Messenger's Angel: A Novel of the Lost Angels (30 page)

She shuddered beneath the weight of his words and magic and groaned when it set off an aphrodisiac-like reaction within her body. Mitchell watched her knowingly and then glanced up at his general with dark, glittering eyes.

Kevin brushed the hair from her cheek and waited. Juliette’s lips parted and she spoke, though the sound was a harsh, hoarse whisper, as her tender throat no doubt prevented anything else. “I . . . can . . . remove it.”

“She speaks the truth,” Mitchell said. He’d been in her head. But Kevin didn’t need the affirmation; he’d been in there as well. The ability to read minds was a vampiric power, and his transformation into one of the supposed undead was complete.

Apparently only the individual who put the bracelet on could take it off again. She had already refused to do as much once. It had cost him the life of one of his men. And now if he didn’t get it off her soon, it was going to cost Mitchell a healing power.

Kevin could feel Paul’s stolen power add itself to the cocktail of the others he already had swirling inside. He felt volatile. Strong. “Take it off, Juliette,” he commanded, using every ounce of his newly learned vampiric power to bend her will with his words.

Behind her, Mitchell shook his head as if to clear it and swayed on his feet. Kevin reached out to steady him with a strong hand. Juliette blinked once, and then shifted in Mitchell’s arms. Kevin smiled as she began to reach for the bracelet with her other hand.

But the bunker was plunged into chaos before her fingers closed over the metal. The heavy bunker door came off its hinges and went flying into several Adarians against one wall. The ground, walls, and ceiling began to tremble, and the lights began to flicker menacingly. One of them sparked—and then they all went out.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

T
here was a growling sound beside Juliette, then a grunt of pain, and she was falling. But before she could hit the ground, a second set of arms lifted her, crushing her to another strong chest. She closed her eyes and curled inward, feeling exhausted and dizzy and disoriented. Beyond the periphery of her senses were the distant sounds of scrambling and scraping accompanied by the shouts of the Adarians.

There was nothing she could do as her hair began to whip about in a strong breeze as her captor began to move through the darkness at roller-coaster speed.

“It’s okay, Jules. It’s me,” came a deep voice at her ear. She felt something incredibly soft brushing her cheeks and caught the scent of spice or incense. She recognized the voice, but it took her a minute of frantic mental fumbling for her to place it. It reminded her of the movie
Comeuppance
. And then she remembered. Christopher Daniels.

Uriel!
Relief washed over her, though she knew she wasn’t out of the woods yet.

She turned slightly in his arms, enough to open her eyes and look around just as he shot from the opening of the underground caverns and into the moonlit night beyond. His massive black wings emerged above them, stretching to their full length, and shimmered black and green, nearly iridescent. They beat the air with a hard and steady rhythm, taking them up to the top of the cliff.

There, he gently touched down, still holding her fast in his arms.

“She’s injured,” he said, gazing at someone over her head. She wanted to see who it was, but her neck hurt too much for her to turn her head.

“She’s wearing the bracelet,” Michael said as he stepped up to them. Juliette felt more reassurance wash over her at the appearance of the second brother.

“You did good, lass,” Gabriel said. This time, Juliette did turn her head, despite the pain. The former Messenger Archangel was standing there beside her, his tall, broad form seeming to shield her from the world. His black hair billowed in the sea breeze, the five-o’clock shadow on his strong chin making him appear ever the rake. He was so gorgeous, her pain eased a little at the very sight of him. He looked down at her in Uriel’s arms and his silver eyes claimed her as they always had. “That’s my girl.”

But then he somewhat reluctantly stepped back out of the way and Michael placed his hand to Juliette’s chest. The familiar light and heat she’d felt when he’d healed her before returned once more and the pain in her neck gradually slipped away. But the weakness remained. She frowned, wondering what was different this time.

“I’m sorry, Jules,” Michael said softly as he removed his hand. His stark blue eyes looked a tad bloodshot. “I can’t replace the blood loss. It’s not within my power.”

Juliette could not feel disappointed. She was grateful that they were all there with her, to say nothing of the fact that the holes in her neck had been closed up. “Thank you,” she said softly, meaning it with all of her heart. “How are you here?” They were more than three hundred miles from the Hebrides. How had they all found her? How had they gotten there so quickly?

“Az found you,” Uriel told her. “Then he contacted us and we used the mansion’s portal to get here.”

Speaking of the vampire archangel, where was Azrael? She glanced around and saw Max standing a few feet away. Only Az was missing.

