The Darkest Angel (Lords of the Underworld #4.5)(27)
Author: Gena Showalter

She didn’t say anything. Just looked up at him with wide, hurt-filled eyes. So much hurt he actually stumbled back. A sharp pain lanced his chest. But as he watched, her hurt mutated into a fury that far surpassed his.

“Kill me, then,” she growled.

“You know I will not.”

“Why?”

“Because!”

“Let me guess. Because deep down you still think you can change me. You think that I will become the pure, virtuous woman you want me to be. Well, who are you to say what’s virtuous and what isn’t?”

He merely arched a brow. The answer was obvious and didn’t need to be stated.

“I told you that from now on I’d only hurt the wicked, right? Well, surprise! That’s what I’ve done since the beginning. The pie you watched me eat? The owner of that restaurant cheats at cards, takes money that doesn’t belong to him. The wallet I stole? I took it from a man cheating on his wife.”

He blinked down at her, unsure he’d heard correctly. “Why would you have kept that from me?”

“Why should it change how you feel about me?” She tossed back the cover and stood, glorious in her nakedness. Her skin was still aglow, multihued light reflecting off it—he’d touched that skin. Dark hair cascaded around her—he’d fisted that hair.

“I want to be with you,” he said. “I do. But it has to be in secret.”

“I thought the same. Until what we just did,” she said as she hastily dressed. Her clothes were not like his, did not repair on their own, and so that ripped shirt revealed more than it hid.

He tried again. Tried to make her understand. “You are everything my kind stands against, Bianka. I train warriors to hunt and kill demons. What would it say to them were I to take you as my companion?”

“Here’s a better question. What does it say to them that you hide your sin? Because that’s how you view me, isn’t it? Your sin. You are such a hypocrite.” She stormed past him, careful not to touch him. “And I will not be with a hypocrite. That’s worse than being an angel.”

He thought she meant to race to Raphael and flaunt her presence. Shockingly enough, she didn’t. And because he hadn’t commanded her to stay, when she said, “I want to leave,” the cloud opened up at her feet.

She disappeared, falling through the sky.

“Bianka,” he shouted. Lysander spread his wings and jumped after her. He passed Raphael, but at that point, he didn’t care. He only wanted Bianka safe—and that hurt and fury wiped away from her expression.

She’d turned facedown to increase her momentum. He had to tuck his wings into his back to increase his own. Finally, he caught her halfway and wrapped his arms around her, her back pressed into his stomach. She didn’t flail, didn’t order him to release her, which he’d been prepared for.

When they reached her cabin, he straightened them, spread his wings and slowed. Snow still covered the ground and crunched when they landed. She didn’t pull away. Didn’t run. Something else he’d been prepared for.

Clearly he knew very little about her.

“It’s probably best this way, you know,” she said flatly, keeping her back to him. The wind slapped her hair against his cheeks. “That was my afterglow talking earlier, anyway. I never should have invited you to the wedding. We’re too different to make anything work.”

“I was willing to try,” he said through gritted teeth. Don’t do this, he projected. Don’t end us.

She laughed without humor, and he marveled at the difference between this laugh and the one she’d given inside his cloud. Marveled and mourned. “No, you were willing to hide me away.”

“Yes. Therefore I was trying to make something work. I want to be with you, Bianka. Otherwise I would not have followed you. I would have left you alone from the first. I would not have tried to show you the light.”

“You are such a pompous ass,” she spat. “Show me the light? Please! You want me to be perfect. Blameless. But what happens when I fail? And I will, you know? Perfection just isn’t in me. One day I will curse. Like now. Fuck you. One day I will take something just because it’s pretty and I want it. Would that ruin me in your eyes?”

“It hasn’t so far,” he spat back.

She laughed again, this one bleaker, grim. “The scarves I took were made by child laborers. So I haven’t really done anything too terrible yet. But I will. And you know what? If you were to do something nauseatingly righteous, I wouldn’t have cared. I would still have wanted to take you to the wedding. That’s the difference between us. Evil or not, good or not, I wanted you.”

“I want you, too. But that was not always the case, and you know it. You would care.” He tightened his grip on her. “Bianka. We can work this out.”

“No, we can’t.” Finally, she twisted to face him. “That would require giving you a second chance, and I don’t do second chances.”

“I don’t need a second chance. I just need you to think about this. To realize our relationship must stay hidden.”

“I’m not going to be your secret shame, Lysander.”

His eyes narrowed. She was trying to force his hand, and he didn’t like it. “You steal in secret. You sleep in secret. Why not this?”

“That you don’t know the answer proves you aren’t the warrior I thought you were. Have a nice life, Lysander,” she said, jerking from his hold and walking away without a backward glance.

CHAPTER TWELVE

LYSANDER SAT IN THE BACK of the Budapest chapel, undetectable, watching Bianka help her sisters and their friends decorate for the wedding. She was currently hanging flowers from the vaulted ceiling. Without a ladder.

He’d been following her for days, unable to stay away. One thing he’d noticed: she talked and laughed as if she was fine, normal, but the sparkle was gone from her eyes, her skin.And he had done that to her. Worse, not once had she cursed, lied or stolen. Again, his fault. He’d told her she was unworthy of him. He’d been—was, right?—too embarrassed of her to tell his people about her.

But he couldn’t deny that he missed her. Missed everything about her. That much he knew. She excited him, challenged him, frustrated him, consumed him, drew him, made him feel. He did not want to be without her.

Something soft brushed his shoulder. He barely managed to tear his gaze from Bianka to turn and see that Olivia was now sitting beside him.