heard on the beach—the sound those men had made as they’d tried to drown my rescuer and I’d gone splashing into the surf like a complete idiot to save him. I listened carefully, trying to make out the words. It bore no resemblance to any language I’d ever heard, just a strange, almost melodic thread of noise.

Well, if they were getting ready for a virgin sacrifice, at least they weren’t planning to slice and dice me. Besides, there was something infinitely soothing about those voices, something that drew me toward them.

I began to move down the halls, silent on my bare feet, and at each juncture I took a turn unerringly. Me, who could never find my way through the haphazard streets of the Village no matter how long I’d lived there. I didn’t stop to question it—I just kept going. Maybe I’d been given superpowers, like a decent sense of direction. Anything was possible.

The sound never grew louder, never softened. I could hear it inside my head, feel it underneath my skin; and when I finally stopped outside an ornately carved set of double doors, I knew I’d found answers.

I paused. Something stopped me from going farther, just for the moment. So unlike me—I was a woman who always wanted straight answers, no matter how painful, and I knew that answers lay beyond those heavy doors, beneath the steady, almost musical chant that emanated from behind them. I had never been the type to hesitate—what the hell was wrong with me?

I pushed open the doors and froze.

It looked like some strange sort of temple, though clearly not for any religion I was familiar with. There was no cross, no ark to hold the Torah. Only the cluster of people in the center of the cavernous room lit by a strange, unearthly glow.

My eyes focused on Sarah, sitting in a chair that seemed like a cross between a throne and a La-Z-Boy. Sarah’s calm blue eyes had been closed in a look of meditation, but they opened and turned to mine, almost as if she’d heard my clumsy entrance above the soft chanting.

She smiled gently that serene, sweet smile that seemed to bestow a blessing on everyone around her, and the others must have realized that I was there, for the chanting stopped abruptly and the men moved back.

He knelt beside Sarah. I knew who he was immediately, even in the candlelight. I knew the sun-shot hair, the rough grace. His head was bent over Sarah’s outstretched wrist, but I must have made some kind of noise, and he lifted his face to stare at me.

I could see the blood at his mouth, the elongated fangs, the pulsing veins at Sarah’s slender wrist, and I know I let out the most girly shriek of horror.

And then I ran, letting the heavy doors slam shut behind me.

CHAPTER SEVEN

I MADE IT AS FAR AS THE GRASS IN front of the house before I went sprawling face-first. I hit the rough sand on my knees and elbows, sliding, and ended up at the very edge of the water, breathless, my arms over my head as if I were ducking from a hurricane. It was impossible. Flat-out impossible.

Someone must have drugged me. That was the only reasonable explanation for what I thought I’d just seen, for the craziness that shot such holes in my memory. But if I was still drugged, who and what could I trust? I rolled onto my back, still gasping for breath as I stared up at the house. Parts of it stuck out at strange angles, like a bureau with the drawers pulled out at varying degrees. The sun was setting behind me, reflecting off the windows, rendering them golden and opaque. Someone inside was looking down at me. If the house even existed, if the ocean existed, if I existed.

It was the oddest feeling: I couldn’t trust anything, my eyes, my ears—even the rich salty smell of the ocean could be part of some bizarre hallucination that had started God knows when. I stared up at the darkening sky, trying to pull in what few things I remembered. I could still feel the man’s hands on me as he’d tried to throw me into some deep, bottomless hole. So, serial killer, right? But he’d pulled me back. Serial killer with a conscience?

But maybe he hadn’t pulled me back after all. Maybe this was what death was like—a long, strange, trippy hallucination with vampires and men with wings—Men with wings? Where had that come from? I briefly considered sitting up, then decided against it. I was just fine where I was. Sprawled on the rocky beach, I kept a lower profile. I could just stay this way, listening to the soft hush of the ocean, until the drugs wore off or I woke up or whatever.

Or discovered I was in hell, or heaven, or somewhere in between. Sitting up meant I’d have to do something, and right then I just didn’t have the energy.

The setting sun was blotted out for a moment, and I looked up to see the man standing over me. Raziel, had they called him? Strange name, just another part of the nightmare that had started with his hands on me.

“How long are you going to lie there?” He had such a beautiful voice, the kind that could lure angels to their doom; yet the words were calm and emotionless. “It’s cold and the tide’s coming in, plus there’s a nasty riptide that could pull you out to sea before anyone realized what had happened. You may as well get up—running isn’t going to change things.”

The sunset was gilding him, a nimbus of color around his tall body. I made myself relax. Not a vampire, then. I knew the rules—they couldn’t be in the sun.

I hadn’t realized I’d spoken the words out loud. Not until he answered me.

“You’re an expert on vampires now, are you?” he said.

I considered not rising, but lying sprawled in front of him definitely put me at a disadvantage, so I sat up, ignoring the shriek of my stiff muscles. I glared at him. “No, I’m not. I don’t believe in them, and if you and your friends are into that kind of scene, then you can count me out. I want to go home.”

He was looking at me with detached interest. “‘Kind of scene’?” he echoed.

There was no blood on his mouth now. Maybe I’d imagined it. My brain still didn’t seem be holding two thoughts together. “I’m not a complete idiot,” I said in a cranky voice. “I know there’s an entire subculture of people who like to pretend they’re vampires. They file their teeth to points, they hang out in Goth clubs, they drink blood, they dress in Edwardian clothes . . .” My voice trailed off. Black jeans and a worn black denim shirt didn’t equal Edwardian finery and we both knew it, though I was willing to bet he’d look pretty damned gorgeous in a white puffy shirt. Considering that he looked pretty damned gorgeous already.

“I don’t see a Goth club anywhere,” he said. “No one around here would pretend to be a vampire.”

“So what was that I walked in on a few minutes ago?”

“Allie?” Sarah came up behind him before he could answer, almost as tall, with another of the men just behind her. “What’s wrong?”

“You know what’s wrong,” I said, feeling cranky despite the fact that I liked Sarah. “I saw him.”

“Saw him what?”

I looked at her narrow wrists: blue-veined, delicate, and unmarred. I pulled my knees up close to my body, hugging them. “Who are you people?” I demanded in a frustrated moan.

“Come back to the house, Sarah,” the other man said impatiently. “This is Raziel’s mess—it’s up to him to deal with it.” There was an oddly proprietary tone to his voice.

“In a moment,” Sarah said, kneeling next to me and putting her hand on my arm. “I don’t want you to be afraid, child. No one is going to hurt you.”

I wasn’t as sure as she was, either about Raziel or about the other man. He was as tall as Raziel, with jet-black hair, cold blue eyes, and a merciless expression on his face. “I want to go home,” I said again, feeling like a fretful, stubborn child.

The other man swore. “Raziel, do something about this. That, or let me clean up the mess you’ve made.”

“Give her a minute, Azazel,” Sarah said over her shoulder. “She’s shocked and frightened, and no wonder, with the two of you stomping around, being mysterious. If Raziel won’t give her some simple answers, then I will.”

“Woman,” Azazel said in an icy voice, “I want you upstairs in bed.”

“Husband,” Sarah replied sweetly, “I’ll be there when I’m damned well ready.”

Well, that was definitely weird. Azazel had to be in his early to mid-thirties; Sarah was likely in her fifties and probably older. It was hardly surprising—

Sarah was a beautiful woman—but most of the men I knew liked nubile young chicklets. At the ripe old age of thirty, I’d already been dumped once for someone younger and more pliant.

“She’s going to come inside,” Raziel said, making it clear there were no options. That’s what he thought. My eyes narrowed, looking up at him.

“And just where is she going?” the other man demanded.

“My rooms,” Raziel said. “I don’t see that we have any other choice.”

“She’s certainly not coming with us,” Azazel snapped.

Sarah rose, a graceful, fluid motion that made me desperately envious. If I got back home, I was definitely going to start going to yoga. When, not if. I wasn’t giving them any choice in the matter. I wanted my life back.

“Go with Raziel, child,” she said. “He’s not going to hurt you. In fact, he’s been looking out for you. When he wasn’t dying of fire poisoning,” she added with a mischievous glance at him. “Go with him, and he’ll answer any questions you have.”

“The hell I will,” Raziel said. “I’ll take her to my rooms and leave her there until I figure out—”

“You’ll do what Sarah says,” Azazel said, his soft voice chilling.

Raziel shot the other man a disgruntled look. And then he crossed the sand to me, holding out his hand.

I stared at it, not moving. Now was not the time to notice that he had strong, beautiful hands. Or that everything about him was beautiful, almost supernaturally so. I didn’t like pretty men, damn it. Though God knows I wasn’t sure if I’d ever seen anyone quite as gorgeous as he was.

“Don’t make me carry you,” he said in a warning voice.

Azazel and Sarah were already heading into the house, his arm around her waist. For a moment I considered scrambling to my feet and running after them; but reasonable or not, Azazel terrified me even more than this inexplicable man.

I needed to get up, not loll there like a Victorian heroine. The only problem was that my knees felt like spaghetti. I’m as tough as the next woman, tougher maybe, but I’d been through a hell of a lot in the last . . . whatever. There was a limit to how much I could handle. I tried to rise, but he ended up putting his hands on my arms and hauling me up anyway. He released me quickly enough, and started back toward the odd house, clearly expecting me to follow like a dutiful third-world bride.

The hell with that. I looked around me for some kind of escape and came up with a flat zero, unless I wanted to pull a Virginia Woolf and walk into the sea. There was no place else for me to go. The tide was coming in, and beyond the house all was misty darkness and forest. Besides, I was finally going to get some answers to my questions, wasn’t I?

I just managed to catch up with him. His long legs ate up the distance, but after a shaky start I managed a brisk trot. “You needn’t be so grumpy,” I said, trying not to huff and puff. “It’s your fault I’m here.”

“In case you don’t remember, I was unconscious when they brought me back.”

“That’s up to interpretation,” I said. “I can’t argue, since I seem to have huge gaps in my memory. What do you think they should have done, then? Left me in the forest? With those wild animals out there in the dark?”

He frowned. How could a man have a beautiful frown? “No,” he said. “They shouldn’t have left you.”

“And what the hell were we doing there in the first place? What in God’s name is happening to me?” I hated the plaintive note in my voice, but honestly I couldn’t help it. I could be all Strong Modern Woman most of the time, but right now I was tired, cranky, and totally defeated.

He didn’t answer. I hadn’t really expected him to. “Are you hungry?” he said instead.

As a distraction, it was an effective one. I suddenly remembered I was famished. “Yes. Why don’t you take me to McDonald’s and we can hash this out?” I figured that was unlikely but worth a try.

“No McDonald’s,” he said. “No restaurants at all, but we have people who cook. Tell me what you want and they’ll bring it to us.”

“Just like that?” I said caustically. Not that I believed him, but if that was true, this might very well be paradise.

“Just like that.”

I decided to be difficult, simply because I could. Besides, my need for comfort food had become critical. “Meat loaf, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, strawberry shortcake for dessert. And a nice Beringer cabernet.”

“You want champagne with your strawberries? Red wine is a little heavy for dessert.”

He was being sarcastic, of course, but I simply nodded. “Of course. Moët, I think. No need to go overboard with Dom Pérignon.”

He said nothing, walking into the house. I took one last longing glance outside. Nowhere to go. Until I found out what the fuck was going on, I was stuck.

In a place with, supposedly, limitless, effortless food and a beautiful man who’d kissed me. I supposed things could be worse.

I had to run to catch up with him. He made no effort to adjust his stride to mine, and I was damned if I was going to complain. It was taking forever to get to his rooms—we went through a maze of hallways, and up so many stairs I was ready to fling myself down on the polished wood floors, gasping and panting like a landed fish.