Uriel’s grip on her tightened suddenly as the ground beneath him began to buck. “Time’s up,” he muttered, beating his giant wings once to take them both into the air a safe few feet from the turbulent rock. Juliette looked down as the rock began to crack and separate, opening up like the gates to hell.

She squealed and ducked her face into Uriel’s shoulder when the ground then exploded outward and dirt and stone went flying in a nasty, painful spray. Uriel curled his wings over her body and she could hear the stones buffet the thick, feathered appendages. Then he was spinning away from the new opening and depositing her on the ground a few yards away as two figures shot out from the depths of the crack—two blurs, one black and one blue.

Juliette found her footing and though she could still feel blood loss bending her knees, she retained enough strength in the heat of the moment to stand on her own. She had no choice. Because once the impressive struggling figures of Azrael and Abraxos had drilled their way to the surface, the other Adarians had followed. Now the six remaining soldiers engaged the four brothers and their guardian once more.

Juliette stumbled backward, trying to make heads or tails of the chaotic clash between Adarian and archangel. They were very nearly equally matched. However very nearly was not close enough. Not to ensure Juliette’s safety—not this time.

“Take off the bracelet, Juliette,” came a calm, cool voice from behind her.

Juliette whirled around to face the dark-haired man with piercing black eyes who read her mind and gazed at her as if she belonged to him. She was able to get a good look at him now that he wasn’t freezing her with his power or knocking the ground out from under her.

As far as the tall, dark, and handsome thing went, he was a woman’s wet dream. He was certainly tall, as all Adarians were. He was broad-shouldered and slim and wore dark jeans, boots, and a white button-down shirt beneath a black sport coat. His chin was stubbled slightly and his dark eyes sparked with specks of what she could now see were different colors embedded in the blackness. Like stars.

She wondered what his name was.

He smiled at her, shoving his hands into his jeans pockets. “Mitchell,” he told her softly, taking a step toward her as he looked down at the ground. “Juliette, you seem to be a woman of integrity,” he said then, his expression becoming contemplative. Behind her, lightning struck and thunder boomed, causing her to duck and cover her ears.

A few seconds later, she was straightening again and Mitchell was continuing as if nothing had interrupted him. “I’ve met a lot of women over the years,” he told her, finally looking back up to meet her gaze again. He stepped forward. She stepped back. The sounds of struggle were all around her. “And I’ve been in their heads,” he continued. “I’ve never been as impressed with any of them as I am with you. So, I’ll make you a deal.” He stopped and shrugged, his hands still in his pockets.

Juliette knew better than to say anything. Whatever he was up to, it wasn’t worth letting her guard down. She watched him carefully as he finally took his hands out of his pockets so that he could pull a cigarette from the inside pocket of his sport coat, place it between his lips, and flick a lighter to life, shielding it from the ocean breeze. The end of the cigarette began to glow red and he extinguished the lighter and repocketed it. With utter calm and conviction, Mitchell took the cigarette out of his mouth and focused his dark, piercing gaze on her once more.

“If you grant me your word that you’ll remain with me and give me your blood when I ask for it, I will let you live.” He blew a small cloud of smoke, his eyes glinting as he watched her take in his words.

Juliette had no idea what to make of the offer. It was terrifying for her to think that her only two options in life now were to give herself over to an Adarian to be his eternal prisoner—or to die. The thought left her momentarily speechless. She stared up at the dark-haired man and opened her mouth to say something, but closed it again when she realized she had nothing to say.

What
could
she say? Even if she thought the offer sound and was crazy enough to accept it, how could he be sure that she wouldn’t go back on her promise?

“As I said, Juliette,” he told her, taking another drag of smoke and lowering the cigarette once more, “I know you’re a woman of your word.” He blew a small cloud. “Integrity, Juliette. It’s what sets you apart from the others. If you make a promise, you keep it. Don’t you?” His voice had dropped, becoming almost intimate. She was amazed that she could hear him even over the cacophony of battle going on around them. It was something about the voices of Adarians and archangels—they always managed to make themselves heard with perfect clarity.

“Abraxos would never let me live.”

At this, Mitchell gave a small laugh. He shook his head. “The General is in love with Granger. I don’t have to be able to read his mind to know as much. He won’t be able to kill her. He understands, perhaps better than anyone.”

Juliette stared at him, shocked by the news. Abraxos was in love with Eleanore? Ellie had told Juliette about Abraxos—about how he’d appeared to her when she was a teenager. She’d had a crush on him. He’d been her first crush, in fact.

There was obviously more to it than that for Abraxos. And now everything Uriel and Ellie had told her about Kevin Trenton’s drive to get his hands on Ellie made even more sense than it had before. Abraxos wasn’t only bitter that he couldn’t heal—he was bitter that Ellie wasn’t meant to be his.

