Archangel’s Blade (Guild Hunter #4)(3)
Author: Nalini Singh

“Then I’d have to get tough and remind you that you are still under contract as an active hunter.”

Honor’s knees collapsed, crumpling her into a chair. The Guild was the only home she knew, her fellow hunters her family. “I’m an instructor.” It was a last-ditch attempt to claw her way out of this.

“No, you’re not.” A denunciation no less ruthless for being soft voiced. “You haven’t taught a single class in the months you’ve been there.”

“I’ll—”

“Honor.” A single, final word.

She fisted her hand on the desk, staring unseeing at the haunting blues and passionate reds of the illuminated manuscript she’d dropped with a shocking lack of care on the polished wood. “Tell me the details.”

Sara blew out a breath. “Part of me wants to wrap you in cotton wool and keep you safe and warm where nothing can hurt you,” she said with a fierceness that betrayed the generous heart beneath that tough exterior, “but the other part of me knows I’d be helping to cripple you and I refuse to do that.”

Honor flinched. Not because the words were harsh, but because they were true. She wasn’t whole, hadn’t been whole for the past ten months. “I don’t know if there’s enough of me left to scrape up, Sara.” Sometimes, she wasn’t sure she wasn’t still in that filthy pit stained with blood, sweat, and . . . other bodily fluids, that her current life wasn’t an illusion created by a fragmented mind.

Then Sara spoke and the very razor of her words was a welcome reinforcement that this was the truth. Because surely if she’d dreamed herself into a fantasy to escape the brutal reality, she wouldn’t have made the Guild Director so unyielding?

“Ransom and Ashwini didn’t risk their lives to pull you out just so you could turn around and give up.” A reminder of the hands that had undone her bonds, the arms that had helped haul her up into the painful light. “Find the pieces and stitch yourself back together.”

Honor’s stomach was a churning mess by now, her free hand clenching and unclenching compulsively. “Is this where I salute and say, yes, sir?” Her words held no bite, because she remembered waking time and time again in the hospital to see Sara sitting beside her, a ferocious, protective force.

“No,” the director replied, “you say you’re heading up to get your ass into a cab. It’s only half past eight so you shouldn’t have any problems flagging one down.”

Chills crawled up her spine; perspiration shimmered on her upper lip. “Is it an angel I’m meeting?” Please say yes, she begged in silent desperation. Please.

“No, your meet is with Dmitri.”

An image of a man with skin of dark honey and a face that was cruel in its beauty. “He’s a vampire.” It came out a near soundless whisper. The vampire as far as this city, hell, this country was concerned.

Sara didn’t say anything for a long time. When she spoke, she asked a single shattering question. “Are you happy, Honor?”

Happy? She didn’t know what happiness was anymore. Maybe she’d never known, though she’d thought she’d learned something of it by watching the biological children in the foster homes she’d been shuttled around after she left the orphanage at five. Now . . . “I exist.”

“Is it enough?”

She uncurled her fingers with effort, saw the half-moons carved into her palms, red and angry. The Guild had paid for a counselor, would continue to pay for one as long as she needed it. Honor had gone to three sessions before realizing she was never going to speak to the lovely, patient woman who was used to dealing with hunters.

Instead, she tried to stay awake, tried not to remember.

Fangs sinking into her br**sts, her inner thighs, her neck, aroused bodies rubbing themselves against her as she whimpered and begged.

She’d been strong at first, determined to survive and slice the bastards to ribbons.

But they’d had her for two months.

A lot could be done to a hunter, to a woman, in two months.

“Honor?” Sara’s voice, touched with worry. “Look, I’ll get someone else. I shouldn’t have pushed you so hard so soon.”

A reprieve. But it seemed she had some tiny remnant of pride left after all—because she found her mouth opening, the words coming out without her conscious volition. “I’ll be on my way in ten minutes.”

It was only after she hung up that she realized she’d picked up a pen at some stage . . . and written Dmitri’s name over and over again on the writing pad she’d been using for her notes. Her fingers spasmed, dropping the pen.

It was starting again.

2

The Tower, filled with light, dominated the Manhattan skyline, a cloud-piercing structure from which the archangel Raphael ruled his territory. Honor hitched her laptop bag over her shoulder, after paying the cabbie, and looked up. Their wings outlined against a night sky scattered with diamonds, angel after angel came in to land as others departed. She couldn’t discern anything beyond the haunting beauty of their silhouettes, but up close, they were as inhuman as they were stunning—though word in the Guild was, you hadn’t seen inhuman until you’d found yourself face-to-face with Raphael.

Given their disparate skills, and therefore assignments, Honor had known Elena only in passing, couldn’t imagine how the other hunter handled having an archangel for a lover. Of course, right this minute, she’d rather deal with Raphael than the man she was here to meet . . . the man who was both a nightmare and a dark, seductive dream.

Forcing herself to look away from the illusionary escape of the skies, she gritted her teeth and kept her eyes focused straight ahead as she walked down the drive to the Tower entrance—manned by a vampire dressed in a razor-sharp black suit and wraparound sunglasses. Her throat dried up the second she stopped in front of him, her gut twisted, and for an instant, dark spots filled her vision.

No. No. She would not faint in front of a vampire.

Biting down hard enough on her tongue that tears sprang into her eyes, she resettled the strap of the laptop bag and looked into those sunglasses to see her own face reflected back at her. “I have a meeting with Dmitri.” Her voice was soft, but it didn’t shake and that was a victory in itself.

The vampire reached out to open the door with a strong hand. “Follow me.”

She knew she’d been surrounded by the almost-immortals from the instant she entered the secure zone around the Tower, but it had been easier to lie to herself about that fact when she couldn’t see them. That was no longer an option. The one in front of her, his shoulders covered by that perfectly fitted suit jacket, his skin holding a cinnamon tone that spoke of the Indian subcontinent, was simply the closest. Several stood near the corners of the foyer of gold-shot gray marble, sleek predators on guard. Then there was the pretty woman sitting at the reception desk in spite of the late hour.