Avenged by an Angel (Eternal Mates Paranormal Romance Series Book 16) Read online

  “Sable isn’t coming,” Emelia said for her, sparing her the job of having to break the news to her. “She sent you.”

  “Yeah.” Anais accepted the whisky that Sherry poured for her and offered another apologetic look, her dark blue eyes overflowing with it and concern. “She said you wanted to talk about a problem.”

  She had, but Anais wasn’t going to be much use to her. What had Sable been thinking by asking Anais to come to her instead?

  “It’s nothing. I needed some information she could give me, that’s all.” She waved away the drink Sherry slid towards her. “I came all the way from Cambridge to see her.”

  “Sorry.” Anais pushed a rogue strand of blonde hair back into the loose knot at the back of her head. “She said there was trouble at the border. Thorne had to take her back. She really wanted to speak with you.”

  Trouble at the border.

  Emelia suspected that Thorne had dragged her away because she had wanted to talk about angels, and he wanted to keep his mate out of Wolf’s hands.

  “Dammit.” She pushed her glass away, frustration mounting inside her as she tried to figure out what to do now. Could she speak with the fallen angel herself?

  Apparently, the woman lived at a vampire theatre somewhere in London. How many vampire theatres were there in the city? It couldn’t be that hard to find one. She knew where to find vampires who were talkative for the right price, although normally she wasn’t the one offering up her vein.

  Could she let a man bite her and take her blood for the sake of learning more about Wolf and what might be happening to him in Hell?

  It felt too intimate, as if she would be cheating on Wolf by letting a vampire get that close to her, closer than he had been.

  “Emelia?” Anais leaned forwards, coming into her field of vision, and Emelia shook herself out of her thoughts.

  She couldn’t let a vampire bite her, and not only because she didn’t want to do that to Wolf.

  She couldn’t go through with it because she couldn’t bear a man being that close to her, holding her, restraining her while he took from her.

  Just the thought of a strong man gripping her arms, caging her against his body, his lips on her neck and her at his mercy was enough to have her throat closing and muscles clamping down on her bones.

  “Emelia.” Anais touched her arm.

  Emelia batted her arm away, breathing hard as panic flashed through her. It quickly subsided, leaving her staring at her friend’s hand as she realised what she had done.

  “Sorry,” she mumbled and pulled her glass back to her, lifted it to her lips, and drained the last of her whisky.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” Anais’s soft voice, so tentative and careful, had Emelia’s hackles rising, but she fought back against the instinct to push her friend away.

  “Not really.” She sighed and pushed the empty glass away instead, and reached for the full one Sherry had left for her after she had refused it. “How’s Loke?”

  Anais’s expression grew guarded and Emelia couldn’t blame her for being wary after everything Archangel had put the dragon shifter through.

  “I’m asking as your friend,” Emelia said, wishing things with Archangel were different and she hadn’t needed to distinguish.

  But they weren’t different. They were all messed up. Her friends were all leaving that place behind and she wasn’t blind, she could see it wasn’t only because they had found men they loved. Archangel was shifting course, starting to tread a darker path, one she wasn’t sure she could follow it down.

  “He’s fine. He’ll be a nightmare when I get back. He was against Thorne bringing me here.”

  “Because he can’t be here?” When Anais nodded, Emelia added, “What’s it like for him when he’s here?”

  “He’s weaker, drastically weaker. He can’t shift, and I think that only makes him feel even weaker. It’s different for him now we’re bonded, but he’s still drained if he comes to this world.”

  “How weak?” She couldn’t stop her mind from traversing paths almost as dark as the one Archangel was treading. “As weak as a mortal?”

  Anais’s eyes narrowed. “Where’s this leading?”

  She could see what her friend was thinking and she was way off the mark. “It isn’t about Archangel. I just… If a… dragon… came here, would I be able to kill it?”

