Angels of Darkness

fell forward. Though everything in him strained toward her, he struggled against the urge to thrust into her hand. “No,” he managed. “I meant: I’m not a celibate warrior. I gave up that idea a while ago.”
    Her fingers stilled. Her eyes brightened, shining fiercely gold. “Truly?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œGood.”
    With a grin and a sharp rasp of her claw up his rigid length, she turned for the door, orange scarves swirling around her indigo legs. Marc watched her go, hurting in the best—and worst—possible way.
    Good. He had no idea what she meant by that.
    He hoped to God he’d find out.
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    G ood, because she’d hate to ask him to break his vows again. If that was where they were headed.
    Radha didn’t know if they were, or if she should . She wanted to.
    But a hundred and forty years had passed, and he was a different man than she’d known. All good, it seemed, but a few hours couldn’t really tell her. For all she knew, he might be shacked up with a vampire somewhere. He might be in love with someone. She might get hurt again. Or worse, throw herself at him, and discover that she’d been a fool.
    Solid, unflappable—but under it all, he was just a man. And a man’s cock hardened when a woman fake-licked coconut icing from his finger. His arousal didn’t mean anything except that he was alive and possessed a healthy libido.
    And even if he did want sex, that wasn’t all she wanted. Not anymore. She’d done the pleasure-for-pleasure’s-sake thing. It had been fun while it lasted. But she’d changed, too. Now she needed more . . . and it could never be just fun with Marc.
    So rushing would be idiocy. And they were Guardians; they lived a long time. No need to rush anything.
    Unfortunately, Radha knew that she was very, very bad at resisting something that she wanted.
    At least searching for this demon provided a distraction. Bronner lived along one of the rural roads, and they followed it west, flying under the sliver of a moon. Gently rolling, snow-covered hills passed beneath them. In the distance, the Mississippi snaked southward. Pretty. When the bare trees dressed in their leaves for the summer and green covered the hills, it was probably gorgeous.
    Maybe she’d have reason to come back again, and find out.
    The vampire’s one-level house was situated among a small scattering of homes—mostly humans, Marc told her. Best not to let them see two winged people landing in Bronner’s backyard. To conceal their arrival, she concentrated on the illusion of complete invisibility: no sound, no evidence of their footsteps through the snow, no lingering scent of coconut from her mouth.
    Another scent hit her almost immediately: blood. Not surprising, given that this was a vampire’s home and that they usually fed from each other just after waking—but, given that it smelled like human blood, disturbing.
    And a moment later, another scent: human death.
    Marc smelled it, too. His jaw tightened, gaze searching the windows of the house. “Can anyone see us?”
    â€œNo.”
    He vanished his wings. A sword appeared in his left hand, called in from his cache of weapons. Radha brought her crossbow in from her own psychic storage. Their tips poisoned with hellhound venom, the crossbow bolts wouldn’t badly injure a demon, but the venom would paralyze one. It was a hell of a lot easier to decapitate a demon if it couldn’t run away.
    They reached the back door. Marc cocked his head, listening for noises from inside.
    â€œI’m concealing our voices, our footsteps,” she said. “And I’ll conceal the noise when you break open that door.”
    He nodded, then glanced down at her feet. “Put your shoes on. Something that won’t leave a mark.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œIf a human is dead, I have to call in the sheriff. They’ll look for prints. Unless your illusions can cover up real physical evidence, you can’t go in with bare feet.”
    That made sense. In her own territory, she didn’t bother—but she also rarely worked with local law enforcement. This was Marc’s territory, though, so she’d follow his lead. A pair of flip-flops wouldn’t confine her toes. She hated shoes that did.
    Marc picked the lock instead of breaking the door down. The scent of death intensified. Quietly, they slipped into a darkened mudroom, then a