“How much farther?” I gasped, clinging to the thick, carved handrail.

He was watching me out of narrowed eyes. “One more flight. My rooms are at the top of the building.”

“They would be,” I said in a dire voice. “And I don’t suppose you believe in things like elevators?”

“We don’t need them,” he said.

No wonder Sarah was so lean and fit at fifty-something. She didn’t need yoga, she just needed these stairs.

“Sarah isn’t fifty-something,” Raziel said.

I froze. “That time I didn’t say it out loud.”

“No, you didn’t. You’re very easy to read. Most humans are.”

Most humans? WTF?

“Wait until we get to my rooms.”

I hadn’t said anything that time either. I was getting seriously creeped out by this situation. It didn’t matter how much food I got or how pretty he was, this was just plain weird. The kiss had been nice, from what I could remember, but I wasn’t sure kisses were enough to—

“I’m not going to kiss you again. I didn’t kiss you in the first place—you were drowning. I gave you breath.”

This was just . . . wrong. Clearly silence wasn’t silence to the creature I was following, so I quickly changed the subject, trying not to think about the cool salt taste of his mouth on mine. “Then how old is Sarah? She’s married to Aza—what’s his name?”

“Azazel,” he said. “Yes, they are married; at least, that’s as close a definition as most people could understand. And I don’t know how old Sarah is, nor do I care.”

I looked at him with astonishment. “She’s got to be at least twenty years older than he is. And he’s, what . . . thirty-five? Cool.”

“He’s older than she is,” he said in a dry voice. “And you might think twice about passing judgment on someone like Sarah.”

If Azazel was older than Sarah, then I was the Virgin Mary. “I’m not passing judgment,” I said rapidly, following him down the hallway toward another miserable, cock-sucking, goddamned, motherfucking flight of stairs. “I meant it. Too often it’s men who have younger lovers. I heartily approve of boy toys.”

“You think Azazel is a boy toy? He’ll be entertained by the notion.”

“Christ, don’t tell him I said that! I expect by this time their marriage is more platonic than anything else.”

He looked amused, which was even more annoying. “I believe they have a vigorous sex life, though I can ask Azazel to tell you all about it if you prefer.”

“No need,” I said hastily. “It’s none of my business.”

“No, it is not,” he said in that odd, half-formal way of speaking.

I looked up at the steep flight of stairs. It was the last one, he’d said. Of course it had to be the steepest and longest. I took a deep breath, steeling myself. I could make it. If it killed me, I was going to make it.

“What do her children think of her new husband?” If I kept him talking he might not notice how long it was taking me to get up the stairs.

“She has no children, and Azazel isn’t her new husband. He’s her only one.”

I thought back to Sarah’s gentle, tender concern. “That’s a shame,” I said. “She would have been a wonderful mother.”

“Yes.” It was one word, but there was a wealth of meaning beneath it.

Suddenly I thought back to the stretch of beach in front of the house, the wide expanse of lawn. With no toys, no games littering the beach. Something felt off about the place. “Where do the children live around here?” I asked, uneasy.

“Children?”

“The women who were with Sarah—she said they were other wives. Some of them were quite young; there must be children.”

“There are no children here.”

“That goes against whatever crazy cult you have going on here? You send the children away?” I was righteously infuriated, and it gave me energy. And the end of the stairs was in sight, thank God. I was ready to fling myself on the top landing with a weeping cry of “Land!”

“The women here don’t have children.”

“Why not?” Shit, it wasn’t the top of the stairs, it was just a landing. I faltered, turning the corner, looking at what simply had to be the last flight. Maybe. I wanted to cry, and I never cried.

Before I realized what he was going to do, he’d scooped me up in his arms and started up the final flight of stairs.

I was too shocked to struggle. His arms were like iron bands, his body hard and cold and uncomfortable; for a bare second I considered arguing, then thought better of it. Anything was better than walking.

“You know, if it weren’t for the stairs, I could manage it with no problem,” I said, keeping myself as stiff as he was.

He snorted, saying nothing. When he reached the top of the stairs he dumped me on my feet, seconds before I could demand that he let me down. The hallway was shorter than the lower ones, with only one double door in the center of it. I must be near the top of this damned skyscraper, I thought, remembering those cantilevered shelves that stretched over the ocean.

He’d left me again, already pushing open one of the doors, and once again I followed him, resentful as hell until I stepped into the dimly lit apartment.

The door closed behind me automatically, and I caught my breath in wonder.

It was like being on the prow of a ship. The front of the room was a bank of windows looking out over the night-black sea. Several of them were open, and I could smell the rich briny scent of it, hear the sound of the waves as they lapped against the rocks below. There were seagulls in the distance, and I breathed a small sigh of relief. At least something in this crazy place was normal.

“Sit down,” he said.

He was standing in the shadows. There were two mission-style sofas in the room, upholstered in white linen, and a low table between them. With a covered tray on top, a bucket of ice with a bottle of champagne waiting, and a bottle of red wine open to one side.

I stared at the table mistrustfully. “Shit,” I said. I knew without question that there would be meat loaf and mashed potatoes beneath the domed cover.

“How did you manage that?”

“Sit down and eat,” he said. “I’m tired and I want to go to bed.”

I stiffened. “And what does your wanting to go to bed have to do with me?”

Such a pretty mouth, such a sour smile. “Since I don’t intend to be anywhere near you when I go to bed, I won’t be around to answer your incessant questions. So if you want answers, sit down.”

“You’re an asshole.” I took a seat and pulled the cover off the tray. The smell of meat loaf was enough to make me moan with pleasure. Ignoring him, I started in on it, only looking up when I realized he’d poured me a glass of the red wine and pushed it toward me.

Way to make me feel like a mannerless glutton, I thought dismally.

“Mannerly,” he said.

“What?”

“Mannerly glutton. You haven’t drooled or dropped food or—”

I dropped my fork. “Stop that! I don’t know how you do it, but stop it!”

He took a sip from his own glass of wine, leaning back against the cushions of the opposite couch with a weary sigh. “Sorry,” he muttered. “It’s rude of me.”

“You bet your ass,” I snapped. Of all the mental assaults of the day, his invasion of my thoughts felt somehow worse than anything else. I ought to be able to have my errant thoughts be private. Particularly when looking at Raziel made them so very errant. When he wasn’t annoying me.

But I’d better behave. “I’m sorry. I’m being rude as well. Did you want some of this?” I gestured toward the decimated meat loaf.

He shook his head. “I don’t eat meat.”

It was my turn to snort. “Yes you do. You ate a hot dog.” I paused. “How do I know that? When was I around you when you were eating hot dogs?”

“I don’t eat meat when I’m in Sheol,” he said.

“Is that what this place is called? Isn’t that another word for hell?”

“It means ‘the hidden place,’” he said. “And you’re not in hell.”

I stopped shoveling food in my face long enough to drink some wine, hoping it might calm me down. I looked up to realize that Raziel was watching me out of his strange black and silver eyes, watching me too closely, and unfortunately it wasn’t with unbridled lust.

“I want to go home,” I said abruptly, pushing away the tray.

“You haven’t had your strawberry shortcake yet,” he said. “I’ll open the champagne—”

“I don’t want any champagne, I want to go home.”

“You can’t. You don’t have a home anymore.”

“Why not? How long have I been gone?”

He turned his attention to his glass of wine. “From New York? A day and a half.”

I stared at him blankly. “That’s impossible. How can my hair have grown this long in a day and a half?”

“You still have blisters on your feet from those shoes, don’t you?”

I didn’t need to touch my heel to check. The blisters were still there. “If I’ve only been gone for a day, then my apartment must still be there. I want to go back.”

“You can’t.”

“Why not?”

“You’re dead.”

“Crap,” I said.

CHAPTER EIGHT

I SET THE WINEGLASS DOWN ON THE table very carefully, pleased to see my hand wasn’t shaking at all. It wasn’t as if I hadn’t suspected as much—after all, I was no dummy. Men with wings, fires of hell, bloodsuckers. One moment I was in New York City, minding my own business, ogling a gorgeous man at the hot-dog stand, and the next I’d fallen down the rabbit hole. It didn’t mean I was going to give up without a fight. “How is that even possible?” My voice was hoarse but, apart from that, entirely calm. I’d learned to hide my reactions and emotions from my mother, Saint Hildegarde.

“You think you were immortal?” Raziel said. “Everyone dies sooner or later. In your case, it was a combination of those idiot shoes of yours and a crosstown bus.”

Okay. I sat back, the meat loaf sitting like a lump in the pit of my stomach, floating in a pool of gravy grease. “What were you doing there? You were there before I crossed the street. You were ahead of me at the hot-dog stand. I remember now.” I stared at him, thoroughly unsettled. “I remember everything now. Why? Why do I remember now when I couldn’t before?”

“I lifted what we call the Grace. It’s one of the gifts we have, the ability to make someone forget things. You wanted to remember, so I lifted it.”

“You should call it what it is: a mind-fuck,” I said, feeling definitely peevish. “What were you doing there? What am I doing here?”

“I was there to collect you.”

I let myself melt off the seat down onto the floor, needing something solid beneath me. I wasn’t going to hyperventilate. I hadn’t had a panic attack since I was a teenager, dealing with my mother’s attempts to save me from the devil. Guess Mom failed, because it looked as if I’d gone to the devil after all, if Raziel’s fangs and blood-sucking tendencies were anything to go by. Calm, I reminded myself. The sound of the sea would soothe me if I could just concentrate on it for a moment or two.

The danger passed, and I sat straight, rallying. “And exactly what were you—”

“Be quiet and I’ll tell you what you need to know,” he said irritably. “Your time was over. My job is to collect people and ferry them to the next . . . plane of existence. You weren’t supposed to fight me. No one does.”

I was freezing, colder than when I’d been lying on the wet sand. “What can I say, I fight everyone,” I said glumly.

“I believe it. As annoying as you are, I was still fairly certain that you’re an innocent, and I—”

“Depends on how you define innocent.”

He glared at me, and I subsided. “I assumed I was taking you to . . . what you might call heaven. Unfortunately I was wrong, and at the last minute I became foolishly sentimental and pulled you back.”

“From the jaws of hell,” I supplied. “My sainted mother would be so pleased.”

He didn’t react to that. He probably knew all about my crazy-ass mother. Was probably best friends with her, being an angel. No, he was a bloodsucker as well—she wouldn’t countenance that. “In a word, yes,” he said.

“Then maybe I shouldn’t be quite so cranky with you.” I made an effort to be fair. If he’d saved me from eternal damnation, then I supposed he deserved his props. “Then what happened? You got sick?”

He looked disgusted at the thought. “We can’t tolerate fire. In particular hellfire, but we don’t like any kind of flame. The women here have to tend the candles and fires when we need them. I got singed pulling you back, and it poisoned my blood. It would have killed me if you hadn’t asked for help.”

That was news to me. “Really? Who did I ask for help?”

“I don’t know—I was unconscious at the time. I imagine you asked God.”

Considering that I’d always had mixed feelings about the existence of God, I kind of doubted that. If God had created my born-again mother, he had a very nasty sense of humor. “And God sent them? The men who brought you—brought us back here?”

“God doesn’t involve himself in the day-to-day business of life. Not since free will was invented. But if you asked God for help, Azazel would have heard you, and he’s the one who came to get us.”

“Azazel, Sarah’s husband? I doubt it. He hates me.”

“Azazel doesn’t hate anyone. Though if he heard you being rude about Sarah—”

“I wasn’t rude, I was envious,” I said. “So they came and found us and brought us here. How?”

He took a sip of wine, stalling.

“How?”

“You know, this is going to take an eternity if you don’t manage to infer anything on your own,” he said.

