A Touch of Crimson

She was yanking an edgy tiger by the tail, and from the sharp, rapacious hunger in his gaze, Adrian was getting ready to pounce. And bite.

Leaning over him, Lindsay balanced herself with one hand on the back of the couch and allowed her camisole top to gape open. When his gaze slid to the view, she used his distraction as an opportunity to snatch his iPad.

Straightening, she returned to the table. She resumed eating while using the browser to Google some choice keyword phrases. Like “angel sex” and “sentinel angels” and, finally, “watcher angels vampires.” She was briefly distracted by an article speculating that male Watcher angels had been capable of endless erections, but the deeper import of what she discovered was what, exactly, the Watcher angels had done to get damned with vampirism- they’d lusted after and fucked mortals.

While she read, Adrian sat on the couch, still and silent. She didn’t look his way, but she sensed the coiled expectancy in him and heard it in the rumble of thunder outside. Inside the air-conditioned suite, it felt like the hour before a heat wave broke with a summer storm-unbearably hot and humid, crackling with bated energy. All the turbulence inside him was primed to explode. She knew he needed the release, just as she instinctively knew she could take him to that point of exposure. But at what cost?

She forked the remnants of her hash browns into her mouth, then sat back, chewing thoughtfully. Their gazes met and held.

“As I suspected, I didn’t ask the right question,” she said, after finishing off the orange juice. Now fed, her body was recharging so swiftly she felt light-headed. “Are you forbidden to have sex? Is that the sin you were talking about the other night? Not the lust itself, but the culmination of it?”

Adrian set his elbows on his knees and steepled his fingers together. “I don’t suppose my telling you to leave the consequences to me will satisfy you?”

What would satisfy her was him, hot and hard and deep inside her. But there were consequences, and then there were consequences. “Could you lose your wings and soul and become a vampire?”

“I could lose my mind wanting you.”

“You can’t be serious.” He was killing her.

“I can’t?” He set his chin atop his fingers.

“No. You can’t. And I’d be an idiot to think I’d get away scot-free. My life doesn’t work that way. I pay for everything. In fact, I might have been paying for this”-she gestured between them with an impatient flick of her wrist-“my whole life. I mean, who has the shit happen to them that’s happened to me? When I was born, maybe someone said, ‘Yep, that’s the one who’s going to fuck with Adrian’s perfection.’ ”

He straightened abruptly, his gaze haunted. “Lindsay-”

“You’re the most powerful warrior in the highest rank of angels. I’ve seen how the others look at you. They trust you. Admire you. To have the power you do, and to look like you do… someone up there loves you madly. I’m not going to be the one who screws you up.” Pushing back from the table, she stood, feeling agitated enough to run five miles just to burn energy.

Adrian stood, too. “The decision belongs to both of us. There’s something between us. Something precious and powerful. I want it. I want you.”

His wings materialized, fanning wide. The pearlescent expanse shimmered so beautifully it made her eyes sting. She hadn’t cried since her mother died, but Adrian had brought her close to tears more than once since she’d met him. The way he made her feel important and valuable, the ease with which he accepted her just the way she was… For his tenderness alone, she couldn’t allow him to take the fall for her. He made her feel human; he made her feel-period. She was so vibrantly alive when she was with him, as if she’d been half asleep her whole life and was finally stirring. But the humanity he’d returned to her was forbidden to him and she couldn’t afford to forget that. He couldn’t afford for her to forget.

“I like sex as much as the next gal,” she said, beginning to pace. Adrian was a seraph, just like the Watchers. Same class of angels, same offense-same punishment? She had no reason to believe Adrian wouldn’t suffer the same fate, and he apparently wasn’t going to give her one. “It can be a lot of fun and a great stress reliever. In a twisted way, I’m flattered to get you so hot and bothered. But it’s not worth sucking blood over. It’s not worth losing those gorgeous wings. Trust me-the buildup is the best part. You’re not missing anything.”

He moved, traversing the space between them in the blink of an eye and blocking the path of her pacing, forcing her to confront him directly. She stumbled to a halt just before she ran into him. Thunder boomed directly overhead, rattling the silverware on the table.

His arms crossed his powerful chest; his irises glowed with pure blue flames. He bared his teeth in a predatory smile. “Prove it.”

CHAPTER 12

Lindsay shook her head emphatically. “No.”

Adrian caught her by the shoulders when she made a move to step back. The moment he touched her, he was reminded of the fragility of her mortal body.

And she’d risked her life for his.

He wanted her so much he ached with it. His own vulnerability where she was concerned both enraged and humbled him.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she muttered.

“I need you, tzel,” he said softly.

“No, what you need is for me to be the one strong enough to say no and try to talk some sense into you.” Her gaze lifted beyond his shoulder. Pulling free of his grip, she circled him. “I should have realized before… You’re having a rough time right now. You’ve been through a lot in a short amount of time and you’re not thinking clearly. You’re being reckless. Shit, you took on a nest with suicidal odds.”

She was exquisite. Her hair was still damp, giving the thick curls the hue of pure honey. When she’d come for his iPad, he’d been riveted by her predatory stride-the sensual sway of her hips, the soft rustling of silk as she drew closer. A golden lioness on the hunt. More than a match for him. More than willing to take him on… until she discovered the risks he faced.

Lindsay Gibson was holding back for his benefit, because she was worried about him.

Anticipation tightened his spine, the weighted expectation for a touch he wasn’t sure was coming but hungered for anyway. When her fingers brushed tentatively over feathers on his right upper wing, his eyes closed as the barely-there caress moved through him.

“These are beautiful,” she whispered in a voice filled with awe. “Oh! I thought they were one pair. But there’s… three? Oh my god. You have six wings.”

He could only nod, his throat too tight to speak.

Her touch grew bolder. She stroked along the upper curve and the wing stretched slightly in bliss. She gasped and stumbled back. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t stop.”

There was a pause. “They’re sensitive? But you deflected bullets with them!”

“Nothing manmade can wound a seraph’s wings.”

She stepped forward again, splaying her fingers and running them lightly over his feathers. “Watching you in action was amazing.”

He knew from the low pitch of her voice that the memory was an arousing one, a lingering effect, perhaps, from her time as Shadoe. Or maybe that’s just who she was. Lindsay was a warrior in her own right.

Eager to soak up the heat of her focused attention and admiration, he unfurled his wings slowly, a silent encouragement for her to continue touching him.

“Every angel I’ve seen has had a unique set of wings,” she murmured, torturing him with her gentle petting. “Jason’s are dark. Damien’s are gray. There are some similarities among the others, but no one has wings like yours. The touch of red at the tips… Gorgeous. Does it signify anything? Or are wing patterns randomly individual, like fingerprints?”