Elena tried to hold on to that thought as she fel into sleep that night, tried to tel herself to remember the laughter and the joy. But it was a nightmare that came after her, choking her with the smel of rancid blood and the gurgling whispers of a dead child lying on a morgue slab, the sounds shaped as fine, sticky strands that were very much real. The cobwebby filaments wrapped around her until she lashed out in panic, tearing herself awake to jerk up into a sitting position.
Her hand, she realized after long moments, was clenched tight around the hilt of the knife she’d hidden under the mattress on her side of the bed, the metal cold against her palm. Adrenaline pumping, she turned her head—to see Raphael awake and rising from the bed.
“Come, Elena.”
It took conscious effort to release the knife from her white-knuckled grip. Placing it beside Destiny’s Rose, the diamond sculpture that was a priceless work of art ... and a gift from her archangel, she took the hand he held out, let him tug her to a standing position. “Are we going flying?” Skin jittery, heart pounding double-time, she felt as if she would break apart.
Raphael gave her wings a critical appraisal. “No. You strained them today.” A glance at the wal clock. “Yesterday.”
It was five a.m.; the world was stil cloaked in night when Raphael led her outside. He’d dressed only in a pair of flowing pants that moved like black water over his form, while she’d pul ed on sweatpants and a white silk shirt much too large for her frame. Raphael had said nothing when she’d taken it from his closet, simply sealed the wing slots with a minute flicker of energy so they wouldn’t flap around her.
It was crisp out, making her cheeks tingle. “Where are we going?” she asked as Raphael led her to the woods on the opposite side to the one that separated his home from Michaela’s.
Patience.
Looking around the area she hadn’t yet explored, she realized two things at once. One—Raphael’s estate was huge. And two—they were on a delicately constructed path designed to meld into its surroundings.
Curiosity fought the remnants of anger and fear. Won. “How about a clue?”
Raphael brushed his wing over her own. “Guess.”
“Wel , it’s black as pitch, and we’re in the woods. Hmm, not sounding too good . . .” She was tapping her lower lip with a finger when the path curved—
to bring them to within ten feet of a smal greenhouse lit from within with what looked like three yel ow orange heat lamps.
“Oh.” Pleasure rol ed through her. “Oh!”
Releasing Raphael’s hand, she covered the remaining distance at a run to push through the door and into the humid embrace of a place clearly built to accommodate wings. She was aware of Raphael entering behind her, but her attention was on the luxuriant ferns that hung from the ceiling baskets, their fronds curled and fine; on the sleepy plum-colored blooms of the petunias to her right; and—“Begonias.” Back before Uram, she’d babied her own until they bloomed proud and lush. These sported brown leaves, pitiful flowers. “They need care.”
“Then you must do what is necessary.”
She shot him a glance, her fingers itching to pick up the gardening implements she could see sitting on a smal bench in the corner. “You have a gardener.”
“This is not his territory—he was instructed only to ensure the plants did not die in the interim. It was built for you.”
She couldn’t speak, her chest too tight, too ful . Instead, as the Archangel of New York watched with endless patience, she explored the gift he’d given her, something infinitely more precious than the most exclusive clothes, the most expensive jewels. If he hadn’t already owned her heart, she’d have handed it to him right then and there.
Some time later, Montgomery appeared with a steaming carafe of coffee, buttered slices of toast, smal bowls of fruit salad, and a selection of tiny pastries. The butler, dressed with his usual attention to detail, was seemingly not the least nonplused at finding one of the most powerful beings in the world holding up a branch while she trimmed the deadheads. “Good morning, Sire, Guild Hunter.”
“Good morning, Montgomery.” Raphael took the coffee the butler held out, and it struck her then.
Home.
She was home.
Two hours later, her heart overflowing with a quiet, intense happiness, she was on her way to see Sara prior to her meeting with Jeffrey when her cel phone rang. Landing on the nearest flat roof, she answered it to hear her father’s voice. “We’l have to meet tomorrow,” he said at once. “I have an unexpected business situation to deal with today.”
She should’ve let it go, but the abandoned teenager in her struck out. “Family always takes second place, doesn’t it, Jeffrey?”
A sucked in breath, and for an instant, she had the disorientating sensation that she’d wounded him. But when he spoke, it was to thrust the knife into her own heart. “Family is hardly your specialty, Elieanora.”
No—because he’d made sure of it.
Snapping the phone shut, she took off again, her mood shattered. To top it off, Sara wasn’t at the Guild. Frustrated and needing to do something, she decided to head to Ignatius’s apartment. It was unlikely she’d find anything there to explain his bizarre behavior, but—