“All right, I’ll infer up the wazoo and you can tell me if I’m wrong or right. I’m inferring that you’re . . . God, some kind of angel. If your job is to collect people and ferry them to the next existence, then that’s usually the work of angels, isn’t it? At least according to Judeo-Christian mythology.”

“Judeo-Christian mythology is often quite accurate. Angels escort the souls of the dead in Islam and the Viking religion as well.”

“So is that what you are? A fucking angel? Is that what all of you are?”

“Yes.”

Somehow I was expecting more of an argument. “I don’t believe you,” I said flatly.

He let out a sigh of sheer exasperation. “You’re the one who came up with it.”

The problem was, I did believe him. It all made sense, in a crazy-ass way. Which meant all my slightly atheistic suppositions were now out the window, and my mother had been right. That was even more depressing than being dead. “And how did they bring us here from the woods? They flew, didn’t they?”

“I told you, I was unconscious at the time. But yes, I imagine they flew.”

“They have wings.”

“Yes.”

“You have wings.”

“Yes.”

That was too much. “I don’t see them.”

“You’ll have to take it on faith,” he grumbled. “I’m not about to offer a demonstration.”

“So—”

“Just be quiet for a few minutes, would you?” he snapped.

“You’re not very nice for an angel,” I muttered.

“Who says angels are supposed to be nice? Look, it’s simple. You died in a bus accident. I was supposed to take you to heaven. For some reason you were heading for hell, I experienced a moment of insanity and pulled you back, and now you’re stuck. You can’t go back. You’re dead, and your body has already been cremated, so I can’t return you even if I thought it might be possible. Right now you’re here in Sheol with a family of angels and their wives, and you’re going to have to put up with it until I figure out what I can do with you.”

“This doesn’t make sense. If I’m dead and cremated, why am I here?” I looked down at my all-too-corporeal self. “I’m real, my body is real.” I reached up and hugged myself, and his eyes went to my breasts. Real breasts that responded to his look, wanted his touch.

I was losing my mind. First off, I didn’t want him touching me. Secondly, last time I checked, my breasts were incapable of thinking. I was the one who wanted him to touch me.

I was insane.

“On this plane you exist and your body is real. Not on the mortal plane.” He pulled his gaze away from my body, a relief.

“So I’m stuck here with a bunch of Stepford wives. Aren’t there any girl angels?”

“No.”

“Well, fuck that! Hasn’t God heard of women’s lib?”

“God hasn’t heard of anything—he’s not involved. Free will, remember?”

“Male chauvinist asshole.”

“God isn’t male.”

“Well, he sure as hell isn’t female,” I snapped. Not that I should have wasted the energy. Judeo-Christian theology was patriarchal and male-centric?

Surprise, surprise.

“True enough.”

“So you live here together in this happy little commune and ferry people to heaven and hell. Isn’t that too big a job for the bunch of you? How many people die every minute of every day?”

“One point seventy-eight per second, one hundred and seven per minute, six thousand four hundred and eight per hour, nearly one hundred and fifty-four thousand per day, fifty-six—”

Oh, God. I had to be rescued by a pedant. “No need to get literal—I get the picture. Aren’t you a little bit overworked?”

“Most people don’t need an escort.” He poured himself another glass of wine, then gestured with the bottle toward mine. I shook my head. I was already too rattled—I didn’t need alcohol making things worse.

“Why did I need one? I’m no one important, no great villainous mastermind. Don’t tell me—it’s because of my mother.”

He looked blank for a moment; then realization dawned. Of course he knew about my mother. “Your mother has nothing to do with it. I expect someone will be escorting her to hell sooner or later.”

I’m afraid I was a bad enough daughter to chuckle at the thought. Maybe that’s why I’d been sent to hell.

“I don’t know why I was sent to get you any more than you do,” he went on in his slightly formal way. “Why did Uriel decide you were to go to hell instead of heaven?”

“Uriel? He’s one of the four archangels, isn’t he? What’s he got to say about it?”

I’d managed to surprise him. “How do you know about the four archangels? Most people aren’t that familiar with biblical history.”

“I know more than you think,” I said. “It’s part of my job.”

“What’s your job?” He looked blank. “I’ve forgotten—”

“I’m a writer. A novelist.”

“Maybe that explains why you were going to hell,” Raziel said in a wry voice.

“Shut up,” I said genially. “What’s Uriel got to do with who needs an escort or not? I don’t remember much of anything specific about him—wasn’t he the archangel of redemption?”

He was staring at me, momentarily forgetting I annoyed him. “Among other things. How do you know these things?”

“I told you.”

“Remind me—what do you write?”

I didn’t bother to disguise my irritation. He remembered my crackpot mother, but my life’s work was easily forgotten. “Old Testament mysteries,” I said in a testy voice. “They’re tongue-in-cheek, of course, and a little sarcastic, but—”

“There’s your answer. Uriel is as pitiless as a demon, and he has no sense of humor.”

“I got sentenced to hell for writing murder mysteries?” I demanded, incensed.

“Probably. Unless you have other dark secrets. Have you killed anyone? Erected false idols? Committed adultery? Consorted with demons?”

“Not until today,” I muttered.

“I’m not a demon.”

“Close enough. I know what I saw downstairs. You may be an angel, but you’re a vampire as well.” My head was about to explode.

“We’re not vampires. Vampires don’t exist. We’re blood-eaters.”

I’m afraid I rolled my eyes at such nit-picking. “Whatever. I’m not saying I believe you. I’m trying to keep an open mind about it.”

“How broad-minded of you,” he said, his voice acidic.

“Besides, you’re not very nice for an angel,” I observed. “I thought angels were supposed to be sweet and, er . . . angelic.”

“You’re thinking in modern terms. An angel is just as likely to be the instrument of divine justice with a flaming sword to smite the unworthy.”

“And what kind of angel are you, precisely?”

“Fallen.”

I should have gotten past being shocked by now. “Fallen?” I repeated, no doubt sounding a little slow on the uptake.

“I think you’ve heard enough for now,” he said. “Humans have a limited capacity to absorb this sort of thing.”

“Who the hell are you to tell me what I can or cannot absorb? You haven’t even begun to explain the blood and Sarah and—”

He gestured with one beautiful, elegant hand. It was a strong hand, which surprised me. Angels didn’t do any manual labor, did they? So they ferried people to heaven and hell—that didn’t require any particular strength. And what—

It was like someone had turned out the lights. Suddenly I was drifting in a cocoon, soundless, lightless, no sharp edges or uneven surfaces. I struggled for just a moment, because it felt like death, and I didn’t want to find myself in even worse trouble; then I heard Raziel’s rich, golden voice in my head: “Let go, Allie. Just let go.”

So I did.

I LOOKED AT HER, NOT moving. I didn’t want her here, didn’t want her anywhere around me. She’d slid farther down on the floor, her head resting against the seat cushion of the couch, and she looked . . . delicious. That is, if I were someone else. She was not what I needed. I poured myself another glass of wine and leaned back, surveying her as dispassionately as I could.

Which was easier said than done. For all the distance I was putting between us, I couldn’t ignore the fact that she’d saved my life, as surely as I’d saved her from Uriel’s pit of hell; and the unfortunate truth was that we were bound together, whether I wanted it or not. I most definitely didn’t want it, and the timing couldn’t have been worse.

I was thinking too much, forgetting the rule of blind obedience, the rule that Uriel tried to force down our throats, usually with little success. If I’d just tossed her and left, my life would be much simpler, and the Fallen wouldn’t be bracing for angelic retribution on top of everything else.

It was just as well she didn’t know much about Uriel. There was no doubt he was one scary motherfucker, and she was probably scared enough as it was.

Though she hadn’t looked scared. She’d simply taken in the information I’d given her, with no drama, no hysterics. I was used to a little more Sturm und Drang when I told people they were dead. She’d just blinked her warm brown eyes and said, “Crap.”

I stretched out on the other couch, looking at her. I was feeling better than I’d felt in months. Azazel was right, damn it. I’d needed the Source, rich blood filling all the empty places inside my body, repairing the broken parts, bringing me back to life. A little too much life, in fact. Because I wanted to fuck Allie Watson.

Hear that, Uriel? I sent the thought outward. Fuck and mother fuck. Deal with it.

She stirred, almost as if she could read my mind. Impossible—that Grace was given only to a bonded mate. I could read her anytime I wanted to, but there was no way she could know what I was thinking.

I shouldn’t bother trying to feel her thoughts. I was already too attached to her, whether I liked it or not. One thing was certain—I was not going to have sex with her, even if I wanted to. Hands off from now on, at least while she was awake.

Old Testament mysteries. I snorted. No wonder Uriel had judged her. She was just lucky it had been my turn. She wouldn’t have stood a chance with Azazel or any of the others—they would have tossed her without a second glance.

Which would have been a shame, I thought lazily, watching the rise and fall of her breasts beneath the loose white clothes Sarah had provided for her.

She’d saved me last night in the forest. If she hadn’t listened, if she’d run, the Nephilim would have ripped her apart and then devoured my paralyzed body.

But she had stayed. And then, when she thought the Fallen were drowning me, she’d raced into the water to try to save me. I still couldn’t understand why.

She would have drowned if I hadn’t breathed into her, filling her with . . . That knowledge was making me uneasy, unhappy. Aroused that she held my breath inside her body. The feeling was erotic, explicit, and powerful. She held my breath, my very essence, as intense a bond as if she held my semen, my blood. I was inside her, and in return a part of her claimed me, owned me. I was irrevocably tied to her, and I hated it. I was hard just thinking about it, and obsessed by it, and I had to break her hold.

I should have insisted on waiting for the renewal ceremony until after she’d been dealt with. In my depleted state, I would have been impervious to the allure of a human female.

Not just any human female. Even at my most vulnerable moments, I’d been able to resist the most beautiful, sexual women I’d been chosen to escort.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t feeling at all resistant to the current albatross around my neck. I was feeling . . . lustful.

This wasn’t normal. Why her, why now? Things were already in a mess, and I’d vowed not to risk bonding with a woman again.

Which meant my only sex was with myself, a quick, soulless release that kept me from exploding in rage and frustration. Or with some anonymous human looking for a night of pleasure. A night I made sure she never remembered.

Neither did I.

Every woman in our hidden kingdom was mated, bonded to one of us. There were no offspring to grow up and carry on the tradition. The only way a woman entered Sheol was as a bonded mate, so I was shit out of luck if I wanted someone new, which must please Uriel. Anything that caused pain and discomfort to the Fallen brought Uriel . . . satisfaction. I was fairly certain he was incapable of feeling joy.

But right now I was too tired, too edgy, to come up with any possible solution to the problem of Allie Watson.

I couldn’t even leave her for the night. By putting her to sleep, I’d claimed a certain responsibility for her, at least until she woke up, anywhere from six to twenty-four hours from now. Even if her sleep had been normal, I couldn’t leave her alone up here, not until I’d extracted a promise of good behavior on her part. I couldn’t risk her running off again—the sea might take her, or if she managed to find the borders of our kingdom, the Nephilim would be waiting.

There was only one bed, and I was damned if I was going to give it to her. She would likely sleep at least eight hours. She’d slid farther, so that she was lying on the floor half beneath the coffee table, her head on the thick white carpet. She’d be fine where she was.

I drained my wine and headed toward the bedroom. I pushed open the row of windows that fronted the sea and took a deep, calming breath of air. Even in the dead of winter with snow swirling down, I kept the windows open. We were impervious to cold—the heat of our bodies automatically adjusted. The sound of the ocean waves was soothing, and the cool night air reminded me that I was alive. I needed that reminder of the simple things that made up my life.

