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Flaring out her wings, as if to expose theuid caress, Favashi turned her face toward the dia place, but so hard My land is gentler”

“Afound” He had no doubts that Favashi had buriedsand dunes He didn’t have a problem with that—he’d buried a few bodies himself What he did have a problem as the fact that she’d not only fooled hi in her, but that she’d expected to lead hi cuo it was another life, Dain “Why are you here?”

“I came to see you” A simple answer, but her voice held a soft, exotic music that turned it into an invitation “Let the past lie where it belongs I would court you again”

“No” He captured her wrist as she raised her hand to touch his face, squeezing so hard he’d have fractured a el tried to courtdown to speak with his lips brushing her neck, “she ended up in bite-sized pieces I then fed to her hounds” It was he who had courted Favashi before—or at least she’d allowed hiood thing that had coainhis lips along the sensitive edge of her ear, he sucked lightly in the way he knew turned her weak, while rubbing his thu pulse in the wrist he still held “I watched the dogs feed,” he ers of his free hand over the curving arches of her wings in the er to carve her with the blade”

Favashi ripped away her wrist and stepped back from him It mattered little—her eyes were dilated, her skin flushed He ser very deliberately to the rapid pulse in her neck “The bed isn’t far if you wish to be serviced,appellation She was an archangel, after all But her tone held a concern thatshe cared “You are not who you once were, Dmitri I would not have a s I’d enjoy doing to you” None of it would have anything to do with pleasure “Now,” he said, having had enough of games, “tell me the real reason you’re here”

A strand ofas the wind fell “I spoke the truth” Her face flawless in profile, she watched a group of angels angle in to land on a lower balcony, their wings cupped inward to lessen the speed of their descent “Raphael and Elijah both have consorts and are stable, unlike the others in the Cadre

“I have decided it’s time to join them—you were the only one who seemed a suitable choice” The cool calculation of an immortal “Whether or not I would ever trust you in my bed, the invitation stands Consider how much power you would have at your cos he’d once caressed as she arched nad above hi a call to ensure she’d be tracked out of the country, Dht winds that held strands of the Hudson intertwined with the frenetic beat of this wild, living city of steel and glass and heart Favashi didn’t understand and likely never would The fact was, Elena eak, far too weak to be consort to an archangel, and yet Raphael loved her

While Dmitri, as the leader of Raphael’s Seven, could not accept such a weakness, the mortal he’d once been, the one who had loved a woman with a wide mouth and eyes of slanted brownthat man understood what it was to love so deeply it was a kind of beautifulheat

Charred flesh

Screams

Words she should understand but couldn’t