Elena’s laughter was husky, her wing warm and strong under his touch. No one in angelkind had wings like Elena’s, the evocative midnight of her feathers flowing into deepest indigo that shaded into blue and the shimmering hue of dawn, her primaries white-gold. “The man’s clearly got game.” Moaning in the back of her throat when he increased the pressure of his caresses, she nuzzled into the curve of his neck. “That feels so good. Can you do it all night?”

“If you make it worth my while.” Reluctantly halting the touch that gave him as much pleasure as it did her, his body hard with arousal, he drew her out of the room. “Montgomery will soon be seeking us out for dinner. We should not shock him.”

“I think Montgomery is unshockable at this point.”

Raphael caught the butler’s eye as they left the study—the vampire had appeared in the hallway when Raphael opened the study door. It is a quiet evening, Montgomery. A gift after war and chaos. Perhaps you should invite Sivya to a walk along the cliffs.

Montgomery’s eyes reflected alarmed distress. Sire, I assure you, we have not—

I am an archangel, Montgomery. I know those who are mine. He began to climb the stairs with Elena. To have two of my trusted people become one, it is not something to disdain. Understanding the depth of Montgomery’s loyalty, he made his approbation even clearer. You have my sanction to court her, should you need it.

Halting at the landing, he glimpsed the nervous hope in Montgomery’s expression. It was odd to see the distinguished butler thus, but love had a way of making mortals of them all. Bowing deeply, Montgomery said, Sire.

“What was that about?” Elena asked the instant they were behind the closed doors to their bedroom. “I knew you two were talking.”

Watching her remove her weapons, he said, “Why are you so heavily armed in our own home?” She’d changed into a scoop-necked T-shirt in sky blue and soft black pants that hugged her form, her feet bare. Yet she’d somehow managed to secrete away at least three knives.

“Huh.” She stared at the knife she’d pulled from an ankle sheath. “Habit, I guess.” Placing the weapons neatly in a bedside drawer, she said, “So?”

“Montgomery is courting Sivya.”

“No! Really?”

“You must pretend not to notice,” he cautioned her. “They would be appalled to think they’d been so remiss in their duties as to make you aware of their personal lives.”

Elena pursed her lips, eyebrows drawn together, and began to tug off her T-shirt. “But you noticed.” The sound came out slightly muffled.

“I am their liege. I am meant to notice and make certain they do not sacrifice their joy in the mistaken belief that I would find their coupling discourteous.” He cupped her breasts after she threw the T-shirt over the back of a chair, his need to claim her a pounding in his blood.

He had come to within a split-second of igniting them both on the battlefield in a final attempt to defeat Lijuan’s evil, come to within a split-second of never again holding Elena in his arms. The memory was yet raw. “As my consort,” he said, dipping his head to press his lips to the curve of her shoulder, “your job is to notice when they are a pair, so as to assure their duties don’t separate them any more than necessary.”

Her hands were in his hair, her lips warm and wet against the line of his jaw. “It’s weird to think of Montgomery and coupling in the same breath.” A small gasp when he tugged at one tightly furled nipple. “I’m convinced he sleeps in his suit.”

“Enough talk of others, hbeebti. It is time for our own coupling.” Each hour, every hour of peace was a treasure. War boiled black and violent on the horizon, and when it came, it would engulf the world.

7

The sky was a smudgy gray with only the faintest tinge of orange by the time Ashwini and Janvier arrived at their next destination, located in neighboring Soho—though the area bore that name only until sunset. Then it became the Vampire Quarter. That was when the swanky shops and chichi cafés shut their doors, to be replaced by blood cafés and vampire clubs filled with the cruel and the beautiful.

Hmm . . .

Removing her helmet after Janvier parked down the street from a freestanding dual-level town house on the edge of the Quarter, she said, “The dog, it might be a vamp who’s lost it.”

He took off his own helmet and the silky mahogany of his hair tumbled out. She couldn’t help it; she reached out and scraped her nails lightly from the front to the back of his scalp, the strands cool and the texture exquisite. Leaning his back against her chest, he made a sound deep in his throat.

Her breath caught, her breasts swelling against her bra.

She wanted to wrap her arms around his shoulders, nuzzle her face into the warm line of his throat, and lick him up. Clenching her fist so tight her nails dug into her palms, she got off the bike and hooked the helmet over a handlebar. Doing the same with his own, Janvier swung off the powerful machine with a lazy grace that always caught her attention—and that of any other female in the vicinity.

“Could be,” he said, as if their conversation had never been interrupted by a caress she shouldn’t have permitted herself to make. “You know some vamps don’t do well after three hundred years or so.”

The remembered feel of him burning against her palm, Ashwini unzipped her jacket to give her hands something to do. “What would drinking animal blood do to a vamp?”