I stripped off my clothes and slid beneath the cool silk sheets. My arm still throbbed where the poison had entered, but the rest of me had healed properly, thanks to the salt water and Sarah’s blood. My arm and my cock throbbed—and both were Allie Watson’s fault.

I closed my eyes, determined to fall asleep.

I couldn’t. I kept picturing her on the floor, dead to the world. She’d had a rough couple of days as well. I knew she’d curled up next to me on the hard ground the night before—I’d been dimly aware of it through the haze of pain, and I’d been comforted.

After an hour I gave up, climbing out of the bed I’d longed for and heading for the door. At the last minute I paused and pulled on a pair of jeans. Nudity wasn’t something that meant much in Sheol, and I didn’t care about preserving her modesty. It was my own temptation I was trying to avoid. Even silk boxers or pajama pants were too thin, too easy to slip out of. These jeans had buttons, not a zipper, and it would take a major effort to get them off. Give me time enough to think twice about making such a foolish move.

I pushed the door open and walked back into the living room. It was lit only by the fitful moonlight reflected off the sea, and she was just a huddled shape in the shadows. I went over and scooped her up in my arms. She was heavier than some, though not enough to notice—her weight was no more trouble than carrying a loaf of bread would be for a human. I carried her into the bedroom and carefully set her down on the bed.

She needed to build up her stamina—she hadn’t been able to run very far, and she’d been breathless after only three flights of stairs. She was a pampered city girl, not used to actually moving.

She had a beautiful body. Her breasts were full, enticing, and her hips flared out from a well-defined waist. By current standards, she’d be considered maybe ten to fifteen pounds overweight. By the tastes of the Renaissance, she’d be considered scrawny.

The Renaissance had been one of my favorite periods. I’d enjoyed myself tremendously—the art, the music, the creativity that seemed to wash over everyone.

And the women. Full and lush and beautiful. I’d sampled a great many of them before I made the mistake of falling in love with one, only to lose her. I would have had no choice but to watch my beloved Rafaela age; back then, foolishly, I would have welcomed the chance. But she’d run from me, certain I wouldn’t want her when she looked decades older than I did. She died before I found her again.

Too many women, too many losses, each bit of pain a boon to my enemy, Uriel. I wouldn’t go through that again.

If Allie Watson was going to stay—and right now I couldn’t think of any other option—then she would have to learn to manage all those stairs. Sheol wasn’t set up for guests, and for now she was my responsibility. I couldn’t afford to coddle her.

The tangy salt breeze from the ocean rumpled my hair, and I remembered that humans were more susceptible to the cold. I pulled the sheet up over her —probably a good idea anyway.

And then I lay down beside her. It was a big bed, and she wasn’t going to shift in her sleep, migrate over to my side. She’d lie perfectly still until that particular Grace wore off. As long as my dreams didn’t move me toward her, I’d be safe.

And even if they did, I’d wake up long before I could do anything about it.

I hoped the Grace would last the full twenty-four hours—I needed as much time as possible to deal with the situation. Not that she’d consider this particular comatose sleep a Grace, but that was the all-encompassing term for any of the extraordinary things we were capable of doing. The Grace of deep sleep was one of the least harmful. The Grace to cloud the minds of humans could have much more long-lasting consequences.

I stretched out, closing my eyes. She should smell of the flowered soap the women here used in the baths. She should smell like all the other women, but she didn’t. She had her own sweet, erotic scent underlying the flowers, something that made her subtly different. Something that kept me awake as my exhausted mind conjured all sorts of sexual possibilities.

I glanced over at her comatose figure. She looked younger, prettier, when she was asleep. Sweeter, when I knew she was anything but. She was a time bomb, nothing but trouble, yet somehow I’d gotten tied up with her.

I propped myself up on one elbow, looking down at her. Could I take my breath back from her, loosening the hold she seemed to have over me?

I moved my mouth over hers, not quite touching, and sucked her soft breath into my lungs. And then I bridged the small distance and rested my open mouth against her lips, caught by the sudden urge to taste her.

I sank back on the bed, cursing my own stupidity. I’d felt myself inside her, felt my breath in her body, the inescapable connection. In trying to take it back from her, I’d simply brought her into my body, completing the circle. I could feel her breath inside me now, curling in my lungs, spreading out into the blood that coursed through me.

I threw one arm over my eyes. Uriel would be laughing now. As if things weren’t bad enough, I’d just made them quantitatively worse.

I couldn’t think straight right now. Tomorrow I’d talk with some of the others. Not everyone was as cold and practical as Azazel. Michael, Sammael, Tamlel, would look at things with more flexibility. There’d be someplace to send her, where she’d be safe and I wouldn’t have to think about her. Sooner or later new breath would replace hers in my body, and the connection would be broken. Wouldn’t it?

I groaned, a soft sound, though if I’d screamed she would still have slept on.

It was going to be a long fucking night.

CHAPTER NINE

AZAZEL SAT IN THE GREAT HALL, alone in the dark. None of the Fallen knew the burden he carried. He could feel all of them—their needs, their pain, their doubts. Their secrets.

It was better that they didn’t know. He wouldn’t put it past some of them, Raziel in particular, to figure out a way to shield or control their thoughts, and that would put him at a disadvantage the Fallen couldn’t afford. It was simply something he had to endure, a physical pain that he bore with no outward sign.

Only Sarah knew. Sarah, the Source to his Alpha, the calm voice of wisdom, the only one with whom he could ever simply let go. The only one.

The centuries, the millennia, since they had fallen faded into the mists of time. The number of wives he’d had faded as well, but he remembered every face, every name, no matter how short a time she had spent in his endless life. There was Xanthe, with the laughing eyes and ankle-length hair, who’d died when she was forty-three. Arabella, who’d lived until she was ninety-seven. Rachel, who died two days after they’d bonded.

He had loved them all, but none so much as he loved his Sarah, his heart, his beloved. She was waiting for him, calm and unquestioning, knowing what he needed. She always did.

Because of all the things he needed, he needed her the most.

She wouldn’t let him get rid of Raziel’s woman, even though it was the wisest thing to do. The girl wanted to leave, and he should see that she did. The Nephilim would dispose of what was left of her if she went beyond the undulating borders of Sheol. At least, he assumed so. They preyed on the Fallen and their wives, and she was neither. He didn’t trust her, didn’t trust her unexpected presence in a place that allowed no strangers.

He leaned back in the ornate carved chair, trying to hear the distant voice that came so seldom. The voice trapped deep in the earth, imprisoned for eternity, or so the story went. Azazel chose not to believe that story, not when he heard the voice of the first Fallen answering his most impossible questions.

Lucifer, the Bringer of Light, the most beloved of the angels, was still alive, still trapped. He could lead the forces of heaven and hell, the only one who stood a chance against the vindictive, all-powerful Uriel and the vicious creatures who served him. But as long as Lucifer’s prison was hidden, as long as he was carefully guarded by Uriel’s soldiers, there would be no chance to rescue him.

And without Lucifer to lead them, the Fallen were trapped in a cycle of endless pain. Doomed to watch their beloved wives age and die, never to know the joy of children, to live with the threat of the Nephilim constantly on their borders, ready to overrun their peaceful compound. To wait, knowing that Uriel would send his plagues down upon them at any provocation.

Azazel pushed back from the ancient scrolls and manuscripts, exhausted. There were hints there, perhaps even answers, but he had yet to find them.

He studied them until his vision blurred, and the next day the grueling process would begin again.

There would be no answers tonight. He rose, signaling the lights to stay low, and started toward the huge expanse of rooms that had always been his.

Sarah was sitting up in bed, reading. Her silver hair lay in one thick braid over her shoulder; a pair of glasses was perched on the end of her perfect nose. Her creamy skin was smooth and delicate, and he stood and watched her, filled with the same love and desire he’d always felt.

Uriel had never been tempted as the others had been, one after the other, falling from grace. Uriel had loved no one but his God, whom he considered infallible except for the one stupid mistake of making humans.

Uriel despised people. He had no mercy for their frailties, no love for the music of their lives, the beauty of their voices, the sweetness of the love they could give. All he knew of them was hatred and despair, and he treated them accordingly.

Sarah looked at him over her brightly colored reading glasses, setting down her book. “You look exhausted.”

He began to strip off his clothes. “I am. Trouble is coming and I don’t know what to do about it. We can’t fight Uriel—we’re not ready.”

“We won’t know until it happens,” she said in her soothing voice. “Uriel has been looking for an excuse for centuries. If the girl is the catalyst, then so be it.”

Azazel rolled his shoulders, loosening the tightness there. “Raziel doesn’t want her, and she doesn’t belong here. I could get rid of her when he isn’t looking, take her back to where Uriel charged she should go. The problem would be solved, and we could wait until we’re better prepared. . . .”

Sarah took the glasses off her nose and set them beside the bed. “You’re wrong, love.”

“So you often tell me,” he said. “You think I shouldn’t get rid of her? I have the right to send her back.”

“Of course you do. You have a great many rights that you shouldn’t exert. Raziel is lying to himself. He wants her. That’s what frightens him.”

“You think Raziel is afraid? I dare you to say that to him.”

“Of course I would tell him, and you know it. He wouldn’t rage at me as he would at you. The Alpha can be challenged. The Source is just that, the source of wisdom, knowledge, and sustenance. If I tell him he wants her, he’ll believe it. But I think it’s better if he discovers it himself.”

“He doesn’t want to bond again,” Azazel argued. “Losing Rafaela was too hard for him. One loss too many.”

“Losing me will be hard for you, love, but you’ll mate again, and soon.”

“Don’t.” He couldn’t bear the idea of a time when Sarah wouldn’t be there. Sarah with the rich, luscious mouth, the wonderful, flexible body, the creamy skin. The women in Sheol lived long lives, but they were merely a blink of the eye compared to the endless lives of the Fallen. He would lose her, and the thought was excruciating.

She gave him her full, sweet smile. “Come to bed, love. We don’t need to think about that for a long time.”

He slid in beside her, pulling her against him, pushing one leg between hers, his long fingers stroking the side of her face, her neck, the elegant collarbone. “What are you wearing?” he whispered against her skin.

She laughed, a low, sexy sound. “A nightgown, of course.”

“Take it off.” He was naked—he wanted her naked too.

She sat up and obliged him, pulling it over her head and tossing it on the floor. She’d pick it up in the morning, before the maid came in. She didn’t like having anyone wait on her, but on this one matter he’d overruled her. She had enough demands on her, providing strength-sustaining blood for the unbonded.

She lay back down, a smile in her eyes, and slid her arms around him. She buried her face against his shoulder, and he could feel her teeth nipping lightly at his skin.

He kissed her, hard and deep, and she pulled at him, her hands restless. “Hurry,” she whispered. “No foreplay?” he teased.

“I’ve been thinking about you for the last two hours. That’s foreplay enough.”

He laughed, rolling her beneath him, pushing into her. Her back arched, and he could feel the first tremor of her orgasm tighten around him. She knew how to pull back, contain it so she wouldn’t make him lose control. Their rhythms were perfectly matched, an elegant dance that culminated in a shock of pleasure.

This was faintly different. He sensed her urgency, when they usually took all the time they wanted. “Why the hurry, love?” he whispered.

She didn’t answer for a moment, and he could see the shadow of an old pain in her beautiful eyes. “I’m afraid we’ll run out of time,” she said finally, her voice so low he could barely hear her.

“Never,” he said. “Stop thinking.”

Her smile was faint, lovely, one of the most erotic things about her. “Now,” she whispered.