  “You mean, if Zephyr came here, could you kill him?” Her friend’s tone was hard as she stared into her eyes, and Emelia forced herself to remain looking at her, to let her see that was the question she was really asking. “With the right weapons… probably. Why? Do you have a reason to think Zephyr will come after you?”

  She swallowed hard, nerves crashing over her as she fought to find the words, ones she hadn’t told anyone, not even Wolf.

  “Emelia, what is it?” Anais leaned closer, concern washing across her delicate features as she looked up into Emelia’s eyes, her blue ones filled with worry. They darted between hers as her voice failed her and awareness dawned in them. “You think he’s going to try to take you back.”

  She didn’t think it. She knew it. Some deep, primal part of herself knew that Zephyr wouldn’t let her go. She had seen the need in his eyes, one that wouldn’t die unless he did.

  She wasn’t sure how much longer she could go on knowing that at any time, he could appear before her and take her back to Hell.

  “I’d be strong enough to kill him, right?” She searched her friend’s eyes, hating how her voice wobbled, lacking the belief she knew she would need if she faced him.

  She had to believe she could kill him, or it would be game over. She would never manage to defeat him if part of her was convinced she was going to fail and he was going to force her to become his.

  “You are… in this world. Tell me you’re not thinking of doing something crazy here, Emelia.” Anais placed her hand over hers on the black bar top. “You can’t go to Hell to find him.”

  “I know that,” she bit out, fear for Wolf sharpening her tone as it gripped her, squeezing her heart until she felt it might burst. “He’ll come for me… if Wolf doesn’t find him first.”

  “Wolf?” Anais canted her head, causing her messy tangle of blonde hair to slip to one side. “Who’s Wolf?”

  How to put it? Did she keep it straight and nothing more than the basics, or did she admit what was in her heart?

  “Remember the angel?” she said.

  Anais frowned.

  “The bastard who wanted to kill Loke… oh…” Blonde eyebrows rose high as her blue eyes widened. “Wolf is the angel. He has a name now.”

  “I sort of… might have… might be responsible for that. But that’s not the point.” She really wasn’t going to get into why he had called himself Wolf, because it would only lead to more questions. “I needed to speak with Sable because Wolf keeps going to Hell.”

  “Hang on. The angel who is after Sable keeps going to Hell, a place he said he couldn’t go? A place where Sable thinks she’s safe?” A flare of panic lit Anais’s eyes. “We have to warn her.”

  “He’s not there for her. He wants to kill the dragon.” Her face crumpled as she thought about that. “I think he’s weaker in Hell, though. It affects him like this world affects dragons. I’m worried he’s going to get himself killed, or worse.”

  “Worse?”

  “What if there’s a reason angels aren’t meant to spend time in that place? We know there are such things as fallen angels in that realm. What if angels fall if they’re exposed to it for too long? He’s already changing.” She pushed her fingers through her dark hair, pulling it back as she thought about Wolf roaming that bleak land, coming into contact with forces that might corrupt him and ultimately lead to his downfall. “It’s why I need to speak with Sable.”

  “Okay, okay. I’ll tell her when I get back. If she had known it was like this, she would have come. I promise.”

  “Like what?” Emelia tensed.

  “Oh, Emelia… I
t’s clear you have feelings for him. I don’t know what’s been happening between you two, but if he’s doing this for you… well, he must have feelings for you too.”

  Emelia schooled her expression, even when she knew it was too late to hide how she felt about Wolf.

  “Emelia?” Anais started, a low note of caution in her voice that had Emelia tensing for a different reason, bracing herself for the question she could feel coming. “What did Zephyr do to you? I don’t want to probe, and tell me to shut up if you want. It’s… When I was taken to their clan chief, Zephyr said some things.”

  “Things?” She frowned, afraid of what the dragon might have told everyone about her.

  “He said he had broken you, that you did nothing but cry now because he had been…” Her friend paled. “I can’t say it. I can’t… if he… God, Emelia, I can only imagine what he did. Loke told me he’s cruel, refuses to use his powers to make a female want him… that he likes to hurt them and do things against… I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be saying this.”

