If there was a next time.
Light flashed, illuminating the room. White light, tinged with blue and the very air crackled.
She followed Ash out of the bedroom and into the main room as the front door of the apartment was flung open from outside. Ryan stood in the entrance.
“The place is under attack from fucking angels,” he said, running his hand through his already messy hair. “If I could ever have foreseen anything in my life, this would have been the last fucking thing ever.” He glanced between the two of them, his eyes narrowing. “Did I interrupt anything?” When neither of them answered, he spoke again. “I came to get Faith. I didn’t know you were here—we thought you’d gone back…home.”
Faith was still trying to make sense of his words. Angels? They were under attack from angels. She must have heard him wrong. Though they were definitely under attack from something; the building was shaking again. All the same, she was going to discount the angel thing. She was dazed from Ash’s amazing…she must stop thinking about it and concentrate.
Yeah, she’d heard wrong. Vampires were one thing, but angels? Nah.
“Christian was looking for you,” Ryan continued to Ash. “You weren’t answering your cell.”
“I was busy.”
They both turned to stare at Faith. She drew herself up tall and hoped she didn’t look as though she’d just had Ash’s head between her legs, his tongue…
Stop thinking about it!
“Are we going?”
“Yeah,” Ash said. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.” He held out a hand to her. She stared at it for a second; she would never have taken him for the hand-holding type. Then she slid her palm into his and his strength flowed through her.
“Christian says can you open a portal,” Ryan said. “We need to get Tara away. She lost your talisman. They took it from her.”
“Shit,” Ash said. “I can’t open a portal inside the building, the place is warded.”
A portal? A portal where? A talisman? Faith was so lost, she decided not to think anymore.
“Out on the street?” Ryan asked.
“Too many people. It will have to be the roof.”
“Not sure that’s a good place to be right now.” Ryan shrugged and pulled his cell out of his pants pocket. “Christian, I’ve found Ash. He says the roof.” He put the phone away. “They’ll meet us up there—you get that portal open.”
“A portal. A portal to where?”
Ash gave her a rueful smile. “Straight to hell, darling.”
He was speaking rhetorically…wasn’t he?
He squeezed her hand. “Well, honey, you said you wanted to know about me and you’re about to have a crash course.”
“A crash course in what?”
“Let’s just say, I don’t think I’m going to be collecting on those orgasms anytime soon.”
That didn’t sound good. She glanced away from him to find Ryan staring at her, eyebrows raised.
“Piss off,” she muttered.
“I suggest we all piss off. Before this place disintegrates around us.”
“They won’t do that,” Ash said. “These are warning shots.”
She turned to him, eyes narrowed. “Yeah, because you know all about angels, don’t you, Ash?”
Maybe he was an angel. That’s why he knew about them. She tried to cling to the idea as they hurried after Ryan, but somehow it wouldn’t stick. He just didn’t seem particularly angelic. Maybe he’d worked for them, like he now worked for the vampires. But again, she couldn’t quite convince herself.
He still had her by the hand and was pulling her along. They didn’t use the elevator but headed into the stairwell. As they were in the penthouse there was only one flight of stairs and then a metal door that led onto the roof.
“Let me go first,” Ash said. He gave her hand one last squeeze then dropped it and moved up to stand beside Ryan. As he raised his hand to open the door, he turned back to her. “Everything will be all right,” he said. “Trust your instincts.”
What did that mean? Her instincts were telling her to run screaming in the opposite direction. She nodded and gave him a weak smile.
“Good girl.”
She stepped back and bumped into Ryan.
“If I ever called you a ‘good girl,’ you’d call me a patronizing bastard and punch me in the nose,” he murmured.
“You are a patronizing bastard.”
“So just how ‘good’ were you?” He managed to leer and smirk at the same time.
“Again—piss off, Ryan.”
At that moment, the door opened and bright white light flooded the stairwell.
Footsteps sounded behind her. She glanced quickly away from the light and over her shoulder. Christian was climbing the stairs, Tara beside him and more people close behind them. She recognized the red-haired man from reception. Others she’d never seen before.
Ash had paused in the doorway. Now he turned. “How do you want to do this?” he asked Christian.
“I want you to take Tara to safety.”