Archangel’s Consort (Guild Hunter #3)(19)
Author: Nalini Singh

A sucked in breath, and for an instant, she had the disorientating sensation that she’d wounded him. But when he spoke, it was to thrust the knife into her own heart. “Family is hardly your specialty, Elieanora.”

No—because he’d made sure of it.

Snapping the phone shut, she took off again, her mood shattered. To top it off, Sara wasn’t at the Guild. Frustrated and needing to do something, she decided to head to Ignatius’s apartment. It was unlikely she’d find anything there to explain his bizarre behavior, but—

A feather of heavenly blue edged with silver tumbled down in front of her.

Delight had her shrugging off the lingering echoes of Jeffrey’s taunt. Grabbing at the feather, she craned her neck to search for its owner. But on this field, he had her at a massive disadvantage, her ability to hover and turn nowhere near fast enough to catch the angel Galen had called Butterfly.

Sliding the feather into her pocket to add to the collection she planned to give Zoe, she continued on her way. She glimpsed a whisper of blue with her peripheral vision moments later. “When did you get in?”

For an answer, Illium arrowed his body, his feathers sleek against his back, and dropped toward the skyscrapers as if he was made of stone. She just barely bit back her cry and was pretty sure she was doing a good job of acting nonchalant when he missed a peaked roof by what looked like a millimeter at best and flew back up to hover in front of her, his upper body bare.

“Aw, Ellie.” Eyes like ancient gold coins, even more startling against those incredible black lashes tipped with blue. “No screaming? You stole all my fun.”

“That’s me. A nasty ole fun stealer.” But her lips wanted to quirk, her heart ridiculously soft where it concerned the only one of Raphael’s Seven she considered a friend. “You get stuck with bodyguard duty already?” She and Raphael were going to have to have a talk about his habit of ordering people to shadow her, but she wasn’t going to refuse the protection right this second—because much as it galled, she was a big fat media target at this point, if nothing else.

She’d already had to detour well out of her way to lose a news chopper that had threatened to send her tumbling down into the steel forest of Manhattan. Unlike Illium, she wouldn’t have been able to pull up in time to avoid massive injury. The idiot reporters didn’t realize she wasn’t as strong as other angels—she couldn’t hold her own against the disruption caused by chopper blades as they sliced through the air.

Illium, with his wings of silver-kissed blue and a face designed to seduce both males and females, not to mention his ability to do the most impossible acrobatics in the air, would provide a worthy diversion. The fact that he’d decided to ditch half his clothing was just icing on the cake.

Having shifted position to fly beside her, he now said, “I asked,” answering her earlier question. “I know I’m your favorite.” He brushed his wing over hers when she didn’t reply.

“I swear to God,” she muttered, fighting a laugh, “if you’ve dusted me with blue, I’ll tie your balls in a knot and hang you up by them on the nearest sharp object I see.” The last time he’d glittered blue angel-dust over her wings, Raphael had—eventually—seen the humor in the situation. She couldn’t guarantee Illium’s health if it happened a second time.

Illium dipped low, stroking back up with movements that looked lazy but took considerable muscle strength. “Be nice to me or I won’t give you your present.”

“Idiot.” But he was her favorite of the Seven. How could he not be when he saw her human heart not as a curse, but as a gift? When he would lay down his life for the archangel who was Elena’s? When he laughed with the same easy joy as the children in the Refuge? “Sam,” she murmured, her throat thickening at the thought of the boy who’d been so terribly hurt. “Is he—”

“He’s well, Ellie. We watch over him.” A quiet reminder that for all his laughter and beauty, Illium, too, was a member of Raphael’s Seven. And that he had no qualms over issuing the bloodiest of punishments. She would never forget the sight of him standing in that strange, blooming winter garden, skin bloody and sword flashing lightning-bright as he sliced the wings off angels who’d come to do harm.

“He misses you.”

A silly, happy smile erased the shadow of memory. “I’ve only been gone a couple of days.”

“I made a solemn promise that I would tell you to call him every night. Don’t make me a liar.”

“Never.” Elena adored little Sam, had spent hours with him when she’d been confined to the Medica during her recovery after Beijing. “What about Noel?” The adult victim of the archangel Neha’s daughter, Anoushka’s, vicious craving for power had healed of his physical injuries weeks ago. But those weren’t the deepest hurts.

“He is …” Illium paused for a long time. “Broken. Inside, he is broken.”

Elena knew about being broken. But she also knew about survival. “The man who survived what was done to him”—blood and meat, that’s all he’d been when they’d found him—“will survive that, too.”

“He’ll have to,” Illium said. “Raphael has assigned him to Nimra’s court. She doesn’t play overt games of power—but even Nazarach does not dare step foot in her territory without invitation.”

Elena frowned, making a mental note to ask Raphael why he’d sent the damaged vampire into what sounded like a deadly field. Nimra had to be both brutal and cruel if she managed to hold Nazarach at bay, and Noel needed to heal, not fight for his next breath.

A chopping-slicing sound. Distinct. Unwelcome.

“Is that—” Her eyes widened at the black dot growing larger on the horizon with every slap of sound. “Damn it to hell!” It was the same news crew that had been hounding her the entire morning.

Illium zipped in front of her. “They dare do this?” His voice was suddenly that of the man who’d amputated angelic wings in cold, clear-eyed retribution. “I will ensure it doesn’t happen again.”

“No, Illium.” She managed to grip the muscular warmth of his upper arm. “No blood, not here. This is my home.”

That incredible hair—ebony dipped in crushed sapphires, startling and impossible—blew back in the increasing turbulence caused by the chopper. “If you don’t teach them a lesson now,” he said as she tightened her hold on him to help maintain her position, “the vultures will see you as weak. You cannot be seen as weak, Ellie.”