He didn’t hesitate. His fangs slid down and sank into her neck, finding the sweet spot he knew so well. The blood was thick, rich in his mouth, and he felt the spasms begin to take over, felt her own helpless response as his wings unfurled. He rolled onto his side, taking her with him, his teeth never leaving the gently throbbing vein, his cock deep inside her as his wings clamped around them both, locking them together as he gave himself over to the only kind of death he’d ever know.

CHAPTER TEN

I OPENED MY EYES AND GROANED. I was lying sideways across a big, rumpled bed, still fully clothed—and I was alone.

I had a really annoying habit of waking up instantly, cheerfully, with no need for coffee or a hushed silence to prepare for the day. It was sheer luck that I’d survived my college years—more than one roommate had been ready to beat me to death over my tendency to prattle in the morning.

Today I could have used a little fogginess.

I had actually slept in that man’s bed, though I wasn’t quite sure how I’d got there. Last thing I remembered was falling asleep in the living room, and here I was stretched out on his sheets, feeling physically cozy and mentally freaked-out. I wasn’t used to men carting me off to bed and then doing nothing about it. Actually, I wasn’t used to men carting me off to bed at all.

Except he wasn’t a man, was he? He was some kind of monster, or mythical beast, or a bizarre mix of both, but he was definitely not human. And I held the firm belief that interspecies dating was never a good idea.

I checked my neck, just to make certain, but there were no mysterious puncture wounds; and far from feeling dizzy from blood loss, I was feeling positively energetic, more than my usual morning bounce. The unthinkable had happened, the worst thing imaginable. It had been no surreal nightmare. I was dead and living with a bunch of vampires who seemed to have emerged from Old Testament Apocrypha. It was little wonder I was feeling disoriented. What I couldn’t figure out was why I was cheerful.

The good thing about total disaster—at least there was nowhere to go but up. Maybe it was that simple.

Or maybe, just maybe, it had something to do with the man—damn, I couldn’t stop thinking of him that way—who’d brought me here. Not that he was any too pleased to be saddled with my unwanted presence. Tough shit—it was his fault I’d ended up in this cross between Valhalla and Anne Rice territory.

The good thing was, Raziel appeared to have no interest in my far-from-irresistible charms, sexual, social, or otherwise. For all I knew, Raziel’s people were impotent. After all, no one seemed able to procreate.

That seemed unlikely. The heat between Azazel and his wife had been palpable, despite the disparity in their ages. Maybe Raziel simply wasn’t interested in women. Or, more likely, not interested in me—he would hardly be the first who’d failed to appreciate my particular brand of charisma.

I’d fallen asleep on the living room floor and he must have been kind enough to carry me in to bed, though so far kindness hadn’t been a major part of his personality. He’d left me sexually and hematologically untouched, thank God. What more proof did I need of his lack of interest.

I had more important things to consider. I needed a bathroom; I needed a shower. Last night I hadn’t stopped to think about the dead or undead having actual bodily functions. All I knew was that I certainly did.

I rolled out of the huge bed, landing barefoot on the cool marble floor. The room was dim, the shades pulled against the bright sunlight. There was a door off to one side, and I headed for it. Eureka! A bathroom with a huge tub, a shower made for giants, thick towels, and even a toilet. If the afterlife contained a bathroom like this, it couldn’t be that awful.

I followed the coffee aroma to a small kitchen, bracing myself to confront Raziel, but the place was deserted. There was coffee in a white carafe, and I filled one of the mugs, looking around me with fresh curiosity. Things didn’t seem nearly so bizarre as they had yesterday—amazing what a good night’s sleep would do for you.

I moved to the row of windows in the living room, looking out over the sea. It was misty, cool, the rich salt scent thick in the air. Where had Raziel gone?

And did he really expect me to stay here like a good girl, awaiting my master’s return?

Fat chance.

I found some white shoes that looked sort of like a delicate pair of Crocs and slipped them on, then headed out the door. I paused, staring down the endless flights of stairs, and let out a heartfelt groan.

Going down would be easier than going up, but if I did descend those forty million treacherous flights of stairs, sooner or later I would have to go back up. Why didn’t they have elevators in the afterlife? Maybe most people just flew.

No, only the men could. “Sexist bastards,” I said with a sniff. Maybe I could hitch a ride with one of the friendlier ones.

The stairs were endless, deserted as I descended. It wasn’t until I reached the third floor that I began to run into . . . whatever they were. Fallen angels, vampires, blood-eaters, hell-transporters. Comic-book villains.

None of them looked particularly happy to see me. So it wasn’t just Raziel who resented my presence. I gave each of them my cheeriest smile and a friendly greeting, and for the most part was met with cool indifference. Great. No welcome wagon here.

No sight of the Stepford wives, either, who by now were seeming pretty damned normal and friendly. Were they stuck in some kind of seraglio while the men went about their so-important business? Would I end up there?

Of course not. Seraglios were for wives and concubines, not inconvenient females nobody wanted.

I finally reached the bottom of those endless stairs, ending up in a massive hallway. It was open at one end, leading out to the churning sea, which called to me and I started toward it, something akin to joy rising in my heart, when I was brought up short by the very last person I wanted to see.

Not Raziel, who had his own dubious charms. But Azazel the Grouch, the leader of this happy band. And he was looking at me as if I carried all ten plagues of Egypt.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded.

“Looking for Raziel,” I said, a complete lie. I didn’t want to see him any more than he wanted to come near me, but I could think of no other excuse. The sea was calling to me, and I tried to sidle past him. “I think he might be out by the water—”

He blocked me. “He’s not. Go back to your rooms and await him.”

I didn’t like Azazel. “I’m not one of the dutiful wives, and I’m certainly not going to hide away like someone in a harem. I’m going out to the water, and I suggest you don’t try to stop me.”

The moment the challenge was out of my mouth, I regretted it. I’d forgotten these weren’t New York metrosexuals I was dealing with. Azazel froze, and I wondered idly if these fallen angels were capable of smiting a bitch. If so, I was in deep shit.

“Allie!” Sarah suddenly came up from behind me, tucking her arm through mine. “So nice to see you this morning. Aren’t you happy to see Allie, my love?”

Azazel glowered. “No.”

“Pay no attention to him, my dear,” Sarah said smoothly, leading me away from him. “He’s got a lot on his mind, and he tends to be bad-tempered in the morning. In the afternoon as well,” she added ruefully.

“Is there ever a time when he isn’t grumpy?” I asked with my usual lack of tact.

“Not often,” Sarah said. “He has too many responsibilities. Now, let me find someone who will know where Raziel’s gone. He’s probably up in the caves —he spends most of his time there.”

“I admit, he does have batlike tendencies. The black clothes.”

“The wings,” Sarah added cheerfully, then saw my expression. “Oh, you haven’t seen his wings yet? They’re quite . . . astonishing. A deep, iridescent blue. You’ll love them.”

“I doubt it.”

Sarah smiled. “Let’s find some help. I’m not allowed up there or I’d take you. Besides, with me you’d have to walk and it would take days. Come with me.” She led me, blessedly, toward the open door and the sea.

I stopped for a moment, blinded by the sunlight, and let the cool salty breeze wash over me like a blessing—like a lover’s caress. I opened my eyes to see Sarah watching me with a faint smile.

“You fit well here,” she said.

“I hadn’t realized how much I love the sea.”

“It’s not just that.” But before I could ask her what she meant, she started walking toward two men who were standing in the bright sunlight, watching our approach.

“I still can’t get over why they don’t turn into piles of ashes,” I muttered. “I thought vampires couldn’t handle the sun.”

Sarah laughed. “Vampires are a myth.”

“And fallen angels who drink blood are part of reality television?”

“Reality television is a myth too, from what I hear. I would suggest you reserve judgment. Tamlel, Sammael,” she greeted them, and the two of them bowed.

Raziel was so ridiculously gorgeous he made my knees weak, and Azazel’s stern beauty was impressive. These two were damned pretty as well, and for a moment I wondered if you could be gay in the afterlife.

One of them was older, with dark brown hair tied back, warmth in his eyes. The younger one was blond and cherubic, and it was probably my imagination that he looked slightly sullen. They greeted Sarah with warmth, but it was clear they were unsure about me.

“This is Allegra,” Sarah said. “But you already know that. Allie, this is Tamlel, generally considered to be in charge of scribes. And the young one is Sammael.”

He was looking at me with a sulky expression, and I’d always had little patience for sullen teenagers. Though this particular teenager was probably thousands of years old. “And what are you in charge of?”

There was a moment of silence, and then Sarah spoke. “In fact, he’s one of the angels of death. But since the Fallen have eternal life, he hasn’t had much to do since he fell. Our only connection with humans is to take them to their final home.”

“One of the angels of death?” I echoed. “Like Raziel?”

“Raziel isn’t a death angel.”

“You could have fooled me,” I grumbled, thinking back to that bus. “What’s he doing now—killing someone new?”

Tamlel looked distressed. “We don’t kill. We are charged with transporting—”

“Never mind.” I took pity on him.

“Raziel is the angel of knowledge and mysteries,” Sarah said patiently. “He keeps the secrets of the ages.”

“Typical male,” I muttered.

Sarah laughed, and even Tamlel smothered a grin. Sammael, however, kept a stony expression. “Will one of you take Allie up to Raziel? He shouldn’t have left her alone on her first day with us.”

“How long is she going to stay?” Sammael demanded in a tone just this side of rudeness. I guess if you were an angel of death, you could get away with it.

“We don’t know yet. There are more important things to worry about right now. Her presence among us will be dealt with when the time is right.”

That didn’t sound particularly promising. I wasn’t in the mood to be dealt with, and no one apart from Sarah seemed exactly delighted to see me, though at least Tamlel was trying, bless him.

“I’m afraid I’ve promised to help Michael in the weapons room,” Tamlel said. “However, Sammael would be more than happy to serve.” Sammael didn’t look happy to do anything, but maybe that was because he looked like a teenager.

But clearly no one said no to Sarah. “Thank you, Sammael. I’ll take Allie back upstairs—she’ll need warmer clothes if she’s to go into the caves, and I wish to talk to her. You may join us in an hour.”

Sammael bowed in acquiescence, and we started back toward the house.

“I’m worried about him,” she said in a low voice.

“Raziel? Or Sammael?”

She laughed. “Raziel. Sammael has always been like that. The Fallen are eternal—they tend not to change.”

“Great,” I said. Last night Raziel had treated me like an unwelcome interloper, when it was hardly my fault I was here. I didn’t fancy spending eternity feeling out of place. But apparently it wasn’t the women who were eternal, only the damned men.

I glanced at Sarah as we climbed. She looked human, normal, friendly. There were no marks whatsoever on her wrist, the wrist that had been dripping blood into Raziel’s mouth.

Funny. Popular culture always seemed to suggest that vampires—excuse me, blood-eaters—were sexual, that the drinking of blood was an erotic act.

In retrospect, last night’s scene had seemed more like a mama bird feeding her baby. Though I doubted Raziel would enjoy being seen as a fuzzy hatchling.

“Are you certain going up to the caves is a good idea?” I said uneasily. “I don’t think Raziel will be particularly happy to see me.”

“Raziel gets his way far too much of the time,” she said in her tranquil voice. “Jarameel is usually the one who has visions, but he’s been gone for a long time, and my own are far too muddy and unclear. But I know you’re here for a reason, and that reason has to do with Raziel.”

There wasn’t much I could say in response to that. “Okay.” I let the word sit for a moment. “So what’s he doing up in the caves?”

“He’s doing what everyone is doing. He’s looking for the First,” she said.

“The first what?”

“The First of the Fallen.” We rounded another landing, and I was surprised to realize we were almost at the top. It was far less torturous with Sarah by my side.

“You’re looking for Lucifer? Why? What happened to him?”

