Execution was an angel’s job.
However, since bloodlust was involved in this case, they’d been given the go-ahead to execute if retrieval proved too dangerous. “Ransom’s almost there but he’s got no backup.” She cal ed the other hunter her “almost friend” because they had a tendency to irritate each other as often as they made one another laugh, but she’d spil blood for him in a heartbeat. As he would for her.
“I see.”
Elena set her jaw at that cool statement and finished strapping the miniature flamethrower to her other thigh. “I let it go before, but I can’t anymore.”
Walking to the vanity, she began to plait her damp hair with practiced quickness so that it would stay out of her way. The fine, silky stuff had a tendency to escape even the tightest braid, but the damp should help keep it contained. “You took a hunter as your consort, Raphael.”
“That is no longer the only factor.” An answer made in the tone of an immortal used to getting what he wanted. “More than one archangel would like your head as a trophy.”
“Is it life if you live it in a cage?” A taut question as, braid done, she began to strap on her knife sheaths over her forearms. “I won’t live like that.”
Twisting her braid around his hand as he came to stand behind her, Raphael pressed his mouth to the exposed skin of her nape. “Take the chopper.
You don’t have the endurance to fly that far.”
Emotional y vulnerable to him in a way that scared her at times like this, she pul ed away, turned. “Who’l be piloting the chopper?”
“Venom.”
“That’s your final offer?”
When the archangel merely looked at her with those eyes of pitiless blue, she had her answer. “Fine.” Frustration turned her muscles rigid. “But make sure he keeps out of my way.”
Elena made a call to Sara once they were in the air, stiffly conscious of the vampire at the chopper controls beside her. God, she was so mad at Raphael. She’d known this fight was coming, but that made it no easier to handle—especial y when Raphael simply refused to give ground.
No negotiation. Nothing but an archangel’s expectation of obedience.
If he thought that was the end of—
“El ie?” Sara’s voice sounded as if it was coming from the moon. “Where are you?”
“Approximately halfway to Boston,” she said, then got straight to the reason why she’d cal ed. “Why did you pul me in?” Not that she wasn’t happy to be back in the field, but the Guild had any number of hunters at its disposal.
Sara’s voice dropped out for a second, came back. “... al over the place. We need everyone we’ve got.”
“What?” Elena pressed on the headphones. “Repeat that.”
“Vampires breaking their Contracts al over the place,” Sara said. “It’s like some weird—” A crackle of noise and the cal dropped completely. But Elena had heard enough—chaos on this scale could only be connected to one thing . . . only one being.
Caliane.
16
Ransom was waiting near the deserted concrete pier in Boston where he’d asked her and Venom to land when she’d made contact as they came into the city. Lifting her off her feet as soon as she reached him, he planted a smacking kiss on her laughing lips. “El ie, those wings sure are sexy.”
God, it was good to see him. “Put me down, gorgeous.”
“Archangel the jealous type?” He continued to hold her, which argued to his strength—her muscle mass was high to begin with and her wings only added to that.
Pushing at his shoulders, she freed herself. “I thought we had a vampire to catch?”
“Yeah, come on.” His face—a stunning mix of Native American skin and bone structure, and eyes of Irish green—was suddenly al business. “The trail leads to a particular section of warehouses about five minutes away on foot. That’s why I asked you to land here.”
“If you’re so close,” she said, “why did you wait for me?” Pretty as he was, Ransom was also one of the Guild’s top hunters, someone she’d have at her back anytime.
“It’s not just one, El ie.” He began to lead her past a huge boathouse and toward a number of warehouses she could see in the distance. “And they’re helping each other.”
“Shit.” It was rare, very rare, for vampires to hunt together—but when they did ... “What’s the body count?”
“Twenty-two, last I heard.” Ransom’s long hair, a sleek tail down his back, shifted in the breeze as he gave her the update. “But that was half an hour ago.”
“They can’t be feeding if they’re moving that fast.” Which meant they were kil ing for the hel of it, and that made them a plague. “You said they’re helping each other—are they acting like they’re thinking?”
“Not on a complex level, but someone’s definitely home upstairs. Weird, huh?”
Elena thought of Ignatius, wondered if Neha hadn’t gotten the message after al .
Iron in the air, thick, fresh.