Despite the severely warped situation she was in, Juliette found herself reasoning. What Mitchell was asking her for made sense, in a way. If he really wanted her to live, then giving him nonstop access to her blood was as good as killing her. Once he used his dose of healing power, he could return to her for another. On and on. All he needed was her word that she wouldn’t deny him.

She could even understand why integrity would be important to Mitchell. He could obviously read minds. She imagined that after centuries of reading duplicitous minds, he would long for the solid reliability of a mind that meant what it said. Nevertheless, Juliette was not going to let her empathy with the Adarian snap the trap shut. “What in the world would make you think I would ever make such a deal with you?” she asked him then, and though her own body was weak, she, too, managed to make herself heard.

Mitchell smiled and shrugged, dropping the cigarette to smash it under one boot. “I assumed you would rather not die.”

“You assumed wrong,” she told him. It was true. She had lived many lives—and died many times. And in all those existences, the most painfully grievous moments had been not when she was dead but when she’d been very much alive—and suffering. There were worse things than death.

Mitchell considered her answer for a moment, his gaze searching hers with uncomfortable intensity. “You are not afraid to die. I can understand this. After all, it’s nothing new to you.” He came toward her again and Juliette fought not to step back. She chanced a glance behind her and found that she had maybe three feet to go before she would be flush with the cliff’s ledge.

“However, something in this life
is
new to you,” he continued. “You’ve never truly loved before, have you, Juliette?”

Juliette’s head whipped back around, her gaze cutting to his eyes. Trepidation unfurled within her gut. Dying was one thing . . . but this was skimming the edges of something more dangerous.

She said nothing. She didn’t need to, though, and she knew it. She knew that the moment she thought of Gabriel and his silver eyes and his captivating brogue, he was reading those thoughts as well—stealing them from her in the most merciless and intrusive manner.

His smile was back. He cocked his head to one side, again shoving his hands into his pockets. “What would you do to save him, Juliette? Would you make a promise if his life depended on it instead of yours?”

Juliette froze. She thought of Gabriel and the life she had decided she wanted to have with him. Here. In Caledonia. She’d never experienced a sense of home before, not in all her many lifetimes. But Gabriel could give her that—Gabriel would give her that. She knew it in the very fiber of her being.

Unless he couldn’t. Because he was dead.

She swallowed and nearly choked on the dry lump that had formed in her throat. Mitchell watched her for another moment more, and then he reached into the back waistband of his jeans and extracted a shard gun. He held it down at his side for a few short seconds—and then raised it, along with his gaze, until they were both directed at something above her head.

Juliette spun around to see Gabriel and another Adarian fighting several yards away. The Adarian had him around the neck in a fierce death grip. But the Adarian was also injured and bleeding from several wounds across his strong body. The fight seemed to be well matched.

Except that Gabriel’s back was turned toward her. Juliette’s heart flipped in her chest and her stomach turned. His broad back was the perfect target for Mitchell’s shard gun.

“No,” she whispered, having lost her voice.

“You have three seconds, Juliette. Take off the bracelet and I will consider it your vow to willingly join me. You will live—and so will your precious Messenger.”

Juliette had no further time to think. Either she surrendered, or Gabriel would die. Fury boiled to life within her. She was so sick to death of people shooting Gabriel with those shard guns. How many times had Azrael said he’d been shot? And here was another Adarian again—threatening to do it some more.

With a bitter cry of frustration, Juliette curled her fingers around the bracelet and gave a quick yank, ripping the golden wreath from her wrist with a blinding flash. At once, she felt her powers swell, an influx of energy and ability that had been kept just out of reach while she’d worn the band.

Mitchell’s dark eyes sparked and his cruel lips curled up in a slow, satisfied smile. “That’s better,” he said, lowering the deadly weapon.

Juliette’s heart was cracking open. Visions were flashing before her mind’s eye. Gabriel at her doorway, the salt of the sea in his hair. Gabriel across from her at the breakfast table, laughing as he told her a story. Gabriel as he bent to claim her lips with his own while his body was buried so deeply within hers.

Gabriel, her archangel.

“Not anymore, little one,” Mitchell said softly as he closed the distance between them so that he towered over her. He curled his finger beneath her chin and tilted her head so that she was looking into his eyes.

Her cheeks were wet.

“You’ve given me your word,” he told her, his gaze intense. “And to make certain it can never be broken—” He released her chin, raised the gun, aimed it at Gabriel, and began to pull the trigger.