She looked startled. “I forgot you were a biblical scholar.”

All right, I could be embarrassed. “Hardly. I write—I wrote Old Testament mysteries. I have a certain amount of basic knowledge, but for the rest I just Googled what I needed to know.”

“ ‘Googled’?”

I realized with sudden horror that I hadn’t seen a computer anywhere in this place. Maybe this was hell. “Looked it up,” I clarified.

“Ah, no wonder Uriel hated you,” she said. “He takes history very seriously. He takes everything very seriously.”

“I don’t understand about Uriel. What’s he got to say about things?”

“Everything. When God gave mankind free will, he left Uriel in charge. And Uriel is . . .” For a moment words failed her, and the look in her eyes was bleak. “. . . quite unforgiving. His answer to everything that even hints of evil is to destroy it. And he sees evil in everything.”

We had stopped for the moment, and I considered the consequences of such an attitude. “That doesn’t sound too good for the future of mankind.”

“It’s not good for the future of life in any form.” She pushed open the door in front of us. “That’s why we search for Lucifer.”

The stark white apartment was just as clean and soulless as it had been when I left it. I sank down on one of the pure white sofas. “So where is Lucifer?”

She sighed. “He’s in some kind of stasis, and has been for millennia, since God first passed judgment on him. He’s conscious, awake, but no one can get to him. Only my husband and Raziel have been able to hear him, and the mountain caves are the only place quiet enough for Raziel to listen. As for what we want with him—the Fallen want him to lead them as they overthrow Uriel.”

I blinked. Just my luck—I died, and instead of a peaceful afterlife, I got stuck in the middle of an angelic coup d’état. I pulled my legs up under me, hugging my knees, and cast a glance at a plate of blueberry muffins that was sitting on the coffee table. Before I could reach for them, Sarah went on, “Ask Raziel about it. He’ll probably think I told you too much already. You know how men can be.”

I was ready to make a smart-ass comment—so far Raziel had shown little inclination to tell me anything—but I stopped myself. “You called him a man. Is he?”

“A man? Oh, most definitely. When the angels fall, they take human shape along with their curses.”

“Humans aren’t immortal. Humans aren’t cursed. They can’t fly and they don’t . . .” I hesitated. Once spoken, it would be too real. “They don’t drink blood.”

Sarah’s quick laugh took the onus off it. “Don’t be picky. Call them what you will—they are many things, as you already know.” She moved over to the window. “They’re cursed, and the curse goes deep. If you understand that, it will make things easier on you.”

I stared longingly at the blueberry muffins. If I had one, I’d be hard-pressed not to eat three, and that would use up half my calorie count for the day.

“Why don’t you have a muffin?” she asked, mystified. “You’ve been staring at them since we arrived.”

“I don’t dare. The food’s too damned good here—I’ll end up looking like a blimp.”

Sarah laughed. “That’s one advantage to living here. You won’t need to worry about diet. The women may not be immortal, but we still manage to live a lot longer than most humans do. It’s almost impossible to kill us. In a little while your cholesterol, blood pressure, blood sugar, and anything else will be textbook perfect.”

“Except that I’m not mortal, I’m dead. Aren’t I?”

Sarah’s forehead wrinkled. “I don’t know if anyone’s quite sure what you are. You’re something of an original, and we have yet to discover your purpose.

Even so, I think we all suffer a sea change when we come here. Those who come as wives and bonded mates become almost invulnerable. I don’t think there’s been a flu or a cold here in generations. We live very long lives—I was born at the beginning of the last century, I have the body of an extremely healthy sixty-something, and I expect to live at least another fifty years. It’s similar for the rest of us. The good news is we can give up glasses, contact lenses, allergy meds, and diets.”

“How come you know about some things and not others, like contact lenses and Ben & Jerry’s, but you don’t know what Google is?” I asked, confused.

“It depends on what the newest wife brings to us. I don’t believe Carrie has mentioned Google but she was very fond of ice cream.”

“So am I.”

“Well, you’ll be pleased to know that you won’t have to worry about gaining weight. You’ll stay exactly the same as you are now.”

“What?” I was horrified. “I’m still fifteen pounds overweight. Are you telling me I’m going to be like this throughout eternity?”

Sarah laughed and patted my hand. “Don’t worry—it’s a healthy fifteen pounds. And Raziel might like it.”

I stared at her. “What does that have to do with anything? He didn’t even stay around long enough to say good morning. Besides, I don’t like him very much either.”

Sarah tilted her head, surveying me with eyes that saw far too much. Or read too much into an entirely innocent situation. “He didn’t say good morning?”

she echoed. “Did he sleep with you last night?” The idea seemed to astonish her, which wasn’t particularly flattering.

“Of course not!” I said, trying to sound horrified rather than . . . God, I was feeling almost wistful. What was wrong with me?

“But he spent the night in the same apartment?”

I hesitated, then decided to dump. If anyone was going to help me figure things out, it would be Sarah. “In the same bed, I think. But he didn’t touch me. I fell asleep in here, woke up this morning in bed, alone”—I saw her mouth open to ask a question, and said firmly—“and untouched. It looked as if someone else had slept there too, and he’s the logical choice since these are his rooms, but if he did he kept to his side of the bed. He didn’t even bite me.”

Sarah blinked for a moment, then laughed, her voice light and curiously beguiling. “He’d shag you before he’d bite you, Allie. That’s the highest form of intimacy there is. It’s the last thing he’d want with you.”

Of course it was. Thank God, I told myself virtuously. “I’m thrilled to hear it. So he’s only intimate with you?”

There was the faintest trace of color on her creamy skin. “You mean because he took my blood? Didn’t the two of you talk at all? I can’t believe you simply let him brood around and not answer any questions.”

“We talked. We just didn’t get around to the whole . . . blood thing.”

“Oh,” Sarah said after a moment. “Well, I don’t suppose it matters—it may not affect you one way or another. Unless it makes a great difference to you, there’s really no reason for us to talk about it.”

It did. Everything about Raziel made a great deal of difference to me, but admitting that only made things worse. “No reason at all,” I said brightly.

I looked past her toward the bank of windows overlooking the fog-shrouded Pacific Ocean. At least, I assumed it was the Pacific—for all I knew, we could be on Mars. The windows been left open, and a strong breeze tossed the sheer white curtains into the air, sending a little shiver of some unnamed emotion down my backbone. “Is everything white in this place?” I demanded, feeling cranky. Being dead would do that to a girl.

For a moment I thought I saw something just beyond the windows—the breathless shimmer of iridescent blue wings, the sun sparkling off them. I narrowed my gaze, but there was nothing out there, just a few seagulls in the distance, wheeling and cawing. No seagulls on Mars, I thought.

Sarah looked around as if noticing for the first time. “I suppose so. Raziel tends to see things as either black or white—never shades of gray. He’d probably really hate it if you painted anything.” She grinned, suddenly looking mischievous. “Just let me know if you want some help.”

The idea was irresistible, and I laughed. “Do you want to make his life a living hell?”

“No, dear. That’s going to be your job.”

Another odd fluttering. I rose and crossed the living room to peer out into the bright sky, the rolling mist on the ocean. There was nothing in the sky but the seagulls—I must be imagining things.

Or was I? I was stuck in the sterile aerie of a creature who could fly—why would I assume that mysterious dark wings were a figment of my imagination?

I turned my back on the windows. If Raziel was out there buzzing the building in an effort to spook me, I wasn’t going to let him. Though the sight of him dive-bombing the place would have been pretty damned funny.

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you before Sammael gets here. Apart from welcoming you to Sheol,” Sarah said, “I wanted to warn you about Raziel.”

Oh, great. As if things weren’t bad enough, now I needed to be warned about the only man I slightly, somewhat, minimally trusted. “He’s an ax murderer?” I suggested cheerfully.

Sarah’s responding smile was a token. “Don’t be fooled by his kindness. Raziel has shut himself off from all human feeling, from caring about anyone besides the Fallen and their wives. I will speak for you at the meeting today, but if you’re relying on Raziel to protect you, you’re wasting your time.”

I was still trying to reconcile the term kindness with the bad-tempered Raziel I’d been saddled with. Though more likely Raziel would consider he’d been saddled with me.

“Oh—there’s a meeting?” I said, feeling doomed. “I suppose they’re going to decide whether I live or die, and I’m not going to have any voice in the matter. Of course, I’m dead already, so I guess it doesn’t really matter. I just don’t feel like I’m dead. And I really don’t want to go back to that place.” I shivered. I couldn’t remember much, just heat and noise and the pain of thousands of souls reaching out. . . .

“I’ll speak for you. I’ll do anything I can to stop them. Right now they’re more worried about the Nephilim and whether Uriel will use your presence as an excuse to move against us. I just don’t want you to count on Raziel. He’s sworn off caring about anyone, and I’m afraid he’s not going to make an exception for you.” She tilted her head sideways, assessing me. “At least, I don’t think so. But I’ll fight for you. And sometimes they listen.”

And if that didn’t sound like a rock-solid guarantee, I figured it was the best I could expect. If I was going to get out of this mess, I’d have to figure it out on my own.

Sammael appeared at the door just as Sarah was leaving, and he didn’t look any happier to see me than he had before.

“Are you ready?” he asked politely.

I suddenly remembered all those flights of stairs, and groaned. Once a day was enough. “I don’t suppose you have an elevator hidden anywhere around here?”

“No.” Sammael moved past me to push open a section of the windows that I had blithely assumed was solid wall. The wind was rising, swirling into the apartment, but in Raziel’s sterile environment there was nothing loose that could be blown away. “Come with me—we’ll take the shortcut.”

I looked from Sammael’s calm face to the wind and ocean just beyond those doors to nowhere. He was an angel, wasn’t he? Albeit Sarah had said he was one of the angels of death. He wasn’t going to toss me out the window, was he?

You can only die once, I thought, not knowing whether it was true or not. Taking Sammael’s hand, I stepped out into a nothingness that was blindingly bright.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

IT SEEMED AS IF A MOMENT HAD passed, or an hour. I found myself standing on a cliff, much higher up than the house had been, and I’d never been crazy about heights. I could see out over the vast ocean, and the sun beginning to sink lower on the horizon. Pacific Ocean, then. The ground was wet beneath my feet, and there was no sign of my missing mentor. I glanced at Sammael. I couldn’t remember holding on to him, soaring through those misty skies. But clearly I hadn’t walked.

“Where is he?” I asked.

“In the cave. Just go straight—you’ll find him.”

We were three-quarters of the way up a mountain that I hadn’t even realized was nearby. Its top was enshrouded in mist, as was the rocky shoreline below, and I could see the great yawning mouth of a cave closer than I would have liked. I waited for the familiar panic to set in. “I’m claustrophobic when it comes to caves,” I finally admitted, glancing nervously at the rough-hewn entrance, worn smooth by centuries of scouring winds. In fact, I didn’t like heights, closed-in places, places that were too open—give me a phobia and I embraced it enthusiastically.

“Not anymore,” Sammael said in a colorless voice. “You should watch what you say. You’ll be lucky if the Council simply decides to grant you the Grace.”

“The Grace?” That sounded almost pleasant.

“Your memory would be wiped clean. I promise you, it wouldn’t hurt, and you’d be perfectly happy. You’d be able to do simple tasks, perhaps even learn to read and write a few simple words.”

I stared at him in absolute horror. “No,” I said flatly.

“It won’t be your choice.” He seemed unmoved by my reaction. “Do you want me to take you to Raziel?”

