Archangel’s Shadows (Guild Hunter #7)(95)
Author: Nalini Singh

He nodded and disappeared back down the way he’d come.

The paramedics were in the room a half minute later.

•   •   •

Fourteen hours after that, the city dark, Ashwini leaned against the wall of a large windowless room in the center of the Tower. Janvier stood beside her, one booted foot up against the wall, his arms folded. Elena was next to Ashwini, while Dmitri flanked Janvier. Naasir had growled when told of the capture and said he’d get the report from them. The idea of being closed up with “walking rancid meat” hadn’t appealed to the vampire.

Ashwini wasn’t exactly happy about it, either, but she had to see this through no matter what. Staying strong against the vortex of Raphael’s power was actually giving her a counterbalance to the bile-inducing horror of Cornelius’s evil . . . and Janvier’s shoulder touching her own was a physical anchor.

Raphael stood in the center facing Cornelius—who’d finally healed enough to speak, but not to stand for an extended period. It shouldn’t have taken an angel of his age anywhere near that long to shake off a bullet wound, but Cornelius wasn’t exactly a normal angel anymore. He sat in a chair that was the only piece of furniture in the room, his face wreathed in a grimace of a smile.

Ashwini ground her teeth against the urge to go for a gun again. Marta, the woman they’d rescued, was alive, but the damage done to her was more than skin-deep. Her bones had aged ten years, with her internal organs showing signs of the same. According to the doctors, she’d be fine with supplements, but her life span had been permanently shortened.

All so a monster could live another day.

“Cornelius,” Raphael said, his wings glowing in a way that no one ever wanted to see, because when an archangel glowed, people died. “You are not as you were.”

“My goddess gave me a gift.”

“She fed from you because you were disposable and strong.” A pitiless rejoinder. “My spymaster has confirmed that Xi retreated with the troops, as did Alastair and Philomena. Their injuries and the deaths of Lijuan’s other generals came at the hands of my people, not from Lijuan.”

Cornelius’s smile didn’t slip. “I offered myself to enhance her greatness, to become part of her.” He broke off into a rattling cough. “Alas, she could not complete the feeding in the midst of the final strike, could not take the fullness of my soul into herself.”

That explained Cornelius’s half-desiccated state.

“And the women?” Raphael asked in an ice-cold tone that had Ashwini’s heart freezing. As long as she lived, she would never understand how Ellie got into bed with him. Even more so now that Ashwini had personally experienced the shattering vulnerability that came with sex.

Janvier shot her a look at that instant, his eyes glittering, and it was as if he’d read her mind. She scowled. He grinned and closed his hand over her own. “I could tear off your head with a single wrench,” he said in a low tone that reached only her.

“Stop reading my thoughts.” She wasn’t worried in the least about his strength. If he’d wanted to hurt her, he’d have done it long ago. Instead, he’d put himself in the path of danger for her more than once.

Frowning, Janvier said, “But you spoke aloud.”

She blinked, leaned in to speak against his ear. “No, I didn’t.”

They stared at each other.

“We’ll talk about it later,” she finally whispered and they returned their attention to the interrogation.

Cornelius admitted to using the women to maintain his strength as he awaited his “goddess’s return,” but refused to admit he’d fed on animals before he tracked down Giorgio.

“Saving face,” Dmitri murmured. “To feed on animals makes him an animal himself.”

“What did animals ever do to you that you’d insult them like that?”

Ashwini’s muttered rejoinder made Dmitri’s lips curve. “My apologies. You are, of course, correct. He is an unnatural abomination.”

“What will Raphael do to him?” she asked.

“He’ll ask the surviving victims their will and then he’ll make sure it’s carried out, on both Cornelius and Giorgio.”

“Good.” Had it been up to her, Ashwini would’ve told Raphael to shut the bastards up in a room together, where Cornelius could feed on Giorgio until the vampire died, then starve to death himself. It’d take a long, long time, even given his current state.

Maybe she’d mention the idea to the living victims.

“You are bloodthirsty, my Ashblade.”

When she glared at him, Janvier scowled. “You didn’t say that aloud, either?”

“No.” She pushed off the wall when Raphael turned to leave, indicating the questioning was over.

He left Cornelius in the room and Dmitri locked the door behind them.

“I have spoken to Giorgio,” Raphael said, his wing brushing over Elena’s.

“Already?” Ashwini said before she realized she was interrupting an archangel. “I didn’t think he was powerful enough to heal so fast.”

Raphael held her gaze, the blue of his eyes violent. “He isn’t.”

But Raphael, she understood, keeping a white-knuckled grip on her ability so she wouldn’t be sucked into the force of him, was an archangel. No way of knowing how he’d made Giorgio talk, and it was probably better if she didn’t; she had enough nightmares inside her skull.

Raphael’s eyes didn’t move off her, the power in them chilling. “You did an extraordinary job of containing him without causing a deadly injury.”

Ashwini decided she wasn’t delirious. Raphael definitely sounded amused. “I might have gone a bit overboard,” she admitted with a wince. “I just didn’t want to risk that he’d crawl away, escape justice to carry on his reign of torture and death.”

“A worthy motive,” Raphael said, his expression growing chilly again as he added, “He deserves the pain.”

“You have to teach me the knife-through-the-brain trick,” Elena said, giving Ashwini an excuse to look away from the archangel who had noticed her. No sane person wanted an archangel’s notice. Ever.

“There’s a twist at the end,” she said, curling her fingers surreptitiously around Janvier’s. He curled back in turn, warm and strong.

And it became easier to breathe. “That’s what you have to be careful about,” she told Ellie. “Otherwise, you scramble the brains too badly for the vamp to recover.”