Her Dark Angel (2 page)

He landed mid-way along the bridge over the river behind her and stepped down off the wall, changing his appearance as he did so. His wings didn’t want to disappear and it took several strides towards her before he was sure the mortals wouldn’t see them and that his glamour was falling into place. He changed his clothes, replacing his armour with a fine black suit, with a black shirt and a dark blue tie, and then swept his long hair back and tied it at the nape of his neck in a ponytail.

Finally, he lifted the force that made him invisible to the mortal eye and walked casually towards her. He took the blue handkerchief from his pocket, stepped up behind her, and hesitated for only a moment before touching her shoulder.

“Are you alright?” he said in French, hoping he had the right language and the right words. He hadn’t spoken to anyone in a long time and although he knew modern languages, he had never used them.

She touched her face again, her long fair hair a curtain which he couldn’t see beyond, and sniffed. When she turned to face him, she was smiling. Her hazel eyes lit on the offered handkerchief at first and then slowly ran up his arm to his chest and then towards his face. She was more beautiful in the flesh, her features soft and her eyes round. She could be an angel herself. He hadn’t realised how much shorter than him she would be. She was at least a head shorter, and petite too.

The moment her gaze met his, her expression changed. Her hand stopped close to taking the handkerchief and horror filled her eyes.

“Get away from me.” Her French held a sharp note of panic and then she stormed towards the bridge.

Apollyon frowned, looked at the handkerchief, and then went after her.

She glanced over her shoulder and her pace increased. It was easy to close the gap between them. His strides were longer than hers and her little heeled sandals were clearly not made for a swift escape.

“Leave me alone.”

Why was she running?

People were staring, murmuring to each other. She was causing a scene and he wasn’t quite sure why.

“Get away from me!” She turned to face him and then backed away, the fear still bright in her eyes. They darkened when she frowned and spoke as though uttering a curse. “Abaddon.”

He hadn’t heard that name in a long time.

She knew he was an angel.

How? Had his glamour failed? It had been millennia since he’d had to cast one. He looked around them at the watching mortals. None of them looked afraid. If they could see an angel before them as she could, they would be reacting the same as she was. People would be screaming that the Apocalypse was nigh and the world was going to end. He would be in serious trouble with his master.

He remembered that she had called him. Could she see through the glamour? Was she different somehow to other mortals?

“I don’t want to die,” she muttered almost beneath her breath and cast a fearful look his way.

This wasn’t going as he had expected. She wasn’t supposed to have been able to see that he was an angel. She was supposed to have accepted his kind offer of a handkerchief to dry her tears and told him why she was crying so he could figure out what he was doing here and whether someone was playing a trick on him.

Tears spilled down her cheeks and she wrapped her arms around herself, making herself small and making him want to reach out to her and somehow ease her suffering. Whatever pain had caused her to cry, it was still strong within her heart, tormenting her. He could feel it. There was some sort of connection to her that gave him insight into her feelings, a sense that she needed him and that they were supposed to have met here today.

It was ridiculous.

A mortal could never call him. They didn’t have the voice.

He had been alone too long and was dreaming all of this, seeing things as he wanted them and not with clear eyes.

There was only one way of finding out whether she had called him somehow. He had hoped to discover it through casual conversation but that wasn’t an option now. It was time for a more direct approach.

He stepped towards her and she backed away again, holding both of her hands out as though that gesture alone could stop him if he wanted to get to her.

“Please,” she whispered and shook her head, sending more tears tumbling down her pale cheeks.

“Leave her alone.” A burly man started towards him.

Apollyon lost patience and cast his hand out, waving it across the gathered crowd. “There is nothing interesting to see here.”

Their expressions went slack and they moved as one, drifting off and back into their own lives, moving past him and the mortal woman as though they weren’t even there.

“Oh God, you’re going to kill me.”

He frowned at her. “Why would you say such a thing?”

“It’s what you do.” There was accusation in her tone and a hint of bravery.

Courage in the face of death?

A moment ago, she had been fleeing him and now she looked ready to fight.

“I have not done such a thing in a very long time.” He sighed. It was never going to leave him. Spend a few centuries as the angel of death and no one forgets. Everyone presumes you’re still in charge of taking life’s final breath from mortals. Still, it was better than the other rumour that he was the Devil. “There is a fleet of angels who do it now.”

She didn’t look as though she believed him. Her hands trembled in front of her.

“I didn’t ask for my powers. Please don’t take me there.”

“Where?” His patience was wearing thin again and he seemed to be unable to get his question out into the open. He tracked back over what she had said.

Powers?

“All the fires of Hell are in your wake... I don’t want to go there. I haven’t done anything wrong.”

Apollyon looked behind him. All he could see was Paris. The edge of the stone bridge and the murky river, and the city beyond.

“You are gifted.” He looked back at her, deep into her hazel eyes. She nodded. Was this how she had called him? He frowned and looked at the fountains at the other end of the bridge behind him and then at her. “What were you doing there?”

She looked past him, blinked a few times, and then her eyebrows rose. “Nothing really. Contemplating life, I guess, and how shitty it was.”

“You did not ask for anything?” He stepped closer to her and this time she didn’t back away. She kept staring at the fountain with wide eyes. Tears lined her dark lashes. All of her fear disappeared and the pain returned. She clutched her hands to her chest, and he felt the hurt well up inside her, overwhelming her.

“Revenge,” she whispered and her gaze darted to him. “I asked for vengeance against that cheating bastard.”

Cheating? A sinner?

She had called for vengeance and he had heard her, and he had felt compelled to answer and accept her mission. He couldn’t. Contracting with her would break the one between him and his master.

Apollyon looked at her, studying her pale beauty.

She had called him and he had come. She was his master now. He had accepted the mission and the contract the moment he had left Hell.

