Archangel’s Consort (Guild Hunter #3)(52)
Author: Nalini Singh

“You are my consort.” A kiss placed on her cheekbone. “You may do things any way you wish.”

Gray eyes rimmed with a very, very thin circle of purest silver met his as her fingers pressed on the back of his head. “Yeah? In that case, I think I’d like to distract you.”

He allowed her to bring them closer, angling his head so he could take that stubborn mouth, those soft lips. She tasted of wildness barely contained, a brilliant, blinding mortal fire. Ready for the blaze, he was startled to feel her hands move to cup his face, her hold tender in a way that leveled his defenses as she whispered, “Let me love you tonight.”

Enchained, he made no protest when she slid off the desk, switched off the lights, and turned to tug him to the warm glow of the fireplace. As he watched, she undid the straps that held her black top snug to her body and dropped it to the rug—to reveal lush br**sts he’d marked with his kiss more than once. Tonight, it was the fire that marked her, flickering over her skin and burnishing her in red gold, creating sultry shadows he wanted to explore with his mouth, his body.

She sighed in pleasure when he slid his hand over the curve of her waist, but her fingers were on the buttons of his shirt. He shrugged it to the floor the instant it was open, wanting her hands on him. She gave him exactly that. Palms flat on his chest, she stroked over his pectorals, his rib cage, his abdomen. “I could do this,” she mumured, exploring the ridges and dips of his body with a slow intensity that made his c**k throb, “for hours.”

Palming the erotic weight of her br**sts, he bent to press a kiss to her shoulder. “I’m afraid your consort does not have such patience.” He used his thumbs to tease her ni**les as she twined her fingers through his hair, as she tugged him up, as she seduced his mouth with her own.

When she drew back to kiss her way down his neck to his chest and lower, he permitted it. The night was yet young and he’d discovered he had a weakness for being loved by Elena. What wicked things are you planning to do tonight, Guild Hunter?

Kneeling in front of him, her wings spread behind her in an extraordinary display—gleaming midnight shading to indigo, to a deep, haunting blue before whispering into dawn and a shimmering white gold kissed by the firelight—she tilted up her head to give him a provocative smile. “You’ll just have to wait and see.” Reaching up, she undid the fastenings on his pants, brushing the rigid push of his c**k with her fingertips as she did so. He had no compunction in helping her strip off the remainder of his clothing, in standing na**d and aroused before her.

So proud, Elena thought, so beautiful. Fisting him with her hand, she stroked once, tight and smooth. His hand clenched in her hair, and when she looked up, she saw he’d thrown back his head, the cords of his neck standing out so strong and taut that she wanted to rise up, bite down on them. Then there were his wings, magnificent in their power.

He was pure addiction. And he was hers. To take. To pleasure.

Placing the palm of her free hand flat on the thick muscle of his thigh, she leaned in to lick at the head of his cock.

Elena. A warning not to tease.

Another night, she might have done just that, but tonight, she wanted to love him hot and sweet. Sliding her grip to the base of his arousal, she closed her mouth over the head. His shout was gritted out, those muscular thighs unyielding as rock as his hand pulled at her hair. And the taste of him … Moaning around the rigid length covered by velvet-soft skin, she took an inch more. Sucked wet and deep.

A harder tug on her hair. Now, Elena.

She hadn’t had her fill, nowhere near close, but there were other ways to satiate her hunger. Releasing him after laving her tongue over the thick vein that ran along his arousal, she rose up and nudged him backward until his knees hit the back of one of the chairs not far from the fire. “Sit.”

A raised eyebrow, pure masculine arrogance.

Lips curving even as things low in her body pulsed with the darkest of sexual cravings, she stepped back to pull off her jeans and panties. This time, when she pushed at the muscled silk of his chest, he went down into a sitting position, his hands sliding over her rib cage to settle on her hips. Instead of tugging her forward as she’d expected, he leaned down to press a kiss to the dip of her navel. Hunter mine.

Heart aching under the rush of emotion, she weaved her fingers through his hair. “I love you, Archangel.” Her body trembled at the intimacy of his breath against her skin, the rough caress of his jaw. When he lifted his head, she didn’t wait, couldn’t wait. Shifting to straddle him, she fitted him to the ultrasensitive entrance to her body, sliding down that hard heat oh-so-slowly, his hands possessive brands on her hips.

A shudder rippled through her as she succeeded in sheathing him. Holding him within her, caressing him with intimate muscles until he whispered promises of retribution, she put her own hands on his shoulders, squeezed. “Brace me, Archangel.”

Would you ride tonight, hbeebti? Strong hands moving down over her thighs to grip her just below the knees as he sucked on her lower lip before inciting a languorous tangling of their mouths.

Oh, yes. Then, as the storm continued to rage outside, she took her archangel, slow and deep, and again, until the crashing wildness of pleasure swept them both under.

22

The next day, having received a message early that morning, Elena found herself flying down to land in front of a gated home in the Palisades area. Set back from the street and shaded with perfectly manicured greenery, it shrieked of money. Even the architecture—old, elegant, timeless—told her she was looking at something that had cost in the millions.

I could afford this.

It was a startling thought. She kept forgetting that she was rich now, that the Cadre—through Raphael—had paid her the fee they’d agreed on when she had “accepted” the Uram mission. Snorting at the memory of exactly how she’d been dragged into the whole bloody mess, she folded back her wings and stared at the glossy black door of the home only a few feet away.

Narrow. Too narrow for angelic wings.

It was stupid to feel rejected. Her sister Beth had lived here with her husband, Harrison, since the day they had married—both had been human at the time. Then Harrison had applied to be Made a vampire, been accepted . . . and broken the century-long contract of service he’d signed on for as a condition of being Made. Elena was the hunter who’d brought him back to face his punishment. Harrison didn’t understand that he couldn’t hide for eternity, that the longer it took for his angel to track him down, the worse the price he’d have had to pay.