Angel in Chains (The Fallen #3)(78)
Author: Cynthia Eden

And he’d been loving her, but he’d just been too blind and foolish to realize it sooner.

“I can’t,” Bastion said, almost sounding regretful. “It’s too late. She’s gone—”

The screams in his mind grew louder. Jade is calling me. Az fired. The bullet burned right through Bastion’s chest. “If she’s dead, then so are you.”

A howling filled his ears, blending with the chaos of the screams. The fires around him flared higher, hotter, destroying everything in sight.

“Azrael!” Sam’s horrified yell tore through the blaze. “What have you done?”

Smoke drifted from the hole in Bastion’s chest. “He took her.” Az knew he had. Bastion had been close the whole time. And when Jade’s neck had broken . . . “He took her from me—took her, when I’d just found her!” A woman who could love the darkest of the angels.

Gone.

Sam stood behind the line of blazing fire. “You’re out of control. You need to—”

Az aimed the gun at him. “I told you to summon the witch.” Angels couldn’t help him. Rule followers. But the witch . . . Mateo followed no one’s rules. He’d cheat death.

For the right price.

Sam frowned at the gun. “So now you’d shoot me?”

No. Yes. He couldn’t think. His heart was gone. Ripped from his chest. Jade’s scent—strawberries—surrounded him and the fire’s heat told him that only hell waited for him. He wouldn’t see Jade again when he left this earth. He’d never see her again.

“The world doesn’t go on without her,” he gritted out. Tanner screamed as the fire caught him and burned his flesh. “It doesn’t.”

Swearing, Sam leapt through the flames. He grabbed for the gun.

Az tried to yank the weapon back. He wasn’t letting go of it. He wasn’t letting go of Jade.

Never let go.

The gun fired. He was staring straight into Sam’s eyes. He saw the shock in his brother’s gaze. The flash of pain.

Then he saw the whisper of life leaving as Sam’s spirit was pulled from his body.

Sam fell to the ground, dead at his feet.

One brother, killing another . . .

The ground split around him. No longer small crevices, but deep, giant fissures that seemed to stretch all the way to hell.

A prophecy had been made once. When one brother kills another . . . hell comes.

Jade’s scent faded until he could only smell brimstone. And the screams in his mind had finally stopped. Now he could hear laughter. Whispers.

Hell comes.

He dropped the gun. Held her cold body even tighter. “Mateo!” The witch would appear. The witch would save her.

Or . . . at least . . . kill me.

Because the chains that had always held him in check were broken and only fury raged within him.

“Mateo!”

Jade was dead. He’d destroyed his brother, and if Mateo couldn’t kill him . . . Az was afraid he’d destroy the world. “Mateo!”

“I’m right here,” the witch said as he shook Az. “Look at me, Fallen. Look.”

Az realized he was kneeling on the ground. His whole body shook, and sweat soaked his skin. He glanced up, and found Mateo staring down at him.

“Bring her back,” he whispered, his voice broken.

Mateo sighed. “She’s not gone yet.”

In an instant, Az was on his feet. But he stumbled, his knees weak, and he shoved his hand out—

And touched blood.

He turned his head slowly and stared at the wall of the crypt beside him. The blood looked black in the moonlight, but he knew what it was. Blood covered the side of the crypt, twisting and turning in a series of ancient symbols.

A broken mirror lay shattered at his feet, and his heart was still trying to jump out of his chest.

“It’s always been thought that a Fallen Angel would be the one to open the gateway to hell. At least, that’s what my sources downstairs told me.” Mateo’s voice was carefully emotionless.

Az swallowed and tasted ash. “Where is Jade?”

“Right this second? She’s racing through the cemetery on the far left side, running after Tanner and Brandt.”

What? “She’s . . . not dead?”

“Not yet.”

Az turned away.

“Did you learn anything?” Mateo’s sharp voice stopped him. “Or do you not even realize what the hell just happened here?”

I lost everything.

“I gave you a very special gift, Fallen. I used my own blood and my own power to show you what could be if you chose wrong tonight.”

What could be . . . Jade dying. Tanner burning. Him killing Sam.

“You need her. I get that.” And the witch was suddenly before him. “But everybody else needs you to f**king hold it together. Don’t let that rage eating through your gut break free.” Mateo’s eyes glittered. “Make the right choice. Change fate. Do you hear me, Fallen?”

Fate can’t be changed. All angels knew that.

And he realized he’d just whispered the words by rote.

“Then I guess the angels are wrong. Or maybe those precious rules have changed.” Mateo glanced up at the sky. “Maybe someone wants them to change.” His gaze fell back on Az. “What do you want?”

Jade. Alive. Happy.

“I let you into her mind with that vision. You know what she wants.”

She’d begged him to shoot. But he’d been too afraid of hurting her.

“You know what you desire.” Mateo sighed. “Now let’s see just what happens . . .”

Az still had the gun. Still had the chance to save her.

To save them all.

“I’m not a monster,” he whispered. No matter what he’d seen or . . . done in those dark images. He wasn’t . . .

“Prove it.”

He would. Or he’d die trying.

I am not a monster. And he wouldn’t let the darkness in him break free. He wouldn’t hurt those he loved.

He’d sacrifice himself first.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Az raced around the graves. He turned to the left. His body shook and his heart seemed to burst through his chest.

He pushed forward with a furious blast of speed and saw them. Brandt—with his hands wrapped around Jade’s struggling body. The bastard’s claws were out. Killing close.

But it hadn’t been the claws that killed her in Az’s vision.

Tanner was on the ground, covered in blood, and not moving. But the shifter wasn’t dead. Not yet.