She parked the Porsche in the alley behind the Mortal Coil and tossed Fane the keys. Then she gathered her shopping bags and the broken ornament and let herself into the club.
Her heels tapped a slow, boring tempo down the back hall. So empty, so quiet. Sometimes she wished she kept the place hopping during the holidays, as a way to stay busy if nothing else. But she couldn’t risk others when the tenebrae came creeping. She wouldn’t let what happened to Mirabel happen to anyone else. At least not in front of her. Not again.
Despite her dismal thoughts, she found herself listening for the thud of harder footfalls as she rummaged behind the bar for a votive candle holder. But the only sound was the whisper of air through the ducts high overhead and the tinkle of glass as she dumped the broken ornament over the burned-down wax. She stifled her disappointment and turned toward the stairs to her apartment.
And let out an inadvertent shriek as she found herself nose to chest with Fane.
“I thought you were going home,” she said.
“I thought you were going home with me,” he countered. “Where are you going to hang your ornaments?”
“Upstairs. It’s smaller, more defensible.” Plus, she could see the pretty baubles from her bed and maybe sweeten her dreams.
He stepped out of her way. She hesitated a moment, but then with a mental shrug, she went up.
He was silent on the stairs behind her, almost eerily so for such a big man. Why did an angel need to be so sneaky? It had the power of goodness and light on its side.
But she felt the weight of his gaze, like the memory of his hand running down her naked back, and suddenly goodness and light seemed very far away.
She hurried a little faster up the stairs.
In her apartment, she hung her parka on the row of hooks by the door and kicked off her boots before taking the broken ornament to the reliquary. The antique was in the classic French style, like a miniature gilt-copper cathedral with rock crystal windows and a red enameled front door. With her fingernail, she popped the tiny latch and slid the candle into the depths.
“Watch out.” Fane’s hands on her shoulders made her start. “There’s still broken glass on the floor from when you threw your drink.” He guided her to one side then knelt to sweep up the trash.
She bit her lip. “You don’t have to do that.”
“If I cut myself, you can add it to your collection. Unless the blood from an outcast angel is useless.”
“I guess it depends on how you cut yourself. The warden shed his blood to reject us, to repel what he saw as a transgression. That impulse works against the tenebrae.” She ran her finger over the peaked steeples of the reliquary, and the copper spires thrummed an almost musical arpeggio. Did she dare ask if he would shed his blood for her? Or some other bodily fluid?
Her mouth felt swollen where she had nibbled at it, and when he stood up, looming over her, she couldn’t help but lick her lips. As transparent as glass…
He turned and went to the kitchen where he found her trash can under the sink. The ring of plain broken glass in the bottom of the bin sounded like her silly fantasies shattering.
Which incensed her. An imp did not want dreams. An imp did not need fantasies. Her only plan had been to keep herself free of the tenebraeternum another year, but here she was, exposed to an angel-man, half embroiled in a fight against a djinn-man, and on the sphericanum’s watch list, no doubt.
Doing her utmost to ignore Fane, she unwrapped her new sleigh and reindeer team from their tissues and hung them from the curtain rod at the window.
“You won’t be able to pull the drapes,” he warned.
“This time of year, I want all the light I can get.” She fussed with the spacing until they were perfect, then stepped back. The window was only a square of black framing the storm clouds and encroaching night. But the meager light of the streetlight below glinted in the silvered bits of the mercury glass, and she saw not just the reflected glimmer but the time and talent and joy the old man had blown into the molten glass. Drunken curmudgeon he might have been, but his love shone in the ornaments.
She gave the lead red-nosed reindeer a gentle nudge to set him swaying and then reluctantly turned to face her visitor.
He’d taken off his coat and stood with his hip propped against her kitchen counter, looking long, lean and mean with a tumbler of clear liquid in his hand.
She pointed. “That’s a pretty hefty drink for someone who’s about to drive away.”
“Who’s leaving?”
She tapped the accusing finger against her lower lip. “Um, let’s see…”
He drained the tumbler in one long swallow and then stalked across the room toward her.
She’d hung her protections against attack from the outside. Maybe she should have been looking within. She took a short step back.
He didn’t stop until their thighs bumped. “Yes, let us see,” he murmured.
He leaned down to kiss her, a slow kiss that coursed through her like the silver the old man had poured into the blown glass, so she felt as breathless and delicate, with a bright spark inside her. She wanted his hands around her curves, his mouth stoking the flames.
When he finally lifted his head, his smile was as slow and hot as the kiss.
She swallowed hard. “Liar. You had pure water in your glass.”
“Then I must be drunk on something else.”
“Exhaustion, maybe.”
“Are you saying we should go to bed? I’ve been wanting to get a closer look at all those embroidered pillows.”
She choked on nothing.
He took her hand and turned toward the bed, oh so conveniently right there.
She took one step before setting her stocking feet flat on the floor and tugging her hand free. “No.”
“The kitchen counter again? If that’s what you want.”
“Where is this going, Cyril?”
He gestured one direction then the other. “The bed or the counter. Your choice. Unless you have another idea.”
“I don’t…”
He crossed his arms over his chest, tensing his broad shoulders. “Don’t what?”
“I needed a light against the darkness. You wanted to forget for a night.” She matched his crossed arms, hers lower over her belly where the ache of desire and denial centered. “What more is there?”
“Nothing more, not if you push me away.” Against the severe lines of his winter-pale cheekbones, his eyes seemed bluer than ever.
For an instant, her breath caught in her throat. When had she begun to see him so clearly? The blue of his eyes—no matter how blue—should be nothing more than another shade of gray to the imp. Then her heartbeat resumed with a frantic thud.
How had she gotten so far from the isolation and barricades that had saved her? The longest night was here and her tenebrae brethren would be close behind. Mirabel had died, the windows of her soul forever dimmed rather than confront the demons. Bella would never let him face that, see her like that. All she would have was a clearer view of the horror and disgust in his heavenly blue eyes.
With a slow shake of her head, she backed away. She had been the death of a hopeless, helpless girl; she would not be the stain on an angel-man’s soul.
From the lies all demons mastered, she dredged up a casual flick of her fingers. “It’s been fun, Fane. But the season is almost over. This is definitely over. Thanks for the ornaments. Thanks for showing me…showing me it was wrong to steal.” Wrong to steal the Jesuses. Wrong to steal a night of light from an angel-man. Wrong to steal… No, she might have just given away her heart. She tilted her head and let her smile tilt toward sardonic. “You’re obviously too good a man to be with the likes of me.”