“I can manage,” I said, not sure that I could, but I really didn’t want to hear any more of Sammael’s awful possibilities. The inhabitants of Sheol seemed to have mixed feelings about me. Azazel, Sammael, and Raziel clearly thought I didn’t belong, and I was happy to agree with them. Tamlel, Sarah, and the Stepford wives were welcoming, but that would probably mean nothing once they held their council meeting. “But I thank you for the offer. I think I need to figure out how to get what I need on my own, don’t I?”

He barely registered my question. “I’ll come back if there’s a problem.”

“How will you know?” I asked suspiciously. Raziel had been able to read my mind—if it turned out the whole place knew what I was thinking, then maybe I wouldn’t mind getting a lobotomy.

“Sarah will know. Sarah will tell me,” he said simply, as if he expected me to know something so basic.

Clearly Sarah was a force to be reckoned with. It was a good thing that she seemed to be on my side. “I’ll be fine,” I said firmly, and before I could add to it, Sammael had disappeared into the wind.

“Well, damn,” I said out loud. I’d been hoping to see wings. If Sammael came equipped with them, I hadn’t had time to notice. Which made travel convenient, but still a little bit puzzling.

I turned to look at the cave, waiting for the icy fear to set in, but I felt nothing but an entirely reasonable nervousness at the thought of bearding Raziel in his den. Sammael had told the truth—the claustrophobia had vanished. Whoopee, I thought with a suitable lack of enthusiasm, walking forward.

I still wasn’t crazy about enclosed spaces. The wide corridor into the mountain looked as if it had been a mine shaft, if they had mine shafts in the afterlife. It narrowed a little too swiftly as I made my way down it. Normally I’d be curled up on the ground, covered with a cold sweat. The fact that I could keep moving, deeper and deeper into the mountain, was more proof of how different things were. A proof I could easily have done without.

I wasn’t quite sure what I expected. The corridor took a couple of sharp turns, shutting out the daylight at the entrance, but I managed to keep going without stopping to hyperventilate. Where the hell was Raziel? I had the sudden fear that Sammael had pulled a Hansel and Gretel on me, luring me to this mountain to abandon me, thereby getting rid of a messy problem. Sarah wouldn’t let him get away with that, would she?

I’d almost given up trying to find him when I turned one last corner and saw him sitting on a wooden chair in the middle of a huge stone cavern, his eyes closed.

I had planned to be a smart-ass and say something like “Yoo-hoo, imaginary creature, I’m here,” but I thought better of it. He was sitting at the edge of a great yawning hole in the center of the cave, and it looked like some of the walls had collapsed inward. He was at the very edge, too close for comfort, and as I looked he seemed to sway toward the opening.

I tried to stifle my instinctive scream, but he heard me anyway and jerked, startled. He fell backward, away from the pit, and the chair went over. I could hear it splintering against the stone walls as it fell, and I shivered. He rose, focusing on me, and I tried for a cheerful smile.

As I expected, he wasn’t the least bit pleased to see me. “How did you get here?” he demanded, not moving any closer.

“Sammael,” I said.

He grunted. “You’re wearing my clothes.” “It’s better than all that white,” I said. “Were you frightened by an albino when you were a child?” “I was never a child.”

Another of his flat, incontrovertible statements. At least he was talking to me. “You mean you were born this way?”

“I wasn’t born.” He stayed where he was, on the edge of the pit, and it made me nervous. Though I supposed if he fell, he could probably fly out of there, couldn’t he? “Why are you here? I told Tam and Sammael to keep you busy. This is no place for you.”

“I don’t belong in this dank little cave? I can agree with that,” I said. “Not that it’s actually dank or little, but you get the point. Or I don’t belong in Sheol at all? Because I’m willing to agree with you on that one as well, but apparently it’s your fault I’m here and not back in New York dodging buses, and I really don’t feel like having a bunch of men get together and decide what’s going to happen to me, particularly when one of the options includes the equivalent of brain damage. And I don’t like white.”

He blinked at the non sequitur. “Tough,” he said shortly. He started toward me, and I watched him, trying to put all the strange, disparate things I knew about him together in one package.

“Where are your wings?” I asked. If I was going to be stuck with angels, I should at least get to see some feather action.

He rolled his eyes. “Why is that always the first question? You don’t need to know.”

“If I stay here, do I get them?”

“You’re not and never will be an angel,” he said.

I was willing to put up a fight. “Oh, you never can tell. I mean, clearly I’ve been far from angelic so far, but I can always change my ways and become positively saintly.” I gave him a hopeful beam that left him entirely unmoved.

“People don’t become angels,” he said in a tone that said, Any moron knows that.

“How about heaven? Don’t people get wings there? Since I’m dead and all that, it seems like a good place to start.”

His laugh wasn’t flattering. “I don’t think you’ve reached that point yet.”

“Then you’re stuck with me. Get used to it.”

He halted directly in front of me. “For now,” he said. “I wouldn’t count on a lengthy stay. But for as long I have to put up with you, you can stop stealing my clothes. And you can stop talking—the sound of your voice is like fingernails on a blackboard.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said, totally unmoved. “I have a delightful voice. It’s low and sexy, or so people have told me. You’re just being difficult.”

“I don’t care how glorious your voice is, I’d appreciate hearing less of it.”

I opened my mouth to protest, then shut it again. If I wanted to survive, I needed him on my side, and I was going to have to behave myself, at least a little bit. I stood perfectly still, saying nothing, waiting for him.

He tilted his head, letting his strange eyes slide down me, assessing. Odd, but it felt as palpable as a touch. “My clothes are too tight for you,” he said helpfully.

“You’re a man, I’m a woman. I have hips.”

“Indeed,” he said, and I looked at him sharply to see if there was an insult hidden behind his bland tone of voice. “I meant to have clothes provided for you.”

“You did. They were all white.” “You don’t like white? It’s the color of rebirth, renewal.”

“It’s not a color at all, it’s the absence of color,” I said. “I may be in limbo, having to get by on your charity, but I’m not going to let everything go a dull beige.”

“Limbo is a mythical construction,” he said. “And white is not beige.”

“Sheol is a mythical construction, and angels are part of fairy tales, and vampires are nightmares, and you don’t exist,” I snapped. I was getting a little tired of all this.

“Then where are you?” He wasn’t expecting an answer. “What did Sammael tell you?”

“Sammael’s a teenager. He barely said two words. Sarah was more forthcoming. She told me not to count on you for anything.”

“Did she?”

“She said that despite your great kindnesses to me—and I have to admit I have yet to see any evidence of kindness on your part—you wouldn’t speak up for me at the meeting and you’d let the others do what they want with me, and I wanted to make sure—”

“Be quiet!” It was spoken in a soft voice, soft but deadly, and I shut up.

Almost. “Are you going to let them melt my brain?”

He looked confused for a moment, before resuming his familiar exasperated expression. “Oh, the Grace. No.”

It was one small syllable, but I trusted him.

“In the future, you’re not to come up here,” he continued, his tone cool, “and I will make certain Sarah knows where you’re allowed to go and what’s offlimits.

There are dangerous places in Sheol, including the gates that surround us. This place is almost as dangerous.”

“Have you found Lucifer?” He opened his mouth to reprimand me, and I shot back, “It’s four words, for heaven’s sake. Deal with it.”

He looked annoyed. “Sarah’s been talking too much.”

“Everyone seems to talk too much to suit you. Or is it just women?” Sexist bastard, I thought with a peculiar lack of heat.

“No I’m not,” he said.

Not what? I thought.

“You are the only female around here who seems unable to control her tongue You don’t need the details of our fight with the archangel. It’s none of your —” “—business,” I chimed in with him. “And Sarah didn’t tell me much. Besides, I might point out that Lucifer fell because he dared ask too many questions.” I shot him a wry glance. “You should have some sympathy for the curious.”

“Don’t get delusions of grandeur. Lucifer’s questions were more important than whining about why there are so many stairs.”

“And that reminds me—judging by Sammael’s ‘shortcut,’ I shouldn’t have had to walk. You have wings—you could have flown me up there in no time.”

“I could have,” he agreed. “But you need to know where you are, what’s expected of you. There won’t always be someone around to transport you. And I don’t want to transport you if I can help it.”

“Why not?” He probably didn’t want to touch me, I thought, grumpy at the idea. He was treating me as if I had an advanced case of leprosy, which was both annoying and ever so slightly depressing. Not that I was attracted to him—he wasn’t my type.

“You know why,” he said shortly.

“What do you mean?”

His eyes met mine, and I had the oddest feeling I could see my own thoughts in them. Which was truly a horrible idea, because I’d had some thoughts that were decidedly warm, indecent, and embarrassing. This was hard enough without him knowing that I had feelings I was using all my excess energy trying to fight. If he could read my every thought, I was screwed.

“No, I can’t always tell what you’re thinking,” he said by way of an answer, and my heart sank. “Some things are easy, other things are well protected inside you. It takes a lot to get to those, and I’m certainly not going to bother.”

I wasn’t sure if that was reassuring or insulting. At least he had no idea that I had a furtive desire to jump his—

“Stop it!” he snapped.

Shit. Okay, I could try fighting back. I batted my eyelashes, giving him my most limpid, innocent look. “Stop what?”

He crossed the cavern so fast I wondered if he’d used magic, or whatever his abilities were called. “It will not happen, so you can stop thinking about it. I am never going to mate with you.”

“Mate with me?” I echoed, much amused. “Why don’t you just call a spade a spade? You’re never going to have sex with me. Which, incidentally, is fortunate, because what makes you think I want to have sex with you?” No one likes rejection, even from someone they despise.

“There’s a difference. Mating is a bond for life. Your life. Sex is simply fornication.”

“And you don’t approve of fornication.”

He looked at me then, a slow, scorching look. Maybe I was wrong on the rejection part. He loomed over me, dangerously close. “I could quite easily fuck you,” he said deliberately, the word strange in his faintly formal voice. “You are undeniably luscious. But I’m not going to. And you need to get it out of your mind as well. It’s not just the words that distract me. It’s the pictures.”

Oh, crap. He could see the visuals? “I can’t help it! It’s like telling someone not to move. As soon as someone tells me to be still, I end up having to wiggle. Anyway, you were the one who brought up the subject in the first place.”

He opened his mouth to argue, then closed it. “I have things to do,” he said finally. “I don’t want to transport you.”

I looked around the cavernous room. “You’ll have to put up with it,” I said. “Otherwise there’s no way down and I’m stuck here.”

“You tempt me,” he said, and his stark, beautiful voice danced down my backbone. I really was much too susceptible to him. “But someone would come to find you.” He moved past me, heading toward the corridor that led to the outside world. As outside as Sheol might be. He paused, looking back at me.

“Are you coming?”

I would have loved to tell him no, but there was a chill to the place, and I didn’t want to wait there alone until someone came to rescue me. I was managing pretty damned well, given the situation, but I was his responsibility and I was not about to let him abandon me.

I raced after him, catching up as we reached the mouth of the cave and the misty daylight. “What next?” I said. “Do I climb on your back, or do you carry me in your arms, or—”

“You stop talking,” he said.

I almost tripped over the white rug that covered part of the white marble floor. We were back in his sterile apartment, and he was in the kitchen. My legs felt a little wobbly, and I sank down on the sofa and put my head between my legs to keep from passing out. Then I looked up. “You could give me some warning next time,” I said irritably.

“There won’t be a next time if I can help it.” He leaned against the counter, looking at a plate of doughnuts someone had left. “Aren’t you going to eat these? I suppose Sarah told you you can’t gain weight.”

I bristled slightly that he would even mention my weight in such an offhand manner, but hey, that was permission enough. I got to my feet and moved into the small kitchen.

And it was small. Too small to hold both of us, really, but he wasn’t shifting away and I wanted those magic doughnuts.

