Raphael’s smile was lethal. Shooting past the nose of the plane with inches to spare, he brought them down light as a feather until her feet touched one of the metal wings, the thin film of precipitation slippery. “Careful.”
Wobbly for a second until her boots gained traction, she said, “Got it.”
Releasing her, he flew over and across to the other wing, so the plane wouldn’t unbalance. The young ones sometimes do this—they call it jet surfing.
Elena laughed, her arms spread to hold her balance against the roaring wind that caught at her wings. I read a report once in a newspaper, but I figured someone had had a few too many margaritas on a flight.
It’s highly discouraged, but I look the other way every so often.
“Whoa!” She almost slid off when the plane banked, and Raphael was there, his arms locking around her as he lifted off before she could be sucked into the engines. Strong and protective against her, he was her everything and, all at once, she’d had enough playing. Kissing his throat, she whispered, “No more.”
No response, but less than a minute of breathtaking speed later, they were in the privacy of their bedroom. Tugging off her clothes as he kissed her, Elena then pulled at his own until he got rid of the impediments to her touch, his body heat rough against her own. Hushed whispers and hungry caresses, their language that of lovers who know each other’s every pleasure point, they moved together with raw intimacy.
Holding himself inside her toward the end, his thickness stretching her flesh, Raphael held her gaze. “Eternity would mean nothing without you. For no power on this earth would I trade my Elena.”
Heart splintering at the piercing tenderness of his words, she touched trembling fingers to his lips and hoped his choice wouldn’t doom him, this man whom she loved until she couldn’t breathe.
With the donor blood coming into Blood-for-Less being tested around the clock, they had a hit on the tainted donor at three the following morning. Getting out of bed, Elena was dressed and at the blood café within fifteen minutes, Raphael by her side. He hadn’t slept, having escorted a fuming but compliant Michaela out of the territory, then returned to speak to Galen and Venom via a visual link to the Refuge.
Landing at the back of Blood-for-Less so as not to alarm its customers, they met Marcia in the shadows. When the woman couldn’t get a word out at the sight of Raphael, her fear so potent that Elena saw Raphael’s expression alter in subtle anger, she took over the questioning.
She’s probably never been near an archangel. Cut her a break.
It’s not Ms. Blue who is the target of my anger. My angels are instructed to be brutal if necessary to keep their vampires under control, but this one’s record is clean.
Elena hadn’t realized he’d checked Marcia’s file. You think she was abused? Given the violence and cruelty she’d seen in the immortal world, she hadn’t thought vamps doing their hundred had any rights.
Damaging a useful tool until it’s too fragile to function is a waste, was the coldly practical answer. It seems I may need to remind certain angels of that fact.
Sensing that Marcia was failing in her attempt to force words out through her terror, Elena motioned for Raphael to disappear farther back into the shadows and caught his raised eyebrow before he complied. I’ve got a theory—if she can’t see you, she can pretend you’re not here.
It seemed to work.
“We’ve had only two other donors in the time since the tainted donor, and the Tower is testing their blood now,” Marcia said in response to her question, the vampire’s eyes turned scrupulously away from the shadows that swathed Raphael.
“Surveillance images?”
Proving her intelligence and preparedness, Marcia held out a photograph of a thin young woman with stringy brown hair. “She has the blood that’s been marked as bad by Tower personnel.” The image shook as her fingers began to tremble.
Elena took it before it dropped to the ground. “You’re certain?”
Immediately hiding her hands behind her back, Marcia nodded. “I marked the time of each donation and printed out a still from the surveillance footage as soon as the donor left.”
“Anything else we need to know?”
Marcia swallowed, but got the words out. “I take sick donors all the time—they often need the money, and blood’s blood. Usually.” Sweat beading on her brow. “But she looked half-dead—much sicker than the last time I remember seeing her.”
It was possible the carrier wasn’t a true carrier, simply someone who could withstand the effects of the infection for longer. “Can you pinpoint the time of her previous donation?”
“I am truly sorry, Consort.” Marcia’s teeth began to chatter. “We a-allow anonymous donations so all I can say is that it was with-with-within the l-l-last week.”
Elena sent the vampire back into her café before she had a fear-induced heart attack, then turned to Raphael. “I hope you terrify the fucker who did this to her, or I’ll find him and personally cut off his balls after I beat him bloody.”
“An excellent punishment. Be assured it’ll be carried out.”
Passing the stills to Raphael without any feelings of remorse at the sentence she’d just passed, she set aside her simmering anger and, after checking to make sure the area was clear, went over to the donor doorway. It was a carnival of scents, not unexpected given the number of vamps who no doubt moved in and around the building—the real problem was that the tainted donor was human and Elena was a bloodhound attuned to vampires.
On the other hand, she’d sensed the presence of the disease in the drawn blood, so perhaps the carrier’s blood chemistry had altered enough to highlight her to Elena’s nose.
This Marcia is indeed a valuable tool, came Raphael’s voice into her mind. She e-mailed the photo to the Tower as soon as the alarm was sounded and Aodhan is following up on it. Ransom Winterwolf, however, may have the better contacts when it comes to the humans and vampires who frequent this area.
Elena stopped what she was doing to meet the painful blue of his eyes, extraordinarily pure, extraordinarily lethal. If I bring Ransom into this, she said, keeping the conversation on the mental level to avoid it being caught by the surveillance equipment, and he ends up with information you can’t permit a mortal to have, you’ll wipe his mind.
You know our laws, Elena.
Exactly. She thought of Illium’s punishment and knew she couldn’t ask special favors for Ransom. Raphael had already gone far beyond what could be expected of him when he’d permitted Sara into the Refuge. If Elena wanted to protect her friends, she was the one who had to put up the boundary walls . . . even if it meant they’d stop being a part of her life. Better that painful rupture than to watch them be treated as puppets by the immortals. Knowing those laws is why I won’t bring Ransom into this.
You’d let innocent vampires die?
That isn’t fair. Stepping up until they were toe to toe, she stood her ground. Ransom’s life is worth as much as that of any vampire—and I won’t be involved in stealing any part of it from him.
Some of the vampires who may yet die will be friends of his. The wild wind, the dark sea, crashing into her mind. Do you believe he’d protect his own life at the cost of theirs?