  “It’s fine.” And it was, because now she understood why everyone at Archangel had been smothering her so badly. “You told Sable about all this, didn’t you?”

  Anais nodded.

  And Sable had told the medical team, Mark and Linda.

  Everyone thought Zephyr had been violating her, had broken her mind by abusing her body.

  He had damaged her, there was no doubt about that, and what had happened to her was terrible, but it could have been so much worse, and it was nowhere near to what everyone thought had happened.

  It wasn’t even close to what Zephyr had said had happened.

  Why had he lied?

  She shoved him out of her head, but he refused to go, kept looming in it, tormenting her even now.

  Why hadn’t he treated her like he had treated so many other women, judging by what Loke had told Anais about him?

  He had been different with her, but he had still been cruel. A leopard couldn’t change his spots, and Zephyr’s were black blemishes on his soul that tainted him, coloured his actions and controlled him. He might not have broken her as he did other females, but he had been vicious at times, had lashed out at her, revealing what sort of man he was.

  Still, she felt lucky as she thought about what Loke had told Anais about Zephyr. Which was weird. She wasn’t lucky at all. Zephyr had put her through hell.

  But it could have been so much worse.

  Unspeakably worse.

  “It isn’t the truth.” She sipped her whisky for courage, because she wanted to talk at last, but it was still difficult. Anais wouldn’t judge her, not as others at Archangel would if they knew what had really happened to her. She kept telling herself that as she lined up the words. “He was cruel, and he did… touch me… over my clothes… sometimes not… and he made me touch him once, but I hurt him.”

  Surprise flickered in her friend’s eyes. “What happened then?”

  “He was angry with me. He said something vicious sounding in the dragon tongue and hit me so hard, I almost blacked out. He left me alone for a while after that, went to the ledge of the cave and ignored me for a day straight.” Which had been heavenly because she had needed the reprieve, the space to think about how he had changed and to wonder why. She hadn’t imagined the cause of his change to be anything close to what had fuelled it—that he wanted her to love him. “Another time when I lashed out at him, he retaliated by splitting my lip and twisting my arm behind my back, forcing my front against the wall of the cave. He pressed against me from behind, and I was so scared… But rather than… He ended up trying to soothe me.”

  “That doesn’t sound like the Zephyr I met.” Anais shook her head. “No… he said that he…”

  “I don’t know why he lied.” She honestly didn’t. She was having as much trouble trying to comprehend that as Anais was.

  “What happened after he tried to calm you?”

  She swallowed another mouthful of whisky, needing the liquid shot of courage. “He left and was gone for some time before he came back with a dead creature.”

  “He left?” Anais’s eyes widened. “As in… you were alone? Unguarded?”

  She nodded, hating herself all over again for missing her chance. “I was too afraid to attempt an escape, and in too much pain. Maybe he did break me a little. I had been too busy crying to even think about running.”

  “That’s nothing to be ashamed of, Emelia.” Anais curled her fingers over Emelia’s hand and held it gently. “It’s only natural. My strength left me at times too, but we’re both still here. Still fighting.”

  She wished she could smile at that, but she felt too heavy inside, weighed down by what had happened. She needed to get it off her chest, to spill it all and hope it would free her as she believed it would.

  “When he came back, I was terrified. I thought he was going to try again.” She shook her head, remembering how he had looked, his expression hard and his green eyes more than a little crazed before his entire face had softened, all the tension draining from him as he had looked at her arm where she had been holding it to her. “He came back… different. I wasn’t sure what to make of him.”

  “Different how?” Curiosity mixed with suspicion tinged her friend’s voice.

  “He took care of my arm, was gentle with me, which confused the hell out of me.” She closed her eyes as she remembered what had happened next. “He was so grave that when he told me I could leave, I believed him. I reached the cave mouth before he grabbed me from behind.”

  “Bastard,” Anais spat, the venom in that one word flowing in Emelia’s veins, eating away at her like acid.