It was a novel experience, having a beautiful man tell me to eat fattening foods, the stuff of daydreams. “No, dear, at one hundred and eighty pounds, you’re too thin. You need to put on some weight.” Be still, my heart. Oh, he was hardly the first beautiful man I’d been around. I was shallow that way—I liked men who were pretty and just a little stupid, and I’d always preferred them on the beefy side. I had the unhappy suspicion that Raziel was a little too smart for my peace of mind. But I was beginning to see the appeal of lean, powerful elegance.

Most of my boyfriends had wanted me to go on a diet, get down to a size six or eight from the comfortable size twelve I’d worn since college. We’d go out to dinner, I would dutifully order a side salad with a spritz of lemon juice or vinegar, and then the moment I was home alone I’d plow through the Ben &

Jerry’s. Super Fudge Chunk had marked the end of many a dull date.

“So I’m still going to be hungry and eat, use the bathroom, sleep, bathe, and never gain weight. Sounds delightful. Do I get to have sex with anyone if you don’t want me?”

He stared at me, momentarily speechless. “No,” he said finally. “Absolutely not. It’s forbidden.”

“But you said you could happily—”

“I said you and I won’t have sex,” he interrupted before I could drop the F-bomb as he had.

“Why would you want to?” I said, managing to sound bored with the idea.

“I don’t want to,” he snapped. “You asked me if we would have sex.”

“You misunderstood. Deliberately,” I added, just to annoy him. In this strange, otherworldly place, annoying him was one of the only things that made me feel alive. “I do understand why you’d want to, but I really don’t think it’s a good idea. You being my mentor and all.”

This was working even better than I’d expected. He was ready to explode with frustration. Not the right kind of frustration, unfortunately. Indeed, it was too bad that I was taunting him, but I couldn’t resist. He really was freaking gorgeous. It was probably unwise—I needed him on my side. “No,” he said repressively.

I shrugged, taking another doughnut. “Do we get sick? Will I start feeling bloated if I eat a fourth doughnut?”

“Yes,” he said.

I put the doughnut down. “Well, at least you’ll outlive me. Cheer up. You can dance at my funeral.”

“I won’t know you when you die. Assuming we figure out what to do with you, we probably won’t see each other again.”

This wasn’t very comforting news, but I wasn’t giving up the battle. “Once they decide, how long will it take to get rid of me?”

He just looked at me, his expression saying it couldn’t be soon enough.

Oddly enough, I wasn’t sure I wanted to leave, even if they could give me back some semblance of a normal life with mental acuity intact. Yes, I enjoyed picking on him, and the white had to go. But despite my arguments, I . . . kind of liked it here. Liked the sound of the ocean beyond the open windows, the taste of salt on my lips. I’d always wanted to live by the sea. I was getting my wish a little earlier than expected, and it wasn’t technically living, but it was close enough.

I liked the bed I’d slept in, I liked Sarah, and I most definitely liked to look at Raziel, even if he was frustrating, annoying, and all the other negative adjectives I could think of. And if he could read my mind, tough shit.

In fact, I was living my dream. I’d spent most of my adult life sifting through arcane literature and Bible criticism to come up with my far-fetched mysteries, and I was well acquainted with the totally bizarre fantasies of Enoch, with his tales of the Nephilim and the Fallen.

Except it turned out Enoch wasn’t the acid freak I’d always thought he was. All of this was real.

The kitchen was too small for both of us, but for him to leave he’d have to brush past me, and I knew he really didn’t want to touch me. It was lovely to think that it was unshakable lust keeping him away, but I knew it was more likely annoyance—I’d done my best to make him want to strangle me.

“No,” he said, “I don’t want to strangle you. I just want you to go away.”

Grrrr. “How long are you going to be reading my mind?” I demanded, thoroughly annoyed.

“As long as I need to.”

“Well, that time is now over. Turn off the switch, or whatever it is you do. Stay the fuck out of my brain. Don’t read my mind, don’t cloud my thoughts, don’t wipe out my memory. Keep your distance.” I didn’t bother trying to keep the snarl out of my voice. I’d had enough of this crap.

He was looking dangerously close to be being amused. His gloriously striated eyes glinted for a moment, but I seriously doubted that Raziel possessed even a tiny trace of a sense of humor in his cold, still body. Sure enough, the expression vanished so quickly I was sure I’d imagined it.

“Or what?” he said.

Asshole. He knew I didn’t have much to fight back with. Little did he know that I’d always been wickedly inventive. Maybe that was why I’d been sent to hell.H ands sliding down my body, beautiful hands, his mouth following, on my breast, sucking—

“Stop it!” he said with complete horror, pushing away from me as if burned by the sultry image in my brain.

I smiled sweetly. “I’ve got a hell of an imagination, Raziel,” I said, calling him by name for the first time. “Stay out of my head or prepare to be thoroughly embarrassed.”

Taking the plate of doughnuts, I sauntered back out into the living room.

CHAPTER TWELVE

SHE WAS A WITCH. SHE SHOULD have been humble and weepy and afraid of me. Instead she was the complete opposite, and the quick vision of her sex fantasy was having the expected effect on my body. Azazel was right—I’d been celibate too long.

I stayed in the kitchen, not moving. I’d thought I at least had my body under control. In truth, it was no wonder I was hard, with that brief fantasy she’d indulged in. I had no idea whether she really found it appealing or whether it was just part of the game she was playing.

No, it was real. As I’d seen the thought, I’d felt her own fevered reaction, as intense as mine despite the brevity of the image. If that had simply been an intellectual exercise, it wouldn’t have been so . . . disturbing.

I had to get rid of her, and fast. I needed her out of my rooms, out of my world. There was no way in hell I was going to let them invoke the Grace of forgetting, but apart from that anything would be an improvement. Sarah was always looking for someone to mother—Allie Watson was the very thing. I could pass her over, then go out on my own and not have to think about her anymore. It might take a day or two to get her out of my system, but I could do it. I could turn myself off. As long as she wasn’t living in my apartment and taunting me.

I was getting closer to Lucifer’s burial ground. I could sit and listen and hear him deep in the earth, feel his call vibrate through my body, and I was close, so close. I didn’t need to get distracted by a woman with a mouth that wouldn’t stop moving and erotic images invading my mind.

Why the hell had Sammael brought her up to the cave in the first place? He knew better than anybody that place should be off-limits, particularly to an interloper like Allie Watson. It was the closest we’d come to Lucifer, the Light, and to have her bumbling around with her incessant questions was close to blasphemy.

Not that I believed in blasphemy. That was part of why I was here, wasn’t it? Because I, like the others, refused to follow the rules, to kill without question, to wipe out generations and scourge the land. I had looked on a human woman and fallen in love, and for that I was forever cursed.

Surely there was something wrong with an ethos that equated love with death. It was so long ago I wasn’t sure I could remember what we’d been thinking, could barely remember her. But I couldn’t forget the emotion, the passion that had driven me, the certainty that choosing life, choosing human love, was the right thing to do. It had been worth it, worth everything, and I had never regretted it.

I could regret the vulnerability, the need that had driven me to such a desperate act, but it no longer mattered. I had done what I had done, and I wouldn’t wish it changed. But it would never happen again.

Uriel knew how to use vulnerabilities. He knew how to torture, even with the rules that kept him from wiping us out. I wasn’t going to let him use me again.

So perhaps there were times when I wished I could still feel that innocent, powerful love. Hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of years, millennia, piling up, and I’d never been able to recapture that pure, essential passion that had made me destroy everything.

But I still would have done it. Chosen to fall. We’d been taught that the humans were like cattle—you trained them, destroyed them if they disobeyed, never answered their questions, and, most of all, never looked upon them with lust.

We’d been sent to earth with our appointed tasks. Azazel had been sent to teach the people metalwork; his job had been to train and to pass on the magic. The first twenty each had jobs, and we’d done well enough at first. But the longer we remained on earth, the more human we became. The hungers started, hunger for food, for life, for sex. And we started thinking that we could make this benighted world a better place. We could bring our wisdom and power, we could experience love and dedication. We would intermarry and our children would grow strong and there would be no more wars and God would smile.

God didn’t smile. There were no children—the curse was swift and vicious. We were damned for eternity. Because of love.

No wonder the woman wandering around my rooms annoyed me. It wasn’t just her prattle—she was right, it was a pleasant voice. But after all these years I had no use for humankind, for women in particular. And this woman, of all women. A moment of unexpected sentimentality, and I’d complicated my existence and that of the Fallen. No woman was worth it.

Still, it was my choice, my mistake, and my only option was to fix it, even if I wanted to pass her off. There had to be someplace we could send her where she wouldn’t cause trouble. And then we could deal with Uriel’s wrath.

I was the keeper of secrets, the lord of magic. Within me resided all the wisdom of the ages, and I had been sent to earth to give that knowledge to its hapless inhabitants. So how could I be so fucking stupid?

I glanced down, adjusted myself, and followed her into the living room. She was sprawled on one sofa, barefoot. My clothes fit her too damned well—I was going to have to see about something loose that covered up all the curves but was colorful enough to keep her happy.

God, why did I have to start worrying about keeping a woman happy? Especially a woman like Allie Watson.

Her long, thick brown hair was much better than the short bleached cut she’d had when I found her. Her face was prettier without makeup. She shifted, turning to look at me without getting up.

I walked over to one end of the sofa. “Where do you want to live?”

She’d been looking both annoyed and slightly downcast, but at this she brightened. “I’ve got a choice where I go?”

I didn’t think so, but I was grasping at straws. The one thing I knew, it couldn’t be hell. It was nothing personal. I hadn’t come this far to let Uriel win.

“Maybe,” I said, not exactly a lie. “I imagine it depends on your talents, where you can make yourself useful. What can you do?”

She appeared to consider this for a moment. “I can write. My style is slightly sarcastic, but I’m sharp and literate.”

“We have no use for writing.”

“So I’m in hell after all,” she said glumly. “No books?”

“What would we read? We’ve lived millennia.” “What about your wives?” “I have no wives.”

“I don’t mean you specifically, I mean all the women here. Sarah and the others. Don’t they want to read? Or do you guys give them such a fulfilling life, trapped here in the mist, that they don’t need any kind of escape?”

“If they wanted to escape, they wouldn’t be here,” I said in the voice I used to shut down arguments.

I should have known it wouldn’t do any good. She didn’t seem to realize that was what my voice signified. “I’m not talking about physical escape,” she argued. “Just those times when you want to curl up in bed and read about crazy make-believe worlds. About pirates and aliens and vampires . . .” Her voice trailed off beneath my steady gaze.

“What else can you do?”

She sighed. “Not much. I’m useless at Excel. I type fast, but I gather you don’t have computers here.” For a moment she looked horrified as she understood everything that meant. “No Internet,” she said in a voice of doom. “How am I going to live?”

“You’re not alive.”

“Thanks for reminding me,” she said grimly. “So clearly you don’t need Excel. Let’s see—I’m a demon at trivia, particularly when it comes to old movies.

I’m actually quite a wonderful cook. I kill plants, so I’d be no good in a garden. Maybe you could find me some commune-type thing? Without the Kool-Aid.”

I remembered Jonestown far too well. “You don’t need the Kool-Aid, you’re already dead,” I said.

“Lovely,” she said sarcastically. “So do I get married? Have kids? For God’s sake, at least have sex again?”

“Again?” It always managed to startle me, the way women of the current times simply gave their bodies when and where they wished. Two thousand years ago they would have been stoned to death. A hundred years ago they would have been outcasts. The human women who came to Sheol had been the same over the ages. They had never known anyone but their bonded mates. Azazel had seen Sarah when she was a child and known she was going to be his, and he’d watched over her, keeping her safe, until she was old enough to be his bride. The same was true for all the others.