God, but he was dangerous, if only because I was dying for him to mark me.
My skin tightened when I felt his breath on my neck, then a pair of lips that were soft in contrast to the thick cock plunging into me.
He kissed my shoulders, working his way to the nape of my neck.
I moaned when he slammed in and stayed there, his fingers still teasing my clit. The heated pulse of his cock seemed connected to my own heartbeat, and I tried to writhe back onto him, to take even more.
Azazel stroked me hard, making my muscles twitch, and pushed in deep enough to almost hurt.
Instead of pain, a pleasurable molten sensation spread through me, and when he circled my clit again. My hips bucked, and this time, the orgasm was deeper, twisting through my stomach like a never-ending spiral of bliss.
He thrust in again, then harder, until he was pummeling my tightened core. I heard him groan with release before his lips found the base of my neck and a flash of pain streaked through me.
Instead of shocking me out of the orgasm, it seemed to twine through me, pleasure and pain melding into one.
His breath was heavy when he finally removed his lips, brushing gentler kisses over my shoulders, and when he slid free, the shadow-bonds lowered me to the ground and vanished like so much mist.
Azazel caught me in his arms as my legs wobbled.
I felt a connection to him, like the irresistible urge that had kept me away from Belial. “You marked me,” I breathed, finally given the chance to run my hands all over him. I wanted to touch every inch of skin he hadn’t allowed me to have yet.
The rabid hunger was gone, and his violet gaze was almost shuttered. The ravenous hunger had burned itself out for now. “Do you… regret this?”
Even though I mostly wanted to melt into a puddle, I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him, showing him the same unbridled affection I gave to everyone else.
If I didn’t do it while his walls were down, he might push me away again.
“I don’t regret a single moment, and I want to do it all again.” I nipped his earlobe and slid my tongue down his neck, luxuriating in the salt-and-herb taste of him.
He relaxed, almost imperceptibly, and gathered me in his arms.
“But don’t you want to see your mark?”
I stopped trying to seduce him into round two and touched the spot at the apex of my spine that was still slightly sore. “Yes.”
He flicked his fingers, and two mirrors formed in midair, surrounded by wisps of smoke. He angled them so I could just make out the little mark by what moonlight there was.
It was a six-pointed star of deepest violet, the color of the sky just before the first rays of dawn.
I touched it again, almost unable to believe it was really on me, that I had now had every right to touch and taste Azazel as much as I wanted.
That maybe my soul would spill over and heal the void in his.
“I love it,” I said, my voice coming out in a rasp. “I want it there forever.”
Azazel’s mirrors vanished, and the Watcher grabbed me to kiss me again.
“Then that’s where it stays.”
20
Melisande
I woke up instantly.
A twig had cracked in the forest. There was something secretive in the sound, a furtive footstep that had landed in the wrong place.
The fire had smoldered down to embers. I was draped over Azazel’s chest, and one of Lucifer’s legs was flung over mine. Any other time, I would’ve been happy to go right back to sleep, but I caught sight of Tascius on the far side of the dead firepit, slowly and silently rising to his feet.
He saw me struggling to sit up in the pile of limbs and raised a finger to his lips.
Azazel moved next, his eyelids snapping open into immediate wakefulness. I was pulled into the air by Lucifer, who stood in front of me protectively as they scanned the wall of solid trunks and foliage surrounding our camp.
My blades were lying on top of a saddlebag. I crept towards them, pulling one from its sheath as quietly as possible, but one of the horses whickered and pawed the ground.
In the unnatural dead-silence of the forest, that little movement sounded as loud as a gunshot.
Several more snapping sounds echoed from the forest, spreading around us. A gurgling chuckle sent shivers down my spine, and I knew that we hadn’t passed Acheron unseen.
They’d just been waiting for the right moment.
“Fly away, Melisande,” Lucifer said, his voice strained. The Nephilim stalking us knew we were here; there was no point in staying silent any longer.
I gripped my daggers firmly. “Absolutely fucking not.”
Tascius hefted a heavy axe, his eyes flickering from one gap in the trees to the next. He raised his head and sniffed the air, his arms bulging from the strain of holding the axe at the ready.
Then he moved so quickly it was shocking, swinging the blade and slamming it into what I could’ve sworn was only a tangled patch of brush.
Something shrieked, sending every bird flying into the canopy for cover.
A twisted creature ripped through the brush, shoving Tascius aside and landing sprawled over the smoldering fire. All I could make out was several lanky limbs and a wide, yawning mouth before it was on Tascius, tearing at him with clawed fingers.
My Nephilim shoved it back, but his axe was plain iron, not designed to cut through an unaltered Nephilim’s flesh.
Azazel dissipated in a swirl of shadows, becoming the creature I’d seen last night. He was no less eerie for the daylight, his features hidden beneath black fog.
Tascius gripped two of the Nephilim’s arms, holding as much of it back as he could as Azazel glided forward and plunged his hand into the thing’s chest up to his wrist.
The Nephilim let out a
