Bucking up against him, her body out of control, she cried out his name as the orgasm peaked with a fury and felt him fall with her in a final, powerful thrust.
• • •
Later, as they lay tangled in bed, the near white of Elena’s hair tumbling across his skin and her head on his shoulder, he gently squeezed her nape. “What did you dream?”
She went motionless, her hand folding into a fist against his chest. “You woke me up before anything really happened.”
“You’re getting into a bad habit, Elena.” His voice was hard, the echoes of pleasure fading rapidly under a wave of anger.
Rising off his chest, his consort shoved her hair out of the way. “Don’t use that tone on me.” It was a furious command, her eyes angry and alive and beautiful. “We’re more than that.”
“If we’re more than that,” he said, his own anger honed to a deadly edge, “then why do you keep lying to me?”
White lines around her mouth, she swung away without replying. When she got out and began to dress, he did the same. His consort, he’d begun to realize, did not do well in contained areas when driven by anger and nightmare, so he’d give her the sky. The one thing he would not give her was distance.
They flew out three minutes later, heading seaward. The waves were high tonight, the sky dark once they left the lights of Manhattan behind. Elena flew and flew and he knew that, once again, she was pushing herself well beyond her limits when it came to the physical strength needed for endurance flights.
It had nothing to do with determination and everything to do with physiological fact.
Elena’s body simply hadn’t developed the necessary musculature, immortality yet growing into her cells, but he didn’t stop her headlong flight. Words would mean nothing, not when she was like this; no, she had to come face-to-face with the perilous risk she took without thought to the consequences.
And worse, this was the second time she’d done the same thing. A third could well be lethal.
If she fell from this height? It was doubtful she’d survive. Even if her luck held, she’d break every bone in her body, her organs collapsing from the impact. Young as she was, that would kill her—either the actual injuries or the inevitable drowning. Unlike him, she couldn’t yet survive without air.
Flying above her, high enough that she wouldn’t feel hunted, he knew the exact instant she realized the danger. Immediately sweeping left and around, she headed homeward, but her wings had begun to falter, her body dipping lower to the water in erratic drops before she stabilized herself. Only for the pattern to repeat, her body dropping faster and longer each time.
Still she didn’t ask for help.
Teeth gritted, he dropped close enough to assist, unable to allow her to cause herself harm, even to teach her a lesson. Are you planning to let your pride drag you to the bottom of the ocean?
Silence, her right wing so strained, he knew it could collapse at any instant. Winging his way in front of her in a burst of speed only another archangel could match, he turned and flew directly at her, grabbing her in his hold. He was careful to ensure his arms slid under her wings to avoid any further damage. “Close your wings.”
“No, let me go.” Jaw set, she shoved at his shoulders, her open wings causing significant drag. “I didn’t ask for your help.”
“The tendons on your right wing are about to go. Just like last time. Do you wish to cripple yourself?” He wanted to shake her. “Injure the same area over and over, and you’ll be grounded for years!”
“I’m fine.” Slamming fisted hands against his chest, she twisted, almost freeing herself because he hadn’t expected such an irrational move.
“Let me go or I swear to God I’ll—”
“Use one of your blades on me?” he asked, his arms steel around her. “Would you draw my blood in earnest, Guild Hunter?”
Fisted hands going still, she looked away, but folded in her wings at last. Her silence rasping against his senses, he gripped her chin with one hand, intending to tug her face toward him, force her to acknowledge his presence. She resisted . . . and then he felt a single hot droplet splash onto his hand.
“Elena.”
Her tears shocked him; he’d seen his consort cry, but never during a fight between them. Such emotional manipulation was beyond her, and even now she dashed the wetness away, as if to refute their existence. “Are you in pain?” he asked, concerned she’d snapped a tendon before he caught her.
“No, I’m fine.”
Her answer infuriated him anew. “You’re clearly not fine.” His tone ice, he jerked up her chin. “Tell me—”
This time, it was Elena who interrupted. “Or what? You’ll take it from my mind?”
“You question my honor now? Is this the trust you have in me?”
Instead of looking shamefaced, she responded with unmasked fury. “I trust you more than anyone else in the universe! That’s the problem.”
“You find it a burden to give me your trust?” Fingers tightening on her chin, he spoke through white-hot anger. “You are mine, Elena. Your trust is my right.”
“Something is happening to you!” It was a scream, her fisted hands raining blows onto his shoulders and her eyes locked on the spreading line of darkest red along his temple.
“I am going nowhere,” he said, realizing the shape of the fear that had stalked her dreams.
“You can’t know that! We don’t know what’s happening.” Her fingers on his temple. “Every time you drop the glamour, I see how much further it’s spread, how much more of your skin it’s begun to cover.”
“I’m not dying.” It took conscious control to keep his rage at those who’d done this to her, seeded such a grave fear into her heart, out of his voice. Marguerite Deveraux, after all, was forever out of his reach. “I am an archangel.”
Chest heaving and cheeks red, she gritted out her reply. “I don’t need you to placate me with arrogance.”
“It’s not arrogance. It’s reality,” he said, holding her gaze so she’d hear him through the roar of her anger. “There are very, very few things on this earth that can kill an archangel, and disease is not one of them. Never in our history has an archangel succumbed to illness.”
“Vampires aren’t meant to die of disease, either,” she snapped back, but her fingers were gentle as she touched the blemish on his face again. “Every time I look at this, I get so scared. I thought I had a handle on it, but it’s like this constant icy fist around my heart. I can’t breathe, I can’t think.”