  She gripped her glass harder, glaring at it. “I couldn’t take it anymore, so I lashed out at him. He was weak, injured, but he didn’t fight me. He just kept saying that he couldn’t let me go. That I couldn’t leave him. I sank into myself… I… gave up.”

  And she was ashamed to admit that.

  She had prided herself on being strong, capable, and a warrior.

  Depression had defeated her so easily, had revealed the truth of her. She wasn’t strong. She was weak.

  She didn’t want to be weak again, and if it took slaying a dragon to make her feel strong once more, she would do anything to achieve Zephyr’s death.

  “He tried to make me eat.” She wanted to vomit at just the thought of the food he had tried to give her, meat she still wasn’t sure which creature it had come from. “I refused, and when I felt sure I might finally die of hunger, I… I was scared. I didn’t want to die, but I couldn’t eat what he was offering. I begged him for fruit… something familiar to me. Something from my world.”

  “What happened?” Anais grabbed the bottle of whisky Sherry had left and poured them both another, and Emelia looked around, only just now realising they were alone.

  The club was empty, as quiet as that cave had been. Almost as dark.

  “He swore he would get me anything I wanted and mentioned a town in the free realm where he could get some. He immediately left to get it. I thought about escaping, but when I tried, I passed out.” She took a large gulp of the whisky and forced it down. “When I came around, I was in the medical wing with Sable standing over me.”

  She had been so relieved to see her friend, to see the familiar surroundings, and so afraid that it was nothing more than a dream, that she had broken down.

  “So Zephyr never…?” Anais said.

  Emelia shook her head. “No.”

  Her friend looked relieved to hear that.

  “He touched me a few times, and was vicious and hit me, hurt me… and he kissed me once… but I tried to bite his tongue off, so he didn’t try again after that.” Even though her stomach had turned at the thought of actually biting it off once she had sunk her teeth into his tongue, she had still tried to go through with it. Zephyr had been too quick for her, and too strong. He had easily broken free of her, and had struck her for her efforts, almost breaking her jaw. “I think he tried hard to b
e nice to me.”

  Which was the most confusing thing of all and one that still haunted her to this day, had her thinking about it from time to time, trying to decipher why he had been attempting to be kind.

  “I don’t know why he changed. Do you have any idea?” She couldn’t get answers or insight into angels without Sable, but she could certainly get some answers about dragons from Anais.

  “Nope.” Her friend studied her drink. “According to Loke, Zephyr is known for taking females against their will and taking pleasure from it.”

  Emelia shuddered at the reminder. “Why didn’t he do that with me, then?”

  Not that she was upset he had tried to be nice to her instead of completely breaking her.

  “I don’t know.”

  There was wariness in her friend’s voice and a guarded edge to her blue eyes that rang alarm bells in Emelia’s head.

  Her voice was a touch too bright when she said, “I can ask Loke.”

  Emelia frowned.

  Anais knew something and was hiding it from her.

  That feeling was compounded when her friend stood, hurriedly gathered her things, and barely spared her a glance. “I had better get back. I’ll tell Sable to get in touch with you about the angel.”

  As she watched her friend go and silence rose around her, a question spun around her mind.

  What wouldn’t Anais tell her?

  CHAPTER 19

  Wolf paced the garden, wearing a trench in the grass as he fought a constant battle against the darkness writhing inside him. His lips peeled back off his clenched teeth as he pivoted and strode back the way he had come, his steps clipped as his entire body tensed. The air around him cooled, the evening light growing dimmer. He rolled his shoulders, trying to shake off the invisible force that was irritating the fuck out of him. When that didn’t offer the relief he needed, he flapped his wings, hoping the feel of the wind in his feathers would soothe him.

  Where was Emelia?

  He needed to see her.

  Black thoughts surfaced, wicked ones that goaded his mood into traversing darker paths. She should have been here. Where had she gone without him? To see someone? A male? He growled, the inhuman sound pealing from between his teeth as he glared at the mansion. She wasn’t here, that was for sure.