He was going to get into trouble for this.

It had been a while since he had been on Earth though, and although the angels who watched over mortals now tolerated the old sins and only took them into account at death rather than punished the sinner during their life, he did still hate some of them.

Infidelity in particular.

“Are you really here to kill me?”

Apollyon smiled and a hint of colour touched her cheeks. “You called me and I came to you, not to take your life but to ease your suffering.”

She swallowed and looked as though she was going to deny that she was in pain. Apollyon stepped up to her and touched her face. Her skin was warm, soft, and felt good beneath his fingertips. He caressed her cheek, placed his fingers under her chin, and raised her eyes to his.

“Whatever he did to you, I will make him suffer for it, but no man is worth such tears. Your heart will heal in time and you will love again.”

Her hazel eyes searched his.

Apollyon stared deep into them, feeling a strange warmth travel along his hand from where his fingertips touched her face. It chased through him and finally settled in his chest, burning there, stirring feelings that he had long forgotten existed.

“I will give you the revenge you seek.”

Those words were distant to his ears even though they issued from his lips.

He was lost in her eyes, in the way she was looking at him with so much warmth.

Was it gratitude that made her look that way?

Or was it something else?

“Are you a goddess?” he whispered, trying to keep his thoughts on track and on his mission.

She shook her head, moving his fingers with her, and licked her lips. He made the mistake of looking at them, watching the soft pink tip of her tongue sweep over them. A surge of hunger swept through him and he took his hand away, shocked by the strength of his desire and the suddenness of it.

“I’m a witch,” she said, matter of fact, with a little shrug.

Apollyon stared at her. Was he making a terrible mistake by helping her? A part of him said to leave now before it was too late and he became too deeply involved with her.

He couldn’t though.

She had cast a spell on him.

And he was a slave to her.

S
erenity’s hazel eyes went wide and she stepped back when the hulking mass of man standing before her drew the sword that hung at his waist, afraid that he had changed his mind and was going to kill her after all. She wasn’t sure what to think when he eased himself down onto one knee in front of her, lowered his head, and held his sword out to her, the hilt and tip of the beautiful blade resting on his palms.

“I am yours to command.” His French was perfect, making his deep voice so sexy that a shiver tripped over her skin whenever he spoke.

Was she supposed to do something?

People were staring again as they passed. What did they see? They certainly weren’t seeing a man offering a sword to her, that was for sure. To them, did he look as though he was kneeling with his hands raised in supplication?

Was he dressed in black and gold armour that didn’t leave much to the imagination?

Did he have huge black feathered wings?

She imagined that he didn’t. If he did, the people would probably be screaming rather than merely glancing at him as though he had gone insane.

“Erm, okay.” Serenity hesitated before touching the sword. The gleaming steel was cold beneath her fingers. She took her hand away, not liking the feel of it. “Thanks.”

He stood with grace, his muscles shifting beneath his golden skin, and she tried not to stare at his physique. Either he worked out a lot, or angels were naturally endowed with the body of a god. He was pure perfection as he stood close to her, his broad chest rising and falling, moving the beautifully decorated black breastplate. His stomach was bare, taut muscles delighting her hungry eyes, and the smallest black loincloth in the world protected his modesty.

Something that she was lacking. She lowered her gaze, taking in the toned length of his legs. They were as powerful as the rest of him. Her eyes roamed back up, over the black cuffs that covered his forearms, decorated in gold with images of lions, and over his biceps to his strong shoulders. From there, they wanted to go to his face, but his wings were too fascinating. They were large, casting a shadow across both him and her, tucked against his back.

She wanted to walk around him and investigate every delicious inch of him, taking in that he really was an angel and not a man parading as one.

An angel.

Abaddon.

Her mother had taught her gods, goddesses and mythology. She knew all about him and his kind.

Her eyes finally leapt to his face. He had a smile that could stop hearts and vivid blue eyes with icy flecks in them. They held her gaze, unwavering and strong, and her temperature rose when they narrowed slightly and his pupils widened. What was he thinking in there?

Did he like what he saw as much as she did?

The man was a god.

No, an angel.

And he was beautiful.

Breathtaking.

But he wasn’t at all as she had thought an angel would look. Everything about him spoke of darkness, right down to his aura. Whatever power he had, it was strong and it wasn’t the sort that resurrected mortals or healed them. It felt as though the opposite would happen if he unleashed it.

Abaddon. The angel of death. Although he had denied that title. What title did he claim as his then?

“So, Abaddon—”

“Apollyon,” he interjected with a charming smile that teased his sensual lips and made her heart beat a little faster.

He was an angel. No matter how good he looked and how much he was making her forget her pain just by looking at him, she couldn’t think about him like that. It was wrong of her. He had offered his assistance in getting revenge on her bastard ex and she was going to take it. Whatever dark power this gorgeous man had, she was going to let it rip in her ex’s direction.

“Apollyon?” She stopped her gaze from dropping down to take him in again. If she told him to put on something a little less distracting, would he be able to do it? She had seen through whatever spell he had used. Could he ever fool her eyes?

“I prefer my true name.” He cast a quick glance over her. His eyes lingered in all the places a mortal man’s would.

Surely, she was off limits too? Angels were asexual weren’t they?

The voice at the back of her mind said that the tall hunk of handsome standing in front of her definitely didn’t look asexual. He looked like sin incarnate, not like an angel at all.

“Serenity.” She offered her hand to him.

He took it and a jolt ran through her at the feel of his strong warm hand grasping hers. She shook his hand but he didn’t let go when she was done. He held it, his thumb resting lightly against hers.

“My mother thought I could bring peace to a chaotic world.” Her heart sped when his thumb grazed hers and then he took his hand back, his fingers brushing her palm and sending another shiver through her. “I’m not much good at it.”